Thursdaily Update

Also starring Bat-Nipples.

Hey all, sorry about not publishing an update yesterday, time just seemed to slip away from me. In truth I was just too engrossed in DC Universe Online and only played a couple of hours of Daggerdale. The upside is Gotham is safe once again from the evil exploits of Bane and Scarecrow. Batwoman was quite happy, I never knew she was a red head! I guess my only Batwoman experience is that of Alicia Silverstone in the thoroughly average movie Batman & Robin. Now that I think of it she may have actually been Batgirl... I digress.

TheDonMega is now level 11 and has taken down his fair share of villains, learnt a new ice power that encases him in ice and heals a lot of health quite rapidly and finally learnt how to fly faster. Getting around the world with only the base level flight was quickly becoming tiresome. I will say that I am enjoying the change of setting a lot, as all of the MMOs I've played in the past have all been in a fantasy-ish setting. This is the first time I've played in a PvP server, which has made it a lot more fun. Minding your own business trying to complete a mission only to have some villain drop in unannounced to battle you has kept things interesting, turning the rote MMO fetch quest into something unexpected.

TheDonMega

Me and my buddy (Badgeros), who convinced me to play a bit with him, have been flying around together for the most part and we've had a lot more success than failure when it's come to villains dropping in unannounced. One of the best times I've had so far is when 3 villains tried to jump us as we were searching for some fetch-quest MacGuffin. Badgeros took the brunt of the onslaught and concentrated on the highest level attacker while I danced around dodging a lot of damage while trying to deal my own. He managed to take out his main assailant but his health had dwindled too much and as he got caught in another attack he collapsed, leaving me and 2 damaged but still dangerous attackers. After a flurry of ice and bullets it turned into a duel between me and the remaining perpetrator, and after a tense couple of minutes I had him on the ropes. As he went to take of TheDonMega gave chase, wanting to avenge the fallen Badgeros. As I chased the villain around the corner of yet another skyscraper I froze. There I was facing 12 odd villains forming a group for a raid, before I could even turn around TheDonMega was sent crashing into the pavement. Flying through a city, popping caps in fools with guns, experiencing PvP and a different genre to MMO my way through might just hold my attention for a while.

Enough PC talk, this blog has Xbox right up there in the title. Since I last updated everyone I have finally leveled everyone of my Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale characters to level 10, which took a lot longer than expected due to me losing my concentration and dying every second run through of the last boss. Only just moments before starting this entry I finally struggled my way through beating the last boss in Coop with myself. Having to babysit a level 1 character through the last boss while simultaneously trying to deal as much damage as possible to get it over as quickly as possible is something that took more tries than I'd like to admit. A hint for those going for it, don't think that if he goes down and you get to the boss in time before he bleeds out that you are safe. I found out the hard way that his timer is still ticking down during the last long diatribe he has to get out of his system before finally croaking it.

Spoilers: The last boss is a dragon. Now you don't have to play Daggerdale, you're welcome.

One more achievement to go, and that's grinding my way to having 100 000 gold. I should be done by the end of today and will therefore be posting a review of Daggerdale next time I blog. I'm not sure if I'll be writing an entry over Easter, so I'll take this time to wish everyone a happy Easter. Try not to engorge yourselves too much on chocolate and whatever else you'll be eating during the festivities.

Tuesdaily Update

Hack and/or Slash

So we finally get to a more typical update post. Shorter and to the point, though in the past any blog I've started by saying that has been anything but. I'll try to buck the trend, but first I hope everyone's had a fine day full of gaming and/or achieving. All of my gaming time has been spent with Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale lately. I'm closing in on finishing the game a forth and final time, however I will still need to put in some time afterwards.

One of the achievements requires you to get all characters up to level 10, which will be a bit of a grind seeing as you finish the story at around level 8, even if you complete all the side quests. This is the first action RPG where I have actually enjoyed playing a spell caster. Usually I find playing one tedious, my Dwarven Cleric and Halfling Wizard have both been the most fun to play. Historically I've been more of a warrior type, but I have to say the Human Fighter just didn't grab me at all.

I'm about 3/4s the way through with my Elven Rogue, which is the last of the characters you can play as, and about to jump back in kill off a whole bunch more goblins and hopefully finish the game. Other than getting all characters to level 10 the rest of the achievements are easy.

Daggerdale is very similar to the original Diablo in that it all takes place in the one dungeon. You work your way through the floors completing quests until you reach the bottom/end and face off against your nemesis. I won't go into too much detail on the game as that's not what these updates are for, I expect to finish it soon however and will write up a review.

Today was a Good Day in Metropolis

That's all that has been happening on the Xbox 360 front. On the PC, however, I have been playing some DC Universe Online at the behest of a friend. This is the first MMO I've delved into since World of Warcraft, which I lost 3 months to years ago. I usually peter out on MMO's fairly quickly, though I will say DC Universe is now free and has a cool character creation tool that has allowed me to squash injustice as Ice Cube with both my gats and ice powers. You might find me flying around the PvP US Server. My hero's name is TheDonMega, drop me a line if you play.

Xbox Musings

This should be the last historical post before I start writing what will be a more typical update post. I'm looking forward to writing more of them, as these are quite a bit more taxing to write. These posts usually end up long and filled with reflection, when I'm more of a go with the flow and keep looking forward person. I don't usually like talking about myself too much, and these past couple of posts just come off (to me at least) as a bit self-important. I just wanted to establish a decent base, so people might be able to understand where I'm coming from a little better.

I thought that now you guys have a decent base to work from I should lay out some of my more recent pursuits from which the shorter, more consistent updates will use as a jumping point.

My mistress

I've been playing my Xbox 360 pretty much constantly since I got it. The thing that keeps me glued to the system is achievements. I'm an addict, if the choice exists between a PC version and Xbox, Xbox will win out. I'm not in it for the bragging or e-fame or whatever, I just love the idea that everything I play is in my history. Someone can scroll through my whole list of games, see how far I got in them, what difficulty I beat it on and more from this pool of points I've amassed over the years. It's a cool system, couple that with my slightly OCD obsession with completing or collecting everything I possibly can when I play games and you've found my crack. This has led me to put myself through some grueling challenges, some of the upcoming ones I hope to share with you later when I get video capabilities.

My most proud achievement would have to be completing Lost Planet. I firmly believe Lost Planet to be the hardest game I have ever played and beat so far. Added to that the fact that it is one of the only games I did all the multiplayer achievements legitimately without any boosting or working the system. I usually only have a very limited time for multiplayer, I usually lose interest in a couple of days or a week. Once I've seen the maps a couple times I'm good, I think I play games to experience new things and complete challenges, once I'm replaying maps, struggling against faceless people only to finish a map and do it again with no gain I fall off rather quick. For some reason Lost Planet really stuck with me, I went from enjoying it, to real frustration, to really enjoying it all over again. I firmly believe that there is a lot of depth to Lost Planet multiplayer, in nearly every aspect of the game, from movement to weapons and tactics. I haven't played the sequel yet, but just at a glance I'm not sure it's recaptured the magic. It was this game that taught me to really appreciate and enjoy animation priority, and left me looking forward to the day I finally get time to tackle Dark Souls.

T-Eng for me!

Lately I've been working through XBLA game after XBLA game. I'm a sucker for sales, and Microsoft's had so many that I've completely filled my hard drive with them. I've no longer got any space to download anything or install my disc-based games so I've decided to try and get them under control. I'm trying to complete the ones that take up the most space. I've written my review about Sonic Adventure 2 last week, which you can read here, which was the game I most recently completed. Right now I'm working through Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale. I've been on a bit of an extended RPG kick, which will hopefully provide a tonne of content you guys will appreciate.

I won't get into that too much now, or I won't have anything to say next update. I don't really know if I achieved what I set out to do with this entry, but time is up. I have a previous engagement I need to head off to in 30 minutes. See you all next time!

Sonic Adventure 2 XBLA Review

Taking a break from all the narcissistic ramblings about me, I thought I would write a small review on my time with the XBLA version of Sonic Adventure 2. I guess this will also tie into my previous stories involving Sega, however just to assure everyone reading that my blog will most definitely not be solely about Sega or Sega related items. It's just happenstance that I decided to start this thing while I was in the end stages of completing Sonic Adventure 2, I think I know what inspired me and a shout-out will be in order after I say whatever it is that I am about to say.


Firstly if you've read my previous entries you'll know there is quite the amount of Sega nostalgia derived from some of my earliest days of gaming. I did however stray from the path of Sega and into that of the other 4 lettered console manufacture, also starting with an "S". After owning both the Master System and the Mega Drive our family jumped to the Sony Playstation and from then on a dearth of anything Sega came across my TV screen. No Saturn or Dreamcast for me, the later being something I'm extremely disappointed I didn't get to experience. Only one friend of mine had a Dreamcast and I only went to play it a couple times, what I did play I enjoyed greatly.

It's because of this that whenever there is any Dreamcast game available to me I have, for the most part, bought and played it. While I play most games for fun, some games I just want to experience for... I don't know - historical reasons, i guess you could say. If you've never played Sonic Adventure 2 and you've that in mind you'll have a pretty great time, but if you come just looking for a good game you might be disappointed.

Overview
It's with this context that I had quite a fun time with Sonic Adventure 2, nostalgia derived from the first few Sonic the Hedgehog games on the Master System mixed with a sense of curiosity of what I would have experienced had I stuck with Sega. Even still it wasn't a smooth ride, it just makes the completely valid problems with the game just that little bit easier to deal with, but let's not start out with the negatives.

Running towards the camera happens more than it should in Sonic Adventure 2

Sonic Adventure 2 is a decent game with none of the conveniences or streamlining we get in the newer games. This is obvious as it was originally released in 2001, while that doesn't seem too old, it's literally a generation ago in the console ages. All the classic Sonic characters make their return including a few new ones. The game itself is split into a few different sections, with the Hero and Villain sides of the main story both playable. Once beaten the campaign levels are available in the level select screen and open up offering 5 challenges in each level to complete. These range from score, collecting rings, time, harder versions of each level and hunting down an illusive lost Chao hidden somewhere in each stage.

Chao are needy little things

Chao's are back, returning from the original Sonic Adventure. If you haven't played a Sonic Adventure game before Chao's are little creatures you can raise in a separate area to the main game. It's a surprisingly deep and involved process for a meta-game you don't really have any reason to involve yourself in. Many Sonic Adventure enthusiasts love the Chao meta-game and spend hundreds of hours raising their Chao in a pseudo Tamagotchi fashion. When you defeat an enemy in the main game they drop animals or Chaos Drives which you can pick up and bring back to your Chao to absorb. Each item your Chao absorbs can raise and/or lower their different stats which in turn affect how they do in special Chao Races and Battles. Placing well in these events can get you items that will affect your Chao's mood, you can also pet your Chao and perform all kinds of actions to make it love or hate you. Eventually your Chao can evolve and also breed, to create many more and different Chao. As I said it's a fairly involved process, and this is only scratching the surface, for something that really has no bearing on the main game.

Rational

TRUCK!

So you're not lacking for content in Sonic Adventure 2, it took me over 50 hours to complete everything it had to offer. I grabbed every Emblem, got all the A-Grades and raised 2 Chao's to high enough levels to complete every Chao challenge. The rough edges slip in here and there however, the most prevalent being the shoddy camera angles. The game switches back and forth between a third person style camera in which you have some control to predefined cinematic angles that can really through you off and at times make you jump or run off in the complete wrong direction. To anybody who has been playing video games for a while you've run into stuff like this and accept it as a limitation of the era, but it still doesn't make it any more frustrating. When you're mid level and the time limit is bearing down on you, only for the camera to switch unexpectedly sending you soaring off into space for the tenth time in a row you really begin to feel your blood pressure start to rise.

One wrong move and you're in the drink!

Another real downer is the abundance of glitches in the game, things just don't act like they're supposed to sometimes. Maybe it's a sequence where you don't have any control that ends in you supposed to be grinding down a rail and your character just falls through to oblivion or using your homing attack to try and take out an enemy only to be sling-shotted out of bounds. Nearly all of the levels have instant death drops all the way through the levels which can lead to frustration and some intense near misses. Especially when going for the challenges as a death mean restarting the level over again.

The last gripe I have with the game is with a context sensitive button being packed full of sometimes more than 5 available differing actions. You can cycle through them with another button but when time is of the essence this can lead to unnecessary frustration and death. The most egregious being when playing with Sonic the same button can be used to shoot along a trail of rings or zoom straight down for a descending bounce attack. When the only way to the next platform is to zoom along a trail of rings in the air that you have to jump to, there is no time to cycle to the correct option, you cross your fingers and hope you go across those rings and not straight down into nothingness and a level restart. Fortunately you can get used to the exact timing required to consistently pull this off, but it's something that causes unnecessary frustrations.


Summary
Apart from those 3 main gripes, the rest of the game is enjoyable, especially if you're a Sonic fan. The gameplay is varied, with the different mission types keeping things fresh. There is plenty of challenges here to keep you busy, not to mention raising your own Chao army if you want. If you're not a Sonic fan, I wouldn't recommend it, as you will more than likely be turned away by the frustrations an older game like this can deliver.


Shout out to TehMonitor on Youtube, and their excellent Sonic Adventure 2 A-Rank Guide videos. I think listening to them and working my way though the game also partially influenced me into starting this blog with the intention of working towards creating something like their channel in the future!

Past and Future Endevors

Before I can start giving you guys updates I guess you'll need a reference point to start from. I can start dumping updates on you which will eventually form some kind of progress but it'll make a whole bunch more sense if I lay a little back story out first.

The all powerful Master System

I touched on my history in my welcome post which you can read here. That was a real quick over-view of some of my formative years, which won't be too important to the upcoming update posts through out this blog. They will however give you an idea of where my particular tastes and nostalgia is coming from. As a quick recap the lions share of my early gaming memories came from the Sega Master System. I guess most kids either became Nintendo or Sega aligned, not due to any real cognitive decision, but more of the circumstance their parents placed them in. Which ever console your parents decided to get you, was the one you were stuck with. 

Personally I could not imagine growing up without spending the hours upon hours playing Alex Kidd, Wonder Boy, Space Harrier, Columns, Streets of Rage and so many more. Sega will always hold a special place in my heart, even throughout the mostly crap they've been putting out as of late. I guess the reason I'm going over this again in a bit more detail is that if you follow me in my adventures you'll probably see a whole bunch of Sega stuff (old and new) in my gameplay. You might ask yourself why I would waste hours playing something that is by most accounts objectively lower in quality than some of the great games I have stacked up on my desk waiting to be played, nostalgia's one hell of a drug!

Pile of Shame

I guess from there we'll transition into my "problem". I love games, pretty close to nearly all of them. Which can lead me to buy a whole bunch of them, and I really mean a lot! While I have plans to play them all, I can't actually be sure that that will happen. As such I'm trying to cut down buying more while I work my way through the backlog I've amassed. This means that if you're coming here for up to the minute gameplay and information you will be sorely disappointed. I can't even guarantee the stuff you'll be seeing pop up here be timely within a year, in fact I can pretty much guarantee it won't. I'm here to have a good time with games, not rush from new release to new release, so I invite you to join me in just having some fun, playing some games and relaxing.

It's not always going to be relaxing, mind you. I also have a bit of an Achievement addiction. Not in the sense of collecting as many as possible, by playing all kinds of games, grabbing the ones that come easy and moving on like some people. I'm more the completionist, I love the challenge of trying to obtain all the achievements the game can offer and usually I try to stick with one or two games until I do. This adds to the time it takes me to move from one game to the other, compounding my backlog problem. I do think that upcoming features of me raging my way through an achievement or two will make for some very entertaining and embarrassing upcoming features once I get my video recording stuff together. This could also turn into some Guides and How-Tos.

Hopefully as the community of my blog grows we can get together for some gaming sessions, or work on achievements together. If you want to get in contact with me you can do so through the comments below. Please leave a comment letting me know which direction you want me to take this. I have a good idea but I'm hoping to have this be more of a community thing in which you guys help me shape it as well. If you tell me what content you want, hopefully I can provide it for you and we all get what we want!

Hey there, I'm Frank!

Hi there!

Welcome everyone!

After writing blogs off and on for a while now on many different services/websites I decided I would start my own here. Instead of wasting time posting a blog every now and then for someone else to capitalise on, I've decided to commit and start my own blog with a new entry at least every couple of days.

I guess I should tell you a bit about myself. First and most importantly; I love Video Games! I play them every second I can with 99% of that time being on my Xbox 360. Most people that know me would tell you the same, it's just what grabs me. I'm not deep into any one genre, I pretty much just play as many as I can and usually find something to like in most of them.

I've been into video games for as long as I can remember, with some of my earliest memories growing up are that of game play sessions of Mixed-Up Mother Goose and Commander Keen on my dad's computer. Later we had an Atari 2600 where many an hour was spent on Pitfall. Then came the Sega Master System where most of my nostalgic gaming memories are from. My cousins also had one and we swapped games regularly. Between all of us we must have had hundreds of games and I remember so many good times playing them all.

Masterpiece

Those years were the formation of my near uncontrollable love of video games. Since then I've owned and spent many an hour on the Mega Drive, Playstation, Xbox and now Xbox 360. I've been playing video games in some form or another for over 20 years, so when I decided what to write my blog about it seems no other subject can really come close.

Enough about me, I'll be sharing more with you as we go, let's move onto the blog. To start with things will be a bit slow with mostly text entries popping up sporadically. I'm going to be writing a whole bunch of (Mostly)Daily Updates, Reviews and Guides to start with. I have grand plans though, and as soon as I have the means I will more than likely have all kinds of video features and other stuff to upload for all of you, most probably in the extended Let's Play form, along with whatever else you guys ask.

If there is any type of content I haven't mentioned that you would like provided please don't hesitate to ask. Leave a comment below, about anything, I hope to have a ton of interaction with you guys in the future.