That's what she said...

...Well, that was short. I finished The Minish Cap in about two days of solid play. It was fantastic and is possibly my new favourite of the series, but I want more. Sure, you can go back after finishing the game and find all sorts of new items and secrets, but without a grand purpose behind it all anymore, it's just not the same. The problem lies with the dungeons, and there are two possible fixes: Either have more of them (there are really only five), or make them longer. I found myself spending more time unlocking new dungeons than I did conquering them. Still, this is a great game that is definitely worth everyone's time. The new play mechanics (The Minish, kinstones, sword skills, etc...) were well-executed, and exploration was very organic. Perhaps I've just become accustomed to the grid-based play of Zelda, Link's Awakening, and the Oracle games, but exploration was never tedious and always fluid; it really helped to immerse me in the adventure. The game was also a touch on the easy side, but aside from that and the length, everything was done right. If you're a Zelda fan of any measure, you should definitely be picking this one up.

I've now gone back to finish The Adventure Of Link, and I'm still having a hell of a time getting settled-in. Perhaps it's just the first boss, who I find infuriatingly frustrating to beat, but I'm quickly getting a very bad taste in my mouth. That's a real shame after being so impressed the last three titles that I played in the series. Also, as you may have noticed from my XBOX Live gamer card on the right there, I picked-up Tony Hawk's Project 8 and King Kong for the 360. I stumbled upon both of them new and cheap at a usually over-priced and relatively sketchy shop on Yonge Street today. I already own the latter for Windows, but the StarForce copy protection irks me to no end, so I'm hesitant to install it; besides, the 360 version has much better graphics. Project 8 is just amazing. It's classic Tony Hawk (like, the first two in the series) with awesome graphics and some new gameplay innovations; "nail the trick" mode breathes a whole new life into the experience.

Tender!

I finished the Oracle games! Both Oracle Of Ages and Oracle Of Seasons were top-notch titles, and the linking features really tied the whole experience together nicely. The weapon, item, and ring transfers weren't tedious, and the way they handled the plot cross-over was clever. The final battle, only available after completing both cartridges, really made it all worth it. I definitely recommend giving these ones a go.

So now I'm on to the The Minish Cap, and it is spectacular. It features gorgeous graphics, classic gameplay with a few new twists, and some familiar touches from previous Zelda games in the sound and music. What really grabbed my attention, however, were the new interpretations of some of the traditional aspects of the franchise. From redesigned (yet still familiar) enemies to Link's hat, there's a lot to rediscover here, and it's definitely welcome as it breathes new life into the series. Oh, and I really like the way they handle the mine carts in this one :) The only complaint I have so far is that it seems as though this adventure is going to be a little short... I'm already nearing the half-way point of the game, and I just started playing it this morning :\ I'll keep you posted.

Curses!

Neither Castle Crashers nor Fable 2 will be available until some time in 2008, and that's only if things stay on schedule! Gah! Oh, and Casino Royale is only on Blu-Ray DVD! Also, while Rogers On Demand has The Illusionist in HD, The Prestige is only in standard definition! I hate my life.

Well, I am on the last dungeon in Oracle Of Ages, but then I also seem to have develpoed a bit of an addiction to Texas Hold 'em on XBOX Live, so that doesn't really help matters at all :\

So I was productive yesterday...

...I helped one friend order a new battery charger for her camera, fixed this guy's borked Windows installation (plus data back-up and PSU and GPU fan repair), got a friend's new laptop (some kind of Celeron D Toshiba running Vista Home Basic) and home wireless network (the interface for Bell's SpeedStream wireless modem/router combo is painful) running all spiffy, and set-up another friend's two new digital cable boxes... Now all they need is a new line to the house for a stronger signal; some channels are kinda chunky in one room :)

*fingers crossed*

Since finally getting this digital cable thing up and running, I've had the HD terminal freeze once, had it lose its signal twice, and lost various channels for seemingly random periods of time. I really hope it's just because of the weather we've been having lately and not another problem with the line or the terminal, and I especially hope this isn't indicative of Rogers' usual service :\

I bought a used copy of The Legend Of Zelda: The Minish Cap the other day; it was $10 cheaper than the cheapest new copy I could find. I'm about two-thirds of the way through Oracle Of Ages, and I can hardly wait to move-on to The Minish Cap; it's easily one of the prettiest things I've ever seen on a GBA.

Oh, and here's something potentially disturbing: A while back, Activision bought Red Octane and the Guitar Hero franchise, to be continued by Neversoft (Tony Hawk's Pro Skater). EA just announced that they're publishing Harmonix's next game... So, yeah, it looks like Guitar Hero won't be handled by its original developer anymore at all... I don't like the sound of that.

The Arcade

I downloaded some demos from the XBOX Live Arcade, and I'm a little torn; I enjoyed Robotron 2084 quite a bit, Time Pilot and Contra bring back some great Commodore 64 memories, and Smash TV would be a blast in mutliplayer... I'm leaning heavily towards Smash TV, but then I'm also considering just hanging-on to those 450 excess points and putting them towards Castle Crashers or Castlevania: SOTN when they come out... Or maybe DooM is the way to go. I mean, classic deathmatch! Gah! Stupid Microsoft and their money-grabbing trap! I walked right into it!

Damnit!

I went to exchange a defective keyboard today. The guy said they only do direct exchanges in the first 30 days from purchase, and after that, I have to deal with the manufacturer because it's refurbished. That's standard policy, so I left without fuss... But it was an OEM product, not a refurbished one, and it was only $10, so I'm not about to pay to ship it to Logitech when I could just buy another one for around the same price.

I also picked-up a 1250-point XBOX Live prepaid card while I was out, and bought Alien Hominid HD when I got home. I have 450 points left-over now... What should I get? Gauntlet? Contra? Uno? Many choices... I just can't decide. I noticed something funny though; 1250-point cards tend to cost around $20, I've seen 1400-point cards for $25~$30, and 2800-point cards for $40... Anyone else see the problem here? Yeah, the 1400-point card is actually the worst value in terms of points-per-dollar, even at $25. What the hell!? Crooks. I also picked-up Tony Hawk 2x, Wreckless, and Ninja Gaiden Black for XBOX for $35 altogether.

w00t!

Found one of these. More expensive than my two-composite-switch solution, but I'll get by...

In other news, the ice storm I mentioned in my last post knocked-out cable to the neighbourhood later that night, and service wasn't restored until earlier today. I'm willing to bet someone's messing with me ;)

Ooh, and I downloaded demos for Alien Hominid HD, NBA Street: Homecourt, and MLB 2K7 for XBOX 360. They're all very pretty, but I'll probably only be purchasing Alien Hominid... Followed by Castle Crashers (from the same developer), whenever they get around to releasing it :\

Respect.

Big ups to Mike, the cable guy, who really kicked-ass at his job today. He showed-up well within the appointed time frame, asked if I wanted him to take his boots off, made perfectly enjoyable small talk while still totally intimidating me (he was almost as tall as I am, but I was in a hoodie, baggy pants, and slippers whereas he was wearing winter outerwear, a tool belt, and a Harley-Davidson belt buckle), and then ran a whole new cable to my house from the telephone pole across the street in the middle of the crazy fucker of an ice storm that has been pummeling us all afternoon! He had me do some of the wiring inside the house because he couldn't feel his hands... But he stuck it out and got the job done, so I made sure to get his card. To tie things up neatly, I now have HDTV over digital cable, and analog cable is much cleaner with the new line. The problem was indeed the old line running to the house that was installed, I'm told, nearly 30 years ago! The guy said it was the two splitters, the amplifier, the coupler, and the surge protector causing the problem, but I tried it without all of those the other night, and it didn't help. So, the only loose end now is the component switch. I think the easiest route would be to pick-up two sub-$30 composite switches and use one for component video and the other for stereo audio.

I'm worried now though... My computers are all solid and still fast enough to keep me from upgrading to a whole new build, I have no service or consulting jobs lined-up in the foreseeable future, my home theatre setup is just about complete, and no video games are really holding my attention. I guess that leaves me to focus on university and my band... Weird. I'll try to find something to post here until things pick-up :)

Guh...

Two things:

Rogers has not yet resolved my cable issues. The HD terminal did show up a few days earlier (Friday the 23rd) than they said it would (Monday the 26th), but it was supposed to be here no later than 21st initially. Since it showed-up on the Friday and they had offered us a $6 per month discount plus some extra channels, we e-mailed to accept the offer. Unfortunately, nobody seems to work past 3pm Eastern time on Fridays at Rogers, so all digital channels were "Not Authorized" until Monday morning; that's when about ten channels appeared and the rest showed nothing but gray. We received an e-mail confirmation of our order later that day, assuring us all would be well within the next 24 hours. 24 hours later, nothing had changed, so I called their 24-hour repair service line. Turns-out that this address is the only one in the neighbourhood that was not returning a signal to the tech. Sweet. The tech was very personable and didn't treat me like a moron, but was unable to solve my problem. After trying another TV and a few different wiring possibilities, I had exhausted my options and so I made an appointment for a house-call tomorrow. Oh, and they said they were going to charge me for a partial month... Hah! Not if I have anything to say about it.

Next up is accessorizing. I looked-around for a DVI-D cable (for the HDTV terminal) and a three-input component switch (for my 360, XBOX, and PS2). I found DVI-D cables going for as much as $180 for 2m, but, of course, I went to the local independent computer store and got a 3m cable for $20.99 :) I didn't have nearly as much success with the switch though. Apparently nobody carries them. I did find one place that had a two-input switch for $120, but that's a little high for something that didn't meet my minimum requirements. So, it seems as though I'll either be ordering one online, buying a stereo composite switch (~$30) and doing audio separately, or building my own... Should be exciting regardless of what I choose to do :) In the interim, I splurged and bought a copy of Serenity on HD DVD. I would've picked-up Pitch Black and Army Of Darkness as well, but they were over $30 each!

It's official...

...Resident Evil 4 has been put on hold indefinitely. It's one thing to have challenging gameplay that forces players to use ammo and health items, effectively eliminating stockpiling and creating a very tense experience; it's a whole other story to have enemies that appear out of nowhere and stick you in the back with a pitchfork the second you turn your back! Seriously, the respawning enemies were bearable because they dropped plenty of ammo and money, but when I'm standing at the top of a hill with only one path leading towards me, that is clear as far as the eye can see, and I'm suddenly mauled to death by no less than two enemies just moments after turning away from said path, I can't be bothered. So far, Bully is much more entertaining.

Solid... Platinum?

Microsoft has announced the next round of XBOX 360 platinum hits:

• Battlefield 2: Modern Combat
• Burnout Revenge
• Call of Duty 2
• Dead or Alive 4
• Fight Night Round 3
• Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter
• Top Spin 2
• Rockstar Games presents Table Tennis
  

Burnout and Fight Night are definitely tempting, and DoA4 and Table Tennis are pretty much sure-things. Sweet. Now if only Dead Rising, Lost Planet, and Crackdown were cheaper :)

Adventures in HDTV...

Let me start from the start...

So Rogers makes the Speed channel digital-only, replacing it with two classic movie channels. Ugh. I call to research my options, and am told that I'll need to pay an extra $6.98 per month for basic digital service and hardware rental plus $9.99 per month to get the sports package that includes the Speed channel. After checking the website and seeing that the information did not match-up, I made another call. This time I was told that I didn't need any additional packages, just the digital service, and so I opted for the HD terminal when I placed the order online. Everything seemed to go well until I received an e-mail saying my account information was incorrect and that I had ordered a PVR. I just forwarded what I had already sent them (since I checked and it was indeed correct) and assured them that I had not ordered a PVR, and they were happy. They even gave me a reference number. Well, here we are, three business days later, and no delivery. I called-back to see what's up, and I was told that despite my reference number, Rogers had no record of any transactions on my account. I assured the support guy that he had been wonderfully helpful, and then I threatened to cancel my service before hanging-up.

This really shouldn't be that complicated, should it?

Doot doot doot...

I haven't touched my N64 in forever, my 360 is getting more use as a DVD player than as a gaming system, and my Guitar Hero guitars have been collecting dust for a little while now. Why is this? Well, I really have no solid answer. I did sit down and finish Oracle Of Seasons and get started on Oracle Of Ages (see "zelda" to the right), and I've been trying my damnedest to get into Resident Evil 4 with little success, but that doesn't really explain what's going on. I performed a clean Windows XP installation on my audio/gaming computer, but that was just one evening. I've only taken-on one repair job over the past few weeks (data back-up on a failing hard drive), and that, again, was only one evening. This is strange...

Anyway, I feel should explain why I'm having such a hard time getting into Resident Evil 4. I really enjoyed the first game in the series, but never finished it. The same can be said for Nemesis and Code Veronica. I did finish RE2, and it was fantastic, but it was also a trying experience. I think the RE games previous to 4 have ingrained a sense of necessary resource management and performance perfection in me for the survival horror genre. If I take too many shots to kill an enemy, or miss a pick-up, or take too much damage, the ridiculously scarce resources of the previous games have made me paranoid that I won't be able to progress past a certain point on account of my inefficiency. Now, I'm learning that RE4 is much more forgiving in this department, but I still can't shake the urge to reload my last save and check walk-throughs every time I finish a scene. It's frustrating to say the least, and I'm finding myself more than a little tempted to move-on to Bully or Jak 3.

Once I was the king of Spain...

My older brother picked-up one of these, which reminded me of this, which had me considering spending a lot of money on something I didn't really need at all. I have a laptop and a portable MP3 player, so really, what would I use either of these for? Portable video? Instant-on web browsing? Gaming? Huh... Sounds like it'd be cheaper to just get a PSP (which I'm already planning to anyway). Sure, I sacrifice some of the nicer features like a touch-screen keyboard and the vast amounts of storage space, but I do get better games and save some cash. Meh, they're all just new toys at this point anyway :)

Oh, and hey, so I realized that XBOX Live accounts are per profile, not per system... Looking back after having this realization, I see that I was foolish to assume otherwise, logistically speaking. That doesn't change my mood though; I'm a little disappointed that I can't let my little brother play online without shelling-out another $60. I wonder if accounts are transferable; I won't have much time to play until the summer anyway.

Sneaky bastards...

The other day, my dad asked me why they were showing old movies on the "Speed" channel. Turns out the cable company decided to change their existing cable package and make that channel available only as an add-on for digital customers. Great. So the cable bill automatically goes up by another $4~7 per month for the digital service and equipment rental fees, plus another few bucks for that one channel. What a fuckin' racket. My dad said he called them to see what was up, and they said that because people were unhappy, they were waiving the hardware rental fee for the first year... Except that's their standard promotion anyway; it has nothing to do with unhappy customers. Jerks.

Speaking of jerks, it turns out Microsoft isn't quite so asinine about upgrading previous versions of Windows to Vista. There is a work-around to the upgrade path I mentioned a few posts back that does not require a previous installation in order to use an upgrade licence, and not only is Microsoft aware of it, but they don't plan on doing anything about it!

Speaking of erroneous past posts, I was wrong in my belief that the PS2 version of Resident Evil 4 supported progressive scan. I confused it with natively supporting a widescreen format that the GameCube version didn't. Just to double-check all of my PS2 games (not all have the "Progressive Scan" tag on the case), I headed over to Mobygames to see what their database had to say. What a great site :) Oh, and yeah, this means I've finished God Of War... It was fantastic!

Anyway, a couple of quick final notes: The music in Oracle Of Seasons is some of the best I've ever heard come out of a Game Boy, or any system. It's just well-written and really stands-out because of it. Also, as I was wandering around downtown Toronto yesterday, I stopped-in at Game Shack (just off Yonge and Dundas, Northwest block) and saw a copy of Psychonauts for Windows for $15. I brought it up to the counter, and the guy said he'd get me another one. Turns-out he has stacks(!) of factory-sealed copies of the Windows and PS2 ($20) versions of the game that he got from one of his suppliers! I asked him about the XBOX version, and he said he'd look into getting it. If you're ever in the neighbourhood, kids, pick one up!

Well that's annoying...

http://gaim.sourceforge.net/faq.php#q72

You know you're jealous...

Last night, a very attractive young woman came over to my house and played through Streets Of Rage 2 (Genesis) with me. Then we took turns playing Katamari Damacy (PS2), followed by some fierce Burnout: Revenge (XBOX) competition.

ABUH!?

Now this is enough to warrant the purchase of a PSP. No, seriously, this is like... Gah! I can't even put it into words! I'm getting this, a PSP, and then Loco Roco just for kicks :)

Ooohhh... Pretty.

So I got the XBOX 360 HD-DVD player earlier this evening, and I'm currently taking a break from watching King Kong on it. While it's very nice to get a pack-in, they could've picked something a little less... Drawn-out :) I've never seen the movie before, and while it does showcase the wonders of the HD generation quite nicely, I'm a little over half-way through it and ready to do just about anything else. Also, the Universal Media Remote uses IR (saves on batteries, I'm assuming), and part of my entertainment centre kinda blocks the IR receiver on the console... And no, I can't move it somewhere else (wiring). Ugh. Still, I have an HD-DVD player. Hooray!

I've also been informed that the 360 up-samples regular DVDs from 480p if you're using the VGA cable... Now, I'm pretty sure my TV only has DVI, but an adapter would do the trick, right? Hrmmm...

Anyway, that's about it. Wait, one more thing: I did renew my XBOX Live Gold account, and immediately downloaded the Crackdown demo. Holy shit, is this game fun! Power-ups are accelerated in the demo, and once one of your attributes hits level two, a 30-minute time limit begins, but I'm already hooked! The graphics are nothing special (it's built on RenderWare technology, so it's not ugly, but not super-awesome either), the story is trivial, and the cel-shading style just seems out of place, but the gameplay is gold! Think modern Grand Theft Auto with Deus Ex/Matrix-esque abilities. I could skip all the missions and just jump from rooftop to rooftop for hours, and if I got bored, I'd just throw some cars and trucks around with my bare hands :)