Adventures in Babysitting
No, I didn't pick up a second job.
Rather, we're trying to pick up our weekend roleplaying after having been largely on hold for the last few months. This has involved shifting to Sundays because it was pretty much the only day one player would be available. That's a little difficulty psychologically by itself just because I'm so accustomed to having Sunday off to decompress after any play that might happen on Saturday. But it was also a bit of a surprise to get said player's wife along (which had been discussed as an undated possibility way back when) as well as a second infant on the premises.
I think I can safely say I am not a "kid person." I understand that new parents want to continue to engage in whatever fun activities they had before, and I understand that when both want to be so involved the default option is probably bringing their child along with. But between the watching, wrangling, breast-feeding, and crying (which Zyden seems more inclined to do than Gavin - hope I'm spelling those right), many such activities are going to be disrupted by kids along. I've been willing to try it, and I'm not to the point of calling things off yet, but I do feel... put upon by having infants present for an afternoon of gaming.
On top of that, my home is decidedly not baby proof. I suppose it could be made moreso, but the thought of having to do so, particularly for other people's kids, is offensive to me. Playing somewhere else may be the way we go down the line. I've generally played host by virtue of being semi-central and more "in town" than the other players in that group. Nevermind that a couple times we've played at one of the others' houses, I've ended up headachy and nauseous for 12-24 hours afterward (due, I suspect, to residual... smoke).
I suppose we'll see how things go yet, but my thoughts on the future of this particular group/schedule are not favorable at this time.
A step forward and a step back? While MGS 4 wowed me right off, GTA hasn't proven quite so impressive to me. Oh, it looks good and there's a lot of detail, but I'm finding myself missing things that have existed in previous installments. What's up with that?
Pros:
- Perfectly fine overall. Good visuals, solid movement, lock-on that works pretty well, use of cover, etc.
- I think I like the new setup in having to evade police to lower wanted levels.
- Lots of little sub-games like bowling, darts, and pool that are well done.
- GPS feature in cars. Neatness.
Cons:
- One city, no airplanes like in San Andreas. No more hillsides of wilderness or parachuting from a Learjet look-alike.
- No levelable traits like in SA. No purchasing of additional properties/businesses (Vice City and SA, I think) that I've seen so far.
- High-maintenance associates - friends and girlfriends who call wanting to do something and turning them down can lose you reputation with them. Seriously, I've been called by one person while going to pick up another. Connected is that you're given an hour in game time to pick someone up, even if it'll take twice that to reach them from across the city. This means I can't take time to myself collecting cars or exploring without brushing off multiple calls and slowly losing favor of people.
- Accents. Some of the characters are really hard to understand. Okay, it might just be that I don't have an advanced, crystal-clear sound system, but I've run a couple missions blind (just following the goals as they come up with no idea what I'm doing overall) because of this.
Hmm... yep. The things I "don't like" about the game tend to be things I've seen done better (in my opinion) in the GTA 3 series. I guess the game designers know their stuff, but they couldn't include everything (or decided they didn't want some of those things) in their first PS3/X360 installment.
Rather, we're trying to pick up our weekend roleplaying after having been largely on hold for the last few months. This has involved shifting to Sundays because it was pretty much the only day one player would be available. That's a little difficulty psychologically by itself just because I'm so accustomed to having Sunday off to decompress after any play that might happen on Saturday. But it was also a bit of a surprise to get said player's wife along (which had been discussed as an undated possibility way back when) as well as a second infant on the premises.
I think I can safely say I am not a "kid person." I understand that new parents want to continue to engage in whatever fun activities they had before, and I understand that when both want to be so involved the default option is probably bringing their child along with. But between the watching, wrangling, breast-feeding, and crying (which Zyden seems more inclined to do than Gavin - hope I'm spelling those right), many such activities are going to be disrupted by kids along. I've been willing to try it, and I'm not to the point of calling things off yet, but I do feel... put upon by having infants present for an afternoon of gaming.
On top of that, my home is decidedly not baby proof. I suppose it could be made moreso, but the thought of having to do so, particularly for other people's kids, is offensive to me. Playing somewhere else may be the way we go down the line. I've generally played host by virtue of being semi-central and more "in town" than the other players in that group. Nevermind that a couple times we've played at one of the others' houses, I've ended up headachy and nauseous for 12-24 hours afterward (due, I suspect, to residual... smoke).
I suppose we'll see how things go yet, but my thoughts on the future of this particular group/schedule are not favorable at this time.
A step forward and a step back? While MGS 4 wowed me right off, GTA hasn't proven quite so impressive to me. Oh, it looks good and there's a lot of detail, but I'm finding myself missing things that have existed in previous installments. What's up with that?
Pros:
- Perfectly fine overall. Good visuals, solid movement, lock-on that works pretty well, use of cover, etc.
- I think I like the new setup in having to evade police to lower wanted levels.
- Lots of little sub-games like bowling, darts, and pool that are well done.
- GPS feature in cars. Neatness.
Cons:
- One city, no airplanes like in San Andreas. No more hillsides of wilderness or parachuting from a Learjet look-alike.
- No levelable traits like in SA. No purchasing of additional properties/businesses (Vice City and SA, I think) that I've seen so far.
- High-maintenance associates - friends and girlfriends who call wanting to do something and turning them down can lose you reputation with them. Seriously, I've been called by one person while going to pick up another. Connected is that you're given an hour in game time to pick someone up, even if it'll take twice that to reach them from across the city. This means I can't take time to myself collecting cars or exploring without brushing off multiple calls and slowly losing favor of people.
- Accents. Some of the characters are really hard to understand. Okay, it might just be that I don't have an advanced, crystal-clear sound system, but I've run a couple missions blind (just following the goals as they come up with no idea what I'm doing overall) because of this.
Hmm... yep. The things I "don't like" about the game tend to be things I've seen done better (in my opinion) in the GTA 3 series. I guess the game designers know their stuff, but they couldn't include everything (or decided they didn't want some of those things) in their first PS3/X360 installment.
New parents wanting to continue to engage in their old activities is one reason I firmly believe that one should pick a wife (or mother, I suppose) with whom one has very little in common. Solves many issues, like bringing the baby to mutual interests, actually talking to the person, etc... Also, it might be a good idea for at least one of the babies you are hosting at these games to get used to being around small dice, and sharp metal things ;)
ReplyDeleteHeh. Little in common, eh? That's one way to go, I suppose. Dice and bladed items... I guess we could call it a Darwinistic approach to child rearing?
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