My excitement for Watch Dogs is inversely proportional to
hype surrounding its release -- and directly proportional to the amount of time
left until said release.
I can remember a time
when I thought that the game would be something new, exciting, and interesting,
and actually looked forward to seeing more of it. But from what I’ve seen and what I could
gather, and with the knowledge gained from what are now semi-historical
precedents (and recent concerns), I’m not feeling very confident about its
quality. Is Aiden Pearce going to be
more than just a bland, designated hero living out a revenge fantasy? Probably not.
Is the gameplay and game at large going to offer up something better
than what we’ve seen in the open-world genre?
Probably not. Is the story going
to have something meaningful to say and do more than just name-check real-world
concerns? Probably not. And I feel bad about thinking the way I do
right now; once upon a time, I would have been eager to try Watch Dogs, or anything coming down the
pipeline. Now it feels like I have to wait for people to announce that the newest release is anything above "not terrible". Look at what you’ve done to me, video games.
Well, maybe this is
just a sign that I need to stay away from triple-A games forever for a
while. Tokyo Jungle has been plenty good to me recently, after all, so
it’s not like I’m ready to wash my hands of this woeful medium.
And then there’s Transistor.
Oh dear, is there ever.