Re: The Original and Best Play Want Bin

In article <slrnfom8fr.8oa.usenet.chris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Chris Whitworth <usenet.chris@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Seeing as Kotaku are doing a PWG thread on Fridays, this thread is titled in
anticipation of them ripping this off as well.

Play
----

Phantasy Star Universe: Ambition of the Illuminus (PS2) - Woo, new event
missions. I had to resort to a FAQ to figure out what in the hell is going
on, since the new missions don't actually tell you what the goals are or
how to accomplish them until you're deep into it. This is probably a
limitation of the system they use for getting new content into a client
that doesn't allow more than 4 megs of local storage. Which is clever and
significant in my book, but still annoying. And yet I continue to play.

Final Fantasy III (DS) - Not much to report here, just whacking away. At
monsters.

Shining Soul II (GBA via DS) - I was paranoid that the DS was capable of
erasing save data on GBA cartridges randomly. Turns out this was just a
bug in one specific Pokemon game and not something endemic to the
hardware. Newly informed and empowered, I've abandoned the GB Micro to the
portable gaming museum shelf and I'm starting to play more GBA titles in
earnest. This is nicely Diablo-esque in a non-isometric, anime-styled sort
of way. I wonder why Blizzard doesn't port the first Diablo to DS, given
how logically the touch screen and multiple buttons would work with the
game's UI.

Starblade Arcade (PS2) - Finally unlocked this from Tekken 5, and it's
totally worth it. I've played the game enough now that I've noticed some
interesting differences between this and the many home versions, which
have some simplified flight patterns to work around the 3D limitations of
the various consoles.

Guitar Hero III (PS2) - A holiday gift from the future in-laws, who mean
well and for whom I have great respect. :) Having said that, when your
first exposure to the Red Octane equipment is to open it up so you can
repair cold solder joints, it tends to sour the rest of the gaming
experience. The fifty-thousand foot view is: A pleasant game, but not one
I'm likely to spend lots of time on. I did enter the code to unlock all
the songs, given that there's no download option and I might in the future
entertain guests who will insist on rocking out. Ahem.

Want
----

Starblade Alpha (PSX) - Still looking. I just realised that there's a copy
available back at the shop out west I visited over the holidays. Dammit.

More Xbox 360 backward compatibility - The rumour is that Microsoft won't
be doing any further compatibility updates, ever. Used original Xbox
consoles are down to $50 in some places here in the States. Time to go
shopping for redundant hardware. And to download another copy of the
CDR-based BC update ISO image to see what sort of hacking potential can be
found there.

A decent C-64 emulation platform - I'd like something that plugs into a
real television and has a keyboard, please. Being able to read from and to
write to real floppy disks wouldn't hurt either. As long as I'm hunting
for more Xbox hardware, I should see if there's a port.

An excuse to visit PlayNTrade - A new game shop chain I learned about over
the weekend, which is apparently run by a cadre of local crooks rather
than a single group of nationally organized crooks as Gamestop is. There's
one an hour's drive north, and one an hour's drive south. Maybe one of
them will have Starblade Alpha.

An Action Max Replay Pro (PS2) - See below.

All Japanese RPG developers to take a good, long, hard look at Final Fantasy
XII and realise that things have moved on now and the same thing with shinier
graphics isn't really good enough any more.

Just to be clear, are you citing Final Fantasy XII as an example of the
new direction for RPGs, or as an offending party in the crime described? :)

Bin
---

Tekken 5 (PS2) - It's not utter garbage, but there's nothing here you
didn't see in Tekken 3 other than the flashy, plastic graphics that are
disturbingly reminiscent of King of Fighters MAX, at least to my eyes.
Also, I find the rest of the extras monstrously tedious. Now that I've
spent hours unlocking Starblade, I don't see myself doing anything with
the rest of the content in the game. The next time I buy a title strictly
on the strength of some bonus content, I'm going to do it via a downloaded
save. Hence, the wanting of the Action Max whatever thing.

Getting up when it's dark.

But that's the best time. You get more done when the rest of the world is
still groggy and crusty.

-KKC, who notes that Summer Glau doesn't seem to mind being naked on camera.
--
-- Universal survival rule #109 - Chicken nuggets must be served -- kendrick
in a quantity that is also a prime number. Failure to do so will -- @io.com
result in a geometric disturbance conducive to the resurrection of Cthulhu.
Disregard this rule if the meat in the nuggets is not actually chicken.
.