Ha, podcast junkie. Dan Dormer (of Player One) used to work at 1UP News with me. And I saw Jurassic Park 3 in theaters with CJ and a mutual friend (is that really an accomplishment?). Oh, and he dated an old friend of mine. And... if that's the Phil I'm thinking of, he once worked at the GameStop I primarily worked at, just many, many years before I did. I think there were pictures of him in the back room taken with the Game Boy Camera/Printer. I might be wrong.

Weeeeeeeird.

Wow Andy, my respect for you has just sky rocketed. I mean, I already thought highly of you because you're doing the whole 1UP thing, but dude you're in with all the P1P folk. Awesome! I'm very jealous. Good shit man. Happy New Year indeed.

BTW never made it in. Live is still down for me. Fuck you M$.

AND my second Rock Band guitar broke. Not a good 2008 so far.

Haha, to say I'm in with any of them is way, way overstating it -- I'm just amused that there's some sort of tiny connection to a bunch of dudes on the same podcast. And hell, to round out the bunch: Sewart freelances for GamesRadar... as do I! Bam.

I don't like the Rock Band guitar at all, man. I use the GH3 wireless one for both games. Actually, because EA kinda screwed up my customer service, they said I didn't have to send back the two busted guitars I have on hand. Thanks... I've always wanted a couple of broken fake guitars?

See the thing is, I love that guitar when it works. I might be in the minority, but its easier to slide along the fret board, and I like how you can hold onto the strum bar. My fingers keep slipping whenever I strum on the GH 3 guitar. I'm very sad. I'm gonna pick up Orange Box tomorrow at Best Buy for 40 bucks tomorrow in hopes that it will make me feel better. But it sucks to hear that TF2 is still laggy on 360. I was looking forward to that, but Live isn't working for me anyway so it doesn't matter I guess.

man, after working 17 hours on new years eve, sleeping 4, and then working 8 more, coming home and going back into the dystopia of HL2 was great.



can't believe i'm having this much fun with an FPS.

Tell me about it. I resolved last year not to buy any next gen consoles til 2008, but my PS2 to-play list is still so big that I doubt I'll even get a 360 this year. I still have to get through Gradius V, FFXII, Okami, Disgaea 2, GH3, God Hand, Shadow of the Colossus...

I got through GHIII on Medium in a couple of days, was surprised how well I did considering how long it's been since I've played GH and how bad I suck. I pretty much have no patience for "learning" a song, so playing them once or twice a level (as needed) is about all I can handle. I probably need to redo a couple of the hardest songs on Medium and try to play some of these on Hard, but otherwise, it'll likely go on the shelf with the others. I've lost major steam for that franchise. I also didn't like the boss pit challenges AT ALL (I really got pissed when I thought I had to beat them to move on), and I was disappointed that there doesn't appear to be any kid of "reveal" of more songs for the main game as you beat certain levels. For PS2, that's what... 40-odd tracks plus a set of mostly-lame bonus tracks? Meh. Was considering getting the Rock Band game just for the GH-game play, but I notice that about 5 or so songs are repeats from GH III! I'm not sure $50 is worth 35 or so new songs. Maybe as an anniversary or birthday gift.

Picked up FIFA 08 (PS2) when the price dropped to $20. Nice game. As usual, I suck and can't even attempt a fraction of the moves you can supposedly pull off, but on the lower difficulty settings, it's fun. And my thumb hurts like a MF'er.

a couple of things... is there a standard for sensitivity adjustments on FPSes? i'm playing HL2 (with vertical inverted - is that normal?) with sensitivity a little looser. am i shooting myself in the foot getting used to it this way? the last fps i played before this was perfect dark!

i notice sometimes its difficult for me to get in the headshots and if i ever go online i guess i'm curious as to the norm for playing against human combatants eventually...

second, how can their not be any CHESS on live arcade?

last, anyone ever play psychonauts? its looks interesting to me. worth a download?

1. I think it's a matter of preference. I play with standard orientation and a loose view, but not super loose -- then again, I don't really play online.

2. Spyglass Board Games on XBLA has Chess. Check out reviews first, though -- heard it wasn't a great collection, but chess might be alright. Chessmaster is coming early this year to XBLA as well.

3. Own it, but haven't played it yet. Picked up the original Xbox disc a few months back for like $12.

Yeah, I own it. A really smart and well designed platformer. The level design and sense of humor in the game are very unique and quite impressive. The gameplay itself isn't terribly groundbreaking, but I think its safe to say that as an overall experience, its as good as any platformer post Mario 64 and pre-Mario Galaxy.

It was the last game I bought for my old XBOX and got about 2/3 of the way through it when I got my 360. Have never gone back and restarted it, so I don't know how it ends. I've read some minor issues with the last level(s) - sporadic camera issues, delves a bit into a collect-a-thon - but I haven't personally experienced them. And hell, even Mario Galaxy suffered from those issues towards the end *cough* 100 Purple Coin challenges *cough*

Definately worth a dl. Don't hesitate . . . its tough to find in stores. Even used.

Still can't get on Live. Starting to get the shakes. It's been like 4 days. The last two days on xbox.com it said Live was "Up and Running." Major Nelson keeps alternating from "Oh it's working great" to "We're working on the problem." I don't know how bad it is for everyone else. I've heard different things, but I wish I could just log on at least. I like to have my achievements up to date online lol.

achievements = lulz

Edit: That's just my perspective though. God bless anyone who wants to go after them, I'll just never understand the impulse.

I'm not totally obsessed with them. I'm not gonna play those games with the easy achievements like Avatar(cough Sausage), but I do enjoy getting them when I get them.

I'm a little late to this party, but... I bought Mario Galaxy, for my daughter (even she didn't believe that). It was the first new Mario game I played since Super Mario World. What was that, 15 years ago?
I LOVE Mario Galaxy. It's just so much fun to play. I've got about 60 stars. At the rate I'm going it'll be summer before I get to 120 with Mario and Luigi.


Spring Mario is kind of annoying.

pretty fun:

wolfquest.org

Man, I luuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuv Portal. Got stuck on one room last night, and while I was walking home today from work, without even thinking about it I figured out the solution so I ran home and did it. It gave me so much satisfaction, and good feelings...Very memorable moment. Gotta finish it.

I love Galaxy too(20 stars in). Almost done with Mass Effect. Good times!

I sped through the game, except for the one room with all the those robots and the really high platform. If it was for that part I would have done the game in 2and half hours instead of three and half.

i was bored and got all 242 stars in galaxy finally!

HERE ARE THE GAMES I PLAYED AND BEAT OVER DECEMBER THEY WERE ALL REALLY GOOD

Pssst . . . isn't Bioshock a FPS?

What did you think of Mass Effect? I'm leaning that way for my next purchase now that I'm close to wrapping up heavy duty Orange Box. And did you have the alien lezboz make out and rub tittay?!?!

I couldn't bring myself to beat Knights of the Old Repu- erm, I mean Mass Effect. The design of the game was really sloppy. Mass Effect suffered from Bioware's continuing decision to say fuck all to their long time fans in favor of cultivating the 13 year old Halo crowd.

Fuck Bioware. Fuck Mass Effect.

That's disturbing. I couldn't finish bother to finish Jade Empire, so that's what gave me pause about Mass Effect. But I'm getting a bit tired of twitchy games; kinda want to change it up during these dog days of winter in Minnesota by sinking my teeth into a longer game.

When you say "cultivating the 13 year old Halo crowd", what do you mean? I played KOTOR; what design changes were so dramatic with Mass Effect?

It's a actually a really short RPG. Even figuring the side quests in.



You drive the Warthog of Halo on similar looking planet after similar looking planet. Run down the same monotone hallways and caves over & over. De-emphasis on stat and group management. More shooter than tactical RPG.

Superficial relevance in the moral choices you make. Tedious exposition-y dialogue. Derivative story, they really made a sloppy KoTOR 3. Terrible controls. Elevators.

It's a nice looking but simple action-RPG. Even BioShock manage that better.

In the same way Jade Empire gave button mashers a mock of an RPG. Mass Effect gives console shooter fans a mock up of an RPG.

the driving sequences in mass effect made me feel like this



seriously the worst controlling vehicle ever, driving in landscapes completely devoid of anything interesting, seriously bioware, can't you at least put some palm trees or shaquille O'Neal somewhere on these planets that I'm traveling to? mass effect was far too ambitious for the 360, it absolutely failed on it's promises but it did succeed in having a captivating story that i enjoyed, I don't mind a lot of text. The combat got unbelievably broken a few hours in when my characters became ruthless, soulless, killbots however.

basically i liked it because i got to kill that annoying chick who was only black in certain lighting but white everywhere else like some kind of fucking werewolf, or i guess a blackwolf, i dont know. I saved Carth because he's Carth, i love that guy 4ever

i beat bioshock in 2 sittings, i'll talk about that one later.

also my character fucked the shit out of the blue bitch because it's the cheesiest

sorry, that was a really awful kraft macaroni & cheese pun

Carth? Jesus, you think Bioware could come up with a new name now and then.

He's just referring to the voice actor. They used the same guy for a party member in Mass Effect.

Gotcha.

Reviewing these this week:



Also playing a handful of Wii shovelware titles for some articles.

Man, I love full-time freelancing. I spent the weekend working on a feature project for PlayStation: The Official Magazine. My first print work.

yeah, man. i meant to say congrats on that! that is huge! if you ever scan it, pass along a copy! I'd love to see it!

New Years present to anyone who wants it:

Free copy of Half Life 2 and Half Life 2 Episode One for PC. I have extra online copies via Steam and I can gift them to whoever. I'm trying to give them away to someone who has not played either one. Give me your email, I type it into Steam and Valve sends you an email explaining how you can download the games for free.

If anyone is interested, let me know. It's not first come first serve, but rather a random deciding process. Also, it would be cool if your computer could run the game.

i picked this up and shenmue II(i might want to see how the dub turned out) in the bargain bin a couple days ago, fun finally owning a box, because i get to catch up on all the games i missed. still need to grab psychonauts, ninja gaiden, the halos, and jet set radio future and i'll be pretty pleased with my box collection.

anyway, i just got through the first level, i hear theres only like 3 or something. I loved the original Panzer Dragoon, but I never played Zwei or Saga, but game feels pretty familiar and fills the hole that star fox left after that franchise went to shit.

Thanks dude! I don't know if I'll get a byline on the article (since it was primarily legwork for a big feature), but I'll hopefully be listed as a contributing editor up front. They were really happy with it and it seems like I might get more work. Hoorah!

Good Lord. As if the HSM karaoke game wasn't enough, now I'm likely to be subjected to the Disney dance game? Shoot me now!

Panzer Dragoon Saga was such a great game.

I realize that for many the Dreamcast will always hold a special place in the heart of hardcore gamers and once Sega fans. But for me, the Saturn is my Dreamcast. Nights alone would be enough, but the system also boosted the only near perfect adaptation of SFAII and the spectacular Burning Rangers.

I miss the Saturn some days.

the psx SFAII was such a joke compared to the saturn port, i never got a chance to play Burning Rangers though, I really liked my Saturn, but it definitely got the shaft from hardcore gamers who typically disregard it but embrace the Dreamcast. Dreamcast is the superior system no doubt, but Saturn was badass. It's just too bad it's killer apps all go for like three million dollars on Ebay. But i have my copies of Nights and SFAII so i'm happy

and Bug! lol

damo if you have any extra copies of Saga laying around I'll take them off your hands


edit: also, speaking of nights, has anyone played the wii sequel? I almost don't want to because I don't want to ruin what I saw in my eyes as a pretty much perfect game and Sonic Team's last hurrah when Naka was still being compared to Miyamoto, but I've actually heard it's not terrible.

No, I don't have many Saturn games left. Sorry dude.

I would be glad send them if I did though. But my Saturn broke quite a long time ago. Ditched most of the games around the time of Dreamcast launched. Heh. What a mistake.

Oh, I think I do have that special Christmas Nights Into Dreams game that they put out in limited numbers lying around. Have you played it by chance?

i cant find my hookups for my saturn anyway

ultra gameplayers packaged a demo of christmas nights in an issue i bought, it was only one level i think, but i remember you could unlock sonic or something.

oh man, Sonic Jam, greatest compilation ever, the hub blew my mind back in the day.

Ugh I miss my Saturn, but it was quite expensive to game on that thing because Sega of America was DUMB. Every game I wanted wasn't being released in the States, so I was importing a lot. When I came home from Japan I brought home Virtua Fighter Kids, and thought I was hot shit because I was really sure they wouldn't release a SD cute remix of VF2. of All those Capcom 2D fighters, RADIANT SILVERGUN FTW. mmmmmm. I still have the system, but it's back in CA, and I sold all my games for it.

I bought a Saturn with like 10 games, 3 controllers, and a light gun off a kid for $30 in 2000 -- my first week working at GameStop. Dude comes in to trade it in and we stopped taking that shit quite some time before I worked there. Grabbed the whole package from him.

System battery is dead, so you have to set the time everytime you start it, but otherwise its fine. Accumulated about two dozen games total, but a lot of it's junk. Had the import of X-Men vs Street Fighter for a while, though.

Yeah, I have a semi-decent Saturn collection (all the Sega 3D fighters, Guardian Heroes, Nights, Xmas Nights, Sega Rally etc), but I would so love to have Radiant Silvergun, DonPachi and stuff like that. This is the key reason why I hope (in a futile manner, I know) that someone will eventually be abe to emulate it on PSP.

I managed to get one of those cool RAM/save/other stuff carts from Lik Sang before they were shut down.

my roommate just got a ps3, and with my 360 and wii and his dreamcast I think we've got it covered.

I may be getting NitroBike on the Wii, think it comes out on the 16th. Looks like a super fast version of excite truck which was mindless fun.
Also looking forward to Burnout, but wanna see the reviews first.

Then in Feb. there's Brawl!!! and condemned 2...2008 will break me game wise even more than last year.
(sure this has been posted before but if not: http://www.gamepro.com/gamepro/internation...es/151148.shtml )

i'm modding my wii on saturday so i can download the JP Brawl later this month

kinda crazy, i know, but after the calamity of Galaxy being able to be played weeks before you could pick it up legally nearly drove me to insanity, this is the only thing i can do to preserve my well being./

hey sausage could you post your impressions on bioshock? thinking about picking it up... almost done with orange box, and i'd hate to jump right into another fps but i played the first 10 minutes of 'shock and i thought it was alright. thoughts?

I'm not the biggest FPS guy but even I liked Bioshock, a marvel of art design and a unique atmosphere, especially if you dig steampunk or 1984 dystopian kind of shit. I was able to forgive the kind of sparse gameplay(not too many monsters, only a handful, i used the same strategy on all of them, upgraded my crowbar and only used that exclusively) and the game is so forgiving in the whole dying scenario that you might fall into the trap of hoarding your med kits and just accepting constant death, which can sort of hamper the experience.

Those are really the only low points, The game is surprisingly intuitive and there's never a question on where you have to go thanks to a well organized UI and good map design, yet it remains non-linear in the fact that you can take your time and explore all the exquisite detail the game has to offer. The plasmid system is fun as hell, and you always have an abundance of wealth so you can really play through a lot of different ways, not to mention the storytelling and voice acting is top notch. I don't think there's a better game on the 360 right now to spend money on besides Orange Box.(and of course, Castlevania SOTN on live arcade)



I picked up Blue Dragon cheap, I can't believe they were so audacious to make such an archaic JRPG in an age where people are really starting to criticiize JRPGs as being too outdated. Nevertheless, I look forward to playing through it.

Sausage sure does love his dragons.

Strange how that game got ripped for the exact same reason Dragon Quest VIII was praised for two years ago.

i still need to finish that game, completely lost interest halfway through, never was a dragon quest guy, and VIII didn't really change my mind on the matter.

Wal-Mart has a pre-order deal on Brawl for $19.82. The 10 days of extra wait for shipping is kind of a pain, but it's worth the $30 savings.

EDIT: Forgot the link:

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?...747080002949590