This is a journal prompt to make a list.

So, here are 5 video games to which I refer often when people ask me if video games are art (actually, they never ask that; they just ask what my favorites are. This is mostly in descending order of awesome. Mostly.

1. Undertale by Toby Fox – an emotional experience like no other, Undertale speaks to the lost child in all of us. Yes, all indie games feature this now, but Undertale earns every metagame moment, and genuinely makes you feel things about yourself that you wouldn’t have just hitting buttons in a JRPG on which it’s modeled.
2. Planescape: Torment – Released in 1999, this game set the standard for multiple endings based on story decisions and remains the game for which the most writing was ever done. Each setting and every character have unimaginable depth based solely on the writing and the evocation of your own imagination.
3. Mass Effect Series – This game has unbelievable scale, broke down barriers of openly gay relationships in video games, and defined the narrative western RPG forever. Although Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic tested the waters for Bioware’s epic, they proved with this series that their writers could create one of the most complex and expansive science fiction universes of modern times.
4. Arkham Series – Every one of these games manages to encapsulate multiple eras of comic book feelings in a single game. Players get to tangle with Batman’s incomparable rogues gallery, and examine the reasons why Batman and his comics are the most psychologically potent of the genre.
5. Bioshock Series – Although I am partial to the first story’s setting and villain, each one experimented with agency on the part of the player, making them unwittingly complicit in a Rand-ian tale filled with paranoia, fear, and the desire to give up freedom for a sense of control, all while appealing to the modern-day shoot-em-up crowd.

That’s all for now.

Thanks, Harmontown.

I have renewed my focus on improving myself, despite the feeling that it is selfish. I’m only three days into this new outlook, to be objective, but I have worked out at a difficult level, meditated, journaled, and completed chores and other assigned tasks, even in the face of what I consider obstacles. I have even been able to fit in some video game time.

Last night, I turned in another strong performance with the unrehearsed Shakespeare company of which I am a troupe member. I was outshone by a friend, but I held more pride in his performance than any real envy. I want to perform at that level. I want women to look at me in awe the way the dainty, stern-faced woman did at him at the end of the show. I want to have people tell me how blown away they were by my performance. But, this time it felt more like a personal goal than an unyielding vacuum within that needed validation. I want to achieve, and that is different than wanting accolades.

Perhaps that is the confusion most people have when I say I want to be revered and that fame sometimes is the only metric for progress in that arena. Like pride, I think it comes in two forms, one positive and one negative. I want the positive and eschew the negative, in pride, in fame, and in life.

My meditations are encouraging me to distance myself from my thoughts and feelings, as they are not my true identity. I am beginning to understand it, even if it can be difficult to extricate myself from the mire. And I’m using myself instead of oneself, because I am beginning to allow this journey to be mine, and not feel cold when I want things for myself.

The problem, as I see it, comes down to discernment and judgment, objectivity and prejudice.

I hold a degree in literary and critical studies. This has prepared me for putting forth strong analyses on just about any subject. It has formed in me a critical mind, capable of understanding the difference between taste and truth, the ability to create rational arguments based on the irrational subject of aesthetics.

Thus, when I decide to form an opinion beyond like or dislike, I tend to discover reasons, right or wrong, but well-founded reasons for the stance I take. People will often accuse the critic or skeptic of pedantry or cynicism, but that is not always the case; rather, most critics I know have already considered the other side of the argument, and provided clear information to support their own side, while refuting — not negating — the opposing view.

The new female-led Ghostbusters, the politics of Hillary v. Trump, even just a minor criticism of a board game or theatre piece, these all seem to lead to the critic being hated for simply stating a well-reasoned opinion. “Can’t we just like what we like?” come the cries. The answer is “Of course,” but with the addition that you could also demand better. What if instead of wading through the cloudy murk of poorly thought-out concepts designed to put butts in seats, you could actually find the things you want without wasting your time on pablum? What if the worst art of the future was better than the best art of the past? Progress: it is what drives my every action.