You never know where the day is going to take you at any given moment.


As a cynic, however, my suspicions always remain firmly intact of what to expect from any 24 hour period

One of the reasons I feel so vindicated in giving Mina the Hollower so many props where props are due, is that the game never ceases to delightfully surprise me on such a frequent basis. In an experience that takes from such commonly utilized design machinations, in being a hybridized chimera lavish with all of the fine attributes one finds in both Zelda and Soulslike experiences, the bar is quite high at this point, and being derivative I think is almost expected due to that acknowledgment. Having such an overexposure of a genre over any great length of time, definitely begins to create fatigue within the masses, and does lead to a crippling loss of faith that anything new even has the capability needed to soulfully will anything left of value out of the once flourishing essence of such a primed source of divine energy brimming with the infinite.

Not all infinities are created equal, however, though this one still has some eternity left to spare.



I think the point I was ultimately attempting to hone in on with my respects to Mina just now, is that usually when I sit down for a session with a game I’m currently playing and writing about, I have a good lock on what I want to discuss when the time to write comes, or have some developing thoughts on this, that, or the other thing that’s so worthy of pointed deconstructionism. Mina tends to bring so much to the fore, my mind reels at the possibilities of what to focus on first, as any given sit down has loads to discuss at length when all is said and done. Even the small details, like Mina starting to visibly sweat when she is standing too close to an edge, is not necessarily a fetching little detail one is to expect from an 8-bit title, but the decades of game design since that eras prime time, has left beyond so much wisdom in how better to get the most out of the resources involved, the level of depth to be excavated from is unmatched in comparative worth against any who hail from those days of yore.



Reflecting back on yesterday, I’m relieved in approaching my breakdown of Bone Beach in the way that I did, as after having blasted my way through Coltrane Peak on this last session, which ended up being one part murder on the orient express, and another part scaling Everest, in all of it’s frigid grandiosity, I’m of the mind reversing the order of ones visit to each would give way to a more natural difficulty incline, as Coltrane had lots in the way of challenge to surmount, but with a metaphysical essence that almost felt slightly more tame than what befell me at Bone Beach. Being so yielding as the game is overall, I’m imagining one is likely able to tackle the game in any way they see fit when all is said and done, but there is something to be said of developer intent vs player preference, even with something along the lines of where my posit “death of the dev” is concerned.



I can’t help but feel “comfort zoning” is likely to get some mileage, as the observation is a fitting one in describing everyday player habits. It also brings up such a relevant point of interest where difficulty and self-efficacy is concerned, I’m somewhat shocked I had not encountered such a concept in the gaming wilds before, in reference to how overwhelmingly obvious the reality seems to be. I think one of the odd attributes that gaming culture is regularly guilty of, is this singularity of perspective that comes with most that travel within its realm. I don’t want to say self-absorbed , though there is plenty of personality vices that betray many within the medium, but at the very least, a narrow focus in terms of where a greater perspective is concerned, in discussing the zeitgeist and considering “composite” notions of gamers at large. They might not be a monolith per se, but there is certainly keen insight that awaits though who seek to peer into the mind’s eye of the collective public, to see just what kind of universal truths lay hidden in plain sight.



Ego is definitely an issue at hand, and something I’ve brought up on a number of occasions, even as recently as my foray into understanding the meat and potatoes of Mixtape, as the games shallow depths of gameplay brought into question just how much of a “game” the title really is, which feels relatable to a point I’ve made in the past on some level, at least where understanding exactly what “playing” constitutes as. I can’t help but feel the same joke made about driving applies to gaming difficulty at large, the one involving the idea of generealized bias relative to one’s own velocity, as anyone who is driving faster than me is a god damn maniac, and anyone who is driving slower than me is an incompetent louse, unworthy of the plastic their horrendous DMV picture adorns so embarrassingly.



Within the same comparative process of where the average gamers mind is concerned, any game they can’t beat is brutally unfair, and any game they can finish is an ode to my obvious and ridiculously talented merits as a gaming god made flesh. I think ultimately, in the realm of designing appropriately challenging levels of difficulty, when you do things right, people won’t be sure if you’ve done anything at all, which leads me to believe any noise in the matter means the collective standard begs to differ, where the idea of democratizing difficulty is concerned, though as an immediate push back to my own point, it has also been said you should never give the players everything they want, so the narrative on difficulty in gaming may truly be a tale of two cities/(virtual realities).



Though I think that last thought was a swell enough place to end the article on, I have some more random musings to share, so consider it an aimless epilogue of sorts. I’m not sure if video games are more prone in creating, inducing, or evoking “main character syndrome” in the general public, or if the medium shares equally in the blame for creating such a thoughtless lot of self-serving consumer whores, but when one is interacting within a medium that commodifies everything within its virtual reach, there is bound to be some kind of negative knock on effect that is to happen. Even if a developer has the best intentions, and attempts to design something within the perspective of having virtue ethics at its heart, the element of autonomy will lead many down the path of experimentation, and test the very boundaries of whats possible, virtue be damned. So I think the real take away here is a paradox of sorts, in that by mere virtue of whatever one designs, they’ve immediately created the context for a patch of grass one is either suppose to or not suppose to interact with, and both will happen regardless of outcome.



Video game design really does kind of possess a quantum meow in that way.

~Pashford