2012 Year Review

So, 2012 is coming to a close, and 2013 is right around the corner. Usually, I feel upset about it, and I still kind of am, but not as much as I usually would. Maybe I used to feel upset because it mean't it's one year further away from what I call "The good old days!", but if 2012 showed me anything, is that todays days can be as fun as the "good old days", if that makes sense.

The only thing news-wise I want to talk about is the 2014 Scottish independence referendum being made official, that, to me, was the only bit of news that stood out.

I don't know about anyone else, but after doing a lot of research, I support independence, from what I've read, Scotland can survive, even the head of the anti-independence campaign said we could, and not only that, it seems we'll all be better off. For starters, we can say bye bye to paying the BBC's stupid TV license...

Besides, I'd rather be Scottish than British personally, and I want to hear Scottish accents and the Scots language on TV!

2012 was a great year for video games, I'll list my favourites this year:

Train Simulator 2013 - I never thought I'd find a game like this to be fun, but here we are. I've been hearing a lot about the Train Simulator games all over the internet, and I even have a good few friends who have the game, and say they love it, so I thought I'll get this year's game, and see how it is, it's surprisingly addicting, however, I ended up spending over £50 on DLC just to get all of the Scottish trains and routes, and that was while the sale was on!

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD - It's a nice throw back to the classic Pro Skater games, and even though I have them on practically every system they were released on, I still
enjoyed HD, mostly for it's havok physics bails, in 60+ FPS!

Back to the Future: The Game - I know what youse are thinking "Wasn't the game released in 2011?!", Yeah, the downloadable episodes were, but I get physical copies, and the physical copy, which comes with all the episodes, came out in early 2012, so it counts! These games live up to the TellTale name in being absolutely amazing! Well, that and the episode actually came out on time *cough*Sega*cough*, *cough*Valve*cough*

Sleeping Dogs - Everyone has been talking about it, and playing through it myself, it's no wonder, it's a GTA clone, that I think is better than GTA! It's set in a fictional Hong Kong, and you play as an Undercover cop, sounds awesome, right? Well it's better than it sounds, the game has a combat system, that actually works! I never thought beat-em-ups could ever make it into 3D and work, but Sleeping Dogs achieved it!

Also, 2 games came out for the Playstation 2 this year! FIFA 13 and PES 2013, they're the exact same as their previous year counterparts, but at least the PS2 got games, also, apparently Square Enix is coming out with a Final Fantasy expansion for the PS2 next year, sure, it's technically an expansion, but since the PS2 out of the box doesn't have a hard drive, it'll probably be standalone, so it counts! It'll be out early 2013, Only in Japan...

2012 was also a brilliant year for movies, I'll go as far as to say it's the best year for films ever! Many fantastic films came out this year, the new Muppets Movie, Men in Black 3, the Avengers, Brave, The Dark Knight Rises, Ted, all amazing films in their own right!

As for the music of 2012, all I have to say is: OPPA GANGNAM STYLE!

As for what I've been up to this year, it's been crazy for me, all sorts of things have happened to me.

I've started development on a new game, as Stated before, called Rossies 3D, which will be a first person shooter that will run on the Unity engine! I am working with fellow Rossi member, and this guys a nutter, so with him on board, the games humour is guaranteed to be intact! I am very exited about the game, and so are others I've told.

I've discovered a new language, it's known as Scots, and it turns out that I can understand this language perfectly without studying it or anything, and speak it quite well, most Scottish people can!
So esentially, I'm fluent in a second language, without putting in any effort to learn it, brilliant! My guess is that we learn it through neds and it being used as "slang", so like English, we learn it as we grow up, kind of making it a second first language, if that makes sense.

Knawin the Scots leid wioot tryin tae lear it is afwu braw! Nou Ah can pit aw o ma gemmes intae this leid! Ah'll e'en pit thaim intae Spainyie and Italian an aw!

If you understood that, then give yourself a pat on the back, you know another language!

Aside from them, and playing a bunch of awesome retro games, not much happened, just all kinds of little stuff happening.

• Most Played Game Platform: PC
• Most Played Game: The Sims 3 [PC] (According to my Raptr)
• First Game Played in 2012: Motorstorm: Artic Edge [PS2]
• Last Game Played in 2012: Bully: Scholarship Edition [PC]
• Favourite Game of 2012: Sleeping Dogs [PC]
• Favourite Film of 2012: Men in Black 3
• Favourite Song of 2012: PSY - Gangnam Style
• Favourite Gaming Moment of 2011: Me and Steven playing Robot Arena 2 for the first time (Not recorded on Blog)

Overall, I think 2012 was a great year, almost as good as the old days! I hope 2013 will be just as good!

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" Arrivals: FIFA 13 [PC & PS2] & F1 2012 [PC]

I know I said I'd stop doing articles dedicated to stuff that arrived in the mail, but I had to make an exception!

FIFA 13 didn't arrive on Friday, but both of the PC and PS2 version arrived today! and 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!


This was just a quick update to say they've arrived, and look great! F1 2012 arrived as well, which is awesome!



Well, I don't have time to write much more, I have some FIFA 13 to play!

-Cobra!

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 Pick-Ups: A Sega Mega CD!

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.

Retro Pick-ups: A whole bunch of stuff

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!

I've yet to try out the Sega Saturn games, so if you'll excuse me... I'm going to play Sleeping Dogs!

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 Pick-ups: Virtua Tennis 2 [DC], RC Revenge [PS1] and 007 The World Is Not Enough [PS1]

On the way home from College, I popped into both G-Force and CEX.

When I was at G-Force, I saw a couple of Japanese tourists, or at least I think they're Japanese, I can tell they weren't Chinese, I doubt they'd be in game stores, so they were either Korean or Japanese, either way, it's the first time I've seen Asian tourists here in Scotland. I could tell they were tourists, because they were speaking a foreign language to each other.
Apparently, we get Japanese tourists in Scotland all the time, but it's first time I've seen any, why would they come here anyway, I could understand going to the Highlands, I imagine it's nice there, I want to go there myself, but why Glasgow?

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.

All the discs look in fine condition, I've already tried Virtua Tennis 2, and it works just fine. I've yet to try the others, though.


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!

Right, I'll be off, I have so many games to play, but so little time...

Retry Diary - 2/9/12 - "CobrbDB! My arch nemises!"

Monday 27th August 2012

YES!!!! For years, I wanted this handheld system called the "Wonderswan", or more specifically, the "Swan Crystal", because that's the last in the line of Wonderswans, so I can play all wonderswan games, that and it has the clearest and best screen.

I ordered (Kaze no) Klonoa: Moonlight Museum for the Wonderswan a few days ago, I forgot exactly when, because I am a huge fan of Klonoa, and this game was rarely comes by, but I found an item on eBay, and got it, despite not having a Wonderswan, that is until now.
I saw a Swan Crystal in eBay yesterday, in that "Crystal Blue" colour I wanted, it was £50, so I made an offer yesterday of £40, and they accepted!

Like I said, I wanted a Swan Crystal for years, but never found one until now, I guess it's true when they say good things come to those who wait...

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Wednesday 29th August 2012

Nothing of note really happened on Tuesday, so I'm skipping to Wednesday.

My and my brother played a few games (or "Duels" as the game calls it) of Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock, 4 games to be exact, and I lost all 4, 2 of the games my brother went on medium while I went on easy, he still beat me...

I tried out both the Driver and Dri3r demos on PC, Driver 1 ran great, even on high settings, although coming from a 13 year old game (Jeez! Is it that old!?), I didn't expect any less!

Before I get to the Driv3r PC demo, I have and played the PS2 version, and also played the Xbox version, the PS2 version had a choppy framerate it ran awful! The Xbox version ran more-a-less the same from recollection, maybe a bit better.

I was worried that perhaps this was one of those games that ran at this same framerate regardless of the hardware you're using or what your settings are, like Reservoir Dogs or 007 Quantum of Solace.

Luckily, it wasn't, and it ran beautifully on PC, bye bye Choppiness!

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Friday 31st August 2012

I think I have become addicted to GTA IV, because I've noticed that that's all I've been playing, and according to Raptr, when I play it, every time it's for at least 2 hours straight! Who cares, though, it's a great game!

I am officially done with Nightfire for the PC, not because I've completed it, but because for some reason, at this one level (Elevator Action), it's become so buggy and laggy, that's it's unplayable, seriously! I don't even know how they managed that, since it's all the same engine, it should stay the same for the whole game, but apparently not.

Before this level, it was functional, maybe boring at some parts, and the levels drag on, but it was fine.
However, once I reached this level, it was full of bugs!

For starters, it didn't auto-save once the level started, like the other levels, which was strange, but that's only the icing on the cake. Sometimes I couldn't move, the mouse lags, the aiming sometimes lags, and what I mean by that is that it constantly switched from zoomed in to normal, the camera does a similar thing, for one frame or so aims the opposite direction, some enemies at some times are you can't kill, even if they're in a wide open space, not behind anything, and you're pumping mountains of bullets into them.
Worst of all, and I know this for a fact that's it's unbeatable, there was a part I was stuck at for ages, I consulted the trusty Strategy Guide, and it said I was to use the grappling hook, but guess what... you have no grappling hook! I read back to see if I missed a part where I was to get it, but nope, it didn't mention it until that point...

That's f*cked up! Did EA even play test this level!? Probably not, because hiring play testers would've involved EA spending money...

There are even several patches to the game, but none of them bothered to fix this problem!

Like I said, the rest of the game is fine, so why suddenly now does it glitch out on me.

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Saturday 1st September 2012

My Klonoa: Moonlight Museum game arrived today!

Since it was from America, it came in one of those US parcels, I thought it looked cool, since we obviously don't get them here in Scotland. So I took a photo, here it is:


One thing I have to say about the game, or rather the box itself is.... it's tiny! I expected the box to be a taller version of the Game Boy and Game Boy Colour boxes! Here's a size comparison:


See what I mean?

Unfortunately, I still haven't got my Wonderswan (otherwise I would've mentioned.), so I can't try it out...

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Sunday 2nd September 2012

I decided to bring the N64 over the Dreamcast (I was struggling to choose between the two) to gran's this week.

I was going to show my cousins my Wonderswan, but it hadn't arrived, but as mentioned earlier, a game I ordered alongside it did, so I just brought that and showed them that.

I mentioned also about the US parcel, and me and Gaincarlo had a little interesting conversation about, you could say, Exotic parcels? Well, he mentioned he ordered a Zelda: Minish cap off of eBay, and the seller was from Hong Kong, so his parcel was has a lot of Cantonese writing. I kind of hope my Wonderswan will come in a parcel that's got Japanese writing on it, being that it's from Japan, it probably will.

I played a mission on Mission Impossible.

Then me and Steven played WWF Attitude, had a few games, funny to play as always.

Then we played Goldenwhy! (Goldeneye), we had 2 games of that, I won 1, and he won the other.

Then Giancarlo joined in to play Perfect Dark with us, we had a few games of this, I was played a guard with Shigeru Miyamoto's head! Steven took the alias as "CobrbDB" referencing a typo I once made in a game, although I forgot which, maybe Steven could tell me... Throughout the time we were playing, he got the most kills, so I declared CobrbDB as my nemesis!

Then me and Steven played Riiiiiidge Racer 64, then after a few races, Giancarlo joined in.

Then me and Steven played Tony Hawk's Skateboarding for the N64, we had a game of horse! Instead of horse, though, it was "EQUSFEZAA"! I won the match, but he did manage to get a letter or two out of me, and he said that was enough for him! Fair enough, it also made the game look less one sided. Even at that, it's 14-5 to me now, the whole thing looks one-sided, and I'll be honest, I don't like that, I hope Steven steps up his game and gets himself a few wins, maybe we'll play the games he's good at...

Then finally, we played the Pokémon Stadium mini games, it was first to 5 wins, and he won...


That's it for this week, next week we're back on schedule, it's PS2 week!

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

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 Pick-Ups: Mission: Impossible [N64], Beyblade [PS1] and Virtua Tennis [DC]

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...

Anyway, here are photos of proof:

Retro Diary - 19/8/12

Monday 13th August 2012

Batman Arkham Asylum arrived today! It's just as awesome as the demo made it out to be! I've been playing that all day.

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Tuesday 14th August 2012

Quoted from the Retro Pick-Ups video posted that day: I was spending the day with my friend, as a sort of birthday get together, as his birthday was coming up, while we were out, we went to CEX, which a store that people bring old games, CDs and DVDs and they sell them, my cousin, Giancarlo, goes in there a lot, and says it's a great store, so I went in, and disappointingly, it was mostly PS3 and Xbox 360 games, I managed to find a section that had 6th gen console and PC games, so I browsed around that part for over half an hour.

I got 007 Nightfire on both PC and Gamecube, because I heard that the PC version was cut-down from the console versions, but I wanted to try it anyway, it was only 75p anyway, so why not? The Gamecube version was £1.50.

I also got Reservoir Dogs on the PC for £1.50, I'm a big fan of the film, I have it on DVD, have it's soundtrack ripped to my PC (Turns out my dad used to have it, well, we found it at our old house.), and I always wanted to play the game, now was my chance.

Lastly, I got RC Revenge Pro on the PS2, just because I can!

Nightfire on the Gamecube was brilliant, it got every right, it's not as good as Goldeneye, but it's definitely up there! The PC version, however, is actually kind of rubbish, they've changed the game completely! The only thing that remained is the story, and even then, many scenes have changed, everything else is completely different.

Reservoir Dogs was badly optimised and was an extremely shoddy console port, but it's good fun in my opinion, so I'll probably be playing it to the very end.

I've still to play RC Revenge Pro, I want to get and complete the original RC Revenge on the PS1 first

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Wednesday 15th August 2012

I tried out a demo of Need for Speed Underground 2 on the PC, owning it on the PS2 and Xbox wasn't enough for me!

Well in all honestly, I loved the game, but didn't like how it ran slow and looked rather blurry, after realising there was a PC version, it shouldn't have surprised, need for speed originated on the PC and 3DO and every game in the series is available on PC.

It was much better than the console versions in my opinion, it runs much faster, you can turn all the blurring effects off! However, it doesn't support widescreen resolution, but the beauty of PC gaming is the modding community, and low and behold, there exist patches (user created), that make it support whatever resolution you want, so I installed one, and it looks great!

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Thursday 16th August 2012

I got a pack of 3 games today, all Codemasters racing games, all with creative titles, they are DiRT, GRID and FUEL!

The awesome things about DiRT and GRID are that when it comes to selecting your profile, you get to choose your nationally, and you can choose to be Scottish! Finally, games that acknowledges us a separate country! The games are a lot of fun as well, I had a bit of trouble running DiRT at first, but once I was sorted, I was off!

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Saturday 18th August 2012

I got a Need for Speed Collector's Pack today, which contained Need for Speed Underground 1 & 2 and Most Wanted, I've only played the Underground games, I loved them both on the consoles, and it's only made better on the PC because of the higher framerate and the ability to turn off those annoying blur effects, the only downsides to them is that don't support widescreen resolutions, so I get thick black bars on each side, but you get used to it.

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Saturday 19th August 2012

It was PS1 week this week, and Steven couldn't come, and Giancarlo had to move all of his stuff to his new flat, and only had time to play a game for 5 minutes. Basically, like every other week recently, everyone's either not present or don;t have the time.

I played a bit of Jinx and Formula 1, then me and Giancarlo had a few games of Tekken 3, then he played a game of Vib Ribbon.

After that, he had to leave, is it me or are we not playing games nearly as often as we did when I started this?

I'll see next week if we get time to play next week's consoles (I'm leaving it to my cousins), to see if the time and effort put into packing them and setting them up is worth it.

Retro Pick-ups: Stuff I got from CEX.

I was spending the day with my friend, as a sort of birthday get together, as his birthday was coming up, while we were out, we went to CEX, which a store that people bring old games, CDs and DVDs and they sell them, my cousin, Giancarlo, goes in there a lot, and says it's a great store, so I went in, and disappointingly, it was mostly PS3 and Xbox 360 games, I managed to find a section that had 6th gen console and PC games, so I browsed around that part for over half an hour.

I got 007 Nightfire on both PC and Gamecube, because I heard that the PC version was cut-down from the console versions, but I wanted to try it anyway, it was only 75p anyway, so why not? The Gamecube version was £1.50.

I also got Reservoir Dogs on the PC for £1.50, I'm a big fan of the film, I have it on DVD, have it's soundtrack ripped to my PC (Turns out my dad used to have it, well, we found it at our old house.), and I always wanted to play the game, now was my chance.

Lastly, I got RC Revenge Pro on the PS2, just because I can!

Nightfire on the Gamecube was brilliant, it got every right, it's not as good as Goldeneye, but it's definitely up there!

The PC version, however, is actually kind of rubbish, they've changed the game completely! The only thing that remained is the story, actually, I'm going to do a new series, where I play through 2 versions of the same game at pretty much the same time, I complete 1 level on one platform, I do the same level on the other, and compare my experiences and I'll explain the differences

Reservoir Dogs was badly optimised and was an extremely shoddy console port, but it's good fun in my opinion, so I'll probably be playing it to the very end.

I've still to play RC Revenge Pro, I want to get and complete the original RC Revenge on the PS1 first.

Anyway here are photos:

Retro Diary - 12/8/12 - My birthday week

Monday 6th August 2012

I saw the Dark Knight Rises today, and it was brilliant, it's my favourite film this year, and seeing how brilliant all the other films I've seen that came out this year, it's saying a lot!

I've downloaded the Batman Arkham Asylum Demo today, but at first, it didn't work, but I manually installed a patch for it, and it worked just fine, and I loved the demo, I am without a doubt getting the full game as soon as I can, preferably the Game of The Year Edition!

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Tuesday 7th August 2012

I've finished Stranglehold today, and what an epic game it was! As I keep telling you...

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Wednesday 8th August 2012

I went to a Basketball summer training camp with my friend, Jamie, or "Midfield Maestro", as he likes to call himself. I'm mentioning this because he's staying with me for 2 nights after that, when we got home, the first thing we did was play FIFA 12 on the PC, the second thing we did... was play more FIFA 12! Then we played PES 2012 on PC. Then FIFA. Then Fronte Del Basket 2, Then FIFA 12, then NBA 2k12, which he somehow beat me at, his big ego never shuts up about it, then FIFA 12, then we watched some videos, and finally, some FIFA 12! Finally, we watched some Fawlty Towers.

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Thursday 9th August 2012

Both me and Jamie watched some Spongebob Squarepants, just thought I'd tell you that.

We played FIFA 12 all morning, then one of my old friends came up, it's been years since I've seen him, and he hasn't changed one bit! For this purposes of the blog, and since I don't have permission to use his real name, I'm going to call him "Rydo".

The three of us played FIFA 12 and PES 2012 on PC for most of the day, then my cousins came along, and we played a bunch of games, I forgot the order we played them and we played some of them at the same time, a couple played one, while the rest played another, here's what we played:

• Metropolis Street Racer [DC]
  
• Mashed: Fully Loaded [Xbox]
  
• The Sims 3 [PC]
  
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 [GC]
  
• FIFA 12 [PS2 & PC]
  
• Pro Evolution Soccer 2012 [PS2 & PC]
  
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater [N-Gage]
  

I got a lot of Birthday money today! As well as that, my cousin, Giancarlo, gave me a couple of games he got from CEX, I got The Broken Sword Trilogy on PC and From Russia with Love for PS2.

My mum got my birthday cake, she showed it to me, at first, I expected, since I was 18, it would be about some rubbish about beer/alcohol, even though I'll never drink, I hate the idea. However, it turned out it was a cake modelled into a PS1! Brilliant!

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Friday 10th August 2012

It's my birthday!!!!!!

My mum said she would give me my "Main" present early, it was a 160GB Ipod Classic! I always wanted one of them! What has it got to do with this blog? Who cares!

I got an Atari Flashback 3, what that is, click here.

I got a whole bunch of games and Sims 3 expansion packs, which are:

• TimeShift [PC]
• Grand Theft Auto IV [PC/Games for Windows]
• Dead Rising 2 [PC/Games for Windows]
• Strong Bad's Cool game for Attractive People [PC]
• Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventures [PC]
• Sims 3 World Adventures [PC]
• Sims 3 Late Night [PC]
• Sims 3 Generations [PC]

I've been playing them pretty much all day.

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Sunday 12th August 2012

Instead of going to grans this week, since she was at England, along with my cousin, Giancarlo and his family, to watch the closing Olympic ceremony, my cousins came to our house for a barbecue, a perfect opportunity to play some games with Steven, and anyone else who might want to play games.

We played some Atari 2600/Flashback 3 games first, Starting with Combat, then Sprint Master, and finally Maze Craze.

Then we played WWE All Stars for the PS2, we played a few games.

Then we played a 10 minute game of Goldeneye for the Nintendo 64, then unfortunately Steven had to go, he wasn't there for long...

Before he left, I gave him a lend of both Stanglehold and Blood Stone 007, since they were DRM-Free (Well, DRM in the anti-used game sense.) and I completed them, he said he had always wanted to play Blood Stone, but was waiting for a Steam sale (All digital gamers are the same!), so I gave him a retail copy to borrow!

Next week we'll be back at grans, instead of doing PS2 week, I'm brining a mystery console, I haven't decided on what it is yet, so as of now, even I don't know what it is!

Retro Diary - 5/8/12 - "Sega of Antartica!?"

Monday 30th June 2012

I've downloaded the TimeShift demo last week, and it didn't work, no matter what I did, it turns out that it's because my CPU is quad-core, the game was designed for Single and Dual-Core, and the company that made the game went bust, so there is no fix as of yet, I'm going to find a way to run my CPU on 1 or 2 cores to get this game running.

At that time, I cancelled the order for the full game, but just today, the idiots sellers dispatched it, they should have been checking their inboxes...

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Tuesday 31st July 2012

Since it's Dreamcast week this week, I decided to play a game on said console right now to make sure it's in full working order, so I popped in Metropolis Street Racer and had a game or two on it, and the Dreamcast was working perfectly fine, thankfully. (Touchwood.)

Me and my brother watched Batman Begins on Blu-Ray, never seen it before, but I've seen The Dark Knight, and Batman Begins was brilliant, in fact I thought this was better, but that's just me, everyone else seems to beg to differ.

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Thursday 2nd August 2012

I finally got the TimeShift demo to work! Although if I wanted to play the game now, every time I do, I have to change my CPU to run on single or dual-core, reset my PC to make the changes, play the game, make the CPU run on all cores again, and reset again, it seems like a lot of hassle for just one game, I'm trying to find a better solution.

I watched a bit of The Dark Knight on Blue_Ray with my brother, but I wanted to go to bed about half-way though, seriously, that film is way too long!

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Friday 3rd August 2012

I was going to see the Dark Knight Rises in theatres today, but me and my brother had a row (that he started, honestly), over a stupid sock, sound ridiculous, right? Well, tell my brother that...

I asked about the TimeShift situation on Yahoo! Answers, and I only got one answer saying that the method I did was the only way to get it to run, but mentions that the game is worth it, I decided that I'd only play it then if there's nothing else to play... then I realised that, that's kind of what happening right now, I want to play something, but don't have a game at my disposal to play, except maybe Stranglehold, but that didn't occur to me at the time, so I decided to set my CPU to dual-core, reset my PC, and played through the demo, and holy sh*t, was it awesome! I might go as far as to say it's one of the best FPSes I've ever played! Seriously! I'm glad that full game has been dispatched, and arrived!

I played a bit of Soldier of Fortune on the Dreamcast, again, to check if it's functioning properly, and it still is!

I found out that Telltale games made a game based on Wallace and Gromit called "Wallace & Gromit: Grand Adventures" and, like most TellTale games, had a compilation of all episodes (Yes, all 4!) on a physical DVD, so I decided to try out the demo of episode 1 before I get the full game(s?), and like all TellTale games, it was brilliant, so I'll be getting it for my birthday!

I've decided to watch the rest of The Dark Knight, and it was just as awesome as the first time I watched it! While I was watching it, I thought I wouldn't make through the rest of the film in one sitting and that very soon I was going to turn it off for another time, but nope, I sat still, and watched it.

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Saturday 4th August 2012

I tried out the demo for Batman: Arkam City for the PC, just to see how it ran because according to both Game Debate and Canyourunit, I don't meet the recommended requirements and wouldn't be able to run the game on high settings, I put all setting on high, and it ran just fine! In fact at some points it goes up to 60fps! Maybe my CPU and RAM make up for the graphics card... ?

I played a bit of Le Mans 24 Hours to check if my Dreamcast was still in full working order, so I did a simple 3 lap race, which lasts about 10 minutes, and it was working perfectly fine the whole way though!

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Sunday 5th August 2012

It's Dreamcast week this week, however, for most of the time, we were just watching the Olympics.

I played a bit of Shenmue II, progressed a tiny bit further, as in I now know what to do and where to go, hopefully I won't forget that, because I don't play it often.

Me and Giancarlo played a few races of Metropolis Street Racer.

Then we played a game of Ready 2 Rumble Boxing, which I surprisingly dominated, only got knocked down once, whereas he got knocked down constantly.

Then me and Steven played Metropolis Street Racer we played a few normal races, then we had a shot at "Pursuit", where within a time limit, one player has to catch up with the other, I was the one running away, and he was to catch me, and I lost...

The we had a few games at the Kart races on Sonic Adventure 2, then a few Sonic/Shadow action stages, then we decided to give the Dreamcast a rest, as it was getting too hot.

As we were playing those game, I mentioned to them, that apparently there exists a Sega of Antarctica, no, you did not misread that, I mean that continent at the bottom of the world that has virtually no population.

There's no website about them, but they are a few articles floating around recently about them addressing a rumour around SA3.
It's probably fake, I mean obviously they wouldn't gain anything from having a division in Antarctica, but I'll probably pretend it's real for a joke.

After the Dreamcast got it's "rest", all 3 of us had a few games of Chu Chu Rocket.

After that, Steven had to leave. Then me and Giancarlo played Virtua Fighter 3 TB.

Then finally, we played Re-Volt, we had 2 races, I won one race, he won the other.

Next week is PS2 week, what games do I have that we play on PS2?... Oh yeah, WWE All Stars!

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!