Breaks are necessary. If you don't take a break every now and then you'll burn out. I regularly take breaks from gaming after beating a game I have been playing for an extended period of time. How long the break lasts depends on how awesome the game was and how heavily I was playing it. For instance, I didn't play any games for nearly a month after I beat Persona 3 and got the good ending, because the game was amazing. Also, while playing Persona 3 I hadn't been doing anything other than playing it for the 3 or so weeks it took me to beat it. Right now I'm not really playing anything as I just finished beating all three versions of Borderlands and with the Olympics on I have little motivation to game.
Smash TV is what we always end up playing at my place when people are over and we play 360. Then in the middle of playing it we always talk about how great it would be if XBLA had the original Narc.
It looks absolutely beautiful. The combat looks like complete madness though and I am not a fan of the whole transforming summons thing. Also, what Brad said about the Techniques system reminds me of how the magic system worked in FF8 for some reason.
I feel like I've stepped into The Twilight Zone. Yesterday Jon Wood posted an article over at MMORPG.com about "it" and how "it" has changed with MMO's, which lead to an interesting discussion in the comments that touched on becoming a parent and games. Now I see today's Penny Arcade and Jerry's link to that Kotaku article and what he is talking about and it just feels weird. Anyway, I think it's a really interesting concept for what is being talked about here and I agree that if done right in a game or games it would be pretty awesome. Those 3 franchises that you mentioned are the only ones that readily come to my mind, but I am certain there are more out there. I too fell in love with Harvest Moon due to the parenting aspect of it, but my first one was Harvest Moon 64. My one criticism with games that let you become parents is they don't go far enough. It just feels like "hey you have a kid" and that's it. For Harvest Moon I would love a game where you start off as a kid playing on your grandfathers farm. Maybe make it like the tutorial thing with the baby blocks and books at the beginning of Fallout 3. As you grow up grandfather ages and dies and you inherit the farm. Then it plays like regular Harvest Moon with you running the farm, wooing a local girl, and having a kid. However, you continue to age as your kid grows up and then maybe he leaves and has kids so you then get grandchildren. Anyway, the game ends with you dieing and your child, or grandchild taking over the farm like you took it over from your grandfather. Maybe A Wonderful Life did this. I dunno as I haven't played it, but I think it would be a pretty awesome and powerful way to end the game.
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