True story, or at least one heard from one degree of Bacon away: this guy that works with my girlfriend admitted one day that he had dropped 5,000 yuan (around US $800) on a free-to-play video game on his phone.
The way he explained it is that even though he knew what he was doing was wrong, he couldn’t stop himself from paying for micro-transactions within the game. One after another, as they added up worth thousands of yuan, the co-worker bought enough power-ups to blast through the game with ease. As he said, he felt like a god.
That game* was a clone of this game, Raiden, the original game where you don’t feel like a god, but can accrue enough firepower to kill one.
That’s what makes this a great game: the immense firepower you can accumulate to dominate your enemies is balanced the ever-present threat to your mortality. In the form of bullets. That keep shooting at you. Again. And again.
Never mind what that serial killer documentary has to say about it: attaining the fleeting feeling of godhood isn’t from what you are able to kill, but that you dare to continually escape certain death.
But as old school gaming shuffles off its moral coil, so too is old school satisfaction. The virtual world we live in now is full of regenerating health, save points, and as the co-worker will tell you, micro-transactions. To our detriment, video games have gotten too smart for their own good: instead of us playing them, they now play by our rules.
I wasn’t there, but I like to think this what happened with the co-worker: After leveling up beyond proper taste, he continued to play the game, eviscerating all enemies the moment they appeared on screen that no longer posed him any threat, enjoying his hollow triumph past the point of boredom. Nothing could stop him from his regal position as master of the game, at least not until his wife came home.
That co-worker was ashamed of what he did, and vowed to never tell her about it. Raiden, on the other hand, will offer you nothing but shame, because without shame there is no glory.
* Pencil Fighter. It’s horrible
How far I got in 20 minutes on Day 2: Not far. Beat the first boss after adjusting the difficulty level to the lowest setting; the game allows you to do this, but I had trouble falling asleep last night afterwards.
Would I play this again once the year is over: Yes. Consider it Raiden in stone.
Numbers of days so far in the Year of the Play-a-DayStation: 2
Play-a-Daystation 