the new relevence of .hack for me..
Posted: Sun Sep 17, 2006 5:46 pm
I had a weird nerd-girl epiphany the other day and I wanted to share it. it's kind of convoluted thinking but I swear it'll make sense. maybe...
So unlike alot of people I never really played any of the .hack//sign series. I read all kinds of rave reviews and most of my friends were really into it, but for whatever reason I just never really picked up on it. The same applies to the anime. The first series is rather chatty and character driven, and I always would catch it midway through a re-run of the series on cartoon network. I'd watch it and scratch my head. The same goes for its 2nd incarnation .hack//twilight, which was just plain annoying. I couldn't even stomach it when it was the only thing on at 5am.
I just didn't get it, I guess.
I mean, who wants to watch a show ABOUT people playing an MMO? that was my rationale at the time. flash forward 2 few years.
I recently came over to FFXI from World of Warcraft, which I'd devoted the better part of the last 2 years of my gaming life to. Many people are of the opinion that WoW "sucks", having never played it themselves. To be frank, I think in terms of actual gameplay and game mechanics, WoW has FFXI beat hands down. I come from a game where a well geared 'endgame' warrior can exceed 8000 Hp and destroy 10 players singlehandedly with minimal effort. I come from a game where there are servers that are dedicated to PvP, where druids can shapeshift from bears to sealions, and where an undead player, upon killing you, can eat your corpse. How thrilling.
But the real appeal for me was I made so many great friends through that game, many of whom became some of my closest RL friends because of it. Like we all shared some kind of bond because we did all this crazy stuff together online.
Many of those friends spoke about having played FFXI and stopped for whatever reason, but when reminiscing about their expieriences online, they'd get a far off look in their eyes and a little smile at the corner of their mouths. That's what piqued my curiosity. And as we all know, curiosity killed the cat...
I came to Vana'diel on a whim. WoW had gotten increadibly tedious, and I needed a break. Alot of the glamour and fun i felt when i first started playing was gone, the game felt like a job gone sour, a job that I was looking for an excuse to quit. I came as a tourist, and ended up as a resident. When I logged in for the first time, I felt like a stranger in a foreign country where i barely spoke the language. Everything was new, but it felt very 'lived in' at the same time.
I'm still trying to get over the novelty of being a newbie again.
The other night I was perusing downloads on a site I subscribe to, and I saw '.hack//roots' listed on their menu. I had this vague reccolection in my head where I got an images and my mind said "boring! forget it". but for whatever reason I clicked the download link. And really, I don't know what it was, but watching it? It suddenly -spoke- to me. I don't know if it was the years spent playing WoW, or just starting up in FFXI, but I suddenly kind of 'Got' it.
I never played everquest or any of the other MMO's. I briefly dabbled with city of heroes, but mostly I was strictly RTS and console games. In fact I used to make fun of my friends who got hooked on EQ. And now here I am, some years down the line, doing roughly the same thing. If they saw me now would they be laughing, or welcoming me with open arms?
.hack//roots, or really, the .hack series, is the equivelent of an MMO player's soap opera. It's "days of our lives" for MMO players. It talks about thinks like PKing and the problem of RMT's, RL issues affecting gameplay, social issues, etc. It adresses that whole "you never know who's behind the keyboard" kind of thing alot too. 2 or 3 years ago I just didn't grasp this at all. it was so totally foreign to me. and now all of a sudden, I realize that 'yeahh, I'm the nerd that this is directed towards'.
I love it. I'm totally addicted to it. It's a show aimed at people like you and I, male or female, that have spent way too much time planted in front of a monitor, with a mouse or gamepad in there hands, exploring a virtual world that occasionally feels more like home than the real thing.
Part of me, the really cynical part, wants to say "sooo.. you've just realized how big of a nerd you really are?" while the other half of me is standing triumphantly and saying "Yes, I am that nerd, and I I love it!!".
-mira
So unlike alot of people I never really played any of the .hack//sign series. I read all kinds of rave reviews and most of my friends were really into it, but for whatever reason I just never really picked up on it. The same applies to the anime. The first series is rather chatty and character driven, and I always would catch it midway through a re-run of the series on cartoon network. I'd watch it and scratch my head. The same goes for its 2nd incarnation .hack//twilight, which was just plain annoying. I couldn't even stomach it when it was the only thing on at 5am.
I just didn't get it, I guess.
I mean, who wants to watch a show ABOUT people playing an MMO? that was my rationale at the time. flash forward 2 few years.
I recently came over to FFXI from World of Warcraft, which I'd devoted the better part of the last 2 years of my gaming life to. Many people are of the opinion that WoW "sucks", having never played it themselves. To be frank, I think in terms of actual gameplay and game mechanics, WoW has FFXI beat hands down. I come from a game where a well geared 'endgame' warrior can exceed 8000 Hp and destroy 10 players singlehandedly with minimal effort. I come from a game where there are servers that are dedicated to PvP, where druids can shapeshift from bears to sealions, and where an undead player, upon killing you, can eat your corpse. How thrilling.
But the real appeal for me was I made so many great friends through that game, many of whom became some of my closest RL friends because of it. Like we all shared some kind of bond because we did all this crazy stuff together online.
Many of those friends spoke about having played FFXI and stopped for whatever reason, but when reminiscing about their expieriences online, they'd get a far off look in their eyes and a little smile at the corner of their mouths. That's what piqued my curiosity. And as we all know, curiosity killed the cat...
I came to Vana'diel on a whim. WoW had gotten increadibly tedious, and I needed a break. Alot of the glamour and fun i felt when i first started playing was gone, the game felt like a job gone sour, a job that I was looking for an excuse to quit. I came as a tourist, and ended up as a resident. When I logged in for the first time, I felt like a stranger in a foreign country where i barely spoke the language. Everything was new, but it felt very 'lived in' at the same time.
I'm still trying to get over the novelty of being a newbie again.
The other night I was perusing downloads on a site I subscribe to, and I saw '.hack//roots' listed on their menu. I had this vague reccolection in my head where I got an images and my mind said "boring! forget it". but for whatever reason I clicked the download link. And really, I don't know what it was, but watching it? It suddenly -spoke- to me. I don't know if it was the years spent playing WoW, or just starting up in FFXI, but I suddenly kind of 'Got' it.
I never played everquest or any of the other MMO's. I briefly dabbled with city of heroes, but mostly I was strictly RTS and console games. In fact I used to make fun of my friends who got hooked on EQ. And now here I am, some years down the line, doing roughly the same thing. If they saw me now would they be laughing, or welcoming me with open arms?
.hack//roots, or really, the .hack series, is the equivelent of an MMO player's soap opera. It's "days of our lives" for MMO players. It talks about thinks like PKing and the problem of RMT's, RL issues affecting gameplay, social issues, etc. It adresses that whole "you never know who's behind the keyboard" kind of thing alot too. 2 or 3 years ago I just didn't grasp this at all. it was so totally foreign to me. and now all of a sudden, I realize that 'yeahh, I'm the nerd that this is directed towards'.
I love it. I'm totally addicted to it. It's a show aimed at people like you and I, male or female, that have spent way too much time planted in front of a monitor, with a mouse or gamepad in there hands, exploring a virtual world that occasionally feels more like home than the real thing.
Part of me, the really cynical part, wants to say "sooo.. you've just realized how big of a nerd you really are?" while the other half of me is standing triumphantly and saying "Yes, I am that nerd, and I I love it!!".
-mira