What are your overall thoughts on the potential of video games as a storytelling medium? How does it compare to other media, both in theory and in practice? Do many games come to mind that utilize the capabilities of the game medium to tell a story in such a way that other media couldn't quite imitate?

Games has the unique ability to present a story similar to how a film or television series would, while having the length of a novel. The longest anyone will sit down to watch a movie these days is probably three hours, and while television has a lot more time to tell its story and develop its characters, they're either divided by an hour, or a half an hour per week. A game can be something along 10, 20, or 40 hours of uninterrupted narrative. And you can interact with the world being created in a whole different way than you could with a movie or television show, again kind of like a book. Because you're becoming this character, whether they're custom created or a default character. I think it takes the best of all three of these mediums while offering something new.

As for games that come to mind, I think Final Fantasy VI, Metal Gear Solid, The Last of Us, Beyond: Two Souls, and Telltale's The Walking Dead, The Wolf Among Us, Tales from the Borderlands, and Game of Thrones, and even visual novels like Phoenix Wright, are perfect examples. Final Fantasy touched on a lot of mature themes with respect, even suicide, and that's something I don't see a whole lot of unfortunately. Suicide is usually seen as “the coward's way out” and if you commit ut then you're a terrible person, and all of that, but that wasn't the case in FFVI. We knew why the character went down that road, we sympathized with it, we hoped a miracle would occur and we didn't think less of the character when they did it.

Metal Gear Solid was probably the first game that gave us the “cinematic” experience in a video game that influenced games like Final Fantasy X, Xenosaga, and The Last of Us. And it was able to fit all of that onto two discs. Convert that into a movie and at best you'd probably have a three hour trilogy that still cuts a lot of things out. Because I timed all the cut-scenes in that game, and watching it all with no gameplay is over three hours long. The TV would give it more of a chance to tell the story, but just the Briefing scene alone uncut is thirty minutes. So, outside of a book, a game is really the best medium you could have something like that on because games can be as long as they need to be. The people working on The Last of Us film is probably going to learn that lesson the hard way, because how do you condense all of that into a two hour film? You just can't. Not without losing a lot of the “magic” if you will.

Then Telltale Games come along and show that games can be just like a television series, an interactive television series and there's a market for it because now we have developers like Capcom and Square Enix coming along wanting a piece of the pie. The Elder Scrolls, in terms of world building, is probably the “Lord of the Rings” of video games right now. Because of just how large the world is, how many games it spans, and how many hours you can put into it. It can be that because of the nature of video games, it doesn't need to condense itself into a two hour featured film, or break up various parts one hour each. Not every book out there can be “Lord of the Rings,” “Harry Potter,” or “Game of Thrones.” They have to find a balanced length for their novel or they risk losing readers. Games can afford to be that long a lot more, while having the same visual techniques you'd see in a movie.

What was the hardest game you've ever played?

I'm sure there are people waiting for me to say Dark Souls in answer to this. Well, I'd hate to disappoint but the hardest game I ever played, that I can remember, is Shadow of the Beast. Because of how fast the frame rates were making enemies come within a blink of an eye, which I go into more details in in my review on my blog. But it was ridiculous. You could duck and still get hit, punch the enemy and still get hit, jump and still get hit. No matter what you did nine times out of ten you were going to get hit by something and go back to the beginning. At least Dark Souls had checkpoints. There are no checkpoints here, if you die it's right back to the beginning again. That's why very few people have ever completed Shadow of the Beast to the end.

What was the hardest game you've ever beaten?

I assume you mean fairly because Monster Rancher was so hard I needed to use cheats just to see the ending of the game. I'm going to say... BattleTanx. The original BattleTanx for the Nintendo 64 is probably the hardest game I ever beaten. The campaign mode is a huge pain in the ass. You're getting blasted from all sides, and you have landmines, and other trout coming at you, and you can't even turn your main gun while driving like in the second game. By the end I was running to the finish line with my heart racing trying not to die, and then BOOM! I die, and I have to start all the way at the beginning of the level and try again. I haven't forgotten you, Dark Angels. Oh no. I haven't forgotten. One of these days we're going to go. The final battle! Just me and you, and no one but a select few are going to get this reference. You know who you are! smurfing Dark Angels. You think because you were a big, bad show on FOX that you can take on me? Well, you're going to learn the hard way that when you step into this dog house you're going to get bit! I'm sorry, next question?

What is the most fun minigame in any game you've played?

Hmm... I mostly curse at it now, but when I was a kid my favorite minigame were all the arcades in Final Fantasy VII. Mainly the motorcycle ride. I just like slicing those assholes tires and watching them die a horrible death (okay, so I didn't technically slash their tires, but a kid can dream). It reminded me of Road Rash in a lot of ways because that was mainly a race to the finish on motorcycles where people whacked each other with blunt objects when they got too close. Good times.

What was the longest you've ever played one game, not counting multiple playthroughs or MMOs?

No idea. I'm one of those weird kids who don't keep count of how long I spend on a game. It'd either be one of the many wrestling games I played a bunch of matches on for trouts and giggles, or one of the many RPGs I played like FFVII or FFX which I did play to the end. So, probably one of them. No idea how long it took me. I probably spent a lot of time on FFXII with all the running around I did. Kept getting lost. I don't have very good sense of direction and can't read a map to save my life.

What games you've played were totally unexpected gems?

Dust: An Elysian Tail. Beautiful world, beautiful artwork, fun characters, a good story, and great voice acting. For a game that only cost fourteen dollars it's a pretty good investment. Had I not known going in that this was an independent game, I never would have believed it.

How many visual novels have you read/played?

Not a lot. Maybe a little over four, or close to ten. The main two I played was the first two Phoenix Wright games, then I played some romance stuff that was only available online. It's not a genre I've done too much digging around in for some reason. I'm still trying to find the rest of the Phoenix Wright series. Whenever I have money again...

Which Blizzard games have you played?

World of Warcraft, Diablo, and StarCraft. I played a free trial of WoW years ago and enjoyed it a lot. I avoided getting hopelessly addicted to it by being too cheap to afford the monthly subscription after my free trial ended. I played the first Diablo with my brother on the PlayStation and had a lot of fun with that, too. And I've done reviews of both StarCraft games and loved them. The story in StarCraft 2 was better than I would have expected it to be for an RTS title.

What games in any given genre were so good that other games in that genre could really go and learn from the things those games did so well?

In RTS games that goes to StarCraft 2. The campaign was non-linear, had interesting characters right off the bat and lots to do just outside of the usual missions, and the missions were pretty varied. Even Command and Conquer could learn some things from it, and I loved those games.

When it comes to the fighting genre, I have to say Evil Zone and Mortal Kombat. Evil Zone showed you could have a good story in a fighting game and plenty of characters who are tied to each other. Mortal Kombat showed you could have entire story arcs. I know a lot of people didn't like most of the 3D games after MK4, but the story arc that carries over from Deadly Alliance to Mortal Kombat IX was amazing, and I loved watching it continue on from game to game. It got me excited to see what would happen next.