Game Diary: 15/03/2014-16/03/2014

I've realised something, I haven't played Animal Crossing in a while, my town must be in a sate by now. Playing video games have been painful this past week because I've had really bad skin chapping on my hands and just when I've healed one bleeding split another appears. My thumb feels like it's been sand papered and I'm having to type with my middle fingers because the tips of my index fingers are all dried up and hurting.

Super Smash Bros Melee (Gamecube)

It's Sunday so the video game league did their Sunday sessions, I decided I'd treat everyone to cooked cheesy nachos but the bastards were 15 minutes late so the nachos went cold and in the end I had to eat them all on my own.

Anyway I did a hell of a lot better today than I did on Wednesday and in many ways I have redeemed myself, I'm making less mistakes and I've learned to beat the people I was struggling with previously. The group of people who I play Smash with are all starting to show improvement which is great because the more they improve the more I can improve.

Smash Bros is out for Wii U and 3DS at the end of the year but to be honest I have doubts about it, I can see it easily being like Brawl where the game speed has been reduced and the random elements have increased, Nintendo don't want to make competitive games they want to make "fun" games even though the design of games like Melee worked because it was a good game competitively and casually.

Trauma Center: Second Opinion (Wii)

I beat this after getting hooked and playing it non-stop for 3 hours. It's weird when this originally came out years ago I thought it was an incredibly difficult game but now I manage with it, I guess as I have gotten older I've become better at using the Wii controls. I really like the challenge in this game, it's the best kind of challenge where you know you are being pushed but at the same time know you can handle what is being thrown at you. I could easily move onto Trauma Center: New Blood right now but I want to keep playing this for a bit longer, I beat the game on easy now I'm trying to do the same on normal, I still have 7 missions left to finish but they are extreme difficulty levels, they are harder than any of the previous levels when played on hard mode, or they are supposed to be anyway.

Game Diary: 11/03/2014-14/03/2014

I've had a busy week, finally saw the dentist, the good news is I do not have to have a root canal... yet... I'm on a new filling for 6 weeks to see if I'll need a root canal or just a new permanent filling. Anyway video games.

Super Smash Bros Melee (Gamecube)

I played this at the Gaming League on Wednesday, after my play on Sunday the League wants me to represent the University at Melee when they do their vs event with another University at the end of the month. I played poorly, I can't even hold all the shame after Wednesday, I did okay playing teams but there is one guy there who plays Shiek and he is basically better than me from what I figured, maybe I'd edge him in a one-on-one. Anyway I got some people together and we did a 5v5 crew battle and we got wrecked. For those who don't know a crews battle is when you get 2 teams of people and have them put their stocks together, at the end of  each match the loser stops player and is replaced by the next member of their team, if the winner lose any lives in the previous match they have to suicide until they have the same number of lives as at the end of the last match.

Anyway my crew lost and the other team had 2 guys left, a lot of us made mistakes in our games, I went into the last game with a live advantage but the guy still beat me, I could make all sorts of excuses but it is simple as me not knowing how to take on Donkey Kong with Captain Falcon. Captain Falcon only has close range attacks, Donkey Kong has powerful close range attacks that can be charged, I'm quite aggressive when I play, the other guy played defense and camped under platforms so I could not approach without risking a Donkey Kong punch.

Since Wednesday I've been trying to improve my play so that doesn't happen again. I forgot to mention but I overcame some things before the Wednesday session, while I was visiting home I beat All Star on one life and beat Event 51 by using Jigglypuff's critical hit move over and over, turns out he's the character you are suppose to use for it. Now I have all the stages and all the characters.

Trauma Center: Second Opinion (Wii)

The difficulty is starting to settle in, all I will say is bomb disarming is super hard, it's just one big puzzle and you will always get stuck on the same bit for several minutes, I hate it man.

I'm better at the game than I used to be, the missions I used to fail at constantly are much easier for me now, swings and roundabouts. I forgot how much I really liked the writing in this game, Atlus games always seem to have decent character writing.

Super Swing Golf (Wii)

I can't think of anything to expand on since I last played it because I've only played 6 holes since the last update.

Pangya! Golf with Style (Wii)

I picked this up after reading up on how Super Swing was the sequel. They really didn't change much between the two games, like they are the same game near enough, same graphics, same engine, same levels, same motion detection, it isn't a big difference between the original and the sequel. The sequel does have some clear improvements, it has more content and modes, the controls are better, you can do things with the d-pad that the original demanded you did with motion controls and unlike the original the sequel tells you if your shots are straight or off aim and curving.

I like both versions to be honest but the sequel is better in every way on the principle of having come out later, it's as simple as that.

Game Diary: 04/03/2014-10/03/2014

Super Smash Bros Melee (Gamecube)

So I watched The Smash Brothers on Youtube last week, if you haven't seen it you should totally find the time to watch it, it is one of the best video game documentaries I have ever seen (and I consider myself a documentary fan). Anyway watching the Smash Brothers has caused a awakening in me, the last couple of weeks I've been pretty anti-social when it comes to games, all I've really done is play Guilty Gear and a bunch of other games that no one else is interested in. I spent most of the weekend just past  playing Melee and unlocking content. All-Star mode is giving me far more trouble than I would like to admit, I'm going to blame the game spawning items, many of which are capsules that contain explosives instead of items, I've been killed by those things so many times that I reckon I'd beat All-Star mode easily on one life if there were no items at all besides the hearts you have between stages. As difficult as All-Star mode is it has nothing on Event 51, Event 51 is one of the most one-sided boss fights in any games ever, you vs. a team of Giga Bowser, Mewtwo and Gannodorf, a team of characters who have their AI set to counter everything you do, oddly enough I can kill Giga Bowser easy because he is such a big target, Mewtwo and Gannondorf are the real problem characters because they are covered by Giga Bowsers bulk while countering all of your attacks, I still haven't beaten it and I cannot get the Final Destination stage until I do so.

I played Smash mutliplayer on Sunday with some people from the Gaming league, it might just be the hours I spent on Friday and Saturday playing the game but I absolutely wrecked them at the game, well okay I'm not so hot at free for all matches where it is 4 players because I never taken them seriously but when it comes to 1v1 and teams I am absolutely on fire, I suppose it helps it was under the terms that suit me best as a player, items off, friendly fire on, stocks, certain stages banned, the competitive play style suits me quite well. I'm not saying I'm good at Smash I'm just a lot better than the 5 people I played it with on Sunday, that said I am slightly envious of the guy who knows how to Wave Dash and Dash Dance, I need to learn how to do those, I compensate a lot with my Air Smash skill, most of my kills come from Captain Falcon Knees and forward jumping Falcon Punches.

Anyway Smash Bros, not much needs to be said about Melee as everyone knows it is good.

Guilty Gear X2 # Reload (PC)

I said I wouldn't be playing this again for a while but I've been playing it, how about that. Playing this again has made the differences between this and Accent Core really apparent. So it turns out this has a anime trailer to Guilty Gear X in the Gallery. I just want to talk about this animated Guilty Gear X trailer, I do not know if there is a fully animated Guilty Gear X trailer or if this was a one off but I have to say, the animation is cool, the English voice dubbing is absolutely fucking atrocious, I can't even do it justice in words it's just awful, Legend of the Overfiend had better dubbing than  this Guilty Gear X trailer and Legend of the Overfiend was a creepy ass animated horror/porn film from the 80s.

Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus (Wii)

I haven't played the arcade mode much on this since I got it, instead I've been going through the story mode with different characters. When you think about it Ky Kiske's canonical ending is kind of bothersome when you think about it, so spoiler warning right here, in Guilty Gear 2: Overture (which I have never played) Ky kiske has a son called Sin Kiske, it is revealed that Sin is the Son of Ky and Dizzy. In Accent Core Plus Ky Kiske's story ends with him getting into a sexual relationship with Dizzy, who is a Commander Gear (gears are  man-made humanoid bio weapons with Dizzy being the daughter of Justice, the previous Commander Gear), in Guilty Gear XX Dizzy is 3 years old but has the body of a young woman because of rapid aging. Now I know what the context is but no matter how you spin it Ky Kiske fucked a 3 year old girl. I never thought I'd play a game containing a scenario where having sex with a 3 year old wasn't technically wrong.

Xenoblade Chronicles (Wii)

I haven't touched this in ages because I was stuck on a boss, fought boss again, he wrecked me, I must grind harder. I like Xenoblade but oh man do you need to grind a lot in this game and do a tonne quests to get better items, I'm a good 35 hours into Xenoblade, when it grabs you it is an amazing game to play and I am so happy I was lucky enough to get this for cheap before it become really expensive.

Burnout 2: Point of Impact (Gamecube)

Nothing to say here, went back and replayed some of the cups because I didn't win all the races previously, just content unlocks really. I have Burnout 3 on PS2 now so when this is finished I'll be moving onto that.

Trauma Center: Second Opinion (Wii)

So I came into some money recently, I won't say where I got it but I can assure you it was totally legit and there was nothing dodgy involved, either way I went out over the weekend and bought 40 games so you'll probably start to see something different on here as the weeks go on.

Trauma Center is a series that years ago represented one thing for me, total frustration, the Trauma Center games are really hard, they're really, really hard. I like these games both on DS and Wii but they are really hard! I have to be honest I like Trauma Center though, I think the the Trauma Center games were a bit understood by many people at the time, they were in many ways made out to be Surgery Simulators when they were in fact action games all along, I compare them to he Ace Attorney games in this aspect, take a profession that sounds exciting but is actually a bit mundane and make it more exciting than originally imagined.

I don't know who the artist was for the Trauma Center games but I really like the art style, when Atlus want to they can make all sorts of great games, not just RPG's.

Super Swing Golf (Wii)

I don't really follow golf as a sport but I actually like Golf video games, Mario Golf on Gameboy Color being the standard that I use to measure the worth of all other golf games. Before I start I must say Super Swing Golf is a bit of an odd case because the game goes by two names, the names are Super Swing Golf and Pangya! Golf with Sytle, turns out what I have is not in fact what I thought it was but is in fact the sequel.

So in America you have Super Swing Golf which was then followed up by Super Swing Golf Season 2.

In Europe you have Pangya! Golf with Style which was then followed up by Super Swing Golf.

Can you see how confusing that is when searching on google!?

Anyway this a pretty good, it's basically a clone of Camelot's Everybody's Golf games (speaking or which there is an Everybody's Golf spin-off called "We Love Golf" that is also on Wii). I found the controllers a bit finicky at first, because of the Wii controller there is a delay when you bring the club up so if you try swinging in one fast motion the shots all end up under powered with the ball barely moving, then again I don't play golf so for all I know the weight of the golf club could cause a delay in swings in real life in which case fair play to the developers for doing that.

I was expecting taking swings to be a nightmare that would rely on luck but it turns out that you can get better with practice, after about and hours play I found my drives were becoming more straight and were not being misfired as often.

Super Swing Golf is a really satisfying game once you get used to the controls, I don;t know about you but I become a lot more expressive with my body language when I play golf games, when you get a birdie or get a chip in it feels immediately and awesomely satisfying and you can't help but grin, Super Swing clearly has a learning curve but it is a easy to adapt curve, Golf games is something the wii does well, it is almost like the system was made for it. I think games like this got ignored by most people because people played Wii Sports golf and decided the system probably wasn't cut out for golf due to the short comings of the system.

Game Diary: Oops

I've been pretty damn busy this last week. For you 3 people who read this expect a big up date tomorrow.

Game Diary: 28/02/2014-03/03/2014

Pokemon Silver (Gameboy)

My interest is pretty much starting to waver again, I had a go at battling Red but his Snorlax killed my team so I'm going to have to grind more. Heracross was a bad team choice in this game, he doesn't know any good fighting moves, at least there is Mega Horn to look forward to when I can bother to level him up to Lv 56. The MVP of my team is easily Nidoking, if I get him up 10 levels he will be able to sweep most of Red's team on his own.

Timesplitters 2 (Gamecube)

Every other week I remind myself that I have a huge backlog of games I have started but haven't played very far into, Timesplitters 2 is one of those games. Most of these kind of games I play through and then get rid of afterwards, this game was on that list but after playing it I have had a change of heart. To be fair to the story mode it isn't the main attraction of the game (the multiplayer and "arcade" mode is) but for what it is I really enjoy the single player levels, sure the controls are a little wonky being an early Gamecube FPS game (good luck sniping) but the missions are short and well paced and are the kind of thing I would enjoy replaying from time to time.

P.N.03 (Gamecube)

Hard mode keeps getting harder and now the final two regular suits have appeared and cost 600,000 points each to buy, looks like I'll be spending a few more hours slaving away at the trial missions so I can afford to buy and upgrade them so I can unlock the final two suits when I complete the Hard mode. I really enjoy this but the developers went way too far with their reliance on the trial missions, I know the main game is super short but I'd be enjoying the trail missions a hell of a lot more with the suits and power ups were a little bit cheaper.

Burnout 2: Point of Impact (Gamecube)

There is something incredibly uplifting and frustrating about Burnout 2. It is uplifting to skillfully charge your way through opposing traffic while doing burnout combos but at the same time it is frustrating when you can be having a really good race and still be punished by the games rubber band AI. The original Burnout was pretty bad with it's AI because you could time out of a race in first place really easily yet finish below 1st in a race where you had time left over because you crashed near the end. Burnout 2 still has the latter problem, you can time out but it will never happen, instead the other racers will just become incredibly fast when you are racing your best. Rubber band AI is nothing new but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

Guilty Gear XX Accent Core Plus (Wii)

I finally got my copy of this back after leaving it back home by mistake, my time with Accent Core was fun but it will probably never get played again now I have this version, it is literally better in every way. I'm a bit bored with playing Arcade mode so I've sank some hours into the story mode. The story mode is incredibly unbalanced with its difficulty, the hardest fights are often in the middle of a characters story because that is when you get put into one sided fights against boss versions of characters who have regenerating health, the only way to beat them (besides being a complete pro) is to hit them with a one-hit-kill attack and those almost always miss against the story AI. That said though I am enjoying all the new content, now I can play as Kliff and Justice without having to unlock them.

Game Diary: 27/02/2014

Pokemon Silver (Gameboy)

I'm still grinding, I'm still filling up the Pokedex, I'm still nowhere near ready to face Red. I did something silly today, I bid on several Pokemon games on ebay and accidentally won 2 copies of Ruby, oops. It's not all bad I know someone I can give it to as a birthday gift or something. Now I own both ruby and sapphire, there is nothing I can't get on those games (excluding the entire national Pokedex and event Pokemon).

Animal Crossing (Gamecube)

I'm building up a big collection of Gyroids in my basement, in a way it's kind of creepy how I have a basement full of them. I need to stop playing this at night, I'm not finding any insects or new fish.

P.N.03 (Gamecube)

Oh god this is hardcore. I love this game but hard mode is testing me, I spend 15 minutes getting wasted over and over before I get in "the zone" and start clearing trial missions. The trial missions are solid at high levels we are talking about your cover getting blown up while enemies shoot at the sides while missiles and lasers come at you from the front, there is no way you can get past that on skill and reaction alone, you have to be able to predict in this game, you have to stay two steps ahead at all times.
I can't stand the big flying robots that move really fast and take loads of damage, they can surround you and because they get so close you can't hit them if your special attacks. To be fair to P.N.03 though once you are in the zone you feel awesome, it is one of those games that make you feel like you are good at games.

Game Diary: 25/02/2014-26/02/2014

I legitimately forgot to do this yesterday, not that you missed anything because I played the exact same things I played on Monday.

Pokemon Silver (Gameboy)

So I hit all of my goals, I beat the last few gyms, I caught that Snorlax, I did some side quests, I caught Ho-Oh and now I'm grinding my team up while using Exp.Share on my weaker Pokemon to fill the Pokedex up because truth be told I was part of the original Pokemon generation and I've decided before I die I will complete at least one full pokedex, if I can fill just Gen 1 (which is possible to do) then I'll be happy, if I can get the full 251 on the original Gameboy games then even better, if I can fill the 3rd gen Pokedex then I'll probably never want to play Pokemon again because there are some pokemon that can only be caught in Pokemon Colosseum and Pokemon XD and I really do not like those games, I can't stand them, I beat Colosseum but I could never make myself go thought it again.

Anyway my team is looking pretty good now:

Typhlosion Lv61 - Learned Flamethrower which is good because Typhlosion's physical attack isn't very high.

Nidoking Lv59 - This is the boss Pokemon of my team, he can take out most of the elite 4 thanks to his moveset of Ice, Fire & Thunder Punch + Surf, awesome Pokemon.

Pidgeot Lv50 - Training this on Mt.Silver is a pain in the arse because the wild Pokemon aren't weak to his attacks.

Gyarados Lv48 - His move set is pretty limited, if I could teach it earthquake I would but I already used the TM.

Heracross Lv48 - He won't be very good until he learns Mega Horn.

Don't really have a 5th Pokemon right now, you need flash to get through Mt.Silver anyway so I might not bother.

Animal Corssing (Gamecube)

It's now officially Spring in Animal Crossing, which is good because I've been saying for ages that I want Spring to come so I can catch new things, I haven't seen a single insect yet but they probably only appear in the day. Fish wise I found something called a Stringfish, apparently it's really rare so I put it straight in the museum because I don't need any more bells, I already have over 700,000 in the bank.

Guilty Gear XX Accent Core (Wii)

It's Wednesday so I went down to the Video Game Student Union just because I had nothing better to do, I didn't play this for 3 hours non-stop like I did last week. Don't know what it is about that CRT at the Student Union building, it's bloody massive and it's ideal for this king of game but you can't make out the background music very well, I could just blame all the people going nuts over Divekick but I think it is the TV speakers that are the problem, why am I writing a critique of a Phillips CRT?

FIFA Football 2003 (Gamecube)

Don't know why but I keep coming back to this all the time, I can't be bothered with newer stuff I just play this all the time, I don't know why but I love it. Not much to say really, I decided to pop this on and continue with my Club Championship season as Arsenal, I'm not an Arsenal fan or anything I just kind of respect them. I think one of the things I like about FIFA 2003 is because it is an old football game is that it represents a different era of Football, this was before Rooney and C.Ronaldo and Man City being a top team. Anyway I like the idea of Club Championship, it's the Euro Super League, it's that thing people used to talk about years ago where they'd be sitting down bullshitting about football and discussing what would happen if Europes top clubs went and made their own league.

Anyway how am I doing on Club Championship? I'm doing alright, beat Roma 4-2 and then drew 3-3 with Juventus, eithers it's me being not very good or the game having rubber band AI but whenever I batter a team I find it impossible to win the following game, I was battering Juventus 3-1 before they came back and got the 3-3, yeah my defending is a bit dodgy but it always happens, I'll be tring to control the match only for them to nick the ball and dash through the midfield and defense like it's fucking nothing (before I forget, for those who are curious I'm playing on professional difficulty).

It's not all bad, I'm only 5 points off the top of the table.

P.N.03 (Gamecube)

I can't be arsed with the trial missions, the game is already hard enough I'm not playing the trail missions over and over for the sake of a costume with no ass coverage. Mission 4 is a bit hectic, it's only 6 screens but in those 6 screens you get bombarded by bullet sponge flying enemies, tank's and ATV's, it's almost a purely skill based stage at times.