I love playing video games. Obviously. So I thought playing a game with my backlog would be a fun way to get some of these titles off my pile of shame and feel good going into the fall gaming season. For the most part, it’s been very enjoyable. Forcing myself to play through some of these games, however, is not so much.
Take Lego Star Wars, for example. The Traveler’s Tales Lego games have always been a bit slow, and I can’t say I’ve ever completed one, which is why there are two Lego games on the board. Let me clarify. When I say they’re slow, I mean they’re slooooooooow. These are some of the most witty, adorable, boring fucking games I’ve ever played. No disrespect to TT, they know their audience and I admittedly am not it. The OCD inducing, stud collecting gameplay is intended for a younger age group that is perfectly content with wandering aimlessly punching each other until they break apart and die. But I’m old, and I have an agenda, dammit, and these games just get in the way. To be fair, this was one of the first, and TT have tweaked their formula over the years.
Another title on the board giving me fits is Mega Man Legacy Collection. I’ve always sucked at these games. Ever since I was a kid and my reflexes were sharp and my pattern memorization was on point, I’ve had problems with Mega Man. The only one I ever beat was the second one. So now that I’m old and rusty and can barely fucking remember what I had for lunch yesterday, this one is proving a bit daunting. I don’t know how far I will get into this before I print out a photo of Keiji Inafune just so I can punch him in his stupid face. I will then uninstall Mega Man completely, because just removing it from the board won’t be enough to satisfy my rage.
Final Fantasy XV is another that I’m not quite sure about. There have been so many patches and updates since I played it last I might just have to start over. Add to the fact that I don’t remember a lick of the story and I kept referring to the tough older guy as Areolus yesterday because I couldn’t remember his name and it just sounded right. I almost don’t mind, but it is going to stretch out the duration of this round of Backlog Bingo longer than expected.
The rest of the games on the list shouldn’t be too bad. I just started up Dead Space 2 on casual yesterday, and reached Chapter 3. Bioshock 2 has been started, but still in the beginning chapters there. Recore hasn’t been touched yet. Gat out of Hell, Hitman, Lego Marvel Superheroes, and Sherlock Holmes are roughly halfway done.
Fallout 4 will be restarted, but I’m going with full-on mod support there, and only considering the main story for completion. It shouldn’t take long at all, and am planning on doing a special write-up on that one, just for fun.
Rounding out the list of survivors is Darksiders II, which I am enjoying, but am having a really hard time getting invested in. It’s been taking a backseat to a lot of the other games and I really need to just sit down and play it when it’s not 1 a.m. and I’m not drooling on myself and falling over in my chair.
It’s going to be a battle of attrition and I have to admit there are some other games I’d much rather be playing right now than these, but then again, hasn’t that always been the case? Isn’t that the very nature of a backlog?
No, I’m going to stick with it, even if it means excellent games like Horizon: Zero Dawn are begging for my attention.
