I decided that I wanted everybody right around level 60 before going after the League Championship, so I've been doing a lot of mindless training... initially up around Snowpeak and more recently just west of Sunyshore. Then I stocked up on Revives and HP healers. Although I bought a ton of Super Potions, I also picked up lots of those drinks cans you get at the top floor of the shopping mall. They're a better value.
I haven't necessarily been looking forward to this, which is why it took me so long to work up to actually sitting down and doing. I mean, the battle junk is the least interesting part of the game for me (well, second least since Nintendo bungled the Super Contest thing.) I'm more into catching all of the different types and uncovering all of the games little secrets.
Which is why I bought both Prima strategy guides and kept them by my side as I prepared for the Elite Four. I'm just going to waste time starting and restarting to get this done. I wanted to walk in at a very fat level, have a good idea of what I could do to maximize my team's type advantages, and barrel through all five matches without saving inbetween.
DiRT Demo: More cars. I just can't get excited about driving games. I like that this one doesn't center on keeping the bloody car from falling off the cliff, like the MotorStorm demo.
It has freakin' sweet-ass gorgeous menus, though. I can honestly say I played the demo more than I would have, just because I wanted to click through those menus. Seriously, watch this movie and try to remember that you're watching menus.
PAGE 6: Well, there's Link to the Past. That couldn't have been Game of the Decade, could it? Naw. I mean, it's a good game, but it doesn't compare to the glory of Street Fighter II: Champion Edition. SF2 retains "almost every last detail" of the arcade original, fer cryin' out loud!
Gives you an idea how things worked in 1993; arcade games were top of the line, home console games were bare imitations, and home computer games were all Mavis Beacon.
Internet People (YouTube) This almost makes the internet worth it.
Powers Do Not Equal Personality (Roar of Comics) Steven Padnick ruminates on the tendency of Justice Leagues to accumulate team members based on powers, not personality. LOL moment:
"If you�ve got four guys with omnipotent magic wishing rings, why not bring all of them? When Batman took out Brother Eye in Infinite Crisis #6, he brought Green Lantern Hal Jordan and Green Lantern John Stewart. Why? Because Batman�s not an idiot."
Can you imagine a universe in which this happened:
TOKYO - Sony today announced that it is on track to sell its five millionth PLAYSTATION3 before the end of September, and to make the PS3 affordable for even more customers this holiday season, it is lowering the price of the most popular PS3 model with 60GB of storage from $599 to just $399.
�The surveys are in and PS3 customer satisfaction scores are higher than we�ve ever seen for any Sony product,� said Kazuo Kirai, Sony Computer Entertainment's CEO. �We�ve clearly got a breakthrough product and we want to make it affordable for even more customers as we enter this holiday season.�
The 60GB PLAYSTATION3 is available immediately for $399 in the US through all retail and online stores. The PS3 20GB model will be sold while supplies last.
In case you haven't figured it out, I just took Apple's iPhone price drop press release from earlier in the week and did some Mad Libbing.
Look, we all know that the Everybody Votes Channel is equal parts harmless and worthless. It was an act of purest optimism to assume that Nintendo would somehow use the EVC for actual market research... like, say, culling the opinions of their devoted fans about what VC games we'd like to see or whether we want to see more Zelda games in the style of Wind Waker or Twilight Princess. No, it's for finding out whether you like dogs or cats.
So, those complaints aside, just what in the hell does this mean?
Polished off Okami last night. (Sort-of spoilers coming, mainly about what rewards you earn after beating the game.) Really, really great stuff. I could have finished the game about fifteen hours back, but I decided to set some sub-goals to enjoy the game a little more.
Like the Stray Beads. Here's me celebrating that last bead.
Tony Stark as filthy rich warmonger. Very good. Nice modern update - he's clearly funding a Middle East-based war, as we'll see. He's slimy and arrogant.
He just gave an "American Might Makes Right" speech. This is going to play well in the Red State sticks, although they won't see the big philosophical transformation coming. Which is probably fine. I mean, the first half of this trailer looks like an embarrassing 9/11 revenge flick, but it seems plain that Tony will see the error of his ways and, by the end of the movie, change his weapons company into a defense-through-technology company.
I'm very nearly ashamed to admit it, but one of the reasons I worked so hard to fully exhaust Okami over the last few weeks was so I could move on to a small stack of $10 games. Talk about a sine wave.
Zatch Bell: Mamodo Fury (PS2) Ten cent synopsis: Control both Zatch and Kiyo in a series of mamodo battles, following the storyline from the popular(?) anime and manga.
It's $10 because: It's old. This one came out in September '06 and they've probably done another half-dozen Zatch Bell games since then. Also - and I'm too lazy to look this up - I bet the Japanese release dates back to even older... this game looks and plays like early PS2 fare. That is to say, like ass.
What do you get for your tenner? A lot of misery. I mean, I like Zatch Bell. I wanted to like this game, so I would have overlooked quite a bit. But the combat controls are unreliable, targeting is a nightmare, and any battle with non-standard goals is just about impossible. For example, one battle in the first third of the game has you defending a building until time runs out... but the building has no health meter, so you never have any idea how close it is to getting asploded.
According to the price tag, I paid $21.90 for this, back in the days when I had no video games and was expected to make do with LCD games. Who knows why I chose nondescript Climber; I recall about half a dozen other G&W games under glass at the store.
As far as mangled English goes, this isn't so bad...
Hard to believe it took this long for an American Idol-branded karaoke game to show up.
And, being over three years after the first Karaoke Revolution game, this means we're up to some very full-featured titles. Good song list, a microphone instead of a headset (duh!), plenty of unlockables, and an eerie face-mapping application that puts your head in the game.
The American Idol aspect is a nice fit; judges Randy and Simon critique your performance. The Idol scheme really helps this feel like a real event, even if the judges' comments are only tangentially related to your singing. It's even more fun in multiplayer where you can actually stage your own American Idol sing-off (just without voting from the audience at home).
This is a fine capper to the series... albeit for a franchise that is likely DOA these days thanks to Sony's own SingStar and the upcoming karaoke+music monster Rock Band.
I had read earlier in the week that a new LocoRoco game was headed to the PlayStation Store. If I had a PSP, LocoRoco would definitely had been a purchase, so I was more than a little interested in a downloadable semi-sequel on the PS3.
("would definitely had been"?)
Kotaku initially referred to the game as a screensaver (based on some asinine report from Who Cares Print It IGN), then discovered that it wasn't, but still pretty much hated it... but I was hungry enough to drop a couple dollars on it.
Of course, I completely forgot that today was Thursday - PlayStation Store Re-Stock Day, for some reason - so I was still looking forward to grabbing LocoRoco Cocoreccho sometime later in the week. Until I check Kotaku as Clark was falling asleep and realized that it was in fact Thursday. PlayStation Store Re-Stock Day.
Beautiful Katamari - E3 Xbox 360 Trailer (YouTube) Let's be honest: no 360 owner gives one shit about this game, so just assume it's coming for all platforms and have done with it.
"Halo" no longer just a game for Microsoft (Yahoo News) This article about Microsoft's struggle in the video game industry manages to not mention Nintendo once. The article is all Microsoft vs. Sony, which is sooo 2004.
Undercover: Mac Anti-Theft Software (via Daring Fireball) If your laptop is stolen, it will start taking pictures of the thief using the built-in iSight camera and email them to you.
Toys R Us is having it's probably-annual Buy 2 Get 1 Free game sale (ends Saturday). Which really just means they're trying to blow out inventory before all the really huge fall releases start dropping... like Mario Galaxy, R&C Future, Halo 3, Phantom Hourglass, etc.
I walked in planning to pick up Warhawk (the boxed edition with the bluetooth headset), which meant that I would have to work to maximize my savings by getting games all around the $50-$60 range. On the PS3 racks, this is tougher than we'd all like to admit.
I grabbed Warhawk, then mulled over Metroid Prime 3 for a couple minutes before grabbing that too. But what to choose for the free game?
I had a couple DS suspects in mind, but I really couldn't accept selecting a free game that was half the price of the pay games. Drawn to Life was the lead contender, but at $30, it was simply not an option. Sure, I could have finally picked up Pokemon Trozei - which I've wanted for years - but I cannot let Nintendo get away with keeping that goddamn first-year-DS puzzle game at $35. Even if I'm actually getting it for nothing, I'd still feel like I was wasting my free pick, plus somehow rewarding Nintendo for refusing to drop prices.
Since beating the League, I've been doing a lot of critter collecting. Bringing old favorites over via Pal Park, slowly working through the little post-game sidequests and the weird new evolutions (Tangela evolves now? Tangela?) More on that later.
My sister has been continuing with her game as well and tonight we exchanged the final few types required so that we could both complete the Sinnoh Pokedex. Then I hustled back to the Game Designer at that hotel to collect my prize for finding all 150...
This is just great. Every comics fan - and even pop culture fans in general - should check this out: "In Search of Steve Ditko," a recent BBC documentary. I heard it about a couple weeks ago, but figured I'd have to watch until it popped up on BBC America or A&E... but it was briefly available on YouTube and I was lucky enough to catch it there.
Ditko, for those of you not into comics, was the original artist on Spider-Man ('62-'66). Whereas Stan Lee came up with the concept and name, Ditko designed the costume, the web-shooters, and within a few issues he was writing the stories wholesale. The question of who created Spider-Man has long been a comics bugaboo, since huckster Stan was billed as the creator and writer since pretty much day one, in spite of Ditko's obvious and lasting contributions. In latter years, Stan yielded some credit back to Ditko, but, as you can see in the documentary, Stan the Man may not necessarily have his heart in that decision.
What makes Ditko such a fascinating subject was that he walked away from the character after some dust-ups with Stan Lee... essentially and intentionally leaving behind untold millions of dollars in merchandising that could have been his. He has refused interviews and appearance requests, and although he has done a few spare pages in the years since his Marvel/DC heyday, he chooses to remain untouchable and unreachable. I hope Marvel is keeping a Ditko war chest somewhere, because although Ditko may be an old crank who turns up his nose to make a point, his heirs may not be of such fortitude.
First of all, I'm just thrilled that Fatal Frame 4 exists. Regardless of platform. They could do it as a PS2 game and I'd be there for it. But obviously Tecmo is going with Wii because they want to take advantage of the Remote controls.
Theory time.
The possibility exists that Fatal Frame Wii will be a huge departure from the franchise thus far. Maybe all third-person to simplify the controls. Maybe it's Fatal Frame: the Mini-Game Collection. But I'll be an uber-fan and assume that FF4 will arrive largely similar to the current Fatal Frame formula.
The news reports seem to be sure about Four, rather than a port of any of the previous games (although I'd buy Wii-ified versions of those as well... can you dig a Fatal Frame trilogy disk that included all the games, strung into one long narrative?). So we're likely getting a new, original Fatal Frame story. Although I can probably assure you that it will involve some kind of ancient maiming ritual and a camera that channels psychic energy. However, I would be surprised to see it land as "Fatal Frame 4"... I should think they would start a new brand so as not to ward off Wii owners who have never heard of the first three games in the series. Something like "Fatal Frame: Numberless Subtitle With Camera-Related Pun."
It's that time of year again. Time to pass judgement on the fall/winter release schedule and decide where to put my gaming dollars.
Oh yeah:
Ratchet & Clank Future (10/23) PS3 Yes, I know I was uncharacteristically hard on the third R&C game. The summary of that is, if you're going to spit out a new game every year, you have to work even harder to ramp it up or people are going to get bored. Nevertheless, it's been three years since I've played Ratchet & Clank, and I'm ready for it again. There's a demo coming next month that could make or break this purchase, but I'm betting R&CF will be worthwhile, gorgeous, and one of the top PS3 games to date.
Super Mario Galaxy (11/12) Wii I loved Sunshine. I'm going to love Galaxy. I'm really interested in the two-player mode. (By the way, is anybody else hoping for the next step to be a Mario Universe MMORPG where, in addition to loads of missions in the 64 style, you can easily pick up multiplayer matches of Kart, Tennis, Golf, Strikers and Party, all in one game?)
Suggestive Doodles (YouTube) Remember, it's only dirty if you think it's dirty.
GameStop manager suspended after 'games for grades' policy (local news site) The dipass manager who unilaterally decided that he would not sell product to kids unless their parents vouched for their good grades has been tossed. Look buddy, if you want to climb on your moral high horse, working at the Peon+1 level inside the corporate moneymaking machine is not the place to do it.
And also, I am going to open a store where I will not sell you NASCAR memorabilia unless I can punch you in the face.
Tytla animation art for sale (Cartoon Brew) An original cel of Chernabog from Fantasia is expected to sell at auction for only $800?!?! WTF.
Unlike last year's Mew Day, this Pokemon Event was a piece of cake.
As hoped, the whole affair was run by WiFi download. Although most people showed up expecting a line, so they didn't know where to go. The largest clusters formed around this instructional sign and over by the RZone checkout (where they were handing out the $5 coupons.) Follow the Mystery Gift instructions and bammo, everybody gets a Manaphy. Then we all run right home and breed a Phione.
I decided that I wanted everybody right around level 60 before going after the League Championship, so I've been doing a lot of mindless training... initially up around Snowpeak and more recently just west of Sunyshore. Then I stocked up on Revives and HP healers. Although I bought a ton of Super Potions, I also picked up lots of those drinks cans you get at the top floor of the shopping mall. They're a better value.
Tony Stark as filthy rich warmonger. Very good. Nice modern update - he's clearly funding a Middle East-based war, as we'll see. He's slimy and arrogant.
He just gave an "American Might Makes Right" speech. This is going to play well in the Red State sticks, although they won't see the big philosophical transformation coming. Which is probably fine. I mean, the first half of this trailer looks like an embarrassing 9/11 revenge flick, but it seems plain that Tony will see the error of his ways and, by the end of the movie, change his weapons company into a defense-through-technology company.
Zatch Bell: Mamodo Fury (PS2)
released January 2007, received February 2007
I had read earlier in the week that a new LocoRoco game was headed to the PlayStation Store. If I had a PSP, LocoRoco would definitely had been a purchase, so I was more than a little interested in a downloadable semi-sequel on the PS3.
It was like the hardest decision of my life.
This is just great. Every comics fan - and even pop culture fans in general - should check this out: "
Let's just get excited about this right now.
It's that time of year again. Time to pass judgement on the fall/winter release schedule and decide where to put my gaming dollars.
