Welcome to what potentially might be a more regular feature here on the blog.
Despite a new job that is a bit more demanding than my last one, and my busy life in general, I remain committed to writing in this blog twice a week. I’ve talked about it at different points, but I think it’s important for me for a variety of reasons.
However, I’ve been at this for almost two and a half years now. Usually, when I haven’t played enough new games to write about them, and there’s nothing else going on, I put a list together. After all this time, it’s getting harder to come up with random rankings to do in any given week. I’ve done a lot of freaking lists over here!
So, I’m thinking every other month or so, it might be time to start doing a mailbag feature on the blog where I can put out a call for questions. This weirdly gives me a break because people come up with topics for me, and that’s one of the hardest elements of this sometimes. Also, I think it will be a nice avenue for me to give my takes on current events in the gaming space. I don’t tend to write articles on whatever the latest Twitter or Bluesky controversy is, because they often come and go pretty fast, and they are often so dumb that they don’t feel worthy of an entire 1500-2500 word blog post. But with a mailbag, I think I will have a more logical place to fire off some of the burning takes I have on these subjects.
I greatly appreciate everyone who left a question this week! If you have any questions you want me to answer in a future mailbag, you can hit me up on social media or send an email to bignerdgamingtakes@gmail.com. Let’s get to it!
What are your thoughts on the Pragmata discourse regarding men as nurturing figures?- Cynetrunner on Bluesky
Cy asked this question in a more snarky and humorous way, but essentially, he is asking me to talk about the tweet above.
First off, let me say that the Pragmata discourse is awful. I hate almost every element of it. Basically, it boils down to the fact that one of the lead characters, Diana, is an android made to look like a little girl, and she does a lot of cute things. This is making people say that the game is going to make those who play it want to have kids, and then, this is in turn making people mad for a variety of reasons.
I still haven’t played the game, though I intend to relatively soon, but I’ve seen plenty of clips of her doing something pretty adorable in between all the hacking and shooting that happens otherwise. In the demo that I played, your other character, Hugh, is fighting off a bunch of robots while Diana is distracted doing something. At the end of the demo, it is revealed that she was working on a picture of Diana and Hugh together. It seems like these types of moments happen all the time.
As a father to an almost four-and-a-half-year-old, I can attest that this kind of behavior is genuinely pretty realistic. My daughter literally does randomly cute or hilarious things every single hour, without fail. It’s awesome.
Funny enough, I completely fit the narrative Mary is discussing there. I was never interested in kids for most of my life, and it took a lot of time and reflection before I felt ready to do it. I think my wife wouldn’t have minded if we had kids three or four years before it actually happened. However, I obviously do not represent every man. My best friend once told me while we were in college that one reason he really liked a girl he was dating is that he felt she would make a great mother one day. This was incomprehensible to me at the time, but there are many people who feel this way, and it doesn’t make them “predators.”
There are many reasons that both men and women might not be interested in having kids (it’s not just men who might not have any desire to do so). I think there are many who are like I was and feel that way because we just didn’t have much exposure to them once we became teenagers growing up. My interactions with children were relatively rare for most of my life. But the thought of changing diapers and my life being changed in a million different ways seemed way too scary.
But when you do get more exposure to kids, you start to see the other side of the equation more. As I started getting old enough where friends and family members were having children, I started to see more and more why someone might want to upend their life for this. Seeing other kids doing cute things with my friends and my brother made me want to experience something like that myself. And it also wasn’t for my “lineage.” I personally would have been very open to adopting a child as well, as I thought that would have been the way to make the most impact on the world. That tweet is literal insanity. It’s very funny to me how, for all the complaining about “woke,” there is actually a right-wing version of “woke” that is ten times worse and more restrictive.
Also, on a side note, I’ve also seen many takes shitting on those who say that Pragmata might want to make people have kids by talking dismissively about how it’s actually nothing like parenthood. And look, obviously parenthood is not all sunshine and daisies. It can be really hard. I personally find the baby phase to be really difficult, as I really crave connection in a more social way that babies can’t yet provide. But there’s nothing wrong with a piece of media showcasing the positive sides of parenthood and people being inspired by that.
I know too many parents who are obsessed with competing in some sort of weird suffering Olympics. When I used to talk to some people about how hard the baby phase was, everyone would respond with, “Well, wait until they are [insert age their kids are]!” And actually, that was always stupid. I love being a parent more with every year that passes. I even enjoyed the “terrible twos” and the “threenager” stage, because those highs that you experience when your kids can run into your arms and say, “Daddy!” or “I love you!” far surpass the frustration with some random tantrums. And I think a lot of the pushback on people saying that Pragmata makes them want to have kids is another byproduct of that suffering Olympics.
I am also an example of someone who was inspired to have kids in part because of a video game. As I discussed a few months back, one of the things that always stuck with me when it came to the thought of having kids was the ending to BioShock. It moved me and made me realize how rewarding and powerful it could be to have a kid a full 15 years before I actually had one. I think I would have eventually become a parent either way, but that game was one reason that helped me take the plunge, and I’ll forever be grateful that I did. If you play Pragmata and it makes you think about having kids of your own one day, it is nothing to be ashamed of. I think you should embrace that feeling and even use it as one of your considerations when you get to the day of deciding whether to start a family.
In an era where a plethora of games just try to replicate the success of others (whether Soulslike, Metroidvania, Hero Shooter, etc.), what are some unique games you’ve played recently that have kept things fresh for you?- Brink on Bluesky
The funny part of this question for me is that many of the recent games I’ve played that were truly unique didn’t click with me much. I recently tried Outer Wilds, which feels like nothing else I’ve ever played, and after one run, I just had no desire to try it again. I don’t mind a game having me try to figure everything out, but fumbling with the ship controls while also dealing with everything else was a barrier that I didn’t currently have the desire to overcome. I semi-famously kind of hated Blue Prince last year, which was definitely unlike anything else I’ve ever played. I also recently picked up Shadow of the Colossus for the first time, and while I think it’s good, it hasn’t pulled me in all that much. But that game still feels kind of unlike anything else despite first coming out in 2005, which is pretty wild.
I guess in the end, this is why we don’t see tons of truly new games out there. Obviously, it’s tough to come out with new genres at this point. A lot of video games have been made, and it doesn’t feel like there is a lot of room for innovation. But also, coming out with something totally new is a huge risk. Odds are that I’m not going to *hate* any roguelike that comes out and is at least competently made, although I might end up finding it terribly forgettable. Meanwhile, I’m almost assuredly not going to forget about a game that is truly unique, although there’s also a much greater chance that I end up hating it. I’d say that’s probably all true for most people.
I do have a few success stories in the past few years, though. I absolutely loved the first Death Stranding. That game is truly unlike anything else out there. I’d also include Balatro. Balatro is weird because a lot of its elements don’t stand out on their own, but the combination of it all is really unlike anything else out there. This one was several years back, but Immortality is another recent one that has stuck with me as something unlike anything else I had played before, and I really enjoyed it.
What are the top 10 games currently in your backlog? – Hana on Bluesky
So, this feels like a good avenue to talk about how unhinged my gaming methods are.
During the course of a given year, 94% of the games I play will be ones that were released during that year. The only time I play older games is if I truly don’t have much new stuff that I’m interested in, which has actually happened a few times this year (it had almost never happened the last two). In 2025, almost all of my “old” game playing took place in early January when no new games had been released yet and late December when I called it quits on 2025 games.
This is insane. I know that. But it allows me to keep covering new games and be the most up-to-date person out there on new stuff. Also, I find it a weirdly less stressful way to go about things. So many people I know have dozens of games that they own and have never played, and they think about it all the time. But “backlog” is a term we use at work. I don’t want to feel that way about games!
So with my system, once the new year hits, I stop thinking about any game I skipped from the year before. In the end, I probably played 50+ new releases or more from that year. If I didn’t get to a particular game, obviously I wasn’t THAT interested in it.
Now, if one of those games I didn’t touch still gets talked about multiple years later, or if it was successful enough for a sequel to be announced and I like what I see in the sequel trailer, then I realize it might be worth carving out some time for.
This is exactly what happened for me with Death Stranding and SOMA in recent years. I loved the trailers for Death Stranding 2 and for the upcoming Ontos, and that made me realize I really should play the first game in the series to see if it’s worth pursuing that sequel. It’s bizarre, but it works for me, and gives me peace.
Literally the only game I own that I haven’t touched yet is 13 Sentinels. And honestly, that might be months out from getting played, as the release schedule is picking up fast. Also, I have my eyes very focused on the original Paranormasight. This is a weird reverse of what I discussed earlier. I ended up playing the newest game first, and that made me want to try the original out badly. Outside of that, I would honestly say that there’s nothing truly in my “backlog” right now.
What kind of games do from the current era do you consider timeless? Like, what games do you think people will still be playing and talking about 25 years from now the way we do Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy 6?- Ross from Bluesky
So, I was about to answer this, but then I realized “top 10 modern games that will age the best” is a banger list idea. I think I’ll be writing this in the coming weeks.
Why do you hate farming sims so much?- AndresPlays from Bluesky
My guess is Andres is poking fun at my 5/10 review of Cattle Country in particular here. This question seems like a fun reason for me to reflect on my own experiences after giving out such a scathing review.
I remember almost being in disbelief when I played Cattle Country. The dev had made the very polished Blossom Tales game before that one, so I was expecting a pretty high quality experience. Instead, the game had one braindead design decision after another. It was missing the most basic quality of life features, and didn’t explain almost any of the game’s mechanics. It was clearly unfinished. And even beyond the mechanics, the villagers, festivals, and everything else about the game felt soulless.
I didn’t expect the game to be at a 5/10 on OpenCritic, but I expected most genre fans to see what it was missing and not enjoy it. Cattle Country ended up hitting a 71 on OpenCritic, which is kind of bad, but feels way higher than what it deserved. It also has 86% positive reviews on Steam, which is honestly kind of low compared to most games in the genre, but also feels significantly higher than what it deserves.
For what it’s worth, Cattle Country has likely gotten a touch better since I reviewed it. I’ve read some patch notes, and the game has fixed several of the issues I pointed out in my review (that almost no other review pointed out. I think some smaller outlets have a hard time bashing on games they get review codes for, and it was mostly smaller outlets that reviewed this game). But in the end, I’m sorry, but it does not deserve even the tepid praise that it has gotten from critics and those who played it.
I say all this to say that, I actually love farming sims. But, I guess I don’t love them enough to be able to accept any slop that is put in front of me. I am what you would call a “variety gamer.” I play a bit of everything. However, there are certain gamers that tend to gravitate to very specific genres. There’s nothing wrong with that at all, but it’s interesting to see how they react to their favorite genres. Competitive gamers seem absolutely miserable for example. They seem to hate half of the games that come out in their genre, and they also seem ready to turn on their favorite games the second one balancing patch they disagree with comes out.
On the other hand, there are two types of gaming fans out there that just feel like they are unbelievably soft on their favorite genre. In my view, those are mostly cozy/farming fans and JRPG fans.
I think both of these types of fans can make it harder for newcomers to enter their respective genres. It’s pretty obvious why competitive gamers can be toxic to their genre of choice. These people are eager to bash on games that they supposedly love, so if I’m someone who hasn’t played a certain game, why would I want to if the fans themselves say it sucks?
It’s the opposite problem for cozy and JRPG fans. It has to be nice to have a good time with pretty much any experience in a genre, but it makes it hard to jump in when seemingly anything that does the bare minimums is going to get praised. God forbid someone decides to jump into the genre because some JRPG fan is talking about how awesome I am Setsuna is as an example. I personally love JRPGs and cozy farming sims, but it can genuinely be hard to find the right games to play in a genre when the biggest fans love freaking everything. It also makes it so devs don’t have to try and innovate. This is why plenty of JRPGs still have the most barebones of battle systems that still use the same conventions that were used in the 16-bit era in my opinion. The fans are fine with it, and it holds back the genre.
Obviously, I can’t hate on people who just love something so much. But also, I do kind of want to hate on these people. Expect better and we’ll get better! But also don’t be whiny assholes like competitive gamers. Find that nice perfect balance, and the genres you love will reach new heights. Sounds easy enough right??
Man, who needs therapy when you type 3000 words of takes into the abyss? Thanks for tuning in! I enjoyed myself, and I hope you did too. Let’s do this again sometime.
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