Words On Wednesday

What does it mean to “complete” or “finish” a video game? What criteria are required to say that you beat a game? Obviously, this isn’t a simple question, and there are no definite right or wrong answers. Video games comprise a huge industry, and there is such an immense variety among them that what applies for one game or genre may not apply in the slightest to another. I might be able to “beat” a First-Person Shooter (FPS) in under 10 hours easily, but to say that you “beat” a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG) typically implies hundreds if not thousands of hours of work, and frequently means continued play as developers release new content. Are there any hard and fast metrics you can judge this by? Main storyline is obviously a large component for completing a game. Can’t say you’ve beaten it if you’ve never seen the ending of the story. Usually that means you can see the credits, too. But what about games that have extra story content after the credits rol...

I grew up playing Pokemon. Starting with Pokemon Blue Version in gen 1, I’ve played a Pokemon game from almost every generation released to date. However, the most fun I’ve had in any Pokemon game was doing cooperative double battles in the Battle Tower of Pokemon HeartGold. HeartGold came out when I was a freshman in college, and I preordered it to pick up on release day. Generation 2 was always my favorite, with two full regions and a lot of my favorite Pokemon. Obviously, I was super excited for a remake of that generation. I played through the game like normal, finished all 16 gyms, beat the Elite Four, and took down Red at the top of Mt. Silver. I figured after that, I was done. My roommate at the time got SoulSilver, and he taught me about Effort Values, Inherited Values, and the Battle Tower. The main story of Pokemon was only the beginning. The real game starts once you can access the Battle Tower and breed up some powerful Pokemon. I felt like such a noob, but it was fant...