I can't fully explain it. Something I did or said made the universal forces that govern gaming so mad that they conspired to give me the worst gaming experience of my entire life. Twenty Seven years have come and gone, and now I have a new low. Always good when the bar gets set lower, makes everything else seem better.

This would have been a review but everything was conspired to be so very horrible surrounding this week's McGuffin that I can't in my right mind ever properly review it. It will always be tainted.

That is not to say that NiGHTS:Journey of Dreams is bad, I just hate it with about 46% my being. It is graphically pretty(for a Wii Game), the story is slightly interesting(for a remake/sequeal), and they go out of their way to try and explain things(even if things arn't meant to make sense).

But, it all started with the moment I checked it out at my locally owned national video store, you know the one, they charged me nearly 9 dollars to rent this game. But I am a wussy that will just fork out the money when put on the spot rather than appear to be a jerk. This isn't KNiGHTS's fault, but it still felt like a small betrayal by the game.

I was convinced that I would play this game. I dedicated a few hours to it, but I was nausiated the entire time.

Some might blame the vodka I was consuming to endure the over cheezy "fantastic" fantasy they were bashing together with a rusty colidascope. But I was having a difficult time either way.

When I play a game it should be fun, not forced. And I really, really, really don't want the Title Character to sound like Courtney Love pretending to be a British Androgous 10 year old Peter Pan type character that invents words that they can't explain.

It is freaking 2007, 3d games have been around for over 15 years now. The Wii's controller has enough flexability to control true 3d flight. So why is this game a flying side scroller? I love most side scrollers, but not when there is no varience in play.

You can fly, fly, and oh yeah, fly. Your big weapon is to make loops, if you can actually keep track of where you started the loop.

Suffice to say, they basically sacrificed good gameplay upon the alter of easy clumsy controls to satisfy the family crowd. Oh look I can make him(her?) fly left and right by pointing it at the screen, or I can use the thumb stick..... Glee!

This is all just annoying, there are few games that arn't riddled with annoyance but still shine with their many merrits.

But this game flaunts three of my least favorite Video Game elements and bases everything on them.

Every level has a Timer. I like to work under pressure, it inspires me to accomplish my tasks with greater speed and precision. But when a clock appears in the corner of the screen and some disembodied voice proclaims that the world will end for no reason if I don't complete my task before 0:00 is reached, I have to ask why. Zelda:Majora's Mask had a timer, it counted down to the moment that the moon would destroy all life, now that is worthy of a timer.

Every level has Rankings. Ok, there wasn't enough pressure when I knew that I needed to save the Dreamworld, or whatever, now I have to please some etherial proctor who is waiting to grade my exectution of this meaningless task? "The unspeakable evil is vanquished, you didn't explain my objectives or what I am being graded on, and you give me a D." That just makes me want to keep playing this game.

The third mission in this game made me put the controller down. I have quit better rented games because they gave me the "pointless protection mission" treatment early on. I was suddenly in charge of making sure these generic cute villager chreatures didn't get sucked up into the death vortex. All the while the reason they are being sucked in is because they are holding, for lack of a detailed explanation, parasols.

I kept yelling at them "Just let go, Just let go! LET GO!!!" Soon I was happy to see them meet their maker. I figured it was just Natural Selection eliminating the weak ones. It is a bad place a game has gone when the player is relieved to see the villagers eaten by Godzilla.

So that is why I posted this as a blog rather than a review. This game probably has merit, but I just can't see it because the rage has filled my vision with spots of concentrated distain.

And I paid 9 dollars for the experience. Money well spent.