There are good games that can be done without conflict. It's generally possible to play through Metal Gear Solid games entirely on stealth, supposedly Fallout: New Vegas, and there have been good puzzle and adventure games that were completely without the player having to kill enemies.
One thing I will say in defense of the PS3 is that it's the best-built non-Nintendo console I've ever seen. The PS1 and PS2 were prone to the disc laser failing after a couple of years of heavy use - I know I went through 3 PS2s before I jumped into seventh-gen gaming with the Wii and 360, and two PS1s before that - and don't even get me started on the 360 unless you want to hear a bunch of ranting and swearing that make Gamemaster 4747 proud. And on the subject of Nintendo, even the NES wasn't the best-made piece of electronics out there. Some days I spent more time trying to get the NES cartridge to work without the screen flashing than I did playing the game!
But yeah, I definitely feel your pain. I will be definitely watching the next generation of consoles to make sure all the bugs are ironed out before I jump in. And I worry that EA's shady DRM practices of always online and all the other crooked stuff they put in their EULAs will become industry standard.
What I mostly hate about modern gaming is DRM and day-one patches. I remember spending countless hours with Maxis games like Sim City and Sim Ant when I was younger. Now I feel like I can't buy the new SimCity or any other EA game withouy my lawyer present to review the EULA. Final Fantasy VI had a few big bugs and glitches, like Relm's Sketch and the Evasion stat not working, but it was nothing compared to how buggy a Bethesda game is at launch, and even how buggy they are months after launch.
However, I will also say that the SNES never had games quite like Valkyria Chronicles, Ni no Kuni, or - yes - Fallout 3 or New Vegas. I just wish there was a way to keep everything good we've seen and throw out the bad. But then again, Ni no Kuni wasn't even saddled with all the bad stuff I associate with some modern games, so there is some hope.
Valkyrie Profile was definitely a surprise hit for me. I had a choice between it and Chrono Cross back in 2000. VP looked more interesting but I wasn't sure about its game play style compared to the safer style of CC. I went for VP anyway, and after buying the latter as a Player's Choice title for $20 a year later, I'm glad I went for Valkyrie Profile.
I don't think traditional RPGs are going away so much as they are changing. I've found plenty of good RPGs this generation, including one excellent game from the makers of VP, Resonance of Fate. And with cel-shaded graphics looking better than ever, I don't miss sprite graphics as much as I used to.
This is why it's not worth buying many games day one anymore. Games need to at least work well right off the disc. There is no perfect game, but when a product is so buggy as to be unplayable, that's inexcusable, and the game company should man up and take it on the chin. I'm not paying $60 to be a beta-tester, and I feel it's an insult to gamers that they should have to put up with such shoddy day one releases. At a time when publishers are so concerned about lthe secondhand market and piracy, they really need to be thinking about making sure we feel like we got our moneys' worth.
Poor planning on a game publisher's part does not constitute an emergency on my part.
This was a great game, and I bought it 4 months after beating Final Fantasy VII. I heard about it in IGNPSX's Japan imports articles. Back then I was still used to all the SNES-era cherrypicking and blind dart-throwing that seemed to dictate whether or not we'd ever get RPGs in the US - a trend which was thankfully killed by Square and Working Designs on the PS1 - and thought it was great when Square decided to release it over here. The game's cut-scenes looked impressive and I found it creepier than Resident Evil 1 or 2, not to take away from those games. PE was the first game I ever pre-ordered, and I still have my original copy.
I remember Pac-Man cereal from when I was a kid, and we had it a few times. I guess all the furor over childhood obesity made themed kids' cereals like Pac-Man politically incorrect. Funny, because I was a skinny kid.
Twin Snakes is actually the only version of MGS I've played (prior to that, my only experience with Metal Gear was on the NES). When I was a PS1 gamer, my attention was primarily occupied by Square, Capcom, Namco, Enix, and Working Designs. I bought Twin Snakes at a time when I'd just gotten a Gamecube and was filling out its library with games. I really enjoyed it, and I enjoyed the Nintendo easter eggs in the Psycho Mantis segments.
With GOTY editions, it's almost not worth buying a lot of titles day one anymore. I love Fallout 3 and New Vegas, but sometimes I wish I'd held out on them until their GOTY editions came out.
Although Aerith's death was an incredible scene, pretty much all of Final Fantasy VII was wonderful, start to finish. That game has more awesome moments for me than any 10 other games put together.
