Post everytime that you buy a new game...

[DaMadFiddler]

Buying Megaman 10 this evening. I'll be in contract negotiations until late today (I'm the chief negotiator for my union), so I'll go ahead and post this now.

In celebration, here's Megaman 2 with lyrics:

[Luriden]

Brutal Legend (Xbox 360) $19.99

[MulletMan13]

Bought a ton of things since I last got on here... let's see:

Slim PS3
Battlefield Bad Company 2 - 360
L4D2 - 360 & PC
Torchlight - PC
Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes - GC
Metroid Prime Trilogy - Wii
NHL '09 - 360
Assassin's Creed 2 - 360
Army of Two: The 40th Day - 360
Trials HD - 360

Working my way through one at a time. Battlefield is absolutely fantastic.

[Eviltaco64X]

While wandering around the mall for a few hours, I bought:

PS2/PS3 Component Cables
Street Fighter Anniversary Collection - PS2

[DaMadFiddler]

Grandia. I used to have it on disc, but never actually bothered to sit down and play through it. So far it's not bad, though definitely less polished than the second installment. Horrible PSX scaling & texture wobble abounds, and the voice acting sounds like they called in a couple of interns to crank out the whole thing, complete with awkward delays between each line.

The game itself is fun so far, though.

[Specially Cork]

Final Fantasy XIII (PS3)
- Not started yet

Final Fantasy XIII Piggyback Guide Collector's Edition
- I got this just for the sake of owning it. The guides Piggyback produce are fantastic.

Sonic & Sega All-Star Racing (Wii)
- An exact clone of Mario Kart, yet somehow not as good - until I unlocked Ryo Hazuki. The game is quite a bit more difficult too. Something that always annoyed me about MK was how easy the main game was.

Lunar: Silver Star Harmony (PSP)
- Classic JRPG brought back to life with some excellent new visuals. The gameplay is ancient and the voice acting rapes my ears, but that's the whole point.

[DaMadFiddler]

Sonic & Sega All-Star Racing (Wii)
- An exact clone of Mario Kart, yet somehow not as good - until I unlocked Ryo Hazuki. The game is quite a bit more difficult too. Something that always annoyed me about MK was how easy the main game was.

Could you tell a little more about your opinion on this? I love MarioKart, and when we move to a bigger place the Wii and the PS3 are going to end up in separate rooms. It would be nice to have a MarioKart-alike for the Playstation room, but so far nothing has even come close, except maybe Diddy Kong Racing. But I've heard surprisingly positive things about this one.

[Specially Cork]

Sonic & Sega All-Star Racing (Wii)
- An exact clone of Mario Kart, yet somehow not as good - until I unlocked Ryo Hazuki. The game is quite a bit more difficult too. Something that always annoyed me about MK was how easy the main game was.

Could you tell a little more about your opinion on this? I love MarioKart, and when we move to a bigger place the Wii and the PS3 are going to end up in separate rooms. It would be nice to have a MarioKart-alike for the Playstation room, but so far nothing has even come close, except maybe Diddy Kong Racing. But I've heard surprisingly positive things about this one.

It's a Mario Kart rip-off plain and simple, and the list of similiarities (or lack of attempts to make things different) is often laughable. Unlike Diddy Kong Racing, this game doesn't have a single different gameplay element. It's Mario Kart with Sega IP. Despite this though, I don't think it's as good as MK. My 2 problems are:

1) Things just aren't as tight. The well-balanced multiplayer and fantastic controls are what puts MK at the top of the pile, and it's where all the clones fall short. This Sega offering comes close, but you'll notice the difference when you play it.

2) Sega didn't exploit their IP well enough. I have no idea why they decided to have more games represented in the character selection than in the track selection - especially when a Fantasy Zone circuit could've been awesome. Instead you get multiple tracks for games like House of the Dead and Jet Set Radio Future - games that only have 1 theme. It's a bit dull.

You can argue that there's no point buying an almost-great copy of Mario Kart when you can just buy Mario Kart instead, but it's been a while since the last MK release and if you'd like some new kart racing content you'll probably enjoy this game.

[Luriden]

Battlefield is absolutely fantastic.

Really? I played the demo, it felt like Modern Warfare 2, but worse...

[Specially Cork]

Battlefield is absolutely fantastic.

Really? I played the demo, it felt like Modern Warfare 2, but worse...

You're kidding? So much better than MW2 it's not even funny, and that's before you get into helicopter kamikazes.

I think he just meant that war FPS games are shit.

[Luriden]

Battlefield is absolutely fantastic.

Really? I played the demo, it felt like Modern Warfare 2, but worse...

You're kidding? So much better than MW2 it's not even funny, and that's before you get into helicopter kamikazes.

I think he just meant that war FPS games are shit.

I am getting pretty tired of them. CoD4 was my first, loved the "cinematicness" of it at the time, and I really enjoyed CoD:WaW both offline and online, but everything else seems monotonous. I could say that for 90% of the FPS coming out now though.

MW2 has some of the shittiest online play I've seen in awhile though, I think that turned me off of the genre entirely. And the single player was too cinematic, I felt like I was playing a movie.

[Jeeba Jabba]

BC2 is fucking awesome. I'm hooked on it on PC. It's nice to see REAL online First Person Shooters being made, other than the super-easy casual fuckfest that is MW2.


Godamn I love sniping.


Also, speaking of movies that are called video games, I bought FF13 and a PS3 today. The battle system is pretty good, but my god this game is a tunnel. Not only is exploration completely gone, battles are no longer really a thing you spend time building toward, but really just a time trial at the most. No EXP. Not even a MP meter.

Also, if anyone else is playing, for the love of God please tell me how to beat the Shivas as Snow. I just can't fill that meter. I get about 60% done and then it's over.

[Specially Cork]

The battle system is pretty good, but my god this game is a tunnel. Not only is exploration completely gone

Final Fantasy games never had exploration though. They had lots of smoke and mirrors that made you think otherwise, but 90% of every FF game is a single linear path. FFXII was the closest they ever came to open-world exploration, but everyone crapped on that for having a slow story. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of open RPGs anyway. I find they lack pacing and purpose.

battles are no longer really a thing you spend time building toward, but really just a time trial at the most. No EXP. Not even a MP meter.

Battles provide something similar to EXP later on that you can use for character development. The loss of the MP meter is one of those divisive things Square has been known for recently. I'm not sure if it makes for a better game or not, but it's great to see a company experiment with one of its biggest franchises when they could just stick to the standard JRPG template.

They've defended themselves from a very mixed bag of reviews and fan reception, so it'll be interesting to see if they keep pushing forward with these changes in FF15 or if they opt for something more old-school.

[BlueCrab]

Also, speaking of movies that are called video games, I bought FF13 and a PS3 today. The battle system is pretty good, but my god this game is a tunnel. Not only is exploration completely gone, battles are no longer really a thing you spend time building toward, but really just a time trial at the most. No EXP. Not even a MP meter.

I also picked up FF13 (and that nice hardback book for it as well), and I have to say, sadly with what I've played of it so far, I agree with you 100% here... It literally is ONE TUNNEL, and its rather annoying to say the least. It honestly makes me want to just put the game away and not play it until I'm done with the rest of my stack of RPGs (which will be never, at the rate I'm going -- I've finished about 1/10th of my stack since last June). However, the fact that I spent far too much money to get the game and book make me reconsider this choice...

I will give them that it looks really nice. However, that's about all its got going for it at the moment in my book. Battles are "just hit X and you'll win" so far, dungeons are single tunnels.

Also... why in the world does it take about 10 seconds to open a treasure? Its little things like this that add up to kinda destroy the game, especially when coupled with the tunnel dungeons...

[Specially Cork]

I personally find one tunnel hidden behind 20 dead-ends and random battles more annoying. Plus every review I've read indicates that it opens up later and the battles get much more difficult. Still, much like FF12 I can see this game's opening 10+ hours being a major hurdle in any future replay I do. Handholding should always be optional.

[BlueCrab]

I personally find one tunnel hidden behind 20 dead-ends and random battles more annoying. Plus every review I've read indicates that it opens up later and the battles get much more difficult. Still, much like FF12 I can see this game's opening 10+ hours being a major hurdle in any future replay I do. Handholding should always be optional.

The reviews I've read basically say that the "opening up" takes place in the last two chapters (so about the last 1/10th of the game), and even then, its basically "here's a field with a bunch of tunnels, go down each one and kill the guy at the end."

I really hope it gets better than this, but I'm overall pretty disappointed this far.

[Specially Cork]

I personally find one tunnel hidden behind 20 dead-ends and random battles more annoying. Plus every review I've read indicates that it opens up later and the battles get much more difficult. Still, much like FF12 I can see this game's opening 10+ hours being a major hurdle in any future replay I do. Handholding should always be optional.

The reviews I've read basically say that the "opening up" takes place in the last two chapters (so about the last 1/10th of the game), and even then, its basically "here's a field with a bunch of tunnels, go down each one and kill the guy at the end."

I really hope it gets better than this, but I'm overall pretty disappointed this far.

Really? I heard after 25 hours in a 60+ hour game, around the halfway point.

Either way, it's playing out a lot like Final Fantasy X in terms of exploration and linearity, which just so happens to be my favourite game of all time, so I'm loving it right now. I love linear well-paced gaming, I hate worthless exploration and dead-ends.

[DaMadFiddler]

Not a purchase, but today my girlfriend gave me a copy of Henry Hatsworth for our anniversary. Guess it's time to go figure out where the DS is buried.

[Jeeba Jabba]

I just traded FF13 back in and they gave me 45 bucks. Not too bad. I got Valkyria Chronicles and MGS4 with it.


I couldn't take it anymore. After about 10 hours of play, I was in the middle of an ordinary battle, and just put the controller down and said no more. It's not a game. It's an interactive movie. If you loved FFX, you will love this one. If you loved any other FF, or RPGs for that matter, you will hate it.

[Jeeba Jabba]

I hate worthless exploration and dead-ends.

...That's the point of RPGs. Exploration is what immerses you into the world. Dead ends are what make it a game because it's a challenge of choices. The entire time I spent on FF13 I kept asking myself, "Why even stop the cutscene to allow me to run 10 feet down this path and then cue another cutscene?"