I recently sat down with "Can I be the Hero?" (or "Can I Really Be the Hero?". Or "Can I Really be Assed to Type the Entire Fucking Title Jesus Christ") and I'm not sure how I feel about it..

"It is a game."

That is my response to my roommates, fellow Disgaea fans, who asked what I thought of the spin-off. I want to say I love it; the music is solid, the graphics aren't terribly bad (but seriously, would it kill them to up the resolution some time this decade?) and the characters still have some charm, even after being overmilked a tad (can you blame them? It's not like NIS's other games sell). The different concepts introduced also make it a unique experience; the set pool of 1000 lives at the start are all you have to beat a game. The stages that change depending on the time of day, along with the bosses you face. You can even end the game early and restart with all of your achievements, just incase you want to try a different path.

But for some reason, this game offends me. Could it be the rat bastard controls? Probably. Nearly every aspect of the controls has some flaw, like how dashing requires you to dance for one whole agonizing mississippi-second. The jumping controls still frustrate me, even as I approach the end of the game, and stuff like ducking or climbing up ledges has unnecessary lag that prevents Prinny from being as nimble as a good platformer.

Or maybe it's the bullshit level design, the kind of dastardly layout that forces you two fight three unstunnable, teleporting ninjas whilst dodging random oncoming fireballs, a hail of arrows, and enemies that simply cannot die at all.

I beat Mega Man 9 without dieing. This shouldn't be hard.

I keep playing this game, and I can't tell you why. I think it might have to do with this kind of gamer cred; a "put up or shut up" mentality that I have, despite the fact that none of my acquaintances are challenging my skillz. But there's a nagging voice in my head that keeps calling that same name over and over again...

"...p...y"
"...p..sy"
"pussyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy"

And so, every day, I sit down and stare at my PSP, and I think to myself "It's not that hard. Watch. I'll beat it". I beat the stage eventually, and the game informs me that I died 138 times, giving me an F, crossing its arms, and telling me to suck less.

Great game.

I beat the alternate story first, which turned out to be far easier than the main story. This is disappointing, because I'm stuck on a boss in the main story. A boss I must beat in 3 minutes for reason other than "because the programmers said so." But I have to keep playing, because the Ultra Dessert is always a stage away.

Maybe I'm just a masochist, but this game is addictive, despite the fact that I speak so ill of it.