It is 1:26 AM

And because I am a genius, I had a great Idea for a post.
This Blog is about stories. We all love stories. I pondered about what makes a good Story into an excellent one and came out at our good old friends: The videogames. But then I thought: "Wait, Kal, you're smart. You will also find a bridge to your other friends: The books. So the bookloving part of your readers (which are small in numbers so far...) will have something to read, too!"
You know, there is this old question: "Why were videogames so much better back in our childhoods?"
Because they were connected to everything else we felt back then. We explored two worlds at the same time. Our real world and the fantastic videogame/book world and we learned more and more with every day. Today, we know both worlds. Or at least think we would know them. There are no surprises, in no way. There's not much left to explore for us. But back then, everything new was memorable. A story, that your brain made up, not necessarily the game or the book.
If you heard the word "Impertinenz" for the first time in the book "Beschützer der Diebe" (which I had to read in my German-lessons), you will remember forever what happened in this book, because you remember "Impertinenz". The book itself was horrible to read in a German class.
Same with videogames.
But there's another reason for us to think better of pre-2000 games than post-2000 games. A far mor important reason. And because of it we still love to play videogames, though there's not much new to explore. (NOTE: Of course, the world of Fallout: New Vegas, Skyrim, Dragon Age: Inquisition, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and every other game is new at first. But you know: It contains forests, dungeons, castles, cities, monsters, NPC's and all the other stuff, you don't learn something new, most of the time.)
Videogames we're challenging in our childhood. Sometimes just because they were hard, difficult. Because they wanted us to get desperate over every failed try.
I want to tell you another story here. In my childhood, I loved to play Spyro 2: Gateway to Glimmer on Playstation 1. It was difficult for me as a child and I felt like entering heaven (which is a bad comparison if I think about it now) when I finished it. Then I lent it to some ... other ... human being... and never saw it again. My lovely girlfriend bought another copy of it some month ago and ten years after my last visit in Glimmer I was able to live my childhood again! And guess what: The game was easy. Not because I'm such a great proskilled pwner-guy. It just wasn't difficult or hard to beat. It was just a game. No triumph for me this time.
The game was hard in my childhood, because I didn't have the experience, the motor skills, the patience.
Games in our childhood we're fascinating, because we thought they we're difficult (they we're, actually, but just for us) and we we're able to beat them, nonetheless.
VICTORY BURNED INTO OUR MEMORIES!
Of course, there were other games, which we're truely difficult, even for adults and experienced players. And there were games, which just had crappy interfaces, controls, no questlog, no map and every other crappy technique the programmers were able to impelemt. But they were beaten, nonetheless!
And now to post-2000 games. (NOTE: this is just rough border, there were easy games earlier and hard games later)
I'll give you an example, a great, great example of how most of the games work nowadays.
Assassin's Creed.
Everyone would say, that Assassin's Creed is a great game. Me too. I remember that I played Assassins Creed II. But that's it. I know, that it felt great while playing, but I don't remember anything of this game. It left nothing. Because it wasn't difficult and it didn't tell anything.
It just built up a flow-experience, which had an end at the same time the game ended.
I told a friend of mine a while after I finished, that Assassins Creed II was one of the best games I've ever played. If I think about this now, I have to ask myself if I was sober that moment. The same goes for most of Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag. One of the legendary ships and nothing else.
You do not even create things by your own. Anno 2070 or Cities: Skylines let you take a look at what you've done, what you created by yourself. But Assassin's Creed leaves you with nothing. A linear story, that everyone else experiences in the same way as you do. It is what the game wants to be and it's doing fine. But it's not enough for me.

Well then, I guess that's it for now. It is late now. 'Hope you had fun, see you next time.
02:31 AM. Kalnasir logout.