Retrospectives

Everything I Learned, I Learned From Gaming PART EIGHT: Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence (2005) ・・・ First Bite

March 7, 2015 — 3 Comments

I had completely missed the heyday of Metal Gear Solid when I was a kid. Sure, I remember the ads in gaming magazines declaring that it was ‘the greatest Playstation game ever made’, but it looked too grown up and bleak for me. I was from a military family – so looking at screenshots just reminded me of all the time I’d spent hanging around the Richmond Air Force base, waiting for my dad to finish work after my weekly art class.

After my encounter with Resident Evil, I got caught up in the idea of playing all the ‘mature’ games I had missed out on when I didn’t have a current console. I forget how I stumbled upon it exactly but on one of my classic Wikipedia journeys, I ended up on the entry for Metal Gear Solid and completely lost my shit over the fact that you could disguise yourself in a cardboard box. Suddenly the dreary Alaskan base and army of short-sighted guards sparked my interest. I watched a few cut scenes on Youtube (though they were from the Twin Snakes remake for Gamecube…whoops) and at some point found myself watching a longplay of Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence, but it was a video from the last quarter of the game in Tikhogornyj. I was overwhelmed by the colours, the freedom of movement and most of all – the hunting and gathering of food and supplies. Continue reading

Everything I Learned, I Learned From Gaming PART SEVEN: Resident Evil 4 (2005) ・・・ Flawless Execution

February 28, 2015 — Leave a comment

My best friend in high school was a huge Nintendo fan, the kind that refused to play any other console. She was incredibly stubborn about trying new things, and mainly kept to a few key franchises. At some point she picked up a copy of Resident Evil 4 at launch, then forgot about it for nearly three years because it was too scary for her. So I usually spent my time at her place watching her play Super Mario Sunshine or Twilight Princess. Which was enough for me, since I got to live these games vicariously through her.

Once I had finally turned 18 and we could both go out, we’d usually pre-drink at hers while playing games before meeting up with other friends to go to Purple Sneakers…because we were kind of pathetic indie crowd wannabes. I remember the first time I played Resident Evil 4 very vividly, because it was also the first night I went to Purple Sneakers. I was flicking through Gamecube games on her shelf and came to one we’d never played together, she shrugged and said we were probably drunk enough to play it. I had recently finished Resident Evil Deadly Silence on my DS and was pretty keen to see if the other games were as good. So she popped in the disc and handed me the controller. Continue reading