Unconquered Mountains

The half painted shed. The unfinished novel. The unread web scripting book sold on eBay. We've all had projects that we didn't quite finish. For whatever reason, there are some ambitions that we begin enthusiastically, but lose interest somewhere along the way. The same applies to gaming. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has started some grand gaming project, never to finish it. Today I'm going to talk about some of my unconquered gaming mountains.

Learn Starcraft 2

This applies to every RTS game I've ever played, but Starcraft 2 is the most recent. With an integrated league system, achievements and the general buzz surrounding the game just after its release, I was giddy with excitement at the prospect of finally putting some meaningful time into an online multiplayer RTS.

Upon finishing the campaign I set out to learn the basics of playing as the Terran. I read up on build orders, practiced openings against the AI, watched replays, and even played a few games in the practice league. Surprisingly, I wasn't terrible. I managed to win a few games, and it felt as if I'd earned the victories just by having a grasp of some of the main concepts of competitive Starcraft play.

Fast forward to a few nights ago, when I jumped into a few team matches with some old WoW guildies. As I bumbled about, trying to find hotkeys and wondering what I should have been building, it felt like it was my first time playing, all over again. It might as well have been, since it was the first time I'd played since the 7 practice games I'd managed over a year ago. It made me think back to when I was planning on becoming a Starcraft 2 regular. That was going to be my place in the world of competitive online play.

I think it was the pressure. I play games to relax, and there's nothing more relaxing than a single player game, where there's nobody to judge you. Scripted AI doesn't care how bad you are, it just gets on with it's pre-scripted role without passing judgement. Starcraft 2 requires a lot of intense concentration and multi-tasking, and I think it's the latter that's my achilles heel. There's always something I'm forgetting, whether it's building more supply depots, calling down MULEs, expanding, or even building units at all. And all the while, I'm supposed to be watching the enemy and deciding on which units will best counter theirs? It's overwhelming, and I think it's what led to a few decisions to play something instead of Starcraft 2, and slowly my attention was diverted to other, more relaxing games.

I'm sure it's something you get used to. I still really like Starcraft 2 despite being rubbish at it, and it may even be something I haven't truly given up on yet. Since the multiplayer session earlier this week, I've been watching replays and idly looking at Terran strategies for dummies. I think I can see where this is leading.

Finish Every Final Fantasy Game

A classic. I'm sure I'm amongst hundreds of thousands of gamers who got into Final Fantasy late, either in the PSOne or PS2 era, and upon finishing a couple of games in the series, slammed their fist on the table, proclaiming "I'm going to finish every last one!" Let's take a look at my progress, shall we? It's worth noting that I challenged myself to this somewhere in between Final Fantasy 8 and 9, which was over 10 years ago.

• Final Fantasy - I got to the point where I upgraded my character classes, and gave up due the sheer slog through mindless random battles.
• Final Fantasy 2 - I've owned 2 different versions of it. Never played it.
• Final Fantasy 3 - I've never even owned it, despite a shiny DS remake.
• Final Fantasy 4 - Again, I never bothered to pick it up, let alone play it.
• Final Fantasy 5 - I at least had a crack at this one on an emulator. I'm not sure where I left it, but it was far from the end. I don't remember a thing about it, it was so long ago.
• Final Fantasy 6 - There's a playstation memory card somewhere in the back of a dusty cupboard that has a save file right before Kefka's tower. I dragged myself through the entire, poorly emulated playstation port with horrible loading times, only to suddenly stop playing right at the end. Why do I do this to myself?
• Final Fantasy 7, 8, 9, 10 - Actually finished! Hurrah!
• Final Fantasy 11 - Now, we all know this one doesn't count.
• Final Fantasy 12 - I was playing WoW at the time, and not just a few times a week like I do now. This was full on WoW time, when I would play whenever I had a free moment. During this period, it took me weeks to finish a playthrough of the extremely short Fable. How was a really long RPG going to stand a chance?
• Final Fantasy 13 - Finished.

5 out of 13. Nice going Captain Attention Span.

Defeat Every Dark Aeon, Penance and Nemesis in Final Fantasy 10

I have a soft spot for optional bosses. That's why I was foaming at the mouth at the prospect of taking on a dark version of every aeon, souped up versions of pretty much every enemy in the game in the arena, and the two unlockable 'uber' bosses that each of these side quests unlocked. So much to do after story completion. So many reasons to powerlevel my characters to insane proportions.

It seemed like there was a good way to cheese it too. By creating weapons that converted my overdrive bar (filled up by taking damage) into experience, and adding a nice ability that tripled said experience, it was merely a case of finding an enemy that was going to dish out some intense pain, and reap the massive amounts of experience rewarded for my overdrive bar constantly filling up. Thankfully, such a monster existed; the Don Tonberry.

But of course, this was long before World of Warcraft broke me through the grind barrier. After the initial setup, when the actual grinding began, it wasn't long before I gave up out of sheer boredom. Perhaps I'd be more successful these days since I'm a little less resistant to farming in RPGs. But until the day comes when I decide to dust off the old PS2 and pop FFX in, this remains another achievement I gave up on.

Disgaea

I have a very strange relationship with hardcore strategy RPG Disgaea. In a way, it's the perfect game for me as I absolutely love min-maxing. The amount of character development is incredible, and would allow anyone with enough patience to create an army of indestructible super-demons.

But maybe there's a little too much. I'm the type of gamer who has to be getting the most out of their characters at all times. If I'm offered ways of improving, even optionally, I always will before progressing through the main part of the game. In Disgaea, very early on you're able to create a multitude of different character classes, of which upgrades are unlocked when you reach certain level milestones. Items can be upgraded by entering their own item world, which can sometimes consist of a dungeon with as many as 100 floors. It's due to all this that I've barely scratched the surface of Disgaea's story.

The advice I've read is that you can get through your first playthrough simply by using the main character, who should level up enough to get you through mostly on his own. But that's not good enough for me. I've created one of every class. I want them all to be as equally powerful. That means hundreds of runs through item worlds and levelling characters from scratch every time a new class is unlocked.

I just can't do it. I've started Disgaea on 4 separate occasions, trying to focus on the story in the latter couple of attempts, but each time, I get distracted by all the side-content, which eventually becomes overwhelming enough that I stop playing.

Maybe it's for the best. The max level in Disgaea is 9999, and then there's the option of returning a character to level 1 with higher base stats in order to level them up to 9999 again and get even better resulting stats. I'm not sure I want to know what such a game mechanic would do to me.

Got any failed gaming ambitions you want to share? Comment!