Playstation Plus

More like Playstation Minus AM I RIGHT???? LOLROLF

Anyway, it seems Sony has finally clued into the fact that there's money to be made by charging for things that used to be free. Why it took those geniuses this long, I'll never know. Perhaps it was because free online was the one thing they could lord over the 360 when they were getting their asses soundly kicked.

Now that things are looking up and a PS3 is actually a console people want to own, it's Nickle & Dime Time^®! So what does your $49.99 per year subscription fee get you? Let's take a peeksee .

Full Game Trial - Play a game for up to an hour free, then buy it to unlock the rest! So this is only going to work with titles on their store...That limits it somewhat. What's available so far? Infamous....That game is like $20 now AND has a demo available. Whoop-de-doo~

Automatic Downloads - Downloads select demos, patches and firmware updates automatically, so you don’t have to think about it. Thank god, all this thinking was hurting my tiny reptile brain. Now my PS3 can brick my system AND download more shit I don't want, all by itself!

PS Store Discounts - Save money on stuff you’re buying anyway with discounts on games of up to 50%. I sure am glad for this 20% savings on Smash Cars and Hamster Ball, which I was totally going to buy anyway! I was also going to shove this roll of duct tape up my nose and fart the alphabet!! In case you can't tell I am being sarcastic.

Exclusive Offers - Access to select avatars, themes, and other items other folks can't get – at least not until long after you’ve been there, done that. So in other words, you get useless crap early that everyone else is going to get anyway if they wait a month.

Select Early Demos - There will be occasions where you will get early access to some demos before all the other common folk. That’s pretty sweet. Sorry, no it's actually not that sweet. Unless it's like GOD OF WAR 4 or some shit, people won't care that much.

Priority Beta Invitations - You’ll be the first to receive invitations on select Betas. This is actually pretty decent. Or it would be if betas were anything more than glorified demos these days. So this one is a little redundant.

So as you can see, you really aren't getting anything worth paying extra for. They said they are still looking at implementing voice chat. But they've been looking at doing that since the fucking console came out. How long does it take, guys?!

I'm no Michael Pachter, but I predict this will sell like the big smelly turd it is. They've made a critical miscalculation here. That being, the reason people pay for x-box live is because they have to. If you didn't need to pay to play your games online, 99% of people wouldn't pay for this extra shit. I know I have said that party chat alone is worth $5 a month to me, and that is true. It's worth it to not have to listen to and constantly mute all these fucking morons. I'd pay $15 if a man would go to their house and physically REMOVE their voicebox.

But for many people that play on live, that's not an issue. They fucking LOVE the fact that they can yap incessantly about their sweet headshot or how many bitches they've fucked, and some people will listen. God damn stupid bastards hurrrgh URGE TO KILL RISING!! Anyway, what was my point again? Oh yeah, Don't do drugs!

WTF Japan? - Metal Wolf Chaos

If you're like me you've probably asked yourself at least once, "What are 2 things that Japan has a huge boner for?" Giant fighting robots and America, of course! I guess it was just a matter of time before someone had the idea to combine them. And this unholy union bestowed upon us Metal Wolf CHAOS!!!!

All the games I've posted so far have been awful, or at least cringe worthy. This is the first entry in this segment that is WTF in a good way. Sadly it's also the only one I couldn't get my hands on a copy to play. I know, I know. I am a huge disappointment. Just ask my parents. But I still couldn't pass up a chance to talk about this amazing game.

Like the plot of any good Harrison Ford movie, this game follows the President of the great United States of America as he pilots a giant fighting robot into space and blows shit up in an effort to defeat his vice president who has staged a coup d'etat. Sound awesome? You have no freaking idea.

This game was made by From Software who brought us great mecha games like Armored Core and Chromehounds. The game looks like a crazier, more fun version of Armored Core. I'm actually very surprised it never got a North American release, as the game includes full english voice acting as well (It's terrible though).

I'm really not sure why Japan is so fascinated by the country that dropped a few nuclear bombs on them half a century ago, but I'm glad it leads to hilarious stuff like this. It's over the top in all the right ways. It doesn't even seem like a parody, these guys really do think the president is an ungodly ass-kicking machine.

But enough talk, check out this video, RRRIIIICHARD!!!

New 360 Impressions

So I decided to bite the bullet and pick up one of the newfangled Xboxes everyone's been talking about. It's not that I'm made of money, or that I have such a raging hard-on for kinect that I need to spend 300 dollars just to make sure it none of it precious cables ever have to see the inside of a wall outlet. (I doubt I'll even buy one.) But I've been needing some more hard drive space for awhile now and Microsoft's insanely overpriced hard drives actually made this a decent deal; with a little help from some trade-in credit of coarse. So for the sake of grassroots journalism and nothing else to write about I thought I'd let you in on some of my impressions of the new hardware.

First off it's quiet. Maybe a little too quiet. I can actually hear my blood pressure rising when I'm play Modern Warfare 2. But despite the quiet fan it's nice to know Microsoft made sure this thing gets as hot as ever. You can practically see the heat rising from the vent in the top. I was thinking about getting a hotplate for my room to keep my nachos warm but problem solved. Thanks Microsoft!

Another feature is the new touch sensitive buttons on the front. I like to know what genius decided pressing in on a button was TOO inconvenient. So when I went to plug something into the USB ports I accidentally turned off my Xbox. Fucking brilliant.
On the plus side, I do have to say switching machines was relatively painless. One thing that's not mentioned much is that you can use portable USB hard drives as well as flash drives to transfer your data. While the transfer speed is too slow to actually store games or dlc there long term, it's perfect for moving all you stuff from one 360 hard drive to another without re-downloading a bunch of crap. I will warn you it's limited to 16GBs of storage like the flash drives, and I had to format the thing to get it to work. But it was a spare I had kicking around, and it saved me from buying a 16gb stick or the 20 dollar, never to be used again, 360 transfer cable.

All in all there's not much else to say about the new system that hasn't been discussed to death everywhere else. Built in Wi-fi is good, extra USB ports are good, and it actually doesn't look that ugly when you see it up close. I will say I was surprised when I unpacked it to notice it only came with standard def composite cables. Luckily I still have my VGA cable from my old system, but how fucking cheap do you have to be. You tout this thing as state of the art HD video and gaming machine and then you don't even throw in the right fucking cables to use it. Even the original 360 came with component cables. So if this is your first Xbox prepare to shell out even more money just to play it in HD.

Anyway, I do like the new 360. Was it worth the money? Probably not, but it's not like I was going to spend it on anything useful. (God, I hope 3rd world countries don't have the internet yet.) So if you plan on getting a new Xbox 360 consider yourself warned informed.

Biggest Disappointment of E3?

Yep. Sad, but true. Now obviously this is completely a matter of opinion, based on some trailers of a game that is still unfinished. So if you happen to disagree, good for you.

Maybe it's my own fault, maybe my expectations were too high. I just expected a little more than what looks like lackluster DLC for Fallout 3. When I heard Obsidian entertainment was involved I thought "Awesome, these guys have made a good game or two." But then when I watched the trailer my smile turned upside down. Into a frown, if you will.

Everything just looks the same as Fallout 3. Granted I enjoyed Fallout 3, but by the time I'd finished the game, I had my fill. I'm ready for something new. I thought they'd be taking the game in a different direction. But nope. Same old hat, only now with casinos! Woooooo! Doesn't even seem like they've addressed any of the issues I had with Fallout 3 in the first place.

HOLY SHIT, you can play BLACKJACK AND SLOTS!!! Jesus chocolate covered christ, I am sure glad I bought a $300 console and $60 software for this privilege.

Most Exciting Trailer of E3

Full title is Dudebro, My Shit is Fucked Up so I Got to Shoot/Slice You: It's Straight Up Dog Time II

From what little I have heard about the game, it looks pretty hilarious. Like the Duke Nukem for this generation, only it might actually get released. This is the sort of game from the 90s I have really missed. A couple guys were joking around and came up with a goofy idea, drew up some funny concept art then decided "What the hell, let's make a game of it!"

Even if it ends up being complete shit, I still really have to support what they are trying to do here.

NINJA EDIT: I just realized how much John Dudebro resembles the tool in the screenshot I posted below. Only difference is one is parody and one is supposed to be serious. Maybe the industry is in worse shape than I thought.

How Not to Sell Your Fucking Game

This. This right here. Nothing makes me want to play the new Medal of Honor less than seeing Scruffy McBeard running to fight terrorists with his cap on backward and sporting his Oakley™ sunglasses, while a helicopter is getting blown up in the background.

Give me a fucking break. Are they trying to give gamers a hero they can relate to? Does he use that neckbeard to blend into the bushes like a ghillie suit? Do all soldiers go into battle looking like complete tools? Is this the age we now live in, where we can't even wait until a war is OVER to start making a mockery of it?

These are the questions that keep me awake at night. Now where did I put my pills..

Best Part of E3?

Put on your 3D glasses!

Remember how I said every cartoon based on video games was fucking awful? I guess somebody decided to pick up the gauntlet and make a video game cartoon so ungodly, so skull-fuckingly shitty that nobody will EVER dare to make another one ever again.

I am already prepared to call it a mission accomplished.

E3 Art Design

While everyone touts games for their graphics, it's really the art design that sets them apart. Now with E3 come and gone, I thought it would be a good time to take a look at some of the best visually designed games the the show had to offer.

Lost in Shadow

Journey

Trine 2

Child of Eden

Kirby's Epic Yarn

WTF Japan? - E3 Edition

I am honestly having a hard time telling if this is some sort of prank, or they really thought it would be a good idea to let these guys get up on stage. I know the language barrier accounts for something, but I'm pretty sure they are still fucking insane in any language.

Doing it Wrong

Last night we were discussing the new Metal Gear trailer shown at E3 this year. Warning it's kind of gross.

I was really stoked because it looks like some awesome ninja sword action, Jaison was less enthused. However we both agreed that it highlights something that's wrong with games today, and maybe has been for a long time.

It's the fact that a lot of developers come up with some new gimmick, then just try to build a game around it. Another example that springs to my mind is Little Big Planet. Here is this really cool set of physics and creation tools that has tons of potential. But somewhere along the line they forgot what actually makes a platformer fun to play.

And of course you can't mention gimmicks without bringing up the Wii. It has some solid titles now, but when it first came out it really seemed like they were thinking "OK, we have this sweet motion control....now what do we actually DO with it?" Most games just consisted of flailing your arms wildly, and in the end a lot of people preferred using the standard controller anyway for games like Zelda. Because it wasn't the gimmick they were there for, it was the gameplay and the story.

Maybe I am actually full of shit (I am), just some food for thought. Mmmm food.

DiRT 2 - Impressions

Call me Mr. Late to the Party Man if you must, but I finally got around to picking up DiRT 2 after waiting many months for it to drop in price. Codemasters games seem to take for-fucking-ever. Anyway here is what I think of the game so far.

The first thing that is apparent is that this game is beautiful. This is the game I'd show my friends to convince them to get a 360 or PS3. Take that, Wii! The effects are amazing and everything runs so smoothly. It really is a treat for your eyes. The menus and loading screens are also really slick as well. Everything is very dynamic and it draws you into the experience, even when you aren't racing.

So how does it play? Well I am pretty sure you know what to expect if you played Dirt 1 or Grid. It's definitely an arcade racer, but it requires a lot more finesse than anything like Burnout. The cars feel powerful and graceful yet fragile, not unlike a racehorse. One missed corner or bump in the road could send you flying into the crowd, ending your race and earning you a one way trip to the glue factory. Luckily you can use the replay feature to rewind and start just before your crash.


Now that you understand the basics, it's that time again where I bitch about a little thing that annoys me. In this game it happens to be the voice-overs. Jesus christ, they are annoying. Codemasters went the extra mile for this game to get (I assume) a bunch of professional rally drivers to play themselves in the game. I'm not sure why they felt the need to sell us on the experience even more. I'm driving cars at crazy speeds around a track, you don't need to keep my attention, guys.

What it really comes off as is a lame attempt to appeal to today's youth, who still pay attention to the X-Games I guess. These guys might be great drivers, but voice actors they are not. They all end up sounding really awkward. It wouldn't be so bad if they were only in the tutorial or something, but OH NO! They talk to you for the entire fucking game.


About everything. When you unlock a new car, or enter a new event they will say "Hey it's me Dave Mirra, the professional rally driver. You just unlocked a new car or entered a new event." Thanks Mr. Mirra, I'd be lost without you. Then at the start of the race they give you helpful advice like "Drive fast to win!" or "Don't run into a tree!" Thanks dipshit. They also talk to you over the radio IN YOUR CAR while you are trying to race! There's no escape from these retards.

Sound annoying? You have no idea. But it gets better. You actually have to BEFRIEND these morons in the game to progress. This game has, I shit you not, a menu called Relationships, where it shows your current relationship status with each driver. If you beat them in a race your status is upgraded to Buddies. What does that mean? I have no idea. But if Travis Pastrami calls me on my day off to help him move furniture I am throwing this god damn game out the window.

Scott Pilgrim THE GAME!!!

I think I am looking forward to this more than any other game shown at E3 this year. A side scrolling beat-em up based on my favorite comic of all time, with some amazing old-school style.

You better believe it's going to rock ultimate.

Some MvC 3 Gameplay

Here are a few videos of gameplay from the new MvC. I don't know if I am sold on the style just yet, but the gameplay looks as crazy as ever.





One thing I don't understand is why they felt the need to switch it to 3 vs 3 in the last MvC. I thought 2 on 2 matches were just long enough to be fun, with 3 characters and all kinds of crazy shit flying everywhere it gets a little hard to take sometimes.

Medal of Duty - Honor Warfare

Oh hey, here's a trailer for the new Call of Du....er I mean Medal of Honor.

I know CoD sells like crack to the children, so I shouldn't be surprised other games are lining up around the block to suck it's dong. But jesus christ in a tiny car, DICE you should be ashamed. I'm seriously considering revoking all the Goodwill Points™ you accrued with Bad Company 2.

Ya Call That a Knife?

Now that the obvious joke is out of the way, let's rap serious for a moment about the place of knives, swords, chainsaws and other sharp objects in online games.

It's easy to blame Call of Duty for popularizing knives as an instant kill in any close combat situation. But I'm sure that, in the beginning at least, their intentions were good. Instead of having people strafe around each other emptying their clips like morons, it provides a quick, decisive means to end any close encounter. It's also a good option to stealthily take out your enemy. In theory, it's a pretty novel idea. In practice, not so much.



The problems with ANY 1 hit kill weapons (knives, sniper rifles, railguns, etc) become immediately apparent when you introduce lag into the equation. It's infuriating to shoot first, only to be insta-killed by some asshole who is hosting the match. This happens with any kind of weapons, but when all it takes is 1 hit, there's much less margin for error.

Many games in the past managed just fine having melee weapons that took multiple hits, and were slow enough that someone shooting at you could actually take you out, even with an inferior connection. Knives do have their place. It's their implementation that these developers seem to be royally screwing up.


Gears of War and Call of Duty are the two worst offenders here. I've had matches in both where I did much better just running around being a dick and exploiting the horribly broken melee kills. Gears at least tried to balance it by adding chainsaw duels, even if they failed horribly. Modern Warfare 2 decided to void their bowels and just shit the bed completely, with ways to increase the speed AND range of your knife.

Some games like Uncharted 2 actually have a decent melee system, where it's not entirely connection dependent. But those seem to be much fewer and far between. For now I guess it's something we'll put up with until it dies out like hypercolor shirts, those Wazzzup commercials, and every other retarded fad.

Games I Like - Lunar : Silver Star Story

I don't need to tell you this is a great game. If any of your friends are RPG nerds, I'm sure they've tried to cram it down your throat already. Lunar is just one of those games that is great for so many reasons. I first played it on the Sega CD, but never got very far in it.

As with many people, my real experience is with the PS1 version. We all know the PS1 had a metric fuck-ton of great RPGs, but this has got to be my absolute favorite, for a few good reasons.

First of all, the presentation is incredible. This is something I miss sorely about Working Designs. It had a hardcover manual, soundtrack, bonus CD, cloth map and probably a few other things. It was so freaking cool. Games today are all about the limited edition and preorder shit, but this was all stuff that added to the overall package and was great to own.

Next were the graphics. The in-game graphics were very simplistic and stylized, they had a ton of old-school charm to them. Despite being tiny, the characters had personality. And of course let's not forget the cutscenes! Those blew me the fuck away at that time. Beautiful animated cutscenes. Don't give me any of this pre-rendered or in-game engine crap. Hand-drawn all the way! It worked really well, and got you a lot more involved in the story. You'd want to keep playing just to see the next one.

The voice acting in-game and in the cutscenes was pretty bad. Jesus Christ, Nall's voice makes you want to stick a pen in your ear. But despite that, it's still endearing in a goofy sort of way. They were trying so hard!

But perhaps what many people (myself included) enjoy most of all is the story. At it's core it is pretty cliche. Boy wants to become a dragon master, girl is kidnapped, evil sorcerer, yadda yadda. It's ok though, these concepts work. The last thing we need are more games like the later FF games that get so far up their own ass they are finding coal nuggets. The characters in Lunar are all funny and well written. I attribute most of this to the fact that they didn't just translate the script word for word from the Japanese version.

Maybe that's a rant for another day, but Working Designs did some fantastic localization. Sticking to the spirit of the story while adding in some humor and references that appeal to your target audience is very tough to do right. But somehow they pulled it off.

It all comes together to produce an RPG with a very distinct old-school Swords n' Sorcery feel that I love, while managing to have enough personality to stand on it's own. They also released the sequel on PS1, but I didn't really enjoy it as much.

The original has received a remake on PSP with entirely redone graphics, including re-recorded dialog and some gorgeous background art. It sticks closer to the original script though, and maybe for that reason it just lacks that spark that made the original so endearing.

Stop Motion Mario

Classy

Dr. Pepper you are dead to me

So apparently Dr. Pepper is running some sort of promotion in connection with Iron Man 2 where you get a code under the cap of each bottle, which you enter on their website to get free x-box live stuff.

Normally I wouldn't give two corn filled craps, but some of the prizes you can win are custom camo and costumes for Bad Company 2. Do want! So the other night I was buying a drink at a local corner store and decided to give it a try. Well here's where the turd train left shit station.


First you have to sign up on their stupid website and create an account. Fine, whatever. But you need to make sure you go to the CANADIAN website, if you are in fact living in Canada. I made an account on the USA website by mistake and my code didn't work. Annoying! Anyway, then you have to enter this long code from under the cap and TA-DA!! It tells you that you have, in fact, won a prize. Ready to claim it now? Well hold your gosh-darned horses there Mr. Impatient!! We can't just have people grabbing prizes all over the place that would be COMPLETE AND UTTER CHAOS!

Ohhh no, you get ANOTHER long-ass code which you have to take to the x-box live website, sign in and enter it. It took me a good 15 minutes to find out that all I won was a premium theme. But I thought, free is free right? After all this shit is PREMIUM. It says so right there. It also says it's "Iron Man 2 Dr. Pepper theme". Cool, I bet it has some shots of Iron Man flying around fighting commies and doing crazy things. Well....here's basically what it looked like.


A bunch of cans of fucking soda. Only one of which even has Iron Man's face on it. That's the main theme, the little pictures that appear behind your friends' avatars on your friend list look something like this.

Each of your friends is standing in front of a giant can of Refreshing Dr. Pepper® While Iron man flies by in the background gripping a bottle.

So let's get this straight, I bought your damn pop, jumped through your hoops and wasted 15 minutes of my life for the privilege of turning my 360 desktop into a giant advertisement. Now I just wasted 15 more bitching about it on the internet. Thanks a lot Dr. Pepper, you crap snacking fuck fencing shit stove.

Call of Duty: Money Whorefare 2

Like that title? So edgy it hurts.


Anyway see what happens when you set a precident, people? First everyone cried "Fifteen dollars for a map pack that is OUTRAGEOUS A BLOO BLOO!!" Then as soon as it came out you all ran and bought it like good little robots. I am ashamed of all of you, and especially you Jaison.

Because now instead of actually fixing their game they just shat another big fat turd right into our waiting mouths and everyone is going to gobble it up. "Only 15 dollars? Yes I will have some more, OM NOM NOM"

Despite feigning all this impotent nerd rage, it doesn't really bother me much. What does actually bother me a bit is this trailer.



Specifically the part where Bowling says something to the effect of "Remember those lame, unbalanced parts of our old maps? Well we fixed them now that we're re-selling them to you!" So obviously they were aware of the problems. Then why didn't you fix them the first time around you chode!

Next time release a map pack that causes anyone who equips a tac knife to explode into a shower of dongs, then maybe I'll buy it.

Split/Second Review

Ok, normally I wait until I have beaten a game to talk about it. But being a racing game, it's not like there is a massive plot twist or something to uncover. You drive cars the end. The story isn't what we are here for anyway. It's all about the gameplay. So how is it? Fabulous.

I hummed and hawwed over whether to get this or Blur for a while. I've had a boner for Split/Second since I played the demo. But a lot of people were complaining that the crazy explosions and setpieces would get old, and the full game doesn't really offer more than the demo.


All I can say is those people obviously never played the full game, and are retarded. You know something that never gets old? Dropping a fucking bridge on someone. Or landing a plane on them. Or swinging a giant wrecking ball and crushing them. It is totally satisfying on a primal level. Man has yearned to blow up his fellow man while driving fast in cars since the dawn of time.

I was caught a little off guard at first. The gameplay here is much more GRID than Burnout. You don't get very far ramming your opponents, you are much better off drafting them, then drifting to gain some power. Then when the time is right you activate your trap card!



There are a bunch of other modes too. My favorites are the one where you drive the track while a freaking HELICOPTER shoots MISSILES at you, and the one where you have to try and pass these big rigs that are dropping explosive barrels all over the track. It really gets your pulse racing, the beautiful graphics and effects do a lot to really drive the experience home.

There are other neat touches like how each achievement you earn shows up as a decal on your car. So by the time you get a bunch, your car is all blinged out like a real race car. For online, your car number is reflected by your worldwide ranking, which I thought was cool. It also has SPLIT-SCREEN!! Thank GOD developers pulled their heads out of their asses and realized it's morally wrong to make a racing game without split screen.


So that's my praise. Do I have complaints? Of course I do, I'm from Nova Scotia. I could complain a dog off a meat wagon. It would be our provincial sport if ours wasn't already Bingo. But all is forgiven when you are driving up the deck of a sinking aircraft carrier, dodging the planes while they slide off. Then you drift around a corner while a chopper is SHOOTING MISSILES at your ass and a truck is DROPPING BOMBS and shit is blowing up EVERYWHERE!!! Hurrrghh. My pants are getting tight just thinking about it.

Piss Off Your Friends

Graphic Design Nerd:





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