First off, a huge thank you to mourning orange who filled my very unpopular request of uploading old Podcastle episodes. If you, like me, are having trouble with the torrent, head to the bottom of the comments of my previous post for direct linkage goodness to old Podcastle podcasts.

Now onto the post.

I have a fear of starting new games. By new I mean, for the most part, games I've never played before. Perhaps it's because I get overwhelmed incredibly easy – sometimes I look at my game collection, a quarter of which have yet to be played and the other quarter have been played but not completed, and find myself with a bit of a headache. The task of playing half of my 70-or-so game collection is incredibly daunting. The idea that I'll play all of them feels impossible.

So why then, with so many games I have yet to play, did I start playing Mario 64 DS this week? I guess it could be classified as a new game – I've never played the DS version of Mario 64 before – but it's also an enhanced port of an old game. A great old game. Above all, it's a comfortable old game. It's a game I know.

There's something easy about replaying games you know. Starting new games is scary. You might have an idea of its length, its story, the type of gameplay the game involves, but you don't know how you'll react to it. At least with games you've played before you know you'll enjoy them. But new games? That's a different story. You're immersing yourself in a new world with a new story and new game mechanics. This is exciting for most, but terrifying for me. What if I find this new world too big to explore? What if this story is confusing or unenjoyable? What if the game mechanics are complete shit? These are risks most are willing to take to experience something new. But for me? Well, I'll make the leap to that game eventually, but it's going to take some time.

So most of my games will have to wait. At least until I complete Mario 64 DS. And because I am an insane completionist I insist on getting every single star, so it could take a while.