I dont understand this notion going on in the discussions on this site that these next gen consoles are too weak. They have atleast 2X the graphical capabilites of the PS3 and Xbox 360. You cant look at the PC platform and compare it to the console platforms considering that PCs can be upgraded and the hardware for that market is moving forward all the time on a constant basis. These next gen consoles are very capable machines considering the launch price and hardware inside. Just look at some of the launch titles like Killzone SF or Battlefield 4 or even Ryse, these games look amazing for launch titles and give us a taste of what these systems are capable of. Now you have to bear in mind that these are indeed "launch" titles and wont ultimately be an indication of the limits of these systems, game engines get optimized and you see better looking games over time, this is how it has always worked.

Another thing you have to take into consideration is that we are starting to reach the point where graphics for games are starting to look very realistic or lifelike. The only real improvements that we can make from this point is detail in the environments, AA, and possibly more realistic lighting and animations. But we are most likely not going to see that PS1 to PS2 jump or even PS2 to PS3 jump, its just the law of diminishing returns taking effect. Look at high end PC GPU tech verses what we are seeing in the PS4 right now, slightly higher resolutions if your rig can handle it, and maybe some slightly sharper texture quality or something but its not a significant difference between the PC and PS4. Most people have HDTVs that support a max resolution of 1920x1080 or 1080p which these consoles are capable of doing. Yes you can get higher res on PC like 1200p or 1440p but you have to buy expensive monitors to do that and you have to buy a very high end graphics card for your PC which can cost anywhere between $400 - $1000+ or more even. For the price that these consoles are being sold to us we are gettin some top notch hardware.

Alot of old school gamers, like my self, like to say that games are too easy these days. People like to say that too many games these days hold your hand and treat you like a dumb child. Im an old school gamer(been gaming since I was 5 and now I am 25 years old now), and I strongly disagree with this notion that games have become too easy or dumbed down. Back in the NES days, alot of games were so difficult because of the fact that you had limited lives and once all those lives were gone it was game over and you had to start the game over again. Some games would have continues and reset the amount of lives you had, but even then, once you ran out of continues it was game over and you had to start the game from the beginning. Design choices like that make games feel overly frustrating and sometimes make you want to stop playing.

Recently a game that has gained alot of attention from gamers, Dark Souls, has borrowed alot of design choices from the games of old. Dark Souls challenges players by having enemies and bosses that do considerable amounts of damage to the player every time the player gets hit and there is little to no room for error on the players end. Human beings are not perfect, we make mistakes and errors all the time. Yes we can learn from those mistakes and make better choices or decisions about how to approach a challenge, but when the challenge is borderline impossible or unfair, it causes most of us to not enjoy the journey as much. Im not saying that challenge is a bad thing, but the challenge should be fair enough so that we can learn from our mistakes and overcome obstacles without having to start over or retry a billion times.

A great example of great game design are the Zelda franchise from Nintendo. These games are very challenging but what makes them great is that the challenge isnt so overbearing that you get frustrated and want to quit the game, you can learn on the fly during boss battles and adjust your strategy accordingly to overcome the bosses in the game. You still get the satisfaction of defeating a very challenging boss while still enjoying the adventure that the game puts forth. Having to retry parts of games over and over for hours is just frustrating and tedious and makes games less fun for the player. People that look for that overbearing difficultly in games dont understand that not everyone has the "skill" or patience level to deal with the tediousness of games such as the recent Dark Souls games. Its a shame that a game so rich with atmosphere and interesting lore and a solid combat system has to be as annoyingly difficult and tedious as it is, because having to repeat 15 or 20 min of gameplay over and over again creates a situation where most people would just drop the game and do something else that doesnt feel like a waste of time.

In conclusion, all Im trying to say is that i dont think games are too easy today at all. I just think that game design has improved so much over the last 2 decades, that games just dont have those frustrating elements to them that plagued games of the past therefore resulting in the game feeling easier. We have come a long way since the 8 and 16 bit eras of gaming and now not only enjoy games for their gameplay, but also the characters, story, atmosphere, etc. I believe that for the most part, gaming has only gotten better since the old days. Although some devs and or publishing companies are making crappy business decisions lately, The quality of games has generally improved over time, give or take a few exceptions.

     I know I will get massive backlash from fanboys and have my integrity and intelligence as a gamer questioned by the drones themselves, but I just feel like voiceing my opinion on this game.  Obviously, Dark Souls is credited by many gamers as being one of the hardest games in recent memory.  It is indeed a very difficult, and very frustrating game as well.  The frustration stems from the fact that almost every enemy in the game can do massive amounts of damage to your health, especially the bosses which alot of them can instantly kill you in one hit.  There are other factors of the game that make it very frustrating to play as well, like the bonfire system.  The bonfire system is basically a bunch of checkpoints spread throughout the world.  When you rest at a bonfire, your health is fully replenished and you can level your skills with the souls you have collected from enemies.  My issue with the bonfires is that they are, more often than not, too far apart from eachother.  There are many instances where I will have been walking around fighting enemies to get to the next bonfire, I have been doing this for about atleast 15 min and I happen to die.  Well instead of spawning fairly near the area where you got killed or died, you have to start over at the last bonfire you rested at, therefore having to repeat 15 to 20 min of gameplay all over again.  And the worst part is that all the enemies that you were fighting along the way respawn back, therefore making the whole thing feel really tedious.  Basically, I think the bonfire/checkpoint system is flawed in that they are too spread apart in most cases.

     The other frustrating aspect about this game that I want to address is the enemies and bosses.  Now this aspect of the game being frustrating obviously comes down to personal opinion.  In my opinion it is the second aspect of the game that frustrates me to the point of turning the game off.  First of all, alot of the enemies in this game can insta-kill you, especially if you dont see these moves coming.  Now some people will say that you just gotta learn the enemies attack patterns and stuff.  Well that is frustrating to do especially when once you think youve learned an enemies attack pattern and weakness, they do something else out of nowhere that catches you off guard again and often ends with an inst-kill.  The bosses are even more frustrating cinsidering that alot of them change thier pattern of attack so often that it is difficult to adapt to the fight at hand or the fight is so lopsided that you can barely move before your just dead.  For example, the Capra Demon is one of the most frustrating fights in the whole game. What makes this fight so difficult is that he has two dogs fighting with him that make this fight almost unbarable.  The second you enter the room, the dogs will gang up on you almost instantly and then the Demon will do a jumping attack at you which feels almost impossible to dodge.  That attack will do about 3/4 of your life bar in damage in most cases and then the dogs will continue to gang rape you then giving the demon a free kill shot at you.  I tried healing with flasks when I could, but I was just getting overwhelmed to the point where it didnt matter.  Hell I had to have a friend help me beat him by killing the dogs so I could consentrate on the demon himself.  To me, that is a bullcrap bossfight and one of many reasons I cant bring myself to want to play this game.

     The third thing i want to address is how some of the games mechanics are so cryptic that if you dont know in advance how something works in the game, you have to do alot of research on the internet and hope you can find answers.  Like for instance, The Capra demon fight I have been told woulda been alot easier if I had more poise because then the dogs wouldt have been able to basically paralyze me in place for free hits.  How in the hell was I supposed to know that unless I had looked it up on the net somewhere.  That is info that the game should be explaining to the player so that they can be prepared for fights like that.  I shouldnt have to do countless research on the net to find these things out.

     In conclusion, Dark Souls is a game that, while containing very interesting lore and gameplay, has alot of flaws that make it a very frustrating game, for me to the point where I dont have fun playing it for the most part.

Recently within the last year or so I have seen many people on the forums saying stuff like "Uncharted is a movie, not a game" and other similar remarks like that.  I have to firmly disagree with these statements as I believe them to be very illogical and inaccurate.  First of all, games are defined as an interactive medium as opposed to movies which are more a visual only medium.  In games you actually interact with the environment and characters around you while in a movie you just sit back and watch it all unfold.  So by definition, Uncharted is indeed a game because you the player control Nathan Drake and interact with the environment and characters around you in many different ways.  You often have to solve puzzles with Elena or Sully or a number of other interesting characters in the game.  You also end up in lots of action packed combat sequences with enemy AI characters as well.  While the game is very cinematic in nature with alot of cool action packed set pieces,  It still has all the elements of gameplay that define it as a videogame.  And to end this blog on a good note I will say that the Uncharted series for me has been one of the best experiences in gaming for me this gen.