[img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/treasure_chronicles/Club_Nintendo.png[/img]
Japan has know the sweet loyalty program known as "Club Nintendo" for years, Europe has had "Nintendo VIP 24:7" since the Gamecube launched over 6 years ago and "Club Nintendo" since the launch of the Wii. But, Nintendo wasn't nice enough to give North America a Club Nintendo just yet. In fact, even South Africa has had a Club Nintendo for six months already.
But, in October 2008, it was revealed that Club Nintendo was coming to North America. And to the instant relief of millions of Nintendo fans, was launched December 15. But, as anyone who tried to sign up already knows, the site was rather buggy, in fact it didn't really work at all. Many who tried to sign up for the first time couldn't get it to work and nearly everyone who tried transferring their "My Nintendo" information found that the system just wouldn't let them log in.
I know I was one of the first to be elated and aggravated with the system in the same 5 minutes. I tried at least twice a day to log in, but was always met with a "your username or password are incorrect" message. Finally, today I tried and was instantly logged in, and was given the opportunity for my first survey. I promptly gave "World of Goo" a glowing review and received my 10 coins.
So, now that I've mentioned "coins" you may be wondering what they are. Well, they're points that you use to "buy" stuff from Club Nintendo. Many people out there feel the prizes right now are terrible, but I think there are some very nice things to be had.
For 800 coins, you get the Game & Watch Collection for DS.
For 600, you get a White Nintendo DS Game Card Case.
For 800, you get Hanafuda Cards. The picture shows a huge stack, but it doesn't say how many you actually get.
500 coins get you Mario Party Playing Cards or Animal Crossing Playing Cards.
600 gets you a Mario Nintendo DS Game Rack.
600 gets you either a Black, Super Mario Bros. Theme, or Animal Crossing Theme Nintendo DS Game Card and Stylus Set.
400 gets you a Nintendo DS Lite Case (Silver).
And 300 will get you a Wii Remote Holder.
As you can see, the prizes are heavily geared towards the DS, with only one item for the Wii. Many users are complaining that Club Nintendo isn't giving North America the same awesome prizes that Japan gives away, such as a Super Famicom style Classic Controller for the Wii and unreleased games such as Tingle's Balloon Fight DS and Exclamation Warriors Sakeburein. But I feel the prizes they are offering are very good, for a program that has just started up. I know I really want three of the available items, and I'm confident Nintendo will be adding new stuff after not too long.
The only major drawback to the system I see is that only first party Nintendo games can be registered, and only new ones at that. So all the GameCube games you have won't get you any points. I think that is a big mistake for Nintendo because they should give their loyal customers something for their years of money, not just people jumping on the Wii/DS bandwagon. Wouldn't is be amazing if we could register our hundreds of NES, SNES, and N64 games 
So Nintendo fans, head on over to https://club.nintendo.com/ and sign up to start receiving your free stuff. A word of advice I noticed with the site, before you register games, it looks like you can add games to a "Intend to Buy" list first and then register them to receive 10 extra coins.
[img align=right]http://i76.photobucket.com/albums/j22/Mike_2_0_0_6/UncleSamForChat.jpg[/img]
OK, maybe the US needs more than a bunch of collectors, but what does need you is the RFGeneration Chat. You see for the past few days, the chat has been inhabited primarily by Canadians. Yes, our cousins to the North who we pretend to hate, but are really just jealous of.
Right now 4 out of the 5 users in the chat are Canadian, and since Alfador must have made it through the snow to get to work, I'll probably be the only American in there for a couple more hours.
So, Americans, help your country turn the tables and join in on the chat. You can use the wonderful chat applet provided by Dave or your own IRC program to get there, but just make sure you join in.
Click Here for our Chat Page
I'm not dead, I just took a week off to do my final exams and stuff like that. Plus, this time of year is dead anyways, so I figured it could wait. So, here's what came out last week and what's out this week.
| Playstation 3 | Xbox 360 | Nintendo Wii | • Rise of the Argonauts
• Sonic Unleashed (get the Wii/PS2 version instead) | • Rise of the Argonauts | • Calvin Tucker's Redneck Jamboree
• Neopets Puzzle Adventure
• Rock Band 2
• Summer Sports 2: Island Sports Party
• The Tale of Despereaux
• Word Jong Party | | PSP | Nintendo DS | Playstation 2 | • Dungeon Maker II: The Hidden War
PC
• Band Manager
• Lost Secrets: Bermuda Triangle
• Hidden Expedition: Amazon
• Hired Guns: The Jagged Edge
• Prince of Persia
• Rise of the Argonauts
• RPG Fantasy Action Pack
• The Tale of Despereaux
• Zoo Tycoon 2 Ultimate Collection | • Animal Boxing
• Australia Zoo Quest
• Build-a-Lot
• Candace Kane's Candy Factory
• Cate West The Vanishing Files
• Driver's Ed Portable
• Dreamer: Horse Trainer
• Dreamer: Puppy Trainer
• Learn Math
• Left Brain Right Brain 2
• Mystery P.I.: Portrait of a Thief
• Slingo Quest
• The Tale of Despereaux | • Rock Band 2
• Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4
• The Tale of Despereaux |
 Very boring, am I right? Get used to it. That's what the next few weeks are going to be like.
The only highlight here is Persona 4 for the PS2. I don't know much about it other than it's a weeaboo JRPG with an even more weeaboo translation that keeps all the honorifics and stuff on there. Also, you commit suicide to gain powers. Apparently it's good if you're into that kind of thing, but I'll stick to Fallout 3 thank you very much.
So, next week, I don't think anything is coming out. Literally, nothing.
It's hard to believe that our blog is nearly a year and a half old already! One of the great things about a blog is that you can chronicle your history as well as step back in time on a more personal level as you read reviews, opinions and reactions to gaming news from years past. It's also where we celebrate milestones, promotions and contest winners. But what you ask, did RF Generation do before the blog was built? Glad you asked!
From the site's formation in 2004 until the unveiling of the blog system in 2007, we used a combination of front page posts, forum announcements and Wikipedia. At one time, we had the entire site history in an organized short form style split between site history and database history in our Wikipedia article. Then one day they decided to cut our article off at the knees, leaving what you see there today. Shorter and more to the point, but it doesn't detail how we got here month by month, milestone by milestone.
Giving thanks to the incredible team of volunteers who kept the ink flowing as we noted each milestone and event in RFGen's history, here in part 1 of this series, are the recorded entries for the database and site news from 2004.
Continue reading RF Generation Timeline Part 1: 2004
I bet you were wondering if this was ever going to get posted, well I am happy to report that here it is and I now have a functioning pinball machine, although it still has its fair share of problems....
Continue reading My, mostly, Lifelong Dream Pt 3
Reviewing is something completely new to me, so this will be a learning process for me, so feel free to critique my reviewing style. My reviews are based on what I like and dislike about the games, not what I think the general public will like or dislike about the game. Since I'm not a big gamer as most other reviewers, my reviews will be based on the first few levels of games instead of the entire game, so keep that in mind when reading. I'm going to try and start reviewing games that are a little less talked about and maybe even games that you've never heard of. I'm going to start with some NES and Famicom games because I've got this really cool 76-in-1 pirate cart that is full of great (and not so great) NES and Famicom games.
B-Wings [img align=right]http://www.rfgeneration.com/images/games/J-027/ss/ts/J-027-S-02780-A.jpg[/img]
The first game I'm going to review is B-Wings for the Nintendo Famicom. B-Wings was released in 1986 and is a Japan only game, so good luck finding it if you're in the US or Europe, there isn't even a copy of it on eBay right now, but there was one on GameGavel not too long ago, so they are out there, it just may be a bit pricey.
Gameplay: The game plays about the same as any generic vertical shooter, but it does have one thing that sets it apart from others that I have played. At the start of the game, you have your choice of weapons. There are ten different weapons for you to choose from. The cannon fires three shots that shoot straight in front of you, they are quite powerful, but lack any ability to shoot in other directions. "Wide" fires 5 shots that progressively spread further from each other, they are powerful and the path of destruction is great. "Multi" fires three shots, sometimes they all go straight ahead, other times one goes straight, one goes to the left and one goes to the right, and other times they fire at an angle so they all go forward, but progressively get further form each other. "Van" fires six very powerful shots that go a very short distance, but spread around you in a fan shape. "Side" fires seven shots, one that goes straight ahead, and three on each side that fire to the sides in a fan shape. "Anti" fires two shots straight ahead and two shots straight behind. "Hammer" is my personal favorite weapon and fires two very powerful shots straight ahead and also has two "orbs" that circle your ship for extra protection. "Jump" is essentially the same as Cannon, but one of the shots explodes, but it doesn't really seem to help things much. "Dyna" is an extremely power single shot that is very wide and can destroy several smaller enemies in the one shot. "Fire" is the last weapon option and is a wave of energy that is quite powerful but has a small range, and it allows you to almost continuously fire.
Once you have selected your weapon, your ship attaches to it and you're sent into space to destroy anything that comes at you. There are several different types of flying enemies to destroy as well as stationary objects to destroy. If an enemy drives into you or hits you with a weapon, you lose your main weapon and have to rely on a very small, weak cannon. If you drive into one of the stationary objects, your ship explodes and you're dead.
Throughout the game, you have the option to pick up another weapon, you can pick it up by simply driving into it if you have already lost your main weapon or you drop your current weapon and then pick up the new one. The weapons all have a different shape, but with 8-bit graphics, it's quite hard trying to distinguish and memorize what each weapon looks like.
There is also the option for 2 players, which sadly isn't co-op, but you alternate turns when one person dies the other picks up where that person dies. It's better than no second player support, but co-op would have been even better.
Graphics & Sound:
The graphics aren't bad for 1986, but nothing spectacular either. I've only played through the first two levels, but the enemies all seem to be unique, so it's not as repetitive as some games in this genre are.
The sound effects and music are very nice. The sound effects are basically your average 8-bit sound effects, but the music is great. Though it is hard to hear when you're constantly blasting away.
In conclusion, this game is great, if you like vertical shooters at least. I could definitely see myself playing this game for hours on end if I had the time. If you're looking for a deep game to lose yourself in the story, well, this isn't for you then. It's more of a pick up play when you've got some spare time type game.
I gave this game a 90% because it is a blast to play, but there really isn't anything memorable about it.
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Posted on Dec 14th 2008 at 07:54:30 PM by ( Sirgin) Posted under Magic, The Gathering, TCG, Trading Card, Game, Free, Shards, Alara, Tenth, Naya, Blue |
[img align=right width=150]http://sales.starcitygames.com/cardscans/MAGBOX/10themedeckblue.jpg[/img]
After getting the White, Green and Red Tenth Edition theme decks for free I decided to buy the Blue and Black decks. Although I'm not really getting back into Magic, I thought it would be neat to have the whole set.
I went back to the card shop where I got all the free cards a month ago, because I had some questions about some game mechanics that I'm sure that guy would be able to answer.
Continue reading Gathering The Magic: Part 2
Now, generally I do not like to review something until I have completely beat the game, and as such, this post is going to be impressions of the game, which to a certain extent is probably a review.
For those of you not in the know, I got the first disbursement of my sign-on bonus this week, and promptly splurged it on a PlayStation 3. Of course, the very first game that I bought was LittleBigPlanet. Why wouldn't I have bought that game first? Everything I've seen about it on the internet suggests that it oozes creativity. To a certain extent, it shows that this generation Sony and not Nintendo has the creativity wand when it comes to games. I had to buy this game, and by golly I did.
LittleBigPlanet is based around the concept that this world managed by Creator Curators is created by the combined imagination of the world and you, as Sackboy, get to explore it. On the surface of playing the game, LittleBigPlanet is a semi 2D platformer. You can only move left, right, or back and forth in the background. But, see, just because the game is in essence a 2D platformer does not take away from the fact that it oozes with creativity and fun.
This game is customizable, and not just a little customizable, but "HAVE AT IT WON'T YOU?" customizable. As you progress through the game you are gifted and obtain lots of stickers, objects, and doodads to fool around with. In story mode, these stickers can be placed wherever, and sometimes these stickers serve as triggers. But, the real beauty of collecting these customizations is the fact that the game allows you to create your own levels. These aren't some corny shallow level but often full fledged levels limited only by the imagination of the creator, and that's really neat. Theoretically you could never run out of levels to play because the community keeps pumping them out. It's really truly amazing.
That said, the Media Molecule (developer) levels are also very cool. Basically, each creator curator has a theme and mini storyline that ties in with the other curators, and levels get harder and harder as you progress through the story. Of course, once you beat a level there are plenty of reasons to go back. See, chances are you won't be able to get all 100% of the items on your first go, so there will always be that reason to come back to the level. Secondly, you could play the level by yourself, or you could play the level with someone online. The neat thing about that is that you sometimes have to have another Sackboy with you to get certain items and cause certain events to occur. Thing is though that I am so addicted to the game that I just want to beat it through before playing with someone online, so I don't know for sure how that works, but I imagine it's pretty cool.
From customizing your own levels to customizing your Sackboy, you have a lot of freedom in this game, and this freedom makes the game so damn enjoyable. I'd say I am about 70ish% through the story mode, and this game keeps calling me back. If you have a PS3 I don't think you have to buy the game, but you'd be doing yourself a great disservice if you didn't at least try it out. After all, Sackboy is so damn lovable. Forget Home's avatars, Sackboy should be our official Sony avatars. He's just so damn precious.
Have the game? Want the game? What are your impressions of LittleBigPlanet? Is it everything you thought it would be, or is it something that you hope it will be?
For my entire collecting "career" I've only bought stuff locally. I've never purchased anything from the internet, including eBay. I've always been very proud of this fact, because there are so few collectors out there that do it the "old school" way.
But, as my collection has grown, I've not only been having a harder time finding games I don't have, but I've accumulated hundreds of duplicate games. Now, for the past few months I've been trying my hardest to sell those duplicates. But, I've been having trouble doing that, which brings me to the point of this post. I've been considering becoming open to trading. In the past I was against trading over the internet as much as buying over the internet, but I'm not so sure anymore. Trading would essentially mean turning duplicates into new games, but I can't help but feel as though I would be going against my principles.
So, now I'm turning to you my fellow collectors, what do you guys think? Should I be open to trading or should I stick to my local roots only?
So, it's come to my attention that those of you that were using our chat client (known as mibbit) to get to our chat room may have found yourself more often than not with the wonderful welcoming sight of glined. What does that mean? Well, it appears quakenet places a temporary ban on connections via mibbit when too many users connect to the network via the program. In this case, it was almost always happening, and as such I view mibbit no longer as a viable option for our chat program.
What does that mean? Well, in short terms, we're back to using our old Java Client. Same chat room, same network, new webchat client. All the links should have been updated, and you should be able to get on easily, provided you have Java installed. Here is a link below to the new client. Again, sincerest apologies about the previous webclient dropping the ball, especially when I've been whoring out the chat in recent times. Do join, won't you?
Click Here for our Chat Page
 Tomb Raider: Underworld. This game has a 78% rating on gamerankings, but the PS3 version of the game has a special designation here. See, Tomb Raider: Underworld happens to be the forty-thousandth game in our database, and well, that means we have 40000 games in our database. Talk about a milestone! When we started we had about 15000 or so entries, if not less than that. Flash forward to today and we have 40000 entries and growing. What an accomplishment.
You guys absolutely rock, and no one person and be credited for the growth we've experienced. Rather, everyone on this site is to be commended, as so many of you have made submissions to the site and kept this site as the best independent video games database on the internet!
We're all very proud of this milestone, and as the Site Director I am very proud of you guys. I am sure if Mike was still around he'd be just as proud as me. Hell, I bet he's proud up in the big pie in the sky. We couldn't have done it without you, and we really look forward to the submission that gets us to 50000 games. We know that you guys will hit that milestone someday, and when that day comes we'll celebrate the moment just like we celebrate today! Here's to the past, present and future of RF Generation!
Congrats to Tynstar for adding the 40000th game! You deserve the designation and honor! This milestone is so huge that our old RF Generation spokesman has temporarily come out of retirement!
Wow, 2000 members. That's a big number, and it's touching. I don't think any of us expected RFG to be as successful as it has been, and we could not have done it without all 2000 of you, in addition to all you lurkers that visit the site and just browse. It's you guys that make the site what it is, and for that we're truly grateful.
Of course, we want to see us continue to grow, and over the time we hope to do so. I certainly hope that over time you'll see more new things here. Of course, there are new database additions every day, but who knows, maybe you'll see a new feature or two to play around with. Maybe, someday. Of course, those of us that do the programming now have full time jobs, but who's to say we won't work on the site in our free time? See, I am writing this post right now!
What a milestone. Here's to 3000, 4000, the future! To MrMatthews, congrats on being the 2000th member. You get a big imaginary cookie. We could give you a real cookie, but we'd rather spend that money keeping the site running. You know how it is. But YES! Congrats on being the 2000th member! Here's to you, and here's to our future!
Can you hear them? Why, it's the faint sound of crickets in the distance? Is it a summer night? Nah, it's the RF Generation chat room, and it's so quiet in there that you can hear the chirp of crickets in the vast emptiness of our chat room.
Of course, chances are that you can't hear the crickets because you're not in the chat room. The question is why wouldn't you be in the chat room? The chat room loves you, and is greatly sad that you're not in the room. It's not as though we have a vendetta against anyone in the chat room. We'll talk about most anything as long as it does not violate any US laws. We're really a fun bunch, and it'd probably be a lot more fun if you were there as well?
So, why aren't you in the chat room yet? I mean, the link to join is right below? Don't want to use our applet? Well, the room is #rfgeneration on quakenet. If you're IRC saavy you'll know what that means, otherwise, we hope you'll use the applet below. See you in chat!
Click Here for our Chat Page
Sorry for being so late with this, but this is the last week of the semester for me before finals, so the professors have been dumping all sorts of homework on me. Yippie. So, I need to keep it short and sweet this week.
| Playstation 3 | Xbox 360 | Nintendo Wii | • Prince of Persia
• SingStar ABBA | • Destroy All Humans 3: Path of Furon
• Prince of Persia | • Bigfoot: Collision Course
• Family Party: 30 Great Games
• King of Fighters Orochi Saga
• Mushroom Men: Spore Wars
• My Fitness Coach
• Nancy Drew: The White Wolf
• Safecracker
• Ski & Shoot
• SPRay
• The Tale of Despereaux | | PSP | Nintendo DS | Playstation 2 | NOTHING
PC
• Disney's Bolt
• Grand Theft Auto IV
• Neopets Puzzle Adventure
• The Tale of Despereaux
• A Vampyre Story
• Zoo Tycoon 2 Ultimate | • Animal Boxing
• Dreamer: Puppy Trainer
• Emma at the Farm
• Emma in the Mountains
• Happy Cooking
• Mushroom Men: Rise of the Fungi
• My Fun Facts Coach
• Prince of Persia: The Fallen King
• Slingo Quest
• The Tale of Despereaux
• Wordfish | • Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories
• SingStar ABBA
• The Tale of Despereaux |
 Yet another slow week, but there's some good stuff. Such as Prince of Persia. This installment in the long-running series has UbiSoft trying to reinvent the game with a new cel-shaded Okamiesque art style and open world gameplay...and apparently the results are good if early reviews are to be believed.
The other big game I'm interested in this week is Mushroom Men for the Wii. Why is this shovelware sounding game so intriguing? First of all, the game's music was composed and performed by none other than Primus bassist, Les Claypool. However, what makes the game really interesting is that the entire game is synced to a metronome that runs at 120 beats per minute. The result is a very unique look and sound that I've never seen in a video game before. It really must be seen to be fully understood, so take a look at this trailer from GameVideos about the metronome system. IGN also has a great article about the system. Oh, I supposed I should probably mention what the gameplay is like. Well, it's basically your standard platformer, but with some neat MDK2/Fallout 3 like weapon creation elements. I just hope the gameplay is as brilliant as the metronome system, but even if it isn't, I know I'll like the game since it's a bold experiment in sound design. Unfortunately, I can't afford to buy this game right away.  If anyone gets this game or hears anything about it, leave a comment, because I'm dying to know how this game turned out.
Oh yeah, there's some new Kingdom Hearts game out this week on the good ol PS2. It's a 3D remake of the GBA game, Chain of Memories entitled Re:Chain of Memories (clever). Since I don't know anything about Kingdom Hearts other than a lot of weeabos that don't normally like Disney love this game...probably for "kawaii" artwork and stuff. Never understood the appeal of this game.
If you missed out on the consoles, GTA IV will hit Windows this week in all it's SecuROM-protected "glory" (if you can call it that). Hooray DRM!
Anyways, check back next week when I'll be burned out by final exams. But then I'm done with school for a month. 
You know, normally we'd let other fine establishments waste your time with posts on game cakes. But, sometimes exceptional cakes deserve exceptional credit.
In this case, this Super Mario Galaxy cake was made for a daughter's 4 year old birthday party. As you can tell from the photo, it looks pretty damn awesome. I personally like the glass pill from the Good Egg galaxy or whatever special Galaxy it was from. Well, I know the Good Egg Galaxy had a pill, but it might not have been that exact pill, but still it's pretty damn cool.
Either way, this is a cake for the ages, and any game geek should be giddy with glee from the sight of this game cake. What? You say you aren't? Well aren't you a heathen? Well, perhaps a video of the cake might change your mind, as seen after the jump.
Continue reading An RFG Aside: Cake of Pure Awesome
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