(Yet another) Rant: Steam, and similar DRM/Corporate schemes

If this post gets at least one reader (which it probably won't, let's be honest), controversy might follow, Steam fanboys will keep nagging and trolling me, throwing at me insults and complaints without taking 1 look in the mirror. (a.k.a. Steam) They all seem to do. I'm not trying to create a spark or trying to get an angry mob after me, I just want this off my chest, I am only laying out the facts for you, you can choose what you think of it after. As the Oracle from the Matrix once said: "You have already made the choice, now, you're beginning to understand that choice.".

I ranted here previously, about digital download games. Well, since then, my opinions have changed ever so slightly, I'm okay with services like GOG, not as a replacement to physical, but as a companion, for indie games and such! On the other hand, I don't think I'll want to buy any physical game that uses Steam, Origin or UPlay DRM ever again!

I'm not going to complain about Origin and Uplay, it's pointless, as, let's be honest, Steam inspired them, they're just copies, Steam is the real culprit! It's not just Steam either, it's it's fanboys, I'm sure there exist Steam users who are smart, and know what they're talking about, I have a few freinds who are hardcore Steam users, and they're okay.
Most Steam users I've seen online, are a bunch of stupid, hypocritical, inconsistent ar*eholes! I'll get to them later...

Steam and similar DRM don't accept used sales. Now, I've seen a lot of PC gamers complain about the Origin, Uplay and the Xbox One (the latter not anymore) for doing this, when Steam has the exact same restrictions!

Steam requires an online verification to install games, Steam requires an online check-in every week or so (not as bad as Xbox One, but it still means you're screwed if you lacked internet), it blocks used games, and companies have full and total control over what you can and can't do with your games. They can even just take the game away from you, without reason, and you can't have a say in the matter, and you can't sue them either, because Steam have made it so you can't do that!

I am willing to bet that this the main, if not the only reason more publishers have become interested in the PC, it's a publishers wet dream to have full control over the consumer! Steam, and similar "services", makes that dream come true!

When buying a physical game that uses Steam DRM, as my friend once said to me, and he makes a good point, the code inside is more valuable than the disc, the disc is useless, you don't even need it to install the game, you can enter the code without the disc inserted, Steam will register it, and download the game. Once the code is used, you're just as well burning the game, it's that useful!

Worst of all, people want their physical games DRMed, which makes no sense whatsoever! Do these people want their physical games to become useless after the code is used!?

Steam also does nothing to stop piracy, it's very easy to obtain a cracked .exe of a game, and a cracked client, even Gabe Newell apparently said that pirates are a "non-issue" (but used sales are!?), so all the Steam DRM does is forbid buyers from sharing their games, and it eliminates used sales. In other words, it punishes the good paying consumer!

You see, my point about the physical/digital debate is game ownership, where you own your games on physical, but not digital, it turns out, you don't even own the game when buying physical, at least not if it has Steam, Origin or Uplay DRM. They're licensed to you, and you know a fascinating fact about Licenses? They Expire! They are not permanent things, they can expire over-time, or it can be revoked from you for any reason. So esentially, when you buy a game from Steam or Origin, you're only renting it, because you can't keep it forever, can you?

Don't believe me? You can read the Steam Subscriber Agreement.
Like probably the majority of youse, I breezed through it thinking it wouldn't concern me, and accepted, but give it an actual read, you'll be shocked at it's contents! More specifically, read sections 2.A and 2.F.
Actually, Don't bother! I've done it for you! I've even highlighted the important parts, because I'm nice!

2. LICENSES

A. General Software License

Steam and your Subscription(s) require the automatic download and installation of Software onto your computer. Valve hereby grants, and you accept, a limited, terminable, non-exclusive license and right to use the Software for your personal, non-commercial use (except where commercial use is expressly allowed herein or in the applicable Subscription Terms) in accordance with this Agreement, including the Subscription Terms. The Software is licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership in the Software. To make use of the Software, you must have a Steam Account and you may be required to be running the Steam client and maintaining a connection to the Internet.

...and here's section 2.F:

F. Ownership of Software

All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and to the Software and any and all copies thereof, are owned by Valve US and/or its or its affiliates’ licensors. All rights are reserved, except as expressly stated herein. The Software is protected by copyright laws, international copyright treaties and conventions and other laws. The Software contains certain licensed materials and Valve’s and its affiliates’ licensors may protect their rights in the event of any violation of this Agreement.

You can say what you want about Microsoft, and I'm not a fan of them either, but at least their Games for Windows games doesn't require an online activation, you only need it to play the game online (You can create an offline profile), and even then, the key is tied to the physical copy, not on any account. By the way, I've tried this with Street Fighter X Tekken, I turned off the internet, and installed it, and right enough, I had no problems installing and playing the game! (Where as Steam, which is clearly superior, reuqires online verification just to install it and you can't do anything with your Steam games)

If you don't believe me read this!

They even reversed the Xbox One's DRM policies after complaints. What has Valve done when people complained to them? Absoluletly nothing!

It's ironic as well, Microsoft are bad guys and Valve are gods!? Sure, Microsoft have their slip ups, but at least they make up for it later on, Valve just bury their problems and pretend they don't exist, fooling the unsuspecting consumer, and it seems to have worked!

I've seen Steam users complain that the Xbox One stops the ability to share your software, the fact you are screwed without internet, and that it restricts it's audiences to the very rich! When Steam has the same restrictions, when I see someone complain about Steam for the exact same problems, they seem to always put the blame on the user, and defends their precious Steam!

For example, when someone complains that they can't share their games with another user, or use the game on another machine/account, here's a comparison of what the average steam user says:

Xbox One: "Microsoft are a bunch of cheap, greedy b*stards! They just want more money, by treating us like criminals, taking away out freedom, and kills game ownership!"

Response to someone saying the exact same thing about Steam: "Fuck you! Do you want to give the game to another person and cheat the developers out of their money!?"

How many times have we heard both of those kind of comments from "PC gamers"? I see them a lot! They can't have it both ways! Are used games good or bad? Make up your mind!

Also, in response to the latter quote, which I get a lot myself, I only give a DRM-free game away if the other person isn't interested or ever plans on buying the game, either that, or I accidentally buy a second copy of a game new. (which is rare, but has happened a couple of times.) Either way, it wouldn't make a difference to sales whether or not a gave it away or traded it in...

Steam users also seem to talk about installing games anywhere as an advantage, which is a very poor arguement! You can do the exact same thing with a DRM-free physical games, and every download client on this planet, in fact, I'd be scared if you weren't able to do that with Steam!

What's that? Steam has an Offline mode? Well, you need be online to go offline, having online as a requirement in order to use a feature you're only going to use when you can't get online... It really defeats the purpose, doesn't it? Also, I'd like to see youse try to install a disc game offline, you can't!

Steam does achievements and leaderboards? So does Games for Windows, and even Raptr, which is an overlay for games, does something similar. I'm not fussed about achievements anyway, they're nice, but they're not something I need.

Really, the only great thing about Steam is it's workshop, it makes installing mods much easier, and you can easily uninstall them, that, I have to admit, is awesome!

That however, doesn't make up for everything bad about Steam, if I have to give up my digital right to make installing mods a bit easier... I'll stick with the traditional method if you don't mind...

I think everyone needs to wake up, and realize the PC is not the awesome platform it used to be, Valve are not the gods of gaming, they are killing the physical market, they are allowing publishers total control over us behind our backs! They are turning the PC platform into a corporatised rental service, if Valve were any better than EA or Ubisoft, and want to prove it, they would put an end to it all... because right now, getting a PS4 or even an Xbox One sounds quite appealing...

I used to love Valve, I have many memories playing the Half-Life games, and as much as I'd hate to admit it, I had fun with the Portal games and Team Fortress 2, but they're destroying the very market that made them...

I just hope that Mortal Kombat complete edition won't have any DRM, in fact, I reckon there's a chance, I might do another blog entry about why right after this, yeah, some good news to drown out the bad, I'll see youse then!

-Cobra!

Rant: Download games, and why I don't like them.

Please read the full article before responding! I'm always getting people making arguments I've addressed in the article itself, so please try and take everything in, I know it may be hard if you disagree with it, but please bear with me!

This topic has been really bothering me, I personally don't like downloading games, because I've had almost nothing but bad experiences with downloads, I much rather get my games on disc, despite the DRM PC games have these days, it's good to have a game on your shelf.

Me and my friends have been having a debate on which is better, I prefer physical, like I said, so does my friend, but he seems more than willing to switch to digital when the "digital age" comes, I will personally be dreading it.

Before I start, I want too point out that people complain about the PC and Xbox One when it was planned to have DRM for blocked used games, saying you can't share or trade games in, yet people embrace downloads, which have the EXACT same restrictions? To me, that's like, for lack of a better analogy, going against hanging because it kills people, but supporting hung, drawn and quartered! It makes no sense!

Most of the time, digital games cost more than their physical counterparts, especially on consoles and handhelds, Animal Crossing: New Leaf is £5 cheaper physical, physical games sound like a no brainer, doesn't it? Well people are downloading the games anyway, Animal Crossing: New Leaf broke records on the e-shop...

It baffles me how stupid people can be, you spent £5 more for essentially more for your money, not just the fact you get no case or cartridge, you can't share that game with others, or even give to a friend when you're finished with it, or trade it in! Also, when the 3DS gets discontinued, and the e-shop servers go down, you better hope you still have it installed, otherwise, good luck trying to play it again!

Even if you prefer downloads, you can't justify the higher price, and the fact you can't share or trade in that game!

Everyone I've talked to always mention virtual console, "What about virtual console?" they ask, well, they couldn't of brought up a worse example. Virtual Console is the best example of why digital downloads are bad, half of the 3rd part companies, most notably Sega, have all taken their games down from VC, they always tell me "Well, Sega are ar*eholes!", which isn't the point, the point is, they've done it, and nobody's stopped them, they have full control over what you can and can't get. Heck, I'd be surprised is anyone who bought their VC games got a refund or anything from it. Sure, they're only old games you can buy the originals of anyway, but it shows the power publishers have over the consumer.

If a company decided to stop manufacturing a physical game and stops selling it, it's still very much possible to track down a copy of that game, if a company decides to stop selling a digital game, it's gone forever...

That's exactly why companies are trying to switch to digital as soon as possible, companies, especially publishers, want full control over the consumer, they want to call all of the shots, and they want us to just take all the crap they will throw at us, digital downloads gives them the power to do that!

Not just with virtual console, but with downloadable Nintendo games in general, the game is tied to the console, and not any account, so if you accidentally lose or break your 3DS or Wii U, all your games go, too! Unless you bother with spending days of contacting Nintendo, and they shop you bought the console from, in order to either get a refund, or move the games over. This isn't come rumour I've heard, I can vouch for it, I have a story to tell youse: My brother once had a Wii U, he (or should I say out mum) bought Lego City Undercover from the e-shop, £50 it costed us! It turned out he didn't have the space for the game, the Wii U only has 25GB of space, the game took up 26GB. If Nintendo are going to be shoving digital games down our throats, the least they could do is provide enough memory for games, but I digress.

He cancelled the download for the game, and bought the physical copy for Amazon, which I may point out was £10 cheaper, it even included a little figure! He got it, played through it, etc., no troubles there.

He later on took his Wii U back (I still have mine) to get himself a laptop, he was later on charged for the digital copy of Lego City Undercover, despite not fully downloading it, my mum is trying to contact Nintendo for a refund for the game, but was told they needed the serial number of the console, but we no longer had the Wii U with us, so we couldn't give them the serial number, it would've made more sense to ask for the Nintendo Network account, but whatever.

We have to contact the store where we bought Wii U from to get the serial number, that was a couple of days ago... still no refund.

Already, getting a refund for out digital game has been a LOT more hassle than if we wanted a refund for a physical game. All you need for them is a receipt, and even if that's lost, you can trade it in used and get something for it.

In summary, we payed £10 extra for a version of a game that you can't play, or get a refund for... I'm so looking forward to the digital age!

That's another thing, space, not so much with PC games, but consoles never have the space to store enough games, AAA at least. Sure, digital games can save shelf space, but not much, the Wii U for example can barely hold 1, and anything by Sony or Microsoft could hold maybe 3 or 4, not much at all, is it?

Even with Sony and Microsoft's consoles, once the console is discontinued, and servers go down you better hope you have your digital games installed, otherwise, good luck trying to play them again.

PCs can probably hold quite a few, I'll admit, the PC is probably the best platform for downloads, the download clients still have their problems though:

Steam (as a DRM, not as an indie game store) I think is overrated, don't get me wrong, Valve make terrific games, I love the half life and portal games, and Team Fortress 2 is good fun, but people don't need to suck up to them! Steam isn't as great as people make it out to be, in fact, when you think about it, it's no better than Origin, a client made by EA, the greediest company alive! Steam doesn't allow used sales or trade-ins, and you need online and a code to validate games, meaning those who lack internet are screwed! Steam has an offline mode for already-validated games? So does Origin! Steam has discounts all the time? So does Origin!

Like Origin, Steam games are more expensive than their physical counterparts, not as expensive, but it's still bad. The sad thing is, the US PC market appears to have abandoned physical games for good, which is kind of depressing. For the curious US gamers, yes, Europe still has a physical market, with companies even releasing their DLC in the form of download codes in cases!

Another PC download client I'll mention is GOG.com, to be honest, I kind of like GOG, it's almost like how Virtual Console should be, while I would still rather get the games on discs, I can live with GOG, their games have no DRM, and they go for very good prices, usually under $5, let alone pounds! If there's a game I can't find physically, I wouldn't mind getting it from GOG.

I guess that would conclude my rant, it's off my chest, and I feel much better after letting it out! Before, I go I will mention a benefit of downloads, the only one I can see: Download markets are good for indie gamers to get popular, I suppose I wouldn't mind getting an indie game digitally if it means supporting the developer. Who knows, maybe it'll lead to a physical version in the future, like some indies have.

However, I think it's possible for indie developers to release physically as well, there exists services like Kunaki and Cafepress, who offer to make and distribute physical games for free. They do, however take away from any sales made, but from what I've heard, so do services like Steam and Desura. With that said, you can start physically selling your game with zero money on you, if you do that alongside your digital releases, then the way I see it, in the worst case scenario, you'll make a bit of extra money. Some people have said that would "punish" those buy it digitally, but I don't get how it would, could someone please explain it to me...

If you're games successful enough, you won't even need to do that, there are publishers in Europe and Oceania, such as Merge Games and Lace Mamba, who specialise in releasing popular indie games physically, DRM-free, with any extras, such as the soundtrack and a Steam gift-key, to give to a friend. Popular Indie games, such as Limbo, Binding of Isaac, Super Meat Boy and Awesomenauts, all have physical versions for sale on Amazon (I have a feeling Don't Starve is around the corner as well, seeing how popular that is, so I'll wait to get that). They're cheaper than if you were to buy the digital equivalent of the stuff on Steam, and also, you can have the games on your shelf! So if you haven't got the games, I'd say their worth a look.

When I make my indie games, I of course hope to have the latter happen to me, but most likely, the former will happen, I'm fine with that.

So I guess this actually end on a high note, maybe if there's an indie out there I'm genuinely interested in getting (apart from Super Meat Boy, Pro Wrestling X and A Hat In Time, but a physical version of the former exists, and latter 2 will have physical version coming out), I might consider getting the game digitally, if it means supporting the developers, and if they release a physical version later on, and I like the game, I'll be the first to get that!

Retro Diary - 31/12/12 - Last Retro Diary of the Year

I've been thinking of redoing the blog for a while, I kind of missed it, to be honest.

I will do them again, however, I won't be as active as before, 2013 is going to be a busy year for me, for starters, College is starting to take up a lot of my free time, having to do all sorts of assessments and test at home, (At least I can't say I have too much free time, I won't be looked down on as much, but not sure if that's a good or bad things, though.), and I'm working on my new game: Rossies 3D, which will be made using the Unity engine, so it will be easier (but it's just as genuine) to make games, so I hope I won't give up on this one...

Anyway, next year, you might be lucky to get more than 1 post in a month, but hey, being not very active is better than being inactive, right?

So without further delay, let's begin:

To sum up what happened between my last post and now, PC games, lots and lots of PC games! Most notably the Tony hawk games, which all have insane modding communities, making the PC a great platform for the Tony Hawk games.

I'll tell youse what I got for Christmas:

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland [PC]
The Orange Box [PC]
Train Simulator 2013 [PC]
Skateboard Tycoon 2003 [PC]
Snowboards Tycoon [PC]
Sonic 4: Episode 1 & 2 [PCDL]
Sonic Adventure 2 + Battle [PCDL]
StarFox Adventures [GC]
The Legend of Zelda: Ocerina of Time [N64]
Incredible Crisis [PS1]

A new PS2
and a bunch of Blu-Rays

May seem like a lot, but most of them didn't cost that much, so that kind of balances it out.

Train Simulator 2013 was easily the best game I got, it's brilliant, although it didn't come with any Scottish trains or routes, I had to pay about £50 worth of DLC to get them, and this them on a sale with 50% off, so usually, it would cost me about £100! The game is still fun though, speeding trains, derailing them, making them crash into things, it's good fun!

Sonic 4 is pretty good, but I can't help but think it's just a shoddy attempt to recreate the original games using 3D graphics, Generations is far better! in my opinion at least.

Sonic Adventure 2... It doesn't work, if Sega are going to be putting out 10+ year old games, they could at least make them work, they are lucky I didn't buy myself and that a Steam sale was on...

I only got Orange Box for the unlikely event that Valve goes bankrupt and you can't download their games anymore...

I've yet to try out the console games, but I look forward to once I get around to it.

As for the PS2, the one I had broke, it stopped reading discs, so I had to get a new one.

Did you know that the PS2 went through another redesign? Yeah, it did! They even made a new box for it, take a look:


I love how it's the same blue theme as the PS Vita and new PS3 and PSP boxes! It's clear Sony haven't forgotten about their good old PS2!

The PS2 itself went through a redesign as well, now the left of it is entirely piano black, and caught dust and fingerprints after 5 minutes! The only problems I had were that the power and eject buttons are now very small and hard to reach, and that it only came with an EU plug, it didn't even come with a converter! Luckily, I had one myself:


Looks alright, doesn't it? It works great, so all is good!

That same day, we were going to our grans for a Christmas dinner, so I brought the new PS2 along, seems only fitting, right?

We played a bit of Timesplitters, and that was about it... We spend most of the time chatting and watching Doctor Who, hopefully, we can have a proper week next year...

Well, that's all I have to say, see youse.... in my 2012 year review!

Retro Diary - 30/09/12

Tuesday 25th September 2012

I got Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD and Jet Set Radio on Steam today.

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD is great in my opinion, very underrated. Jet Set Radio is okay too, but it's the exact same as the original game, but with a higher resolution, which makes it look sharper and clearer, sure, but it's nothing major, I suppose though it's for the better, the original still had some value.

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Friday 28th September 2012

I ordered FIFA 13 on PC months ago on PC from Amazon, and it said it would arrive on the day it came out, but guess what, it didn't, I'm fuming...

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Saturday 29th September 2012

FIFA 13 on both PC and PS2 as well as F1 2012 on PC have arrive today, it's about time, but at least I have it now, and a weekend to play it!

I was met with a pleasant surprise with the PS2 boxing, Apart from RC Revenge, do you know of any PS2 games with a picture/logo on the spline instead of plain text? Well, at the end of the PS2's life, it finally got one with FIFA 13's case, look!


My brother copy of FIFA 13 on PS3 has arrived as well, we've agreed to make this week PS3 week to play FIFA 13, then it's PS2 week, where we'll play the PS2 version. which sounds fair enough.


Well, I don't have time to write much more, I have some FIFA 13 (and F1 2012) to play!

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Sunday 30th September 2012

It was PS3 week this week, or so it was supposed to be, we didn't actually play it, we just talked for a short while then left, that's it...

Let's hope next week will be better, which is PS2 week, so we can play FIFA 13 on PS2 as I said before.

Retro Diary - 23/9/12 - "HA! Beat THAT!"

Monday 17th September 2012

I've completed Sleeping Dogs today! It was an epic game! I really hope they make a sequel!

I got a 6-pack of AA Batteries because my TV remote needed new batteries as it wasn't working, or so I thought, they don't work, so that means the remote is broken, so I can't play any console games until either the TV gets fixed, or I get a new one. The batteries I got came with a free download of the London 2012 game for the PC, well, a demo of the game, but you can only get it through getting the batteries, so I did that, gave it a shot, and I have to say, I wasn't entirely impressed, the game seemed average.

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Wednesday 19th September 2012

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD is now on PC!!!
Sure, it's only a download game, sure, it's a remix of an old game, and sure, the reviews aren't brilliant, but it's the first time in years a new Tony Hawk game has come on a platform that I have!
It's been years since I've had that feeling of getting that new Tony Hawk game near Christmas time! Just to get that feeling again, I might just get it!

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Friday 21st September 2012

Before I write anything, Happy 5th Birthday Gamerstorm!

I've been trying out this thing called "Game Gain", which is supposed to improve performance for your games, I've tried this before, on Stranglehold, but didn't see any difference, but that was a bad game to test it on, as it ran on 60+fps normally. Since I have a lot more games that can't run 60fps on high settings, I thought I'd try it out again, and I actually noticed a slight increase in performance, nothing major, but it's impressive how they improved performance at all with the same specs as before.

My Copy of Space Station Silicon Valley for N64 has arrived, too bad I don't have a working TV to use to play it, I ordered the game before I found that my TV is broken...

I've tried out the F1 2012 demo, because I found that along with FIFA and PES 2013, people were buying F1 2012, so I thought if there's a demo, I'd try it out, I really enjoy Codemasters' racing games, not just because you can select Scotland as your country, they're genuinely fun games, and also I like F1, not the sport itself, as it more for the money, at least these days, but I have a lot of F1 games so I thought combing the two, it should be good.
Initially, at the country selection for your profile, it was at "United Kingdom", I thought, "That sucks!", but then I found you can still select the countries in the UK, so that's good, but why anyone from the British Isles would choose the UK, which isn't a country, over their actual country, is beyond me.
I've only tried the tutorial stages of the game so far, and first impressions are good, like all Codemasters games I've played on PC, it's very well optimised, it can run 1080p on high settings on my PC easily, and the game itself is quite fun from what I've played.

As if by a miracle, my TV started working again! So I had a shot of Space Station Silicon Valley, and it's great fun, but after seeing the first cutscenes, I had to make this!:

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Saturday 22nd September 2012

Pro Evolution Soccer for PC has arrived today!

I've just opened up the box, and the manual and disc look really cool!:


The manual is also in full colour! Which I haven't seen in years! It feels so good to not be reading in black and white:




I've played the game itself, and it's the same fun game as last year only... the same, it controls and plays the exact same! Oh well, Hopefully next year's game will be different/better with their new Fox Engine...

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Sunday 23rd September 2012

It's PS2 week this week.

I played a couple of levels of Transformers until Giancarlo and/or Steven came in.

Then I played a couple of games with Giancarlo.

Then we played Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam.

Then we played a few fights of Mortal Kombat Armageddon.

Then we and Steven played a few games on Timesplitters 2, then me and Steven played two levels (Wild West & Atom Smasher) in Co-Op Mode.

Then we played 4, (yes, 4!) games of Horse in Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarder, The first two Steven had won, then we decided to change the handicaps around (usually I'm set to lowest and he's set to highest) and I won that time, so in the final match, we set both of our handicaps to +5, and it was good fun, we were both equally matched, I say that, I mean he still annihilated me... Although the horse name then was "YASSS", making me a YASSS, YASSS!
It's 17-8 to me, he's catching up, I see this as good, I love a balanced battle.

After that, we had to go.

Next week is Xbox week.

Article By: Cobra!
Help Provided by: Steven (CobrbDB)

Retro Diary - 16/9/12 - "Great shot, CPU! Oh, CPU, you idiot!"

Monday 10th September 2012

I was a G-Force after college today (No surprises there.), and I bought 3 Sega Saturn games, Sega Worldwide Soccer 97 and 98, and Virtua Fighter (1).

I saw a model 1 Mega Drive with a Mega CD attachment, it had no price tag, so I asked at the counter how much it was, and she said if it works (they had yet to test it), they said it might be £60 for both, which sounds really good. I liked it up on ebay, and to buy model 1 Mega CDs on their own on eBay costs £240! I'm getting that Mega CD out of G-Force as soon as I can! I know the guys won't be interested in getting it before me, I trust you guys, but you're wanting it, I'm not overly fussed, the race will be on!

I came home to be greeted by 2 parcels! One that looked like one that a strategy guide book would go in, and the other was actually pretty big, but it had Japanese writing on it, so I knew exactly what that was!

The guide was the Sleeping Dogs strategy guide that I ordered alongside the game, I only do that to games I really want.

The game was Digimon Tamers Battle Spirit 1.5 for the Wonderswan Colour, the box was actually taller than a Black & White Wonderswan game, it was actually the size I initially expected them to be, the rest of the box was just paper and bubble wrap, it seems the Japanese aren't big fans of the environment.

I've played Battle Spirit, and it's brilliant, even better than I hoped! Visually, it looks amazing, just like a GBA game!

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Tuesday 11th September 2012

It's worth mention first, R.I.P. to those who died in 9/11, it's been 12 long years.

Remember when I said I saw a Model 1 Mega Drive+CD there and said it might be £60 once they're ready to sell it? Well, I went back there today, and they had it for sale for £100, but it came with 2 6-button controllers and 3 games, technically 4! I was a bit sceptical at first, but they mentioned that they do a 3-month guarantee, which isn't too much, but with an old console, you'd be lucky to have a guarantee on it at all, it also means if it breaks within those 3 months, you can take it back and get a refund, which sounds alright. They also mentioned that chances are, it'll go in a couple of days, they rarely come by, hard and expensive to find on eBay, and it's on high demand.

Believe it or not, £100 is a good price for a Mega CD, To buy one on it's own, without the Mega Drive itself, any games, or controllers, would cost you a whopping £240! and that's not including delivery! £100 doesn't sound so bad now, does it?

So I decided to get it, if it doesn't work, I could just take it back, so I might as well give it a try.

As I bought it, they were explaining to me some things I would need to know about the Mega CD, like that it uses it's own power, that the reset button opens the tray and start closes it. I knew all of this, but it was awesome that this shop hires people who know what they're talking about. Unlike a certain other store...

The console works perfectly, although the display is a little off, but it turns out it was the Mega Drive itself with that problem, because I get the same display quality when playing a cartridge game, which of course doesn't require or involve the Mega CD.

The games I have for it at the moment aren't that great, except for one, I got Prince of Persia, Jaguar XJ220, Cobra Command (Which, sadly, sucks! ='(), and Sol-Feace, which is actually pretty fun.

Now that I own a Mega CD, that opens doors for me to try out those really bad FMV games, like Night-Trap! I can only get Sonic CD, with the proper music the EU/JP version had, as opposed to the US one Gems Collection had.

I downloaded and tried out the FIFA 13 demo for the PC, I downloaded it from Origin, because, where else? The game's just as fun as FIFA 12, maybe slightly better.

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Wednesday 12th September 2012

I got Space Invaders for the PC today out of CEX, expecting it to be just like the PS1 version, only supporting bigger resolutions, sharper graphics and a much higher framerate, well, only 1 of the 4 are right...

Transformers for the PS2 arrived today, and it's just as good as it was when I first played it years ago!

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Friday 14th September 2012

Black Mesa is finally out!

I've been looking forward to it for years, and I'm not disappointed, it's a great game!

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Sunday 16th September 2012

It was a Mystery Console this week, I didn't reveal it until my cousins had finished their lunch and came in, it was the Sega Dreamcast, to make up for thee fact we didn't really play it last week.

Steven brought back my copy of Stranglehold that I let him steal, after he completed it.

Me and Steven started things off by playing Chu Chu Rocket!

Then we had a few games of Metropolis Street Racer, Steven and Giancarlo had a game as well. I changed my name from "CobrbDB", which I probably put it there for a joke, the misspelling came from Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Wii, to "Cobra!". Steven changed his nickname from "Steven" to "CobrbDB", which is practically his new nickname, and we changed Giancarlo's name to "Ya555555555", which is mostly what he uses these days.

Then me and Giancarlo played Virtua Fighter 3TB.

Then me and Steven had a game of Virtua Tennis.

Then we played Virtua Tennis 2, Giancarlo joined in after us realising you can have 3 players, the game was just pure madness! I think we have found our new favourite multiplayer game, at least on the Dreamcast!

Then me and Steven had a game of Horse on Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, we played on the Skatestreet level, the "horse" was "RJIBYAHHBZ", Steven lost, with me having "RJIBY", 15-5 to me!

Then we played Le Mans 24 Hours.

Then we played Sonic Adventure 2, our- well, my favourite! We had a race on the Go-Karting, which he won out of us 2. We had a couple of shooting battles, We both won 1, then we had a 2 races, again, we both had a win.

Then we played Ready 2 Rumble, our reality that live and Australia, and they were watching us play this, he loves to watch boxing, we had 2 game, I think we both won 1 game each.

At this point, we were aiming to have played all of the game we had, we almost done it before, but this time we had much more time, we it was possible.

Then we had a game of WWF Attitude.

Then we had a race of Sega Rally. Which I lost!

Then we played Sega GT.

Then we played Mortal Kombat Gold.

Then we played Re-Volt, we had a race, which he won, somehow...

Then we played NBA Showtime, we had no choice to play as a team, and we lost by 10 or so points...

Then we had a game of WWF Royal Rumble.

That was us played all of the games, so we celebrated by playing some more Virtua Tennis 2! We played doubles, both of us on separate teams, but most points were by either the CPU being good, or them making a stupid mistake!

It turned out that we missed a few games, we played some UFC, the graphics were fantastic for a Dreamcast game, it looked stunning, but the gameplay kind of sucked.

Then we played another horse game on Tony Hawk's Skateboarding, this time, the "horse" was "GLQTEZWZY", for some reason, we could change it this time, last time, we had to stick with "horse".
Steven got GLQTEZWZY, but I ended up getting a G, was this the glimmer of hope Steven needed? Nope, He got a Y right afterwards, I win, 16-5!

Finally, we had a game of ECW Hardcore Revolution, which I won.

That was certainly an active week, next week is PS2 week, WWE All Stars time!

Article By: Cobra!
Help Provided by: Steven (CobrbDB)

Retro Diary - 9/9/2012 - Happy Birthday (NA) Dreamcast!

Monday 3rd September 2012

I've ordered a Wonderswan game off eBay late last night, after realising I had some money, it's called Digimon Tamers Battle Spirit v1.5, and it's for the Wonderswan Color. Just thought I'd tell you.

My first day back in college, and I bumped into one of my old high school friends on the train, he says he goes to the college I go to now, which is awesome. We were talking about a few things, mostly games, and My Little Pony, because he recently became a brownie, not that I have a problem with that, he can like whatever he wants.
He mentioned to me how it's weird that sometimes our opinion changes drastically about a certain thing, one time you might hate something, but later on, you might love it, and he was right, that's the case with me and games like Mirrors Edge and Grand Theft Auto IV, I hated them when they came out, but once I actually played them, I fell in love!

I came across another friend of mine, it's been years since we saw each-other, first thing he said to me was that he got a Dreamcast, good on him! I see he's still as into games as I am, that's good to know. We were talking about Dreamcast games for a good while, then we talked about the Max Payne games, funnily enough, the original game was planned for the Dreamcast, but that was cancelled.

I finally have a Wonderswan!
It has arrived today, and wow! it's tiny, it's smaller than I expected even after seeing one of it's games! Here's a size comparison between it, and a Game Boy Color:

Also, a size comparison between the console, and a box for one of it's games:


Of course, being that it came from Japan, the text/writing on the parcel was in Japanese, however, it was just a sheet of paper stuck on the cardboard, so I took it off, and there was another one, took that off, and there was another one, took that off, and they were all off, but then the last sheet of paper turned out to be two stuck together! Did they really need 4 sheets!? Since I have a thing for , I guess you could say, Exotic parcels/packages, I decided to hang them on my wall!

I've had a go on Klonoa: Moonlight Museum on it, everyone seems to think this game is mediocre and only for collectors, I partially agree with the latter, as it rarely pops up on eBay, and when it does, it goes for over £30, which is ridiculous for any Handheld game. However, once you get past the first world, which is dull and boring-ish, I'll admit, it really gets interesting in my opinion, you get new monsters and block that you'll recognise from the other Klonoa games, and makes the game a little more interesting and fun!

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Tuesday 4th September 2012

Anyway, last week at that shop, I saw a copy of RC Revenge, boxed with manual for only £2 because the case was cracked, but I didn't get it because I ordered it from Amazon. That copy didn't arrive, and I got a refund for it, so I decided to visit the shop again if I get the chance, and get it if it's still there, it was!
I also found 007 The World is Not Enough for the PS1 there, it looks completely different from the N64 version, so I wanted to get it, because I love the 007 games, and wanted to get something new, well, new to me. It was £5, so I thought why not, at that price, it must be in pristine condition, the disc, I mean, they take out the discs when displaying them to avoid theft.

I also saw Viruta Tennis 2, I got the first game from there last week, loved it, so I thought why not get this one, it was also £5, the same as it is on Amazon, not too bad.

After that, I went to CEX, I found Resident Evil 4 for both Gamecube and PC, the PC version being £3 and the Gamecube version was £12, I also saw Theme Hospital for about £2.50, I was going to get them, but the line that particular day was massive, and I was killing enough time as it was, so I thought forget it, I would probably get them all cheaper on Amazon anyway, if not, I'll get them the next time I'm there, which I guess will be Thursday, when I go back to college, I'm off tomorrow!!!

When I got back home, I got 2 parcel today! I got Max Payne for PC and 007 Agent Under Fire for the Xbox!

I played a few matches of Goldeneye Source with my cousin, Steven, it was almost as fun as the original! There was funny moment we had, in a match where the weapons were set to explosives, I threw a bunch of remote mines in a certain spot, and Steven fell right into the trap, I detonated them just as he was running over them, I found that hilarious, truest me, it's funnier than I'm making it sound...

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Friday 7th September 2012

Max Payne 2 Arrived Today, I haven't installed or even opened it yet, I'm waiting until I complete the first game.

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Saturday 8th September 2012

Sleeping Dogs, Inversion and 007 Everything or Nothing Arrived today!

Sleeping Dogs is fantastic, I'm very addicted to it!

Inversion, however, isn't quite up to that level, it seems it's another shoddy PC port, you have no option to turn off Motion Blur or Depth of Field, why don't games give you the option any more!? No one likes these effects, sure, some don't mind, but there's a difference between that and actually liking them. All they do, is blur out the game and slow it down, they're not good for anything! I know no one's going to listen to me but, developers, get some common sense, and don't use these effects! This is one of only 3 PC games Namco have ever released, and they all have this problem! I love Namco, but they're not cut out for PC games!

I expected Everything or Nothing to be just like Nightfire on consoles, only improved further, but nope, they've ditched that engine, and gone third person, why? It never works, only Blood Stone years later got it right. It plays just like 007 From Russia With Love, which was okay in multiplayer, but was kind of rubbish in single-player, trust EA to screw franchises up, eh? Luckily Activision got their hands on the 007 licence and got things right again!

As you probably imagined, I was playing Sleeping Dogs all day.

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Sunday 9th September 2012

It's the 9th of the 9th, the Dreamcast's birthday! Well, the North American Dreamcast anyhow... but it was the perfect excuse to bring along and play the Dreamcast!

Well, that was the plan, but my brother brought his PS3 as well, and we, or rather they, were mostly playing that.

When Steven came, he gave me back my copy of 007 Blood Stone for the PC... just thought I'd mention that.

Me and Giancarlo were playing Virtua Tennis and Virtua Tennis 2, and a game of Ready 2 Rumble Boxing, that's it.

Then for the rest of the time there, they were just playing Guitar Hero and Rock Band on the PS3.

That sums up today in a nut shell, next week, I'm not sure what we'll do.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be playing some Sleeping Dogs...

Retro Diary - 26/8/12 - The most active Sunday EVER!

Monday 20th August 2012

I downloaded this thing called "Game Room", which is a virtual arcade on Xbox live, however, I learnt that there's also a Games for Windows Live (PC) Version, so I downloaded that to try it out, and it's rubbish, you can't do anything cool unless you're willing to give Microsoft all of your money, this is why I hate free-to-play games...

Quantum of Solace Arrived Today! Thankfully, the lag/stutter that was in the demo isn't here! It's still full of bugs, and it runs choppy on my PC, and no matter what the setting are, it runs the same, and this PC can run Blood Stone on High Settings at 60fps! Once you look past the flaws, it's a brilliant game, it's no wonder it got so much praise back when it came out!

I also got Rugrats: Search for Reptar on PS1 today, I used to have this back in the day, which is why I bought it again, I expected this to be one of those games I loved back in the day, but wouldn't enjoy now, but surprisingly, it's just as fun now as it was back then!

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Wednesday 22nd August 2012

I was at an induction to my college course today, and on the way back, I popped into G-Force, because I had plenty of money left, and wanted to spend some of it on something, because I've run out of things I really, really want.

I found a few things I wanted, and were all cheap too!

The first game was Mission Impossible on the N64, I've recently become a fan of the Mission Impossible series, and I've been tempted to get this game, luckily, G-Force had it fully boxed with manual and inlay for only £5! A Steal!

The second game was Beyblade for the PS1, again, I've been slightly tempted to get this, and this game was only £4!

The final game was Virtua Tennis, this I wanted for a long time, I always heard good things about the Virtua Tennis games, and wanted to give it a try myself. This was only £3!

All 3 games came to a total of £12 roughly.

I remember leaving the store and checking the game, and it had no disc, so I went back in, and they put the disc in, I probably should have mentioned there was no manual either...

I've tried out Mission: Impossible, and it's a pretty good game, one thing worth of not is that it's one of the few N64 games to support widescreen!

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Thursday 23rd August 2012

I got Blur and Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box for PC today.

Both games have a similar problem, registering, the games install just fine, but you need to register the games when you start them, but guess what, servers for both games are down, so I couldn't, thankfully, for both games, you only needed to register the key to play multiplayer, and seeing how both servers are down, that's not a huge loss.
However, because both games are no longer online, it's be hard to patch them, burnout paradise wasn't a big deal, you can download the patches from websites that host patches no problem. Blur, however, you could only download the patches from their servers, which are offline, and the latest update further optimises the game (makes it run smoother), so it was a big deal, eventually, I managed to download the patch after literally hours of research.

Both games are terrific! So much fun, and it's great to know that you can play them after the servers are down and the game has ceased production, because it's already happened!

I've completed Quantum of Solace today, and what a game it was, although the final boss was too easy in my opinion, even for easy mode.

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Friday 24th August 2012

As if by some miracle, I was suddenly able to connect to the Blur servers, and registered my game! Yes! Although no one is online... Oh well, at least I was able to connect to my Facebook account, that has to count as something right?

You'll never believe this, but I was able to connect to the Burnout Paradise servers as well! I couldn't register, because it turns out it used your Origin account, or so I assume, so I did this and I'm connected with that as well, although the thing that kind of annoyed me was that because I did that, I got extra content, I can't help but feel that they took them out for those who can't connect to the burnout servers on purpose, I just have a gut feeling...

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Saturday 25th August 2012

My brother got Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock on PS3 today, I had a shot, and it's a lot harder than it looks!

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Sunday 26th August 2012

It was PS3 week this week, because my brother requested it, well, it was supposed to be, but before he could even take it out of the bag it was in, we had to leave, we were only there for half an hour! Shortest console week summary, ever!

That's it for this week, I hope next Sunday will have more happening, I decided since it's my last week on my summer holidays and until I go to college again, I'm choosing what console to bring, I'm stuck between PS1, N64 and Dreamcast...

After that, the console weeks will go back on schedule, so in case I forget, I'll remind my future self, we're at PS2!

Retro Diary - 29/7/12

Sunday 22nd July 2012

After I posted my Retro Diary last week, me and Steven had a game of Left 4 Dead for the PC, we completed the 2nd chapter.

After that we were going to have a game of Goldeneye Source, but neither of us could get a server running or join any public ones, so we couldn't...

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Monday 23rd July 2012

Trials 2 arrived today! The case seemed tatty, and the autorun was in a foreign language, but the game itself was in English, and it was lots of fun!

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Tuesday 24th July 2012

I've just been playing Sims 3 and Blood Stone 007 today. However, I've discovered This thing called Raptr, which is one of those databases for games for a signature/widget, but this one automatically updates your status, and the games you've been playing by connecting to your Steam, Games for Windows Live and/or X-fire accounts, I connected all 3, so whenever I play a game, this widget (Located on the right of the page), will automatically update, it even saves my signatures. It also supports Xbox 360 and PS3 games, and you can also add old games, but you'd have to manually track how long you play them, which makes sense, there's no other way of telling it.

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Wednesday 25th July 2012

I got Hard Boiled on DVD today, and what a film! I can definitely see why so many people love it! Although considering it was made in 1992, a year after Terminator 2, it seems behind it's time in terms of video and audio quality, that doesn't affect the awesome gun scenes and exiting plot of the film!

I saw Ice Age 4 in the cinema, it sucked, but while we were waiting for the picture to start, which was just under an hour, we went to an bowling alley/arcade, which happened to be near the cinema, I played Razer Storm, a shooter and Dead Heat, a racing game, they were both pretty fun.

I completed Blood Stone today, the game was kind of short, and I thought the ending was disappointing, I won't be spoiling anything.

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Thursday 26th July 2012

I started playing Stranglehold, it seems for a while, my goal currently is to beat Mirrors Edge, Blood Stone and Stranglehold, and I've completed the former 2, so I'm at the last stage of this "Goal" of mine.

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Friday 27th July 2012

I was playing a bit of Street Fighter X Tekken just there, I was playing in normal mode, much harder than the easiest difficulty I usually do, and flipping heck was it intense! Especially at the last battle! I was frustrated at a game for the first time in ages, but when I finally finished I, it felt so satisfying! I also unlocked a good few achievements on he way, so something came out of it...

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Sunday 29th July 2012

It was N64 week this week, I was bringing the N64, and Steven brought along extra games and controllers.

I've forgotten the order we played the games, so bear with me.

We (Me, Giancarlo and Steven) first had a game of Goldeneye, usually we do Licensed to Kill Slappers Only, but this time, we did a normal gun match, makes a nice change, and it was fun as always, even if Steven dominated the match.

Then me and Steven played 1080 Snowboarding.

Then the three of us played 007 The World is Not Enough, like Goldeneye, we just did a normal gun much, or rather a few.

Then we played Super Smash Bros, I was, as always, last place, except surprisingly the last match.

Finally, me and Steven had a quick game of Perfect Dark, and we didn't even finish it, because we had to leave.

When I got back home, my download for the Borderlands free weekend was done, and surprisingly, my PC struggled to run it, well, it struggled doing 60 fps, it can run on all high settings at 30+ no problem, but why do 30, when you can do 60? I played around a bit to get the game as awesome looking as possible, whilst running fast, I took out all post rendering effects and dynamic shadows and Bam! 60+ fps!

I have to say, I love the cel-shaded graphics, I'm an absolute sucker for those kind of graphics! I also loved the game's RPG elements, and interesting characters. I'm definitely getting this game!

Then I played more Sims 3 and that was it.

Next week is Dreamcast week! One of my favourites!

Retro Diary - 22/7/12 - "Slow."

Monday 16th July 2012

I faced my brother in another few games of FIFA 12 on the PS3, he was Classic XI, which is a team for 11 of the best football players who ever lived, and I was Celtic, I beat him in both matches we played, with the scores 9-3 and 11-5 respectively.

The latest issue of "Retro Gamer" arrived today, which means my subscription is back! In June, my subscription ran out, and I didn't have the money to renew it, so I made a new one, because I'd have money for it in July, and I was right!

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Wednesday 18th July 2012

I just ordered another bunch of stuff off Amazon, a couple of which actually being stuff... packs! For The Sims 3! I'm getting High End Loft and Fast Lane stuff for my Sims 3, because I love cars and technology, mostly gaming related! I'm also getting both Pets and Ambitions expansion packs. I ordered a whole bunch of other stuff, which I most likely reveal once they arrive in the coming days... In the mean time, time for some more Sims 3!

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Thursday 19th July 2012

My Street Fighter X Tekken Strategy guide arrived today, great, now all I need is the game, take a wild guess what platform I'm getting that on...

Blood Stone 007, Left 4 Dead 2 & Plants vs. Zombies have arrived today, I got Blood Stone 007 because it was the last game by Bizzare creations before they went bust, and I loved them, so I thought I'd pay tribute and get their last game, and through ordering it I realised an advantage to being a PC gamer rather than a console gamer, is that even in retail, PC games are considerably cheaper, sometimes even with pre-orders! When I ordered the game, Blood Stone for the PS3 and Xbox 360 were about £15 each, the PC version was £5, booyah! So far, I love the game, I'm glad I got it!

I played the heck out of Left 4 Dead 1, so I decided to get the 2nd one, although I've been busy with Sims 3 and Blood Stone, I'll get around to it eventually...

Before I kind of mentioned it, did you know that you could get Plants vs. Zombies on a CD? Unbelievable, right? I got the Game of the Year Edition, again, I've been busy with other games to play it, but like L4D, I'll get around to it...

I got all of this, but no Sims 3 Ambitions? I ordered it with free one-day delivery, and it hasn't arrived on it's time limit!...

Oh wait, hold on, it's here! For some reason it arrived later than my other stuff, weird, but I'm not complaining... I'll go play more Sims 3!

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Saturday 21st July 2012

Yesterday, all I played was Sims 3 and Blood Stone, so that sums up Friday, however, it seemed that I was so in trance into them yesterday, that I missed yesterday's post, although at the time, I thought I didn't receive anything, because I wasn't expecting anything, according to Amazon, nothing I ordered was estimated to arrive yesterday or today, but it turns out, just about everything arrived!

I got my Sims 3 stuff, I got Street Fighter X Tekken, I got a switch box for all of my AV consoles, so swap jobs should be a thing of the past, and I got my Mirror's Edge strategy guide! Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be playing some games...

I just encountered a game on MDickie's Facebook Page called "Wrestling Revolution", I downloaded it for the PC, it's free by the way, but the game is absolutely awful! Every aspect about it is bad, I suggest you steer clear at all costs, there are much better free games out there, and even better Flash exe's, including Mdickie's own Flash Stuntz, and even his flash conversion of Sure Shot.

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Saturday 21st July 2012

I just got my PS1 packed up, and my auntie is going to pick me up to grans, or so I've been told, so I decided while I waited, I'd play some games, I played a bit of Sims 3, then I went on to complete Mirrors Edge, it's a great game in my opinion, I wouldn't say it lived up the hype, but it's still great.

It was PS1 week at grans today.

Steven had a game of Vib Ribbon, 2 actually, one on Normal, and one on Hard, he managed to pass both.

I then had a game on Normal, then Giancarlo had a game on Easy, the coward!

Then me and Steven had a few races of Firebugs.

Then we had a few games of "Cops and Robbers" on Driver 2.

Then we had a few races on Wipeout 3: Special Edition, most of which Steven either got destroyed, or ran out of time, what I love about Wipeout 3, is that it's straight out, it doesn't try to dumb it down or be nice, it just said Steven was slow, his part of the end stats didn't display any time or "DNF", it just said "Slow", brilliant!

Then for the first time in ages, we had a "Horse of the Week" game on Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, the "horse" was "UFNFXPWDTC", my handicap was set to the lowest, and his to the highest, to assure a more fair match... I still beat him, I didn't get one letter!

After that, we left, next week is N64 week, it's been far too long since we had a game of Slappers!

Retro Diary - 1/7/12 - "It's challenge, challenge, chalenge!"

Monday 25th June 2012

My Wolfenstein 3D PC collection (Wolfenstein 3D + Spear of Destiny) has arrived today... but they didn't work... However, I got the games working on DOSBox, which odd as they're supposed to be Windows ports, but at least I get to play them! As I mentioned last week, it came with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, which works just fine on my PC, so that's good!

I also got my Brick Buster game, which is a lot of fun, considering it's a budget game.

I got my PC back!!!! ASUS have actually fixed it! It feels so good to be sitting back at my desk!

Yeah, despite my attempt to upgrade the PC, which would've voided the warranty, they fixed my PC, it seems to them the warranty doesn't matter, either that or they don't mind people upgrading PCs, ad they make graphics cards and all, and on their help website solutions to problems sometimes involve "removing recently installed hardware", they can't be referring to USB devices, otherwise they'd of said "devices"...

Anyway, I'm not complaining, my PC works fine (touchwood), so now I can play games in stunning HD (No really, 1080p resolution) one again!

Just in case, I'm only going to upgrade my PC once the warranty has run out, that way, even if it breaks, ASUS won't fix it, my mum apparently know someone who could fix it for me, sop it's not a problem, hopefully...

I tried out Trackmania Nations Forever on the PC, and WOW is it a massive improvement, on my laptop, it ran at 30fps on low settings at best, but being how beat my PC is, I can run it highest settings at 60+fps, and it looks beautiful and runs beautifully!

I also tried out The Wrestling Channel 4: Fight! on it, same things, only it doesn't look as good, it still runs fantastic!

However, I wanted to play FIFA 12, but as usual, Origin is being sub-par, it was saying I didn't own EURO 2012, when I clearly bought it.

It turns out, and I wasn't told until I closed it and opened it back up that I needed to update it, it wasn't until I did, when it finally installed EURO 2012.

The problems didn't end there, though, I wanted to get saved on EA servers (yeah, great start), to my PC, I had to restart Origin 5 times before it successfully synced, and even then, it took 2 hours to do so, this is what you get when the evil overlords of gaming go cheap with everything...

After all that, I finally played the game, and everything was in order, although it took longer to load my data, I blame an update, because every other game I tired played the same as before. So I played the Italy vs. England EURO 2012 challenge, and then quite because I wanted to play other games.

Then I played a Co-Op Session of Portal 2 with my cousin, Steven, at first it thought it was my first time playing, because it showed the beginning intro which you only see when you first play Co-Op, so I tried restarting it to see if that was a one time thing, thankfully, it was, it loaded my data the second time, unfortunately, at that time, there was something wrong with the Portal 2 servers, because both me and Steven were both lagging like crazy and kept disconnecting.

After that, I saved up money for the past week or two to get a much of PC games for my new PC, so I ordered a bunch of games, including the Sims 3, Trackmania United Forever, and Stranglehold.

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Tuesday 26th June 2012

I played my brother in FIFA 12, and I kept scoring against him, and he was scoring against me as well, I wasn't counting the score, but when I looked at it after I scored a goal, I realised I was beating him 10-4! Ooft! I'm a lot better at FIFA than I thought!

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Wednesday 27th June 2012

3 game I've ordered have arrived today, Toy Story Mania, Toy Story 3 and Dreamcast Collection, all on PC. Also, my Stranglehold strategy guide arrived, although I've yet to receive the actual game...

Toy Story Mania came as a surprise when I found out about it, I thought the game was a Wii exclusive casual mini games game, and I was right, but I found out a year or so later, only in Europe, they made a PC version, I usually wouldn't have bothered with it, but since I was getting Toy Story 3 for the PC and this was less than £5 brand new, I thought "What the hey!", and ordered that alongside Toy Story 3 and a bunch of other PC games. I got it, and it sucks even more than the Wii version, half of the features don't work in this version, and by that, I mean basic things you have to do, such as shake the Wiimote/mouse, that doesn't work on the PC version, and it's just overall boring to play, but I suppose for £5, I shouldn't be complaining...

Toy Story 3, on the other hand, is brilliant! I've played the PS2 and Wii versions beforehand, and really enjoyed them, so I thought I'd get the PC version, because usually, PC versions of games are the best if you have the right hardware and a decent controller, and I had both (I use the Xbox 360 controller with wireless receiver!), and I was right, the PC version, is the best version at least from the versions I've played, it had a great Toy box mode much like the Wii version but has more and the game runs much faster, 60++ fps!

As for Dreamcast Collection, I wasn't going to get this one either, since I hate collections of old games, I think they abuse the original systems and deplete any value they have... but since the PC version of Dreamcast collection was only £1 brand new, I thought I might as well.

However, just like Toy Story Mania, I was disappointed with this one, it took, literally over an hour to install for starters, then I tried out Crazy Taxi, the controls were confusing as heck, and you couldn't change them, and most importantly, they ruined it by replacing the music, I understand Sega may no longer have the licence to use Bad Religion songs, but if that were the case, they shouldn't have bothered at all, it's just not Crazy Taxi without Bad Religion, they aren't any improvements in the game anyway, it's not even in widescreen like they claimed, it's in letterbox mode, they aren't any widescreen resolutions, so just stick with your Dreamcast original.

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Thursday 28th June 2012

Ultimate Quake on PC and Twisted on the 3DO have arrived today!

Unfortunately, I've been having problems with both at first. With Twisted, my 3Do stopped outputting sound, although I soon realised it was playing sound, just very quietly, and found out when the system warms up, then it plays the sound at normal volume, strange, but at least I know what the problem is exactly, now to find out what causes it and how to fix it... oh yeah, and Twisted worked perfectly, so I can just throw my broken burnt CD away, I have a genuine properly, working copy now!

Quake Live was a slightly different story, Quake 1 installed and played perfectly fine, but Quake 2 and 3 didn't install at all...

With Quake 2, it turns out all "install" did was move content of a certain folder into a folder in Program Files, so I just did that manually, and it worked... sort of, I could only play it windowed, however, I found out about a source port called "R1Q2", which fixed this problem, so I installed it, and it worked perfectly!

Quake 3 Arena was a weird one, the install didn't work at first, but I could run the game off the CD, but if I were to do that, I'd have to insert the CD key every time I start it, so I decided to try it again in compatibility mode, and it worked!

Remember when I got Wolfenstein 3D and it only worked in DOSBox? Well, it turns out there exists a source port called "New Wolf", which not only makes the game work on Windows, but also supports higher resolutions, a bigger screen, and it runs much smoother! I've applied it to both Wolfenstein 3D and Spear of Destiny, which, by the way, I found out if you cope the folder from the CD to your hard drive, you can make the game work without the CD, so I did that.

I've also discovered GZ-Doom, which is an extension of Z-Doom, it improves it even further, supporting higher resolutions, and makes 3D models out of the doom levels, so you can look up and down without it looking awkward! There are also tonnes of little things that make GZ-Doom that much better! I've also found some Doom PWADS, one is called "Call of Dooty", which makes fun of modern shooters! Another is "Doom Center", which is a town, it has a bowling alley, and an arcade, in the arcade, there's a duck hunt game which you can play using doom itself, it's pretty awesome!

I've played a Co-Op session of Portal 2 with Steven again, this time, with the server up and running like normal!

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Friday 29th June 2012

The Sims 3 arrived today! I'm just about to play it...

...I've had a go, and it's absolutely brilliant, it's very addicting!

I've had a game of FIFA 12 with my brother on the PS3, a few, actually, and I've beaten him in pretty much all of them, one of them was completely mad, full of shots that ended up hitting the post and bar, one, in particular, my brother explained in detail, I had to wait for 5-10 minutes for him to type it.

EA claimed that you can pre-order FIFA 13 Ultimate Edition for the PS3, Xbox 360 and the PC, so I thought "Great! A PC version, I'll be getting that!", but guess what? No store have the PC version for pre-order, not even EA's very own Origin! EA: Trolls of the century!

I've been playing more Sims 3, and I was so into it, I didn't realise the time, so when I finished, when I stopped playing it, it was 1:15am!

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Saturday 30th June 2012

Trackmania United Forever had arrive today, and it's awesome!

I've played another (partial) game with my brother at FIFA 12, we only play for about 10 in game minutes, until he left, neither of us scored...

We played a full game of FIFA 12 later on, we both did random teams, he ended up with Arsenal and I ended up with some Portuguese team... We played another game afterwards, I believe it was an El Classico

Also, I'm going to make a new feature of my blog. It'll be similar to "Horse of the week", but it'll be with my and my brother, and we'll be recording the scores of games we do, there's a twist, which, chances are, like Horse of the Week, we'll soon stop exclusively doing that, is that we'll be using sliders for our games...

My friend from college, Jamie, got the Sims 3 as well, just a day after I did, which is pretty cool, we've added each other of the community website.

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Sunday 1st June 2012

It was 3DO week at grans this week...

I played a bit of Starblade and Need for speed first of all to get the sound on (It's quiet until it's been on for 5 minutes.), then when my cousins came in, we had a game of Twisted! Giancarlo technically won it, I say technically, we didn't finish it, but he got the furthest.

We had to leave after that, we brought our cousins up for the Euro 2012 finals (Spain vs. Italy), before the game, I played a bit of Sims 3, then my and Giancarlo played a match of Mortal Kombat Armageddon on the PS2, and then we played a race in the Motor Kombat mini-game.

After the Euro 2012 game, I showed Steven GZ-Doom, and a cool custom wad, which makes fun of modern FPSes, called "Call of Dooty", then I showed him Trackmania United/Nations Forever, and he said me might download Nations, as it's free, then he had to go.

I showed Giancarlo the Sims 3, and he said it looked like a lot of fun to play, and said he might get it, awesome, 2 people I know will (hopefully) have it!

After that, he left.

I'm going on holiday to Italy tomorrow, so there won't be a Retro Diary next week, but the week after, I'll be adding a lot to this site, like the Sliders feature with me and my brother being added.

Next time at our grans, it will be Saturn week.

Alright, see you in a couple of weeks!

Retro Diary - 24/6/12 - "This-Game's-Great!"

Monday 18th June 2012

I finally got around to playing the Browser version of Plants vs. Zombies, and I really enjoyed it, the Game of the Year edition of the game is only £5 brand new on Amazon, so I suppose it's a why not, I'm getting it!

My PC got sent off to get fixed today, well, I hope they actually fix it, I have a gut feeling they'll just send it back, broken...

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Tuesday 19th June 2012

My MDickie compilation DVD arrived! I was expecting the Disc to contain absolutely, pretty much like it was claimed to, but sadly, it didn't, a few DOS games and the original version of the 3D Big Bumpz was missing, I've downloaded the rest, as they're all free, but it would've been nice if they were on the DVD as well.

However, I found that the DVD contained 2 mods to his popular Wrestling Mpire 2008, one of them being called "The Wrestling Channel 4: Fight!", which featured far improved graphics and presentation, and the game had a better atmosphere too, I can honestly say that this is the best wrestling game on the PC now, it'd be awesome of Matt Dickie himself and the team and modded it joined forced to make a sequel, how awesome would that be!?

So yeah I've been playing that, even if it runs like crap on my laptop, I want my PC so bad...

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Thursday 21st June 2012

My sister came up to my room to play some Mega Drive, she reached the same spot before getting bored, she keeps saying to me she'll come over and we could complete it like we did with Sonic 2, but never does, I'd be lucky if she even comes up to play it half the time.

I've just noticed, my brothers have nearly finished school, which sucks, I was hoping to spend those extra weeks off by playing some awesome PC games while my brothers are at school and aren't here to annoy me, but my luck doesn't want any of that, and my PC broken down, seriously, why me!?

I suppose on the bright side, I haven't heard anything back from ASUS, no "we can't fix your PC", or any of that crap, so I suppose no news is good news, but I have a feel it's still just in a very long line of PC that are to be inspected, and I bet knowing my luck, it's be weeks until they finally get to my PC and say "Sorry, we can't fix it!", making all of that time, waiting for it to get "fixed" gone to complete waste!

I saw Wolfenstein 3D + Spear of Destiny on eBay, and as a bonus, that particular copy also included Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, all on PC... Ordered!

I was once looking at a "Let's Play", or rather a "Retsupurae", which makes fun of bad Let's Plays, and found one on Ultimate Doom, so I decided to look at it, and saw that this guys copy ran faster, had a different HUD, and was running on a bigger resolution, I thought, "Wait, how come my copy isn't as good!?".

It turns out, he had a mod put in which makes all those improvements and more into all the Doom games, it's called Z-Doom, called so because you can look up and down, unlike the original, I tried it out, and it was like upgrading a computer or to a new computer, you suddenly get a massive improvement in performance! I was in awe playing it, the resolution could go much bigger, and therefore looked so much sharper and clearer, it ran much faster, the new HUD rules, and tonnes more, I practically fell in love!

Later on, I was browsing for my games because I was bored and wanted something to play, then I discovered a few PC games I've had for years, but never played, one of them being a £1 budget game called "Winter games", I decided to try it out.

I've tried other budget games published by the same people, and they were quite enjoyable considering they're only £1, but this one sucked!

However, I discovered trial games that came free with the game, one of them being "Brick Buster", which is a 3D breakout game, I decided to give it a try, and I really, really enjoyed it, so I looked it up online to see if I could find a copy cheap.

You can download the game, it costs £10, which is outrages, however, on eBay, I found a retail copy which also came with another game, and that was less than £2, seriously, why do people digitally download games these days?

Physical copies are usually cheaper, you can install them on other PCs/Consoles, and if you feel nostalgic for a game years later, chances are, the digital download will no longer exist, but you can still install the physical copy!

My sister came into my room to play my Mega Drive again, which I don't mind, she gave up, again, because she wasn't doing as well as usual, so I had a go, and done even worse...

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Friday 22nd June 2012

I've been told I will get my PC on Monday, hopefully fixed, but they haven't said otherwise, so that's a good sign, but I'm still not getting my hopes up...

I discovered a Free-to-play game on Steam called "Trackmania Nations Forever", which is a game all about whacky tracks, and the fact you can make your own! I had a go of it, and I loved it! Unlike every other F2P game I've ever played, it doesn't ask you for money anywhere in the game!

I might know where they'd get income then, from their other, more advanced game, Trackmania United Forever, Nations is a Free Trackmania game, everything else is like a mainstream game, a case with a disc, that costs you about £20-£30. United Forever is all of the Trackmania games and expansions put together into one game. After playing and Loving Nations, I'm definitely getting United Forever!

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Saturday 23rd June 2012

My sister came into my room and played Sonic 1 for a bit, then gave up, so I gave it a try, and I actually reached Labyrinth Zone Act 2, by far the furthest I've ever gotten, until I got a game over!

I completed Episode 2 of the Ultimate Doom, and the end boss for that episode, is absolutely merciless, I couldn't defeat him no matter what I did, I lost count of the amount of tries it took, not that I counted in the first place.
So I decided, f*ck it! I put a cheat in to get the BFG, and then I completed him my first try... Alright, second try!

I realized it was 3DO next week, and I didn't have a working copy (or even a proper one at that) of Twisted, and that games makes 3DO week, 3DO week, so I went online, and there was only 1 copy left, it was £15, but I made an offer of £10, and not even a minute later, he accepted it, so now I'm getting a proper copy of Twisted! Hopefully it'll arrive before next Sunday...

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Sunday 24th June 2012

It was Mega Drive this week at grans, unfortunately, I only had one controller, so I brought along the Sega Master System controller, in hopes that it would work... It didn't.

I was playing a bit of Mortal Kombat for a while first.

Then I played a bit of Aladdin, still trying to figure out the level skip cheat I knew of years ago, it seems it's activated when I press A, B, B, A, while rocking the D-pad, but it doesn't do it when I leave it alone or hold it in any direction.

Then Giancarlo played Streets of Rage for a bit, he reached the boat level before getting a game over.

Then Steven came in a while later and played Spiderman, and couldn't get past the first level.

Then he played Bart vs. the Space Mutants, same thing there, couldn't get past the first level.

Then he played Micro Machines 2, he played a lot of races before getting bored. We have something new to say during the countdown of that game, while it counts down, in rhythm with the countdown, we say "This-Game's-Great!"!

Steven decided to let someone else play a game, so Giancarlo then played Sonic 2, because we couldn't go through Mega Drive week without playing that, no really, we couldn't!

While he was playing, he mentioned that once he gets a job, he's getting an Xbox 360, and he also mentioned he's getting a computer as well.
I thought "What's the point?", I mentioned he could just get a gaming PC, sure it may cost more to get a gaming PC than a console, but you're going to buy a console and PC anyway, it doesn't cost much to get a PC that can play all the modern games and PC games are generally cheaper than their console counterparts to pre-order and get brand new the day a game comes out. (Sometimes with £15 in difference!)
Besides, me and Steven play mostly on the PC now, so it'd be awesome if all 3 of us did!
It's his choice, I know, but I'd go for PC gaming if I were him, but then again, no one's like me.

He reached the Casino Stage Act 2, but then Giancarlo had to go, so Steven took over, and reached Hill Top Zone Act 2 before we left.

I bidded for an item of "Ultimate Quake!" for the PC, basically, that's the first 3 quakes (including 3 arena) for I think modern OS PCs, luckily, no one else placed a bid on it, I wouldn't think anyone would, these days, if anyone who's not me wanted a PC game, they'd get it on Steam, not me, I hate digital download games and try to avoid them as often as possible, luckily, I don't need to download anything to play Quake 1, 2 and 3 Arena any more!

Next week is 3DO week, it's time to land on the Challenge Square!