Consuming a healthy amount of suckers online everyday!
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It seems like an eternity since this game was released but now I have the perfect excuse to go back to it as the Playstation 3 trophy patch has finally been released.
They’ve also added in some alternative difficulty options which are very welcome. (This isn’t an easy game by anyone’s standards!)
But, no, you still can’t jump! 
Breakbeat hardcore and Robocop. Two things that shouldn’t be relevant in the year 2009 (and probably show that I’m getting old!). Hey, who cares… I love this tune!
It’s one of the most frustrating games I’ve played recently (admittedly I’m rubbish at it!) but if you own it and are up for more punishment, you’ll be pleased to hear that the Pure Time Trials downloadable content pack is now free for Mirror’s Edge on the Playstation 3.
It’s not advertised too well though so you’ll have to search through the Playstation Store for it.
(Unfortunately it still costs on XBox Live. Then again, XBox owners are probably used to paying through the nose for everything by now :p)
Piracy and games aren’t always a bad combination!
I’ve been silently campaigning (hoping even) for a new Monkey Island game for years now and Telltale Games almost sneaked one out with a completely new story without me noticing.
It’s now calling itself the Tales of Monkey Island and it is being released in five episodes:
The first chapter is out now and you can download a playable demo at http://www.telltalegames.com/monkeyisland
And yes! It’s good, it’s very good! The writing is classic Monkey Island and they’ve even got the voice talent of the original Guybrush Threepwood himself – Dominic Armato. The guy with a name that sounds like tomato!
If you are a fan you won’t be disappointed.
Insult: “You fight like a dairy farmer.”
Comeback: “How appropriate. You fight like a cow.”
Whether you appreciate this or not will depend on your taste in music. But if you are partial to some hard drum and bass you might like this track from Mistabishi of Hospital Records called Printer Jam.
It is a track built around the sound of an ink jet printer and, somewhat bizarrely, it works!
You’ll either love it or hate it! Try unpluggin’ it and pluggin’ it in again!
Incidentally if you prefer your drum and bass a little more melodic search out All Hell Is Breaking Loose by London Elektricity which is also available on Hospital Records.
There is a bit of an outcry going on at the moment about new Silverlight-driven advertisements coming to XBox Live and the subsequent replies by Major Nelson on the subject.
But if Microsoft starts showing adverts like this people might have a point!
Warning: That link does contain vomiting so if you are easily offended – Don’t click it!
(It’s not particulary likely that Microsoft will load puke-related ads on the XBox dashboard but it was a humourous way to report two stories in one post!)
There are not many, if any, musicians that cause the same level of impact on the world as Michael Jackson. Over the last couple of days every news channel has been reporting on him and every music channel and radio station has been playing his music.
You can even hear people playing his music walking down the street and out of every car with it’s windows down.
He wasn’t a stranger to the gaming world either: The Moonwalker game was released on the Sega Master System, he had a cameo appearance in Space Channel 5 (as Space Michael if you are wondering!) and he was even, allegedly, responsible for the soundtrack to Sonic 3.
I don’t think many people in the world cannot be familiar with at least one of his songs and know the lyrics.
If the best tribute to Michael is to play his music and you are looking for the right game. Dig out your copy of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, grab a motorbike, turn up the volume and blast out Billie Jean!
Chamone!! R.I.P. MJ!
To celebrate its anniversary Super Stardust HD is on offer on the Playstation Store for £1.59 (1.99 euros). You shouldn’t need any convincing to snap it up at this price as it’s one of the best shooters on the Playstation 3. Be quick though, the deal ends soon!
In other news (always wanted to say that!), DICE and EA’s free online cartoon-style first person shooter – Battlefield Heroes, has finally come out of beta. I’ve had a quick blast on it and it’s well worth a download. You will need real money if you want to customise your character to any extent but, so far, it seems perfectly possible to play the game and not need to spend a penny.
Just get to http://www.battlefieldheroes.com/ and sign up.
A bit of advice: Make sure you register an account and log into your account BEFORE you click the “Play Now” button and launch the Battlefield Heroes updater. (Initially I didn’t log in and ended up getting annoying “Build not found” errors whenever I tried to play the game. Very frustrating for an hour or so until I googled the solution!)
It’s been a while since I caught up with anything new in the demoscene but this amazing 4k intro was bought to my attention by Phil of retroleum.co.uk.
It features almost photo-realistic landscapes displayed in realtime using procedurally-generated textures all in 4KB. You don’t have to understand that… You just have to watch it and pick up your jaw afterwards!
The soundtrack isn’t bad either.
The trade-off is that it will probably only run on the PC that you are going to buy in about two years time. Fortunately you can watch the video if you don’t have the horsepower in your system to run the executable.
All the relevant links are on the pouet page here: http://pouet.net/prod.php?which=52938
If you are going to watch it as streaming video, please pick the demoscene.tv link as youtube doesn’t do it justice at all.
(Yes, it’s been another slow week! More posts next week all being well.)
It’s been well over a week since I last posted anything and I’m ashamed to say it’s because one of those evil supermarket corporations took advantage of my complete lack of any willpower and sold me an XBox 360… At a very reasonable price.
So now I can put my 2p worth into the XBox 360 vs. Playstation 3 debate!
I’ve only had a week with the 360 so far but the boring conclusion is that they are just about evenly matched. Both consoles and the services that come with them have their strengths and weaknesses.
Here are a few quick observations:
Hardware: Both machines are big and heavy. The PS3 being the larger of the two. The fans in the XBox are loud and it gets even louder when a DVD is spinning up in the drive. The PS3 is virtually silent with hardly any drive noise.
XBox Live vs. Playstation Network: A Gold subscription on XL will set you back £40 a year but PSN is completely free online. XL does have many more games on offer though and a movie store which is available in Europe. On the other hand Sony now has an impressive free music video service on the PS3 called Vidzone.
XBox Live Arcade vs. PSN Games: I really like the idea that every game on XLA has a demo version. Demos of PSN games may not always be available and are often only downloadable weeks after the full version of the title has been released.
New Xbox Experience vs. XrossMediaBar: This is just my personal opinion but I prefer the PS3′s XMB. It just looks a bit more classy and seems quicker to navigate with. To be fair though, there is much more content on XL so it’s reasonable that some of it can seem hidden away. NXE has gone a bit more family-friendly-Wii-avatar style which is okay if you like it.
XBox Achievements vs. Playstation 3 Trophies: These are basically one and the same. The big advantage of achievements is that every single 360 game supports them, where as trophies are only supported by the most recent PS3 titles. I do think the trophy system is a little more evolved in that you have a total number of trophies and an RPG-style trophy level. This means you can quickly deduce that those people with a high trophy level and relatively low number of trophies have put in the effort to chase the gold and platinum awards. In contrast, people with high trophy counts but low levels are mainly collecting the easier bronze awards. Maybe I analyse this too much though!
Games: What fanboys love to argue over constantly! Well, personally I can’t see much difference in games between either platform. If you think back a year ago the PS3 was struggling with a lack of titles but now it has a very respectable library, even if it is not as large as the 360′s back catalogue.
I could go on forever but the main point of this post to to say: Stop arguing about which is the best machine. They are both great! The fact that both machines (and the Wii) exist and are successful is the best situation for gamers. It means Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo need to continue to work hard and innovate to stay at the top of their respective games (pardon the pun!).
It’s worth noting that when the world first embraced mobile phone technology on a large scale the development of mobile phones went crazy. Big phones went small. Monochrome LCD screens were replaced by full colour displays. Full internet access is now available and almost every phone is now an mp3 player.
Now games are finally being accepted by the rest of the world. What is going to happen to games technology over the next few years?