Video games, etc.

Bjam · Post by **Bjam** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 6:02 pm

I brought myself a Nintendo DS Lite with the new Mario game. Very good little console. I justified spending the money by the fact that I've been working for a few months and still hadn't brought myself anything. Mmm, presents for yourself.

Anyone else have a DS? Know of any good games? (I'm planning on getting Nintendogs or Animal Crossing in a few weeks.)

john m · Post by **john m** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 6:06 pm

Mario Kart and Castlevania are definites.

sausage boy · Post by **sausage boy** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 8:40 pm

I downloaded this port of a game that came out on the Amiga just before it really went under.

onEscapee

Nice little side scrolling puzzle/platformer. Kinda like Flashback or Another World. Graphics can vary from really impressive to really shocking, but I found out I can replace all the background music mp3 with j$ songs!

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Sun Jul 02, 2006 9:44 pm

My brother picked up Viewtiful Joe for Gamecube. That game is sweet. It's a weird superhero game where you can slow down time and stuff. It's actually really fun and fairly original, especially for a side-scroller.

Sober · Post by **Sober** » Tue Oct 31, 2006 1:53 pm

Played Bully all last week, and it's pretty decent. It's built right off the GTA: SA engine, so the controls feel pretty comfortable (though they mucked up the camera+movement interaction a bit). It's a fun game, if only by virtue of how different the context is from other sandbox games.

Before Bully, I played Scarface. Great game. Ultra profane, violent, and raunchy. Great character. Only complaint is that the game is too linear and short (perhaps the shortness is perceived because of the linearity). I beat it in about 4 days of hard playing. Still a good play for fans of the sandbox genre.

Other sandbox games I have yet to play include The Godfather and Just Cause. I sat the latter at Blockbuster and it looks interesting, though I know very little about it.

Now, I just broke down and rented FFXII. I know it's going to be horrible. I played the demo that shipped with DQVIII, and that was horrible. Penny Arcade says it's horrible. IT'S HORRIBLE. But I had to at least rent it. The opening cinematics should be worth the $8.65, right? We'll see. I'm not sure if I should go start it up right now, because I have to go pick up my neice in an hour, and if you're familiar with the Final Fantasy series, you know that an hour might not be long enough to get to the first fucking save point.

I'll report back.

john m · Post by **john m** » Tue Oct 31, 2006 9:47 pm

Got to the first save point in 15-20 minutes (while talking to Jessica, so not really power-gaming).

Main character is ANNOYING, but the game looks okay so far. I've loved Ivalice since FFT:A. But seriously, I kept wishing other characters I met in the FMV ended up as the main character. And the fact that the right-analog camera rotation is inverted is irritating. But the game is pretty cool, to this point.

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Tue Oct 31, 2006 10:28 pm

Bjam wrote:I brought myself a Nintendo DS Lite with the new Mario game. Very good little console. I justified spending the money by the fact that I've been working for a few months and still hadn't brought myself anything. Mmm, presents for yourself.

I'm planning on picking one of those up. Is it as good as you thought?

Bjam · Post by **Bjam** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:05 am

jolly roger wrote:
Bjam wrote:I brought myself a Nintendo DS Lite with the new Mario game. Very good little console. I justified spending the money by the fact that I've been working for a few months and still hadn't brought myself anything. Mmm, presents for yourself.
I'm planning on picking one of those up. Is it as good as you thought?

It's pretty good. Games are pretty expensive, but I got Super Mario Bros and later Brain Age, both of which are solidly good games. I play it quite a bit in little chunks, but as I've played through Mario, and unlocked all the stuff in Brain Age it's getting time to buy a new game, but they're expensive. So all in all, a good chunk of money spent on a pretty okay object. If you've got a lot of free time where you're just sitting about (rehearsals or before class or summer) then it's a pretty good buy.

Sober · Post by **Sober** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 6:13 am

John:

Do you speak of the horizontal or vertical inversion? I like myself an inverted Y axis, but the inverted X is killing me. Tony Hawk games are the same way. I'll get used to it in a while, but the next time I play a GTA game I'm fucked all over again. Scarface had the option to invert both axes if I remember correctly.

Anyway, my 1st day review: This game is not a Final Fantasy game. Nothing about it looks, sounds, or feels like it. For god's sake, this is the first installment I'm aware of that doesn't use the trademark bleepy cursor movement/selection sounds. Combat is obviously the greatest leap, with its odd realturn action.

That's about all I can say bad about this game. It's not what I want it to be. As it stands, the game really is fantastic (maybe not finally so). The opening sequences were fuckin amazing, especially on my brother's big-screen with the 5.1 sound going. The Final Fantasy theme music delved into truly epic scoring, and the visual editing style made me really feel like I was watching a well-produced movie.

The combat system is weird, but it's workable. What I really like is the skill-building system, which they call licenses. Similar in principle to past iterations, but I find this implementation particularly pleasing.

So yeah, the game isn't awful on it's own, it's just kinda sad they had to call the game Final Fantasy XII. John, have you played Dirge of Cerebus?

john m · Post by **john m** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 8:25 am

I meant the horizontal axis. I mean, I can get used to it, but I don't want to. I hate not having that customizable. (I happen to dislike an inverted Y-axis even more, though, so I guess I'm better off there.)

And yeah, this really isn't FF, especially in relation to the combat (though I'm told there's a way to make it turn-based? not that I really need to), but it's still a fun (and gorgeous) game. The combat is odd in that wait-time still exists even though the characters can move freely; it makes for a lot of situations where you and your enemy are just facing each other, completely able to move, but instead just looking at one another, waiting to strike.

I really want to play it on a nicer TV and with better speakers. I like licenses, too, can't wait to delve deeper into that. But I HATE VAAN (and most of the character designs). Please, enough with the overly feminine men! We get them dubbed as boy band singers.

No, I haven't played Dirge of Cerberus. I haven't played the PSX FFs (or X/X-2) for any reasonable length.

Sober · Post by **Sober** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 11:39 am

X-2 is fantastic, the best since 8 in my opinion. Pick it up in the used bin at Blockbuster for $8 like I did.

Been hacking through XII a bit more today. Where's the minigame? Blitzball, the cardgame.. where is it? (X-2 has an awesome minigame btw). And god did that palace invasion turn into a bataan death march or what?

GlennCase · Post by **GlennCase** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 2:56 pm

I just broke out my Playstation copy of Castlevania: Symphony of the Night a couple of days ago, and playing through the game is solidifying my belief that it is one of the greatest games that has ever been created.

ROCK!

Glenn Case

Tonamel · Post by **Tonamel** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 9:17 pm

I just picked up a DS, along with Big Brain Academy, Castlevania, and Phoenix Wright. All of them are awesome, Phoenix Wright doubly so. I mean, you get to shout "Objection!" and "Hold it!" and "Take That!" at the game, how can you not love it?

Sober · Post by **Sober** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 11:41 pm

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/09/07

Found it. Relevant.

HeuristicsInc · Post by **HeuristicsInc** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 8:02 am

Last night, a friend and I finished the original Guild Wars game (Prophecies - with my ranger/monk character). Sense of accomplishment!
-bill

Bjam · Post by **Bjam** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 1:14 pm

I want my Wiiiii already. I think it's gonna be taking up my Thanksgiving break.

Sober · Post by **Sober** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 1:27 pm

5 days til Tony Hawk's Project 8, and I have no 360 to play it on D:

fluffy · Post by **fluffy** » Wed Nov 29, 2006 6:14 pm

I finally bought a GameCube, since I got sick of waiting for a Wii to become available, and I suddenly realized that the "one or two" GameCube games I wanted numbered closer to 8-9. (My original plan was to get a Wii and those "one or two" games but then I also realized I'd need to buy a lot more hardware to make them playable on the Wii, though of course I bought that hardware for the GameCube anyway but the GameCube was $88 and, you know, available.)

Currently I am totally digging on Paper Mario, not liking Mario Sunshine or StarFox Assault so much (I had Assault confused with Adventures, which I was actually interested in even though it wasn't a TRUE STARFOX GAME or whatever). I also have a copy of Wind Waker and Metroid Prime 2, but Paper Mario is so awesome that I'm going to finish it before I start anything else (except maybe with occasional forays back into Mario Sunshine but its control seems a lot more finicky than mario 64's did, with too much of an emphasis on precision).

The main things that bother me about StarFox Assault are that the camera control is backwards (it behaves like a first-person camera but the game is third-person) and that your fucking wingmen still need you to fucking babysit them because they're fucking idiots who keep on getting bogeys on their tail and expect you to bail them out even though you're on foot and hauling a pea-shooter and they're, like, 3000 feet up. What the hell.

fluffy · Post by **fluffy** » Wed Nov 29, 2006 6:16 pm

Bjam wrote:Anyone else have a DS? Know of any good games? (I'm planning on getting Nintendogs or Animal Crossing in a few weeks.)

SPRUNG. IT IS TEH AWESOMEST GAEM EVAR.

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Wed Nov 29, 2006 9:53 pm

Definitely didn't want to waste my cash on a wii or ds yet, so I picked up a $20 ps1. Just bought Crash Team Racing. What a game. I love second hand games.

lucidia · Post by **lucidia** » Wed Nov 29, 2006 10:03 pm

Bjam wrote:I brought myself a Nintendo DS Lite with the new Mario game. Very good little console. I justified spending the money by the fact that I've been working for a few months and still hadn't brought myself anything. Mmm, presents for yourself.

Anyone else have a DS? Know of any good games? (I'm planning on getting Nintendogs or Animal Crossing in a few weeks.)

My DS Lite is the BEST THING EVER!!!!! I have the following games that I recommend highly:
brain age (i mostly just play sudoku, but the excercises are great and you can definitely improve your brain function by regularly doing them)
tetris DS
super mario bros (great classic mario fun)
mariokart ds (a bit too easy, but there are a lot options plus awesome multiplayer)
pokemon trozei (it's not really as gay as it sounds... it's a fun puzzle game)
viewtiful joe (interesting integration of the stylus into an action based game)
bomberman (not as awesome as other versions of bomberman, but it's still bomberman and i love it)

my boyfriend has metroid for his, and he LOVED it. I don't get into those types of games so much but I hear it's great so if you liked any of the metroid games, it's worth checking out, plus it has multiplayer options.

nintendogs is fun, but honestly, it gets old pretty fast. if we were 10, we'd probably be far more amused for a longer period of time. but it's fun, pick it up used and expect it to get boring after a few weeks, plus 60 or 70% of the gameplay requires you to talk into the DS which means you may not want to do it in public... depends on your personality

I have a PSP and i never use it... my DS Lite was far better from the start and I'm happy my boyfriend gave me one for my birthday... BEST PRESENT EVER!!!

Sober · Post by **Sober** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 2:48 am

I've considered getting some kind of handheld, but I've always been able to rationalize not spending the money. I own a sick laptop, and it goes most places with me anyway. I would like more simple rpgs on here like you find littered on the ds, etc. shelves.

I think I'm going to buy FFXII. I haven't played it since I rented it, and I miss it. I still haven't played Project 8, even though it's available for ps2. From what I understand, an entirely different developer was in charge of the ps2 version, and it's a lame port of the american wasteland engine (aka thps3 engine).

As far as next-gen consoles go, I think I'll try to pick up a 360 for cheap after christmas on ebay. They're already down to like $200, so it shouldn't be too bad.