Aussie Ben

Free Radical http://www.frd.co.uk/poll.php Has a Game Ever Made You Cry? Yes. But then I cried at the end of 'L.A Story' when Steve Martin is talking to the road sign. (20%) No. But in fairness, I have to beat homeless people to death with a hammer to feel any emotion at all. (47%) Almost. I got a lump in my throat, but it turned out to be a cyst. (33%)

I haven't seen either of them because they both sounded terrible, not to mention that The Island was not only awful, but apparently a ripoff of some B-Movie that got roasted on MST3K. I originally dreaded the whole "Transformers: by Michael Bay" thing. After seeing the movie, this was not a problem for me. But I still laugh at that Pearl Harbour Love Ballad song from Team America. Does that help?

Rodi, your side note is CRAZY TALK! I saw it on Saturday and loved it, and then again last night with five of my friends. Only two of them had not seen it previously.

Following Yufster's in-depth set of rules and stuff, here I go: (One of my) Favourite game(s): Tetrisphere One of the official Tetris variants made for the Nintendo 64, I really liked this one. Basically, you have assorted familiar Tetris pieces on a sphere, and you have to clear tetrads to get to the centre of the sphere. Tasks are varying - sometimes you'll need to clear the bricks around a tower, sometimes you'll need to find hidden pictures on the sphere, sometimes you'll need to find pieces of the picture and then construct them. It was one of those games that was really great fun to play, I found. Least Favourite game: Chrono Trigger I've tried and tried and tried multiple times, but I simply cannot get into Square games. At all. I really don't understand the massive, obsessive frightening fangasms had over what is basically a very crude story with repetitive menu selections and making numbers go higher. I really did try with Chrono Trigger, but it was more of the same dull repetitive stuff to me. I'll take Terranigma or Illusion of Gaia over a SNES Square game any day, thanks. The baffling thing about all this is that I can play Pokemon without any trouble. Maybe it's because it's designed for really young kids? (I don't mind if that's what it is.) Least favourite mum: your mum's

Yes, but you said that, and then posted an image of Waluigi, who first debuted in Mario Tennis (not to be confused with Mario's Tennis for Virtual Boy or Mario Tennis for Game Boy Color). Ergo, your subconscious betrays you by revealing your secret, raw, hot, emotional love for Mario Tennis over Grim Fandango. My logic is irrefutable. Maybe

Grim Fandango had a great story, but controlling Manny was like trying to steer a dump truck. Also, you couldn't even combine objects together. Seriously, what. As a story? As a game? I have spoken. Or something. Oh wait I didn't write down a game. Star Control II. I didn't like it myself, but I certainly appreciated the incredible detail and depth that the game had. It was pretty hard not to be humbled by the damn thing.

Was going to make a comment about how really, at it's core, Twilight Princess is just a nicer looking Ocarina of Time, but then I remembered that we've all covered this already so instead of retyping the same tired argument I'll write something different. I wonder what criteria Edge used to choose the most popular game? What sets it out from other games? Ocarina has a nice story, but in the end it's pretty basic. The Z-Targeting was groundbreaking, that's for sure. But there are other games with more entertaining gameplay that didn't completely revolutionise a control system. Theme Park, Prince of Persia (the original one), Flashback, these are just a few. But yeah, as someone already said - it's all objective. There's no definitive "best game ever".

I finally bred that Hypno, so now I've got myself a Drowzee. We should totally hook up again. I think I've caught about 430 Pokemon... I'm positive I've caught all of the ones that are new to Diamond/Pearl. And this time I'll remember that I can actually talk.

Alley Cat will probably still run on your newest PC - the programmer, Bill Williams, was a bit of a prodigy, and future proofed the game so that it would check your CPU's clock speed and adjust itself accordingly. Pretty damn brilliant. Not to mention that the game itself STILL holds up gameplay-wise, even now.

Seeing as the original, good Sonic games were about the essence of speed, and RPGs seem to be about the repetitive stat grinding required to see the next nicely rendered CG movie that looks nothing like the game itself, it will be nice to watch this game Hindenburg.

What, not even game over? That blows, what's the damn point of putting the time limit there? *sigh* Oh well, I suppose it is pretty hard already. =)

Yeah, I've been playing through it - this game is seriously awesome. Nice to see that they didn't dumb down the difficulty for it. I initially thought that for the regular game, the time limit wasn't going to be there. But man, it's getting so hard now! You have to set off a switch two screens away, go into the next room where there's another switch to activate (to exit the room), then quickly navigate through the blades, go through the first door that's closing, and finally exit through the second closing door. That is TOUGH. And yeah, like others have said, the game is actually more fluid now. You don't have to turn the Prince around the right way to grab a ledge above him. You can also do things much more quickly thanks to stuff like the wall jump and the backflip. The wall jump, in particular, lets you reach a wall and grab a ledge behind you in one smooth motion - which is quite handy when the clock is ticking. But yeah, I wish those blades were as gruesome as they were in the original:

I was going to get it - I was rather interested in getting it, and then I found out it wasn't coming out for the Xbox 360. So I think I'll pass. I never played the original Tomb Raider and I would have liked to play it. But not that much.

Yeah, I've been playing this since I got it on Friday. Quality stuff. My favourite, as I knew it would be, is the cover of Monkey Magic - yes, the TV show theme song. I'm finally getting some A Ranks too, which is a big big achievement for me. My vast improvement this weekend even meant that I went back to EBA and beat some of the songs I was stuck on, and unlocked ABC. (It's like Baby's Day Out, but with a cat!) I also like the Teen Wolf parody (it even says "Wolf" on his shirt, like it's his college sports team). Oh, and that Pop Star song is good too, where you're a doctor that has to fix things like an old man's hair, a horse, and a microwave. It's interesting that Inis seems to have taken the bits they liked from EBA and applied them to Ouendan 2. (Check out the final scenario, you'll see what I mean.) Oh, there is one new thing I've noticed - after you've finished the level more than once, you can skip past the outro once you've finished the level to get to your score. A great addition, this makes it even easier for players to keep trying to improve their scores.

Note to self: Remember that when you're online, the DS ACTUALLY HAS A MICROPHONE THAT ENABLES YOU TO TALK TO PEOPLE. Don't just listen to other people thinking "Wow, it would be great if I could talk back!"

Okay, I can tell you the specific area, if you like:

You *can* play games with the GameCube Controller, but you can't reconfigure the buttons in nearly all cases, thus making it completely useless. I have one of those Hori SNES-style GameCube pads, and I was planning to use it for the Wii. Forget it. The buttons are all mapped wrong, it's like trying to drive a car using only your tongue.

My friend and I have been giggling immaturely at making an army of Jynx (you all remember Jynx, don't you), sending them all across the world called "Your Mom". Hee hee! Oh Pokemon, it's good to be back. Also: THE FUTURE IS NOW - I finally managed to trade some Pokemon with Moos. Hooray for technology! And fluctuating time zones!

zozole - I'll give you a gentle nudge in the right direction for that bit, if you like: Hope that's vague but helpful enough. And the puzzle mentioned in the review is still valid to me - that old trick still works on my car, bless it.

Nice beret. =) Oh! Also, when you mate Pokemon, the offspring goes back to the lowest initial evolutionary form. So you'd get all the joy of seeing your cute turtle baby turn into a TREE CONTINENT MONSTER.

Gender was introduced in Gold/Silver. Basically, nearly all Pokemon are assigned a gender, meaning that you can breed 'em. This will come in handy later if you want to trade a Pokemon you have but don't have a second one of it - you can breed a second one and trade the baby. The general rule of thumb for breeding is that if the pair will mate, the offspring will be the same as the female of the pair. So if you have a male Pikachu and a female Geodude mating (this may be completely impossible, I don't know), the resulting baby would be a Geodude, not a Pikachu. It's more in-depth than that, but that's the basics. I was tricky with my Pokemon. I bought two copies of the game because my friend at work wanted a copy too. So, I bought them both for us, used his copy to farm the starters over to mine, and then gave him his copy. I did (of course!) ask if this was okay before I did it. The response I got was basically 'fire away'. I can certainly help you out with Pokemon you're missing - also, the Global Trade System helps loads, but unfortunately there's a lot of idiots out there asking for "LEVEL 100 INFERNAPE TO TRADE FOR LEVEL 2 MAGIKARP" and there's no way to filter shit like that out. But it can help you get what you need. Oh yes, this is exactly what I'm talking about in the second last panel.

After purchasing Pearl, I found out that all the cool kids were playing Diamond. Diamond seems to be more popular because it doesn't have a pink-themed cover. Thusly, if you buy Pearl, it should be easier for you to get the Pokemon you don't have on your version, because there's a larger amount of Diamonds out there compared to Pearls. I called my Rival Odlaw!

You could certainly talk about the game's website in this thread. Nice to see that the musicians from Killer 7, Contact, God Hand, Devil May Cry, Meteos and loads more are on the scene. If nothing else, sounds like the music will be good!

Miffy, I'd gladly swap it for Super Paper Mario. Or even, I don't know, the knowledge that Super Paper Mario is even going to exist locally. And don't laugh - Kirby and the Amazing Mirror never came out in Australia even though it was rated locally.

They don't call them the "final boss" because you can poke them with a feather duster and they die, you know. Why on earth would the last boss in the game be easy? It's meant to be an accomplishment, an achievement, a feat! When you finally manage to defeat that sucker, your heart's pumping and you are secure in the knowledge that you've saved the kingdom and restored peace. You don't get that kind of shit handed to you on a plate.