Funtownarcade

Sonic Adventure critters

2010-09-23T20:34:00.000-07:00

I really wanted to like Sonic Adventure. I never actually owned the game for Dreamcast but Nickle Nickle an old arcade near me had some Dreamcasts set up in the back row rigged as arcade machines and I played it a few times there. Now the classic Dreamcast game is back and ported to Xbox Live Arcade. I was thinking about buying it just to support the rerelease of more dreamcast games but I decided to pass. I was hoping the port would be given more care like Rez was, actually redone in 16:9 full smooth HD, instead it feels a bit sloppy with blue bars on the side forcing you to play in 4:3. Although Sonic Adventure isn't really a "hardcore" game it was interesting to see how much easier games have gotten in the decade since its been released. I died on the part where you do a few loops in the first level, I figured there would be more leeway but it seemed like you really had to spin the sticks around in a few circles to make it past that part, todays games would let you make it by just holding the stick one direction for sure. I thought I was automatically collecting those little critters you save from beating the enemies too, but no you really need to make an effort to collect them otherwise they are goners.
It was interesting to play Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light right after checking out Sonic. I noticed both games string loot along a path through the level to guide the player. Some loot is there just to show you where to go, and others reward exploration. Lots of games use this mechanic, and Sonic obviously wasn't the first. The critter mechanic was unique to Sonic though, and I think more games could use this. Rather than just killing nameless enemy number X, they could have a reason for being there.

The Street Fighter IV FightStick Tournament Edition

2009-02-18T21:46:00.001-08:00

How could you play the game on anything other than this? Here is the product description from play-asia.com

Designed for the serious Street Fighter enthusiast, nothing brings the arcade experience closer to home than the Street Fighter IV Arcade FightStick: Tournament Edition. Overseen by Capcom and legendary producer Yoshinori Ono, the Tournament Edition features an unparalleled level of detail and uses arcade quality components. Sourced directly from arcade manufacturer Sanwa Denshi™, the FightStick: Tournament Edition uses the same Japanese style ball-handled joystick and 30mm Action Buttons found in the official Street Fighter IV Vewlix™ arcade cabinet, marking the first time such components have been used for a commercial product outside of Japan. With the D-Pad control switch, dual Turbo functionality for each button, and exact button layout matching the Vewlix Street Fighter IV arcade panel, the FightStick: Tournament Edition delivers an experience unlike any other arcade styled controller. Complete with detailed touches such as screw on rubber feet for solid surface play, unobtrusive placement of the Start and Select/Back Buttons along with a locking mechanism preventing accidental activation of Turbo settings for tournament play, the FightStick: Tournament Edition represents the best possible choice for the hardcore and dedicated Street Fighter fan.

Street Fighter IV FightStick Tournament Edition (Xbox360)

Microsoft V United States

2009-02-02T23:03:00.000-08:00

Surfing the wikipedia to learn about Guantánamo Bay a series of links ended me at the Microsoft V United States antitrust case. I noticed there was some video of bill gates disposition and a link to the whole video, i was interested so followed the wikipedia to this page that hosts the whole disposition in a variety of formats. The native format was WMV, a Microsoft format video, but the webmaster was kind enough to provide an open alternatives, such as Theora Video, DUDE! At first I looked at the file size differences and laughed at WMV's weak compression so picked Theora for my viewing choice. After having to download a special program to view the video, the audio and video were completely out of sync! Later I downloaded the trusty WMV and it worked perfectly and even had an extra feature of displaying captions at the bottom. After watching more of this disposition that I probably should have, all I have to say is, Bill Gates rules!

Didn't iTunes used to auto play CDs when importing?

2008-12-23T13:46:00.000-08:00

I no longer see this setting in preferences. I'll miss that old little tradition.

Apple

2008-12-13T01:16:00.000-08:00

I often hear people mention the possibility of Apple releasing a console. I just don't see it happening, at least anytime soon. The Apple 2 was a big platform for games... they had a few rough years, but these days you can run any PC game on a Mac, and some of the best ones (Wow, Spore, Warcraft 3, Diablo, Uhhh.. Wow) even run natively! Even the iPhone and ipod support games and have distribution channels for Apple to sell games. They are pretty much already in the gaming space, and have been forever, I just don't see them releasing a console.

More LBP impressions & others.

2008-12-10T12:39:00.000-08:00

Amazon had a deal I couldn't refuse on Banjo Nuts & Bolts so I picked it up. They make it so easy, remembering who you are, your payment and shipping info... I tried for about an hour, the game is surprisingly meta. They talk very directly about previous Rare games, the game industries trends, and make reference to other games. I have barely started the game so I can't say if its worth a purchase or not but if you have the means or are interested, it got good reviews so I'd say its worth checking out.
I also got to play a bit of Gears 2 last weekend, co-op in Horde Mode, we got to round 10 or so before I had to go, but it was pretty fun. We were in a map where you have laser shields protecting a small area, so we'd camp in there and mow the enemies down with the machine gun that spawns in there, it is so big you have to take cover before aiming that thing, and firing it is satisfying. I was pleased by the variety in monsters that they throw at you in this game too.
I keep poking away at the Little Big Planet single player and trying random levels online, nothing has really caught me as great yet. I threw in Super Mario Galaxy just to get in the platforming mood, and remembered the amazing variety they give you in every level, LBP feels the opposite, it is more like one of those games where they give you ONE gimmick move and you have to figure out how to use it in a variety of situations. I feel like I'm playing that game that came with old computers where you move blocks around in a top down view. Although I appreciate the different backgrounds, music, and themed stuff like that, the actual mechanics just don't seem that appealing. Getting into a typical gunfight in GOW2? A blast, just a joy to control and view. Typical platforming puzzle in LBP? Dieing over and over at a checkpoint, ohh man its the last guy, replay it....

Still waiting on my wow mini delux starter set.

2008-12-03T22:48:00.000-08:00

I saw them at a local comic shop for sale already. I pre-ordered it from upper deck months ago, what gives?

Little Big Planet impressions

2008-11-29T17:53:00.000-08:00

I had been holding off on picking up LBP, I felt like I saw all there was to see in the Beta. So the first half hour is just patching, three patches! It made me consider if consoles having hard drives is worth it, I mean, you could play Gears Of War 2 and Fallout 3 without a hard drive right? It is clear that hard drives have let developers release unfinished products with the promise of day 1 patches, look at Fable 2 for example they decided to just ship the game without co-op and patch it in day one. I'd rather just have a finished game on the disc, thank you.
After the half hour of patches, I got another half hour of unskippable progression stopping scenes where I had to sit and listen to an old man talk, all stuff I've already heard from playing the beta making it even more boring. Strangely enough the friends leaderboard only showed one of my friends scores, but I know for sure there are at least half a dozen of my PSN friends that have the game, it was either a bug or a poorly explained feature. Next I decided to see what cool levels were out there. I recognized about half the featured levels already. First I checked out the Batman level I had heard good things about. Basically you are just platforming on blank square platforms with some flying bats and batman imagery in the background. Next was the legendary Gradius level. The flying part was accomplished by laying a ton of jetpacks on the ground, so you get a nice Drop Jetpack button prompt while you are in the spaceship. I don't see any levels ever being able to be immersive with these type of technical limitations. Although recreating the first level of Gradius in LBP is surely a technical feat, it wasnt really that fun to play.
Maybe playing multiplayer would be more fun, so I decided to jump in an online game of the Mirrors Edge level, which I was happy to see was there after hearing they are pulling levels that have any copyrighted material (BTW there goes about 50% of the type of levels I was hoping to create). Just another platforming level, but with backgrounds that slightly look like Mirrors Edge. A fourth player jumps in and stops moving, holding the other three of us up in the top right corner of the screen. After about a minute of standing there I see the chat text "Hello!" pop up, great. Not to mention this text appears right over my character. Finally he climbs up to meet us, and accidentally pushes me into a pit of fire, oh that was my last life. Power off. I don't see me playing this game again anytime soon.

Funtownarcade Live comming soon!

2008-11-25T00:13:00.000-08:00

Howdy Folks, prepare for Fun Town Arcade Live this Sunday November 30. I will post details on that day. Please leave a comment if you'd like to participate, it will most likely be some sort of live chat podcast deal.

Fable 2 or Fallout 3?

2008-10-29T19:30:00.000-07:00

Or both?
I was seriously considering passing on Fable 2 and waiting for Fallout 3 & Little Big Planet. Far Cry 2 was starting to sound pretty interesting, and I was enjoying the WOW 3.03 patch, it was low on my list. It was the pub games promotion that put me over the edge and made me pre-order it, but I am glad I got it. Its been an amazing 16 hours so far, just finished the main storyline. I am not sure what else there is to say about it though, there has already been much discussion in the blogosphere, Gamers With Jobs mention in their last podcast ties of the dog to Molyneux's previous game Black & White, and the city stuff to Populous, so maybe you can say Peter Molyneux didn't only come through on all his promises from Fable, but from all the games he has ever made? It is an excellent game, and I am glad most of my time with it has been interacting with people in cities and fun stuff that doesn't involve swinging swords at monsters in forests.

Spore impressions

2008-09-06T12:21:00.000-07:00

I started out as a fat green slug named Ryliot just cruising around minding my own business being a herbivore, enjoying the lush green plants along with some little yellow leeches in whatever ooze I was swimming around. Before I knew it I got so fat that the leaves I was eating at the start were just small specks now, and only the larger plants could satisfy my hunger. As I swallowed entire plants, I could still see the little yellow leeches eating the small leaves off of them. Eventually my slug had grown too big for his own good, and couldn't compete for the good big chunks of plants so I had to grow some horns and learn how to release a poison gas around me to fend off the bigger animals and still remain a vegetarian. Adding parts here and there, before I knew it after about an hour I had legs and was cruising around on land looking for even bigger plants. When I first encountered another land faring creature I had to decide if I was going to kill anything that got in my way or befriend them. Staying true to my herbivore roots I decided to befriend them, and before I knew it I had a tribe of little green monkey like creatures cruising around the whole continent impressing the local brutes with my races advanced dance and musical abilities. This game is insane...

How Blizzard gets you back into it.

2008-08-10T22:08:00.000-07:00

Time to prepare for the Lich King by mining through the old lands of Azeroth. I go through old places with my undead warrior killing whatever gets in the way of the gold, but get no reward from it, I comb the land looking only to mine, logging out after mining the good zones.

Mail Time! After a few days of nothing but mining, I cash in on all the ore I've gotten as a byproduct at the Auciton House and realize for the first time I have enough gold to buy a flying mount!

I took what may be a historic last flight to Shadowmoon Village on the scripted path of the Wind Riders. From now on, I'm sailing on my own bird! Now I am a full time flying mining machine until I get that Epic Flying Mount.

Games I've played

2008-08-02T21:47:00.000-07:00

An audio sample of some games I've played and not blogged about.
click play

IGN UK: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots Review

2008-05-30T00:52:00.001-07:00

"...enjoy a dazzling, heart-lifting, voyage of discovery."

IGN: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots Review

Conan the MMO

2008-05-30T00:26:00.000-07:00

Prepare for the better version on 360 by playing the PC game today!

EBGames Preview Hype for MGS4

2008-04-12T13:10:00.000-07:00

MGS 4: Upholding a great tradition

By: Otacon Date: Thursday, Apr 10, 2008
For over 20 years, Metal Gear Solid has redefinied the stealth/action genre in videogames. The franchise has continued to push the benchmarks on how a quality military video game should be made. Following in the tradition of its predecessors, Metal Gear Solid 4 is sure to set a new standard in gaming. Everything in this game, from gameplay aesthetics, to enemy A.I, has been greatly improved. This will be Snake's last mission, and he's sure to go out with a bang. Sneak out, and grab yourself a copy of the Limited Edition, while it's still available!!
EBGames.com

I agree with Otacon.

Now Playing: Crisis Core

2008-03-30T21:27:00.000-07:00

If you know what a Mako Reactor is then this game is for you. I'm only a few hours into this but so far I'm enjoying the nostoligic setting of the Final Fantasy 7 world with innovative modern day gameplay. As much as I enjoyed FF7 at the time, there is no way I'm going to play a game today for 90 hours with turn based random battles and selecting commands from a menu, sorry Lost Oddesy fans. The prequel brings a new real time battle system in to keep things fresh, it feels like God of War, but keeps all you know and love about the classic system in place.

Board Games > Video Games?

2008-03-22T01:15:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I'll have a brand new console game I want to play but some friends want to drink and play board games. Few people are up for board games these days, its a tough choice but I almost always go with the board games. Recognize this game? Carcassonne is great, easy to learn but enough strategy to keep it fun, a great game to get started with board games if you are new. Pro Tip - Farms FTW, it helped me win the game pictured here :)

Rainbow 6 Vegas 2

2008-03-21T02:02:00.001-07:00

Got this. I would have got it on ps3 but fry's had a sale on this one so I'll put up with the 360s loud fan this time. Too bad I played Vegas 1 because there is a well documented achievement bug if you did, preventing you from ever getting 1000/1000 points in the game. I have been hearing the term "ubisoft sequel" in the blogosphere, and there is no denying thats what this is. The company has a tradition of pumping out map packs as sequels, anyone who got GRAW2 knows about this. The actual game is definitely refined, my favorite addition is that your character is the same offline and online so as you are playing the campaign you are unlocking stuff for multiplayer which is great. Also every enemy you kill you will get experience points for, more points if you do a harder kill like long range, short range, head shots, etc., There is an EXP bar at the bottom similar to wow showing your progress through the ranks. Even if you die it saves your XP, so when you are re-playing the same sequence over and over again (And this will happen if you are playing on Realistic setting like me) at least you are getting free experience killing the same enemies again. The enemy positions will also slightly change based on what you do to avoid total repetition, but I felt that seeing them do different things seemed to devalue the experience, like getting into a memorable battle is just random coincidence, not an elaborately planned sequence of events. It also exposes how they spawn their enemies, you will see a clear rooftop one way, but if you happen to look the other way and go back, there is guards on that same roof. You can get yourself into situations where you have an eye on that same roof, and can tell once the enemies have been spawned, all of a sudden there is two guards running around on there that happend to be JUST out of your view like they were just waiting behind a vent for you to step on an invisible trigger and then they run out.

Sent from my iPhone

Smaller games are the future.

2008-03-13T19:27:00.000-07:00

Over at the Playstation Blog the president of thatgamecompany shows a PS3 game their team made in 24 hours. The comments section of the post is filled with fans saying they would pay a small price to get their hands on this small game. Even big companies are getting in on small games. During the unveiling of the iPhone SDK bigshots EA, Apple, and Sega all showed games for the iPhone that were coded in only two weeks! Pretty much anyone I know that has worked in the games industry has at some point fantasized about doing smaller XBLA or PSN titles and now there are more and more ways to distribute them like Steam and the iPhone store. Working on AAA titles is rewarding for its own reasons but I think the whole industry is going to just slowly but surely start making smaller games, and as a lot of gamers get older I think they will support the small games movement because they simply lack the free time for massive games.

PS3 outsells Xbox 360 two months in a row.

2008-03-13T19:03:00.000-07:00

A month ago Microsoft put out a statement about having shortages, it only made sense a day later when the NPDs (tracker of videogame hardware and software sales) were released and it showed the PS3 had outsold the 360 for the first time. Having seen plenty of 360s on shelves in my neck of the woods I figured Microsoft was just putting out damage control. This month's results showed the PS3 still ahead. Microsoft's original statement said they would see the shortages continue for one more month and stop after that, so march will be another interesting month in the console wars.
Of course the 360 still has a much larger install base, and dominates the top selling games, so it still makes sense for developers to have the 360 version as their main sku, often porting the game over to the ps3 at the last minute or having different studios do it entirely. There is still many years left in the lifecycles of these devices, and I hope one day developers turn to the PS3 as the main sku, having a confirmed hard drive and a larger disc can really only help make better games and I think thats what we all want. Call me a Playstation fanboy but its a shame for the more powerful system to be the one getting the sloppy ports.

Moved to Blogspot

2008-03-11T17:35:00.000-07:00

I just recieved word from my friend who hosted the site that I can't leech from his host any longer so I created this using Google's Blogger.com and like it. Set up was nearly automatic and so many people have blogspot blogs the layout is instantly familiar to web 2.0 surfers. This image you see is the result of a quick search for public domain art, a fine piece. Could a game have this art style?