Modern games are often compared to motion pictures in terms of production values: the quality of the graphics, the voice acting and immersiveness of the total experience. For years, games were judged by how well they were able to emulate a cinematic experience; Metal Gear Solid was the action movie we always wanted to play. The experience was linear and loaded with hours of non-interactive dialog and cut scenes, but it hit all the right beats. By the time the sequel came around, however, it was clear that something wasn’t quite right with the formula and it wasn’t just Snake’s emo-ninja replacement, Raiden.

Cinematic storytelling, as it turns out, isn’t all that interactive.

After a promising unveiling, the PlayStation Vita has faced a lot of cynicism because of Sony’s decisions with the handheld. It seems like they’re trying to screw up their own system with pointless limitations like a proprietary memory card, a one-user limit for the proprietary memory card, and a still-unconfirmed-for-the-United-States overpriced UMD owner game download plan. Basically, Sony’s choking the PS Vita, and when the 3DS is already $80 cheaper than it will be when it launches in February (after missing the holiday season), this could mean the new PSP will suffer the same also-ran fate as the old PSP, or suffer the completely-failed-and-ignored fate of the PSP-Go.

The PS Vita isn’t a lost cause, though. Despite some screw-ups before launch, it does have a lot of potential. Its screw-ups aren’t that big for most users, as well. While hardcore gamers will be irritated by the memory card issues and the UMD thing, these are actually factors that most users won’t even notice.

RPGs are some of the most polarizing video games out there, with different groups either loving them or hating them. You need to be in a certain mindset to play an RPG, and it takes a lot more investment than an action game or sports game. However, the very idea of what an RPG is can be debated, and fans of one type might hate another type. This is where the separation between the East (Japan) and the West (America and Europe) comes in, and how the big wall between the two cultures’ approaches to RPGs has effectively made two completely different genres.

To put it simply, western RPGs craft a world, while eastern RPGs craft a story. Yes, the former have stories and the latter have worlds, but the emphasis on each is clear. Western RPGs put the player in control of the game and let them write their own story, following the signposts left for them. Eastern RPGs make the player a part of the story and let them explore the world in the way that lets that story unfold.

Two weeks ago, Frank Miller caused a bit of a stir by writing about the Occupy Wall Street protesters. He didn’t have anything nice to say. The backlash was impressive. A lot of fans hate him now. I feel sorry for him.

This is a serious, political post, so if you don’t want part of that, skip this and we’ll get to some regularly scheduled dick jokes later. Incidentally, Saints Row: The Third gives you a bonus if you shoot 25 guys in the nuts.

You’ve probably heard about Modern Warfare 3′s controversial scene, or at least are aware of it. After Modern Warfare and MW2, it’s pretty much expected to have a shocking, powerful moment in the game that really hits you in the pathos. A soldier you played through a mission dying in a sudden and unexpected nuclear attack and seeing his vision fade as he’s overcome by radiation poisoning, an airport full of civilians getting killed by terrorists as you’re helpless to do anything, and so on. Modern Warfare 3 has one big moment like that, and a few that call back to it. Unfortunately, it fails at making any of those moments powerful or deep.

Spoilers ahead, so don’t read on if you haven’t played through the game (or specifically if you haven’t played through the game and don’t want it to be spoiled).

Deus Ex came out in 2000, and it remains one of the greatest PC games ever made. I’m not even kidding. It’s up there with The Elder Scrolls, Civilization, Ultima, and Portal where you should really pick out your favorite game in a given series, because if I name Morrowind, Civ 5, Ultima 7, and Portal 2 I won’t draw the ire of most of the fanboys of any series. PC Gamer actually named it its top PC game of all time. There’s a reason for that, which I’ll get into below. First, you need to know that you can and should play this game on your current PC. Yes, even if it’s a netbook. This is an 11 year old game with some fan patches that make it surprisingly usable on any system made in the last decade.

Nerd factor 9, engage! Okay, this one isn’t my fault. Blame my friend Zach of Hanlon’s Razor for starting this argument this morning, which got me thinking about the most popular mysterious sci-fi show of the last decade: Lost. I, like many, hated the finale. Well, that’s not accurate. I disliked the finale and hated the entire last season for what the finale did in explaining it, and I retroactively hated the show for failing to satisfyingly bring everything around.

We’ve been arguing about the focus of Lost, and what the show wanted to do and why it wanted to do it. Lost was a deeply character-driven show, and the final season proves that, as the showrunners said from the beginning, the characters and how they acted, grew, changed, and lives were more important than the mythology of the island. For a lot of people, that’s a satisfying explanation for why the show was the way it was, and why it left so many questions unanswered or vaguely answered. The mystery doesn’t matter compared to the people, and how they grew and changed. The problem is that it’s a flimsy excuse. You can have great character development and powerful character studies while still offering a mystery-filled narrative that manages to bring everything to a satisfying conclusion. Babylon 5 proved that.

Spoilers ahead for both Lost and Babylon 5. Also, this piece is ridiculously long, and I am a giant nerd for writing it.

This has been bugging me for months, and I’m finally going to address it. Often, when I visit my favorite sites, I see banner ads for various browser RPGs. A lot of them are transparent rip-offs, look-alikes, or outright scams. But two really stick out for being shamelessly shitty and opportunistic in their marketing: Evony and Batheo.

Nintendo, you’re breaking my balls here. I want to love the 3DS. I seriously appreciated getting Link’s Awakening DX onto the eStore when it started. Sure, the store itself launched over a month after the game, and I’m still irritated that I had to play through the straight Ocarina of Time version again to access the Master Quest, but at least it was something. Giving away the 3D Classics ExciteBike game for free was great, and gave us a taste for the whole 3D Classics concept.

But we’re still waiting and… not much on the horizon. Wait, there’s something, seen through Nintendo’s Japanese site. It’s a new 3D Classics release! It’s… Urban Champion.

I’m a lifelong Nintendo fanboy. I grew up with the NES and SNES. During the first 3D console war in the mid-90′s, I sided with the Nintendo 64 despite missing out on many, many great games until years later. I was optimistic for the Wii, and the DS completely won me over. That said, I’ve realized something about Nintendo that I think always floated around in the back of my mind, but that I didn’t really accept until the WiiU was announced.

Nintendo doesn’t care about wooing hardcore gamers. Yes, jaded gamers think this is self-evident, but it’s actually worse than it seems. Nintendo doesn’t care about wooing hardcore gamers because we’ll come back to them anyway. That is the truly terrible thing about Nintendo’s current strategy. It doesn’t matter how disappointing their hardware is, how inept their handling of online services is, or how much they bother to build a platform that third party developers actually feel like using to make a decent game and not just a half-assed semi-port.

Let me be crude but concise. Nintendo is our cheating ex-girlfriend who, every six months or so, calls us up at 2:00 a.m. looking for action. And, because we are idiots and she does that one thing we like, we come over. Maybe it’s a one-night stand, maybe it’s a short rekindling of the relationship, but it always ends with her completely ignoring us and sleeping with our little brother.