Features// Girl in Post-GTA IV Malaise

An article in which our spunky heroine plays Rock Band in HMV, reconsiders the Wii, rolls balls around Japan, remembers her distaste for Japanese RPGs and drags her feet over playing GTAIV.

With the post-GTA IV calming of the waters upon us so soon, I have attempted to pre-empt any sudden loss I may feel by trying to find another game in which to become wonderfully lost and happy. This has not been an easy quest.

There are many good games on the horizon, but they seem to be infinitely far away – untouchable and glorious – like the very stars in the sky. I say infinite because I feel burnt, used up, cruelly teased by Rock Band.

I, personally, wouldn’t have bothered buying GTA IV. I would have conserved my funds to go towards buying this console-priced game when the release date finally came around.
[url=http://spong.com/feature/10109715]
I first started raving on about Rock Band nearly six months ago[/url]; back when I was innocent and, yes, even naïve about it’s ‘imminent’ release.

Months and months of torture were endured whilst my importing friends quickly progressed to expert level and left my own efforts cracked and weak in comparison; still no Rock Bandrelease date. And then, suddenly, just as hope was almost lost, it came.

And there it is. Children playing it in HMV, parents asking me what the best tracks are. Yet still I own it not. Oh, what a harsh reality we live in! A reality wherein what we want and what we treasure is used by the masses like your fiancée’s until-recently-hidden hardcore porno career.

I am, of course, being overly dramatic here and, in truth, all of this rambling are just bitterness. I am bitter because I STILL do not own it!

I facepalm myself to sleep at night in fury at my own ill-organised flappings on play.com combined with my tiny pay packet (Stop your moaning and write! Ed) And getting my car clamped.

Oh sorrow! This, this pathetic sequence of events brings me back to GTA IV. To squander my time on foreign streets pretty much as I do at home, whilst normal gamers are all tired out and returning to regular haunts such as COD 4 and new experiences like Assault Heroes 2 - that's what I'm brought to.

My pre-emptive attempts to by-pass the GTA IV malaise have been failures. Beautiful Katamari probably kept me occupied the longest on my own as, prior to this.

I had never played with katamaris before. I had never met King Cosmos. I had, as no-one had before, never been able to get online and compare time trials with other geeks. Geeks too internally tortured to be taking out their aggression on civilisation rather than attempting to repair it by collecting as many items as possible on an irregular, ever-expanding shape which will take the job of replacing the planets of the universe.

It wasn’t one of those games that many people would’ve rushed out to buy on the launch date, but BK made me very happy, and the co-op was fun too. I probably would play it longer even than Viva Piñata (which I am pretending not to be excited over the sequel of).

The best game I played with others, apart from when we took HMV in Manchester by storm with a rendition of Maps on expert on the launch day, was Mario Kart Wii.

Mario Kart on the Wii was such a fantastic return to form that I forgave the Wii instantly for the way it shuns my custom usually. I may not be part of a family that sit around playing games together, but, for the first time since I was 14 I had a marathon session as Yoshi and loved every minute of it. I even forgave the Wii its showboating gimmickery for long enough to play Wario Ware Smooth Moves for half an hour!

These games were a good short term antidote to the gritty criminal underworld of Liberty City: challenging, fun, bright, gentle. But, like a British summer, these were emotional wonders, and they were soon eclipsed by a yearning for something more substantial, more reliable. Like sausages.

Something beautiful, yet playable and not relentlessly negative. Like…sausages.

Today I will get Rock Band and let nothing get in my way.