So Mitch Gitelman, FASA Studio Manager is mad as hell that people don’t give Shadowrun the praise it deserves. Why should I care? Most people play games for entertainment purposes… if people aren’t entertained, then shouldn’t that be the end of it? I mean really, if you have to sit people down and say “Look, you’re obviously not getting it, this is a gaming masterpiece… Look at it again. LOOK AT IT! YOU! IT! LOOK!” then maybe the problem is more deep seated than we originally thought. For clarity’s sake, Mitch Gitelman never actually said those words, but that’s the feeling I get whenever I read he or someone like him telling us how awesome Shadowrun or some other game is and that I should really put in the work to learning how to play it so I can get up to speed and *gasp* have some fun. By the way, I do this other thing in the daytime that’s actually CALLED work. I don’t want to work some more just so I might have some fun. I’ll probably just pick up one of the other dozens of games out now that starts being fun right away with no work on my part. That’s the kind of entertainment I prefer.

I remember growing up with videogames (I’m of the age such that I grew up with most videogames… I had an Atari 2600 when it was new if that gives you the appropriate timeframe here) and they were almost always fun or not fun. Hits were defined by whether you and everybody that played them couldn’t STOP playing them… you’d get instantly (or almost instantly) hooked. But what we didn’t have were the people that wrote the games telling us we really need to play it some certain way, or for some certain length of time before we’d learn to enjoy them. I’m noticing more and more that some games just don’t have that instant appeal for the mass market and developers and marketing folks are resorting to telling us how and why to play and it’s starting to seem like flat out desperation. Look at Viva Pinata. The game looks like it’s aimed at 5-6 year olds, but can you find me a 5-6 year old that can even comprehend what in the hell the game is about? My 10 year old son loves it (which amazes me — the other day he told his mom that two ladybugs were romancing in the grass… thanks Rare!) but then again none of his friends like it, they think it’s boring. The people that like the game seem to be adults. Adults that can put up with the kiddy graphics to get to the gameplay underneath. The folks at Microsoft keep harping that Viva Pinata is a great, great game. To some it may be, but why isn’t the game itself speaking to people saying “I’m great! Play me once and you’ll never want to stop!” because I think that would be more convincing to the dollar spending public. If your looks appeal to one group but by design you’re intended for another group, well… when people do that, there’s a strong possibility Eddie Murphy might “give them a ride home”. Look it up kids, Google’s great for that stuff. Is that the hidden message Rare wants to be sending out with their romancing game? I doubt it. Pick a target audience and focus both the gameplay and style to the SAME target, Rare.

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