Posts tagged my week in gaming

I’ve been playing portal 2 this week! So yer I didn’t post last week because I didn’t play anything so it would have been pointless. We’re coming to the summer lull so I’m guessing I either have to buy more games or play more old ones. This week, however, I’ve only been playing portal 2 so that’s what I’ll be talking about this week. I’ll try to keep it spoiler free as possible but I can’t make any promises so you have been warned.

So I loved the first portal, I played it through on the ps3 orange box (the only orange box game I’ve actually finished). Then later I got it on the pc free, when valve gave it away with steam for mac. I realised just how superior the pc version is and played it through countless of times. I bought portal 2 on the ps3, but I get a free pc copy so I’m sure I’ll play through it again on pc (because PSN only came online again today I’ve only just downloaded the pc version) So anyway let’s talk about portal 2. If I could sum it up in a word I’d say “amazing!”. It’s taken everything I loved about portal 2 and amped it up. I love the story, steven merchant does a great job as the loveable, but stupid, Wheatley. As with the first game glados is a prominent character in the game and the part where she is trapped in a potato is a particularly hilarious moment. It’s not just the story that produces a lot of laughs in portal 2, there are some really funny visual gags. Like when your in the depths of aperture and you open I giant vault door, only to reveal a brick wall with a normal sized door in the corner. Theres also a lot of nods to the first game (like the ending for example). Normally I’d say a game this awesome would be my game of the year, but with so many big games coming out this year I think it’s going to be a tough call. But anyway all in all the single player portion of portal 2 was amazing and I think everyone should play it (and the first game for that matter). The game would have been great even if the single player was the only mode, but of course it isn’t.

So let’s talk about co-op I started on the co-op after I finished the single player and I played through the entire campaign with fellow stars team member Tanya. I would highly recommend playing through co-op with someone you know and can talk to, I imagine it would be very frustrating if you couldn’t clearly communicate. Overall I thought the co-op offered a decent challenge and it really felt like it was built for two people. I play a lot of coop modes that feel like It could be played with just one person, but with portal 2 you really need another person on every puzzle. Wheatley, unfortunately doesn’t make a return in the co-op campaign. So it’s just glados guiding you through the test chambers. There’s still some humour but not as much as the single player. The ending to the coop and single player leave the door open to a sequel so hopefully this won’t be the last game in the series. I can’t imagine it will be but let’s just hope we don’t have to wait as long as episode 3.

Anyway thats all of this week, no minecraft picture this week because I haven’t played it so see you next time. Maybe not next week, I’ve got exams soon

Yer so I haven’t played many games at all this week. I’ve been playing black ops as usual (which I won’t talk about again), played some minecraft multiplayer, played a bit of scott pilgrim the game and umm I guess I’ll talk about about collecting video games. 

I play minecraft all the time, but I haven’t played a lot of multiplayer, but seeing as the game now runs (just) on Tanyas laptop, we thought we’d give it a try. It was actually pretty fun. I’m not sure why but just having someone else there makes everything about the game much more fun. Hopefully we’ll play some more of it soon. After I had messed around in the multiplayer I thought maybe I should try out some server mods. It was really fun just giving myself 64 TNT and absolutely destroying the map, I did remember to back up the map before I did all this. So yer pointless destruction is fun, who knew.

I finished the Scott Pilgrim game ages ago but I only found out yesterday that there’s multiple endings, so I figured I’d try and complete it with every character. I’ve already finished with Scott and Ramona, I thought Scotts ending was hilarious. Anyway I really like the Scott Pilgrim game, the soundtrack is awesome and the 16-bit graphics look amazing. Plus the story follows the books pretty well and there’s tones of little nods to the series. 

Right so this weeks post isn’t super short I figured I’d talk briefly about a recent experience with collecting video games. I’ve got all of the consoles I want for specific games, so any others I get are only if they’re really cheap. Today I bought a zx spectrum for that very reason. It was super cheap and came with 40 games. So I couldn’t really turn that down. So I take it home and of course it doesn’t turn on. I thought maybe it was the power supply so I looked around and my nes power supply was the same voltage, but had a lower amperage. I figured that it’d be fine so I put it in and the consoles light lit up. After that I unplugged it just to be safe and not cause it any damage. Now I knew the power supply was the problem I thought I’d check the fuse, so I open up the plug and there wasn’t a fuse. After replacing the fuse I think I’m finally good to go, but of course when I plug it in nothing happens. I think I may have shorted it out, because now the nes plug won’t work either. So the lesson learned from todays purchase is “don’t swap plugs”. On the plus side I still have all the games and while I was out I also got a couple of original xbox controllers for pennies, a really good condition original devil may cry and a dragon quest game. 

So thats it for this week sorry it was a bit short this week hopefully my random collection tale made up for it. Anyway I’ll leave you with a picture of my new wolves that replaced the ones that died last week (yer these aren’t allowed to leave the house)

Seeing as I’ve had a ton of free time lately, I’ve played quite a few games this week. I’ve been sinking quite a few hours into black ops multiplayer, played some mortal kombat 1 & 2, had a blast with super mario world, briefly played some pilotwings 64, played sonic next-gen and finally had a frustrating play session of Shadow the hedgehog.

I’ve realised that I really suck at fighting games, back when we used to record wednesday rewinds I thought I’d do street fighter 2 on the snes, but when I went to record footage I couldn’t get past the first round. I figured maybe I was just bad at street fighter so I bought the first 2 mortal kombat games for the snes. I finally got round to playing them this week and, as with street fighter, I couldn’t get past the first round. I don’t know why I can’t seem to get to grips with 2D fighters, maybe its the whole combo thing. I am pretty good at smash bros though so at least I have that to save my pride. So thats about all I can talk about mortal kombat so I think I’ll move on.

Another game that I couldn’t really get into this week is pilotwings 64. I liked pilotwings resort on the 3DS so I thought I’d give pilotwings 64 a try (I’ve actually had it since I got my current N64 but I’ve just never had any interest to play it). I’m not sure why but I really didn’t find it as fun as the 3DS version, I’ll probably give it another try some other time but the first impressions haven’t left much of an impact.

I’ve played a bit of sonic next gen this week, but it was for a let’s play for the site which you can check out here. If you don’t feel like watching the video, then long story short I think it’s a game with good ideas but was very poorly put together. 

Super mario world is probably my favourite game for the SNES and this week I played a bit more of it. I love the graphics of this game, I think it’s one of the few retro games that, if it was released today with no changes, it would still be a huge hit. I know a lot of people like super mario bros 3 more but personally I think super mario world is a much better game. The only problem I have is that my SNES controller buttons are really spongy, but obviously thats not a problem with the game. 

I’ve tried to play shadow the hedgehog before but I’ve never really invested any time into it and this week I wish I never had. I don’t know why sonic next gen gets the title of worst sonic game, shadow the hedgehog is much worse. It’s just one of those game where you play it and think “what were the designers thinking?”. Whoever though that sonic adventure 2 with guns was a good idea was a complete idiot. The guns are impossible to aim which makes them useless and the other attacks are equally as useless. The objectives are also completely stupid. It’s supposed to have a simple moral choice system, where there are 3 different objectives (good, bad and neutral). Depending on what objectives you do on each level depends on the ending you get. Now I was trying to get the good ending, until I got to the about the 3rd level. The good objective was to collect 300 rings. Now in any sonic game collecting 300 rings would be a pain, but this game makes it stupidly tedious. You still loose rings if you get hit and if you die by falling into a bottomless pit, which happens all the time because the homing attack doesn’t always work, you loose all your rings. So by about the 3rd time I’d got to about 200 rings and then died, I gave up on shadow the hedgehog and I won’t be picking it back up anytime soon. 

I don’t normally play online games but for whatever reason I’ve got into black ops multiplayer. I’m not great at playing online, I’m not awful just about average I guess. I really like the maps in black ops. I never really liked modern warfare 2, but I loved modern warfare. I don’t think the maps are as good as modern warfare but they’re still pretty fun. I really need to level up some more, the best assault rifle I can get at the moment isn’t very good. Anyway I’ve talked about black ops before so I won’t waffle on anymore.

So thats about it for game this week. Hopefully next week I’ll get round to playing some pokemon, but who knows. Anyway I’ll leave you with the sad scene of where my first wolf died :( haha see you next week!

It seems like I’ve had a little bit more time to play games this week. I finished COD black-ops, finished ace attorney trials and tribulations and played some Pokemon. So lets get started.

I bought black ops at release but I never really got into the single-player, I played a fair amount of multiplayer but for whatever reason it’s taken this long to finally get around to finishing the single-player. Overall I would say that the single player for black-ops was really underwhelming, the set pieces were boring and the characters were uninteresting. In terms of the multiplayer I think there are some really good maps, not quite as good as the original modern warfare, but much better than modern warfare 2. So yer unless your into multiplayer don’t buy black ops

I’m gonna get straight to the point and say I loved Trials and tribulations. The previous 2 ace attorney games we great but this was the best overall. All the cases flowing together was a great idea. I’ll probably move onto the next game in the series eventually but I’m a bit apprehensive because of how nicely this game wrapped everything up. But so far the ace attorney series is something anyone with a DS should play, it really doesn’t get the attention it deserves and if more people buy the games maybe capcom will translate investigations 2. 

So finally this week I played some more of pokemon white. Thats the game I’m focusing on at the moment so hopefully I’ll get it finished soon. I’ve only just beat the 6th gym so I have a way to go yet but I’ll take my time and enjoy it. I’ve mentioned pokemon a lot in past posts so I’ll try not to repeat myself. I will however, say that the 6th gym was stupidly easy. A gym that far into that game that uses nothing but flying type pokemon really doesn’t offer much challenge. Anyway in summary i’m still liking the new pokemon and I’m looking forward to playing it some more.

I guess that’s pretty much it for this week, hopefully I’ll have a little bit more to talk about next week seeing as the whole team is meeting this week to do some recording. Anyway I don’t have any cool minecraft pictures so I’ll just end it here.  

With deadlines creeping up on me I haven’t played a lot of games this week but I have completed mass effect 2, played some ace attourney and played a bit of Amagami Ebikore+ on the psp.

I’ll start with the game I finished early in the week and thats mass effect 2. I’ve said previously that I had no problems with the game but I wasn’t very interested in the story and now that I’ve finished the game I think I know why I wasn’t interested in the story. I think it’s because I haven’t played the first game. I was quite far into the game before I realised the reapers were ships and not some enemy that I could fight. Although saying that, the final boss was a reaper but that wasn’t a ship. So I have no clue who the reapers are. Anyway I wasn’t interested in the story but the character missions were much more interesting. Overall I liked the gameplay and have no problems with it, I do however, think that the final boss was completely stereotypical. It’s not what it was that was stereotypical it’s just what it represents. I think huge boss battles have been completely overdone in the past few years and I think don’t think it added anything to the game. Apart from the final boss though, I enjoyed mass effect 2 and I’ll probably play mass effect 3 when it comes out. I’m don’t think i’m interested enough to go back and play the original mass effect, but I never really got into the overarching story. 

I’m not going to talk much about ace attorney simply because I haven’t played it much this week. At the moment I’m on the final chapter of the third game (trials and tribulations) and I’m really enjoying this game compared to the second game. This game feels like the cases really tie together whereas in the previous game the middle cases were pretty uninteresting. Also I think this game flows much better and keeps me interested as apposed to the previous game that dragged on for way too long. Anyway thats about all I’ve got for ace attourney, hopefully if I complete it next week I’ll talk a lot more about it.

So finally this week I’ve been playing the Amagami visual novel on the PSP. Now I’ll start by saying that this game was entirely in japanese and I have a very limited knowledge of the language. So I couldn’t understand much of the games dialogue but I still wanted to play the game because I really enjoyed the anime which was based of the original ps2 game. I think this game might be a port of that game but obviously I can’t say 100%. Anyway I thought it’d be a typical visual novel but it was actually quite unusual. Essentially you have about 40 days to get one of the heroins to like you enough and depending on which heroin you get to the ending zones depends on what ending you get. There is also a conversation mini game which was fun but I had no clue what effect that had on the actual game. In the end I got a good ending with the character I was aiming for, I think I got the perfect ending but I can’t confirm that. Overall it was fun I played an entire route in a single play session and I probably won’t go back to it any time soon, but it was a fun distraction.

So thats my week in gaming, not very long but with uni deadlines it can’t be helped. See you next week and I’ll leave you with a picture of my minecraft wolves claiming their next victim.