Emulators

 On my way from a friend's 21st birthday party, I was taking in the awesomeness that is Autumn. The colors, the temperature... and then I realized something odd. Have you ever had moments of like, well... I guess it's sorta like deja vu, but not really. Certain types of weather and temperature seem to trigger times where I've played certain games in the past; Autumn, in particular, for some odd reason, gives me the odd craving to play one of the Harvest Moon games. During the summer, I yearn for a good romp through EarthBound, since I played through it so much during my summer breaks.

 I'm sure it's something deeply psychological, and not really something I'd like to think too hard about... I just think it's an occurrence that I've noticed -- certain moods, seasons, and weather effects the things we like to do, and... in my case, what video games I feel like playing.

 My thinking process is a snowball effect, of course, so I'm like "Mmm... Harvest Moon... 64...", and then I'm like "Wait, I don't have that cartridge any more...", which then leads to "Wow, I really need to stock up on emulators."

 And that leads us to what I'm really posting about, today, in my sleep-deprived state (I got rather drunk at the party and ended up with a second wind, being unable to fall asleep and playing through an entire game of Civilization V on my laptop). I really don't care for emulating and pirating games that are easily and readily available in retailers, but games that are excessively expensive and hard to find? Yeah. For sure.

 I've had emulators for the SNES and NES for a while, and although I have tons of "ROMs" for them both, I'm sure that I don't have EVERY game for them, I'd like to. Why not, right?

 So, as terribad as so many people think it may be... I'm wanting to mayhaps find decent emulators for various "classic" systems and amass a collection of the games which I know I'll probably ever have raw copies of. It'll certainly help me work toward that massive list of games to complete (which I still need to get around to posting up there, next to my wishlist... I'd do that now, but my body is dying for a nap... which will more than likely evolve into hibernation....) and discover others that I'd like to try out.

 Anyone have any suggestions, places for me to look for easy, massive rom downloads, or anything like that? I don't really know where to start -- what I have were actually given to me by a friend years and years ago.

... Oh! And while my mind is still on it, I've totally decided what I'm gonna do to make steady progress. I'm going to do a "fortune cookie" random-pick thing to choose which game I'm gonna work on each week. If I finish a game early, I'll just get a head start on the next week's game... although I certainly have a feeling it'll be much more likely that I'll end up falling behind. Regardless, I'm too fickle and indecisive to actually pull this thing off without a plan, so we'll see if it works!

... and now, off to bed with me. It's beckoning to me with the force of a thousand ... um... okay, I don't really know where I'm going with this. Shutting up and sleeping, now.

How 'bout a Plan?

 Alright, things seem to just be getting worse and worse. I keep starting up games in the middle of playing others, and I got a handful of new ones for my birthday, making it almost impossible to sit down and complete a single title. That's why I need some help.

 I'm wondering if there might be some plan or something I can enforce upon myself. Like, "complete a game per week", or "X amount of games per month"... I dunno, something like that. So far, I've pretty much done awfully. I keep starting a game, and then I start another, and another... I have so many games I'm playing now, I'd have lost track if I didn't keep a list of my active games on this blog. Yikes.

 I'm asking for advice. Does anyone have an idea for what would be reasonable, steady pace to complete games? I could really use your input! Thanks!

Progress

 I've been playing games a bit more regularly, and I'm certainly making a bit of progress, although not nearly as much as I'd like to. I completed all of the achievements for Boom Boom Rocket on XBLA, about half of the achievements for Civilization V on Steam, completely mastered my first character in Castlevania HD (XBLA), and I've been working intermittently on various other Xbox LIVE Arcade games to increase my GamerScore, which is now sitting at 1060. I guess that's not too bad for only having the 360 for two months or so, right?

 There's lots going on in my life, right now, trying to get it all sorted out... so although I don't have as much time for games as I'd like, I'm sure I'll be able to squeeze in more time once I'm back on track. I'm moving soon, and hopefully I'll have a full-time job, as well, so huzzah. Wish me luck. :D