Getting poll results. Please wait...
Weekends are for rest. They are also for recreation, or if you're the type of person who frequents this site, weekends are for gaming. You've already worked a long week, and provided The Boss doesn't call you in on Saturday (mine did
) you deserve a little time to let the mind be in a world other than the one that surrounds you. Now here is a question...
What happens when gaming becomes your second job?Has a game ever enslaved you. You put in time and fail to make any progress. You get stuck on that same level at that same spot. You've cleared everything but the final boss which requires nothing but grinding away to level up towards a distant victory. Maybe it got too hard, or boring. There is only so much you can do.
Quit. The loser's way out, but keeps you from wasting time. Time you could be using to be playing something better.
Keep playing. You're not made of weaksauce. Hard games
are hard. Deal with it.
Get help. An online tutorial might cover something you missed. Maybe there is a technique to help you reach your goal faster. Additionally, sidequests or performing special stunts might open up a new way of playing a previously completed title.
Gamesaving grace The #2 timesaving option. If it is only a matter of gold accumulation or leveling up why grind? Cheat codes might also give you what you need to get the job done faster and make it more exciting in the process. Don't overuse this one. The only person you're cheating is yourself.
Break it. The game had it coming. You made a purchase and you'll find your amusement somehow. If the game is lousy enough it will likely have no resale value, so you'll have to fuel your amusement with your imagination. Snapping a disc is simple and to the point, but inserting a cartridge into a toaster (highly NOT RECOMMENDED) will surely bring forth satisfaction and toxic fumes. Drink coasters and skeet shooting targets are other alternatives.
I finally did it and bought a PS3 I've been drooling over this magnificient machine since its release and have nearly bought one many times finally this week while visiting a local game shop I saw a used (no box, some scratches) 40 gig ps3 on sale now I love this shop and I wanted a PS3 and I had the money for once to buy it. So I did. I found out when I got home that I overpaid by about 20 bucks but thats ok I love this shop and they need my support. Anyway I've been having a blast with it so far playing the following:
Ferrari challenge
Everyday shooter
lingering wake (interactive art)
motorstorm
Gran Turismo 5
And I have a copy of Time Crisis 4 with guncon on the way (and I have the big screen to play this bad boy on!) I need to get an HDMI cable though running composite just seems wrong!
Also I've got a wonderswan crystal and Judgement silversword coming
and am looking into finally beggining my Neo Geo AES collection after having had a nice Neo Geo Pocket collection in the past.
As you probably know by now, I'm very excited for the upcoming PS3 exclusive game, LittleBigPlanet, which comes out in a little over a week. I love the happy-go-lucky atmosphere and the bright colors...however Sony has officially thrown that out the window with a newly announced guest Sackboy character...
SEPHRIOTHYeah, that Sephiroth. Everyone's favorite long-haired emo villain from Final Fantasy 7. The same Sephiroth that inspired many awful fanfics, fanart, and especially other games, is now coming with his trendy Hot-Topic dress style into the world of LittleBigPlanet. Along with Sephiroth, expect thousands of 15 year old otakus who think Sephy is kawaii bishie and writes long yaoi fanfics involving him and Cloud to follow.
Also coming to LBP: Old Snake from Metal Gear Solid 4.
For those of you who sort of follow gaming news, however few of you there are, probably have been following the Tokyo Game Show, which is probably the biggest show there is for gaming now that E3 is dead. Long Live E3. So, there are a lot of bombshells and great announcements to come from TGS, and if you want to know what they are I suggest you look at a website that blogs about games. Might I recommend
Kotaku. See, I am not here to report all the crap that was announced at TGS. Rather, I want to start a discussion as to the things that excited
us. Well, now that I got this out of the way way, let me begin.
Continue reading TGS is going on, what excites you?
Well, here is a treat, it's the Mega Man 3 theme, with lyrics. I was a bit skeptical when I decided to listen to it, but after listening to it, I am very pleased with what the singer has done:
Isn't that awesome? I sure thought so. Tell me what you think in the comments.
[img align=right width=175]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/U-005/gs/U-005-S-01510-A.jpg align=right[/img]
September / October, 1982 (26 years ago):
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial is released for Atari 2600 (Sources are unclear on exact release date).
October, November, December 1983 (25 years ago):
North American Video Game Crash of 1983 begins due to the market flood of poorly made software.
E.T. The Extra Terrestrial is one of the most famous games ever made, mostly because it is also one of the most poorly made and over-produced games. The reason for the rushed development and overproduction is clear: the movie of the same name was an instant hit, and became the most financially successful film at the time of its release (yes, surpassing Star Wars). It only made sense to think that a game based on such a hit movie would become a bestseller, so Atari reduced development time to only six weeks, skipping audience testing in the process.
Certainly,
E.T. was not the only reason for the subsequent Video Game Market Crash; there were other low-quality games made around that time (the terrible "flickering ghosts" port of
PacMan comes to mind). Imagine how confused parents must have been, deciding on which console to buy: Atari 2600, Atari 5600, ColecoVision, Intellivision, Astrocade, Odyssey 2, Fairchild Channel F, to name a few, and that is not including Sears clones or other, more obscure consoles. Other contributing factors for the crash were an abundance of start-up companies trying to make some cash and hoping that customers would buy any video game regardless of how bad it was, as well as the availability of cheaper and usually more versatile computers, such as TI-99 and Commodore VIC-20.
[img align=right width=175]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/U-005/gs/U-005-S-03070-A.jpg align=right[/img]
Most important effects of the crash were:- End to 2nd generation of video game consoles;
- Slowdown of the video game hardware development;
- Many third-party game development companies shutting down, including Coleco and Magnavox;
- Activision taking years to recover;
- Atari never recovering from the blow and eventually leaving video game hardware business;
- Almost complete lack of retailers' and customers' interest in Video Games for several years afterwards;
- Resurrection of video games industry by Nintendo and its NES (note that it is called an "entertainment system", not a "console");
- Beginning of Japanese video game domination, primarily by Nintendo and Sega;
- Introduction of strict rules regarding licensing third-party made games.
In my own opinion, the
E.T. game is terrible. Should a person unfamiliar with the movie play this game, he/she might think that the movie consists of E.T. walking around places with many, many deep holes in the ground, constantly falling into them, slowly "levitating" out of them, just to fall back in, and again, and again. If you are one of the fortunate ones who never played this, ask your Atari-loving friend (I am sure he has this game somewhere) to let you play, just for educational purposes.
Other events for this month include:
Continue reading This Month in VG History: E.T. and the Market Crash
[img align=right width=200]http://img18.yukle.tc/images/215Colin_McRae_Rally_04.jpg[/img]Colin Mcrae Rally 04 (2003) is the fourth installment in the succesful Colin McRae Rally series. Whether the title alludes to the fact the game was released in 2004 in North America or simply to the fact it's the fourth game in the series, I'm not really sure. Looking at the titles of the series there certainly has been a lack of continuity on the developer front: 2.0, 3, 04, 2005 and DiRT; it's almost as if they couldn't make up there mind how to label their games. No matter though, because I'm here to pay homage to the great Colin Mcrae by reviewing this game, not complain about at the series' titles.
I'll start of with the main menu which is kept simply, easy to navigate and straightforward. There's the championship, quick-race, single race and single rally modes. In the option menu you can make graphics and sound adjustments aswell as select what controller you'd like to use. Next to the keyboard, you can use an analog controller or a driving wheel. The last obviously being the best choice for a realistic experience but since I don't own one nor a PC controller, I have to limit myself to my keyboard.
In the championship mode there are actually six championships that can be completed. One for each of the game's difficulties (normal and advanced) and each of the different vehicle categories (three). There's the standard 4WD category with cars like the Mitsubishi Lancer or the Subaru Impreza WRX, a 2WD category with smaller cars like the Citroen Saxo or Ford RallyeSport Puma and the "B-group" category which consists of high-powered older vehicles such as a Lancia 037 or Peugeot 205 T16.
B Group cars are forbidden in current-day rally because these faster, harder to control machines too often led to accidents. Luckily for us gamers, Codemasters has included these fun cars in Colin Mcrae Rally 04 for us to ride with as much as we want!
Every of these categories feel thoroughly different to drive with and even specific cars within a category handle differently. My favorite car is the 2WD Ford Puma because it is a nimble, lightweight car that can take consecutive corners rather fast. But no matter what car you choose to drive, it doesn't take long to get used to its handling and you'll be driving like a pro in no time. That's probably the most fun aspect of this game: the fact that it feels like realistic driving yet isn't too realistic so it doesn't become extremely difficult to control your car without smashing into the scenery.
The championship mode will take you to all of the game's locations which range from snowy Sweden to wet Brittain, or tropical Australia. All countries have a different dominant surface that you'll be faced with: tarmac in Spain, wet gravel in the UK, snow in Sweden, rough gravel in Greece, wet tarmac in Japan, fine gravel in the US, pea gravel in Australia and gravel in Finland. Plenty of variation in other words and just like with the cars, driving on different surfaces really feels differently.
The key to success in Colin Mcrae Rally 04 is: A. Carefully listening to your co-pilot and B. Selecting the right settings between stages. Although this might sound logical, paying attention to your co-driver's instructions really makes all the difference. Unless you'll play the game a lot, you won't be able to memorize what the different stages are like, so you're really up to his instructions. Especially in narrow sections, it's important not to get of track, because once you're between trees, it can easily cost you 10 seconds to get out again.
Once every two stages you can set up your car in the service station for the next two stages. You get a little map which shows you the course layout and gives you a stats table that shows how much of a type of surface you may expect. It's important to check what surface type appears most in the next two stages combined and choose tires accordingly. Besides tire types you can also adjust your brake bias, steering speed, gear ratio, ride height, spring tension and anti-roll.
Second function of the service station is to repair damage done to your car in previous stages. Depending on how big the damage on, say, your turbo might be, it'll take anywhere from only a few minutes to almost half an hour of repair time. You get a maximum of 60 minutes at every service station so it's best not to trash your car on the way there. Besides visual damage there's also alot of internal damage that can seriously affect your car's performance. You have the option to set the car damage on "normal" or "hard" depending on your skill level. At the normal setting the occasional jump in the scenary doesn't mean catastrophy but at the hard setting it's vital to avoid crashes at all costs.
In the championship mode you'll have to drive a series of normal stages in each country and end with a special "face-off" stage where you have to drive faster than another driver in an arena-track. Between rallies, you'll be able to attempt to win new/upgraded car parts in constructor challenge mini-games. This can range from sliding enough to wear down tires on a selected course to staying within a small RPM-range while switching gears.
Goal of the championship mode is to win each individual rally (obviously) aswell as having your manufacturer win the overal championship. After finishing one of the championships, you unlock a few cars.
The PC version of the game features online or LAN multiplayer for 2-8 players. Despite all players driving at the same time, you can only see ghosts of your opponents' cars instead of the actual cars. I haven't had the chance to check the multiplayer out just yet, so I can't really say anything about it.
Visually, Colin Mcrae Rally 04 is great. The PC version has improved graphics over the original Xbox version, with more detailed and sharper looking cars, roads and foliage, aswell as improved weather conditions. The game was always smooth to play, with a minimum of framedrops and glitches. Textures are generally good but some foliage and trees are rather low-res; this is especially apparent when you go of-course. the damage model looks pretty realistic with broken windows, loose bumpers and parts that completely fall of your vehicle. Colin Mcrae Rally 04 doesn't have the DX10 graphics of DiRT, but that's only natural considering the game's age.
There is no music in the game except for the random techno tune of the menus, but that doesn't mean Colin Mcrae Rally 04 sounds bad. In fact, this game sounds as realistic as I can imagine rally sounding like. Engines roar, gearboxes rattle, exhausts scream, windows shatter, ... it's all there. Derek Ringer does an excellent job as co-pilot and never bored or annoyed me at any time. Every sound gets a extra dimension when switching to the cockpit view where everything looks and sounds just a bit more dramatic. I never made much use of this view though, because it limits your view greatly.
If you happen to see Colin Mcrae Rally 04 somewhere and it isn't too expensive, get it. It's pretty much everything a good rally game should be and I had a great time playing this game.
8.0/10
This would be the sorry for me being slow, at least it's still the calm before the storm edition. Oh well, here's this week's BALLIN release list:
| Playstation 3 | Xbox 360 | Nintendo Wii |
•Fracture
•NBA 09: The Inside
•NBA 2K9
•NBA Live 2009 | •Crash: Mind Over Mutant
•Guilty Gear 2: Overture
•Fracture
•NBA 09: The Inside
•NBA 2K9
•NBA Live 2009 | •Army Men: Soldiers of Misfortune
•Crash: Mind Over Mutant
•Game Party II
•Line Rider 2 Unbound
•NBA Live 2009 All Play
•Ten Pin Alley 2 |
| PSP | Nintendo DS | Playstation 2 |
•My Spanish Coach
•NBA 09: The Inside
•NBA Live 2009
PC
•Baseball Mogul 2009
•Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway (Also available in a limited edition)
•Can You See What I See
•Dark Horizon
•Etch A Sketch
•Exodus from the Earth
•The Guild 2: Venice
•Nancy Drew: The Haunting of Castle Malloy
•SAS: Secure Tomorrow
•Sniper: Art of Victory | •Baseball Mogul 2009
•Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway (Also available in a limited edition)
•Can You See What I See
•Dark Horizon
•Etch A Sketch
•Exodus from the Earth
•The Guild 2: Venice
•Nancy Drew: The Haunting of Castle Malloy
•SAS: Secure Tomorrow
•Sniper: Art of Victory | •Crash: Mind Over Mutant
•NBA 09: The Inside
•NBA 2K9
•NBA Live 2009
•Onimusha: The Essentials |
Anyways, the highlight this week is Fracture. In case you don't know, Fracture is a third person shooter like so many others. What sets this one apart from the rest is the ability to manipulate the terrain around you. Neat idea on paper, but the actual games falls victim to the disease affecting so many other games today: more of the same. The actual shooting portion of the game is just not that great. It feels like every other third person from the past two or three years. But that's not my biggest issue with the game. I truly have a problem with how it seems very linear and hand-holding in what you need to do. LucasArts really should have taken this game and made it more into a free roaming style experience with some clever puzzle solving aspects rather than a generic third person shooter that rips borrows something from every big name game over the past couple of years.
It may sound like I didn't like Fracture, but that's not the case at all. The game is pretty fun, but nowhere near $60 fun. Wait for this one to hit $20 or $30 before buying. Or if you're unsure, try out the demo on Playstation Network or Xbox Live.
Also out this week is the latest game based on the Bleach anime series. The only reason I mention it is because one of my favorite developers, Treasure, made it. I didn't highlight in the release list because I hate Bleach and it's wannabe
Chuckie main character.
Another big release this week, and a possibly game of the year contender will be released this week: Etch-A-Sketch for the PC. In case you have not been following the massive hype surrounding this game, Etch-A-Sketch is the new prequel to the classic MS Paint which appears to feature a special guest appearance from a silver Pac-Man. Wonder why they decided to bring out a prequel over 20 years after the original, but maybe they can ride the cash wave of casual games. For me, I'll be sticking with Paint.
Finally this week, notice Ten Pin Alley 2 in the Wii's release list? This is the perfect example of how bad the shovelware situation on the Wii has become. Did you ever hear of the first game? It was a mediocre bowling game released in the US in 1996 for the PC and PS1. Yeah. We're digging up mediocre 12 year old franchise and shoehorning in Wiimote controls in hopes of a little money. Nice going Jack of All Games, whoever you are.
Come back next week when the
REAL wallet raping begins. Now if you'll excuse me, I just got a LittleBigPlanet beta key in my email.
"LOOK AT ME OOOOH OOOH! I AM ME! I AM SUPER COOL! I NEED TO BE LOOKED AT. I AM THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Hey there readers, what you see above is some game developer off in the distance crying out for attention. It happens from time to time really, and it’s god forsakenly annoying. Really, it’s not cool, and honestly I don’t understand why some developers go the route of the attention whore.
You might have at one point been wowed by a game called
Eternity’s Child. It had promise, it really, truly did. It’s developer seemed to be a charismatic developer who you might know as Luc Bernard. He seemed cool, and he was more than willing to tell his development story on Destructoid, and from a hype generating standpoint, he did an awesome job getting people excited for his game. The thing though is that you have to deliver on the hype, and apparently he didn’t do a good job finding a competent programmer for the job. Perhaps he should have hired Chainclaw on the side, because those people who have played the game as it was released on Steam found the game to be absolutely atrocious.
One site decided that they would be brutally honest in their review, and this is where this story gets
fun. See, Luc and Destructoid were buddy buddy prior to the release, and it was a shock to see a 1 rating for Eternity’s Child. We’re not going to go into the reasoning for the score, but you can read all about it on Dtoid.
What
is important is what happened after the review. Luc appeared to become a child, criticizing Destructoid for giving his game such a low review when there were going to be many more revisions to come to the game. The thing though is that reviews are generally of the game as it is released, and in his case, his game apparently was straight from the seventh circle of Hell. Honestly, I don’t know anything about the quality of the game, but, if it truly plays like a low budget flash game then that’s rather sad. If a game is bad, be prepared to accept the cold hard truth. People are brutally honest, sometimes, and you got to be prepared for that. In Luc’s case, he wasn’t and he sort of went down in flames.
Destructoid commenters are a cruel bunch, and they absolutely destroyed him in not so nice ways. In reality, Dtoid could have done a better job moderating that comment string, but that’s not of my concern. After the harsh words and not so friendly banter, Mr. Bernard swore off developing games, and insisted that he’d only work on his art. Well, let’s fast forward to this week and what do I hear? Oh that’s right, Luc is working on Eternity’s Child 2.
It came to me as an epiphany. Luc was either a marketing genius, or someone with the emotional equivalent of a 12 year old. See, his game would never have gotten the hype it got if it wasn’t for his Destructoid relationship, which then got caught on with other gaming sites. Truly, for an independent developer, he is a marketing genius. Unfortunately, his game sucked, and in the process we learned that Mr. Bernard couldn’t take the heat of bad press, or maybe he could… It certainly generated a lot of attention, and in the process a lot of us now know about Eternity’s Child 2 because he essentially leveraged attention he got upon himself upon his next project.
How very shrewd.
Mr Bernard, you used the bad review to your advantage. You never were going to quit developing games, were you? Sticking to your art would not have given you the limelight you so sorely have wanted. Aren’t you an attention whore, Luc? Isn’t that why Mr. Destructoid was originally in the game? It got you press, didn’t it? When they slammed you, it was gone. Clearly then it wasn’t crucial to the game, now was it? Why else would you have placed it in the game? Maybe you genuinely wanted to do something nice for the site that gave you your attention, but I imagine it was so that Dtoid would keep you in the limelight.
Regardless, congrats Luc! You’ve got everyone to report on the development of Eternity’s Child 2, including now the niche gaming site known as RF Generation! Here’s to you!
Game developers – don’t follow the Luc Bernard route. Here’s a very important marketing / customer satisfaction mantra that you should follow: Underpromise, Overdeliver. The best games don’t need to show itself off like a prostitute from O-Town. For indie developers, it’s a fine line, trying to get mainstream recognition while at the same time underpromising. Well, why not just shoot for the mainstream recognition while not whoring yourself / your game out? Be careful, or your experience could end up blowing up in your face.
God, this really wasn’t about attention whoring, or was it? Might have just been me bitching about Luc Bernard. Oh well. It was supposed to be about attention whoring, but in my eyes Luc is an attention whore.
I can't believe it's October and I'm still able to find enough each weekend to make a post. The weather has been spectacular these past few weekends and I think that has a lot to do with it.
Now, onto the deals.
Continue reading Treasure Hunt Chronicles #24
Wow, two years ago the hardware database did not even exist, but some of you persisted and since October of 2006, we've had a hardware database. In the beginning, there were zero entries for this database. Truly it was something that would have to be nurtured into a viable database. Sure, growth of this database seems at time slow, but on the plus side it's still growing. That said, I am pleased as punch to inform the masses that our hardware database now has over 3000 records. For a database created from scratch, that's a huge accomplishment. I'd really like to thank lots of people for this achievement, but for now I'll just thank the three staff members that truly have made the hardware database what it is today - Marriott_guy, Tan, and Apolloboy - thanks. Of course, they are not the only people who have allowed for this occasion to occur, and I am certainly thankful for all the submissions that you, our community, has made for this database to reach this milestone. Thank you all for your help in getting to this point!
So, it took two years to get to 3000 hardware records... how long will it take to reach 6000? Here's looking forward to the continued health of our databases!
You are strolling down the walkway when you see a gleam in the distance... "What is that?", you begin to wonder. You quicken your pace, and the thing comes into view: a store front. Jogging now, you begin to hear a courus of Angels Singing "Hallelujah!! Hallelujah!!". An aura encompasses the place! You are crying because you haven't seen the place in many years!! FUNCOLAND! Ahh... The memories. You fling the door open... And...
You wake up. It is raining outside, and the clock reads 10:04 in the morning. You look outside, and see what was once holy ground, FuncoLand. Now there, is an evil, desolate place.
GameStop!
AHHAHAHA! Okay! So! Story telling aside, as you may have noticed, I have had some really bad experiences at GameStop. A few (not many...) have been great, but these 'good times' are overpowered by the 'bad' to even 'horrid' times. So even though the title says "Good Game Stores", GameStop may or may not be such. Let's see why...
- Selection: Meh. They have all the new games, and some of the older ones as well. Also, they usually have lots of used games too. They don't always get their games on time though... 3.5/5
- Organization/Product Quality: I have NEVER seen a GameStop in which the games were alphabetized, or even remotely organized (ex facing the same way, etc). And their used product quality is horrid. Out of every 5 games that I get there, 1 will freeze and or NOT EVEN WORK. Can't they check to see if a game works? I give this section a 1.5/5, and I think that is VERY generous.
- Prices: Good to Great actually... They have some great sale deals that happen every once in a while, as well as just normal prices that make up for the abysmal customer service and crappy game conditions/playability.4.5/5
- Customer Service: Blarg... (Yes I said Blarg...) Not the WORST, but far from the best. I ask them if I can check the disks (visually) before I buy them. What do they say? "They are FINE man... Just trust me." Trust you? I think NOT!!! I trusted them, and I got a copy of Guitar Hero 2 THAT DID NOT WORK!!!!2.5/5, because I can always trade their faulty games back without much hassle.
GameStop manages to scrape a
12/20, or
60%. All in all, I will continue to shop there, but there are MANY alternatives that I usually try before I patronize them.
Have any of you guys (or gals) ever had a success story with them? Probably a horrendous one?? Leave a comment, post a blog, PM me! Thanks!!! And keep it on channel 3!!!!
The biggest game of this week is EA's sci-fi scarefest, Dead Space. If this game is not on your radar, it should be. Why? It's supposed to be an