mgroves

Posts Tagged ‘gaming’

I got a whole stack of games for Christmas this year, and I’ve spent a lot of time playing them instead of blogging.

So now you get to read my “mini-reviews” of the games that I received.

NiGHTS Journey of Dreams. I’ve been anticipating this game since the rumors first broke. I haven’t played much of it yet, but my experience is a positive one. If you liked NiGHTS on Saturn, this is not that much of a radical departure. All the reviews have mentioned that the cinematics can’t be skipped, which is quite annoying. I haven’t tried the motion controls yet, since the game itself recommends using standard analog joystick controls. Verdict: Good.

Super Mario Galaxy. My expectations were not very high since I’m not a big fan of 3d platforming to begin with, and Super Mario Sunshine wasn’t outstanding. I was extremely suprised to find an incredible masterpiece of a game. This game easily deserves the glowing reviews that it’s getting. This is easily the best Super Mario game in a long time, and surpasses Sunshine by parsecs. Verdict: Must play!.

Beautiful Katamari. I never got to play the original Katamari very much, so this is my first opportunity to cut loose on this game. It’s suprisingly challenging. The game is very unique and fun. The game’s sense of humor makes the game even more enjoyable. There’s plenty of replay value here, but this game probably isn’t for everyone. I recommend playing the demo a few times to see if it’s right for you. Verdict: Good.

Elebits. I already reviewed Elebits when I rented it. Now I own it. Enough said. Verdict: Good.

Carnival Games. This is a mini-game collection for Wii from Rockstar. The graphics are horrendous, and the voice acting is comical (maybe on purpose?). However, there is a large variety of games to play, and lots of unlockables and stuff to make this a fun game for multiple players or parties. Verdict: Great casual game.

Game Party. This is another mini-game collection in the “budget” category. The graphics are even cheaper that Carnival Games, but the sound effects and music are suprisingly good. The real gem of this game is the Trivia mini-game which is really fast to pick up and play (up to 4 players). The other games range from so-so to good. Verdict: Good casual game for the price.

Alien Syndrome. This is an overhead shooter from Sega based on the 1986 arcade title. It’s an overhead arcade-style shooter. I haven’t played it much, but there is some potential here. I think a multiplayer Alien Syndrome is where it probably shines the most. The conrols are pretty tight: analog controls movement, Wiimote pointer controls aim. It has a Gauntlet/Smash TV feel to it. There are some mini-games that interrupt regular gameplay that I haven’t quite figured out the point to yet. Verdict: Rent if you like arcade shooting.

Aperture Science

Portal deserves consideration for game of the year.

Yeah, you heard right. It’s such a fantastically crafted game experience that I played through the game three times in two days.

Portal is nearly flawless.

• The level designs and escalation of complexity make the game accessible to just about any gamer.
• The character(s) and storyline are very rich, but you hardly drown in story.
• The challenge to the game comes almost 100% from thinking and not from action, a huge plus in my book.
• The voice work is stunning. The game is worth playing for the song at the end alone.
• The extra features make this game very replayable: commentary, advanced levels, challenges. Yes, this game is short (perhaps it’s one minor flaw), but not short to a fault, and these extras more than make up for it.
• The portal device itself.

The last feature listed cannot be stressed enough. You will not understand the sheer coolness of this device until you play the game. Yeah, the concept is easy to grasp, but until you fling yourself across chasms, through the air from pedestal to pedestal, and make gun turrents suddenly sink into oblivion, you won’t understand.

The weighted companion cube. What can be said about him that hasn’t already been said?

GLaDOS. Such an atypical computer game villian, but so memorable, unique, and entertaining.

The only two very minor problems with this game: it’s too short, and you have to get the whole Orange Box to play it (if you are like me and not very interested in Half-Life or Team Fortress).

The cake may be a lie, but the hype around this game is not. Get Portal by any means necessary and play it immediately.

Verdict: Good. Really, really good.

If you recall, the first Xbox 360 game that I bought (besides XBLA games) was Blazing Angels. The game got average-to-poor reviews, but I really enjoyed it.

I also tried to rent Blazing Angels for Wii multiple times, but was thwarted. However, I recently picked it up on sale. So yes, I now own two copies of the same game for multiple systems.

I think if you like Blazing Angels for 360, you’ll like it for Wii. Ubisoft made bad decisions on both versions, so I guess it’s a “pick your poison” situation, since both versions have weaknesses. Here’s a brief rundown of the differences of the Wii version as compared to the 360 version:

• Two new missions (Georgia & North Sea). The Georgia mission is a really good idea (protecting and assisting multiple ground divisions on multiple islands), but Ubisoft either biffed the programming or made a bad decision here. Because of the sheer amount of targets in the Georgia mission, there is noticeable slowdown, which sucks. I haven’t got to the North Sea mission yet.
• 10 new planes. This includes the awesome F-82 Twin Mustang.
• There are subtle differences in many of the other missions. For instance, on Guadalcanal, when you have to land and switch planes, you get hit by flak (part of the mission) which makes it much harder to land. The first Normandy mission is considerably harder with faster advancing ground targets.
• I didn’t think it would be possible to make the “sandstorm” mission any more annoying, but Ubisoft did just that with the Wii version. Instead of listening to the Germans banter (in English) over the radio, you get a wonderfully loud, piercing stream of morse code for the whole mission that cannot be turned off. I turned off my stereo. In exchange, it’s easier to find the German bases with an on-screen indicator/radar thing. And thankfully, I achieved Ace rank on the first try, so I will never, ever have to play it again. Honestly, this mission should have been excluded from all versions of the game.
• In most campaign missions, you can choose which plane to use. Why anyone would turn down the Spitfire V and/or P-51 for any campaign given the opportunity is beyond me. So yeah, you can fly Spitfires and Stukas against Zeros if you want.
• The controls are obviously the biggest difference. You can choose between 5 control schemes. My favorite is the Wiimote motion to control direction with the nunchuck for throttle/weapons. Additionally, I switch hands because I was so used to the 360 controls. This seems to work fine, though it takes a half-dozen missions and ace battles to really get the hang of motion controls.
• The graphics are significantly worse than the 360. The planes still look fine, but in general the game looks more jagged. I probably wouldn’t have noticed this if I hadn’t played the 360 game first.
• There’s no online play. (The 360 version has online play, but good luck finding opponents).
• The voice acting was redone, for whatever reason. The script is largely the same, but now Germans speak German and Japanese speak Japanese. So there’s less stereotyping, and more realism. Fine. Your wingmen have less exaggerated accents as well, and your player has a large speaking role in this game as a sort of narrator, as well as an in-game persona.
• There’s a cockpit view. I found this completely worthless as I do with every other air combat game, but some people like it.

So there you have it. I highly recommend it if you like air combat and have a Wii.

I get asked alot “hey where do I get roms?”

More precisedly, “HEY D00D WHAR IZ de ROMz?”

Well, I can’t really host most of the commercial ROMs here on my site for fear of legal repercussions, but I can give you a few hints about where else to find them.

To be clear, the legality of ROMs is somewhat gray, but I’m almost 100% certain that it’s illegal to have a ROM for a game that you do not already own in some other form. Even if you do own it, I’m not 100% sure it’s legal to have it on a ROM. I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice.

That being said, here’s some general guidelines on how to find ROMs. First, what the heck is a ROM? Well, to be more precise, when I say ROM, what I really mean is a ROM image, which is just a copy of data from a chip. It could be from an NES game, a Genesis game, or the firmware in a cell phone. A ROM isn’t much use unless you are able to “flash” it to some sort of hardware or you have an emulator that can interpret the ROM on some non-native device (like your PC, or a Game King.

Okay, so there’s lots of more information about ROMs and emulation out there, I’m not going to go over it all here, but you can check out some of my other blog posts about emulation.

Now, suppose you have an emulator/device/whatever and you want to get some ROMs to play games on it. Where do you get ROMs?

• The “usual” sources. This includes P2P networks like Limewire, Shareaza, etc, and my current favorite, BitTorrent (which is much different than a traditional P2P network). You will need a BitTorrent program like BitComet and a website to download torrent files. Some good ones are The Pirate Bay and isoHunt. Torrents are a good way to get ROMs in quantity, but not so great if you are looking for specific ROMs.
• IRC. Internet Relay Chat has been around for at least 100 years. It’s the original chat protocol for the internet, before all you kids and your instant messanger and MySpaces and what not. Yeah it’s good for chat, but it’s also good for finding specific things. In this case, ROMs.

IRC is a big place. Where to start?

I’d recommend starting at roms-isos.com, the website for a chat room that I have been know to frequent, #roms-isos (IRC chat rooms start with #). You will eventually need an IRC program, of which the most widely used by far is mIRC (and for good reason). Once you have mIRC and have figured out how to connect to the #roms-isos chat room, you can follow this handy guide to using an FServe, which is a “file server” in an IRC chat room.

It’s a little tricky and complex, but like I always say, nothing worth doing is ever easy. So, good luck, and stop asking me for ROMs. I won’t give you any.

Like free games? Free achievement points? Who doesn’t?

Xbox Live is coming up on their 5th anniversary, and among other things, they are giving away a free copy of Carcassonne for a limited time.

If you haven’t played the demo, Carcassonne is a resource-based, turn-based strategy game, similar in nature to Catan, which is also available on XBLA.

So, starting on November 15th, 2007, you can download a free copy for 48 hours.

I played the demo only recently, and found it very interesting. If you like strategy and/or board games, this one is definitely for you.

Gift idea!

Gift idea for a newborn/toddler/kid, whom you want to corrupt with video gaming.

You know you want it.

Here’s a new video about NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams, which I’ve been harping on for the longest time now.

If you think you’ve made up your mind about NiGHTS and you haven’t played the original, I implore you to give it at least a rent.

Before you watchi this video, note that the beginning gameplay footage is from the Saturn version. It doesn’t really say until after the clip, and it had me kinda worried…

So there you have it. It’s a unique gameplay experience with a fantastic soundtrack. What’s not to like?

I really enjoyed Elebits for Wii, and I think I will be receiving it for Christmas.

But just in time for me to get that game, it looks like a sequel is in the works.

According to this random guy at IGN, when he asked the creator of Elebits about Elebits 2, he said “that’s a secret”.

So, take that rumor for what it’s worth. I, for one, welcome our new Elebit overlords.

Listen as the love child of Ray Ramano and Christopher Walken comments on a video of the hardest Super Mario hack ever.

I can’t find the original source of this hack, but it’s rather masochistic and close to impossible.

There are some really funny lines in this video, and I encourage you to watch the whole thing.

The guy commenting wasn’t actually playing, he just added his commentary.

I’ve been meaning to get to some recent gaming news that I found noteable, but haven’t had a chance. Here’s a quick dump of some links and notes that I’ve been accruing.

• Wii Ware will soon have some actual real games on it. If you aren’t familiar with Wii Ware, it’s basically like VC, except that it’s new titles (like XBLA). There will be a Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, Bomberman, a Karoke title, and some other stuff, including multiplayer Dr. Mario with Miis.
• Two notable new titles for XBLA: Puzzle Quest and Yaris, the latter being a free game meant to promote a car or something. An “advergame”, if you will. I really like this idea. Make sure to download it: it’s free, and it probably has achievement points.
• If you bought a Wii last year, you’ve probably noticed that there have been a lot of Wii releases, but not much in the quality department. Sure there’s a few good titles here and there, but a lot of Nickelodean crap too. Don’t worry, the good stuff is on its way, including Donkey Kong, Table Tennis, Guitar Hero III, Battalion Wars 2, Tony Hawk, DDR, Mario & Sonic, Super Mario Galaxy, Puzzle Quest, Jenga, Rayman Raving Rabids 2, Super Smash Brothers, Mario Kart, and, of course, NiGHTS. Should be something for everybody.

There’s lot of other big news in the gaming world. Halo 3 is out, for instance, but you already knew that. I played the Bioshock demo, and even though I’m not a fan of FPS games, I found it interesting–especially the storyline. Er, that’s it.