Of course, the real question is do they need to make anyone cry? Would that be the gauge of cultural relevance and a move to “high art”? Is any of that even necessary?

I don’t actually want to answer any of those questions, because I find them silly. I did, however, find some incredibly thought-provoking points over in this article by Chris over on ihobo (as linked over on Kotaku).

I absolutely adore the idea/theory/proposition that there is nothing about it being a game that drives you to experiencing some type of emotion; it’s all about the narrative, itself. There is narrative in a movie, in a song, even in a painting. By taking the “cause” out of the game, you therefore actually place the game on the same level as everything else. I think that is a really important to step, and one that we will continue to make over time. I have heard the point made time and time again that the game industry is so young when compared to the other media industries that have moved us to tears with their products. It simply needs more time to continue evolving and for all the old people to die out who have no familiarity with the medium and various business models.

I do want to address one point in the article, and take slight exception to it. Here is the exact part:

So even though, for instance, many people report that they cried when they played Final Fantasy VII at the fateful scene (and indeed, several other cRPGs also show up in player studies as having provoked tears) the moment that actually brought the player to tears was a non-interactive cut scene. It wasn’t the game (in the systems view) that made them cry – it was the story – and there never was a question as to whether stories could make you cry.

Believe it or not, I am going to dispute this point with the same example! Well, somewhat. I am not talking about the original Final Fantasy VII, but actually Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII.

There are intense spoilers here (as if you didn’t know how it ended…), so if you have not played through to the very end of the game, keep in mind that I am going to describe not just what happens, but how it happens.

Yes, there was a bit of genuine gameplay during the ending of Crisis Core that made me cry. It was not a cut-scene; I was in full control of Zack during the point where I broke down. In between lots of events going on, and before the full-on CG ending sequence, Zack is being hunted down by the Shinra army. He has very little energy left in him, but he continues to fight back with everything he has (occasionally flashing back to memories from the course of the game along the way). There finally comes one last stand-off where Zack fights off against a (literally) endless stream of soldiers. No, really… it is infinite. You will die. You may be strong enough to hold them off for a pretty long time (especially if you have done some grinding in the side missions), but the point of the sequence is that Zack is shot down. You cannot avoid it. You progress the game by dying.

I am choking up as I write this, because this is the part that made me break down. I was in full control of Zack, but I had absolutely no control over the situation. I knew where it was heading. I knew I was going to die. There was nothing I could do about it. It was not fun. It was not enjoyable in any way. It hurt. It hurt a lot. The point where I had to take my fingers off of the buttons and let them kill me in a situation where I was otherwise in complete control was what did me in. I had to sit there and watch my character be gunned down.

And I cried.

Last night I was playing some good ol’ Foo Fighters songs on drums, and it was going great. Switched over to play Fall Out Boy, and BOOM… suddenly failing where I otherwise should not be failing. Doing some quick testing on the resulting menu, I found that the blue pad was no longer working. Everything else was totally fine, but blue was dead.

I checked it out further this evening, and found the following:

Yep, that’s a wire split right at the base where it connects underneath. Dammit! Not sure what to do about this. It seems like it’s something I could fix, but I’m not entirely sure. Anyone have experience with this kind of stuff? The fact that it’s split right at the base is the killer, since I don’t see much to work with and splice back together.

Also, we seem to have solidified our topic for episode six of the podcast. Actually, I’m not sure if Jeff has heard, but everyone else knows! Someone else (new to this show) will be joining us for this particular episode, though it should be a familiar voice for listeners following along from other shows. I am really looking forward to this one! Hopefully we can record it around two weeks from now and get it out by the end of the month.

Looks like I forgot to do a page for the Top 10 list from our last podcast episode (guest appearances). I will get right on that!

Check everyone later~

I started playing the game this evening. Got around an hour or so in (according to Steam, I played for 1.2 hours). I’m absolutely terrible at these games, so I’m playing on “Easy” and I died a lot. Without spoiling too much, here are a couple things I noticed / wanted to mention:

- I hate platforming in first-person. I cannot for the life of me ever fully determine where exactly my character is in relation their surroundings and get any sort of depth-perception. Do you get used to this with time?

- I hate falling in first-person. See the above description for why I might be having this problem.

- I’ve noted this before, but I’m definitely a mouse-and-keyboard elitist, despite barely playing these types of games.

That’s about it, so far. It runs absolutely beautifully in 1680×1050 on this computer (as it should, being ten years old). Kinda nice not having any sorts of stuttering problems! Not much to say beyond those few things… just kinda wanted to write about it…

It came a little later in the month than anticipated, but hey… everyone’s got busy lives going on right now. Thankfully we were all able to get together and record a great episode, including our buddy Bryce, who’s back once again to shoot the shiz with us.

This time around we had a nice long discussion about all the games we’ve been playing (especially Andrew, who seems to have become a different man). Phones, handhelds, last-gen, current-gen, PCs… we have it all covered. We moved into our discussion about crossover games, and specifically why and how they are created. Is it a simple money-making machine? Is it beneficial to all parties involved? Do they get better over time? We finished up with a very fitting Top 10 list: the Top 10 Special Guest Appearances. Not specifically from crossover games, these characters took a special role in the games they did a guest stint in, and they are all memorable in their own ways.

We’ll hit you back again soon with some regular blog entries. In the meantime, enjoy the show, and let us know what you think about everything! We have big plans for the site (including blog entries, podcasts, design, community, etc.), and we’re thrilled to have you along for the ride.

Why aren’t we using it more? Is it the particular games we own that simply bore us? Is it Nintendo, themselves, driving us away with things like Wii Music? Why aren’t I going back to all those Virtual Console games I purchased?

Let me toss a couple ideas out there.

Something I’ve heard pop up a few times (and more recently Rym & Scott did a GeekNights episode about it) is that instead of playing new games, we just keep going back and playing the same old games from the past over and over again.

I am totally guilty of this (but is “guilty” the right word to use if I don’t feel bad about it…?). Despite owning tons of games (some even unopened) that I’ve never played, I will go back and play through the original Legend of Zelda on NES at least once every two years. There’s also never a bad time to decide to sit down and beat Super Mario Bros. 3 or even the original Kirby’s Dream Land, which for me is almost like a brainless activity at this point. Then there are all the times I’ll hook up the Saturn and play a few races in Sega Rally Championship or Daytona USA. Meri has played through Ocarina of Time at least once in recent memory, and while she’s just now finishing up the first Phoenix Wright, you’ll see Super Mario World sticking out of Slot 2 down there. Then there are “new old games” like (the obligatory mention of) Rock Band. It’s basically an expansion upon Guitar Hero (which is itself an expansion on previous rhythm games), which means we’re really playing the same game that we’ve been playing for years and years and years, only with new content every week. That brings in the whole idea of a single game being its own platform, but I won’t bother getting into that, again.

So I suppose the real question is: am I not playing the Wii, or am I just playing old games and thus inadvertently not playing the Wii?

For people my age and older (anyone post-college, I suppose), another big factor is disposable income and the sheer amount of games. Unlike when I was younger and onwards into college and could only afford one or two games at a time, now I can pretty much own anything I want whenever I want it (for example, buying Dragon Quest IV because it was $20 this week, despite the fact that I have a row of other RPGs to get through first). There’s no need to justify a purchase for myself by forcing an entire play-through and trying to convince myself that a game is pure art when it’s really nothing more than just another game. If I get bored with it or see something shiny elsewhere, I move on.

Pulling the Wii back in, let’s look at Super Smash Bros. Brawl versus the previous Super Smash Bros. Melee on the Gamecube. In the previous game, I not only unlocked every character, but made it a point to beat the game with every character in both single-player modes to get each version of their trophy. I would spend those coins to try and get more trophies, spin them around to look at them, read up on their history, etc. I’m not sure how much time I put into that game, but it was certainly a lot…! However, with Brawl, I only went so far as to unlock all of the characters and stages. I never actually finished Subspace Emissary (I think I got about 75% of the way through), and I didn’t put any time into creating any of my own stages (or collecting all of the parts to be able to do so). That’s not to say I never play the game ever again, though. There are instances where I’m craving some Nintendo fanboy catering, or have to laugh at how incomprehensibly bad the online-play integration was, and I pop it in for a few minutes. A get-together of friends is another great time, since I do have four Wavebirds… The point, though, is that despite dropping the $50 on the game, I simply don’t feel the burning desire or any real compelling reason to attach myself to that game solely as I would were I twenty years younger.

How about straight-up dropping games? Personally, I’ve dropped just as many games on the Wii (sorry, Super Mario Galaxy) as I have on other systems, so there’s nothing inherently there to jump on and pick apart.

So am I really just playing the same games over and over? Let’s take a look at what I’m playing just in the last week and see if there are any trends:

- Rock Band 2 (360): Mentioned above; basically just Guitar Hero evolved, so yes, the same game over and over.

- DragonBall Z: Infinite World (PS2): A mash-up of Budokai 3 (which I played through twice; US PS2 & JP PS2), Shin Budokai (which I own and dropped) and Burst Limit (which I own and dropped), so yes, the same game over and over.

- DragonBall: Origins (DS): Whoa, a totally new game! Fancy that. I’m quasi playing it “for work“, though.

- Final Fantasy VI (GBA): New to me! Classification is up in the air on this one, though, since it’s an evolution of games I’ve played before (III & IV) and a predecessor to ones I’ve also played (VII, VIII, X).

How about a game I only recently kicked the bad habit of? That’s right, Pokemon. Well, FireRed was an enhanced remake of a game I had played when it first came out (in my case, Yellow) and Pearl is really just another evolution of the same game (if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it).

So what does that say about me? Am I just playing it safe? I will admit to starting to unfortunately feel that apprehension and insecurity when I start playing an entirely new game, something I never expected myself to feel with regards to any technology.

How does that relate to the Wii? Shouldn’t I be right at home since it’s basically a Gamecube and all my old games are there on Virtual Console? I’m totally ready to go with Shining Force II (again, another old game I’ve played through multiple times) but I really need to finish some of these other games I’m playing, first! Our Wii actually gets used like clockwork every time Andrew and Jeff are over, if only to mess around on the Everybody Votes Channel. I know, I know… it sounds ridiculous… but it’s an event in our household. We even have our own lingo to go along with it, talking about who’s the biggest “conformist” when their choices are closest to the general population, and so on and so forth.

I also wonder if it seems like I use the 360 more than I actually do because I use it as a media center for displaying programming up on the television. Combine that with the Rock Band constant state-of-being, and I suppose it would look like I’m attached to it.

What about you all? Does your Wii collect dust, or is it at the center of your gaming experience? Does any of that other nonsense I’ve spouted relate to you, or is it just the gibberish of yet another ranting lunatic on the intarwebz?

While I appreciate all the co-op / multiplayer gaming requests I’m getting from everyone to play GoW2, unfortunately (for you) I don’t have the game and don’t have much of an interest in playing it :P.

You’ll be getting a pretty hefty update on what we all have been playing on episode five of the podcast. Right now we’re scheduled to record not this coming weekend, but the weekend after… so look for the show very soon after that. I know Andrew’s been playing more games than I can even fathom, so he’s sure to have a lot to say. You’ll probably get some crossover discussion outta me due to a couple new releases, but… well, just wait to hear about it on the show!

That is exactly why the game has become such an investment. With everything working together so beautifully, it makes complete sense to say “Money be damned!” and go ahead and spend lots of virtual space money on the game, racking up a collection of dozens upon dozens of downloaded songs to play.

I actually briefly brought up this idea with my wife (hehe! fun to say!) earlier. She thought that maybe the term “investment” wasn’t really accurate, since you’re not, for example, making any money off of it. I think it really is accurate, though. For me, that return on investment is the fun that you get from having all of it in such a convenient mass (my time and effort is worth money, I say). There’s nothing more enjoyable in gaming to me, right now, than having a bunch of people over and having the awesome ability to scroll and scroll and scroll to whatever type of song any particular person wants to play.

Anyway, those decisions just got a lot more interesting with the release of Guitar Hero: World Tour. Suddenly you have two completely separate “platforms” that both work in the exact same way and perform the exact same function(s).

What is a music fan to do?

Unfortunately for Activision, I’ve already made a decision on what my platform is going to be… and it’s Rock Band. Why is this? Quite frankly, it’s because Rock Band was there first.

I am currently up to 247 songs available in the game, including 108 downloaded songs (which itself includes those 20 free downloads with a new purchase of Rock Band 2). With such a huge amount of entertainment at my disposal in that game, it makes little sense for me to start doing the same thing in a separate game that (like I just mentioned) works and performs in the exact same way.

This feeling is further heightened when you consider just how much overlap already exists between the games. In terms of straight-up on-disc songs, there are 13 overlaps between the two latest games. When you count DLC as-of this writing, you’re up to 19 songs. There has been very little pure exclusivity announced, so there is always a possibility that a song that shows up as DLC in one game could show up weeks (or even months) later in the other. Again, Blink-182’s “Dammit” was an on-disc song for Guitar Hero: World Tour, and even though Travis Barker was involved with that game, it didn’t stop the song from appearing as DLC for Rock Band just one week before their competitor’s launch. Billy Corgan has the exact same role in Guitar Hero: World Tour, yet “Today” appears on-disc in both games, and Rock Band already has “Siva” and “Zero” as DLC (in addition to “Cherub Rock” being on-disc in the first game). Guitar Hero: World Tour launched with Hayley Williams and “Misery Business“, but Rock Band was there first with Paramore’s “crushcrushcrush” and “That’s What You Get“.

This is why I am so frightened to purchase any DLC within Guitar Hero: World Tour. Why purchase it for that game if there’s even the slightest possibility that I can purchase it for Rock Band and add it to the larger, pre-existing collection of music?

If Activision wants to compete on this level with this information and these situations in mind, they’re going to have to do something that is horribly anti-consumer-friendly… bring in the exclusivity.

There are already confirmations of this with Metallica, and they’ve even noted that Rock Band getting an Aerosmith song took place before they grabbed the band for Guitar Hero: Aerosmith. The consumer (read: ME) would need this knowledge that there is absolutely no chance of them getting a band’s music in the other game (in this case Rock Band) before they would consider purchasing it for the new game (in this case Guitar Hero).

So what is the point to this tirade? Is it just more pro-Rock Band shenanigans from me? Possibly; I certainly wouldn’t deny that. If nothing else, it proves that Harmonix was the one with the foresight to plan for all of this and get there first.

Finally, as a brief follow-up to yesterday’s “Subtle Harmonix Genius” post (and pretty much falling in line with the above conclusion), they’ve announced that next week’s Rock Band DLC is going to be the entire Foo Fighters album The Colour and the Shape. It’s not the No Doubt pack I was expecting, but it *is* a giant pack of music from yet another artist that is also featured in Guitar Hero: World Tour, and that’s more or less exactly what I expected them to do (I just predicted the wrong artist :P).

EDIT: In thinking about this a little more this morning, I realized that I’ve basically described a typical video game console war… except the games, themselves, are acting as the consoles. Sure, we’ve always had this type of competition (especially in things like yearly sports games; EA vs 2K for example), but never has it reached the $200-to-entry threshold level between competitors (for the full experience, anyway).

(That basically means that I talk about Rock Band in some capacity, if you’re new here.)

So I picked up Guitar Hero: World Tour (game-only) Monday evening after getting back into the states. I was considering getting the guitar bundle as the new guitar looks pretty sweet, but since my Guitar Hero III one is still kicking pretty well and the whammy bar is the only broken component of my original Rock Band one, I’ll just hold out until something major actually snaps somewhere before I upgrade. I’m not going to talk about the new Guitar Hero just yet, though. I do have a whole lot of comparisons and such I’d like to make, but it’s not time for that yet.

I want to talk about some, as I’ve titled it, “Subtle Harmonix Genius”. Harmonix, as you may well know, is the developer of Rock Band (and originally Guitar Hero, before the four or so involved companies all got split apart, sold, acquired, formed new alliances, etc.). I’ve been keeping an eye on what Harmonix has been doing with Rock Band (more specifically Rock Band 2, though it’s all one big platform, as they’ve accurately described it) as the release of Guitar Hero: World Tour neared. It’s all extremely intriguing, and quite sly if you dig really deep into it. Let me give you a few examples.

Foo Fighters’ “Everlong” is an on-disc song in both Rock Band 2 and Guitar Hero: World Tour. Months ahead of time (back in July), Harmonix began heavily promoting their game with “Everlong“.

System of a Down’s “B.Y.O.B.” is an on-disc song in Guitar Hero: World Tour. On August 5th, Harmonix made “B.Y.O.B.” available as DLC for Rock Band.

Nirvana’s acoustic (MTV Unplugged) version of “About A Girl” is an on-disc song in Guitar Hero: World Tour. Two weeks prior to the game’s release (on October 21st), Harmonix released a seven-track pack of Nirvana songs as DLC for Rock Band.

Travis Barker, current drummer for Blink-182, was involved with Guitar Hero: World Tour in that he was motion-captured and appears as a playable character/avatar. Blink-182’s song “Dammit” is an on-disc song in the game. One week prior to the game’s release, Harmonix made “Dammit” available as DLC for Rock Band.

The week of Guitar Hero: World Tour’s release, Harmonix announced that the 20 free downloadable songs promised with all new purchases of Rock Band 2 would become available.

I haven’t even touched on a whole ton of other songs that are available in both games, via all sorts of combinations of on-disc and DLC (”The Middle“, “Lazy Eye“, etc.). Take a look at No Doubt, though. I’ll make a prediction and say that Harmonix’s promised “The Best of No Doubt (Rock Band Edition)” pack will be made available extremely soon, hot on the heels of Guitar Hero: World Tour and its on-disc “Spiderwebs“.

None of these are coincidences. These are all calculated and smirk-inducing examples of the genius over there at Harmonix. I can see plenty of examples of a potential Guitar Hero: World Tour consumer who already owns Rock Band looking down the set-list and saying, “Why buy the whole new game when I can just spend $10 on DLC and get just the songs I want in a game I already own…?”

More Rock Band / Guitar Hero discussions coming from me will be on the topics of the series as a platform and choosing one side to make an investment in, actual comparisons between the two games and their gameplay, and a whole heck of a lot more.

No, there will be no Rock Revolution discussion. Sorry, Konami.

At the end of my shift today I heard laughter erupting from one of the rooms in our employees only area. Gazing past many many people crowded in a little room I was able to catch what everyone was watching: a YouTube video of a guy cussing the hell out of one of those “Impossible Mario” (or Kaizo Mario as I’ve heard it called) levels. Watching those levels being played without audio is funny enough (just search YouTube for “Impossible Mario”), but this added commentary– done by a guy who obviously was just over-dubbing his own vocal to the video– really made it hilarious.

It brings to mind, however, the kinds of things I would say or have said when playing video games that were just WAY too hard. I can recount many times where I’d get to a point in the night where I’d be so tired and so bereft of sleep that I’d start talking to myself. These videos sound exactly like me as a kid. More than enough times I’ve said, “Ok, Mario, that was not my fault. That was your fault. I push the buttons, you jump. That’s how it works.” As if any of this made a fucking difference!

Other favorites of mine: “Listen… I know you don’t like me, Toad, but all I’m asking you to do is drive you FUCKING kart through FUCKING Rainbow Road in this FUCKING race. You don’t have to be #1 the whole time but AT LEAST stay on the FUCKING track for one full FUCKING minute!!!”

It’s really bad when you’re doing a marathon run of SimCity (the original) while singing the entirety of BoyzIIMen’s Cooleyhighharmony in mid-broken voice and neglected girlfriend on your bed. So very, very sad.

Anyway, to share in the hilarity, I’m embedding here the three parts of… well, I don’t know the official title since it looks like four people have uploaded this same video in three parts… let’s put it this way. This guy has a lot of fans. Be sure to watch in order, and you might find yourself stopping at the middle of part 2 since it does get a little repetitive and somewhat hard to watch all the way to the end. Part 1, though, is absolutely the best. Minus the Family Guy comment.

So, what dumb shit have you ever said when frustrated at a video game?

- Mario Party 8
- WarioWare: Smooth Moves
- Wii Play
- GBA (original) w/ Link’s Awakening (original)

I remember loaning him the GameBoy Advance and Link’s Awakening after the first episode of our podcast, but I had completely forgotten about those Wii games. Now that I have them back I remember bringing them over there for his house-warming party, but since then I had completely forgotten I even owned them. It’s really funny, because just the other day I moved a whole bunch of games around on the various racks and shelves  here, and I remember thinking to myself, “Huh… I thought I owned a couple more Wii games. *shrug*”

It reminds me so much of being a kid, loaning games to friends… and never getting them back. For me, it had a lot to do with the fact that I moved around so much (I went to four high schools in as many years). The two examples that I remember very well are Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES), which Jennifer (the girl who lived across the street from me) borrowed. The other was Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins (GB), which my friend Ryan (who actually got me into DBZ) borrowed. I’m sure there are plenty of others that I’ve lost this way over the years, but those are the two that I’m most mad about! God dammit, I’ve been dying to play SML2 again, and not emulated! C’mon, DS-version of Virtual Console!

So I leave you all for the next week or so with this question: What games have you lost in a similar manner?

I’m not here to just go on and on about the wedding. You don’t care about that (most likely). You care about video games; that’s why you’re reading this (most likely). What I’m trying to say is that I’m here to talk about both the wedding, and the video game references there-in.

The wedding was pretty “traditional” overall, with no obvious, strange things pointing to the contrary. Being who we are, though, we weren’t about to pass up the chance to slip little things into the ceremony and reception that key friends (and maybe family) would understand and see the meaning in.

The first video game reference we had was actually our recessional music (the song played as we walked out of the actual marriage ceremony after being pronounced husband and wife). The song choice? The Final Fantasy “Prologue“, and specifically the version from Celtic Moon. I actually cut the very beginning (our wedding version begins right where the main tune normally starts), and sped it up about five percent. It was absolutely wonderful.

The second (and probably final) video game reference was our cake-cutting music. The traditional songs are usually dumb ones like “Pour Some Sugar On Me“, or otherwise totally inappropriate songs that vaguely reference sugar or something sweet. Our choice? C’mon. Video game. Cake. Sense of humor. Do the math.

That’s right, “Still Alive” (from Portal) was our cake-cutting music. We didn’t use either the GLaDOS or Jonathan Coulton versions, though. We actually used a piano version by Jarrett Heathe (you can download the MP3 we used on their YouTube entry for the song). What made it all the more amazing was about halfway through when all of our friends in the back starting singing the lyrics along with the song, much to the confusion of the rest of our attendees. Apparently our DJ came up to them afterwards and was all, “Wait, there are lyrics to this song? What is it? Huh?”

At the end of the day, what I am actually trying to stress and say with this entry is that you can do these types of things on your special day, and pull them off respectfully. Unless anyone knew any better, both of those songs were just that… songs. They were beautiful pieces that fit the mood perfectly, and are easily forgettable at the same time as just regular ol’ classical-style songs that were played at a wedding.

But to us they held deeper meanings, let us express ourselves, and we were able to share those connections with those who understood us. It’s something I’ve talked about elsewhere, but the concept of simply passing for normal productive members of society is incredibly important… that doesn’t mean, however, that you can’t slip in those little pieces of your nerd life!

Town names!

I have a hard enough time remembering all of the character names (something I’ve always had a problem with in TV shows, movies, and even around the office!). When you toss magic attacks, items, and enemies on top of all that, and then ask me to remember where all the towns are so I can backtrack to them? I’ve got issues.

Today Final Fantasy VI asked me to fly back to Narshe. OK, no problem. I recognize that town name. I don’t really remember what it looked like, but I know I’ve been there a few times and it’s important to the story. I should be able to find it no problem. Then I realized I had absolutely no idea where it was or what it looked like. I hopped onto Google Image Search on the iPhone, looked at a world map, and still flew around for about fifteen minutes completely unable to find the stupid town. Finally I just landed in the general area of what all the maps said, and I finally walked into a mountain and put it all together again in my head (you know what I’m talking about if you’ve played the game).

So what was the real problem? Since I’ve already recognized that I have a difficult time in life remembering names (it takes me FOREVER), I can only assume that it’s a huge factor here. Final Fantasy VI probably makes it even worse by throwing so many characters and towns at you without ever slowing down. I’m trying to think back to other RPGs I’ve played in the past to find some parallels, but I’m drawing a blank. I initially thought that Final Fantasy VII did it perfectly by baby-feeding you with one town at first (Midgar), but even then, there were all of the separate areas within in (Sector 7 slums, Aerith’s house, Shinra Headquarters, etc.). Zelda II had a wonderfully small amount of towns that I could probably recite in order, but that is such a different type of game and from so much longer ago.

What do you all think? Do you have the same problem in games? Are the terrible world maps also to blame (seriously, these GBA games’ maps are impossible to see)? Is it the outlandish names of these towns, that almost always seem to be neither English nor Japanese in origin? At least those two languages I’m familiar with…

I have come around on this issue. Sure, I think my original point is still valid. Most people don’t have HD TVs, including most “casual” gamers (oh no, I used the “c”-word!) , and they were the target consumer base for Nintendo. But now I am one of the HD-snobs. In my apartment we have an overhead HD projector. I measured it at 83 inches and it is just sick looking. The games just look great in HD. Take a look at some pictures:

Alpha 3

Braid

And for next-gen games made with HD in mind: Check out these Silent Hill: Homecoming Photos. These are not screen shots, just photos I took.

Silent Hill: Homecoming

Silent Hill: Homecoming 2

Silent Hill: Homecoming 3

I just took these with my camera. If you don’t think it looks that great, take a photograph off a standard def TV and compare the two.

So which me is correct? The old me, who says Nintendo is right not catering to the a/v geeks and HD is irrelevant? Or the new me, who says Nintendo is missing out? I’m interested to know, how many people are playing games on HD? Is that an issue for you when buying a console? Is HD here, or is it still a few years off from being the norm?

PS- Sorry, if I am come as a braggart in this post….but it is awesome

So here are the ground rules when we here on vgconvos talk about a game we are playing and want to hear feedback from you all while still going into spoilers (which I guess we’ll just call “Video Game Club”). Note that these rules are subject to change, and probably will change as we figure out what the heck we’re doing.

(1) All in-depth talk / spoilers will be put behind a “read more” cut.
(2) The age of the game is irrelevant; we will respect spoilers in all games.
(3) Before the cut, we will describe the general area of where we are in the game, and where appropriate, the current play-time.
(4) You can’t hold us responsible for ruining games for you!

With that out of the way… I’m about 11 hours into Final Fantasy VI. If the town of “Vector” and a research facility don’t sound familiar to you yet, do not…

As I hinted at in episode four of the podcast, there have been a few hints of things here and there that lead me to believe I’m eventually going to get some sort of emotional attachment to some of the characters and impact from the overall game. Right now, though, these are all just hints… I simply don’t feel anything substantial yet.

One of those hints was Locke’s scene in Kohlingen in the basement of the building where “Rachel” is “sleeping” (dead?). It was certainly something good to toss into the mix, and helps develop his character slightly. I don’t really think it was enough, though. I’m hoping there will be more to this story later on, but at the same time, it doesn’t seem like it actually needs any more. Hints were left, and I should probably just read between the lines on my own and stop expecting it to spell it all out for me.

I have definitely been enjoying the Locke x Celes stuff going on, though. It’s been nice to have a little tension between characters while Terra is gone for a while. The blushing during the entire opera saga was definitely cute, and the awkward conversations and exclamations back and forth were wonderful, humorous touches to that tension.

This all culminated for me today with the scene in the Magitek Research Facility where Celes teleported(?) herself, Kefka, and the underlings away from the team (mine’s Locke / Edgar / Gau) and Cid. Her spoken desire to actually save Locke for once had just enough subtlety, but wasn’t too over-dramatic.

I’m also having a bit of a problem understanding the Esper system in the game. I can’t really tell which is equipped to which character and what it’s really doing for me. Am I just going to figure it out as the game goes on and I fart around with it more, or do you also feel that it’s not all that well integrated into the menu system?

So far I am definitely enjoying the game, and appreciate the layers that are being woven together as I move along in the story. I was hoping it would start moving a little faster, and I think it is. Then again, that just may be my inability to play too much of the game lately, which will continue up and through the wedding and honeymoon. I also spent about 30-60 minutes of play-time previous to Vector going up and down the continent just doing a little grinding, which takes you out of the story far too much. The flights coming up will give me plenty of time to sit in one place and play a ton of the game, though!

We heard about it hitting the Japanese Virtual Console last month, so we knew it was on its way. That doesn’t change the fact that a SquaresoftEnix game coming out at a budget price via digital distribution rather than a $40 Nintendo DS remake is a strange thing in today’s world.

Seiken Densetsu 2, or Secret of Mana, hit the North American Virtual Console yesterday. I know Jeff will be all over it once he clears out some blocks on his Wii (I’ve got five, he’s got zero!), and Andrew I’m not sure about (probably? but he’s got his SNES hooked up and owns the cartridge…).

If you’ll remember back to our first podcast episode, Andrew and Jeff totally loved the game (as well as Secret of Evermore), but I had actually never played it. I surprised them on the show by having played a good few hours into the game before talking about our mutual top ten games. Some of my complaints were the at-times clumsy hit detection on enemies, your companions getting stuck behind things, and… well, I don’t remember much about what I said. I did recognize the wonderful music and the ingenuity of the “ring system” for the menus.

So what about me? Should I be picking it up on Virtual Console? If I do, I’ll probably wait a few months while I work through my backlog of RPGs on the system (Super Mario RPG, Ys Book I & II, Shining Force II). Does it really deserve another chance, though? What do you all think?

Since I’m getting married next week, and therefore all parties involved are pretty busy right now and will be out of town (Hell, Jeff’s down in Virginia as I type this for AnimeUSA), we had to decide what we were actually going to do for a podcast episode this month. Would we just do a cheap cop-out episode? Would we record anything? You can’t do nothing for an episode, and you can’t do a clip-show after only three episodes!

What we decided to do was have a split show. The first part is going to be as-per-the-norm, with the regular intros and talking about what we’re playing right now (along with any fun stories to be shared). We also wanted to address some of the feedback we’ve been getting (thanks for all the blog comments and e-mails, everyone!), so we hit up one e-mail and gave some suggestions based on their questions.

The “conversation” for this episode, however, is actually a topic portion of my main show, Daizenshuu EX, from nearly two years ago (January 2007). In it, we all talked about old video game magazines (specifically EGM from the early-to-mid-1990s) and their coverage of import video games. There was (obviously) a huge DragonBall slant to the discussion, but it’s actually general enough that it makes a lot of sense over here in the vgconvos style. I think you’ll all find it incredibly interesting! The only downside is that I guess this was recorded before I got the new mixer and mics, so the sound quality is quite a bit different than you may be used to. I re-balanced it, though, so it should be slightly better than it was two years ago.

You may also want to check out the page I set up back when we first recorded the episode which showcases a whole crap-ton of scans from those magazines. There’s stuff in there ranging from the very first issue of Nintendo Power (July/August 1988) up through stuff in 1997.

So there you have it! Next time you hear from me on the show I’ll be a married Mike… which isn’t all that different from how it is around here right now, except that it’ll be legal on a piece of paper! Sweet! Hopefully Jeff and Andrew can keep things going with some regular blog entries over the next couple weeks. Catch you later, everyone!

It’s been perfectly wonderful.

To briefly recap, I played about halfway through Yellow back on the GB(C) when it first came out in 1999. Got pretty bored and dropped it soon there-after. I felt the bug coming when Generation IV (Diamond & Pearl) were on the horizon, and decided to give it all another go having skipped two generations. I picked up FireRed (GBA) and Pearl (DS) the day Generation IV was launched in the US, and proceeded to put something like 90 hours into GBA and around the same into DS (I honestly don’t remember the exact numbers; it was approaching 100 for both, I think…?). Once I “beat” Pearl (that is, defeated the Elite Four), I captured all of the standard, non-event legendaries and various specials, and then pretty much let it go.

Many months later, I randomly picked it up again. I don’t know why or how, but I did. Perhaps it was around the time that the special event critters were being passed out at Toys R Us…? I finally started messing around with things like trading on the GTS (and with a couple friends), going underground, breeding… all things I barely dabbled with on the initial playthrough. It was like a whole new world of end-game content was available to me, despite it being there the whole time. I really enjoyed it all. My Pokemon Ranch added a little bit of fuel to the fire, giving me even more of a reason to try completing my PokeDex and transfer specifically-bred (and traded) critters for the sole purpose of putting them on the ranch and seeing what they do.

It was like I was a kid again, dedicating all of my gaming time to the same, singular game (even playing FireRed or Ranch was essentially playing Pearl, since they all led to that destination). The only “problem” with this was that I was ignoring all of the other games I had been accumulating and dropping. Sure, I would hit up the new multiplayer games when friends were around (Mario Kart Wii, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, various other fighting games including the standard Capcom staples, etc.)… but no progress was being made in any single-player games. I just wasn’t getting any other experience. It was really bothering me, but at the same time, I told myself I was having fun and that’s all that really mattered in the end.

While I still stand by that justification, I have to say how wonderful it is to be playing some other games again. I’m somewhere around ten hours into Final Fantasy VI, and while I’m still waiting for that huge emotional impact to hit me, it’s fun to be playing none-the-less. That’s really all I’ve been able to put time into right now (with the upcoming wedding, and all) since I’m able to play it on-the-go (mostly during lunch at work), but I’m psyched to come home after the honeymoon and know I have so many other games (both new experiences and re-playings) waiting for my time…

WipEout HD (barely started), Super Mario RPG (re-play; in-progress), Ys Book 1 & II (not started), Shining Force II (re-play; not started), Soul Calibur IV (in-progress), DBZ: Burst Limit (in-progress), The World Ends With You (not started), Space Invaders Extreme (not started), Bioshock (not started)… Hell, I might even go back and play some more of Super Mario Galaxy, which I was having a ton of fun with but just suddenly dropped (classic Mike gaming).

I’ve already recorded something extra to stitch into the games-we’re-playing little mini-segment of episode four of the podcast, so maybe I’ll have a second stitch going in before I put up the episode in the next couple days!

Anyone else have it? Wanna play together? Add “VegettoEX” on PSN and drop me a line.

(Also downloaded Portal: Prelude, but it would help if I would go finish the original damn version of the game first. Only have, like, three levels left. Which takes about two minutes. Argh.)

In case you haven’t heard, we play the crap out of Rock Band. Constantly. It was like a part of me was dead on the inside when I had to send my 360 back for repairs and thus could not play Rock Band. One of the things we love about the game (series) is how amazing Harmonix has arranged the playable songs. There’s literally something for everyone. No matter what type of music you like (or think you like), there are a couple songs that you are dying to play on every single instrument.

I figured the three of us could take a couple minutes to jot down a Top 10 list, but in a different way from what we’ve done before. My list is going to be the Top 10 Emo Couch Songs In Rock Band. Admittedly, some of these are going to cross genres a little bit, but they’re all relatively part of the same scene (or evolutions over time). Both games are fair for this list, as well as all downloadable content.

10: AFI - “Girl’s Not Grey” (music video on YouTube)
What I like about the inclusion of this song is the style. It’s more aggressive than the majority of others in the same genre, but the vocals are of a different range, as well. It’s far from my favorite AFI album (that would probably be The Art Of Drowning), but it’s a logical and fun inclusion.

09: Jimmy Eat World - “The Middle” (music video on YouTube)
It was a pretty huge song, so it makes sense that it would eventually be whored out to all of the current-generation music games (it’ll also be popping up in Guitar Hero: World Tour and On Tour Decades). Every little bit of the song is fun to play; that brief pause after “It just…” totally makes you feel like a rock star.

08: Against Me! - “Stop!” (music video on YouTube)
It was literally just released as DLC this week, but it’s an awesome inclusion. It’s got a slightly funky drum beat to it, all of the parts are fun to play, and it’s a great song. I’m not even really sure what else to say about it. Don’t stop and take some time to think… just download it! Ugh, that was terrible.

07: 30 Seconds To Mars - “Attack” (music video on YouTube)
I don’t even particularly like this band, which is what really impressed me about the song. I threw it on a mix CD of songs from the game, and happened to really like what I heard. I absolutely loathed “The Kill”, and was shocked to find myself enjoying this one. I keep trying and trying to be able to do all of the singing and screaming parts of this song, but it’s just totally out of my range. I can’t do it. Grrrrr. Thankfully, it’s ridiculously fun on guitar and such, so it works out in the end.

06: All-American Rejects - “Move Along” (music video on YouTube)
The fact that I got Jeff to even remotely listen to a couple of this band’s songs is a testament to their catchiness. Their first album is probably the superior one in terms of hooks, but this particular song is a perfect inclusion. The opening drums are super fun once you get the hang of the pattern, and the vocals are at a perfect range for nearly anyone to sing.

05: Buzzcocks - “Ever Fallen In Love” (music video on YouTube)
I’ll admit that I actually didn’t know of this particular song until I heard Thursday’s cover of it. Their version is delivered quite differently in the vocals, but it’s amazing that you can sing it either way and it still works out perfectly in terms of scoring. The drums are really fun to play on this song, but my favorite part is easily the final “… ever fallen in love wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiith” at the end.

04: Paramore - “Crushcrushcrush” (music video on YouTube)
While “Misery Business” would have been our first choice of a Paramore song (which Guitar Hero: World Tour is getting), having this show up as DLC one day certainly wasn’t a bad thing. The drum part of this song is one of the easiest expert-level songs, which can really make you feel like you’re making progress with learning how to play. The vocals are deceptively difficult to get a good score on, mostly because you simply don’t have a lot of time to breathe in between lines!

03: Fall Out Boy - “Dead On Arrival” (music video on YouTube)
Those that were present the first evening that we had Rock Band will painfully remember my squawking along with Pete’s vocals on this one. Sorry. Take This To Your Grave is somewhat of a scene classic with its clever lyrics, and while this song is much more straight-forward than the rest, it was a great pick from the album. Bring in the (and I hate to use the phrase again) deceptively difficult instrument patterns (especially on drums) and you’ve got a winner.

02: Weezer - “El Scorcho” (music video on YouTube)
I’m a sucker for gang vocals. Add to that the fact that it’s in a party game which essentially obligates people to shout along? Sold. From the oft-forgotten album Pinkerton, this one’s another “easy” song in all areas, but its lyrics are so ridiculous and fun that it doesn’t matter. Definitely one of my staple performances, and one that I can actually 100% on hard-level vocals.

01: Dashboard Confessional - “Hands Down” (music video on YouTube)
When I heard that the game-titled tour was going to have a DLC pack in the future (and that Dashboard was a part of it), I was both excited and terrified. I was excited just to have some Dashboard music coming my way, but was terrified that it might be something much newer that I had no real attachment to. Reading that song title put a huge smile on my face, as does singing it every time. Chris always introduces the song as being about “the best day” he ever had, and I have absolutely no problem sharing in that with him every time we play the song.

How about you guys ‘n gals? What are you favorite couch songs? Jeff and Andrew… what are your lists going to be?

I’m about 2 hours into it.  It’s not flawless.  A few complaints, but they are admittedly nit-picky.  So far, Double Helix, so good.  I hope it continues to be this good.

Shining Force II is a game that I probably shouldn’t have a whole lot of familiarity with. As you probably heard in our first episode (and then on my personal Top 10 list), it was Final Fantasy VII that got me most interested in playing additional RPGs. A few years earlier, though, I dipped my toes into the pool with this game.

I actually didn’t own the game myself, but instead played it on the Sega Channel. I loved the game so much that I refused to save any other games from month-to-month, just in case Shining Force II disappeared for a little while.

(As an explanation, the Sega Channel was basically an on-demand gaming service offered by a couple cable TV providers in the mid 1990s. You rented a device from them, plugged it into the top of your Genesis, and plugged a cable cord into it. They refreshed games every month. There would be about 50 or so, and they would rotate in and out. A game may be there one month, gone the next, and then right back again the following month. However, you could only save one game at a time. If I wanted to play Shining Force II and keep my save indefinitely, I couldn’t save any other game.)

I won’t lie. What I really liked about the game was the cheat code that allowed you to control even the enemies. I couldn’t die. I could just breeze through the story and not worry about ever messing up. At the same time, though, there was a lot to love about the game. Whoever Motoaki Takenouchi is, their score was absolutely top-notch, and remains a favorite to this day (if you pay attention during podcast episodes, you may even see this love at work). From the blaring title screen music to the jazzy town music, it was all over the place in tone but had such a consistent feel to it.

The amount of characters was another thing I simply had never seen before in a game. What really flabbergasted me was using the aforementioned cheat code to also rename every single last character in the game… and then never actually getting around to meeting half of those characters. Holy crap!

The grid-based fighting system was also new to me, and something I still haven’t gotten myself back into ever again (never played any additional strategy/tactical RPGs).

Long story short, you are silly if you do not spend the measely 800 Wii Points to grab the game on Virtual Console. Even though the going price on eBay has come down over the last couple years, $8 is a steal. I can’t wait to re-live my junior high years with this game.

Once I get around to finishing Super Mario RPG, that is. Which I don’t have any time for right now. You know, getting married in two weeks and all.

Regardless of that fact, we have a podcast episode coming for you! That’s right… episode four should be making its way online sometime later this week. Half of it is going to be new material, and half of it is actually going to be recycled material… but only if you happen to have listened to a certain podcast episode on Daizenshuu EX a couple years ago. It’ll all make sense once it comes out!

You’re all familiar with buying used games, I’m sure. More often than not, we’re getting our used games from GameStop. Well, I’ve picked up two original Xbox games that did not come with the actual cover/spine slip. They look really ugly over on my game rack like that.

I was hoping someone out there might own copies of these games and be able to scan those covers (front / back / spine) for me!

The games in question are Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2X and Jet Set Radio Future / Sega GT 2002 (dual-pack).

Can anyone help?

There has already been a bunch of discussion about the whole thingie-ma-bob, despite the press event only happening within the last 24 hours (as of this writing, Nintendo has yet to hold their US press event). However, there are a couple very specific things that I wanted to bring to everyone’s attention.

The first item of interest is the removal of Slot 2 (the GameBoy Advance slot) on the DSi. As you no doubt heard from episode two of our podcast, the issue of backwards compatibility is of both major interest and apathy among us (depending on the system, games, etc.). A huge point we brought up was that Activision’s Guitar Hero: On Tour, as well as the upcoming On Tour Decades on November 18th, rely(ies) on Slot 2 to house and interact with the guitar frets attachment. Needless to say, these games will (theoretically) be completely unusable with the DSi.  I suppose it’s a good thing for Activision that they already got their Guitar Hero: On Tour & DS bundle out the door earlier this year, because that thing is looking more and more irrelevant as information comes out of Nintendo today.

This is yet another example supporting my personal belief that Nintendo has been one step behind where they should be with regards to… well, everything… since the Gamecube. I know, blasphemy, especially considering all the profit they are raking in. Hold on.

Microsoft realized and made it clear back with the original Xbox that digital distribution was going to be huge for conoles (even if you missed all of the other signs out there), but Nintendo really had no foresight for this. The Wii’s internal space was limited to microscopic levels (more on this in a bit), and the DS had Slot 2 to play actual GBA games.

Of course, you have to consider Nintendo’s approach during the DS’s launch. To them, it was their “third pillar” (main console / GameBoy line / the new DS). For the time, it was a brilliant move; if the DS failed, well, that wasn’t meant to be a replacement for the GameBoy line (right… with it having the GBA slot, and all), so no big loss! Luckily for them, the DS has become a global phenomenon. That Slot 2 is where it gets tricky, though. Would the (original) DS have taken off without it? Keep in mind that nearly every late GBA game was coming with little pamphlets showing you how you would be able to play them on a DS in a whole new light, so to speak.

My point is that if Nintendo really wanted to crank up the digital distribution and sell us GB/GBC/GBA games directly for our new DS, they should have cut Slot 2 out of the DS Lite. The DS was already popular, but the DS Lite is what really… how do I put this… oh, just insert an “it prints money” joke here. Now we have that device in what appears to be every-other-person’s hands no matter where you look, and the GBA slot is right there with them. I’m pulling some Wikipedia-research on you right now, but the numbers look like ~80 million GBAs, and ~77 DSes (so far). That means that there’s already a huge crossover with DS owners that probably have a nice little GBA game library kicking around somewhere. I’ve mentioned this on the show plenty of times: why would I re-pay for a game on a new format when I have the original cartridge sitting right over there?

Of course, there are plenty of reasons (as seen by my constant purchases of Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda games) with convenience and portability being the main ones. Nintendo is really going to have to prove to these millions upon millions of potential customers exactly why they need to re-pay for Super Mario World: Super Mario Advance 2 (on top of already paying for the original SNES version on Virtual Console, on top of still having the cartridge sitting in their Super Nintendo). Price is going to be a key factor, and one that I do not feel they have been particularly persuasive with. We know the DSi digital distribution pricing scheme will be between about $2 and $10, but there is no further clarification on what will be sold and for what price level.

How does Pokémon play into this, by the way? A huge deal with Diamond & Pearl was the fact that you could put all of your Generation III games (FireRed / LeafGreen / Ruby / Sapphire / Emerald) into Slot 2 and do all sorts of neat things (transfer the critters via Pal Park, mostly). How about future games? How are we going to be expected to transfer from Generation IV to Generation V? Will we need two DS systems?

That also brings to mind what I call Nintendo’s “tethering” to the DS. If you play certain games (and especially if you go online with those games), you will notice that the games tell you that your system and game are being considered a single entity now, and will need to be used together exclusively. For the most part, this presents no problems other than ending up with a new friend code if you decide to upgrade from a DS to a DS Lite, for example. For games like Pokémon, though, it gets a little more difficult. I actually do not know the full extent of it, so perhaps you all can help me. What are the ramifications for taking a Generation IV game to a new system? If I start playing it on a DS Lite instead of my old DS, will My Pokémon Ranch recognize that it is still the same game? Will I be locked out of transferring back my little guys? It may not be the same system + game combo, but gosh darn it, it is still the same cartridge!

Finishing off my backwards compatibility ranting and raving is the whole idea of the “Wii de Asobu” (Play On/For Wii) series. Just like Capcom did with Resident Evil 4, but actually applying a brand to it, Nintendo is going to re-releasing a bunch of Gamecube games with enhanced Wii-specific controls. You don’t get to play a new Pikmin game, but you sure get to play the old one… with Wii controls! In all honesty, this actually sounds like it could be pretty interesting. Metroid Prime fans are probably salivating at the thought of re-playing the first two games with the Prime controls. Imagine going back and playing Wind Waker with the Wii’s Twilight Princess controls; while they may not have been as necessary or appropriate as the Metroid Prime control evolution, going back to non-Wiimote+Nunchuck for Zelda can be a little off-putting. This is pretty ingenious on Nintendo’s part, in that they (once again) get to charge you (once again) for playing the exact same game (once again) only slightly differently.

You will notice I am ignoring all the things like the internal cameras, further embellishing on the SD card slot, downloadable web browser, music playing, etc. These are all the expected next-steps for Nintendo, and I honestly just do not have a lot to say about any of them.

The last thing I did want to address is Nintendo’s admission that there is insignificant storage space available on the Wii, and that they will be utilizing the SD card slot to solve this problem in Spring 2009. I have spoken before about my experiences with having to clear out the fridge, so I will not bother going into it in-depth again. It would not surprise me if it was Nintendo’s arrogance that got them into this situation, though. They honestly believed that there would not be any storage problem, and they honestly believed that moving things to and from (rather than executing directly off of) an SD card was sufficient. That would be perfectly fine… if they weren’t also selling us Nintendo 64 games, Turbo-CD games, and WiiWare games. Especially with the latter, it was probably quite shocking for them to realize that the less-than-512 MB really isn’t enough to actively use the system for what they’re now intending it to be used for. The SD card slot is really the most simple solution, and I am thoroughly glad (and relieved) to see them utilize what is actually right there inside the system, rather than pushing more useless white plastic our way.

So what about you all? What are your thoughts on everything? It was certainly a lot to wake up to this morning, that’s for sure.

You have probably heard on the show our little story about the Neo-Geo Pocket Color. If not, the short version is that Andrew picked one up our senior year of high school (1999-2000), and suddenly it became a little cult hit in our area. At least half a dozen people seemed to have one within the next week, which… if I’m doing my math correctly… accounts for at least 98% of the installed base of the system, in total, globally.

I’m kidding, I’m kidding. But seriously. Weird.

We all played the crap out that little system and its games. Remember that at this time, the newest handheld we had going for us was… what?… the GameBoy Color…? The GBA wouldn’t see a release for another two years or so, and before the NGPC, we were trading Pokeymanz (yes, seniors in high school were playing that game… in calculus) and not a whole lot else.

I actually didn’t pick up the system right away, for whatever reason. I guess I just played Andrew’s constantly. Needless to say, the system didn’t last all that long, and it soon became very cheap and very unheard-of. I finally picked up my own system the following year during my freshman year of college. If I remember correctly, every couple of months Amazon was getting in some overstock that they were selling off at a bargain price. I believe that I grabbed the system (packed in with Sonic the Hedgehog: Pocket Adventure) for $30. Not a bad deal!

Since then, the system has mostly sat in its box over on my shelf, with the occasional break-out to show wide-eyed friends a handheld console that they had never seen before in their lives. As much as we loved the darn thing for the few months that it was the new-hotness, that love seemed to mostly be in memory and not quite in practice.

One of the games that we played the Hell out of, though, was (and this should be no surprise if you’ve been following along with us) SNK vs Capcom: Match of the Millennium. Being the actual first game in the SvC/CvS series, it was quite a novelty! The controls were spot on, the dialog was hilarious, the unlockables were wonderful, the music was amazing… it’s shocking to me that they didn’t port this over to GBA!

Well, I finally picked up my own copy of the game at Anime Weekend Atlanta last month. It cost me $30 (omglolz price I paid for the system), but I don’t have to iron out my plan to steal it from Andrew, anymore.

It was quite a trip playing an old favorite like this game. It’s one of those games that you continue to quote long into your adult life (for example, “Gwwwaaa! I can’t stop me!” and “It’s Mai Time!” are NGPC staples). While I thoroughly enjoyed getting back into it, the DS and PSP (especially the DS Lite and PSP-2000) have really spoiled us all when it comes to handheld screens. It’s better than the old GameBoy systems, but unless you’re in perfect lighting, it’s damn well near impossible to see what you’re doing. It doesn’t do the actual graphics any justice, and that’s such a shame. I’d love a DS port of this little bugger… so long as I can also get one of those little clicky, faux-analog nubs to place over my d-pad, as well…

Note that I’m not really the biggest RHCP fan in the world. In fact, I don’t really like them that much at all. Especially over the last few albums, I feel that it’s VERY much turned into a monotonous string of the same music over and over. Does that say something for Anthony’s getting clean? I dunno. But that’s not really what I’m here to talk about.

“Under the Bridge” is one of those new-classic-rock songs, having been one of the most played songs of the early 1990s… and quite frankly, being amazing. I was still a kid/teen in the early 1990s, and so I have the same rememberings and fascination with the song that, perhaps, songs from bands like The Who and such are for an older generation.

Needless to say, I hopped right on Xbox LIVE this morning to grab the song. It’s not like I was going to have any time to play it before work, but it’s the principle of the matter… I like knowing it’s sitting there already on my hard drive, ready to play when I eventually get home (have a meeting with the DJ for our wedding after work today, so my playing is getting delayed even further :P).

Clicked to download. 1%. Ran off to cook breakfast. Came back. 1%. Raised an eyebrow. Sound effect and notice that it failed to keep a connection and I would have to re-download. Huh. Tried again. Same end result. Signed off and back on. All other internets working. Tried again. Same end result.

Here’s hoping we don’t have another Moving Pictures-style “technical difficulties” issue, and it’s all resolved by the time I get home tonight…

Anyone else have any issues? How about you PS3 rockers?

Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood (DS) and Silent Hill: Homecoming (PS3/360) are both out this week. Are you picking up either of them? What’s your interest level in them? I know you were aprehensive about the new Silent Hill after watching some previews of it.