The good people over at Penny Arcade have started up the 2009 Child's Play drive, and since this is something I can really get behind, I thought I'd take a couple moments to talk about it. I don't have any personal stake in it; it's just a cause I really believe in. We spend a lot of time here at GameSpot arguing, but I think that this is something that we as gamers can all get behind.
To be brief, Child's Play is a charity drive that is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin. The ultimate point of the charity is essentially to provide entertainment for children in hospitals that would not otherwise be able to afford it. This might sound like a rather trivial cause to donate to, but it's not, really - many of these children spend days, weeks, months in the hospital, going through extremely draining treatments and procedures that suck the life out of them. There are many charities out there whose purpose is to save lives, and that's as admirable a cause as any, but I think equally important is quality of life, too, and that's exactly what Child's Play aims to help with. Gabe and Tycho get tons of letters testifying about just how much the charity impacts the kids at these hospitals. Other charities save lives; this charity gives kids life to be saved.
One of my favorite things about Child's Play is its format - whenever a hospital signs on to participate in the charity drive, they create a wish list on Amazon of things that they want for their patients. Anyone who wants to donate can load up one of those wish lists, add the items they'd like to donate to their cart, and then pay as they would normally on Amazon. What I really love about this setup is that it makes your donations fundamentally real. Whereas most charities simply ask for a nebulous sum of money, whose ultimate destination one will likely never know, here you know exactly what you're giving. It makes things very modular, as well - if all you can spare is $5 for a box of crayons, then you can do exactly that. Or, if you want to go all out and splurge on the kids, then you can do that too.
There are participating hospitals in 42 US states plus DC and in 7 Canadian provinces, as well as in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Egypt (although hospitals in these last three can only accept PayPal donations). So, chances are you just might find a location near you filled with kids who need your help to brighten their holidays - holidays that they may well be forced to spend away from home. You can find the map with locations here; to donate, just click on one of the controller icons (you can see what hospital it corresponds to by hovering your cursor over the icon) and add the items you'd like to give to your cart. Even if there isn't a place close to home, there are no rules saying you have to donate locally - no matter what location you pick, the children will be as happy as anywhere else to receive your help.
Or, if you'd like to directly donate money to the general cause, there's a PayPal link for that as well.
Like I said, the format makes it very easy to give as little or as much as you want - so even if you can spare just a little bit, you can still help make someone's life that much better. Or if you can't spare money, spread the word instead - reaching someone who might donate who otherwise wouldn't have heard of the charity is just as valuable a contribution.
A funny fact about Child's Play is that it was originally created almost as a challenge to gamers in response to a negative article about video games - and the response was so overwhelmingly positive that the writer of the original article apologized and celebrated the effort. Every year, Child's Play both helps kids and reminds the world that gamers aren't antisocial recluses, but caring individuals just like everyone else. None of this would be possible were it not for the efforts of gamers just like us - so let's all do our part for the kids.
Then we can get back to our arguments.
The Playstation 3, Xbox 360, and Wii... awesome consoles yes? Two of them are starting to push graphics that rival real life in some cases. This is both a good, and bad thing. I will explain why, IMO, that this is so, and also give my opinion on this generation overall.
Good- we have games that are competing with say, Pixar movies, in terms of graphics. Look at Ratchet & Clank. People that have dreamed of playing RPGs in more than blocky characters can finally do that. Shooters are still on top of their game in terms of always pushing the edge of graphics further, look at Crysis.
However, all these games trying to mimic real-life for graphics is bringing up a bad trend: developers and publishers are expecting us to fork over 60$ or more for games that will last you only around 6 hours unless you are a completionist and have to get all the achievements, trophies, secrets, unlocks, and spend lots of time on mutliplayer. Of course not every game follows this, I was merely using it as an example.
Some key titles have garnered tremendous hype before release, yet when I go into a GameStop or other local used game places, I see copies of that said game already on the used shelf only a few days later. Was there so much hype that people came away disappointed? Or do some people buy a game, beat it, then take it back?
This gen seems to be all about graphics and little gameplay. A lot of games are all trying to do the same thing: look very real. Where is the art form? The unique-looking graphics? Hell, the uniqueness period? Mind you im mostly an RPG player so when it comes to other genres my opinions are probably off. Most of the games today are not new ideas, merely changes on old formulas, sequels, rehashes, or the next annual re-release of a franchise. Guess what EA, football doesnt change much if at all from year to year. Very little seems to be new and unique.
Onto consoles. This gen seems like its the gen of screwing over the early buyers. I dont mean the gradual improvements to hardware as time passes, and the eventual price cuts, because thats always how technology goes. What I mean is the hard drive problem. Microsoft started it with the Xbox 360: you could get a drive-less console, or one with an HDD. Drives for the 360 started out at 20gb, and are at 120gb now, and will get bigger in the future. The huge issue with this is that M$ in their infinite wisdom decided to put a standard laptop drive into a proprietary case and then turn around and expected people to pay an arm and two legs for them to buy them not pre-attached to a console. $150 for a 120gb drive, are you insane?? I would very much like to upgrade my 20gb drive, but with prices like that why dont i wait until 360's are down to $200 with a big drive, and I will get better hardware in the process.
Luckily Sony countered that gripe with making the drives user-upgradable. But the bad thing about the PS3 is that it was one of the most expensive consoles in gaming history at launch. Why? Because of the blu-ray disc drive. Im still not sure why it was needed in the system. Look at games that are on both 'HD consoles' and there is almost no difference between the two in terms of graphics. Yet the PS3 games come on a higher capacity media, that is supposed to be better for games, but I bet you that most of the games on the system, you are paying for mostly empty space on the disc. Then Sony had the foresight to kill BC on the console by gutting the EE/GS chip. So it's the newer buyers getting screwed in this case. However most people own a PS2 already so this fact doesnt matter unless one really cares about BC.
Using a controller like a steering wheel was new and awesome on the Wii's launch right? Who didnt want to game while standing up and swinging the remote like a sword? You were lucky to see a Wii sitting on a shelf for about two years after launch, it was that popular. Now the gripe about the Wii im sure you all know: graphics. It's passable to the first Xbox but no where near the other two current systems in terms of power. And now we are in a situation where the system's library is full of crap and shovelware with only a few titles here and there that stand out. Unless a Wii is all you own, it's probably been collecting a lot of dust lately. And what is this friend code garbage? I really hope that next gen Nintendo wont be so afraid of graphics and online.
This may seem long-winded and probably whiny, but I hoped to shed some light on this gen and how I feel about it. There are many feelings i just cant shake off and most games these days Im not walking away completely satisfied like I was with the Playstation 2. Now there is all this new motion tech due out next year that is supposed to revolutionize things. Is this going to be true, or will it end up just being another fad?
On the portable front I have little to complain about actually. The DS is fun and has a big library of games of all genres. The PSP is finally starting to get more games than crummy ports. I think that Sony needs to stop making a new model of the portable though every six months. And let's not forget the mistake called the PSP GO!. Almost no one that already has a PSP will want to make the switch, since Sony has said there will be no UMD 'trade in' program. So guess what, you are going to have to buy all your games over again if you do want to 'upgrade' at the price Sony dictates. They are definately trying to fight the used game market. Everyone already knows the insane MSRP on the Go so no need to touch on that again here.
Give me a regular controller and good gameplay. Spend more time developing the story and quality rather than trying to push polygons and see how many people you can get into paying 60$ for something you can finish in a day. I wouldnt necessarily mind that price if the games lasted a good while and had decent replay value. Game on.
When I arrived home this afternoon from school and checked the text messages on my cell phone (new annoying cell phone policy at school, had to wait all day just to whip out my phone), I found one from my brother, saying that two hardcore Christians came to our door today preaching about Jesus. The reason it's funny, obviously, is because I'm not religious, nor is the rest of my family. In fact, if anything, my brother is the antithesis of the women that showed up at our door. He's essentially a hardcore atheist that cracks up in laughter at the mention of any religion.
Personally, I'm inclined to agree with my brother on that one. Religion, especially Christianity, is much too fable-tastic to be taken seriously. People once believed in a God named Zeus that lived above the clouds.... also fable-tastic. I don't doubt that someday Christianity will also be taught in our English cla sses for purely academic purposes. Really, not even kidding.
But, that's not to say I don't have some spiritual side to me. After all, when I hit my low of lows,I still turn to God. Why? How the heck should I know. But I do. Maybe it's just habit from when I was little and was God-fearing. Or maybe there is a part of me that still believes in a higher power? For such reasons, I do at least consider myself agnostic. Like every other religious individual, I get solace in the idea of there being a higher power that can save us all and give us our own perfect vacation spot for all of eternity. For everyone's sake, I hope there is such a thing. I'd hate to spend eternity in an empty dark abyss of nothingness.... 
Despite my lack of real spirituality, I do seem to believe in a lot of supernatural theories. Karma really is a b***. I don't need scientific proof to understand that. And ghosts? Keep me the hell away from Gettysburg!Who knows, vampires could exist too, for all I know. Can't say I'd be terribly frightened by them... not if they looked like Edward Cullen, anyway. 
Or even werewolves?A few Jacob Blacks in the world wouldn't hurt either!
For now, however, I'll keep on searching for what I truly believe about where we came from. Big Bang Theory, Adam and Eve, big magic stick that flashed and created a universe.... whatever. The point is, I'm here, and I'm going to live my life to the fullest regardless of where I came from.
