Backlog Bullshit

The world of gaming moves pretty fast


Some parts faster than others

My gaming schedule is seemingly beset upon me with no clear resolution in regards of clear priority or proper resolution. I’m constantly in need to play new games, especially in relation to writing about them, but can never find time to finish them. A serious issue in terms of productivity to be sure, but I think one more so unique in regards to my attempts of writing about them, in all of their peculiar machinations. A few core examples to help illustrate my point from recent days are titles like Indiana Jones, Warhammer, and Balatro, that I’m consistently at odds with myself on just how much is enough to get the general gist of a game before being able to both write about it and move on. At least with Indiana Jones, there is a conclusive ending, same is true for Warhammer’s single player at the very least, in all of it’s charmingly try hard Bologna Boy Battalion Space Adventures kind of way.


A screenshot from the epic conclusion of Warhammer
40k: Space Marine 2’s finale

Warhammer’s multiplayer though? That’s a tougher nut to crack, though I suppose reducing the answer down to the simplicity of “when enough is enough” without overly complicating the issue is the answer I’m not attempting to write some kind of grand opus deconstructionism of the title after all, nor am I trying to position myself as the go to expert of the Warhammer multiplayer sphere moving forward. With that in consideration, having finished the story mode at the end of January, and having only found the enthusiasm to play a handful of matches in the last month and a half, doesn’t that send a clear enough message to me that the excitement levels just aren’t there and that I should just pull the plug on the entire thing and just move on with my heretical life?


Maybe if I just paint more minis the game
will seem like it’s more fun

More to my point: there’s always going to be another shooter, and plenty of the more competent ones (See: Warhammer) will eventually have to be left behind for greener pastures. I’ve even been thinking about how I want to get back to Halo, truth be told, not even having finished the campaign when I played it on the Xbox One, and having really enjoyed the multiplayer to boot. I’ve also, much like my ridiculously long journey with Rare Replay that I’ve been detailing recently, have been slowly moving towards “100%in” The Master Chief Collection for the better part of a decade now, and still have a long way to go in getting all the cheevos attached to the compilation of titles. Unlike Rare Replay however, deep down I’m fairly certain it will all be for naught, as just the multiplayer aspect alone of the Chief Collection will likely stop me from acquiring every last achievement, but the interest in the attempt remains.


At least I can be rest assured I will never run out of
teabags, no matter how long the attempt takes

I say all of this while sitting on the world select screen of Sonic Colors Ultimate, a game I meant to write about today, which is another title I just started, in spite of constant reminders to myself to *not* start another game on the PS4 until I get the Platinum on Elden Ring, which has been an ongoing project for the last year of time, while my poor Switch (and Zelda to that point) continues to collect dust. This is all the while, as previously mentioned, I attempt to justify another ante in Balatro to see, much like Warhammer, I really *get* the game before moving on, even while plenty of other titles I love sit there screaming “play me” amidst the chaotic schedule that has me constantly on the hunt for a free minute to enjoy a new game.


Ah shit, I knew I forgot to download something

The backlog remains an eternal struggle in a never ending game of tug-o-war…at least I have plenty to entertain me for the rest of eternity.

~Pashford

Inanity, thy name is video games

The struggle is real.


Who I’m envisioning as the mascot for 2025

At least, it feels real in regards to not just the complete insanity that 2025 has already launched with, but keeping up with the craziness enough with the same kind of “DON’T PANIC” vibes I advocate for on the regular. That obviously complicates my day to day, including finding time to sit my ass down and write with any regularity whatsoever. I always desire to have more fleshed out ideas for articles in this space, to elevate Active Time Event above just another gaming blog, but alas, to quote a prescient prophet of our cosmic time, if wishes were horses, we’d all be eating steak. With all of that said, I feel as if in a constant state of flux truth be told, in always feeling as if I need to “start again”, as if reigniting the fires of creativity in some kind of conceptual grand gesture to imbue my meager efforts with some well needed feelings of gravitas to frame the whole affair with. Keeping that in mind, I’m not quite sure the number of times I’m essentially going to refer to my own writing endeavors as a “soft reboot“, but I’m speculating the number will indeed be too many, and simultaneously, not enough at the same time. I did make my return to the writing space about this time last year, and while the first half of the year dragged a bit in terms of consistent content, the couple of pieces I did get out were decent pieces of dynamite, setting the stage for a second half of the year resulting in a wild stream of content every day for months on end. A stream of content I may add which eventually ended in November for, uh, tragically disappointing reasons many of you were confronted with as well.


November 5th forced me into doing a perpetual Steve Harvey face for the rest of the year, ngl.

As I made mention recently, this time of year is always devastating for me, as both seasonal depression and related moments of destructive tendencies that are contingent on said moods tend to drag me down to the depths of despair and debauchery in the most nefarious of ways. In those ever present and unrelenting times of melancholic torture that attempt to drown me in chaotic malaise, I seem to catch a serious case of the fuck its I just cannot shake, and the lack of motivation and complete abandonment of what I view as my duties that follows is one of absolutely brutal and insurmountable malcontent that is nearly unrivaled in bloodshed and misery.


Nearly unrivaled

That’s kind of the abhorrently abysmal hole I’m still attempting to crawl out of, on some metaphorically psychological level at least, but this year has been one of the most promising springboards of regeneration coming from a point of stability in recent memory. I’ve at least maintained a decent day to day of gaming and an ounce of respectability in terms of writing about them, far more so than basically any point around the same time in the last 7 years combined in retrospect, which is worth saying. Perspective is everything, and if you’re use to test flights ending with the entire vehicle engulfed in flames and crashing into a side of a mountain, merely having a rough landing where a wing gets bent or a wheel falls off should be marked on paper as a successfully executed colossal undertaking.


Someone made a PS2 about similar subject matter
if my memory isn’t betraying me…

So yeah. Still enjoying my new Xbox Series X, still don’t have a PS5 (work in progress), still somehow enjoying games on my launch Switch, a system which is in extraordinarily dire stakes, with the back cracked in half, the poor damn thing randomly vibrating, and on it’s fifth set of joycons mind you, but still trucking non the less. I somehow still haven’t beaten Echoes of Wisdom, in spite of the title being both a Zelda game and getting in weekly play sessions on the regs, but I’m always enjoying about 7 games at any given moment, so playthroughs tend to take a second. I’m also schmoozing the competitive Smash scene and admiring Animal Crossing up close and person everyday, but I don’t have much in the way of interesting ideas floating around about either at any given moment. This could be do to the notion either feels like an old relationship of some kind, where it’s become more of a way of the everyday then a conscious effort, akin to the nutrients vicariously but unconsciously absorbed that keeps one breathing. A lack of inspiration involving writing ideas could also be predicated on that notion I just know to stay in my lane and realize I’m not within the authority of exterior design to speak with any gravitas on the matter, or wish to give some succulent trade secrets of the Smashing persuasion, but I hold my tongue appropriately when I feel as if nothing of value can be imparted to ye lucky crew of readers and onlookers alike. I suppose I’ll dig deep and attempt to offer insight on both Smash and AC simultaneously for you now.


Love what they’ve done with their village layout. They
have trees and everything. Also, Smash Protip: Don’t
fall off the edge.

See? Rubbish.

I’m continuing to give Warhammer 40k: Space Marine 2 a shot, even though I feel as if I know me and the game have no real shot of longevity together. The campaign was fine enough, though the multiplayer does feel like it lacks a certain crisp quality involving that bespoke 30 seconds of fun (of Halo legend) needed for any gaming experience to stay relevant for long in this hyper competitive market this day and age. However, I muster the courage to continue my college effort in my affairs with the title, giggling still as I play, watching the big bologna men run hither and thither doing big bologna men like things whenever I play Space Marine 2, wondering who in their right mind takes any of this seriously, but that may be one of the only things keeping me invested in my bologna man space dystopia adventures, so it’s really the small things that count.


A screenshot of one of my more intense
matches playing Warhammer 40k: Space Marine 2.

I did also finish getting all the achievements for Castlevania, Order of Ecclesia, the final cheevo involving beating Albus mode, which is just where you go back through with an optional character and rebeat the campaign with an unlockable character after the credits roll, in the memorable style of Symphony of the Night. I do chuckle thinking about the comparative nature of Albus as a character vs others in the series, as while he is relevant to the main story of Ecclesia, he is essentially a dude with a gun in a story involving legendary vampire hunters and demonic entities born of myth and fury. Still, Dracula still has a mouth that one can fire bullets into, which contributes in meaningful ways to dislocating his ass from this reality and then launching his bastard ass directly into hell with relative fucking gusto.


Pictured: a conceptual representation of Any Castlevania
progatonist by the end of their respective game. Not pictured:
Dracula’s immense frustration with being evicted by the
Belmonts every god damn century

On the PS4, I’m largely just focused on Elden Ring, having finished the DLC Shadow of the Erdtree about a month ago. I maintain a pride in having played through both the vanilla portion of the game and the DLC without having used any external help whatsoever, be it guides, videos, walkthroughs etc, and even pushed myself not to summon any player help to fight any of the bosses, which I consider to be a stubbornly bullheaded endeavor of herculean proportions that I’m happy to have seen to it’s bitter end. Though the playthrough of both the title and it’s add-on did put things into a stark perspective, and that is I can’t sacrifice a year of my life to a single game all of the time, as it just simply isn’t sustainable. I realize not every experience is going to be as demanding as a souls-like is, but the truth remains that in this day and age of hyper busyness, combined with a ridiculous slate of games coming down the pipeline, on top of my general desire to have hobbies and passions outside of gaming, I’m trying to remind myself it’s really okay to ask for help and or take a shortcut every now and again, or else one would surely get consumed by the madness of struggle, and drown in the endless sea of everyday inanity in a moment’s notice.

~Pashford

Raw Dogging the Rough Cut

This photo captures the essence of self-deprecation
involving my sales pitch of this post, but I promise
you the vibes are at least twice as funny and four
times less shitty in execution

In reference to my visual sarcastic aside above, I kept putting off a similarly slapdash attempt at a return to proper writing (about video games) for arbitrary reasons, though I imagine unless I had been kidnapped by a traveling dance theater to perform for them due to their outlandish threats involving being sent to actual hell before I die, outside of that obviously reasonably likely scenario, just about any other reason for a mood being spoiled thus halting the creative process would come off as arbitrary.


Like when family get togethers really spoil the holidays,
for example.

The joke would be on that ill-fated group of stylishly groovy kidnappers regardless, as December does represent a kind of personal hell for me every year, though I refuse to elaborate within any serious context as to why. I do attempt to keep this first and foremost about gaming after all, and the reasons I reference fall far outside the boundaries of the virtual. Now that it is almost February, and I’m in a much better place overall, I will eschew the notion of waiting for my first piece of writing, “the return” if you will, to be some grandiose affair or some amazingly well thought out narrative or brilliant deconstruction of the industry or some title I’ve recently beaten. I’m just going to casually riff about games in general for a bit, if that’s okay.


Just the average Pash like creative noodling for
your idle entertainment, just like old times

I recently gifted myself an Xbox Series X for X-mas, not that I even care about celebrating the event in any serious way, but I’ve been attempting to curtail my more Grinchly demeanor in many small, celebratory fashions to attempt to hold back the cynical tide that washes over me. In a twist of unintentional spiteful reinforcement of my complete apathy towards Christmas itself, I did in fact not even open the damn thing on the day of, and even waited till the New Year to do anything with it. While I have been thoroughly enjoying my experience with said system, as I have always been an advocate of any major platform within the realm as someone who identifies as platform agnostic, the series X is by and far the least substantial jump from one generation to another I have ever seen. It makes sense on some level, as why fix what’s not broken, as the UI for the Xbox family has always been mostly functional, so keep the ecosystem similar, right?

Fair enough, though I do think this among many factors indicative we, as a collective, are starting to come to a head here in terms of sheer innovation for consoles moving forward, and I’m not just picking on Microsoft here. Having seen the PS5 UI in action, and at least glimpsing the very “same-ish” nature that the Switch 2 is bringing to the table, I think the day of the truly new and the innovative, in terms of pure individualized ingenuity, is likely behind us at this point, for many reasons I think is worthy of a much longer winded, well constructed post on the matter, so I’ll save elaborating on that thought for another time.


An example of a well constructed post

The game I chose to be my “launch title” was Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, and truth be told, while the experience has been fun, I’m kind of shocked that this console is already four years into it’s lifespan and this is the supposed peak that we’ve hit with it thus far. Like, yes, I realize it runs at a high frame rate while stable, with hi-res textures and a shit ton of enemies on screen moving around, but the fact that it comes off as kind of a derivative Gears of War third person action romp comes off as a little underwhelming. Much like the Series X; yes, its fun and I’m enjoying myself quite a bit, but I certainly wouldn’t advocate to anyone to rush out and drop several hundred dollars on picking up the new Xbox offering or upgrading their PC just to enjoy this. Both feel like warm greetings to someone who hasn’t just arrived, but is “already there”, if that makes any sense. I know any stans of either MS or 40k are probably just vomiting blood at this point due to my perceived heresy in having reserved expectations about consumer products I interact with instead of trying to be the next big shill in the content creator space, but I didn’t start writing about games to blow smoke up the ass of either developers or fandoms while giving them a reach around with every prevailing thought I have regarding their favorite hobby/industry of choice.


I did not get into this line of work cause
I enjoy gargling wieners mind you

However, one is lucky enough once in a great while to enjoy a come hither experience that runs parallel to a gratifying sexual release, which is where my mention of downloading the Castlevania: Dominus Collection comes in. This would in fact be a double dip, but this is one media allegiance I don’t mind getting undressed for, as we normally have no problem having quite the sexy time together. That is of course, when Konami isn’t being a bunch of shit heels cause they’re too busy putting out low-grade pachinko machines for horny middle aged Japanese business men, and doesn’t leave me high and dry by sitting around with their thumbs up their stubborn asses for a better part of a decade doing absolutely fuck all while Nintendo and Netflix do all the heavy lifting in reminding people how awesome Castlevania is.


So awesome

Good thing I did download it, too, as Warhammer took an astonishing 11 hours to install on day one, and I desperately wanted to actually use my Series X for something on January 1st aside from using it as one of the most gloriously excessive paperweights of all time. Since I had recently just finished Portrait of Ruin on the Switch, and I had not touched Order of Ecclesia since it’s days on the DS, the choice was obvious (sorry Dawn of Sorrow). Such a damn good game that helped to set the ground work for what would become it’s marvelous spiritual successor Bloodstained. If nothing else, I praise OoE for it’s mindful editorialization, as the pacing is par excellence. I mean, everything is about as Castlevania-ey as it gets, so the game is a complete package, which goes on to help further showcase the the mind numbing, head scratching direction Konami would travel forward with after a successful series of three top notch titles on the DS, by going the Lord of Shadows route immediately following, soon after diverting into complete obscurity for the series in total.


Seen here: Konami helping to lay the ground work for
the eventual shift into focusing on their pachinko machine
machinations

Game pass has been sorely missed, and for all of the very reasons I love it, I also ironically can’t really utilize it. The value involving the content available with the sheer number of titles is astronomical, and definitely helps to continue to set the tone for what most platforms should have moving forward, but my problem is time, not access. To wit: I happily picked up Rare Replay once again after so long away, to continue my long and arduous trek to get the end all be all equivalent of a “soft” 100% of the title by finally acquiring the achievement “Stamper Brothers Forever”, which is essentially mastering like, 30 games. I double checked, and come this August, it will have been a decade since I started this insane quest, and I do not plan to slow down any time soon. Though, referencing my point about time being my problem, not access, outside of the last couple years where I was in a purgatory of sorts in a myriad of ways that prevented me from having an Xbox full stop, time is not on my side when considering the excessive standards, beefier offerings and ridiculously overstuffed with content that modern day gaming represents.


Surely, we must stop and ponder what might be
considered too much of a good thing?

I have many more thoughts to share, and even ones mentioned here deserve far grander elaborations, but this is my first post in months, so I’m going to give myself a Pash on the back and let this small victory breath for a moment while I muse what and or how I may continue to write with consistency in the near future.

Till next we meet…


~Pashford

Spilled Tea: Switch 2, Warhammer, and AI…

…Oh my!

The Principle of Credulity is a philosophical axiom by Thomas Reid that suggest we have “a disposition to confide in the veracity of others, and believe what they tell us”.


Everyday on the internet leads me to believe this is very true

Today is all about about gossip and rumor here on ATE , as there seems to be quite an awful lot of it swirling around gaming news sources as of late, so what the hell? Let’s spill some tea. Before we begin, I just wanted to mention that throughout my day, I always have a hundred little conversations with myself that I think “hey, this would make an interesting aside for one of my ATE articles”. I think that share is possibly one of the first times I actually remembered to retain said kind of conversation, and we are all technically worse off for it. Not because the share was inane or valueless, mind you, but as a reminder of all the times I was unable to remember the rest of them. I really got to start carrying around a tape recorder ala Coop from Twin Peaks to record my thoughts, as every time you read a write up, it is only one of a very large number of permutations we both could have delighted in, had things just turned out differently.


Strange how it all works out

With multiversal shenanigans now in play as a relevant topic of interest, we shift our focus to a peculiar happening that timeextension brought to revelatory light, with a delightful little article going in-depth about how some Capcom staff were initially resistant to the whole idea of crossover fighters involving the Street Fighter crew from very early on. Apparently, due to the lack of sales of X-Men: Children of the Atom and Marvel Super Heroes in Japan, many at Capcom were silently hoping X-Men vs Street Fighter would die a quiet, quick death. This gave the team a lot of wiggle room to over deliver when the time came, and the break out success of the title would go on to eventually spawn the Marvel vs Capcom series, which has stood the test of popular time, as evidenced by the recent release of Marvel vs Capcom: Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics release.


As I always say: set lower expectations and then over deliver

Continuing on with the theme of what is old is new again, it looks as if Nintendo’s lawyer have finally caught wind of Palworld, an open-world multiplayer survival game, which has designs reminiscent of the big N’s own critically acclaimed Pokémon series, and are ready to mount a legal battle over copyright infringement claims. I’m surprised Nintendo’s legal ninjas took so much time getting around to this one, as this sucker has been making lots of noise since earlier this year, and is even an official release on multiple platforms, and not even a fan made dealie. Ultimately, time will tell if Nintendo wins out with the legal disputes involving the developers of the game Pocketpair, but Nintendo has historically been quite grumpy about this kind of thing for a long time now, and regularly geared towards legal actions in the course of their own history. They even took Blockbuster to task for copyright infringement over their manuals for Christ’s sake. I might love their games, but the Pokémon company has had a stick up their ass over petty frivolities for awhile now, so I hope this just blows up in their face.


How Chinpokomon flew under the radar all these years I
will never know

Staying on the topic of Nintendo, potential images of the follow up to the Switch have “leaked”, according to a number of rampant shares on the internet, which I surmised were all pulled from the same dodgy ass source on the internet that no one bothered to check the legitimacy of….or at least I thought as much, and then I read a piece from Eurogamer commenting on the whole affair. The article mentions how the models do seem to correspond with data that has leaked in the past about Nintendo’s next console, but they did come from a 3D modeler’s post on a Chinese social media website, who as since deleted the posts. Like most leaks: dubious at best, and what took someone possibly two hours to make is now going to be discussed for two weeks with endless pissing competitions involving the veracity of the claims themselves. No news from Nintendo on the matter (big surprise).


Everyone knows the Switch 2 is just going to be 16 Gamecubes
duct-taped together, what are we even speculating for?

In another moment of interesting hearsay, IGN reported about a bizarre happening involving recently released shooter 40,000: Space Marine 2, in a story that allegedly has the CEO of Saber, Matthew Karch, commenting on a Youtube video by user Asmongold about the quality of the title. The gist of the posit which was *allegedly* Karch, has the CEO going on about other devs “imposing morals on gamers”, reinforcing games should be about the design itself and not beating the brow of gamers with some kind of overt messaging muddying the waters. Putting aside for a second just how broad of a declaration that is to even confront, the comment hasn’t even been officially verified as the actual CEO, and a comment which could potentially be some kind of windup from a rando impersonating him, trying to create a fuss in the comments section on a Youtube video in a silly attempt at fanning the flames in the name of some obtuse culture war nonsense. I guess, regardless of whether or not it is actually the CEO of the company hanging out in a Youtube comment section (why would he?) giving praise to their own game (why wouldn’t they?), a good game is a good game regardless of messaging. Don’t worry about what other people are playing, do what you want.


To quote a modern day prophet

And finally, to wrap our daily tea spilling as we are nearing an empty pot, EA decided to remind people why they were voted worst company in the US two years in a row, by deciding to make generative AI as their main talking point in a recent investors day presentation, much to the surprise of no one who is use to EA’s bullshit. They went on to assure onlookers that AI is not a buzzword, and is a core element at the heart of their game development strategy. Read the room guys: with so many negative news stories coming out weekly about foot in mouth comments involving AI, to other very real impacts the practice of using AI has had on workers within the industry, you’d think EA would avoid saying the quiet part out-loud and just keep the fuck quiet about their internal machinations, just to save some face in the name of good PR alone.


A picture of EA’s new PR manager

Cheers for joining me in spilling some tea. Until our next party, then…

~Pashford