In which Meg Explains What The Hey She's Been Up To

So a couple of weeks ago we got ourselves a Playstation - PS2, to be exact. Why a PS2, now the PS3's come out? Well, one reason, really - the PS2 is something like a fifth of the price. I picked up a couple of games - Kingdom Hearts 2, and Echo Night: Beyond, then spent most of the last week and a half playing my way through KH2. I ordered Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus online, and it was delivered on Monday. Tuesday night, I started playing it (having completed KH2).

As you may or may not have gathered from these disclosures, I tend to get just a little obsessive about new distractions. Particularly when they allow me to feed into fandoms which have suddenly become rather intense interests themselves... (hello, FFVII fandom, and thanks for the slash).

I've decided I quite like Square Enix (aka Squaresoft, or Squeenix if you're talking to the fangirls) and their way of dealing with a game. There is plot. There is plot with extra plot and plot sprinkles, plus chopped subplot on top and the cherry of genuine character development. It is convoluted. It is involved. It is *interesting*, gods help me, and it's something I've been looking for for ages. I've no idea whether the differences are just a result of the difference between the Japanese and the US psyches (the Japanese seem to have no problems with assuming that their "readers" can and will understand such an involved plot, or that they'll have mental equipment capable of handling such a thing. Neither game is aimed at the stereotypical nine-year-old (KH2 is the closer of the two, but I'd say you'd have a minimum age of about twelve for the plot elements - I shall have to find out whether my niece plays it with the cutscenes in or out), which, again, is a wonderful thing. I like games which assume the player is a grownup, rather than a child.

It sometimes astounds me that there aren't more games like this out there - maybe there are, and I've not seen them. Most of the games I play on the PC are very much the long-playing role-playing type. I like the sensation of getting lost in a different world, and slowly finding out what happens next (which may be why I've gone off Dark Age of Camelot a little lately - I've done all the exploring, and I'm down to the boring bits of levelling up characters and hanging around until odd hours of the morning to go on raids). I like plotbits. I like interesting characters (most computer game characters aren't that interesting to me). I'm not actually a huge one for the whole hack & slash side of things, or even for the run & gun side of them (I'm playing Vincent Valentine as more of a sniper - get the shot right the first time, and you only need the one). What makes me stick with a game is wanting to know how it turns out (which is why I sometimes find "boss" battles to be thoroughly annoying: that's not plot, that's diversionary tactics!).

So, does anyone else know what might be a good, plotty game to fiddle around with on the PS2? I already have KH1 and FFVII (the original) marked on my mental "get these at some stage" list, as well as an entry which says "anything by Squaresoft/Square Enix" - what are some others?