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http://videolamer.com/index.php/2757
"It was like a goddamned hardware launch only the following morning the mass of those proprietors overrun by game dorks just hours earlier would be rich with bloom; their walls stacked to bear out those morsels to which Bungie executives owe their Hummers, Audis and yes, the occasional EVO."
"I laugh freely at those droves for reasons that start with a grasp of the mildly absurd and stretch on into infinity. Is this not a video game we are talking about? Was the game immediately preceding not critically panned, publicly questioned and, dare I say it, as ugly as that lizard baby from V: The Final Battle? "
" I’ve always seen it as sort of a console nerd’s answer to real FPS gaming. There were other console FPSs before Halo, but Halo was the only one I got 13yr olds bragging to me about p0wning. Halo is the default go-to game for people who want to pretend they are hardcore gamers but really have a fair amount of difficulty determining whether or not the television is actually on."
"I’m just saying that I’ve popped off my share of heads, and done so with Jesus Christ’s own mouse and keyboard. He lent it to me for smiting fools. That’s right, Jesus plays UT. WWJD? WSAD."
"I think console FPSs are for boys who pee sitting down. BOOM; head-shot."
"Now that we’ve established the rules of this universe, I’d like to crack it in half by telling you that I absolutely enjoyed the HELL out of the Halo 3 campaign. I think it is a tight bit of FPS on an engine that absolutely drips with refinement."
"1. Console FPSs suck for anyone with a PC and, um, skill. If you can’t find a way to make sense of this you can take your purse, capri pants and subscription to Teen magazine and go home.
2. Halo 3 is Halo: Combat Evolved, only it has actually evolved into what they wanted the first time through. The crappy excuse for a story is evidence of this.
3. At the end of the day, the game is a badass good time if you want to get into a quality ass-kicking situation, even if it reminds you of UT2004 just a little."
Best "flamebait/review" ever.
Another great one:
http://www.gamecritics.com/halo-3-review
Best part of that review is all the butthurt Halo fanboys BAWWWWWWWWWWWWing over the review score in the comments.
Another great article from the same site:
http://www.gamecritics.com/reviewing-the-reviewers
This one criticizes commercial game sites and their reviewing of Halo 3 and other hyped up games.
"A few years back I gave The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay a 10. It was a beautiful and brilliant game that melded numerous genres into a fluid, exciting, and wholly unique experience. From what I can see, no one is claiming that Halo 3 does anything like that. The consensus seems to be that the gameplay is mainly just a minor refinement of Halo 2; that there are some level design issues later in the game; and that the experience lacks the "newness" of Halo. 1UP.com even went so far as to say, "...in Halo 3, the big 'oh wow!' gameplay moments just aren't there"—but they gave the game a 10/10 anyway. Now, having not played Halo 3, I can't say personally whether it's as great as it's being made out to be—I'm only saying that the press has, in my view, done a poor job of substantiating their ratings."
I'll keep it short and sweet.
I put in almost 10 hours today and will still probably get bitched out tomorrow when i go into work tomorrow.
I came in a little early to help because the store is swamped with tourists(3 day weekend zOMG!!!) and was asked by the manager to stay an extra hour till the store closed(midnight) so i could help get everything done by a reasonable hour.
Since my coworker decided to spend much of her shift yakking on her cellphone with all her "boyfriends" and another person we work with i made an exacutive decision and left after restocking the coolers which were close to empty again.
Leaving her to sweep, mop, clean everthing, front and face everything, inside trash and all reports.
And i just bet i will once again be the one written up for not staying late enough. I am the only person who gets anyshit about how i do my work and the only person who has been written up in christ knows how long.
But i am the only person who gets everything done when i work aloe, comes in to help with the work load when they need it, and spends more than half my sift actually working.
And yes compared to how much i could have ranted and raved this was short and to the point if not a little scatterbrained and fragmented....
Another month, another round of submissions made! This post is intended to thank those members who have helped to grow our database. This last month saw 2992 submissions. Of those submissions, 2295 submissions were for the games database and 697 were for the hardware database. In addition, 391 images were added to the database last month.
We'd like to thank everyone for the submissions that they make. A special thanks goes out to those members who submitted more than 50 pieces of information. Those members are Tan, Tynstar, James, eaglebeak99, Funk_Buddy, Pop Culture Portal, OatBob, ApolloBoy, NES_Rules, and Mezmoron. Tan also had the largest number of submissions made, with 874. Congratulations on taking the top spot! It certainly is appreciated.
Any submission made by a regular member must be approved by a staff member, and this month, Tan also took the top post for approving submissions, with 540 approvals. OatBob and Tynstar round out the top 3 approvers, and we are thankful that they and all other staff members helped to approve your submissions. Thanks!
Lastly, I'd like to thank Tynstar for all the items that he helps to fix in the database. Scott, has been great, fixing errors and inconsistencies that can not be fixed using the edit scripts. We are appreciate for that!
Thanks for the submissions, and let's try to submit many new submissions this month!
So i am going to try and fly back to Mass end of November sometime before Thanksgiving and drive back to Texas in my own car(FINALLY MY CAR WILL BE MINE AGAIN!).
Tickets leaving Corpus look to be in the 290-310$ range. Ones leaving out of San Antonio are 80 or so bucks cheaper but the money spent on gas would kill any and all savings probably plus some since SA is over 3 hours away.
ANYWAYS THE INTERESTING PART:
I know the first time around there were a bunch of people who had mentioned i had been relatively close by them. Once things get more solidified maybe on the way back to Texas i could meet up with some RFGeners.
I want to try and get 2 weeks off so i can spend almost a week @ home(MA) and take an easy week drive back to home(TX).
So if you litter the states in between there get in touch. It would be cool to meet up with some of the other members. Hell i could probably get a Trip Tik from AAA and have destinations thrown on there to hit on my way down.
Right now i think my trip will look something like this picture:
[img width=600 height=361]http://a62.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01/65/l_92ad0d6e9d920d8fb9e56b4e48e1d9b5.jpg[/img]
This is just a preliminary map of course...
 On this day ten years ago, Gunpei Yokoi, one of the most important and influential figures in gaming, passed away. For those of you who do not know, Gunpei is the creator of the Game Boy, the system that revolutionized portable gaming, and paved the way for every handheld system to follow.
Game Boy is not the first thing that Mr. Yokoi created. One day, he was riding home on a bullet train from his job at Nintendo. He noticed that the man seated next to him on the train was messing around with an LCD calculator. This event gave birth to Game & Watch, a series of stand alone LCD games. The Game & Watch was very influential on Nintendo's future, especially in modern times. In fact, for Nintendo DS, they pretty much took a two screen Game & Watch game (such as Mario Bros. or Donkey Kong), added modern LCD screens, and turned the bottom part into a touch screen. Also, if you ever play Super Smash Bros. Melee on GameCube, you'll notice that one of the characters you can play as is Mr. Game & Watch, who was the protagonist of many of the Game & Watch games, such as Ball.
After creating Game & Watch, Nintendo appointed him to the head of Nintendo R&D1. While heading up R&D1, he was instrumental in the creation of Kid Icarus, Metroid, and of course R.O.B. for the NES. However, R&D1's most famous creation was to come...
In 1989, Gunpei and his R&D1 team revolutionized the portable gaming market with the original Game Boy, which combined the cartridge based gaming of the NES with the portability of Game & Watch. The Game Boy inspired many of Nintendo's competitors to enter the handheld gaming ring: Sega with the Game Gear, and Atari with the Lynx. While both of them were technically superior and featured a color screen, each of them completely failed in comparison to the Game Boy, due to its very long battery life, small size, and excellent game selection. These factors caused Game Boy held onto the gaming market with an iron grip for 13 years through many variations and revisions, including a color version.
Gunpei's most ambitious project, Virtual Boy, was released in 1995. Virtual Boy was an attempt to create a "portable" system capable of displaying true 3D graphics. However, this system went down as one of the biggest failures in gaming history. Some of the reasons it failed were because it was only able to display red, caused eye strain in most users, ate up 6 AA batteries rather quickly, was not very portable, was fragile, and it cost $180 at launch. The system was discontinued a year later.
The failure of Virtual Boy really brought Gunpei down. He felt horrible, and Nintendo placed the blame on the Virtual Boy failure on him. This pressure led to his resignation from Nintendo on August 15, 1996, mere days after Game Boy Pocket game out in Japan.
After leaving Nintendo, he went to form his own company, Koto Laboratories. They started working on the Wonderswan for Bandai, however, Gunpei would never see the final product...
On October 4, 1997, Gunpei was riding in a car driven by Etsuo Kiso from Nintendo. Kiso's car accidentally rear-ended a truck driving in front of them the Hokuriku Expressway. Gunpei and Kiso got out of the car to examine the situation. While surveying the damage, another vehicle collided with the Kiso's car, killing Gunpei Yokoi.
Fast forward ten years, we can still find Yokoi's legacy still alive. Be it in Nintendo DS's Game & Watch inspired design, the continuation of Metroid, Mr. Game & Watch's appearance in Super Smash Bros, or in the game Gunpey for Wonderswan, PSP, and Nintendo DS. Gunpei Yokoi is an undisputed legend in the industry, and he is missed by all of us.
Check out this article from The Escapist for even more information.
 30 years ago this month the first of the Atari VCS systems started rolling off the factory lines in time for the holiday shopping season. The Atari VCS turned out to be the first "popular" cartridge based game system that families could play in the comfort of their own homes. With a lifespan of 14 years and a library of nearly a thousand titles, surely there is something for everyone.
Reviving a dead feature, this is List 'em. I list my favorites and you list yours. Here's my top Atari 2600 games:- Asteroids - An arcade favorite that also hit it it big at home. The gameplay is simple; fly your spaceship in any direction trying to clear out the Asteroid field. Fly too fast and you crash, and shooting larger asteroids makes them break into multiple smaller ones. I think most people will find this one to be fun with an easy difficulty level.
- Space Invaders - Fortunately in the 1980s there were two "baddies" in gaming, film, and comic books that were impossible to be politically incorrect as the arbiters of leading world faiths hadn't covered them... Aliens and Zombies. Well, here's another mindless alien blaster that needs little introduction. Move your ship along the base of the screen shooting vertically, and taking cover as needed behind destructible shields. The invading ships are arranged in a grid with the higher ones being worth more points for scoring. Occasionally, a bonus ship will chirp and fly across the top of the screen for big points and maybe extra life. The sprites are not the same as the arcade, but the spirit is there and it feels much alive.
"INCREASE SPEED, DROP DOWN, AND REVERSE DIRECTION!" -Lrr (Futurama)
- Pitfall! - Play as a jungle explorer, Pitfall Harry, in search of untold fortune. Obstacles along the way include scorpions, crocodiles, and quicksand, so you better be ready to jump into action or else you'll fall short. Activision (the first "third-party" developer) really nailed it with this one. Unfortunately the difficulty level eventually plateaus, and the only world records to be had are timed "perfect play" runs.
- Adventure - Wander the world from a top-down viewpoint through mazes and castles. Find keys to unlock newer areas to explore and slay dragons that stand in the way of progress. This game was truly revolutionary in terms of mechanics and general scope and size. A similar but far more refined game titled The Legend of Zelda came out on the NES a few years later and blew the world away. To this date I still enjoy playing both games.
- Missile Command - Move the cursor to trigger a mid-air explosion. Use this to destroy all incoming missiles heading towards your bases. This game gets to be tough after a while, with a fair, but gradually increasing difficulty with each wave.
Wow, five is too short for listing all the great games for such a classic system. There's always other goodies like Q*Bert, Pole Position, Breakout, , Yars' Revenge, Frogger, Combat, and multiplayer sports games like Basketball. Expect simple gameplay and don't forget the RF switch. Stay tuned on channel 3.
Captain's log.... Stardate 10.2.2007
Halo Developer to leave Microsoft
At least thats what Gaming e-zine 8BitJoystick and it's source want you to think.
According to 8BitJoystick: The source was identified as "a friend of mine who has someone close that works at Bungie".
Read the whole article here: Article
If you ask me, a friend of a friend, who's father's uncle told me that Nintendo is tired of selling consoles. I heard from this very reliable source that Nintendo is going to stop making consoles and handhelds very soon.
I hope you can see my line of thinking about 8BitJoystick's "source".
I would be shocked if Bungie totally stepped away from Microsoft. Those guys have to be making money "hand over fist". And let's face it, who doesn't want more money?
 This week we're shifting gears and cutting into the fast lane.
OutRun 2019 takes the lead this week as our featured game. Easily one of the fastest racing games on the Sega Genesis, it still plays like the other games from the outrun series. Of course, with these fast speeds come big crashes. If you like any of the F-Zero or Burnout games, you'ld certainly get some fun out of this one.
The featured image this week is a real bargain bin gem, but don't let the cover fool you. R: Racing Evolution looks to be another Ridge Racer game as it was made by Namco and features a shiny car and young Japanese female on the cover. At least thats what I thought when I picked it up. It turns out to be a racing simulation (that isn't Ridge Racer) with more simplified tuning options and a storyline. This game features a lot of real cars with upgrade options where all can be obtained in a reasonable time period. Stock cars, F1, offroad circuit, and drag racing are all represented here. My favorite cars here are the DeLorean (yeah it was really intended to be a luxury sports car) and the Hummer. The Xbox version of this game has a special Hummer with an Xbox paint job, adding in a touch of humor due to its ridiculous size, unplayable slow acceleration and speed. This game is fun to play, and the variety of races keep it fresh. The other drivers taunts are a little corny though, so try and keep the lead so you don't have to hear them as much.
The Gran Turismo 3 PlayStation 2 console bundle closes the gap for hardware. The Gran Turismo series has always been the leading car simulation with high attention to detail and realism. GT3 also helped give the early PS2 the big push for which Sony was hoping, contributing to the largest juggernaut in gaming history. While there are millions and millions of PS2s out there, this bundle proves to have some collector's value as its the only real box variant or bundle for the early model PlayStation 2.
Speeding his way to higher collection numbers is Reps911. He claims to have rekindled his collection habit after meeting his (approving) significant other. Over the past couple years he's shown a fast accumulation of games and systems, and shows no signs of slowing down.
So next time you're rounding the channel circuit, don't forget to stop by channel 3.
 Yes, you did not misread that headline. Rumor has it that the developer of Oni and Myth, Bungie, is leaving Microsoft.
The rumor originated on a website I've never heard of named 8Bit Joystick.com. Today, Jake from that site posted that a friend of his who has a friend that works at Bungie told him that they are leaving Microsoft. Not exactly the greatest source in the world, but it sounds very plausible...
This "friend of a friend" stated that the split would have been announced today, but MS didn't want it to affect their 3rd quarter earnings, so it will be announced on the 6th of this month. However, the non disclosure agreement was lifted today.
Here is the email as quoted on 8Bit Joystick.com...
"So heres my big secret. You should google Bungie + Microsoft + separation this week.
You know that big ol BILLION dollar franchise Bungie has created for Microsoft, to show their appreciate Microsoft is letting Bungie leave. Of course Microsoft gets to keep all rights to the Halo franchise, but as today Bungie no longer part of Microsoft. Ask anyone who works there to search the global address book, they're no longer in there. Microsoft was supposed to release the press release today but if they wait till the 10/6 the impact wont effect the quarterly results. However today is the actual official date and the day the NDAs expire, however you still didn't hear this from me."
"Apparently MS just wants Bungie to make Halo for the rest of their natural days, and Bungie doesn't like how MS is constantly trying to "handle" everything they do; the way they market their games, the way they interact with their fans (basically the fact that they do appreciate their fans), and how stingie they are with the profits (comparable to the rest of the industry). So as of today they are their own independent entity. They'll probably make Halo 4 for Microsoft, however hey are also free to create new intellectual properties for whatever system they want. (Even though they prefer the xbox platform)"
"What a way to say thank you."
I certainly wouldn't be surprised if this rumor was true, because if you were a game company, would you want to stick to making one game forever and ever? I think not. And from Microsoft's point of view, this makes sense because they could make money off of selling Bungie, while still retaining the Halo license. That way, they can license the work on the Halo franchise out to other companies that would require less money to make it, and MS would still sell the same amount of copies since Halo is a big name. All the while, Bungie goes off on their own and makes games that Microsoft would never allow them to do. All parties are happy.
In response to these rumors, game blog Kotaku contacted Bungie, who redirected them to Microsoft's PR Firm who in response said "There's been no such announcement. We continue to celebrate the tremendous success of the global phenomenon that is Halo 3."
Is it true? Keep it on Channel 3 for the latest...
UPDATE:
The originator of the rumor is sticking to his word:
http://www.8bitjoystick.c...up_and_thats_my_story.php
Locks are being changes at Bungie's headquarters...
This is getting jucier...
So there I was.... Saturday afternoon, and Scott shows up with a copy of Halo 3 for me. It was a birthday gift, and a good one! (Thanks Scott)
I was working on the site, and adding the past weeks Wii and DS games to the database. I was also busy writing some guidelines, but finished them up and proceeded to play some Halo 3.
The game looks great. I know there a lot of 360 fans out there who say Gears of War looks better. But I'd have to say that Halo 3 holds it's own. Halo has bigger maps, and more enemies on the screen at any given time. Both games are excellent (IMO).
But the reason I am writing this blog entry is to note that I "Finished the Fight" late Saturday evening. In fact, I beat it on the highest level of difficulty.(legendary) I didn't even play on the lower settings. ;p
The ending wasn't what I was expecting, and I'll leave it at that.
[img width=700 height=525]http://www.rfgeneration.com/forum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=8.0;attach=2031;image[/img]
[img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/repository/204325269947003e9e076a6141427082v7_240x240_Front_Color-BlackWhite.jpg[/img]
RF Generation is a community of gamers, collectors, and generally good people that make this place truly special. With this site though there are costs associated with it, whether it is domain registration fees, server costs, contingency budgets, or contests. Well, these costs add up, and for poor college kids such as myself it is a cost that we would love to be shared amongst the community. As such, today we start the 2007 "keep the site running" donation drive.
Any donation made during this drive will be used solely for server costs and contingencies. Over the past year, we've seen readership grow immensely, and we want to make sure that we have the funds available to ensure that the server and site are always running properly. With your help, we'll have the funds to keep the site going for another year. This year, we are looking for a goal of $500 to be raised.
The question then arises - what is the incentive for donating? Well, don't you love the site? Wouldn't you hate it if it disappeared? Well, while the site will never disappear, you certainly would make the poor college kids (and Scott) happy if you helped defray the costs of running the site. Additionally, there are perks. Anyone who donates money this year will get to be given donor status, which let's everyone know that they helped to keep the site running. Additionally, we have something new this year for donors - freebies! If you donate $20, you will get RF Generation Logo Magnet, and if you donate $50, a cool RF Generation ringer T is yours to keep! That's our way of saying thanks for donating! Please note that to get your shirt or magnet you will have to provide an address to us via PM, and while we're pretty sure we can deliver our merchandise anywhere, we can't guarantee it. If we find out that you live somewhere where we can't deliver the shirt we'll make every effort to make things right, including having the shirt delivered to our house and then out via UPS, DHL, or Fed-ex rather than having it shipped directly from the manufacturer.
To donate, click the donate button located in the navigation area of our forum, or click here. We certainly appreciate any donation that is made, and with your help, we'll reach our goal. Thank you!
 The rumored 40GB, $399, model of the Playstation 3 bundled with Spider-Man 3 on Blu-ray is looking more and more likely. First, there's the rumor that Sony is turning to FoxConn to help make the new model. Then there's the picture of the label of the new model from the FCC website with the new model number of CECHG01. Now, the latest proof of the new PS3 model is on the Blu-ray Savings website. The new program lists a new PS3 model, CECHG01, which is the same one seen on the FCC website. Now, if you know your PS3 models, you'll know that CECHG01 does not match any current model. CECHA01 is the 60GB model, CECHE01/98137 is the 80GB+Motorstorm model, and CECHB01 is the discontinued 20GB model.
Is CECHG01 the new $399 40GB model? All signs point to yes. Now all that's left is for Sony to step forward and confirm it.
 According to Kotaku, an internal Gamestop email has been sent out requesting that all stores take down current signs and promotional material for the Xbox 360 Core model, because once the current stock is sold out, there won't be any more. In other words, the Xbox 360 Core is being discontinued.
Why would MS be eliminating the Core model (other than the obvious fact that it's a horrible deal)? To replace it with a new rumored Core model named Xbox 360 Arcade, which will not include a hard drive, but will include a 256mb memory card, a wireless controller, and 5 Xbox Live Arcade games.
What do I think of this rumor? I say, it's about damn time they get rid of the Core. No one is buying it, and it just makes sense to get rid of it. However, I don't know that replacing it with another model is a good idea either because if people just want casual games, they'll go to Wii or DS, which is where most of the casual games are these days.
[img width=300 align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/hardware/J-136/bf/J-136-H-00010-A.jpg[/img]Casio of Japan, a successful electronics manufacturer, released their first video game console, the Casio PV-1000 in October of 1983 for 14,8000 yen ($129 USD). Debuting against the likes of the Sega SG-1000 and the Nintendo Famicom, this extremely rare and obscure system rapidly was an afterthought and not to be seen on video game store shelves shortly after its release.
The PV-1000 itself is not unattractive and the housing feels very well constructed utilizing thick, durable plastics. Dark-teal in color and rectangular in shape, the soft, curved molding culminates with the game cartridge tier. The front inputs are simple but elegant - two joystick ports are centered in the front of the unit face. The back features the same no-nonsense approach with the power connection and RF connectors anchoring the far left and right. The power toggle switch is located on the right side and there is a port on the left side of the system that resembles a PC connector of some sort (use unknown to me). Overall, the PV-1000 design is sleek, unobtrusive and modern compared to its counterparts.
[img width=300 align=left]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/hardware/J-136/bb/J-136-H-00010-A.jpg[/img]
Powered by a Z80A micro-processor at 3.5Mhz and 2Kb of RAM, this engine was able to display games at a resolution of 256 x 192 pixels in 8 colors. Games were released on cartridges approximately the size of Nintendo Famicom carts. A total of 15 games were released for this system, mostly ports of earlier Casio releases for MSX compatible computers including Pooyan, Amidar, Tutankhamon and Dig-Dug. Overall video quality is comparable to the Colecovision. Game control is driven through a solid joystick featuring one (1) fire button at the top of the it along with a 'start', 'select' and a large auxillary button at it's base (packed in with the system). Casio also produced the PV-2000 in December 1983, which was a computer version of the PV-1000. Both the PV-1000 and PV-2000 joysticks are compatible though the game cartridges are not.
Overall, the Casio PV-1000 was a below average system when it debuted and met its demise quickly. This is an extremely rare item and only recommended for the ultra-serious console collector. This console was released solely in Japan for a short period of time. I do not have a recommendation for price since I have only seen one of these systems once for sale - the one pictured in this review. Be prepared to invest heavily if you do wish to pursue - games are just as scarce and pricey.
So I've had my Xbox 360 since about a month after launch. Of course I had mine pre-ordered, but I was on the second or third shipment. So in nearly two years, I have yet to get 100% of a games achievements. I finally broke through with Madden 06. Yes, it was really ewasy, and yes I borrowed it from Scott for the sole purpose of getting the achievements..... But it had to be done. :p
[img width=550 height=775]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/U-115/bf/U-115-S-00040-A.jpg[/img]
So here's to you John Madden. Thanks for the easy 1000 points!
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We are a community of collectors, gamers and the likes, and some of us enjoy to let the world know what is on our mind. For those members, we have the community blogs, a place where they can publish their thoughts and feelings regarding life, universe, and everything. Some of those members might even choose to write about gaming and collecting! Whatever they write about, you can find it on their blog. You can either see the latest community blog entries in the feed you see to the left, or you can browse for your favorite blog using the menu above. Interested in having your own blog hosted on RF Generation? It's rather simple, first be a registered member, and then click the "My Blog" link that you see in the navigation above. Following those two steps will certainly get you on your way to blogging.
Sit back, relax, and enjoy our entries, rantings, and completely unrelated series of thoughts. We write for you to read, so we certainly hope that you enjoy our material.
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