[15 Games]

15?! Blimey.

 

Ok.

 

Ridge Racer 4 (with the Jogcon - PS1)

Panzer Dragoon Saga (Saturn)

Ridge Racers 2 (PSP)

Frogger (2600)

Game Dev Story (iOS)

Fallout 3 (but I'd swap for the 360 version as my PS3 copy is buggy as hell)

Katamari Damacy (PS2)

Doshin the Giant (GC)

Everybody's Golf (Hot Shots Golf) World Tour (PS3)

Ridge Racer 6 (360)

Robotron (MAME)

Revenge of the Gator pinball (GB)

Pokémon Yellow (GB)

Sam & Max - the Telltale games episodic games - they count as one, right?! (PC/Mac)

Flower (PS3)

[OPinion of the Nintendo 3DS and Wii]

Had a go with one. It's OK. I mean, it's 3D and it's a handheld with, it seems, roughly the same graphical prowess as the iPhone.

Still remains to be seen whether the usual Nintendo effect will happen again - ie. Promise of strong third-party support that doesn't last, in quality at least, while the same first-party IPs (that you either love or hate) roll out steadily. Personally, I'm done with Mario, Zelda et al. so I'm not expecting much long term value from this console.

[What's good in XBLA?]

Ilomilo is rather wonderful. Of course, the great thing about XBLA is that you can try everything out for free first.

[Beyond Good and Evil HD]

One question:is this what that teaser trailer from a year or two was refering to? Or is there actually a sequal in the works too?

 

That teaser trailer was for B,G & E 2 - a game that Michael Ansel and team are still working on. Apparently they're only going to release it 'when it's perfect'. I respect that a lot, but I'm sure it means that we won't get to play it anytime soon.

[Beyond Good and Evil HD]

It's out!!! Wah! Yay! Etc.

Just downloaded the lovely HD refresh of Beyond Good and Evil - the greatest game that no-one bought. Loved it on the Gamecube and I'm loving it again.

 

Anyway, it's in the store, it's only 800 points so pick it up LEST HISTORY JUDGE YOU A SECOND TIME:)

[why are game developers so afraid of the literary world?]

I think that movies based on short stories (rather than novels) come out better as they seem to translate more naturally to the film medium (Blade Runner and 2001 spring to mind).

For the same reason, I reckon more game developers should look to short fiction (partic. Sci-fi) for game ideas.

[game mechanics that need to die already]

Two things.

Rubberbanding in racers - for all the good reasons already listed here.

 

Lives - yeah, lives! That age old mechanic that made a small game take longer to finish by making you constantly repeat sections.

Sure, it makes sense in old school scoresthons, but in modern, large scale exploration games (including Mario Galaxy), it just pisses me off.

[games you replayed the most....]

For multiple playthroughs, probably Ridge Racer Type 4. Never played the Pacman race though. For that, you had to get all 320 cars (that's every variant of every car, so you'd have to repeatedly play through the grand prix on every level, finishing in every qualifying position. Insane. )

[BBC Radio show about Video Game music]

Hallo all. Thought you might be interested in this. BBC Radio 4, the UKs spoken word radio channel (and, frankly, the best bit of the whole BBC) ran a half hour show looking into the evolution of video game music.

Anyway, they've put it up as a podcast download (for 7 days) as one of their picks of the week, so people outside UK can enjoy it.

 

HERE'S A LINK

 

If that doesn't get you the file, internationally, let me know and I'll host it privately.

 

Enjoy!

[Back to the Future]

There'll be five in total this season. One every month.

 

As for the quality of Telltale games, I have LOVED their three seasons of Sam & Max. I think they eclipse anything Lucasarts did 'back in the day'. I've only played through most of episode one of the Monkey Island series and, well, it was OK but not massively funny. To be honest, though, I didn't find the original games as funny as, say, Day of the Tentacle or Sam & Max hit the road.

[What makes a game an arcade racer?]

The difference for me is that arcade racers present car physics as they should be whereas simulation racers present them as they sadly are.

I really wish cars could safely powerslide for half a mile at 180mph with no risk of damage. That'd be awesome. Real life is such a downer

[Back to the Future]

Yay! Telltale's episodic BTTF game has reached the PS3. There's a demo from Episode 1 up on the US Playstation store now.

I was going to get this on the Mac (where my other Telltale games are played) but this is a much more social way to play (my wife likes to figure the puzzles out with me).

[whats your biggest gripe with modern games?]

By far my biggest gripe about modern games is the concept of 'genres'. There's so little variance in games of a genre these days. It's all got so stagnant. Hopefully it'll pull out of the lull with the rise of 'casual' (hate that term) gaming on mobile devices, where originality is what seems to count.

[Ridge Racer Unbounded]

Getting scared & pandering, or trying not to make the same-old same-old for the umpteenth iteration? I'll give it a try, I love vehicle action / vehicular combat.

 

No problem with vehicle combat games, but it isn't Ridge Racer. They should have called it something else. I accept RR is quite a niche driving game but I like it, and the thing I liked most of all was the LACK of aggression. To be good at Ridge Racer you have to flow the car round the track, it's pretty graceful - this is the exact opposite.

This is bound to backfire as there's no target audience for it. Burnout fans aren't going to jump to Ridge Racer and Ridge Racer fans are going to turn their noses up in disgust. They really shouldn't use a franchise name unless they intend to honour at least one thing about it.

[Ridge Racer Unbounded]

Just another instance of the Japanese games industry getting scared and pandering to (what they think) are western tastes.

 

What we have here is everything that made Ridge Racer great stripped away and replaced with a me-too aggressive racing game. The thing that always surprises me is, whenever Ridge Racer is mentioned online -in forums like this - there's the general murmur of 'Ridge Racer 4 was the best one' - an opinion I definitely hold. So, either Namco never looks at the internet or they just can't make lightning strike twice. Still, giving up and producing tripe like this is isn't any kind of solution.

It's like putting guns in Tekken. Or helicopters in Ace Combat....oh wait..

 

Goodness, I hope that the girl in the video wasn't Reiko Nagase. That'd be a virtual career low Looks more like that grotty one from Ridge Racer 5 now I look at it again.

[What Xbox 360 game are you currently playing?]

Currently playing Ilomilo. It's absolutely WONDERFUL. I strongly recommend that you give the demo a go.

[Any games like Blur & Split/Second?]

If you fancy some arcadey racing minus the aggression, I'd get Ridge Racer 7.

[Game Dev Story]

I love Game Dev story. It's the only iOS game so far that's had me hooked right until the end.

[3DS or NGP (PSP2)]

Probably neither. The NGP has very tempting hardware but then Sony always tend to produce great hardware and then mess it all up in every other respect.

As for the 3DS, I'm done with playing Mario/Zelda/Metroid games so there's absolutely nothing there for me. It's going to be another case of strong first party games for the Nintendo faithful, and absolutely useless third party stuff.

 

In any case, both are too expensive for handhelds anyway. I'll stick with iOS for gaming on the go. That seems to be picking up speed and quality all the time.

[PAL Frogger cart wanted]

Hallo all! I lent a bunch of games to some swine a couple of years back and didn't get them returned. Amongst them was my favourite 2600 cart, Frogger. I've still got the box and manual but, damn, I miss that cartridge!

Anyone got a reasonable condition PAL cart (I'm in UK) they could sell me?

Thanks!

[What Xbox 360 game are you currently playing?]

Currently playing Nier. Pretty good and inventive game, WAY better than the reviews suggested. Still, it does suffer from the usual JP RPG filler missions - "I need something really small and trivial. Could you battle against ridiculous odds to get it for me? Now. Please."

 

Aside from that, it's got a lot of very good ideas. Love the way it smoothly transitions between 3D RPG, 2D platformer.. even bullet hell shooter! Cool soundtrack as well.

[Timex Sinclair 1000]

Lovely little machine. Was fiddling with it last week. Real pain to get a decent picture on any kind of TV though.

 

It was my first computer and a real point of nostaligia.

 

Actually how's this? My 68 year old mum pulled a blinder and got me this off ebay for Christmas:

 

[Atari Greatest Hits Vol 2 Announced!]

Hmm. Modern updates to old games? Expect the 'updated' Yars Revenge to look like ass.

[Split/Second]

I was SO excited about this game, having played the demo that I preordered it. I had it for a week or so but I got rid of it. It was very pretty and all but it cheats it's ass off. In order to make things 'more exciting', there seems to be a ludicrous amount of rubber banding (ie. opponents who you wiped out and got a great lead on, suddenly appear right behind you on the last lap). In my opinion, when you do this, it stops working as a game because your skills/ actions have little effect on the outcome of a race.

[Gotta play a Kinect and...]

I'd quite like to have a go at it, but like the vast majority of UK residents, I don't have anything like the room for it. The Kinect is a US solution for US homes, it just doesn't play in this small island.