Backlogs and handheld gaming

 The last game I "finished" was Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 for the Sega Dreamcast. I had mine set up next to my computer to stream from the console to my computer, but I found it hard to play and talk at the same time, so I just went through the game's single player mode trying to relearn all the controls. Along the way I looked up some guides on how to accomplish level objectives (since they're pretty hard) and also cheats to get around some of the game's harder objectives. 

Prior to that the last game I "finished" was Just Cause 4, a humble Open World game that was released to middling reviews. I was impressed by the sheer size of the game world but disappointed by the game's vehicle controls, which seemed either sloppy or slow to react. My guess at the time was the game's "simulation tic rate" was half of the "rendering tic rate" meaning the game's vehicles simulated at 15fps instead of the game's 30fps. All I wanted to do in the game was get on a motorcycle and go on a road trip, and along the way I blew up about 100 enemy bases. 

In games there's this concept of "The Backlog" where once you buy a game it's implied that you will have to play it to completion and until it's been finished, it represents an unrealized potential. Much like unread books, the aggregate time investment overwhelms the purchaser. Meanwhile, buying new stuff always feels good. As a result, one collects unrealized potential that hangs around. "I should finish this game" before buying and starting a new game. 

For me most of these are JRPGs, which I like the idea of but can never get around to finishing. I am especially into Tactics JRPGs, which I also like the idea more than the game itself. The fact that characters can move around the battlefield breathes more life into them, and perhaps that's why I like them more.

The first game I unfinished was Pokemon Yellow, a game I was intensely into when in the 6th grade. i brought it to school on the last day of school and when I entered the Elite 4 for the first time my teacher told me to put it down and do something else. I turned it off without saving and simply never picked it back up. 

Final Fantasy 6 I've started about 3-4 times on various different platforms. Final Fantasy Tactics I purchased for the PS1 and PSP, and have yet to complete it on either. Final Fantasy 7 I got stuck on a bossfight because I didn't level up enough. Final Fantasy 1 I purchased for the PSP and promptly got lost on. Final Fantasy Adventure, for the Gameboy, I aquired at as a trade during a boyscout camp, completing about 80% of the game in a tent while it rained, and then got stuck on an impassible portion of a dungeon. Final Fantasy 3 for the nintendo DS I think I got bored early on and don't even remember why I stopped. 

Final Fantasy Tactics Advanced, however, I continue to make progress on days at a time, with months or years in between sessions. The character designs are good and the mechanics are simplistic enough that I keep going back to it. The problem is, I've been on the same play-through for about a decade. 

Without a public transit commute, there is no reason to use a portable game console. and so the only reasons I have to play it are for plane rides. This was the last time I played Final Fantasy Tactics, December 2019. Nearly a year ago now. I quit when I encountered a battle with enemies much more agile than my team's and was caught flat footed. 

Instead of taking my 3DS on the plane ride, I brought my original DS Phat, alongside my Ipod Video, as if I was living in the mid 00's again. Back when the world still had potential.

My 3DS library is even worse, I have yet to finish any game I have purchased for the system, which I did about 6 years ago. I bought several games for the system, all of which are unfinished. I lost my interest in Pokemon very early as it was simply too easy to engage me. Fire Emblem Awakening I also lost interest in early on after the first few missions. Bravely Default suffered the same fate. As did the excellent Zelda Link Between Worlds. And Pokemon White for the NDS, as well as the NDS copy of Chrono trigger.

An overabundance of choice, coupled with a limited free time, results in these unplayed adventures. There is simply never a time, as an adult, that you can pick up a pocket game console and mess around with it for a half hour. The last optimal time I had to play portable games was when I was commuting from my apartment in Seattle to a remote office in Redmond, facilitating no less than 3 separate bus routes an hour and a half each way. It was, paradoxically, relaxing in a few ways. I didn't have to drive and pay attention, cellphone reception was terrible, and a laptop was a nonstarter on a crowded bus. In this way having a 3DS was justifiable. 

I do find handheld gaming more personal than console gaming. I think the reduced graphics mean that your mind has to fill in more of the gaps of the thing, and it results in a richer experience. You carry it with you everywhere, slap stickers on it, and I think I like it because of that closeness. A handheld is never going to tell you that there's new tweets or instant messages, and it isn't going to pipe ads onto the screen, and you already paid for the game so there's no need to design an entire game around microtransactions. 

So why the guilt here, and not with the growing list of PC games I have yet to touch? I think it's because of the length of time I've spent ignoring the games, as well as not wanting to admit that I won't have time to ever finish them. Maybe I got all I wanted out of them by playing the first 1/8th or 1/16th of them. Perhaps I can't admit that childhood is over. 

I think it's fitting that the game I haven't given up on is Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, a game where the characters are warped to a fantasy world and the central conflict is whether they should return or stay.