Vicarious Gaming 101: Blitzball’d

We return to the story of a girl who doesn’t played JRPGs and her adventure in watching her friend play through one.  This is what happens when people stop being nice and start getting real….annoyed by Tidus.  Due to my plague-like disease, I was too gross to make with the podcasting this week.  As a substitute Leah and I returned to Final Fantasy X and added a few more hours to our quest.

Leah continues to be both a good friend and a patient human being by humoring me and guiding us through another 2.5 hours of Final Fanasty X.  This took us right to the end of the Blitzball tournament in Luca.  I will say that I am becoming invested and interested in some of the characters in this story.  Lulu and Wakka have me intrigued because there is clearly a past involved with the two and also because they are far less irritating than Yuna or Tidus.  I’m also a huge fan of Kimahri because he’s blue, badass, doesn’t speak, and picks on Tidus.  I mean really how could you go wrong there.  Before you ask, yes Tidus is annoying and I do keep hoping someone accidentally kills him just so I won’t have to hear him anymore.  Yuna might actually annoy me more though.  I mean she got captured by some Al Bhed.  Does this not strike anyone else as ridiculous?  I mean the bitch can summon a giant fire creature for god’s sake!

The highlight of this weeks FFX playing was definitely watching Leah play Blitzball.  She hates that minigame with an undying passion.  After watching her play the one game she was required to play I could see why.  It seems tedious and kind of pointless.  I never understood why these annoying mini games were included in JRPGs in the first place.  It clearly isn’t to increase the length of the game so why bother putting them in?  The only good answer is to entertain those who are watching other people play the game.  For me watching Leah’s disdain at having to deal with Blitzball was the most entertaining part of my 2.5 hours watching FFX this week.  

Beyond my increasing interest in the characters and the obvious amusement of watching Leah deal with Blitzball I also came to realize in this installment that there is a huge vocabulary of terms associated with JRPGs that is completely foreign to me.  Leah is patient and explains the differences between spells like Cure and Esuna and details things like Overdrive and the Sphere Grid but I have to say it’s all a bit overwhelming for me.  I think feeling overwhelmed might be the number 1 reason that I don’t currently play JRPGs.  There is just so much to manage between characters in battle, stats, abilities, spells, items, armor, etc.  This creates a huge barrier for me where I could play the first hour or so and then I would have to deal with all of this business and it scares me off.  In shooters or fighting games my options are much more limited and it’s all much more manageable.  I’m not sure if this means I’m simple minded, impatient, or just like violence.  If I had to guess I would say the third one but I could also be a combo of the first two.

So after all that rambling what have I learned this week? 

1) Leah hates Blitzball

2) Tidus and Yuna are almost as irritating as Blitzball

3) Kimahri is freaking awesome

4) JRPGs might make me feel a little dumb and slow

This is sure to get more interesting as time goes on so stay tuned to my vicarious gaming saga.