Day 01 – First game you finished.
“Now try again on a harder difficulty”
This in no way explains why Blanka can generate electricity it also makes me want to cry. Do you realise how many times I got thrown into that statue by M.Bison? The only way I even managed to complete the game on one star is by setting the time to 30 seconds kicking the other fighter in the shin and then blocking for the rest of the round. In order to finish it on over four stars I would have probably had to become magical or at least use something other than hard kick. In real life the victor is the man who kicks hardest also the laws of science dictate that a hard kick would have to be very fast because slow things are ineffectual - just look at a bumblebee or a slow child.
You might say this ending (Psycho) Crushe(r)d my spirit. You wouldn’t actually say that because my spirit was crushed by my dad hitting me with a vacuum cleaner. I might not be able to dodge a Tiger Knee but I can certainly avoid a Henry to the cranium, as an adult this skill remains dormant because Capcom did not accept my idea for a new character named Barry Suckins who fights using a vacuum cleaner.
The moral of the story is that old games are rubbish and that beating people with cleaning equipment doesn’t encourage them to learn combos.
Day 02 – Favourite Fight(ing) game.
In the olden days fighting games used to be called beat-em-ups because of the bit in Street Fighter Alpha where the man says “beat em up guys!”. This was changed because nobody likes Street Fighter Alpha 3 anymore and also because the best beat-em up is the videogame of the film ‘Fighting’. In many ways all games contain fighting but you aren’t allowed to mention it for fear of being labelled a pedant.
For these reasons my favourite fighting game is Capcom VS SNK 2 – an utterly inaccessible game which reuses sprites that were used to fight the Kaiser. (In the game Kaiser Battle 3: Ultimate Wilhelm Dream Match).
In many ways Capcom VS SNK 2 is like a child who you resent because he is ugly and difficult, however you also love that child because he has a heart of gold. (Incredibly tight, precise and well balanced fight mechanics) and a good sense of humour (the fact that I beat my brother ten times in a row with a team comprised of M.Bison, Blanka and Morrigan.) Even if you don’t like children you can ignore the many health problems of your own ugly child and realise that he is the most refined version of Street Fighter ever and yes I’m including Street Fighter IV in that because air blocking is an important part of life.
The moral of the story is that fighting games aren’t about online play. They’re about making certificates when you beat your brother ten times in a row and being able to play as Terry Bogard.
Day 03 – Best Super Nintendo game
In reality the best SNES game is Final Fantasy VI but in reality that game cost a million pounds on eBay and was actually Final Fantasy III, except in America where it was called Final Fantasy Mystic Stroll 2: Burning hearts of strolling. This means I have only ever played it on naughty emulators and so it must be excluded.
Technically then, the best game for the SNES is Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past mainly because you get a free map in the box. A really big map that shows the entirety of Hyrule. (But not the dark world). But unless you get past the first three dungeons you don’t even know about the dark world anyway! Also the map shows you where Kaikaro village is and the house where those two dwarfs are hitting things with hammers. It even shows you the lost woods where the master sword lives, the master sword is the best weapon ever even thought it can be upgraded to level 3 Master Sword. But you don’t know that because it doesn’t say it on the map.) That map was the best £40 my parents ever spent; the game was alright as well once I finally got around to finishing it on the GBA ten years later.
The moral of the story is that Legend of Zelda made me think that any game with a shop in it would be automatically excellent. This idea was soon expelled from my mind when I rented Lagoon, also Lagoon didn’t come with a map.
Day 04 – Favourite adventure game.
I had to go on wikipedia to find out what an adventure game was because all games feature adventures of some sort, even the Sims 2. (The adventure of life itself!). Apparently though an adventure game can only feature adventures experienced through either a text (Zorc) or point and click interface (Zorc: Grand Inquisitor). We all know that text adventures are rubbish because they don’t have any pictures and if type in swear words you just get. “Does not know: Anal Rape.”
That leaves us with the point and click adventures like Secret of Monkeyball Island, Sam and Max Punch the Road, Broken Sword 2: The Smoking Mirror and Toonstruck most of which were made by LucasArts before they discovered that they had the rights to Star Wars.
However the best of these games was produced by the germanic sounding Broderbund (brother bun), that game was Darby the Dragon and it is the greatest thing ever made which involves a dragon. (Apart from Dragonheart 2: Draco’s Awakening). The puzzles may not have been as obtuse or challenging as those of Discworld 2 or I have no mouth and I must scream but what other game can boast a story about a dragon who magically shrinks his sister, or a mentally disabled giant who is frightened of bees, or trolls who can prevent things from flying by singing, or a sexually confusing hermaphrodite jester? The answer is no other games. The Question is “Darby the Dragon is the best adventure game ever?” And that isn’t even a question.
The moral of the story is that you look like you wished for a wish you wished you hadn’t wished for.
Day 05 – Best Mega Drive Game
An anecdote about mega drives is that I once saw a driving school that was named “Mega Drive” that Driving School is now called “Dreamcast Driving”. (Bankrupt.) Meanwhile the best game on the mega drive is Streets of Rage 2.
Streets 2 is not only the best Mega Drive game but arguably the best example of the 90’s ‘Punk Puncher’ genre that now only exists in the form of Tekken Force Mode. The main reason for this is that you get to punch punks in the face OVER and OVER again and it helps that they all have their own names like “V.Signal” or “Galcia.” Although I think Galcia may have been Super Double Dragon. These games were nearly all the same its just that Streets of Rage had the most satisfying sounds when you punched someone and featured a child on inline skates and a baseball hat which is the height of ‘street coolability’. Never mind that though! The soundtrack is good and you can regain health through chickens – this is what videogames are all about.
The best thing about Streets of Rage 2 is that it doesn’t really have to try very hard because the only other game on the megadrive worth playing is Castlevania: Bloodlines and given a choice between punching men and punching skelingtons I pick men every time!
The moral of the story is that I pick men every time, apart from in Streets of rage 2 where I always pick the woman in the red mini skirt.
Day 06 – A game of your childhood
A game of MY childhood would be called “Super Robert Land” and would feature an awkward youth not talking to people and having dead birds thrown at him. There would be a mini game where you eat as many baguettes as possible and then cry it would have 32 meg of action and music by Brian May.
A game I played a lot as a child was Sonic 2:Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and get this I didn’t even own a megadrive I used to have to go all the way to my Grannies to play it. My granny didn’t have a megadrive either but my uncle did and he lived with her….in the attic. He lives in Spain now (possibly in an attic) but I have Sonic 2 on the Sonic Mega Collection AND Sonic jam for the Saturn so it’s not really a problem. Everyone has played Sonic 2 so I can’t be bothered to describe it, needless to say it features a hedgehog running around at speed. The thing is at the time I only ever used to play the special pipe stage so I thought the entirety of that game was jumping over bombs, imagine my disappointment when I discovered the chemical plant zone. A fact about Sonic 2 is that on the daily show they play the metropolis zone music when they have a political guest on, probably to represent how they are from the ‘factory of policies’.
The moral of the story is that like every Sonic game the first level is bright and fast and colourful and amazing and you never want it to end and then the rest of the levels are too hard and you end up wanting to punch Knuckles in the face even though he doesn’t exist yet.
Day 07 – Best Playstation One Game
Dear Sir/Madam
Even though the original Playstation had many fine games i.e. Akuji the Heartless, RC Stunt Copter and Ninja: Shadow of Darkness. You know full well that Final Fantasy VII is the “Bees Fees” and you have been told the reasons why many times, mostly by people who should know better. However here are five things you didn’t know about the bottle-armed epic.
1. Final Fantasy VII came on three discs which was quite a few in those days. The only games that came on more discs that three were Final Fantasies VIII and IX!
2. Character Red XIII says he is the last of his race but in the prologue he has children, therefore he is either a liar or a rapist. (Or at least a bestiality-encourager)
3. Advent Children would have been better if the plot was about all the characters nearly dying in a big fire and then being given to a small girl because President Shinra has to go to college.
4. In Japan Aries is called Arieth because Japanese people can’t talk properly. Also Cloud is called Keith Conditions.
5. I once saw an episode of 2.4 children where the boy said he was playing Tomb raider but was clearly doing the Jenova fight after Aries dies. (SPOILERZ!)
The moral of the story is this joke I invented -
Sephiroth: My mothers just gone on holiday.
Cloud: Jenova?
Sephiroth: No she went of her own accord!
(It’s hilarious because Spehiroth’s mother is actually Lucretcia, he was just implanted with Jenova’s cells while in the womb! Neither of them could go on holiday anyway because Jenova was kept in a big glass tank and Lucretcia was frozen in a block of ice behind a waterfall.)
Day 08 – Game that is playing now.
Or even game that you ARE playing now.
Hello Padre’s I am currently adopting cowboy terms because its cotton tail slim and he’s gone plum loco. (Being playing Red Dead Redemption). On the surface RDD is just grand theft auto but with horses instead of auto’s but if you scratch the surface realise that this game also lets you shoot animals and cut off their skin. Yahoo! Red Dead Redemption also innovates by having a more likeable protagonist who has to shrug his shoulders up to three times before he agrees to kill lots of people for someone he has just met. (In grand theft auto they only shrug once). Boy howdy! There are also problems with this game, the main one being that it reminds me of walking around the cowboy bit of Disneyland because it has many of the same sound effects but even worse I have not been able to kill even one injun! Surely that’s what the old west was all about?
It may seem like I don’t like Red Dead Redemption, but that is not the case. It’s just that Red Dead Redemption is the bit of the song Rhinestone Cowboy about keeping subway tokens in your shoe whereas I wanted to play a game about getting cards and letters from people I don’t even know and offers coming over the phone. (Sunset Riders) Also I think you should at least be able to name your horse/play as Calvin Coolidge.
The moral of the story is that if horse naming features were implemented my horse would be called “Hooves HD”.
Day 09 – Best Playstation 2 Game
Trying to pick my favourite Playstation 2 game is like trying to pick my favourite child only instead of no children I had hundreds of them and instead of resenting them for ruining my life I was compliant in them ruining my life. In the end I chose Persona 3 because it’s the only game I’ve played where I tried to physically force myself into the television to try to get to that mystic land of Ramen Shops and ‘intimate moments’.
So powerful was the effect on Persona 3 on my fragile mind that I actually erased my own school days and now happily remember arranging dates with Chichiro in order to strengthen my Justice persona while trying to woo Fukah let me tell you that trying to find time to study was rather difficult – especially as every night I would run around a randomly generated dungeon level grinding. Needles to say my wife was not impressed with my new memories as I now technically died ten years ago WHICH MEANS I DON’T HAVE TO DO THE WASHING UP EH READERS?
The moral of the story is that if you were quite shy at school then Persona 3 is probably some madly unhealthy form of wish fulfilment in which you are special and everybody wants to befriend/sleep with you as opposed to just throwing dead birds at you. Also you can summon monsters by shooting yourself in the head.
Day 10 – Favourite Simulation Game.
Q. What is Will Wrights favourite computer game?
A. The Sim(p)s(ons) Road Rage! (He especially likes it when Homer says “Eat my nugs! 5000 times.)
Q. What happened when Will Wright was caught speeding?
A. He was given reticulating fines!
Surely the greatest simulation game of all must be Sim City 3000 because not only does it have ‘Sim’ in the title. (Short for simulation abbreviation fans) But it also has the highest number of any game featuring the word ‘sim’. Just look at my sim-maths for proof
Sim City = 1S
Sim Ant = 1S
The Sims = 2S (at least)
Sim Tunes = 2S
The Sims 2 = 4S
Sim City 4 = 4S
The Sims 3 = 6S
Sim City 2000 = 2000S
Sim City 3000 = 3000S
Conclusive proof that Sim City 3000 is the best game where you play a mayor who has the power to build anything he wants while not really being a simulation of anything.
The moral of the story is that eventually you will fill the map up and then unleash all the disasters at once because you are bored.
Day 11 – Best PC Game
The PC is such an awful platform for games. You have to spend all day sat at desk just like in your job only instead of getting paid you are getting bored by having to select whether your sound card is Adlib, Soundblaster or Roland. All that was on my computer at the time was a picture of a green aardvark on a yellow background and he certainly wasn’t giving anything away. Also every PC game ever made is just Doom or Command and Conquer with different graphics.
With that in mind I have to admit that my favourite PC game is Warhammer 40,000 dawn of war which manages to combine the twin evils or PC and Warhammer into a somehow tolerable package. Even better this package manages to run on my laptop with minimum amounts of fuss, well unless you try to install the final expansion pack in which case the entire things goes mad. It seems like Dawn of War manages to fix a lot of the rubbish things about RTS games but I may be talking nonce sense because the last time I played an RTS was 10 years ago and that was WarWind 2: Human onslaught i.e. The game that StarCraft ripped off and sequel to the game that Warcraft ripped off. Anyhow Dawn of War has the following features
1. The armies play very differently not just in terms of tactics but also in how you build and upgrade units.
2. You have a unit cap which stops you from winning the game by building thousands of mammoth tanks.
3. You can colour in your men and give them a name like “The Legion of Loggins”
The moral of the story is that playing as the Metal Skellingtons is the most fun because they have space pyramids.
Day 12 – Favourite Action Game
Trying to pick a favourite action game is like trying to pick a favourite graphics game i.e. very easy because my favourite action game is Gungrave: Overdose. I say this knowing full well that Gungrave Overdose is probably a rubbish and ugly PS2 era mess of triangles, however in the halcyon days of five years ago Gungrave: Overdose was the best thing since sliced loaf.
How many other games not only give you infinite bullets but allow you to fire missiles out of your own coffin? The answer is one - the original Gungrave, but that was slow and had nice box art whereas Overdose is fast and has terrible box art.
It’s not all about box art though! Overdose gives you too playable characters aside from the titular Mr Grave (Real name Brandon Heat fact fans) because you are also able to play as a ghost haunting an electric guitar and a blind man with knives except the handle of the knives is SOME GUNS.
Even at the time the refreshing thing about Gungrave was that like God Hand or Devil May Cry it is unashamedly a video game(High Scores, dodging bullets rather than taking cover, health pick ups! but is far more accessible (easier) than either of those games allowing even rubbish handed people like me to take part. At least I think that’s the best thing about it, I daren’t go back to it now because it will surely be horribly dated – hopefully it will get remade as a gritty cover shooter by a western studio and destroy all my fond memories allowing Super Smash TV to take its rightful place as my favourite action game.
The moral of the story is that games should stop having health bars based on how red the screen is because sometimes everything looks red anyway. i.e. If you are in a communist country.
Day 13 – Best N64 Game
Which of the five available N64 games will I pick as my favourite?
1. Mario 64 – Overrated (Penguin Race – better than Mario World but not as good as Mario Galaxy)
2. Goldeneye – Overrated (FPS – not as good as a game that isn’t a FPS)
3. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time – Overrated (All of it – Not as good as link to the past)
4. Lylat wars – Overrated (Rail shooter – not as good as Starwing)
5. Mario Kart 64 – Overrated (Kart Game – not as good as Super Mario Kart)
How controversial! The best game for the N64 is actually Pokemon Snap for reasons of it being the only photography game featuring Pokemon ever made and more importantly for managing to not be utterly rubbish. In fact Pokemon snap is extremely addictive because it replicates the exact experience of trying to take pictures while on the rides at Disneyland Paris. That is to say you are moving on a trolley over which you have no control and tasked with photographic constantly repeating series of events, only at the end of the ride you are graded by Professor Oak instead of being berated by a Frenchman dressed as a cowboy.
The point is that nearly every game for the N64 was either terrible (Killer Instinct Gold) or has a better version on the WII/Gamecube, Pokemon Snap stands as a unique experience that needs a sequel – a gritty one where Professor Oak has a moustache.
Day 14 – An Addictive Game
Dear GameFreak
My name is R.LaFemme and I am a freelance writer/magician. My dream in life is to work for your very own company as you could say I’m something of a “Poke-face!” I realise that you probably get many people sending you designs for new Pokemon and are already viewing this letter with distain. Please refrain from throwing this letter into your Pokeball bin! I simply wish to contribute some lines of dialogue to the next Pokemon game. (Pokemon Lambert and Butler editions?) in the hopes that you will hire me as the full time incidental dialogue co-ordinator.
I look forward to hearing from you on this matter. (Or should I say Kangeskhan you get back to me quickly!)
All the best
-R.LaFemme
Fire Type Gym Leader: “Lets have a fry up – Pokemon fry up that is!”
Water Gym Type Leader: “Oh no washed down to size!”
Ghost Type Gym Leader: “You don’t have a ghoul of a chance!”
Psychic Type Gym Leader: “I never predicted THAT outcome!”
Ground Type Gym Leader: “Stop hanging a(g)round!”
Dragon Type Gym Leader: “This fight is carrying on too long!”
Electric Type Gym Leader: “Let me teach you about CURRENT EVENTS!”
Dark Type Gym leader: “Dark-cuss how?”
Steel Type Gym Leader: “I have metallious determination!”
Grass Type Gym Leader: “Ahh good timing I was just Seeding a book you see!”
Fighting Type Gym Leader: “This will be a battle to fight home about!”
So yeah the most addictive game ever is Pokemon because it combines level grinding with collecting things.
The moral of the story is that Game Freak never got back to me because they have bigger things to worry about at the minute.
Day 15 – Best Xbox/360 game
Do you like extreme sports rollerblading, modern young people’s music and vandalism? I don’t, but I do enjoy playing Jet Set Radio Future. (“Hyper James Grinding” in Japan). In fact I liked it so much that I spent an afternoon trying to learn how to roller blade, thankfully I only tried this within the privacy of my own home so in effect it never happened. What DID happen is that Jet Set Radio invented cell shading and then this game invented cell shading in games that are more fun because they don’t have unnecessary time limits. As a bonus feature this game allowed you to design your own graffiti so that you can spray “Uncle Pete is rubbish” all over Japanese bus station. The only other game that lets you do this is “Rubbish Uncle daub ability – millennium edition” and that had a terrible “draw distance”!
The moral of the story is that Jet Set Radio future is better than Jet Set Raido in every way apart from how they changed the look of Cube so that I no longer wanted to marry her.
Day 16 – Favourite super heroes’ game
Arkham Asylum may accurately replicate the sensation of being a millionaire who won’t stop going on about his dead parents but my favourite super hero game is Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 because it accurately replicates the sensation of being a child playing with action figures. (Better known as toys)
The entire game revolves around wandering down a corridor punching robots/soldiers/robot soldiers while pretending it’s an RPG. It’s not an RPG at all, it’s just a remake of Captain America and the Avengers. (A redundant title as Captain America WAS in the Avengers!) There is even a bit where the tornado man says “It is you who will not be escaping” only instead of the tornado man it is Deadpool and instead of saying “It is you who will not be escaping” he says a wisecrack to disguise the fact that he is just Spiderman with weapons. If Deadpool was reviewing this game he would say “I know I am in a game” and then he would say the button you pressed i.e. “X-Button!” He would also say that the game was more fun because it had him in it, but it isn’t because he is very boring to play as because his powers are shooting things or cutting them with a sword. Everyone can have those powers Deadpool!
The only slightly disappointing aspect of Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 is that it doesn’t feature every single person from the Marvel Universe as a playable character. Unfortunately my dream team of The Kangaroo, The Inbetweener, The Mad Thinker and The Arabian Knight will have to wait until Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: Kingdom of the crystal Skrull.
The moral of the story is that seeing everything in X-Ray vision is not as good as having a cameo appearance by Stan Lee and his catchphrase “Excalibur! (Was an underrated comic)”
Day 17 – Best Gameboy Colour Game
Dear Game Freak
Unfortunately Pokemon Gold/Silver was not only the best game for the game boy colour, it was the only one worth playing. What a jape you played on us when you told us we couldn’t transfer our Pokemon to the next generation, how we laughed when we thought about all those wasted hours. Anyway you don’t want to hear (read) my story about how my brother accidentally deleted his train ticket using an action replay and had to hike through victory road every time you want to hear (read) more of my excellent Pokemon dialogue!
All the best
- R.LaFemme
Bug Type Gym Leader: “You could say this game is full of Bugs! (But you would be thinking of Red/Blue)”
Poison Type Gym Leader: “I’ll do this in the (arse)nic of time!”
Normal Type Gym Leader: “Have you seen (Para) Normal activity?”
Pokemon Proffesor: “Welcome to the world of Pokemon. A Pokemon is a kind of animal but everyone is obsessed with them instead of just eating them.”
Team Rocket Member: “Raising Pokemon isn’t about love, it’s about level grinding!”
Flying Type Gym Leader: “Oh no I had my wings clipped!”
Nurse Joy: “Welcome to the Pokemon Centre, we heal your Pokemon back to perfect health. Would you like me to heal your Pokemon?”
The moral of the story is that if Walt Disney had lived in the Pokemon World Mickey Mouse would have been called Borris Bidoof.
Day 18 – Best Wii Game
People keep saying that they should bring out a lightsaber game for the Wii , those people are idiots because without anything to resist/clash against the remote the fights would make no sense. (See MAZAN: Flash of the blade for more details) In the meantime No More Heroes has all the advantages of being able to swing a blade of light around with the added bonus of it being a relatively good game/ a fantastic game depending on how pretentious you want to be.
For people that read Edge magazine No More Heroes is a deconstructionist parody of open world games in particular and computer game sin general. Marvel how you have to perform mundane tasks in order to advance, be amazed at how you can only actually visit 4 location in the ‘open world’ and slap yourself silly over the constant breaking on the fourth wall. (i.e pretty much Killer 7 but with Lightsabers)
Meanwhile readers of Playstation MAX magazine will be glad to hear that you can fight an Irishman, listen to actual swear words and buy new jackets. Even better you can listen to Heavenly Star.
Here is a joke
Q. How many more games does Heavenly Star have to appear in before it gets to the top of the charts?
A. At least one more as it’s been confirmed as a level in child of Eden!
No More Heroes is therefore the perfect game as it allows me to enjoy things like a man with machine gun nipples while lording it over my colleagues. “Playing Modern Duties again!? What does that say about the state of modern gaming? Probably that it is indeed a real state of affairs!”
The moral of the story is that Suda 51 can probably get away with any old rubbish so long as it features cell shading and wrestling masks.
Day 19 – A game that you never finished.
Some games I have never finished (and probably never will)
Title: Dragon Quest VII
Percentage Complete: 75%
Reason: Continual phone calls from future wife + realisation battle system wasn’t going to get any less rubbish.
Title: Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits
Percentage Complete: 99%
Reason: Stupidly difficult final eyeball boss/massive jump in levels between final boss and enemies in final dungeon/trading it in to buy Disgaea.
Title: Koudelka
Percentage Complete: 15%
Reason: Frightened of ghost girl.
Title: Dragonball Z Budokai Tenkaichi 2
Percentage Complete: 0%
Reason: Received Budokai Tenkaichi 3 for christmas.
Title: Super Mario Brothers 3
Percentage Complete: 20%
Reason: Stage 3:3
Title: Gears of War
Percentage Complete: 75%
Reason: Tired of looking at meaty faces
Title: Lagoon
Percentage Complete: 5%
Reason: SAMPSON
Title: Shenmue 2
Percentage Complete: 65%
Reason: Melon throwing shemale
Title: Lost Odyssey
Percentage Complete: 5%
Reason: Final Fantasy XIII
Title: Leisure Suit Larry in the land of the lounge lizards
Percentage Complete: 10%
Reason: Only had first ‘floppy’
Title: Final Fantasy XIII
Percentage Complete: 85%
Reason: Having a big field to run around does not constitute the game ‘opening up’.
Title: Ephemeral Phantasia/Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex/Rhapsody: A Musical Adevnture/ Point Blank 3/ Magna Carta/ Yakuza/ Mana Khemia
Percentage Complete: 0%
Reason: Impulse buying
The moral of the story is that I keep saying I won’t buy any new games until I finish the old ones but then the games they bring out seem really exciting so I have to buy them before they disappear from the shelves.
Day 20 – A game you have played countless times.
I don’t think I have ever played a game ‘countable’ times or if I have I forgot to count. (Except for the gameboy version of Choplifter which I played exactly twelve times). I did however play Bust-a-Groove for the Playstation more times than could have been healthy.
For the ignorant amongst you Bust-a-Groove was a pre-dance mat/waggle control dance game where you had to perform rhythmic button presses in order to be better than your opponent at dancing. In Japan it was known as Bust-A-Move but for some reason Puzzle Bobble was already called that in Europe so they had to change it or face the anger of people who expected a game about Dinosaurs Firing Bubbles into the sky but instead got a game about a Giant Robot trying to out dance a woman in a romper suit. To make matters worse Bust-a-Groove 2 was called Project Justice 3 in Japan, whereas Bust-a-Move 2 in Europe was called Puzzle Bobble 4. Bust-a-Move 2 didn’t see a European release at all and in North America it was known as M.Bison.
Bubble based confusion aside Bust-a-Groove was made in the golden era of music games where they used to make up their own music and you didn’t have to use plastic instruments. Thinking about it the reason I played Bust-a-Groove so much was because I really liked the songs and in the days before the internet 2.0 it was either play the game or download amazing midi versions of the songs to damage your ears with. Why didn’t I just listen to ‘proper’ music by ‘bands’? Why don’t you shut your fat face?
The moral of the story is that Heat’s theme song is called “The heat is on” so if I was him my theme song would be called “The Robert is on”
Day 21 – A favourite character.
An ode to Zach Fair by R.Galvin aged 2 and ¾
Oh Zach you were so strong and brave
But you went to an early grave.
Fighting with a very big knife
For a man who would steal your life.
Is being injected with cells a good excuse
For such a terrible misuse? (of your hairstyle)
Oh Zach you were so funny and kind.
You wouldn’t leave your friend behind.
These events are recounted in Crisis Core
With added elements that nobody saw
For example a conversation between Genesis and Sephiroth
That occurs just before it all kicks off. (In the Nibelheim reactor)
Oh Zach you were so skilful and daring
It’s no wonder that Arieth started caring
But seemed to forget as soon as you’d gone
Did she not wonder what had gone wrong.
Furthermore she went off with young Cloud
That sort of thing should not be allowed.
Hopefully everyone is already aware
That what happened to you
Was never (Zach) Fair.
The moral of the story is that Buzujima from Zombie Revenge is the greatest character in videogames.
Day 22 – Game you last bought.
The last game I bought was Red Dead Redemption, the funny thing was I actually bought it twice in a way because the first time it wouldn’t load and I had to bring it back to the shop. This then caused me to impulse buy the Tim Burton Batman film on DVD even though I remembered it being rubbish. (It was) Overall I give Batman one Arms of Orion out of five.
The moral of the story is “Think about the future.”
Day 23- Last game you downloaded
The fact that people will now pay for downloads of games upsets me greatly. What’s the point of buying things if you can’t put them on the shelf and show off your good taste to others? Also what if the game turns out to be rubbish? I can’t take a download back to the shop and pretend that it’s broken? Even worse are people that pay money for ‘extra content’ those things used to be free, now all you get free are achievements and they make me feel sad.
That said I did download World of Goo and it’s pretty good but it’s not like a proper game or anything i.e. I wouldn’t want to buy any sort of World of Goo merchandise and put it on a shelf. Also I probably wouldn’t be bothered about getting World of Goo 2. (Tip it should be called World of Two!) If I was writing a review of World of Goo I would probably say “If you like goo you will probably like this or if you don’t like goo you will probably have fun as well.” But what I would really be thinking is “I’m only playing this because my wife is using the television and nothing modern will run on my laptop.”
The moral of the story is that indie games are just shareware games but you are more likely to buy them because you don’t have to send postal orders to foreign countries.
Day 24 – Favourite platform game
Q. What Playstation 2 game has you chasing after escaped rapists?
A. Sex Offender Capture Man Drei! (Ape escape 3)
Nobody but me likes Ape Escape, they say things like “I wish I could ESCAPE from playing this game.” However everyone but me is an idiot because Ape Escape is the best series of platform games for several reasons and none of those reasons are because it has monkeys in it. (Although they are very funny monkeys)
Reason 1 – It’s not very difficult.
Yes Mario we love you but why do your last couple of levels have to be so difficult? Why do I have to get so many stars to unlock the final couple of levels of Galaxy 2? Why is the cog world in Mario 64 so difficult? Why is the entirety of Mario 3 so stupidly hard? The answer is because Mario hates you and he sends purple coin challenges to upset you. Ape Escape isn’t Childs Play 2: Le Chucks Revenge* but all the difficulties come from solving puzzles/finding monkeys rather than getting knocked of a platform by a giant metal ball with a face for the 500th time.
* Please note that there is no such film called “Chucky Childs Play” the first film was merely called “Childs Play” putting extra words in the title does not make it any more or less responsible for inspiring some murders.
Reason 2- You get a submarine diving thing.
Which is important because it makes manoeuvring in the water easy, unlike every other game ever where the water level makes you want to throw your controller in the bath.
Reason 3 – It has a giant gay yellow monkey in it
He is giant and yellow and gay.
Reason 4 – Lets play monkey football
Or monkey skiing, or monkey boxing, or monkey hit the drums or even a version of Metal Gear Solid 3 which features monkeys. Minigames are generally bobbins, but these mini games were actually rather good, better than anything on Mario party anyway. Theres also loads of other stuff to unlock, what does Mario have to unlock? Play as Luigi! Don’t make me laugh.
Reason 5- Dual Shock
Ape Escape is still one of the only game series that uses the analogue stick for something other than ‘3D movement/camera control’. Every gadget uses the sticks in some way. Rowing a boat requires you to turn them in unison, using the catapult has you pulling the stick back like a string and hulaing the hula hoop has you rotating the stick in the rhythm of a young boys hips. Essentially its motion controls only instead of motions you have buttons and instead of not working they work.
The moral of the story is that whenever you finish a level on Ape Escape the girl says “You’re good!” and I am.
Day 25 – Favourite internet game.
My favourite internet game is probably looking for picture of LADIES without my WIFE finding OUT eh readers?! EH LADS!? EHH!?
By that I mean that I don’t play many internet games these days but I did used to play Zoo Keeper quite a lot during the fun filled summer of 2007! It’s impossible to say whether or not lining up those zebras contributed to my mental breakdown in any significant way. However I don’t think that looking at square shaped animals for long periods of time can do anyone any favours.
Later on when I had put my fragile psyche back together (I remembered that I HAD been at the reactor all along but I was actually the Shinra guard) my other half bought Zoo Keeper for the DS and I finally completed it revealing that…
THE OWNER OF THE ZOO HAD BUILT THE ZOO IN MEMORY OF HIS DEAD WIFE.
The moral of the story is that Zoo Keeper is going to be the next Pixar film.
Day 26 – Favourite Multiplayer Game
Games shouldn’t be multiplayer at all, if I had friends I wouldn’t be playing games I would be sitting on the sofa in a café making wisecracks and not buying anything. This also applies to online multiplayer games because if I had internet friends I would be talking to them on MSN and trying to trick them into touching themselves on webcam. I also find it irritating when people say “This game is good in multiplayer” because all games are good if you play them with your friends, even rubbish ones because then your pal Daz will say “Good graphics M8” and you will laugh uproariously.
Here is a story about when my brother and I were playing Resident Evil 5. My brother kept hitting the boat with the stun rod and then said that he was “Ian Stuntley” and then I said “Driving the Maxine Carr”. But it didn’t make any sense because we were on a boat and also you probably shouldn’t make jokes about child murderers. (Because they might find out and murder your children to teach you a lesson.) Because of all the ‘stunts’ he was pulling it took twice as long to get through the game.
The moral of the story is that capcom’s AI is far more reliable than my brother in a tense situation.
Day 27 – favourite game-based on movie/comic-book/book/cartoon
Kirby your Enthusiasm
Lost (In Blue)
Plok the Week
Coronation Street Fighter II Turbo
(No More) Heroes
Only Fools Errand and Horses
Masterchef of the Lamps
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2007 of the Concords
Everybody Loves Rayman
Shadow Heart(s)beat Covenant
Blanka-ty Blank
You’ve been Fatal Framed
Family Drake’s Fortunes
Britain’s Gotcha Force Talent
The Revolution X –Factor
Donkey Kong Countryfile
Have I got Mews for you?
London’s Burning Rangers
Foyle’s War Gods
Last Bronx of the Summer Wine
Waterloo Road Rash
Top Metal Gear Solid
Under the Skins
The Megaman X Files
Fresh Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Strictly Come Dance Dance Revolution
Pop Star: the Rivalschools
The Tobal Number One Show
The moral of the story is that I really enjoyed Epic Mickey and its probably the best homage to a character/franchise in video game form, yes even better than Arkham Asylum. (You can’t fight the small ride clock in Arkham Ayslum)
Day 28 – Boss or Villain Most Evil
Villains in games are never evil, they’re always just misunderstood. Observe –
Villain – Dracula
Naughtiness committed – Making his castle appear without permission
Reason for naughtiness - Dead wife.
Villain – Sephiroth
Naughtiness committed – Killing Aries, Burning down Nibelheim, Summoning a giant world destroying meteor.
Reason for naughtiness - Misses his mummy.
Villain – Albert Wesker
Naughtiness committed – Inventing new kinds of virus.
Reason for naughtiness – To impress Chris Redfield.
Villain – Bowser
Naughtiness committed - Kidnapping
Reason for naughtiness - Lack of cakes.
Villain – Dr Robotnik
Naughtiness committed – Turning animals into robots.
Reason for naughtiness - Robots are better than animals.
Villain – Liquid Snake
Naughtiness committed – Stole Metal Gear.
Reason for naughtiness - Something about the patriots..
Villain – Lan Di
Naughtiness committed – Killing your dad.
Reason for naughtiness – Your dad stole his mirror.
The only truly evil character in games is Sinistar (from the game Sinistar). He spends his days menacing humble asteroid miners before swallowing them whole. Its not so much the murders we object to, everyone has to eat something – even giant cat faced space stations but why does he have to taunt you with demoralising slogans first? And why does he have the worlds most frightening voice? The average game of Sinistar goes something like this –
Ext Outer Space – Intrepid space miner Azrael Quintox is earning an honest crust extracting energy from space rocks with his space laser.
Azrael: I can’t wait to get my space mining done and get my hard earned pay. I certainly need the money to feed my wife, children and puppy. (Who are all disabled)
He breaks up another rock
Azrael: Just one more to go and I’ll have enough money to give up space mining for good and become a space doctor at the space children’s hospital.
A large space station with a cats face appears from nowhere and begins to circle Azrael’s space pod.
Sinistar: BEWARE I LIVE
Azrael: Cripes!
Sinistar: RUN COWARD!
Azrael: Ack I better get back to my family, this cat-station doesn’t look friendly at all.
Sinistar: RARRGGHHHHHH
Sinistar rams into Azrael’s spaceship and begins to crunch it up in his giant metallious mouth.
Azrael: Oh my god arghhh I’m been eaten alive, I love you wife….
Sinistar: I AM SINISTAR!
Meanwhile back on planet DEFRA , Azrael’s wife is in serious problems.
Jarocks the space landlord: I’m throwing you out of this space dwelling for not paying the rent credits!
Vesper Quintox: Please Mr Jarocks, my husband hasn’t come back with the space rocks. Please can I have just a few more days…
Jarocks: No credits no space dwelling! Although we could come to some arrangement….
He begins to touch her inappropriately.
Vesper Quintox: Gulp…I want to be faithful to my husband…but what about….the children!?
To be continued….
The moral of the story is that Sinistar is a bit of a dick.
Day 29 – Worst Game
I hate so many games it’s too difficult to pick just one so let’s call my worst game “Zone of Modern Duty: Episode 2”. Here are just some of its exciting features –
* Rather than have cut scenes the story is told through in-game events. Unskippable in game events like following people while they tell you things, or having a very long ride on a tram, or hearing explosions and not knowing where they were. This makes the game more immersive because you can’t skip boring things in real life either, especially on the second playthrough.
* Extra Grittiness and 15% stickier cover.
* Zone of Modern Duty doesn’t like to clutter up the screen with “Information”. In real life you don’t have a health bar, your vision just gets more and more red unless you are hidden behind a rock. Having red vision doesn’t make it even harder to see what is shooting at you, it just makes things more fun!
* Item Crafting!
* Games are better when they have online features that you can be charged for such as extra costumes and levels. In the past we used to put these in the game as unlockables to encourage you to keep playing but now we have achievements for that! It’s also important that you play it online against strangers as it’s lots of fun being constantly shot in the back of the head by a man called “Jesus76.” We also made sure to put in online rankings so that everybody has to take the game VERY SERIOUSLY. Two player split screen? That’s a compromise we just aren’t willing to make!
*Licensed music from bands you actively dislike!
* Everything should be in first person view, even if it means you can’t really tell what is going on. Life is in first person view and you never hear anyone complaining about that. Anyway it’s a well known fact that all the best books are written in first person perpective.
* Seeing enemies before you fight them is important because everyone hates random battles. (Except people that like RPGs but fuck them we don’t want to sell RPGs to them.) Granted you still have to fight everything you see and the maps are now massive and featureless so we can fill them with monsters BUT you can see them before you fight them now. That’s the main thing.
* Also we made the battle system be more action-orientated. Everybody likes action, just look how popular action man is. The only person that doesn’t like him is Dr X and we don’t want him playing our games because he will crush the controller with his giant mechanical hand.
* One man saving the world is unrealistic; you need a team of at least four. Having computer controlled friends killing all the enemies/getting in the way is far better.
* Pointless motion controls have been added and there is no option to reconfigure to a button press!
* Full voice overs instead of subtitles, everybody enjoys listening to subpar voice actors struggling through clumsy dialogue. This also means you can’t just leave the game during a bit of exposition. Having irritating voices makes characters come alive!
* Open worlds, moral choices, do the missions in any order!? Narrative, sorry what?
* Every single boss fight is a large creature floating around a platform, you have to avoid his laser vision and then punch his slow moving fists until he falls over and you can poke him in the eye.
The moral of the story is that it was either this or Pitfighter. (And a Turkish person has my copy of Pitfighter)
Day 30 – Best Game
The best game ever was the game I invented called “Gang War” where you could spend gold to upgrade members of your gang in a dystopian future. Unfortunately this game never existed outside of numerous pieces of concept art for the gold selection screen. Some good games I haven’t had a chance to metion yet (that actually exist) include Professor Layton and the Curious Village, Street Fighter Alpha 3, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, The World Ends With You, Wild Arms: 2nd Ingition, Shadow Hearts: Covenant, Shin Megami Tensei: Lucifer’s Call, Rival Schools, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, Parodius , Outrun 2, Chrono Cross, Gitaroo Man, Um Jammer Lammy plus all the top 100 list obvious ones.
I would like to say my favourite game was something obscure like Sexy Mahjong II or something ‘pure’ like Pac-Man. However I hate Pac-Man and you can only get Sexy Mahjong II from PlayAsia and there postal charges are outrageous. Anyway my favourite game is Final Fantasy VII, because it’s great and it came out at a time when I was not the cynical husk I am today. (I was a different kind of cynical husk that liked big swords and people saying “…”. I know full well that there are much better RPG’s and that the entire genre is treated with contempt by John Public. I am also aware that lots of bad people cosplay as Spehiroth and that Advent Children wasn’t that great a film.* I’m even aware that the spin off’s aren’t as good.** But so far as I am aware there is no other game where you can cross dress to pass yourself of as a prostitute and go on to save the world.
Anyway here is my Final Fantasy VII anecdote
One time at the metro centre I saw a man dressed as Cloud working at the Yo Sushi and I thought it would be good to go talk to him and say things like “Back then I could get back with just grazed knees” but I was too shy to say anything and also I don’t like sushi so I just went away instead.
I have never seen him since.
The moral of the story is to live in the moment and always talk to people dressed as Final Fantasy characters.
* But it wasn’t as bad as everyone made out, especially when compared to Spiderman 3 and people seemed to love that. Also it had Sephiroth in it!
** Dirge of Cerberus is pretty good actually – it’s like a first person shooter but with level grinding and a less disorientating camera angle. Crisis Core is excellent and before crisis is probably rubbish but every mobile phone game is rubbish so that doesn’t really count.
