The Dashboard, Psychonaughts and You

So Microsoft have released their newest update for the 360 Dashboard to a surprisingly mixed reception. People everywhere are praising and criticising many of the new features which include:

• Friends list sharing
• Reshuffled Marketplace
• Marketplace Featured Downlods
• Xbox Originals as Downloads

Well, I will admit that the new Marketplace seems a bit crowded, almost an Xbox Live Bazaar, but the features on offer are brilliant. One of the not-so-noted changes includes great functionality fixes which make the whole dashboard seem to run much smoother (including the ingame menu).

Xbox originals are surprisingly awesome though, even if I feel like I am being forced to buy a bigger HD to make use of it. I’ve downloaded the decent Crimson Skies and the awesome Psychonaughts.

I’m not sure if we’ve mentioned it before, but it’s a game you have to play. Stylistically you can’t beat it, functionally its a fairly decent platformer which will just weird you out. One has to wonder if it’s doing long term damage to your eyes.

Its essentially just [Platformer] + [Psychotropic Drugs] + [Genius Game Designer]

Anyway, i’m tempted by Fahrenheit, but I’m not 100% sure >_>

WSAV has been posting the MUGEN videos (or more specifically Mark has been) and i’ve been somewhat active. Expect more from me when I get the cables I need for my Dazzle. Untill then Legend of ET is on a part-hiatus untill I get some art done.

Keep on Gaming,
James.

Ps. Awesome 20th Birthday yesterday Thanks to all those who came.

~ of the Year

Its nearing the end of 2007 and it’s about now that all sensible people with an ear to the industry start to consider who gets what accreditation, such as Game of the Year. Magazines do have a tendancy to do this on release for every 8+ Game (You know who you are) just for a chance to get themselves stamped all over the packaging … But they’re all douches and we know it.

Allow me to take a few liberties and say what my personal “~ Of the Year”s are:

• Person – Me. James. Hah.
• Dust gatherer – The Nintendo Wii
• Paperweight – The Playstation 3
• Letdown – PS3 Firmware 2.0
• Nonevent – Assassin’s Creed
• Timewaster – Madeline McCann
• Shock – America didn’t start any new wars for us
• Facistic Power Usurper – Gordon Brown
• Dickhole Forum Admin – Bin’jamin
• Comic Book Adaptation – 300
• Movie – American Gangster
• Most Hated Religion – Islam
• Rape Case - Warren Jeffs
• YouTuber - PaulsEgo
• Machinima - Ignus Solus[1]
• Innovative Game – Portal
• Tired Genre – JRPG
• Doorstop – PSP
• Format – DVD
• Disease – Bird Flu (Pretend Flu more like)
• RPG – Mass Effect
• Shooter - Call of Duty 4 / HL2: Ep / Team Fortress
• Multiplayer Game - Call of Duty 4 / Team Fortress/ Halo 3
• Developer – Valve / BioWare / Irrational
• Game – I can’t honestly say. Maybe Mass Effect? Maybe (surprisingly) Call of Duty? Not Halo 3 thats for sure.

One brief note, no videos yet … Be patient. Mass Effect review up on Xbox Elite.

Regards,
James.

Bantery – 02/11/2007

I apologise for the sudden stoppage of updates, you can ask Mark why he hasn’t really posted in a while, but I’ve actually got plenty I want to write about including a few movie reviews. Keep an eye out for the following:

A Blacksheep Review, The Kingdom Review, a Saw IV Review, a Bioshock Review, a Halo 3 Review and a Team Fortress Re-review.

In fact; if Mark, Rob or Icefox (presuming he still wants to be affiliated with us) is reading this and wants to do any of the last three, go right ahead.

Now for a word about Mass Effect. W00P! Now for a few more; I have a general principle concerning upcoming titles: Don’t get into the hype. By doing this you minimalise the damage done by overhyped poor titles plus you don’t feel like you’re constantly waiting.

I have however betrayed this principle by allowing myself to get into Mass Effect, I am all too aware of the pitfalls of their design ethos though. I know when they say “Galaxy to explore” they mean a dozen to two dozen depending on the scale on the project. When they say “Explore Planets” what they really mean is visit a few important locations on each … At least, thats what I’ve come to expect.

They could completely shock me and pull off something massive, but I’m going to maintain a fairly conservative series of expecations. I’m sure its going to rock, but i’m not sure its going to be the legendary uber-RPG. And since this is pretty much it before EA makes Bioware churn out “The Sims D&D Edition” I guess i’ll have to enjoy it while it lasts.

I have also ordered “Scene It!” which I’m not entirely proud of. At the same time, I’m a movie fanatic and I really thoroughly enjoyed the demo. So fuck you. Plus, Buzzers ftw.

Regards,
JamesR.

Spore IS Coming

Kotaku reports today that it is only six-months untill the eagerly awaited God-sim Spore is released. They do not specifically comment on platform releases however.

We were told not too long ago that 360 and PS3 versions of the Game were still in development, whereas a PC (and likely DS) version were already complete and ready for release. I would expect that 360 and PS3 gamers are still looking at early 2008 release for their versions.

Purely speculation though, they might have used all that man-power EA has absorbed to create the ports ultra quickly.

Personally, I won’t likely get it for PC unless i’m assured my piece of crap laptop will run it.

I want it and I have wanted it for a long time now, but I would rather wait then play it on a machine worthy of it.

So yes, rest assured that it is coming, albeit slowly.

Regards,
JamesR.

The Orange Box

As I write the end-song to Portal is playing, its now over two days since I purchased The Orange Box and I must say it is everything I had expected, more so in some places. Here’s a brief summary of what I mean:

Half Life 2 & Episode 1 with full commentary in decent graphics is awesome enough, I was expecting at least Deathmatch to make an appearence, but that is alright.

We can break the rest of ‘TOB’ into three pieces, “The Story – Episode 2″, “The Gimmick – Portal” and “The Multiplayer – Team Fortress 2″. Lets talk about Episode 2.

I must admit, the first sections of Episode 2 were extraordinariliy dull. Tunnel after tunnel, cave after cave and filled with those annoying as hell Acid Antlions. A good hour or so in I was wondering when it was really going to start. It started to warm up a bit, as we progressed onto the next series of puzzles involving acquiring a vehicle.

As soon as you get said vehicle it is a whole different game. Open spaces, grand fights and decent numbers of fucking combine. Something the first half of the game seemed fairly devoid of, much to my dismay.

I don’t want to spoil the end of the episode for you, or any of the relevant plot, but rest assured you will not be disappointed. Shock, awe and rage will ensue at various intervals and the “Epic” fight everyone is talking about is good and reasonably difficult. Not COD epic, but definitely epic enough.

Lets talk about Team Fortress 2 a bit. Although, so far, there isn’t a lot I can say about it. You see, 360 users are getting the shaft because of lag and lack of activity at the moment. We are assured a patch is on the way, theres just Microsoft certification left to do.

What I have seen is good though; Sharp stylistic graphics, dynamic and interesting gameplay (not to disimilar to some Ultimate game of Trumps) and interesting map design. Although, its a shame 2Forts is the most played map, because it is arguably not the best.

Balance is an issue though (pre-patch remember) as I think Scouts for one, and Heavy Gunners /w Medics are so ridiculously overpowered. The scout’s advantage may well diminish as latency problems improve, but as things currently stand they can be almost impossible to hit. As for HG + Medic, his high HP and brute force fire power, coupled with the almost overpowered Medic healing gun make him not only a force to contend with, but a practically invulnerable one.

Now, I have left the best (or at least my favourite) till last. Portal. It’s produced by the students who brought you Narbacular Drop (I would hope you’ve tried it by now) and were hired into Valve to produce a similar game in their uber engine.

So far, so good. Uber principle, uber engine. Now the problem with a game with so much potential, is that it will often go wasted. Heck, email me if you want a list of examples. And for the first half dozen or so levels I laughed plenty but admittedly, I wasn’t challenged or particularly intrigued.

Soon enough, it became much more challenging, but you overcome them if you are persistent. You see, the key is in the trailer; You really need to think with Portals. Once you learn how they think you will follow suit soon enough.

Even though I wasn’t expecting much plot besides “I’m an AI – Watch me torture you to death” I was pleasantly surprised. It was entertaining and evocative at the same time. This game MUST be played. Now. By everyone.

Now for a bit of General chatter: The Orange Box is easily worth £40, realistically I would purchase it all for a princely sum of £100~ (if you threw in HL:DM, CS:S and DoD:S) but such is the nature of Valve that they’ll give you pretty much everything.

Sure, I already own HL2 & Episode 1, but why not own it on a 360? With full Commentary? And no Render problems? Ultimately though, PC gamers have a distinct advantage thanks to community maps et al. The true power of the source engine has nothing to do with Valve, but their modding community.

In the future, when my budget catches up with my PC, I will purchase Episode 2, Portal, TF2, L4D, etc again and it will get an even higher score than i’m about to give you simply thanks to the modding community.

Episode 2: 8.8/10
Portal: 9.5/10
TF2: 7.0/10

I Say “The Orange Box is everything I love about Valve.”
One word: Full-Life
It’s: Portal > Half Life 2 > Team Fortress 2
It’s not: Tired > Moddable > Finished yet

Score: 96%

20 Important Things to know about the Wii

1. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
2. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
3. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
4. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
5. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
6. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
7. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
8. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
9. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
10. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
11. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
12. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
13. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
14. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
15. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
16. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
17. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
18. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
19. IT’S A FUCKING GIMMICK!
20. It’s for kids, and you should be embarrassed to play it.

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Sony! You’re a bit Fat Phoney!

If you keep up with WSAG you’ll know we don’t tend to Lampoon Sony so much as the Wii anymore, but don’t worry Kids, that doesn’t mean we’ve forgiven them.

But picking on the PS3 is like “Playing swing ball with a couple of quadruple amputees” (to borrow a Yahtzeeism) because they just keep digging and digging. Stories of removing backwards compatibility, losing exclusives and even recently HD-DVD was looking very strong against Bluray.

They have finally done something right though, by listening to their customers. A Radical policy change. The sale of “Budget” (£300 lol) PS3s in the UK is set to start soon with the 40GB Models hitting shelves. £300 is pretty good if you fancy just dismantling and reselling the parts for Profit, the Bluray drive has got to be worth £300 on its own on eBay.

However, since they’re losing credibility, Game delays are becoming more common and they’re ditching backwards compatibility, is £300 still too much?

I can’t find confirmation, but based in articles I’ve been reading recently, its likely that they will take out all hardware backwards compatibility (and will unlikely pursue software based) … So basically you’ll have to go and buy another PS2, to get the functionality of the Original PS3s. Doesn’t sound like a price drop at all to me!

I urge you to think before you buy! £300 might seem like a reasonable amount, especially considering you might have retarded friends who paid silly money for theirs – But you will not be getting the same product as them! Sony have been doing everything they can to cut corners with Hardware, so think before you invest! (Just get a 360 for Crying out loud!)

On a side note, whats with Heavenly Sword? Are people seriously going to buy God of War again for the privilege of playing it as a Chick? Only Sony would try and sell their fans the same game twice. Like that new Manraider >_>

Regards,
James.

Ps. Whoever found us whilst searching for “Cortana Porn” or any variant thereof, seriously, get a life.

Nintendo Insult You

Perrin Kaplan, Vice President, Marketing & Corporate Affairs for Nintendo of America, Inc. claims that:

“A major insight that Nintendo had early on was that they saw that gamers were getting bored, even though they didn’t know it yet…”

Wanker. Complete Wanker. And everybody who thinks the Wii is revolutionary is a cunt. Connecting a flash game up to your TV is not revolutionary, you twatsacks, even if you are the first to think of it. You’re the first to fucking think of it because it’s a SHIT idea, not a revolutionary one.

Pretty much every fucking REAL game with REAL fucking developers that I’ve played in the last five years is better and far more entertaining than yet another FUCKING GAME ABOUT MARIO DOING SHIT YOU’VE DONE A MILLION TIMES OVER in games made by small/one-man groups of people for the INTERNET. In fact that’s doing the creators of flash games a disservice, because their games are far superior in every way except for graphics, and that only counts if you say 3D graphics are better than 2D ones, which they fucking aren’t. I guess you don’t understand the internet, or you’d have a decent fucking online service and wouldn’t say so much completely insulting garbage, you spastics.

Halo 3, for example, was about three million times better than anything you can produce. Ever. So stop masturbating in our faces about your undeserved sales and get on with finishing those  already late games for your Mario fantasizing fanboys.

Fuck Perrin Kaplan. And fuck each and every one of you dickheads who bought a Wii and will probably agree with what he says because you’re a mindless cock-sucking drone.

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I’m Sick of PC Fanboys

If there is one thing you learn, when you venture forth onto mainstream gaming forums, its that of all the fanboys in existence the single worst group of inbred mongoloids you’ll come accross are the PC Fanboys.

What is a Pc Fanboy?

Urban dictionary was surprisingly little help when I entered the term for search, I received a fairly large sample of results, the following being the highest ranked:

Hermit
In addition to the standard definition, a ‘Hermit’ is a slang term for a PC afficionado. This definition is mainly used on the System Wars forum of Gamespot.

PC Gaming
PC gaming is a form of gaming superior to console games in graphics, performance, and control.

Often called ‘Dead’ by console fanboys, PC gaming is growing back into the mainstream, due to casual hits such as World of Warcraft and Counter-Strike.

Expensive, and needs to be upgraded slightly every year or two, all games are made on PCs, and true gaming is done on one.

As you can see, the bias is pretty strong – you will see a “System Wars” mentioned. I remember a day when that would’ve meant PC vs Mac, or Nintendo vs Sony, but now it seems the entire Console Market is at war with the PC Market.

A PC Fanboy then, is defined not only as a Fanboy heavily biased in favour of the “Father” platform over the Consoles, but also believe that all Gaming hinges on the very existence of PCs. Eight years ago this was more of a fact as most of the famous publishers of today have their roots in “Bedroom” programming.

Why do they Claim Superiority?

For a PC Fanboy, the entire console market is the retarded cousin of real video gaming. End of. They believe that Gaming started, progressed and will end with the PC Platform. As part of this narrow point of view, they believe that everything and anything developed for the console market is flawed.

Why Flawed I hear you ask … Because PC did it first. The way a PC Fanboy wins his arguments is by pulling out the “Yeah but, [this title] did it first and better!” argument, one I am familiar with.

They are right about one thing though, PC Gaming is where it all begun on any real degree. Without those bedroom coders, gaming may well not exist as we know it today, also they have a particularly potent point when highlighting what came first on the PC.

You need only look at titles like Deus Ex, Half Life, , most Simulators, etc. that were PC exclusively until some shoddy half-port dribbled their way onto the consoles.

The Truth According to Me

PC Gamers try to spread such viral hate against Consoles for two reasons:

1) PC Gaming is becoming unfashionable due to the obscene cost of keeping your PC up to spec and compatible for any given title.

2) PC Gaming is the route of most casual gaming, which they themselves claim is killing gaming.

Womg! How can I justify that one? I’ll tell you how, The Internets. A true casual gamer isn’t the one who plays Halo one hour every other day … or the person who spends 70 Hours a week playing Zuma … But rather the person who checks Addicting Games or Newgrounds when they’re bored.

PC Fanboys fail to realise that its their platform alone which is really the “Casual” Platform. For all our kiddy console games … our Barbie Dreamhorse Adventures and such, there is probably 50 PC Kiddy Games and 100 Flash games you could be playing.

So i’m telling you now, I love my PC. I love PC Gaming, but seriously … For fucks sake.

Shut the Hell up with your childish pointless superiority complex. Unless you’re insulting the Wii.

Regards,
James.

Mass Effect: In Da Hood!

EA is proud to announce the next game in the Mass Effect series – IN DA HOOD!

Play the role of Commander Shepard, the famous black space soldier, as he travels back in time to engage in illegal street races and drug deals!

With a bumping Soundtrack with contributions by artists such as 50 Cent, Sean Paul, The Game, Snoop Dogg and Gwen Stefani, this is the game to own in 2008!

————–

James made the point that somebody should sue EA for monopolising gaming and he might be right.

Fuck EA.

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