miffy495

Gave it more of a proper go last night. Really cool stuff going on there. Flying around through the higher reaches of a garden is insanely fun given how simple it is. This one is now a definite must-buy for me when it comes out.

So after much hemming and hawing and almost picking it up on Friday, I came into work today and Blast Works was $25. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that we've sold one copy in over a month. Whatever. It's now mine. I've played through "Campaign 1" now (about 20 minutes...) and here are some impressions. Firstly, YAY! This is actually a really fun game. Controls are tight, building up a giant wall of death is intuitive and fun. All works well. Second, (at least on Rookie level) it's incredibly easy. I was given so many extra lives I thought that the "you got a life!" noise was part of the background music. Didn't end up needing a single one until I got to the boss of the third level. Dying on the third level of easy mode isn't what I'd normally associate with a cake-walk, but for a traditionally styled shmup this is like getting to the boss of a shooter without being hit by a single bullet. For my standard shmup skill level, anyway. Third, major props for including some of Kenta Cho's other games on the disc. Haven't unlocked them yet, but knowing that the original Tumiki Fighters, Torus Trooper, and Gunroar is awesome. Love those games. Overall, this game definitely seems it would be worth your time and money if you can find it budget priced. To think that the cheap box art would have kept me away forever had I not read into the story behind it. I'm going back to play some more soon, and may try my hand at the editor as well. Whee! EDIT: Holy crap, the boss of Campaign 4, coupled with the massive engine of death I had going, crashed my Wii. One thing I started noticing as the bosses got more elaborate and my fighter did as well is that the system does start to chug a little bit. Never in any really bad way, but noticeable. Once the ship started taking hits and losing parts and got down to a reasonable size again, game goes back to super-smooth. Honestly, if I weren't scared that the summer heat (it's like 35 in this room right now...) combined with the performance demands may hurt my Wii, I'd be right back in there playing as I type this. Super fun game. Actually enjoying it far more than Mario Kart, and sorta wishing I'd bought it first.

Fl0w is awesome. As was Eden. Really trippy little bugger. I only got to play for 10 minutes or so, but will be going back to it again soon. I do recommend giving it a shot for those who are able. Stagg, a word of advice. One of the main uniting factors of the Thumb is a shared love of these weird and ridiculous games. If you take nothing else from your visits here, (and may they be plentiful) I do hope that you develop a taste for some of these. That said, always good to have a new face join the ranks. Hope I'm not being too discouraging here, and I may be reading more into what you said than was actually there. Anyway, welcome aboard and all.

Unfortunately, my device being an iPod touch and not an iPhone, I'm lacking in GPS functionality so I don't get to try those games out...

I remember reading some reviews for Dark Sector and being quite intrigued. I'm really not experiencing a dearth of things to play right now, but I'll definitely keep it in mind for the next time a drought hits, much like I did with The Darkness. It did look like a nice bit of fun. It never really hits me how much easier games have gotten until I try playing something I used to be really good at on Virtual Console or the like. Compared to modern experiences (Ninja Gaiden and its contemporaries excluded) they're just so brutally difficult. That said, in a lot of cases the penalty for failure was less drastic as well. Start again 30 seconds ago with maybe a powerup gone, for example. (R-Type III, anyone?) For me it's most obvious in things like RTSes. Even ones from less than, or barely, a decade ago like Starcraft, Emperor: Battle for Dune, or C&C Red Alert seem ridiculously hard compared to more recent things like Dawn of War, C&C 3, or Warcraft III.

Big, dumb, strong men with large guns?

Pending what?

I was on the fence about Dead Head Fred. Seems like one of those "such a good idea, if only they'd made a good game around it" situations. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but need some convincing. What's the good word?

Right. I keep forgetting there was a PSP version as well. Been playing it on PS3, and yes, it is very good. Give it a go.

Have yet to play Crisis Core, but at work two days ago we got a memo from head office telling us to drop the prices of Daxter, Ratchet & Clank, SOCOM Fireteam Bravo (both games), and Killzone down to $10 immediately. I picked up Daxter and Ratchet on my way home because I'd been meaning to for a while anyway, and Killzone just for the hell of it. Ratchet simply is a Ratchet and Clank game. No compromises were made, and you can make of that what you will. I say this because the game is actually hindered a bit by the fact that they gave you all of the moves from a dual-analogue game on a single-analogue console. Move with the analogue stick, strafe with the d-pad, rotate the camera with the shoulder buttons. If you want to crouch, press both shoulder buttons. It can get to be a bit much, and the strafing really takes a lot of getting used to. Pity since it came in so handy on the PS2/3 versions of the game, which I loved. Still, the game is just as good, control compromises aside, and I'm having quite a bit of fun with it. Daxter I bought not so much because of familiarity with the series (Uncharted was the first Naughty Dog game I ever played) but because I remembered so much of the buzz when it came out about how this was the game that would prove the PSP to be a worthy console. It's good. Same camera issues as Ratchet, and insta-death water always irritates me (especially when you fall in because of an unavoidable attack combo animation... ) but I would recommend it as platformers of the traditional, non-gun-focused variety are few and far between lately, good ones even more so. Killzone has surprised me. I remembered buying an issue of PSM back in the day which had the GHII demo on it and also a demo disk for Killzone. Gave it a try then, because why the hell not? It was free, right? I quite enjoyed the demo but couldn't see myself spending full retail on it, so I forgot about it until changing the price stickers on it Monday morning. Figured that for $10 it's kinda hard to go wrong and went for it. Really, really good. The shooting is surprisingly elegant and uses a combination of the older Metal Gear style and even a bit of stop n' pop which surprised me as this game predated Gears by several months. Controls are fluid and intuitive, (with the exception of double-tap L for an evasive roll) the game performs well, and looks really good too. A really solid choice and a pleasant surprise. Other things to pick up if you haven't are (highest recommended have a (!)): Crush Every Extend Extra Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (!) GTA: both Liberty and Vice City Stories God Of War: Chains of Olympus (!) Patapon (!)

Holy crap! I don't know how many of you remember Rhythm Tengoku for the GBA, but as a Japan-only rhythm game made by the Warioware team, it caught my attention right away when it came out in 2006. I imported it right away and it became one of my favorite games of that year. Crazy addictive and very fun. And now it gets a sequel. Hells. Yes. :woohoo: :woohoo:

So... awesome... When is this out again?

Hayter also scripted the first two X-Men movies. I remember those very fondly for comic book adaptations. I can see him doing quite a good job.

Holy crap I got it!

The combine Citadel eating City 17? ...I've been replaying HL2 recently...

Oui, mais comment pourrait un nouveaux membre de les thumbs connait a trouver le reponse? Je pense que c'est un peu trop difficile pour quand ils devenissent membres. (Je m'excuse, mais je ne sais pas comment a ajouter les accents avec mon ordinateur) Apologies if my French is kinda bad. It's been a couple of years since I've actually had to use it. Is it being used to mess with bots or something?

Knowing the community I'm talking to, I figure I'm not the only one here with a shiny little tilt-sensitive gizmo from apple. Mine happens to be an iPod touch, as I can't afford an iPhone, but with an update it's able to play all the games that the iPhone can play. This led me to pick up Super Monkey ball for it about 10 minutes ago. It's currently "backing up" my ipod with the latest drivers, whatever that means, but very shortly I should be able to play Monkey Ball on my mp3 player, which is awesome. I'll be giving it a shot on my way to work tomorrow. I was just wondering if anyone else had tried it out yet and what they thought? If I recall correctly, Yufster has an iPhone, so there should be at least one other person who could have played it...

Well, at least a lot of people want to know... So trying to play it on the bus today was a total mistake. Note to self: Don't try to play a motion controlled game while sitting on a large moving object. Nevertheless, I will give the ipod credit for having the first screen that I didn't have any trouble seeing in direct sunlight while trying to play a game. Kudos to Apple for that. As for the game, I've now been through the first 10 stages twice. Impressions? The : -Graphics. Oh my god this game is beautiful. I've never been so impressed with the output of a handheld machine. I heard that a Sega rep called the iPhone as graphically capable as a Dreamcast and I believe it. Granted, they had to do a bit of 2.5D with it, as AiAi, MiMi, GonGon, and Baby are all sprites rolling around true 3D mazes, but the mazes are so lush and colourful that I don't care. Of course, I can only speak for the early levels at this point, but all seems quite promising. -Controls. Yeah, controls. Ok, so I'll admit they're a bit frustrating at first. Perhaps a bit touchier than the Wii version of the game, but dammit, they work. I'm quite impressed by how intuitive and functional the game is given how badly they could have fucked it up. -Audio. It's Monkey Ball Audio. I don't think they've changed the laugh that the monkeys have since the first one. The music is also very much in the same style. If you liked it before, you will now. I did, and I do. The : -Controls. Yes, here we are again. I'd love for the game to sense how you're tilted at the start of a level and use that as your dead zone. As is, there were several times when I got a fall-out right off the start of a level because I'd been holding the iPod at an angle and AiAi just ran right the fuck off the screen before I realized the level had started. You need to be really careful at the start of a level so you don't get hosed. Once you get into the flow, see the section. -Screen. More my own fault than anything else, but having to tap the screen and getting fingerprints all over it in order to play a game that requires you pay rapt attention to it seems odd. I end up staring at my index finger's mark when I should be guiding a monkey. So that's what I've got so far. Overall, it's Monkey Ball. It's a faithful, fully functioning adaptation of a game I've enjoyed for about 7 years now. I'm very impressed with how the system can handle itself here. I'll have to find a table sometime on my lunch hour tomorrow to get some more playtime in.

Whatever. They invented star power, I don't feel bad using the term for this. If the term hadn't been taken from them, it'd probably still officially be star power now anyway.

BWAH HA HA! Got it! Take that, Snow ((Hey Oh))! Second attempt, after getting warmed up with the entire Who pack (a great way to wash the taste of GH: Aerosmith out of my mouth, by the way) not only did I beat it, but I got 4 and 2/3 stars! Had full star power for the last third of the song too, but was saving it in case it got brutal again. It didn't, so next time I should actually be able to easily 5 star the damn thing, or at least get really close. I had a full bar when I went over at least 4 star power sequences, so I should be able to get a bunch of double-score time in. Made it through all of the brutal parts without activating star power once, very happy with myself on that one. Final score: 186,258. Whoo! On another note, is it weird that, excited as I am about all the awesome in RB2's set list (holy crap! Bob Dylan! And my girlfriend squealed with glee when she saw Bikini Kill on there...) the one that stands out the most to me is Lump by the Presidents of the United States of America. Just sort of a "holy hell, I loved that song in high school!" thing, I guess. And now, to bed. I gotta be at work in 7 hours...

Oh my god that was fantastic.

Silicon Knights are also the guys who did the MGS GCN version... As for PD:0 I thought it was ok, but could never be bothered to finish it. Gears I did finish, but not until yesterday and I got it at launch. Both are good, but I don't think either was spectacular. I can't see hating either myself, but I can easily understand being unimpressed. I'll try the demo once I can get an internet connection for more than a few minutes at a time. Having a bit of a hard time of it right now.

Continuing my recent trend of thread resurrection: Wow, only 5 months later and I'm struck with a sudden urge to play this game again. This time I actually finished the fucker. Goddamn General RAAM was a pain in the ass. Took me a good 45 minutes of repeated trying to down the bastard. First time I've ever thrown a controller in my life. Of course, I threw it at my bed to minimize damage, but still. My beating him was totally a fluke too. I'd gotten in all but my last shot and was charging up my torque bow to dislodge his shield again. At the second I fire, he sends the krill after me anyway. The bolt connects and a few seconds later explodes and kills him while I'm frantically pulling out my sniper rifle because I realize his shield is down. Overall, I'll still remember the game well despite the crazily unbalanced boss fight. Everything else I was really happy with. Very brown game, of course, but that can be said about so much. I'll definitely say I'm psyched for the sequel now, and can't wait to get my hands on it. Maybe I'll even beat it in under a year and a half when I get it.

WHOO! It's been a long time since last I made an attempt at career mode, mostly playing band quick play with friends for the past couple of months, but tonight I figured I may have improved enough to go back in and have a shot at the song which had had me so stymied those months ago. This song was The Hand That Feeds. Kicked its ass. Then the next two tiers as well. Would have gone further too, but my 360 chose the middle of When You Were Young to have a tantrum and crash. I booted it up again to make sure it had only frozen, not RRoD'd on me, and then shut it down figuring it was a sign to give the system a break lest I have to send it back to Redmond. Still, Woo! Feeling much more accomplished as a drummer. More career tomorrow, methinks... And no, I haven't tried Snow again yet. Tonight was all about the skins. Might give it another shot in a day or two.

I'm totally getting that drum kit. Next payday, my preorder will go up. Crap that thing is awesome. I hope I'll be able to buy the new guitar separately as well though. That thing looks really snazzy and my current strat has bitten the dust. Haven't downloaded Snow. It's that good? May do it tonight. EDIT: Oh my god you bastard. Failed at 60% on my first try. Haven't done a second yet. This is definitely one I'll need to work at repairing the strat before I have another go. Trying this with the GHIII controller was murder.