Shauntu شان

(1st Timer) Art Style: PiCTOBiTS (DSiWare): I have played quite a few different ‘action puzzle’ games (Tetris style and beyond) as well as a lot of ‘Match 3+’ style puzzle games (my favorite being the RPG hybrid, Puzzle Quest). The Art Style series of WiiWare/DSiWare games seems to have a fair number of original experiments with the Match 3+ style of action puzzle games, which is a genre normally well suited to the casual gamer. Not PiCTOBiTS, however – this one is through and through a hardcore game. The base gameplay is the most unique in this genre yet – you use your stylus to pick up different color bits and place them in the path of falling blocks in order to form vertical or horizontal or rectangular sets of the same color, which thus clears them from the stage; any falling blocks that get obstructed otherwise or reach the bottom however turn into extra bits for you to use as ‘ammo’. You have a ‘Last In First Out’ queue as well, where bits you pick up are stored ready for you to place them, and a POW block, which you can hit to clear out a large amount of leftover bits (as well as flatten the remaining floating in the way back to the ground), however doing so decreases the size of your queue – you can always spend coins earned within the stage to regain the queue spot, or use the POW repeatedly until you only have a queue size of 1. Unlike most games in this genre, each stage has a completion point, once enough bits have been cleared of each color (forming animated 8-bit sprites from the NES era of games as the reward for the hardcore gamers!). The stages color themes, backgrounds, and even music relate back to those NES games as well. Overall, one of the hardest Match 3+ game I have yet played that is still simple to actually play and also fun and intense when playing. After debating between this and Plants vs Zombies, I chose PiCTOBiTS as my Game of the Month.

Valkyria Chronicles (PS3): Some fantasy aspects are entering the story now, with an enemy character, invincible, went against us and made for a difficult stage. The cutscenes, mostly talking heads, are interesting when they stick to the plot – but there is too much time spent with the main character talking about nature still.

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon (DS): After losing my Dragon in Ch 18, in Ch 19 I appear to have failed to recruit another Dragon! I didn’t get any more thieves, so have been getting by using keys and Marth’s Fire Emblem, which can open chests. I also took the suggestion from the developers to soldier on regardless of how many people you lose by continuing to play after failing the objective of a mission – to retrieve an object needed to defeat some baddie in the future (an enemy thief stole it and ran off, if you can believe it). I also lost 5 characters in Ch 20, including the heroine Caeda, and still played on!

ExciteBots: Trick Racing (Wii): I got through the initial cups, and purchased the Mantis, which is a cool if heavy and big bot. I also played some of the mini-games, getting S in the Red Bar and Rail Song ones.

Rhythm Heaven (DS): I got further through the game, and encountered my favorite minigame yet – where you play these drums in the same style as at the Asian Festival last month. I did pretty good at that.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (DS): I played more, concentrating on the missions, and started seeing the point in the seemingly juvenile dialog in the beginning – it’s intended as ironic humor to see all the gang bosses with low IQs. The game did become more enjoyable, and I have to admit that somehow, the drug dealing aspect of the game makes it better than it otherwise would be.

Maboshi’s Arcade (WiiWare): Farah and I played this together, each on our separate sections of the screen. While the game is enjoyable, the multiplayer doesn’t really have much affect on each other’s games though.

Super Punch-Out!! (Wii VC – SNES): Aran Ryan may be difficult, as I can’t figure out a weakness for him, but I can still beat him. The crazy Japanese after him with the long hair with the mirage dance, though, seems impossible.

Personal Trainer: Cooking (DS): Farah and I used it to make Lasagna together, including making Bolognese sauce and Béchamel sauce. It was a lot of fun to make it together, and the end result was very good as well, best lasagna we have had. Off course, Farah had something to do with it, as she changed the recipe from the instructions, adding some green chile and crushed peppers to the Bolognese sauce! Meanwhile, after making the Bolognese sauce, an old Game & Watch game, Chef, got unlocked for spending time with while using the timer and waiting for stuff to cook. I tried it out, and it was really really basic – move your guy between 3 spots to flip food back in the air. Not really much of a time waster.

Wii Fit (Wii): Using Wii Fit in conjunction with EA Sports Active – for some reason, I guess EA decided they didn’t want to duplicate the weight/BMI tracking included in Wii Fit.

(1st Timer) Bonsai Barber (WiiWare): The best haircut simulation game ever. Also probably the only. Though your customers are vegetables and fruits, and the hair is foliage (which regrows if you sprinkle water in it). There is a surprising amount of fun and depth here… trimmers remove leafs only, while scissors remove branches (including leaves on the branches). The customers have all sorts of unusual haircut requests, including asking for coloring their leaves. Farah and I are both really enjoying it. Brain Age style, the game limits you to 5 customers a day, so you can’t experience everything in the game in a short time.

(1st Timer) Plants vs Zombies (PC): Having loved the demo, discussed below, I bought it off Steam to continue. One drawback is that I had to start from scratch (I suppose I could have transferred the save files…). I can certainly see now that the early stages that were more tutorial oriented are feeling slower paced and easy. But the game is still fun and the zombies are still hilarious. Did I mention the Zombie wearing Ducky Inflators to be able to float in the pool? Or the Pole Vaulting Zombie who can thus skip over one plant (thus overcoming Wall-Nuts, for e.g.) in the path?

(1st Timer) New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat (Wii): This Wii-make of the GC game, which originally controlled uniquely with the Bongo drum controllers, has been adapted to use the analog stick to move, A button to jump and downward swinging to punch and clap. The game has been modified from the original, however. As an example, the ‘clap’ no longer covers a full circle around Kong – but rather, provides a directional vibration controlled by the analog stick. I completed the first 3 stages (each stage actually containing 2 levels and a boss) in my first sitting and had fun.

(1st Timer) Mr. Wong’s Laundromat (PC): This simple flash based web game is part of the Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown War social club experience; money and maybe extras collected in it can be synced to transfer to the DS game. Unfortunately, the actual flash game is pretty basic and not much fun – all you do is move left and right collecting cash and other stuff while avoiding clothing as they fall out of the laundry machines.

(1st Timer) Game & Watch Collection (DS): This was a freebie, chosen from a list of rewards from the Club Nintendo site. It has 3 old Game & Watch games in it – the bug spray one is too basic/boring, the oil panic one is rather difficult, but the Donkey Kong one is awesome. I am sure some nostalgia is involved here, as I used to have that exact Game & Watch game when I was young, but the controls for the (not at all like Mario) hero as he climbs up and uses a crane to cause Donkey Kong to fall have perfect response and the game is still fun after all this time.

(1st Timer) Rag Doll Kung Fu: Fists of Plastic (PSN): I downloaded this in a PSN promotion for free; it’s basically a fighting game where you fight more than 1 opponent at a time from a 2D perspective – kind of like Smash Bros, but without the arena fallouts gameplay. The actual controls are weird though, with both the character movement being stilted and floaty and the attacks seeming to have random range, specially picking up weapons. It was interesting to see it make use of the Sixaxis motion controls for some moves though – that’s pretty rare on the PS3!

(1stTimer) Halo Wars (360): After playing the demo, I played the full game via rental. I made it to the 8th stage, though I had to dial the difficulty down to Easy on the stage with the giant enemy stationary spider cannon, after having lost the mission 3 times – the last time with probably only a couple seconds of fire still left to defeat it. Anyways, I loved the technology in the game, the level designs and the terrain is just awesomely created in the engine. The controls are slightly better than Red Alert 3 on the consoles, but would still be much better on the PC. The story and characters is where the game loses though, as its just not at all interesting up till the 8th mission.

(1st Timer) Boom Blox Bash Party (Wii): A sequel that does almost everything the original did, and then improves upon it – almost. The mechanics are the same and new play styles have been introduced, like slingshots, virus blocks and balls, multiple shapes, Match 3 style modes with paint balls, and a truly extensive co-op mode. The level editor is now fully capable, with an online upload/download server that can stream new stages whenever you want to play something new. The only drawbacks are that the Quick Sample mode is now restricted to a random 3 stages of the same type (whereas in the first you would get 8 or so completely random stages of various game types), and there is no longer any semblance of a story for the solo stages (which had helped give some charm to the original).

(1st Timer) EA Active Sports (Wii): Farah picked this up after reading about it, and we both started using it. It’s not as much ‘fun’ as Wii Fit, with no ‘take a break’ mini-games for example, but it tracks calories and has full workout sets created, with minimal interludes between exercises. It also has a 30 Day Challenge mode to the workout, where a full month’s set of workouts gets scheduled for you, which can be a good motivator. It comes with a Resistance Band and a Leg Strap to hold the nunchuk in some exercises, and it also supports the Balance Board for some exercises.

(1st Timer) Punch Out!! (Wii): This game brings the 15 year old Punch Out!! NES title to the current, 3D generation perfectly, with perfect animation and attitude for the opponent boxers that you face. The gameplay is also completely like the original, though to mix things up you can optionally use motion controls for punching and the balance board for dodging. I got through my first few fights easily, but had my first loss from Bear Hugger, followed by Great Tiger who beat me up many times (while speaking very good Urdu). Aran Ryan meanwhile was hilarious as a crazy Irish boxer. I have gotten up to Bald Bull, and the game has become pretty tough. I also tried out the Exhibition mode, which is a cool set of extra challenges per boxer, though these can be pretty tough even for the easier boxers.

DEMOS:

Plants vs. Zombies (PC): Learning that PopCap released their latest major new game and demo, and recalling having really enjoyed Peggle, I gave the Trial a shot. A couple of hours later, the demo finally stopped me from progressing, having played 35 stages and 3 minigames. It’s a relatively simple game concept, based around the Tower Defense genre, where the enemy is various types of Zombies (including Thriller Michael Jackson dancers, among other hilarious designs) and your towers are plants and mushrooms (only usable at night). Unlike some other Tower Defense games, the enemies come in a straight path (normally 6 paths), and your plants are directly placed on those paths and are thus eaten along the way. I really enjoyed it, and then when I saw it is $10 on Steam, I bought it!

Defense Grid (PC): Another Tower Defense style PC game, though I found this one rather generic – tiny futuristic enemies come along a path to steal something from the center of your map, then try to leave with it, and you place various types of gun towers along the way to kill them.

Up (DS): Some game based on an upcoming Disney Pixar movie; the demo was pretty crappy, showing us control 2 characters with poor control trying to defeat an alligator with poor hit detection.

Knights in the Nightmare (DS): I was saddened to see that all the demo included was a portion of the game’s tutorial. It really seemed like the tutorial was only scratching the surface of this completely new idea of a game. Apparently, you control a wisp – a spirit guide to the hero’s. As the hero’s fight in the top screen, you move your wisp around using the touch screen to guide them into where to attack and optionally with what skill, grabbing gems that fall out of defeated enemies to recharge the skill meter, changing the mode of the game between Law and Chaos to keep the gems coming in high numbers, and avoiding spirit world bullets that the enemies emanate. I would have liked to try out the gameplay more, but I have no idea from the demo if the actual game is going to be actually good or not.

Puffins: Island Adventure (DS): This feels like an attempt by someone to try to do a mini-golf style game without the golf, and without any Monkey Ball type tilting. Instead you slingshot your egg around the map, which takes damage when it hits things. Which is the stupidest game design ever as it means you are discouraged from trying any fancy banking etc. That makes for a boring game demo.

Ninja Blade (360): Take Ninja Gaiden and mix in ridiculously prevalent Quick Time Events, and you get this absurdity, which continuously mixes in the action with cutscenes and Quick Time Events where you have to press the right button or – you don’t die, but rather time resets and the Event repeats over and over again until you get the button press right. Is that supposed to be gameplay?

Arkanoid LIVE! (XBLA): I used to like Arkanoid once, on the old black and white Game Boy. Now, I am no longer sure, as this demo was boring to play. There doesn’t seem to be any skill left – the ball and paddle are too small to have any strategy, random enemies that float about deflecting the ball make it worse, and there was actually a period of time once where the ball just banged back and forth between 2 indestructible blocks, wasting my time.

Space Invaders Extreme (XBLA): This old school looking game turns out to be rather new after all, with fancy weapons like the laser that can wipe out a column in one shot, as well as constant and challenging action that is also fun.

Halo Wars (360): I played the first stage of the Tutorial, and my first comment is how beautiful Ensemble’s engine has gotten, full of detail in closeups and quite the interesting terrain affects.

Uno Rush (XBLA): An odd variation of Uno, where you can see everybody’s card – solving the problem of how to let multiple people play in the same room. The pacing is really fast and after a multi-round game, I never won any rounds due to the mix of fast speed and random luck.

R-Type Dimensions (XBLA): Seems to be a remake of a retro game or two, which is all the trend nowadays. I played the endless mode, and died quite a few times in the single stage available in the demo. The game seems designed with maximum player death in mind, so for casual play you lose all sense of achievement.

Miami Law (DS): It seems this game follows a storyline interrupted by various minigames. The 2 minigames in the demo weren’t anything special or fun though.

Haze (PS3): Good looking FPS game that is exclusive to the PS3, developed by Free Radical, whose Timesplitters series I had a fondness for. The game looks and plays fairly well in the demo, but doesn’t really stand out in any way. Pity about Free Radical getting shut down due to the bad reviews and sales this game got.

Super Stardust HD (PSN): While I have played this before, I played it again just to have some fun. Its a pretty neat space shooter, kind of like a distant cousin of Asteroids.

Over the weekend, I turned on Animal Crossing to get my Friend Code to send to a co-worker. 2 hours later, I was still playing, and realized that the biggest reason why Animal Crossing works is due to how charming it can be. My animal neighbors all commented on me being missing for 5 months. Twiggy roped me into a game of Hide & Seek, getting 2 other animals into the action – I managed to find them all within the 15 minute time limit. I did get a delivery errand, but they provided context, having an animal talk about 2 others having a fight, then having one of them ask me to deliver a present to make amends. Bill the Duck decided to nickname me Big Bro, and later tried to get a compliment on his idea – once I shot him down, he started crying (but pretended that it was just sweat from the eyes). Some also commented on my hair, which was very misshapen – one called it bed head style from sleeping for 5 months. Heh.

Meanwhile, Sydney couldn’t find his key, and strongly hinted it got dropped in the river, but I tried fishing and only caught fish. I also caught a lot of different butterflies, and donated both to the museum. I sent my co-worker a mail from within the game to his Wii System Board, which is a cool feature, then went on my first trip to the City – with Rover on the bus along the way verifying whether I wanted WiiConnect24 to be enabled (for automatic sharing of data between friends, and without friend codes). The city was interesting, picked up a bubbles blower that Alisha loved, and learned how to emote anger at the theatre. Also got a makeover, and can now switch to looking like my Mii at will. Finally, Gracie’s store is a ripoff. I did put up an umbrella for auction at the auction house though.

Later at night, I turned on the game again to put in my co-worker’s friend code. I had letters from others, Sydney still couldn’t get into his house, and I created a Constellation at the observatory – one which the game then let me know would be visible at it’s brightest on July 30th at 8 pm. The constellation I made looks like a Heart. I also checked out the salon, where KK Slider sang a song and gave me a copy. I also claimed everything in the Lost & Found and then sold it all for profit at Tom Nook’s Cranny.

This morning I turned on the game again, and got my first DLC – a Flag Design that looks like the Mayor’s Face, delivered by Wendell (who Alisha excitedly identified as a Sea Lion). A new animal moved in to town, and again Alisha was excited to identify Cube as a Penguin. It’s strange how this game, without any real objectives, can suck you in and get you playing for longer than you could have predicted. I am thinking, maybe later tonight I will turn it on again, and see if I can help Sydney get in his house.

I will start by saying I am impressed. I actually had started to wonder if MS will have much interesting stuff coming up in the future for the 360, and as it turns out they do.

I liked that they decided to skip the traditional charts, stats, and graphs. Let’s see if Nintendo and Sony follow up with this idea. Instead, MS decided to start with showing some of the bigger 3rd Party Multi-Platform (usually shared with PS3) titles, before moving on to exclusives. In the shared games space, they did waste15-20 minutes with Beatles Rock Band; I am sure some people are really excited about that, and the appearances by Paul and Ringo and Yoko Ono may have excited some, but it was rather boring for me. Other titles in this section included Modern Warfare 2 (which looks great!), Final Fantasy XIII, and Tony Hawk Ride (with the new Skateboard controller, shown off by Tony Hawk). Later on, they also had Kojima show up to reveal a trailer for Metal Gear Solid Rising (featuring Raiden rather than Snake). Interestingly, while last year we had multiple games with ‘exclusive DLC’, this time they only had Modern Warfare 2 with a ‘2 month timed exclusive window for the first map packs’.

They showed off a couple of XBLA titles, an Avatar supporting cartoony racer called Joy Ride and Epic developed Shadow Complex, which seems to be in the vein of Metroid and Castlevania, and looks interesting. They also announced 1 vs 100 starting later in the night, which I played at night and rather enjoyed – this may actually be the future for the ‘TV Game Show’, free to play, multiple people support, with a live host/commentator. Not at the conference, but information later came out that a new Games on Demand section will start in August with downloadable versions of older retail 360 titles.

In the exclusives, they did have some new reveals: Crackdown 2 and Left 4 Dead 2 got announced, along with Halo Reach (to go along with the also shown Halo ODST – franchise overkill maybe?). They also showed Alan Wake (it’s a horror title? Oh… for some reason I thought it was a driving game all this time!) which looks interesting, and Splinter Cell Convictions and Forza Motorsports 3. I didn’t notice any ‘montage’ of games, so these seem to be the major ones they are showing off.

The interesting stuff for 360 as a media hub is the new services – radio (Live.fm), expansion of Netflix (browsing and adding to queue), Live TV (only in UK/Ireland though), rebranded Zune Video service w/ instant streaming, 1080p; a Live Party addition with the Theatre, to watch movies with others at the same time, as well as integrations with Facebook and Twitter. Games can make use of the Facebook integration also, which I am interested to see implemented…

The big news though is Project Natal – a new Camera peripheral that provides a 3D camera + voice recognition, and attempts to out-do Sony’s EyeToy, while attempting to compete with the Wii Remote (the hook – its motion controls without a controller). The fake ‘concept’ video was interesting, but the actual demos shown (Ricochet and Splat) didn’t work much better than EyeToy on the PS2… Still, dashboard navigation seems interesting, and Molyneux’s creepy Milo tech demo (where you interact with a virtual kid, sharing drawn images and asking him about homework) shows that the tech does have some promise and potential. Though Spielberg showing up randomly to ‘certify’ the product was rather stupid.

So anyways, in the end, they impressed me. The focus on games makes it likely better than Sony and Nintendo in pacing, as those two have traditionally had some time devoted to sale stats and charts; lets see if they still do that now! It does seem like MS is losing out on exclusives, but they still do have some major ones coming out internally, and Natal could add new life to the 360, if it is done right – but if not, it will just suck. That said, the enhancements to the 360 Dashboard and the possibilities with stuff like 1 vs 100 show there is still a lot of cool things possible on the 360.

Alisha keeps learning new words, both in English and Urdu, and has also been very active about putting words together to form sentences. Sometimes, she will even mix in English and Urdu words together in a sentence, though she seems very quick to understand that something can be called 2 different things and is very willing to switch words when needed (e.g., when I asked if what she was wearing was juta, she replied no, its chapal; but then i immediately asked if they are shoes, and she replied not they are sandals).

Anyways, due to movies and games, one word she caught on to is Gundah – Bad Guy. More recently I also taught her Hero, the opposite of Bad Guy. Well, today, while playing the new Wii game, Punch Out!!, Alisha started labeling my opponents as Gundah. So King Hippo, well, he was Hippo (I happened to mention the name and she latched on to it). Great Tiger (who spoke a lot of Urdu himself) was Gundah. Piston Hondo (a handsome looking Japanese fighter) however got labeled as Hero (and also baba’s dost – thus, my friend). It was when I got to Don Flamenco, however, that Alisha cracked both me and Farah up.

Don Flamenco is a Spanish fighter, and his intro shows him defeating a bull and having ladies fawn over him. At that point, Alisha was calling him Gundah. But when he entered the ring, he carried with him a red rose. So Alisha decided to change his label. Now, Don Flamenco is known as the Nice Gundah!

Alisha (2.5 now) is awesome.

Alisha has been watching some movies with us, and is specially attentive and enjoying cartoons, for e.g.. Well last month, we got Nim’s Island from Netflix, and Alisha watched it all the way through with us. Very very attentively. And something unexpected happened near the end of the movie: Alisha cried.

Not just cried. She bawled. She was upset and sad. And she was crying about the “baby’s baba”.

For those who haven’t seen the movie, obviously this spoils a bit, though it’s nothing too unexpected when watching the movie. The movie is about a girl (Alisha calls all kids babies) who lives on an Island with her father. The father gets caught out at sea in a storm and doesn’t return, so the girl has to survive on her own. Which she does just fine. However, she does contact a book author through email who learns of the girl and decides to set out to help after no one believes her.

So near the end of the movie, they have a scene showing the father thrown off his boat into water and his boat getting ripped apart in the storm. Alisha is still watching intently but is fine. Then they show the author reach the Island and almost drown right after that, with the girl going into the water and rescuing the author. At which point Alisha cried and bawled about “baby’s baba”. She must have realized that if the girl saved the author but not the father… so yeah, Alisha was really affected by that.

The good news, right after that, the father showed up having rescued himself, and Alisha was overjoyed. She gave us hugs and kisses and couldn’t stop talking her baby talk about the baby and her baba.

http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/090506-tw-warp-drive.html

Don’t you just love how scientists work sometimes? Ok, so the current theory is that you cannot travel faster than light in space-time (the 4 dimensions of width, length, height, and time). It’s just not possible, apparently. So what do they do? They start looking into ways of moving space-time faster than light.

Wha???

Seems that the scientists in the article think that space-time has moved faster than the speed of light in the past (post-big bang), and so they think they may be able to find a way to have it do so again. In which case, something existing in that space-time would therefore end up being moved faster than light (even though from it’s perspective, it never moved).

In April, I got back into strategy gaming in a big way, thanks to Fire Emblem and Valkyria Chronicles. Once again, like last month, my Game of the Month is a surprise: Valkyria Chronicles. Great game…

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon (DS): I continued playing this, and it certainly is hard. I stopped losing people regularly after Ch 10, but I did lose my Dragon dude in Ch 18… The story is mostly Marth going around different places to recruit a bigger army from different kingdoms, but the level designs are where this game is at – they are very unique, including variables for many possible strategies – almost enough to make it Game of the Month, though after some internal struggle I gave that to another game… BTW, I read that there are secret stages that can only be reached if you lose most of your characters – and that if your character count goes below the current mission’s allowed units count, you gain generic replacements – appropriately leveled up! I realize that the designers wanted to make sure that players understood that character death is part of the game, and that you should just continue playing on. Which I did, even with my Dragon dead.

(1st Timer) Valkyria Chronicles (PS3): I love Fire Emblem, which is based in medieval type times with swords and magic and horses. Valkyria is a turn based strategy with RPG elements that instead uses guns, grenades, and tanks, set in a WWII type setting. The Europan war (the world is derived from ours, but isn’t) engulfs Gallia, and so it’s militia rises to fight. I love the innovative combat approach, which requires you to think, use cover, cover allies, etc, so that you don’t get shot up while trying to get in place to fire your shots. The story looks interesting, with the alternate history, though the characters talk way too much – specially the main hero seems to like to talk about nature to every single other character in the game, which gets boring and annoying fast. My ‘Game of the Month’.

Boom Blox (Wii): Played the Quick Sample multiplayer mode with Farah. I love the random set of levels they throw up and the variety of different types. I will be buying the upcoming sequel the moment it releases.

MadWorld (Wii): It’s getting harder, and I have understood the level design pattern – basically, kill an unending stream of spawning enemies and score points, unlocking weapons and Bloodbath Challenges with those score points, which help score more points. Until you unlock the boss, at which point you can choose to fight the boss at any time. The stages aren’t linear – they are simply small sandboxes filled with new and original ways to kill enemies; you could stay in the beginning of the stage and fight until you unlock the boss! Somehow, I find that weird. The reason you find new ways to kill enemies in a stage is to keep yourself entertained (plus score points faster to finish the stages faster), otherwise it would get boring fast! So, anyone playing by trying to fight all enemies they see, likely do end up getting bored… Meanwhile, I hate the Frank boss – he electrocutes the water I am standing in and kills me quickly.

Wii Sports (Wii): The best game to bring out when you have non-gaming guests over. Bowling of course is universally loved, but with older people, Wii Sports Golf tends to be a huge hit too. Myself, I used to be pretty crappy at the golf, but I have now gotten much better, even getting Silver on 2 of the 3 golf challenges. In bowling, I had a bit of an awesome run for a bit, starting a game with 3 strikes, but I still ended with a score in the late 160s. What I need to finally beat Lou and Solo’s scores is consistency.

Wii Play (Wii): The shooting gallery is still the best example of quick IR shooting on the Wii. Also played Find Mii and Billiards.

Bloxors (PC): My brother told me about a PSN game he was playing called Cuboid, but upon seeing it’s video I knew I had played it before on a Flash page. A quick search and I refound Bloxors. I played through 5 stages before I gave up.

(1st Timer) Call of Duty: World at War (Wii): First, I tried the online play – which works really really well! I didn’t miss the lack of voice chat at all, as like in Left4Dead, the other characters add random chatter that helps convey what is happened (maybe not as well as Left4Dead, but still pretty good). I also really like the controls – the Wii IR controls for point and shoot really work well in FPS games. The single player mode I played through 4 or so levels, and didn’t like the level design as much – like recent FPS games, its more about getting through an experience rather than trying to have really fun levels that one would want to replay over and over. The game looks good to, leading me to wonder how it stacks up to the HD versions… see the Demo section for my thoughts on that!

(1st Timer) Doritos Dash of Destruction (XBLA): This free Live Arcade title is basically an advertisement for Doritos chips, though for an ad its rather well done. You either control a T-Rex or a Doritos truck; as the truck, you drive to pick up chips, and as the T-Rex you eat the trucks. The city destruction is well done, and there are competing dinosaurs and trucks as well as multiplayer support. Still, the game is an ad, and pushes that fact with humor (along with pushing the fact that it gets you easy Gamerscore for Gamerscore freaks).

(1st Timer) Puzzle Arcade (XBLA): This free Live Arcade title is simply a jigsaw puzzle game; you take a photo and piece it back together. The game has options on the type of jigsaw pieces, as well as more complicated puzzles like fractal based, but the core concept is simple, and using a mouse like cursor using dual analog controls really slows things down. At least it was free!

(1st Timer) Art Style: AQUIA (DSiWare): I picked up the new DSi through a pretty sweet upgrade deal through Club Nintendo, and with the DSi came 1000 DSi Points. My first DSiWare ended up being the first DSi Art Style title. It’s an original implementation of the 3-match puzzle types, where you have 3 columns of blocks only to play with, and a meta game is added to the concept with a diver reaching down to find treasure and air running out (visualized by your field of vision dropping from the top over time). Successful eliminations of blocks recovers a bit of air, and some rare air blocks can be 3-matched to regain all air.

(1st Timer) WarioWare: Snapped (DSiWare): So I ended up using the 1000 DSi Points on 2 of the launch titles, even though I knew Snapped was more of a Tech Demo. Sure enough, its a pretty small package – 4 sets of 5 microgames each played with the camera, Eye-Toy style. Instead of other WarioWare games, there is no randomness, boss fights, or infinite speeding up of the microgames; instead, the idea is to play through 5 set microgames, then view the resultant set of silly pictures taken while you play the game. Since the gameplay involves placing the DSi on a surface as your hands have to be shown to the camera for some microgames means it’s not really a portable game. I still enjoyed the silly pictures at the end, specially in Jimmy’s set where the pictures put together a story involving your silly face while you had been playing. The credits, meanwhile, are also a minigame involving using your head to collect the credits and avoid jellyfish aliens.

(1st Timer) Your In The Movies (360): Hmm this game is horrible. I saw it for 20 w/ the Xbox Live Vision camera (which normally on it’s own is 40), and I had a 10% off coupon to boot, so I decided this is a great deal even if the game sucks. Plus, WarioWare: Snapped above is a similar idea, isn’t it? Well, firstly the camera controls take effort to work, as lighting, shadows, etc need to be just right. Plus, the backdrop is supposed to be static – good luck with Alisha around, jumping along! Plus, no reflective surfaces in the backdrop – too bad about the picture frame above the sofa! Maybe due to all this, but the game wasn’t that great at picking me up consistently, and on top of that most of the time it has you running in place or making poses that make you look silly. The end result is a ‘movie trailer’ where your actions are embedded within, but they are made for 4 players, and any roles not played by us get filled in by other humans who are total strangers to us. Well, at least I got a cheap 360 camera.

(1st Timer) Rhythm Heaven (DS): My first time playing this, in Farah’s Henna stall at the Asian Festival, with music playing from the stage, was a disaster. I guess trying to play a game based around rhythm while music is playing all around you is a bad idea. Later, I did better, though the game hasn’t hooked my like other rhythm based games tend to.

(1st Timer) ExciteBots: Trick Racing (Wii): This sequel to Excite Trucks is amazing! You race with bots instead of trucks this time, with the bots derived from various insects and birds and animals (frog, bat, mantis, etc). It gives them a lot of character. Plus, the system of earning stars through stunts to win, rather than coming first, returns, only with a lot more stunts and opportunity to win stars now. In fact, the game goes crazy with the concept – you end up throwing darts and playing the tambourine and swinging from bars and transforming into running bots and so on… Even though I played it only briefly at the end of the month, I considered it as Game of the Month material for the month!

(1st Timer) Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (DS): I started playing the new DS GTA game, linking my Friend Code to the GTA online Social Club and completing a couple of missions. So far, I am actually a bit disappointed – the characters seem to swear for no real reason and aren’t likable either.

(1st Timer) Closure (PC): After the Games Developers Conference, I read about some high concept indie games that were shown off at a session – one of them is playable on a Flash site. Closure is rather intriguing, using puzzles based around the concept that if light doesn’t shine on a floor or wall, then the floor/wall doesn’t exist and can be walked/fallen through. So, you have to carry lanterns around and drop them as needed to solve various puzzles. Intriguing, though your character’s movement controls are unrefined.

DEMOES:

Marble Blast Ultra (XBLA): This Monkey Ball type title is unique in that you don’t tilt the world, but rather have direct control of the ball. There are powerups like super jumps that are part of the puzzle design, but in the end the game feels generic.

Rhythm Heaven (DS): I tried the demo a second time, wondering whether the game’s longevity will justify the price point of $30. I still had fun, and got a Perfect on the first minigame my first try – I bet I could play that one perfectly with my eyes closed.

Call of Duty: World at War (360): I downloaded this demo after renting the Wii version to compare the two. Graphically, it does blow away the Wii version. There are quieter moments in the game, specially when a level is starting up, that you can get taken aback by. While actually playing, it doesn’t make a huge difference though. The controls on the other hand, made me wish I was playing the Wii version – I hate the dual analog crosshairs stuck in the middle of the screen now that I have experienced the Wii controls. That said, I can still play well enough with dual analog.

Virtua Fighters 5 (360): I tried out this fully 3D fighting game – and can tell, even without being good at these type of games, that it’s better than the last Tekken and Soul Calibur games/demos I tried. Graphics look nice too. I still can’t get the deeper moves though, and end up relying on random button pushing.

Red Alert 3 (360): I love the cheesy FMV videos in the demo – Tim Curry is hilarious, and the other Russian General just seems too familiar. The actual gameplay is much improved from the previous C&C RTS demo I played on dual analog controllers, though I’d imagine the game is probably still best played on a PC, with a keyboard for easier group shortcuts and a mouse for easier unit selection and commands.

The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai (XBLA): There has been a wave of 2D action games on download services recently, with Alien Hominid style graphics. This one is in that category, only with more goth stylings and more blood, as you control a dead samurai dishwasher out for revenge. The levels and action however seem generic, and the combat is a bit button-happy.

Flock (PSN): The look of this one attracted me, but the demo turned me off – mainly due to the UFO’s trying to guide the sheep and cows got annoying as they would end up walking away in angles to where you are trying to move them, even off cliffs. Plus, there would be sheep I just couldn’t figure out how to reach the beam point, which got annoying.

Gardening Mama (DS): Unlike Cooking Mama, this one actually has an elaborate series of sequential steps that you have to perform for a plant. The step by step nature of the game is still a bit boring, but it’s still better than Cooking Mama.

Hasbro Family Game Night (XBLA): Interestingly, the core game is just a hub for the individual games within, which each have to be purchased individually. After seeing how short the Battleship trial was, though, in addition to realizing that each board game trial would have to be downloaded individually, I decided that 10-15 seconds of a trial wasn’t worth the download, and deleted the core hub as well.

MySims Party (DS): A single minigame – uncover fossil by tapping dirt around it, then blow in mic to remove the loose dirt. A bit of strategy is involved, as after enough dirt is collected, you have to blow it away, but you could also be blowing away while digging. Also, accidentally tapping rocks releases a lot more dirt.

Wheelman (PS3): A driving game where you have to elude cops and gangsters, while driving fast. The driving controls are interesting, with a body checking move to slam other cars with, plus you can shoot. Not bad, though it doesn’t hold up when compared with Burnout Paradise. The supermoves, where you can slow down time and aim and shoot at targets to take them out easier, seem repetitive though.

MLB 2K9 Fantasy All-Stars (DS): I was surprised by this baseball DS title – I particularly liked the touch based pitching and batting. The game is arcadey too – you can choose to use powers like sticky balls, chicken shots, etc. The field in the demo had occasional earthquakes that disrupted fielding as well.

Peggle (XBLA): This was the same Peggle I played on the PC last year, pretty much unchanged. Basically, its a ‘pachinko’ style game of luck where you shoot a ball, then watch it bounce about pegs, removing them and scoring points, as you try to remove the orange pegs before running out of balls. The music and many ways of getting extra balls makes the game feel very rewarding, even if much of your success is based on fun luck.

Elefunk (PSN): Ok this was horrible – basically you use a bunch of construction girders to make bridges strong enough to hold elephants and jumping monkeys, so that your elephant can cross the bridge without falling down. The game is completely based on trial and error – I had to play the tutorial bridge 6 times before the elephant crossed successfully!

Weapon of Choice (360 Community Games): I read that 360 Community Games are having low sales, and remembered I hadn’t been looking at that hard to find section in the 360 dashboard. I wonder why? Anyways, I tried this one out as it’s devs were the vocal ones. It’s a 2d sidescrolling Contra style run ‘n gun, with a very colorful art style and unique weapons, and an unusual ability of the characters to climb walls by sprouting mechanical legs or something. It was ok.

Sega Ultimate Genesis Collection (PS3): I played three of the included Genesis titles, including Streets of Rage 3. Though the timed trials for each were really short, which is annoying as it makes the entire trial only playable for a few minutes, less time than it takes to download and install, it does show that this collection has really good value for those into retro gaming.

They said it couldn’t be done. They said it was crazy. Ok I said it was crazy. But, my cataloguing statistician tendencies won over my sane side, and I kept up this gaming diary for a full year.

You know what is coming next then. Especially for someone obsessed with statistics like me. That is right – summaries and analysis of the year’s worth of cataloguing! Don’t everyone jump up in excitement all at once, I am doing that enough for everyone.

Anyways, I thought I would see what I played during the last 12 months and see if anything interesting comes of that. So, here goes nothing.

Firstly, note that I actually have basically all consoles now, minus the PSP. The 360 was gotten for my birthday by Farah at the end of July 08 (thanks Farah!), and my brother sent me the PS3 (thanks Kamran!) in January 09.

First, a list of the games that I played (many rented, specially when I had Gamefly), and how many months they showed up on the list. This doesn’t mean I played a game a lot – sometimes a game may show up after playing for only 5 minutes that month. I will also note the console, as well as whether it was a Fresh game or not – which means, that before I played the game during the last year, I had never played it before. Thus, showing how many older games I continued to play! I will also not games that got a distinction of being a particular month’s ‘Game of the Month’. I will omit Demos and Store Displays. I also indicate where games are ‘Completed’ or ‘Infinite’ – many games have a main single player mode that can be completed, though many games are open ended with infinite playability; other games are focused more on multiplayer and thus by default infinite playability; some games actually have both with equal focus. Finally, I rate the games on a 5 star system.

Wii:
Mario Kart Wii (Fresh, GOTM, 11 Months) – Infinite Multiplayer/Online; *****
Wii Fit (Fresh, 6 Months) – Infinite; *****
Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock (Fresh, 4 Months) – Completed Easy; ****
Wii Music (Fresh, 4 Months); Infinite; ****
Boom Blox (Fresh, GOTM, 3 Months); Completed Solo, Infinite Multiplayer; *****
De Blob (Fresh, GOTM, 3 Months); *****
LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures (Fresh, 3 Months); ***
Wii Sports (3 Months); Infinite; *****
Order Up (Fresh, GOTM, 2 Months); Completed; ****
Animal Crossing: City Folk (Fresh, 2 Months); Infinite; ***
Soul Calibur Legends (Fresh, 2 Months); **
We Ski (Fresh, 2 Months); ***
New Play Control! Pikmin (Fresh); *****
Endless Ocean (Fresh); ****
Trauma Center: New Blood (Fresh); Completed; ****
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (Fresh); Completed; ****
Samba de Amigo (Fresh); ***
MadWorld (Fresh, GOTM); ***
No More Heroes (Fresh); ***
Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 (Fresh); Infinite Multiplayer/Online; ***
Geometry Wars Galaxies (Fresh); ***
NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams (Fresh); ***
Blast Works: Build, Trade, Destroy (Fresh); ***
Wario Land: Shake It! (Fresh); ***
Bully (Fresh); **
Manhunt 2 (Fresh); **
Ninja Reflex (Fresh); Completed; **
Donkey Kong Barrel Blast (Fresh); **
LEGO Batman (Fresh); **
Tomb Raider Anniversary (Fresh); **
Raving Rabbids TV Party (Fresh); Completed; **
Skate It (Fresh); *
Sega Superstar Tennis (Fresh); *
Alone in the Dark (Fresh); *
Dokapon Kingdom (Fresh); Didn’t Play Enough to Rate
Super Mario Galaxy; *****
Super Smash Bros. Brawl; Completed Story Mode, Infinite Multiplayer/Online; ****
Rayman Raving Rabbids; Completed; ***
Wii Play; Infinite; ***
Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles; ***

Wii Virtual Console
Super Punch-Out!! (SNES); ****
Balloon Fight (NES); Infinite; ***

WiiWare:
Toki Tori (Fresh, GOTM, 2 Months); ****
LostWinds (Fresh, 2 Months); Completed; ***
World of Goo (Fresh, GOTM); Completed; *****
Art Style: Orbient (Fresh); ***
Maboshi’s Arcade (Fresh); ***
LIT (Fresh); ***

Nintendo DS:
Elite Beat Agents (5 Months); Completed; *****
Magnetica (4 Months); Infinite; ***
The World Ends With You (Fresh, GOTM – Twice!, 3 Months); Completed; *****
Chrono Trigger (Fresh, GOTM, 2 Months); Completed; *****
Professor Layton and the Curious Village (Fresh, GOTM, 2 Months); Completed; ****
Soul Bubbles (Fresh, GOTM, 2 Months); Completed; ****
Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day (2 Months); Infinite; ****
Brain Age 2: More Training in Minutes a Day (2 Months); Infinite; ****
Worms 2: Open Warfare (Fresh, 2 Months); Infinite; ***
Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword (Fresh, 2 Months); Completed; ***
The Spiderwick Chronicles (Fresh, 2 Months); ***
Big Brain Academy (2 Months); Infinite; ***
Meteos (2 Months); Infinite; *****
The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (2 Months); ****
Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon (Fresh); *****
Civilization Revolution (Fresh); Infinite; ***
Dementium: The Ward (Fresh); ***
Contra 4 (Fresh); ***
Personal Trainer: Cooking (Fresh); Infinite; ***
Ninjatown (Fresh); ***
Lock’s Quest (Fresh); ***
Rondo of Swords (Fresh); ***
Age of Empires: Mythologies (Fresh); ***
Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer (Fresh); **
Master of Illusion (Fresh); Complete; **
Flash Focus (Fresh); Infinite; **
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time (Fresh); **
Jam Session (Fresh); Infinite; *
Metroid Prime Pinball; Completed; *****
Picross; ****
Tetris DS; ****

GameCube:
F-Zero X (Fresh); *****
Destruction Derby 64 (Fresh); ****
Need for Speed Underground (Fresh); ***
1080 Snowboarding (Fresh); *
Pikmin; Completed; *****
Soul Calibur II; Completed Story Mode; Infinite Multiplayer; ****
LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy; ***
Rampage Total Destruction; **

GameBoy Advance:
Riviera: The Promised Land (Fresh, 2 Months); ***
Ninja 5-O (2 Months); ***
River City Ransom (Fresh); *
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island; Completed; *****
Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones; Completed; *****
WarioWare Inc.; Completed; *****

Nintendo 64:
Mario Tennis (Fresh); Infinite Multiplayer; ***
GoldenEye 007; Completed; Infinite Multiplayer; *****
Diddy Kong Racing; Story Mode Incomplete, Infinite Multiplayer; ***
ExciteBike 64; Infinite Multiplayer; ***
Star Wars: Episode 1: Pod Racer; **

XBOX 360:
Bioshock (Fresh, 2 Months); ****
Call of Duty 4 (Fresh, 2 Months); Completed; Infinite Online; ****
Fallout 3 (Fresh); *****
Crackdown (Fresh); ****
Dead Space (Fresh); ***
Banjo Kazooie: Bolts N Nuts (Fresh); ***
Gears of War 2 (Fresh); **

XBOX Live Arcade:
Braid (Fresh, 2 Months); *****
Banjo-Kazooie (Fresh); ****

PlayStation 3:
Resistance 2 (Fresh); Completed; Infinite Online; ***

PlayStation Network:
Blast Qore (First); Infinite; *

PC:
Portal (Fresh); Completed; *****
Warning Forever (Fresh); Infinite; ***
Civilization 4: Colonization (Fresh); Infinite; ***
The Political Machine 2008 Express (Fresh); Infinite; *
Desktop Tower Defense; Infinite; ***

Arcade:
Beachhead 2020 (Fresh); ***
Outpost 2P (Fresh); ***
Dance Dance Revolution Extreme; ***

Cell phone:
Solitaire (Fresh); *

iPhone:
Super Monkey Ball (Fresh); *

Airplane:
InsanAquarium (Fresh); **
Galaktor (Fresh); *
Dynomite (Fresh); *
Bookworm Deluxe (Fresh); *
Inflight Trivia (Fresh); *
Bejeweled; *

Secondly, a summary of the number of unique games per month: (Interestingly, the consoles with fewer games played, are also the ones that offer Demos! Yup, I end up playing the demos on them so much that I don’t bother getting the games in many cases!)

April 08: 8 Wii, 7 DS, 1 Wii VC, 1 GBA… 0 Demos… GOTM: Mario Kart Wii (Wii)
May 08: 5 Wii, 5 DS, 1 GBA, 1 PC… 9 Demos… GOTM: Boom Blox (Wii)
June 08: 7 Wii, 1 WiiWare, 3 DS, 1 GC… 13 Demos… GOTM: Toki Tori (WiiWare)
July 08: 10 Wii, 1 WiiWare, 4 DS, 1 Cell… 7 Demos… GOTM: Professor Layton and the Curious Village (DS)
August 08: 4 Wii, 1 WiiWare, 4 DS, 1 XBLA… 15 Demos… GOTM: The World Ends With You (DS)
Sept 08: 6 Wii, 1 360, 1 DS… 10 Demos… GOTM: The World Ends With You (DS)
Oct 08: 6 Wii, 2 WiiWare, 1 360, 2 DS, 1 PC…, 8 Demos… GOTM: World of Goo (WiiWare)
Nov 08: 5 Wii, 1 WiiWare, 2 360, 1 XBLA, 2 DS, 1 GBA, 1 PC… 22 Demos!… GOTM: De Blob (Wii)
Dec 08: 9 Wii, 6 DS, 1 GBA, 1 Arcade… 18 Demos… GOTM: Order Up (Wii)
Jan 09: 8 Wii, 1 WiiWare, 3 DS, 2 360, 1 PS3, 1 PSN, 2 PC, 1 iPhone… 15 Demos… GOTM: Soul Bubbles (DS)
Feb 09: 2 Wii, 1 360, 7 DS, 4 GBA, 3 GC, 8 N64, 3 Airplane… 1 Demo… GOTM: Chrono Trigger (DS)
March 09: 2 Wii, 1 WiiWare, 1 Wii VC, 6 DS, 1 360, 1 XBLA, 1 GC, 2 Arcade, 3 Airplane… 7 Demos… GOTM: MadWorld (Wii)

Finally, for the Demos and Store Trials, the split among the consoles was as such:

Wii: 2
DS: 48
360: 31; XBLA: 26; 360 Community Games: 1
PS3: 7; PSN: 6
PC: 3

One thing that I think is obvious from this, is that in February and March, I didn’t play too much! Not to mention, the sudden appearance of N64 games and Airplane games. Even the demos got played less. This is easily explained, as I was on a trip to Karachi (and after returning, really busy for a while).

The other observation I have meanwhile, is that I certainly do play a lot of the downloadable demos for DS, 360, and PS3… so I took a quick look to see how often did demos end up translating to getting the game:
The Spiderwick Chronicles (DS)
Flash Focus (DS)
Ninja Gaiden (DS)
Contra 4 (DS)
Worms 2 (DS)
Braid (XBLA)
Perfect Dark Zero (360)
Ninjatown (DS)
Lock’s Quest (DS)
Soul Bubbles (DS)
Personal Trainer: Cooking (DS)
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts (360)
Left 4 Dead (360)
Civilization Revolution (360)
Rhythm Heaven (DS)

So, a pretty small percentage of the time. It does show that some smaller dev, big idea games that would have otherwise slipped my radar got me interested with demos, but most of the time demos would satiate my desire to try the game out to the point that the game would no longer have my interest. So, in that regards, demos are a good thing! However, from a business sense, demos seem to make most sense for smaller devs who really do have unique big ideas, like Braid, Soul Bubbles, Ninjatown, Lock’s Quest, Spiderwick Chronicles, and Left 4 Dead – all games I would have likely skipped if not for the demo.

So, the School of Engineering just had it’s annual Employee Awards Luncheon, which tends to be pretty good for me. A few years ago, I was given a ‘Sun Award’ (which is like a note of appreciation by another employee for your work), and randomly people with Sun Awards got extra prizes, with me getting some picture frame. A couple of years ago I won lunch at a restaurant as a random ticket based door prize, in addition to getting my 5 years gift.

This was the most well done Employee Awards luncheon though. Firstly, the food was free (normally it is only free if you are getting an award). Secondly, other than random people with Sun Awards getting prizes, the Service awards for time worked, and the ticket door prizes (which were in higher quantity than ever), they also recognized retiring employees as well as had the new IMPACT awards – people nominated within Engineering by their peers, and then chosen by a selection committee for cash awards of $500 each (that is 500 after tax!).

Anyways, I was listed in the Sun Awards, as well as nominated in 3 of the IMPACT award categories – and in fact did get chosen for the Achievement award! Other than the $500 check, they also included a nice certificate framed in a nice frame, and included a nice letter that included the reasons for the award as put in by the nominator.

So now I have to figure out how to spend the $500. To start with, I think a nice dinner with Farah and Alisha is in order :).

I started the month in Karachi, but 10 days in got back to Arizona.

(1st Timer) MadWorld (Wii): I love the art style – black and white with lots of red blood and the occasional yellow sound effect. The commentary in the background, which sometimes I ignore while playing, still manages to come through with hilarious results (e.g., after sawing off the arms of an enemy, the commentators asked everyone who got their ass kicked by me to raise their hands). The whole point during combat is to not just fight, but to be as brutal as possible. There are also lots of quick time events, specially with bosses, where moving controls as shown is part of the combat. All this would get repetitive soon though, except that the game keeps throwing out new ways to be brutal (spearing up to 5 ninjas on a spear and walking about while they are all attached), frequent Deathmatch challenges like Man Golf (where you use golf clubs to hit enemy heads into rings in the air), and an intriguing storyline where you are not just a contestant in a ‘kill everyone’ city, but actually undercover… My ‘Game-of-the-Month’.

Chrono Trigger (DS): I finished up with the rather boring Lost Sanctum area, added into the DS version of this remake. Unlike the rest of the game, which was awesome throughout, never felt artificially extended, never felt like a chore, and never felt like grinding, this new Lost Sanctum area was a boring chore that had nothing to do with the rest of the game. I think this shows the level of difference a good game developer can make with a game, as obviously the people who designed this addition to a classic game didn’t get the point of the game and just came out with something they could add for the sake of adding.

Meteos (DS): Played a bunch of versus mode with Arsalan while on the way back from the beach in the bus. It was pretty neat how well it worked! Also played a bit while Alisha watched.

Rampage Total Destruction (GC): Played a bit of this with Alisha and Fabiha, both little girls pounding away at the buttons, until the electricity went out.

Elite Beat Agents (DS): While at the beach, after a while in the water, having ridden a horse and a camel, and having eaten and slept a bit, decided to try out that last stage on the hard difficulty to see how I fare when most relaxed. Yeah, I still couldn’t master it, but I came pretty close! Then after returning back to Gilbert, was finally able to do it! Yay! Unlocked a Hard Rock **** difficulty mode, and the last bonus song, and already completed a few stages on Hard Rock with the Elite Beat Divas.

Worms: 2 (DS): Played versus mode with Arsalan, and after a couple of battles where he was learning out to play, it turned out to be quite a fun multiplayer game to play. Our last match I did screw up by accidentally targetting 2 of my own worms with a homing missile, but I saved face and didn’t lose because Arsalan’s DS’s charge went out :).

Magnetica (DS): Played now and then with Alisha.

Braid (360): Tried it out after all this time, and was able to solve one of the puzzles I had been stuck on.

Super Punch-Out!! (Wii Virtual Console – SNES): I have played this briefly on an SNES long ago, but I love the original NES version and the upcoming Wii version looks really well done, so when Nintendo put this up on Virtual Console, I ended up getting it. Fun boxing game, with weird opponents like Chan, who occasionally jumps the ropes and kicks you. The first 2 circuits I finished on my first try (losing a couple of fights in the 2nd circuit), but the third circuit’s first opponent I am finding to be tough. An Irish dude, after an uppercut he likes to grab hold of me and I haven’t figured out how to counter that yet. I am surprised to see a lack of characters from the original – so far I have only encountered Bald Bull and Sandman from the NES title.

(1st Timer) Bookworm Deluxe (Airplane): I have place some version of this word forming puzzle game before, but with the touch screen on the plane, it was unplayable. Why? Because the touch screen sucked, and would very often detect a touch as 2 touches – either causing words to be formed prematurely, or starting a new word in the middle of me typing in another word. Very annoying drawback of the technology.

(1st Timer) Inflight Trivia (Airplane): The plane had this trivia game which you played along with anybody else on the plane playing it – the most I saw was 11 people. The first time I played, I came in first, and in fact my name remained at the top of the top ten list through the flight. The 2nd and 3rd time I played, my same random choosing of answers to obscure questions of music and sports and aviation and so on categories weren’t as lucky, and I was ending up at the bottom of the pile.

(1st Timer) Beachhead 2020 (Arcade): I tried this out with Alisha sitting on my lap, and it basically was a less interesting version of the opening level from Medal of Honor: Rising Sun. You tilted around a big cannon and shot at planes shooting at your ship from all angles. Not really that much fun.

(1st Timer) Outpost 2P (Arcade): This was actually a pretty decent racing game, in particular since I raced against 3 other players. It lacked a lot of polish though, drifting was pretty basic, and slipstreaming was too easy. Burnout it’s not!

(1st Timer) InsanAquarium (Airplane): The best of the games on the plane, in part since accidental multiple taps didn’t harm the game. You basically fed fish, bought more fish, and fought aliens trying to kill your fish. While purchasing carnivorous fish that ate your fish too, but gave you more money than the small fish.

(1st Timer) Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon (DS): I love Fire Emblem, and was very excited to play the original’s remake. Turns out, later games have definitely evolved from the original, both in storytelling and in giving characters real character. Instead, here, you start a stage and 4 characters join you, and then they never participate in the story or have any conversations with anyone else – they are just there to fight and to be expendable. The gameplay and strategy is still classic Fire Emblem, though the scenarios are sometimes rather difficult, at least if you don’t want your people to get killed. Fortunately, I am not worried about that, and so now at the 10th chapter, have had about 6-7 characters die (and another 2-3 not recruited!). That includes both my thieves! Not my favorite Fire Emblem, but good none the less.

(1st Timer) New Play Control! Pikmin (Wii): Having just recently played the GC version, I wondered how I would feel about the Wii update. It’s awesome! While aiming at an enemy’s back initially took adjustment (focus on the shadow, not the main outline of the pointer), I found myself playing better than with the older style controls. I got through about 10 days in the game and am loving it.

(1st Timer) Banjo Kazooie: Bolts N Nuts (360): The actual game seems better structured with a better starting challenge level than the demo, though the introductory story was bizarre – there was a huge focus on referencing the previous Banjo games, calling the characters losers, and mentioning the game’s desire to outsell Mario. Then setting up a huge collectathon for the rest of the game while simultaneously making fun of the concept. Strange British humor.

(1st Timer) LIT (WiiWare): Nintendo released their Wii’s System Update 4.0, allowing usage of SD Cards as an extra storage and launching point for Channels, and it works great – having avoided WiiWare for a bit due to space issues, I immediately downloaded LIT. Interesting puzzle game; you are in dark classrooms, and can only walk in the light, or you die. You create light by using slingshots on windows, turning on lamps and computers and TVs (with remotes that you can find). You also can shine a flashlight to see in the room and plan out your moves. You have limited slingshot pebbles, flares, and cherry bombs, which you pick up along the way as part of the puzzles, plus you can only turn non a few electric devices before the fuse goes off and all turns dark, so you have to manage what is kept on. Very interesting. I played through 12 rooms, including boss fights against the English teacher and the Janitor. Along the way, I frequently answer the phone, where the hero’s girlfriend gives him information and builds the storyline; the phone conversations happen through the Wiimote speaker, adding to the immersion.

DEMOES:

Killzone 2 (PS3): A small demo, enough to whet one’s appetite certainly. It looks gorgeous, and for once isn’t all grey or brown in color palette. Its different that the normal shooter too, as you move at a slower, more methodical pace, and so does your aiming crosshair. A focus is on cover, which leads to comparisons with Gears of War. There are too many buttons that you do end up pressing at once though (L2 to cover, L to move head, R to aim, R3 to zoom, and R1 to fire, all at the same time!).

Motorstorm: Pacific Rift (PS3): They have 2 demos of this, each with a different stage, and I played them both. The graphics are amazing, and especially the crashes look amazing. I had difficulty keeping up with the AI opponents though. It’s pretty arcadey, which is how I like my racers…

Avalon Code (DS): This RPG demo has 1 interesting idea and 1 blah one. The interesting idea is really interesting – every object, weapon, and enemy in the game gets ‘written’ into a book, where you can see the ‘DNA’ parts it is made off, and you can remove parts or add parts to re-write that object or enemy for the rest of the game. The crap idea is repeat hitting an enemy to juggle them out of the atmosphere. Not actually a fun game to play; I’d like to see the ‘rewriting the world’ idea implemented in a better game…

Resident Evil 5 (360): RE5’s demo shows that they have decided to stick with the RE4 controls and gameplay, only adding in an AI helper (co-op player in 2 player mode) and more zombies. I found the demo rather hard though, and not as fun as RE4.

TrackMania DS (DS): A racing game played on tracks that remind me of this really old PC title – Stunts. I really used to enjoy that old game, specially the track editor and the wild parts like corkscrews and loops. This one seems to have a similar style, and apparently includes a track editor too.

Monsters vs Aliens (DS): I tried this quick demo more to see if Alisha would be excited, but the demo had you control an ugly reptilian creature who could walk on ceilings and walls. Could be more interesting, but the level design was boring and the enemies even more boring. The slide at the end of the demo, showing all the monsters from the movie, though, did get a response from Alisha. I guess she wants to see the movie!

Rhythm Heaven (DS): This rhythm based touch controlled book-style held DS game is quite an oddity. It appears to be designed around minigames, each with it’s own rhythm challenge. The demo has 2, plus teases a third. The first was the most interesting one, where you knock nuts into bolts with the music rhythm; eventually during play, the screen goes dark and you continue playing based on sound. Oddly, I was actually doing better without the screen than with the screen.