I feel like I just got slapped in the face with video games, which as well know can only mean that E3 has taken place once again. But don’t confuse that with Game Fest, a thing that I think started before E3 and is lasting long after it. We’ve got like a dozen game-focused events popping off all summer, so this whole thing is a lot clumsier than it normally is. It’s a mess that’s only gotten messier thanks to a certain pandemic, and will only get worse as E3 flails around trying to grasp at those precious last breaths of relevance. But until that day comes, I guess I’m gonna just keep looking at headlines and trailers and regurgitating that stuff back onto this site with that patented “Ari Spice,” which sounds grosser than I wanted it to, but oh well.

The oddest part about this whole clusterfuck of game announcements is that I’ve barely watched any of it. I don’t think as a hobbyist I can dedicate full days to sitting and watching press events about video games anymore, because it’s exhausting and unnecessary if we’re being honest with ourselves. Like, I didn’t need to watch whatever the hell Square Enix was doing this year, because I usually don’t tend to get grabbed by most of the games they make. I checked out that trailer for the Final Fantasy action game, Stranger of Paradise I believe is the subtitle to that one, and boy howdy did it look real dumb. They just kinda made the most generic looking protagonist who seems like he was pulled out of some middling 3rd person action game from the early 2000s, and said “good enough!” It truly reminds me of that terrible Shadow the Hedgehog game from the mid-2000s with how unnecessarily edgy it’s trying to be.

But whatever, maybe it’ll be great and I’ll be jealous of all the fun that everyone is having playing it. All I know for sure is that I’m really glad I didn’t have to sit through a press conference to see that, I’ve literally missed out on nothing by watching the trailer on YouTube a few days later with the exception of whatever tragedies were taking place in the live chat.

That’s kind of the beautiful side-effect of not checking or engaging with social media as much anymore, because I don’t feel this pressure to be on the cutting edge of what’s being announced or anything. The Bonus World isn’t a news site, and working my ass off to put up articles recapping conferences immediately after they end, doesn’t do anything for me or this site. So I’m just not bothering with it.

As far as actual E3 content goes, there will be some stuff that hits this week, but it’s not going to be anywhere near as comprehensive as it’s been in the past. I’m allowing myself to ease off the gas pedal a bit here, because I know that nobody is coming to The Bonus World for up to the minute game news. If that were the case, you’d be woefully out of touch with what the industry is up to and only know about weird simulator games I’m into at the moment. But that’s okay. I like the little slice of the internet that this site occupies, and I’m not going to overwork myself for literally no benefit.

So yeah, E3 is happening or already happened, I’m not sure anymore. And quite frankly, I’m happier this way.