Time to sit down for another YvoCaro Plays. As always, these blurbs are mostly about the video games I’m currently playing. Sometimes though, I look back at past gaming adventures. Unedited thoughts that spring up in my mind. And sometimes a random train of thoughts starting with the game and ending somewhere completely different!
If you like these bits of gaming thoughts you can find the previous ones here
Playing without Goals
I used to think I didn’t need goals in my gaming. Even more: that I didn’t want any goals, because I have enough pressure in real life as it is, with my job and all. I guess that notion came from the first game I took up in my gaming life (Animal Crossing Wild World): just go about your virtual life and do my virtual chores. No pressure, just laid back gaming. Some of my gaming friends and fellow AC enthusiasts made goals for themselves: to make beautiful hybrid flowers, to collect every picture from your villagers. I never did, though of course having the Animal Crossing town is a goal in itself too: you do want the town to look as beautiful as possible.
As time went by though I’ve found that sometimes I need some goals too. But then again, not all kinds of goals.. am I making sense? Let me explain: one of the first games I played after Animal Crossing was Big Brain Academy. A game much like the better known Brain Training, but this one included a timed deadline too. While trying your hand at things like math and memory, the clock on the screen kept on ticking. And I found that I simply couldn’t put that aside: I got really stressed trying to better my scores, and I mean red in the face, hart racing and shaking hands. I quit that game pretty quick because of that, and I’ve found ever since that I don’t want to play any timed games.
A certain amount of purpose is nice!
But then again, some kind of purpose in a game is nice. Since my first gaming experiences I have found that I do sometimes need purpose in a game. Like needing to level up your party to take on the next boss fight. Or fulfilling requests from villagers in the My Time at Portia town. Or making the best weapons possible through synthesis in an Atelier game.
Maybe I’ve grown on my gaming journey, thinking about this I do realise goals in gaming don’t put me off anymore. But I like to do it in my own time, not being pressured into anything. Yes, I did manage the Divine Beasts in Breath of the Wild. And eventually I’ll get Ganon too. But only when I feel up to it.
Still, the simulation games where you create your own world with just the goals you set yourself, are still my most favourite. Not too long now to wait before my gaming journey comes a full circle, and I can finally get back into a great Animal Crossing game on a handheld device!
Gosh, I’m such a fool for goals in gaming… Which is why RPG is my genre of choice, I guess. ^_^ I live — and play — to defeat that final boss (and all the other ones in between), get that crucial MacGuffin back, or reach the last floor of that huge and perilous dungeon. In fact, I need goals in my games so much that I usually can’t stick to simulation games with no clear-cut ending, such as the Sims or Animal Crossing. I guess I’m the near-opposite of you in that regard! 😀
Its a good thing we are all different right? I remember how you didn’t really like games like AC though I know you really tried!