This is a weekly(ish) blog in which Tayo writes about video games, comics, movies, society and basically whatever he damn well pleases. Be warned that there might be spoilers for a piece of pop-culture you haven’t experienced yet.

Fear and Loathing in Eorzea

Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn has been priority number one for me recently, at least in terms of my gaming habit. I started playing in late October, but took a break from it throughout most of November to work on other projects. Starting the week of Thanksgiving, however, I jumped back into it and really haven’t played much else.

I’m not exactly sure how much time I’ve devoted to FFXIV, but I think I’m not far from hitting the 80 hour mark (probably higher, really). It feels like a lot less, though. It’s an incredibly simple game for an MMO, especially for those of us that started playing the genre when it first became popular in the late ’90s/early 2000s. Back then, games like EverQuest, Ultima: Online and even Final Fantasy XI were typically tops in the multiplayer RPG world, and holy cow were they a chore.

Obviously this all changed when World of Warcraft came along. It was easily the most accessible MMORPG at the time, allowing for multiple styles of play and not requiring players to constantly be in groups in order to gain experience. It still took a lot of effort to gain levels and reach that coveted endgame, but at least it had a “play at your own pace” design that centered around questing as opposed to spending countless hours slaying monsters in a party.

I’m reaching the level cap in FFXIV (50, currently), which means I’m nearing the point where the dungeons and bosses become a lot more challenging, and getting the best gear to outfit my character is paramount to survival. This is the first time I’ve achieved this in the many MMOs I’ve played. I grew tired of them early on, including WoW, but for some reason Square-Enix has managed to convince me to stick around. The fact I’m playing it for review probably helps, but if I hated what I was experiencing I would have called it quits awhile ago.

Geek No More (I Guess…)

Other than Moogles and Chocobos, geek culture has been on my mind frequently as of late. I’ve called myself a geek in the past, but I think I’ve reached the point in my life where I really don’t care. Labels have been something I’ve tried my best to avoid, and I often get irritated when I see others feel the need to compartmentalize every person into a group based on observational anecdotes.

Of course, I’m also prone to this behavior, but I prefer to view humans as individuals as opposed to a collective. The fact of the matter is that we’re both. It’s our primitive instincts that cause us to seek out like-minded people to create tribes (read: communities) that make us feel welcome and accepted. Truly, this is what geekdom is all about.

That said, like many culture critics have pointed out, geeks have a tendency to eat their own kind. Many of them view their lifestyle as a club and enjoy browbeating those that want to join in on the fun. Phrases like “Geek Cred” get tossed around, and those that don’t fit the “description” of a geek get pummeled with mundane trivia questions to make sure they aren’t “faking”, especially if they just so happen to be an attractive female and/or look like a “hipster” that might be mocking them.

It’s not just geeks that do this, though. Truly, occurrences like these take place in all cultures. Just look at all the Democrats and Republicans going after their peers, scholars in the same field constantly trying to one-up each other, neighbors in gated communities suing each other over insolent shrubbery, and athletes blaming teammates and coaches for poor performances. Cannibalism like this makes me believe that humans are much too selfish to live in anything that even remotely resembles harmony.

Perhaps Ayn Rand was right (I can’t believe I just wrote that).