Wrestlevania

Could we not make this into a "dirty laundry" thread? I know I already responded in kind, but reading others sequentially justifying what they do or don't give to charity is making me feel uncomfortable. Mainly because I don't like the idea that other Thumbs may now somehow feel obliged to do likewise.

You're not making sense.

The only substantiated criticisms I've heard levelled at RE4: Wii Edition are: Having to have a reticle on-screen, which removes a lot of the extra fun you would get from aiming with the Wiimote alone. Not being able to move and fire at the same time. I certainly don't put any gravity behind the second complaint. But the first one makes a lot of sense and seems to be unnecessary hand-holding on the part of Capcom. Doesn't really give the player much credit to be honest—especially when you consider how intuitive the (new?) 'thump' feedback for lining up a headshot reportedly is. Maybe they'll fix (i.e. remove) this in the forth-coming "on rails" RE shooter for Wii.

Granted, that improves the statistical likelihood of less shovelware. But that's only with the benefit of assumption... and blind hope. We need to hear about specific franchises/IPs being given a solid, meaningful entry in their series. Not some trashy party game tie-in, outsourced to Bolivia.

Definitely. It's a lot more fucking interesting than your established protaganist stereotypes, although it'll likely be engrained in the canon very shortly at this rate. I'm certainly looking forward to GTA4 for it's characters and story.

I want to see SEGA annoucing stuff like Condemned 2 and The Club for Wii. Not necessarily those titles, but that kind of title - i.e. pretty hardcore, mature games. Capcom releasing something like Lost Planet, too, would also be an extremely important step forward. We need a major publisher to start driving Wii development in this way, with "proper" AAA games. People still aren't taking it seriously at the moment and it's depressing. It also has me worried that Wii may fizzle out once there are no more PS2 games to shuffle over. This "PS2+PSP+Wii" shovelware mentality is fucking abominable.

It's certainly encouraging to see a more wider range of game types being embraced by XBLA. I'm still holding out hope that someone brings BattleTech to the virtual board game mix--I loved that game.

Nintendo say they actively want indie developers creating content, so it's simply down to whatever people want to make. And if this doesn't all-but-guarantee the new Sam & Max episodes coming to Wii, I'll loose what little faith I have left in the games industry. I'm certainly a lot more interested in picking up a Wii now. But I think I'll wait to see the calibre of what Nintendo decide to distribute via WiiWare first. Why's it called Wii Software outside of the US though? That's rubbish. WiiWare is much more catchy and surely not already trademarked?

N'gai Croal kicks ass. He's probably my most favourite "serious" games journalist at the moment. Going to sit down and read this edition of the Versus series properly sometime this week.

We don't give on a regular basis, like via bank transfer or anything. But we've adapted our habits to incorporate charitable organisations for everyday things where possible. For example: we use Oxfam's '118' telephone directory service whenever we want to find out a number, instead of using the Internet or the phone book. Otherwise we donate for the televised stuff directly, and my wife likes doing the "phone vote = donation" thing on reality TV too. We also help with the charity drive for our local groups, mainly the education-focussed ones.

LOLcat much?

"Calm down, dear!" This happens in the advertising industry at least once a month.

Correction: 'closed' hardware is where it's at. As much as I love PC gaming, I bought a console because I'm sick of the hardware rat race. There's nothing innovative about bullying people to buy more-powerful hardware every 6 months - write better code!

Consider yourselves lucky. I only ever see over-confident prick Alpha males, who're probably just doing it so they can legitimately harass cute girls.

I sense a cunning ploy to have me embarass myself, by releaving just how shit my computer really is.

Best replenish my stock of fuck off then...

Not really disproving my argument here... Don't get me wrong, I really wanted to enjoy this game. But the hardware requirements were too inhibitive to actually make it enjoyable for me. I'm certainly envious of others who're having a great time in the game though.

Chuggers (n) : a concatenation of the words "charity" and "mugger"; used to describe the faux pious, mock-jovial fucks who stalk city centres with clipboards and a thoroughly despicable "Hello, best mate!" manner. I hate those fuckers; every bastard time I leave the office to go find some lunch I'm assailed by at least 3 of the nosey cunts: "Hello, what have you got in your bag then?!" "A multipack of 'fuck off' - would you like one?"

BF2142 ran like absolute shit on my machine. I don't care how old my computer is; that software is fundamentally badly designed. So make sure you've got a beast of a computer before you even think of buying--it's incredibly intensive. I'm just in the process of mailing it to a friend so he can play instead actually.

Quickly, to The Bay!

Welcome and welcome! We get a bit passionate around these 'ere parts, but our bark is worse than our bite. Usually...

Go, B3TArds! That's brilliant.

It was an engine, mate. And for anyone who was even remotely curious about it; the mobile version looks great, but plays like shit.

Could I just mention that I'm quite fond of coloured string? OK, thanks.

I'm trying to locally source an Xbox copy of Ninja Gaiden Black (it's convoluted and involves a credit note), but just keep turning up the original Ninja Gaiden release instead. I've noticed that Ninja Gaiden and it's Black sequel are both on the official Xbox 360 BC list. I'm also aware that the Black content was released as a free DLC update to original Ninja Gaiden owners. So, does anyone know if it's possible for an Xbox game, running through 360 BC, to download past content updates from previous-generation Xbox LIVE?