Slime Keychains & Civ IV

I recently received some cool promotional items for the upcoming RPG, Dragon Quest VIII. As we all know, the slime creature has been the unofficial mascot for Enix and Dragon Quest for many years. Along with getting the DQVIII demo for free, I got two slime keychains. Pretty cool huh? Funny thing... I've never finished a Dragon Quest game. I still want to get around to playing DQ7 though. All I need is roughly 100 free hours to do so.




I've spent the good part of this week trying to get my hands on the Civilization IV Collector's Edition. You're only supposed to get it by preordering it. After being told by the local EB and GameStop that I should have preordered it, I was hoping that I'd be able to grab one from Fry's. After 4 delayed shipments, Fry's got them in on Friday afternoon (first told me Wed. morning, then Thurs. afternoon, then Fri. morning). So after being informed by a good friend that Fry's actually got their shipment, I went straight to buy it after work. How is the game? So far, I'm enjoying it a lot. More so than Civ 3. I'm not so impressed with how little effort went into customer quality control for the packaging and hardware compatibility. The game's two discs are mislabeled - disc two is labeled as the play disc when it's actually disc one. I've read reports that Civ IV doesn't work on certain ATi video cards. I guess I'm lucky - no problems so far with my Radeon 9700PRO. Let's hope it stays that way.

Level 60!!!

Hooray! My priest just reached level 60!

GameBoy Micro and its Awesome Packaging

I recently bought yet another GameBoy to add to my collection. Yeah, I don't need one but so far I have nearly every GameBoy model designed (I'm only missing the GameBoy Pocket). Was the GBm worth buying? I'd have to say yes. The screen is freaking awesome - it's crisp and bright. None of that motion blurr that occurs on the PSP and to a certain extent on the GBA SP. Sure the screen is small, but text is amazingly easy to read. While I previously used my NintendoDS to play GBA games, I'm going to switch to the GBm purely because of how light the unit is and how nice the screen is.

The GBm also supports faceplate changing. I doubt that I'd be willing to shell out more money to make my unit unique. I'd only be interested in the upcoming Final Fantasy themed faceplates that Square-Enix will be releasing for promotional purposes to coincide with FF4 Advance. Let's hope they release those here in the U.S.

I'd also like to comment on Nintendo's awesome use of packaging (at least for the GBm Famicom edition). The GBm I bought is the version that celebrates Mario's 20th anniversary. As you can see, the entire box is designed around the dungeons of Super Mario Bros. It's very nostalgic and very cool looking, to say the least. I wish companies in America took the time to design stuff like this. Instead, we get some crappy iPod wanna-be box design. =(

I also admire the compact design of the box. Not so wasteful with space.




Below, you can see the face of the unit as well as the back. Note how small the GBm is relative to the GBA cartridges it plays. Freakishly tiny.



While importing the GBm was't cheap, I'm very happy with it. I have a GBm that is unique to most U.S. GBm owners and I get a nice retro feeling GBA unit. Here are some more pictures that illustrate how small the GBm is when compared to other handhelds and everyday items. For a quick example, the GBm unit can fit within the boundaries of the PSP's screen!

If you have any picture requests concerning the GBm's size, feel free to suggest it.

Happy Mario 20th!

NDS E3 2005 demos

Here is something real cool. You can download these NDS demos that were available via WiFi at this year's E3 and send them to your DS at home. I really want to see that Zelda trailer they have up.

Decisions, Decisions....

There's a lot of deciding for me to do. Shall I continue my career at EA? Or should I try for a smaller game company? Perhaps leave the game industry for a while and pursue a career at Google? As of right now, I'm leaning more towards Google. Of course, any permanent job is a good one at this time. Working at EA, I've found that I'm enjoying the games that I buy less - I'm finding that I'm still doing work related stuff at home. That's not fun at all. And while I understood that working in the game industry would cause me to enjoy the games less, I never thought it'd make me this unsatisfied to play. I do still want a career in the game industry. It's just that maybe I need some time away so that I can regenerate my game ideas, designs, as well as my fun factor. Where ever I wind up working, I'm going to make sure I work my hardest. Not to impress others, but to impress myself.

Still worried about the Revolution's controller?

If you're still worried that the controller will alienate Nintendo from the "mainstream" games, Nintendo did announce at the same time that there would be a "conventional controller shell" as demonstrated in the mock-up image that IGN made.
Note that IGN has clearly stated that the image is not the actual Nintendo design, but a mock up of what IGN believes the conventional controller shell could look like.

Hopefully both controller add-ons will be included in the box when you purchase the Revolution. It'd be such a waste.

I also hope that an add-on such as this conventional shell will give no excuse to companies that just like to port their games to everything possible. They can't say that "the controller just won't work gameplay-wise for [name of game]". If they do, they're just lazy bastards.

Now with the controller shown, Nintendo can finally show us some Revolution games! Woot! Here's hoping for Spaceworld.

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On an unrelated note, there's something fishy going on with Blogger. I can't upload images and sometimes they won't load along with the rest of the page. What's up with that?

Controller of the Future

Nintendo has finally talked about the Revolution's controller! Is it everything that everyone hoped? Sure looks like it... and more. (Once you get over the shock of how it looks.)



If you're unsure about how this controller will be used, check out this video posted on IGN. It will show you the vast potential that the controller provides.

Remember: "Never underestimate Nintendo."

Ain't that the cutest...

Here's the cutest thing I've seen this week. Taken from IGN.com. Isn't that a cute kitten? =)

Also, Burnout Revenge has been released. I really enjoyed it - the gameplay is a lot faster than Burnout 3. My personal best was 89% completion in roughly 3.5 work days. Not too shabby, imo.


On Sept. 13th Nintendo's mascot, Mario, celebrated his 20th anniversary. I'd like to wish Mario a happy 20th and give thanks for the countless hours of pure gaming bliss that his games have provided.

Just a Headache

I finally tried out Resident Evil 4 today. Not my kind of game. I still can't stand the way that all RE games are controlled. Why can't it control more like Mario 64 or Devil May Cry? Needless to say, the game gives me a motion sickness like headache. From what I did play, I could tell that it's easily the best of the RE series... it's just my kind of game. And I still wonder why, out of all names possible, did they choose Resident Evil. The series original name, Biohazard, makes perfect sense. I don't see why they couldn't choose a similar name for the NA release. (The title Biohazard, to my knowledge, is apparently copyrighted and cannot be used.)

Too many games

Thanksgiving is coming very soon and with the holiday comes a very important season for the games industry. There a lot of high quality games coming out this holiday. While this holiday would have been perfect with Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, I'll just have to settle with: Shadow of the Collossus, Burnout Revenge, We Love Katamari, Mario Kart DS, Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, Lunar: Dragon Song, Civilization IV, and more. Not to mention all the other games I bought and have yet to play.

I'm finally reaching WoW's max level of 60 with my priest. I'm trying to play less WoW and catch up with all the other games I started playing. I just never finished them because of WoW.

BTW, God of War is just too much fun. =)

Fractals and Electric Sheep

A cool looking screen saver has caught my eye. Electric Sheep at its heart is a fractal generator - and the results are just beautiful. Check it out!

Super Mario: Reloaded

I was shown something really cool, something done very well. It's a remake of the best scene from The Matrix: Reloaded - except Mario (Neo) fighting Luigis (Agent Smiths). Very cool to watch, and I highly recommended it. I don't know where it's originally from, but my friend from work has it posted on his website: thetravisty.com.

Sad, but true

Penny Arcade always has the right idea.

All systems forward

Posting this update using my new system. I'll post a clearer picture of the leaky capacitors later tonight. It's time to put some stress on this system! BF2 and WoW! =)

Damnit all again !!!1111!!!!ELEVEN!!!!!!

While air dusting my motherboard and CPU, I discover that the capacitors on my motherboard have begun to leak electrolytes. Basically, all the time I spent last weekend reinstalling Windows, game, etc. was for nothing. I now have to go and buy a new motherboard and wipe my hard drive and start all over again. =(

If you don't know what I'm talking about, check out Badcaps.net.

I'm thinking about going for the MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum motherboard. This would mean that I have to upgrade my CPU from my Pentium 4 2.0GHz. I currently have my eye on AMD's Athlon64 3200+ (socket 939, of course). It also means that I have to upgrade my RAM to dual channel RAM. Yeah, I could just keep my current CPU and save trouble but I figure that if I'm going to upgrade the motherboard I should just upgrade the CPU as well.

I was hoping that my current system would last until AMD's Athlon64 X2 chips got cheaper, but I have to upgrade now or risk losing this new hard drive.

I'm going to spend another day-off from work fixing my computer... At least I enjoy building computers, otherwise I'd be really upset.

Sony is funny

Sony has recently said that the Nintendo DS is a gimmick and that they do not consider Nintendo to be competition to the PSP. I find that a funny statement, seeing as how the PSP is currently getting its ass kicked by the Nintendo DS in both America and Japan. Sony is just scared out of their minds by the Nintendo DS and in order to save face for the upcoming European launch of the PSP, they have to play dirty. Perhaps if they actually released games for the PSP, it would be successful. A couple of crappy ports of PS2 games does not count. As of right now, my PSP is a waste of $250. The only game really worth playing on the PSP is Lumines. But I'm still not satisfied by my purchase. Where are the games?! Perhaps it's the PSP that is a gimmick.

BTW, Advance Wars: Dual Strike is a lot of fun. =)

Damnit all

Ugh... Saturday was looking to be a great day. Didn't argue with my girlfriend. Had the day off from work. Playing WoW to my heart's content. Until.... hard drive failure. Luckily I had a spare hard drive lying around my room. I'm still trying to recover all my data from the drive with a dead boot sector. Sigh...

Nooooooooooooooooooo!!!!

Recently, Nintendo has announced that the latest Zelda game is going to be delayed. This leaves us with no big Nintendo title this holiday season. Argh! I really can't think of anything else I wanted to play this holiday. I guess that means I'll just be sticking to WoW even more now.

This news also brings worries about the Nintendo Revolution launch date. If Nintendo isn't going to make an announcement about Zelda's release until after March 2006, then when will the Revolution launch? Fall 2006 instead of Spring 2006 like everyone originally thought?

Still under development

As you can see, I'm slowly updating the blog to my tastes. It'll be a while longer before this thing is up and running.

Madden NFL 06 has hit the stores. Go buy one and enjoy. (And let me know what you think.)

Work Work (Zug Zug)

At lot happening at work. Too busy to do much of anything else. Must play more Diablo 2 and God of War.