Decisions, decisions…

As of today, I am two weeks away from my due date. Therefore, certain things need to be taken care of and planned now, as technically, Thing 2 could make his arrival any minute now, even while I’m typing this. Car seat has to be installed, the nursery has to be finished (this is almost done), and of course, I need to have my hospital bag packed and pretty much ready to go at a moment’s notice.

My hospital bag this time around has experience on its side. I now know what I’m allowed to bring into the delivery room, what I will definitely need post-delivery, and of course, what is absolutely useless to me during both time periods. One thing I have not decided upon yet is which game system to bring with me–Vita or 3DS.

Last time, I had 6 hours in between the glorious time the epidural was administered and when it was time for the actual delivery. We filled it with watching the History channel, as there was a fantastic 8-hour special that day on the Revolutionary War (that the delivery team TURNED OFF during the last 30 minutes. I’m still not over that). I might be able to entertain myself this week with Shark Week, if I do indeed have him this week, but I can’t count on TV for all possible scenarios. It’s up to a handheld, something I did not pack last time.

I originally thought I would bring my 3DS to help with the lull that will surely take place after the epidural. I have two games on there that are meant to play during lulls–Final Fantasy Theatrhythm and Animal Crossing: New Leaf. Then again, I may pick up Dragon’s Crown for the Vita today, and if it’s the delightful hack-n-slash greatness it seems to be, that will be far more fun than either Theatrhythm or ACNL, the latter of which I’m getting slightly bored of lately.

Even if I don’t get or don’t like Dragon’s Crown, I have the Vita packed full of Final Fantasy games, all of which I mean to finish or rage quit one day.

I’m definitely not taking both, since I’m already bringing chargers for my phone and Nook and I don’t want to laden down my bag with two more I’ll have to keep track of. I have a feeling it’s going to come down to whichever handheld I’m playing at that moment, as that will be the one I toss into the bag as soon as I realize these contractions are finally not false labor. I’m getting a little sick of the false labor from the past week.

Dear Diary,

This is most likely the most boring entry I’ll ever have because I haven’t done anything different or new since my last entry. I’m still playing both Animal Crossing: New Leaf and Skyrim nearly every day, and I don’t have anything to say about either except for “same shit, different day.”

Yeah, this is kind of what it looked like.

In many ways, it sounds like both games are incredibly boring. I will say this–they aren’t games anyone could really find enjoyable watching. I remember watching friends playing Final Fantasy VIII in college, and wow were they ever playing it badly. In this particular instance, our friend was fighting a dragon boss (I’ve never played the game, so I’m sorry I’m not familiar with what was going on) and I watched him pull the same few attacks over and over. For starters, watching the summoning of Shiva is only entertaining the first two times. I was pretty damn thrilled when she was killed so I wouldn’t have to watch that 30+ second animation a 50th time. Unfortunately, that was a terrible event for this particular player, as he was suddenly cut down to performing pretty much one task each turn: bringing teammates back to life. Literally this is what I watched for longer than I care to admit:

• Dragon flutters wings.
• One party member dies, one is barely hanging on.
• One heals one member, and the other brings the dead back to life.
• Rinse, repeat.

Then I guess the dragon just got as bored as we all were, because he finally breathed fire on everyone, which summoned the “Game Over” screen and sweet relief for everyone in the living room. FINALLY we could leave for the fricking bar.

That’s exactly what I imagine watching either Skyrim or ACNL would be like; everyone begging for the sweet release of death so we can go to the bar (or in the case of ACNL, begging for you to run out of boring things to do).

As such, it’s hard for me to fully explain why I like them so much. Even with other turn-based games that could be extremely boring to watch, such as Lost Odyssey, I can think of several positives that people would enjoy watching. For either of these, not so much, and that’s because I feel like I do more running around and wandering than anything else.

It’s especially baffling when you take into consideration that I’m a huge story gamer. So far, the story in Skyrim has not impressed me that much (if that continues, I think I’ll get bored before too long) and there is no real story in ACNL. Yet, ACNL taps into what kept me going with both Tiny Tower and Pocket Planes for so long.

So yeah, if you ask me what I like about either, I won’t have an answer. And still, I turn them on every day, even though I have a considerable Stack of Shame, so they must be doing something for me. Just don’t ask me what that is.

Every summer, from about late May or early June until mid or late August, there is a dearth of highly anticipated video game releases. This is exactly why we have the Summer of Arcade sales with Xbox Live, the PlayStation Summer Sale, and of course, the venerable Steam Sale. It’s also the perfect time to catch up on backlogs, like what I’ve attempted to do this summer.

All in all, I’ve been fairly good with my stack of shame this year. It’s a little sad that I’ve played more games from my stack of shame this year than new releases, but sometimes that just happens. I have a feeling that will all change this Fall, starting with the release of Saints Row IV on August 2oth. Then it may be all downhill from there, especially once the next-gen consoles release.

What’s really interesting to me is that during this lull time with releases, I’m playing a video game that has quite a bit of lull time as well. Granted, it’s kind of my own choice, as I’m doing more wandering between locations in Skyrim than I am actually playing quests. I think I’ll go over here…wander that way, kill random beasts and bandits, discover a few towns, and then get killed by a stupid dragon because my level isn’t high enough yet to conquer every dragon I see. In my average play time of 2-3 hours, I maybe get one quest completed because I’m too busy wandering.

And that seems to be the beauty and allure of Skyrim in the first place.

I know I need to stop doing that, because I know I’ll get fed up and bored more quickly if I’m not constantly doing quests. Besides, it would be nice to have a chunk of the main quest done before Thing 2 is born next month.

Then again, I have a feeling that Skyrim will become my own personal World of Warcraft, meaning that it’s a game I’ll play at least once a week while playing other things. I have so many friends who have 200+ hours in Skyrim and haven’t found every quest yet. There’s something to be said for a game that can potentially last that long with random side quests.

At least I know my Xbox 360 will get plenty of play time even after the next-gen releases.