Every now and then I like to put up a writing related blog. After all, that is what most of us are here to do, sharing our thoughts and feelings about the things we love, and sometimes even more; our personal stories, are deepest secrets, and our affinity for boners.

I think a lot about writing and what it has done for me as a person. Although approximately none of you will probably ever be unlucky enough to meet me in the flesh, most who know me through writing first and then meet me in person after are usually quite surprised at how different the real life Manchild is from this guy right here. That's because it is far easier to articulate exactly what is on my mind through writing - and I do write about everything on my mind - then it is to do it in person. I can hardly find the right words otherwise, although it is also a detriment to speak through writing alone because I barely have time to filter out any of the real more nasty crap that collects in my brain, instead opting for a "blurt it all now, apologize later" route which hardly shines a positive light on the strength of my character.

The fact is that writing is something I have grown comfortable with as both an artistic exercise and a cathartic one. It has become a part of my daily routine. Whether I am yamming about nonsense on Twitter, or posting irrelevant quips on Facebook, typing up a piece here or on my own blog, I am always writing. It is something I do just about as often as I take a dump in the morning. And as a result, I have become reasonably skilled at getting a point across.

For the month of November, that is all I will be doing, because it is National Novel Writing Month. I don't know how many of you are just as interested in writing stories as you are writing blogs and opinion pieces, since the two are thoroughly different practices, but I wanted to talk about NaNoWriMo and why it is a good thing, regardless of its many detractors.

I like to spin a good yarn. I have had a couple of things published here and there, and although my success rate for doing so has been abnormally high, I also don't submit my work very often. Fiction is mostly a hobby on the side, one which is obviously directly in line with my tendency to write, but not necessarily a large portion of what I do. I love stories, big and small, in books films and video games alike, but they aren't something I am particularly comfortable writing. And NaNoWriMo, which has you writing 50,000 words in a month, is no small task for someone who doesn't often sit there and attempt to pen out their Magnum Opus of Great Canadian Fiction.



So why do I do it every year? Why do I do it when I know I'm usually going to fail, or that the stories, which are of particularly low quality due to the time constraints and lack of pre-planning are never going to amount to anything?

Practice makes perfect.

I have known a lot of people who were interested in a topic, say sports, or of course video games, and wanting to involve themselves somehow in the industry but not really having the talent to get into the fray and become either an athlete or developer, decided they want to take the journalism route instead. One guy in particular had never written a word of anything in his life. And while he is spending an enormous amount of money and time on courses in order to do so, I honestly wonder just how successful you can be if you haven't invested the years of time it really takes to be proficient with such a skill?

There is an overwhelming focus on "education" these days, with "education" implying that you will hand over a wad of sweaty bills to a teacher or professor and suddenly become a master in whatever art they are striving to teach you. People go to school almost exclusively because they are afraid of the stigma they will face if they don't; peer and parent pressure, mixed with the desire to meet others expectations drives droves of kids into a learning environment where they aren't interested in learning anything. Many of them will pick "cop out" topics like Psychology and Philosophy for a lack of real passion in anything else, and will pay themselves out of house and home, only to finally return, sometimes ten years later, when they are a little wiser and actually have something tangible in mind.

Personally, I thought it was a racket when I was in high school and wondering what I wanted to do with my life. I realized that whatever it was, I wasn't sure of it and didn't want to invest deeply into post-secondary until I really knew what I wanted to go for. Sometimes the simple act of being involved in that system can inspire kids, can teach them about professions or endeavors they otherwise may not have known about before they went to College or University, but much of the time it doesn't; and as someone with absolutely no financial support from parents or other family, I simply didn't want to take the risk. I knew I loved writing back then, but wasn't sure about doing it as a career. And frankly, I'm still not sure.

While I'm not judging anyone for being proactive or ambitious here, I have to wonder about passion sometimes. How do you know you want to be a writer if you've never sat in front of a computer for hours on end attempting to write, sharing your work with others, and bracing yourself for the inevitable criticism to come? How can you say your passionate about something if it isn't a complete obsession, a need, and if you have put no effort in to do it every single day, and to get better despite the lack of tools at your disposal?

That is what payed education is; a tool. I have heard of a lot of people flaunting their credentials, especially when they are called out for being poor at what they are supposed to be geniuses at. But the simple fact is, nobody with half a brain thinks that working your way through a course automatically equates to success in that field. You have simply been given working tools with which to further your skill; how you implement them relies completely on you, and your passion to succeed in your given field.

As with all artistic practices, writing is absolutely no different. You say you want to be a games journalist, a novelist, a sports writer? Well then do it. Start now. Today. If you are saving up for a journalism or creative writing course, keep saving, and do what you think you need to do to improve. But in no way will you improve faster than constant practice, failure, defeat, and savoring in the rare few real successes you will see throughout your career as a practicing writer, even if it is not a career in the payed sense of the word.



That is what projects like NaNoWriMo are good for; failure. You are going to write your ass off, there is a great chance you won't accomplish anything, and there is a definite possibility you will fail to achieve your goal by the end of the month. But what it will get you doing is writing every day; putting up with the frustration of writers block, and making you think actively and write on the spot. The biggest problem with writing is not having anything to say. NaNoWriMo doesn't care if you have anything to say, it just wants you to say something, and like a kid hanging out in a College taking Psyche courses and realizing just by being there that he wants to be an Engineer, you will get bigger ideas, you will be inspired, and all that practice will have one definite benefit; you will get better at writing, just through the act of trying.

I'm going to do it this year again. I probably won't succeed. But I will become a little better at what I do. Just like every time I write a blog for Destructoid, I get a little better at blogging. So no matter how much you think you suck, no matter how discouraging it can be do be criticized by others, just remember this; it's all part of a long and tedious learning process. You will not get better at writing simply by reading materials about how to write. Only practice can bring that.

If you are a blogger for this site who wants to someday become a legit GERMS JERNERLIST, consider this place your education. Consider your payed education to be a toolbox of knowledge to put to work furthering said education.

And most importantly, write, write, write, write, write. Because that is the only way you will ever get better at writing, period.

(For anyone interested in NaNoWriMo, here is the link. The shenanigans start tomorrow. By making an account you can upload your stories and update your word count, find people in your area to communicate with, and sign up for motivational emails to help you stay on track. Good luck, and if you are participating, let me know how it's going for you!)

CHAOS CONTROL



GO SONIC GO!



BOING


This was an example of what can go wrong when Destructoid implements Youtube embeds. This is a public service announcement from your friendly neighborhood Manchild reminding you to use Youtube embeds responsibly, and not as the sole body of your work here on the Dickstructoid C Blogs. (the C is for Cock) Nothing is less tasteful than posting a series a mind boggling Sonic the Hedgehog fan videos, or an entire series of Let's Plays for Avernum IV running at three frames per second because it was the only game you could afford on Steam and "fraps dont working rite".

Keep it classy, folks. Keep it bloggy. And most importantly...



Keep it Kelly.

R. Kelly.

An R. Kelly music video...with fucking Sonic shit going on.

Goddammit.

The movie industry really sucks these days. Hardly anything groundbreaking ever comes out, and the odd film worth watching is usually ignored by the movie going public. Instead, sequels and remakes are relied upon to make some chump change, and that reasoning is why there are more Saw movies than volumes of the first edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica.



That's right, more than three. I wasn't exaggerating.

It's kind of weird when it comes to games, though. At least for me. I am someone who is compelled by the idea of the "total package." The one game to rule them all, a game that will eat up so much of my time that I won't be able to do anything else except masturbate and eat hot dogs, a process (and it is indeed a process) which usually occurs simultaneously. I have been looking for this game forever, and finally found it; it was called Dwarf Fortress. But shortly after investing a small chunk of my life to learn the mechanics of that game, I realized I was wrong, and that there is no all encompassing experience out there. As humans, we get bored, and have to move on eventually, to find the next best thing. But a flaw in the sequel system, in our constant need to refresh our experiences, is that we can often forget what made the original thing so damn good in the first place.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is a pretty good example of this. The game came out to rave reviews, and most people seemed to really be sold by the quality of it. There was not much hate abound at that time; it was a fresh new thing that hadn't yet caught the attention of the mainstream "Mountain Dew" crowd (a term I made up because I imagine jocks who play video games also drink Mountain Dew because it sucks and fuck them) and was a great addition to an already long running series of solid first person shooters. The cinematic approach was kind of new at the time, there were some real shocker moments, and the multiplayer was strong across all platforms. It's still a strong game if you go back and play it now, although it loses a lot of it's value after one play through since it is so cinematically oriented; the gameplay is identical to the new games, however.



Now, no one talks about it. It sits on dusty shelves by the dozen in Gamestop stores employed by sneering children who spit upon each copy they have to stick a new, yellow "recycled game" sticker on. People hate it for what it "did to gaming", a commonly employed slander against anything that becomes too big too fast, and is eventually exploited in order to continue churning out a profit. Hell, when Modern Warfare 3 came out, I was sick of hearing about the series. A part of me which is annoyed by small things, the same part that wants to murder everyone in the neighborhood when I hear a dog barking at night, wanted it to die. Critics like Jim Sterling were absolutely raked across the coals for giving it a good rating; yet it sold a bajillion copies anyways, and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 5: Black Ops 2: The Sequel is coming out in short time, only to receive a similar treatment.

Apart from a few hold outs, the first game in that series and therefore the most important, is all but forgotten. It has been replaced by a fresh new thing; this is how Activision has chosen to treat the franchise, much like a new Madden game. You play the new one for a bit, but don't worry, another is well on the way. So be sure to trade in all your old copies of the series to get your due credit, which will be somewhere in the vicinity of a cent to the dollar on what you had payed originally.



This kind of sucks, and I feel like the potential is there for it to happen with a lot of other things, as well. Hell, even Mario titles these days feel like they are doing that. Super Mario Galaxy 2 is an infinitely better title than the already mind blowing Super Mario Galaxy; so much so that if I wanted a copy of the first, all it would cost is around ten dollars and a quick trip down to the mall, where my EB Games store has about fifty of them in stock. Mario Galaxy 2, however, still retails for around fifty bucks, and there isn't a used copy in sight. Because the sequel did everything better, without doing anything new, it acted as a complete replacement, an upgrade, and not as a unique, stand alone game. Even though the first is still as amazing as it was the day it came out, it has largely been forgotten. It was effectively replaced, and therefore functions now only as an inferior version of its successor.

This happens in the tabletop gaming world, as well. As soon as Wizards of the Coast got their hands on Dungeons & Dragons, they pumped out a new edition which was a welcome upgrade at the time to a dwindling 2nd Edition, which had been hurt by extreme modulation in the form of hundreds of products. The father company, TSR, simply couldn't support it's flagship game anymore, and closed shop. At the time, people thought the 3rd edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, simply called Dungeons & Dragons, would be around for at least another decade. But it wasn't long before a revamp of that system, called 3.5, as well as a whole new set of books came along to change things. Fans held up their hands, shook their heads, but went ahead and bit anyways, only to hear an announcement not long after that a fourth edition was in the works, and that it would drastically change the game and be completely incompatible with the third, thus acting as a total replacement for an entire product line. And D&D; fans would once again be expected to get rid of their old materials, and embrace the new; although they would be two different games, they simply could not co-exist as 3.5 would no longer be recognized or supported by Wizards of the Coast.



Well a little company named Paizo called bullshit on this, and with their own game Pathfinder, decided to keep their beloved 3.5 rules alive. Today, they pump out an insane amount of content which is both compatible with their game and with the original 3.5 rules for Dungeons & Dragons, and they have built a massive consumer base, with many converts from the new, more controversial set of rules Wizards of Coast has provided the past few years. Now, a new version of Dungeons & Dragons called Dungeons & Dragons: Next is on the way, and it will once again be an overhaul of the system. Yet all the while, the 3.5 ruleset flourishes, not only in competition with the current D&D; product line, but also co-existing alongside it; there are plenty of people out there who happily play both games. In fact, there is quite a sizable portion of people who recognized that the original Advanced Dungeons & Dragons rules were good enough for them, and who create oodles of content to support that, too.

It's sort of funny to me then, that many companies these days act like supporting their old content will threaten the new stuff. Imagine if Wizards of the Coast had decided to continue support for every product line they have created up to this point, even if it was just putting out a new book here and there. With the problems they have faced profiting off of the fourth edition, this seems to be a problem they are looking to address with Next. In light of all that, seeing how profitable Paizo has been with their Pathfinder line, Wizards of the Coast released a reprint of their 3.5 core books just a month ago, along with a reprint of the very first edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons earlier this year. They wanted every new edition to completely obliterate the ones which came before it; they wanted it to be a full replacement, but people wouldn't stand for that. They loved their games, had invested so much time into them, that no new flashy rule was going to change that for them. The new thing didn't make the old one obsolete.



In my opinion, a sequel shouldn't just be "the next step", or an evolution of a formula, to the point where you put "Next" in the fucking title; It should do enough different that it becomes an experience all its own. That's why I usually stray away from big name franchises which are able to pump out game after game, year after year, all using a slightly modified version of their engine; or an engine which is often exactly the same. When you pump out a constant stream of titles, same as with endless sequels to a movie franchise, people get sick of it really quickly. They start to feel like they are paying for a mere upgrade rather than an entirely new package, and the old ones feel obsolete. There needs to be a reasonable gap in between each new title so that the attempt to cash in on success isn't so blatantly obvious. People treat some sequels to games like a full replacement because that is the way the companies behind said games treat them, and it tarnishes those really good experiences, and makes us forget their origins and why we liked them so much in the first place.

Go back and play your old games; pop in that copy of the first Super Mario Galaxy, pick up your old AD&D; books once in awhile. Remember what brought you to the fourth edition of a tabletop RPG, or the tenth of a multiplayer military shooter, and you might be surprised at how fun the experience can still be, despite all of those changes and improvements brought to the formula over the years.

A sequel doesn't have to be a full replacement, just like buying a new cat when Mittens dies can't ever really replace her. Except if she shit on the floor all the time and scratched the back of your head whenever you sat on the couch. It's a bad analogy though, because I can't really think of any games which started out as abject shit and eventually turned into something good.



Oh...right.

This is a newer title, so I was kind of wary about writing about it. This is supposed to be a series more about obscure Wii titles, and Kirby games are anything but. The reception for this game was fantastic, I have heard sales were decent as well, so what gives?

Well, Kirby has had a bit of a tough time since Kirby Super Star came around and rocked everyones socks off in the mid nineties. Every single Kirby game in the platforming genre featuring the little dream puff has been compared, somewhat unfairly to that amazing game, and it's easy to see why; with a two player co-op mode, a ton of variety in the stages, and several different modes and mini games to play, Kirby Super Star was one hell of a title. The re-release on the Nintendo DS, Kirby Super Star Ultra was even better, featuring extra goodies as well as updated graphics, and even today the Super Nintendo iteration is still a blast to play.

I feel like people have been quiet about Kirby lately. The new collection for the Wii has helped to spark some interest, but I felt like there was a lot more hype and acclaim happening over Epic Yarn than the latest Wii release, Kirby's Return to Dreamland, and that despite being a traditional Kirby platformer (and shutting up the fans who whined about Epic Yarn) no one really had a whole lot to say about the new Kirby game. Maybe it's just me, but it just seemed to be a title that came and went.



As someone who gave Kirby's Adventure on the 3DS a near perfect score, I am probably not the right guy to be reviewing a Kirby game. Kirby isn't one of my favorite franchises in general, but there is something so infinitely appealing about the games for me. They are what games should be about; having fun. From the power stealing, the cutesy art, the fun boss battles, and the hunt for goodies, Kirby has a very specific style that few other games have attempted to emulate. They are unique, solid adventures that anyone can pick up and enjoy.

And Kirby's Return to Dreamland? In my opinion, it is the best in the entire series, right up there with Super Star.

That's a bold statement to make. Kirby's Adventure is, in my opinion, the best platformer on the NES apart from Super Mario Bros. 3. In fact, it's one of my favorite games of all time. The hours I invested in that and Super Star cannot be counted by modern machines - at least three. Three hours. But after sitting down with the new one for just that long, and only completing the first three worlds, I realized this was not just a quick cash in on the Kirby franchise; all the attention to detail present in previous titles is here, complete with new powers, new enemies, and even a couple of mini games which are very reminiscent of Super Star, and a welcome addiction to an already great game.

The new Kirby finds that fine balance once again between two player co-operation, and a solid single player experience. The puzzles needed to collect energy spheres, the games main collectible used to unlock mini games and challenge stages, are all catered toward challenging a single player, while being made easier by having a partner around so you can focus on the fun stuff; beating up baddies, taking their powers, and generally getting in eachothers way, which usually results in lots of laughs.



There have been complaints that the second player feels more like a sidekick than an actual part of the game. Unfairly, the second players role has been compared to that of Tails, which is only true in that the camera will always focus on the first player. The second player is treated as expendable, but will not return infinitely; each time he suffers a death, gameplay continues, and he must consume one of the first players' lives in order to continue. The game is liberal with lives, so the challenge is not one of repeated deaths, but rather, discovery. In order to unlock everything the game has to offer, you need to collect several energy spheres in each level. Kirby games have always been challenging, with a ramping difficulty level, but the challenge usually lies more in exploration then obstacles. I was able to beat Kirby's Adventure without a hitch when I was seven; anyone complaining about how Kirby games aren't difficult enough is completely missing the point of the franchise. These are accessible, fun platforming titles, not gut grinding platform hell games.

The super powers are a neat distraction, and a lot of them are quite fun to utilize. The Wii remote is used to good effect here, relying on waggle controls only when it is necessary to do so. The problems that plagued great games like Donky Kong Country Returns are not present here; you will be using nothing but the d-pad and buttons a majority of the time, the way it should be for a 2D platformer. The graphics are gorgeously cutesy, and very much in proper Kirby form, and despite what others have said, I feel the game has a soundtrack that is both familiar and appropriate, and fits the style of the game just fine.

The gameplay in general is Kirby Super Star, but with more focus. Rather than splitting the story into several semi-disconnected chunks, you have a cohesive adventure with a large selection of worlds, and quite a bit of gameplay depending on how good you are at finding collectibles. There is even a hard mode you can unlock for veteran players, and few will be bitching about difficulty once they are able to unlock it. And yes, this is a game where you will want to revisit stages; not because there is necessarily anything else to collect, but because some of them are just so damn fun to play through.



Kirby's Return to Dreamland is an amazing package, one which I think people will reminisce fondly about down the road, even if it isn't receiving the praise it deserves right now. I see no reason why this shouldn't be considered a worthy successor to Super Star; playing them practically back to back, I found this to be the superior game, and I don't think that's something you will hear for most people. Personally, I find that unfortunate; when a great game like this comes along, even for a near dead console, it should be recognized, devoured, and celebrated. And that is why I wanted to mention it, to remind people that great games did come out on the Wii, some of them more recently than most people seem to think.

Even at a fifty dollar price tag, this is well worth getting, with or without a friend to play it with; though having a friend is always preferable.



It's the only game my wife will sit and play besides Minecraft, so that, for me, was worth the price of admission alone.

Mother 2, also known as Earthbound, is easily my favorite RPG of all time. Yes, more than Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI, or even Granstream Saga...wait, Granstream Saga? Get out of here, you, I meant to say Dragon Quest.

Anyways, it's very difficult to explain exactly what makes the Mother series special. Being far more familiar with the second game in the series, I'm going to focus on that, though all three have similar traits.

Just telling you how great Mother 2 is won't do a damn thing; unless you have played it, and unless your time in its world was spent several years ago when it was still a hot, and unfortunately mostly ignored product on store shelves, it may be too late for you to bask in its true glory. Just like how me discovering Rush when I was a teenager can't possibly compare to someone hearing 2112 the first day the album was released, all you can really hope to have in regards to Mother 2 is a strong appreciation for what was accomplished. For me, it was the first RPG I ever really sunk my teeth into; it was a game I became practically obsessed with.

Most of my time spent with video games was with the Sega Genesis, but I got a SNES eventually, too. In general, I stuck with action games; the first RPG I ever played was Robotrek on the SNES, a cool little RPG where you built your own robots and used them to fight for you. I never really got into it; it was a bit too hard and slow at the time for me, and although the robot building aspect had appeal, it just never really too hold of me. RPG's quickly became a genre I avoided on purpose; they were those "slow" games. But, then, I was kind of a slow kid, too.



Earthbound changed my mind. The first time I saw it on the shelf at the video store, I couldn't believe it; the box was fucking huge! It had a cool robot looking thing, and even came with a huge game guide. Sure, it was an RPG, but I could handle that - huge box, see? Bigger is better, and I only know that because I have a small penis and an equally unsatisfied wife. Although back then I may have chosen a more age appropriate analogy, hopefully one that had nothing to do with shriveled, useless genitals.



I quickly rented the game and popped it in the Super Nintendo. Here's the thing; right off the bat, Earthbound was hard. This wasn't Mystic Quest, a game that held your hand and told you where your juice box was, Earthbound, underneath it's cheery, big boxed (can't mention that enough) exterior was a big game, and a tough one, too. It took more cues from Dragon Quest than Final Fantasy, and it's bizarre plot points and dialogue were unfamiliar territory for someone not attuned to the RPG. It was almost a satire of RPG's in many ways, with tons of fourth wall breaking humor which constantly poked fun of the genre, and here I was, a nine year old kid who had never really played any RPG's trying to get through it as my first.

Well, I made it all the way to a city called Fourside after a hell of a lot of help from the guide, many, many hours, and a shitload of deaths. And I liked what I saw, but was still incredibly intimidated by it. I put the game down, not to play it again for another year or so. But it stayed with me, haunting my consciousness. Earthbound had become a part of my childhood, and I wasn't even aware of it yet.



First off, a very familiar, American style setting instantly made the game feel familiar. You ate hamburgers to heal, swung at enemies with a baseball bat, and even got to hang out with a caricature of the Blues Brothers. It was this stuff which made me feel so comfortable initially, when all I knew about Japan was that they rode flying Sea Otters and invented gravity. I wouldn't learn about sexy transforming space princesses until a year later when Sailor Moon would come out, and up until this point, that is pretty much the extent of my knowledge about Japan, the country that God forgot.

Another thing was dialogue. Before, and since Earthbound, I have never felt like the world of any RPG has been truly alive, and the NPC's are what made the difference. Even if Final Fantasy games, VI being my favorite, NPC's are mostly useless fodder placed strategically to freely hand out information. None of them feel like their own individual people, because, well, they aren't meant too; it's a game after all, so what would be the utility in fleshing out all these brainless idiots?

Not a lot, but as it turns out, Earthbound is a much better game than it would have otherwise been because of this, not in spite of it. Because you get a feel for most NPC's, because they act like their own people, because they feel like individuals, you actually want to explore the towns along the way and talk to everyone, rather than feeling obligated to do so because you need to trigger the next beat in the story. Some of them are subtle, some of them extreme, but they all have personality. There is a charm there which I haven't experienced in any game since, save for Mother 3 which did the same thing beautifully.



As for some examples, one of my favorite lines in the entire game is a subtle one, but it tells a bigger story. In Threed, a town subject to an unfortunate zombie invasion, a man in a circus tent talks about how he ran away from the Zombies. "I even left my wife and kids behind. That's how scary the zombies were." It's so brief that most people will skip right by it, but every time I replay the game, it makes me laugh my ass off. In two lines, we find out that this man has a family living somewhere in town, and that he is such a coward that he was willing to literally give up their lives just to save his own skin. It's silly, and meant to be funny; and it is. But it is one of many varying examples of how the people are portrayed throughout the game. They are caricatures, but they have a basis in reality. Everybody has met someone in the world of Earthbound, somewhere, in real life. All the game is really doing is taking little tidbits of reality, especially when it comes to people, and amplifying them to a degree where, while they feel extreme, you can still see the connecting threads between the exaggerated fantasy of the game, and the general absurdity of people in real life.

Shigesato Itoi, the games' creator, wanted to created a world that was "not quite a road map", one where stopping in each new town was just not an event created to distribute a new piece of armor, or stay at a hotel. He wanted to create places where players could spend a lot of time, places they wanted to visit, and experience. While he wasn't able to fully realize his goal, he did a pretty damn fine job of doing just that while still keeping the game on track, heading toward a final conclusion. Interconnected areas without an overworld map was one of the finest choices here in my opinion; while the world seems much smaller, there is an intimacy in it that simply opening it up into a vast wasteland with nothing to do between each major location simple couldn't bring. The game is largely cohesive, and this adds to the immersion factor.



These seem like small points compared to the main picture; an incredibly simple, almost initially laughable plot brought together with loveable characters, bizarre enemies, strange and fantastic locations, and a surprisingly sinister, psychological story underneath the surface and set in motion by a pretty compelling antagonist.

Porky, known as Pokey in the English translation, is one of the finest villains ever crafted in a video game. He has a fairly simple motivation, he makes you hate his guts, but underneath all that is heartbreaking character study which is further explored in Mother 3. Porky, quite simply, is a lonely, frustrated, jealous, mean spirited, messed up kid. He craves power in his life because he is so utterly powerless; being overweight he is often made fun of and ostracized, and the only one who will even tolerate him, the protagonist Ness, he may actually consider his only friend - despite trying to thwart his quest at every possible opportunity due to his complete inability to hold a real friendship.



I have actually had friends like Porky. You give them the time of day, mostly out of sympathy, and because you are the only one who can stand to spend five minutes with them, they abuse you at any given opportunity due to the problems they face in their own lives. When you confront them or just plain walk away, they backpedal until you are both in the same place you were before it happened. It is a friendship based only on guilt and bad feelings, and is destructive for both parties for as long as it lasts. While you kind of feel sorry for them when it's all over, part of you is just glad you got out of the situation, and makes you want to see them pay for their actions.

Without getting into too many details, Porky is a character who seldom pays for anything he does; his own lack of accountability and inherent cowardice make it impossible for him to do so. When the going gets tough, when there is no one around to protect him, he takes the easy way out. When he finally does get his come uppence in some form or another, most players aren't too happy with the end result. It kind of tears you both ways because, while he is a bastard of a villain who does some truly sickening things, it's really hard not too feel pity for him. He is the Gollum from Lord of the Rings, in that way; a disgusting creature that is probably better off dead, but that few would have the heart to kill.



Giygas, the main, alien enemy of the game, almost takes a back seat compared to Porky. Being the ultimate evil, he is actually pretty terrifying, and one of the most bizarre and disturbing boss fights you will see in a sixteen bit RPG. But his influence is mostly hands off; you deal with Porky for the better half of the game, and thus, he is the true antagonist due to this constant interaction.

The subtle humor which takes many pot shots at every day life mixed with the other things I described are just a few things that make this one of the best games of all time, and my favorite RPG in existence. I just wanted to share my own thoughts on exactly why the Mother series is so great, and why you should all stop reading this and go donate a few thousand dollars to my PayPal account so I can finally purchase a legitimate copy of my own.



So, like, go do that now.

So recently, something or other, blah blah, ECCO 3. Last week, Ed Annunziata, the man with the impossible name to remember the correct spelling of and the creator of Ecco the Dolphin, announced on Twitter that he would be meeting with Sega to talk about the prospect of an Ecco 3. It was mentioned on Destructoid this morning, or yesterday or whatever. And I peed my pants for a completely unrelated reason at the exact same time as reading the article; mostly because they decided to fucking show this ugly thing as the screen cap for the article.



Anyways, Ecco 3 is looking like more of a possibility, which is awesome for all five of us who were brilliant enough to realize what a masterpiece it is. Now, I`m no Mensa member, but I`m fairly certain that my current I.Q. is sitting somewhere in between the calorie count of a banana and three pieces of bacon, at the very least. I just have a big ego and think I`m better than you. There is nothing I can do to help that, but I must ensure you, I am completely harmless.

Rather than bragging about my enormous brain canister, I will instead muse more about Ecco. And the topic of todays musing will be; just what the hell will Ecco 3 be about?

Now there may be a couple of you whiners out there saying "but Manchild you sexy vagina ruining man muscle of sexy love, why do you say Ecco 3? There already was a third Ecco game, and it was presented in beautiful technicolor and in the third, and last, dimension." That may be true, but it was never a true sequel. Ed had nothing to do with the development of Ecco the Dolphin: Defender of the Future. Appaloosa, formerly Novotrade who Ed previously worked with on Ecco, Chakan, and Kolibri, took the helm to create the new Ecco, and brought science fiction writer David Brin along for the ride. Hew penned a story that was similar to something you might see in an Ecco game; it had globes, after all, and Ecco is all about globes.



But it didn't tie into the first two games. The major enemy of the game, The Vortex, were nowhere to be found. A similarly neat but not nearly as terrifying alien enemy, The Foe, were in their place; it was basically a fan fiction written by a guy who writes fiction. Don't get me wrong, though; DOTF had a lot of meat on its bones story wise, and there were some truly interesting and creative locales to explore. But it would be like calling the Mother 4 fangame - well - Mother 4. Without the original creator behind it, it is just that; a knock off, something else. (Although admittedly, goddamn, have you seen or heard about Mother 4? Mad respect for the dudes behind that game, it looks splendifurous.)

(Spoilers ahead.)

Nope, Ecco 3 needs to be a proper sequel, one that finishes the story of Ecco. To break it down, super super quick, Ecco 1 was all about an alien race called The Vortex whose planet was dying, and who fed from the Earth's seas every five hundred years in order to survive. It was a big reveal that happened about half way through the game, which started with the bastards sucking Ecco's Home Bay, and all his best buds, up into space. Ecco takes a long journey around the world, into the past, and eventually, into space, to save his friends and kill the alien enemy. And, kill them, he does...OR DOES HE

Well the answer is no, and soon after, the Vortex Queen follows him to Earth to start a new hive there. She poops out her alien Giger rip-off spawn to start harassing the rest of the sea life, and Ecco has to restore his powers that he lost to destroy her once again. He travels to alternate futures, one where the Vortex rule, and one where there is peace, and eventually gets his powers back. He fights the Vortex Queen and wins (again) but shortly after he leaves to go celebrate with wine and the ladies, the Vortex Queen transforms herself into a larval state, and heads off to Atlantis, where the time machine Ecco has used like fifty times by now is located.



Ecco's friend, a globey DNA strand called The Asterite, the thing that gave Ecco his powers to breathe in space, tells Ecco that he has to destroy the time machine to set everything right. Time has been split into two seperate "streams", and Ecco is the "stone" that made this happen. After waxing poetic with ol' Asty, Ecco takes off for Atlantis, and is mercilessly attacked by the Vortex Queen while they race to the machine. She gets to it first, and uses it to escape into Earth's past. But as the epilogue of the game states, she meets creatures who she "cannot rule", and is forced to integrate into the life cycle of the Earth, giving birth to insects, crustaceans, and other creatures who I will never touch in real life because they remind me of the ugly Queen. Ecco doesn't destroy the machine as he was supposed too; instead, he uses it, and gets lost in the Tides of Time.

And that's where it ended. Bummer.

However, that wasn't the ending Ed envisioned. Ecco was going to continue. But what would have happened? What will Ecco 3 actually be like? There are a few things we can theorize, and even fewer that we actually know, so let's get down to it.

In past interviews, Ed has stated that Ecco used the time machine to travel back to find the Atlantians. The Atlantians were sort of the puppeteers of everything that happened; they were humans who were fighting a war with the Vortex, and their civilization was eventually destroyed by beams from the planet Vortex. They decided to use their machine to escape into Earths past, since the machine can only be used to travel one way. This way they could be safe, and could set up a contingency plan to save the rest of the world from the alien horrors. They decided to leave clues around for a dolphin who would get the job done, and attuned the machine to read dolphin DNA. And for whatever reason, Ecco has decided he needs to meet them, which was an event planned for the third game.

One theme the game has going for it is the idea that affecting something in the past will directly change the future. In the first Ecco game, Ecco actually becomes responsible for dolphins going from the land into the ocean, and continuing to evolve there. He speaks to them in the distant past of Earth and they are inspired by him. Ecco becomes the sole reason for his own existence. The Vortex Queen becomes responsible for actually creating a significant portion of Earth's own ecology as well. So there is no reason to believe that, somehow, Ecco will become responsible for the events that occur in the other games, at least in part.

One theory I have relates to the dolphin found in Tides of Time. There is a mystery dolphin that keeps showing up and blocking your way, telling you how to proceed. It looks exactly like you, and mimics your movements. So perhaps an element of Ecco 3 would be Ecco himself being responsible for guiding him on his own journey. It sounds kind of bizarre, but it would make sense; Ecco would set everything up for his past self so that all of the right events get set in motion. It would be a neat way to introduce new players to older parts of the game, while offering a compelling task for Ecco to complete.



The Vortex are the other major sticking point. If they are all gone, who would be the enemy? I'd venture to say that Ed is not quite willing yet to give up on the Vortex, and that they will make an appearance of some kind in the third game. The end of Tides of Time specifies that the Vortex Queen found creatures she "couldn't rule", and back when I heard this, I always thought it was like, dinosaurs, or something. But it would be just as conceivable that she went back in time to where the Atlantians hid, and that she had one final encounter with Ecco before finally giving up and farting out crabs. A new Ecco game just wouldn't feel the same without a terrifying alien enemy, and who better than the Vortex to fill their own shoes?

All of this is mere conjecture. Hell, at this point, a new Ecco is barely certain; all Ed has released regarding it was a quick tech demo he whipped up for iOS, but unless he can get Sega on board, Ecco is doomed to obscurity forever. Sega owns the IP, and they won't be willing to give it up without a good chunk of chump change, which, without a compelling financial reason to do so, Ed will not likely fork over any time soon. He has to convince Sega that an Ecco game is worth making; and considering the lack of popularity the franchise has, as well as a legion of vocal haters to supplement it, getting a new Ecco done is a tough prospect.

We can only wait and see, dreaming about the day when Ecco 3 will be in our hands, terrifying us into pants exploding fits of horror, and inspiring our imaginations once more. I just wanted to offer a brief synopsis of the series, and what we may be able to expect from a third Ecco the Dolphin.