Ero Elohim

The only issue I have with Sony as a developer is their tendencies to milk a franchise more than even Nintendo. See: Ratchet and Clank. First game comes out, does well. Every year afterward there is a sequel. Every. Year. Finally, the main PS2 franchise sputters out at the 4th game. The worst part is that the sequels weren't really any different from their predecessors. A few improvements made in Going Commando, but that was about it. Jak was almost the same way, only it suffered a bit from "Xtreme Syndrome." Started as a mildly cutesy platformer and morphed into some wierd Mad Max shit. And God of War, while a good game in my opinion, isn't really all it's cracked up to be. It's well-polished in some respects, but the combat system is still a bit sloppy. I played both games on their hardest modes, which only serves to highlight how cheap the game can be at times. **SPOILER**(Case in point: The Barbarian King in the swamp swings his hammer around when he's in big mode. From visual indication, you should be able to roll backwards and avoid it, but the hitbox still tags you and knocks you around. It makes the attack god-awfully difficult to dodge and I had to resort to a very cheap tactic to beat him.)**END SPOILER** Don't get me wrong, though, Nintendo has been slacking a bit lately, too. They really needed to inject something new into the Zelda series, rather than relying on "OMG ZELDA: TP LOOKS LIKE OOT!!" As it is, Twilight Princess was a good game, but nothing great and new. I'm really hoping Metroid Prime 3 and Mario Galaxy can come up with some wicked new ideas.

Man, Aero? That wasn't in FF1. You need the most awesomely-awesome offensive White Magic spell ever put into an RPG: HARM. Yep. Almost as good as Dragon Quest's HURT. You have to hand it to those guys who worked in the 80's. They had some creative minds. Also, you're forgetting the Thief/Ninja.

Just do what I do and hope for the eventual announcement that MGS4 is coming to 360.

Wiki on Chris Hecker Notice anything odd? Pay particular attention to the line "It is interesting to note that though Hecker is respected within the game industry, as of 2005 he still has not shipped a single game (this will likely change when Spore is released)." Sounds like he's doing loads to further the Games-As-Art movement. Y'know, with the whole not making any games and stuff thing.

Someone want to explain to me how the Statue of Liberty got to Nevada?

VF5 for PS3 has no online play.

Instances are some of the worst XP in the game. You'd be better off finding a nice camp of greens or yellows and grinding if you don't want to quest. I only do instances when I'm bored and need the change of pace (most PUGs make me change my mind very quickly), want a specific piece of gear that I think would improve my progress enough to warrant stomaching the aforementioned PUG, or it's the first run through and I have 5-7 quests I can get done, making it equal or better XP than soloing.

That's clearly by Samwise. As to my knowledge, he's an official Blizzard artist. I don't think that quite qualifies for this thread.

Am I the only one who smells a bit of scam in that? Seriously, there must be some law against holding a contest, especially one with an entrance fee, where you can choose to not nominate anyone as a winner. That sort of thing works for lotteries because it's a random occurance; This, on the other hand, is a completely subjective competition. The judge panel they use could simply declare that nobody wins and the website pockets the cash. I know it's probably not going to happen, but I certainly wouldn't send my money to a company knowing that there's a risk that nobody will win.

All companies hate the used games business. Something about them not getting paid for their games selling really irks them. I think one of the heads of EA (not sure, could've been a different company) once said that he'd 'rather have someone steal a new game than buy a used one. After all, the thief still has money in his pocket to buy a different game, while the man who bought used has spent his money and cannot buy a different game.' I've never gone to E3 or anything like that, but I've heard from the people in my EB district who've gone that you get a lot of dirty looks if you mention you're from EB/Gamestop.

Message from the future: Crackdown is fun as hell. ...-wink-

I honestly wonder if they could get an actor (Mortenson, Jackman, or other) to play Snake and dub over his voice with Hayter's without looking horribly B-Movie. Probably not, but it'd be cool if they could pull it off. At any rate, /agree on the referring to the audience thing and, at the very least, Hayter needs to have a cameo in the movie somewhere. Maybe just some random tech-operator or something that gets to shout out "COLONEL!"

So I picked up a copy of Lunar Knights when it popped into my store the other day. So far, I'd have to recommend it to anyone looking for a good dungeon crawl with depth. Basically, it's the spiritual successor to the Boktai series. You get two characters, one powered by the moon and wielding the "Dark Sword" and the other powered by the sun and using the "Solar Gun." Each character gets multiple weapons that can be switched on the fly (ala Metal Gear style, you hold L and a little quick-change menu appears), which actually change your attacks and such. For instance, the first two Solar Guns you get give you the choice between a standard pea-shooter, fire one bullet at a time gun and a hefty bazooka-staff type weapon that fires slower, but does more damage and homes in. All of your weapons can be upgraded via item alchemy, though the result is a pretty boring attack power bonus. Add on to this the ability to charge your weapons with elemental energy via beings called Terrenials and the boost in power you get with the Trance gauge and you end up with a pretty enjoyable hack-and-slash. But wait, that's not all! On top of this, after every boss battle, you load into your "Casket Rocket" and engage in a touch-screen based rail shooter that actually succeeds at being quite enjoyable. I doubt it'll supplant anyone's love of Star Fox, but it's far and away better than the Gummi Battles of Kingdom Hearts infamy. During the rail-shooter segments, your Terennials give you additional weapons to use against your enemies. The fire one gives you a slow grenade shot, while the light element gives you a quick-firing machine cannon. Finally, the game sports some really nice anime cutscenes, a load of voice-acting (bearable, though not the best I've ever heard), and bears the mark of Hideo Kojima's studio. Definitely a game to consider purchasing. (EDIT: Just for clarification, I've never played either of the Boktai games, so I have no idea how the game relates to those, except that I know you can link Boktai via the GBA slot into Lunar Knights and play with the Sun Sensor enabled. Otherwise, the game uses the in-game weather system to determine energy recharge and such. However, take this as a postive note, too: You can enjoy Knights without ever having touched Boktai.)

Please tell me that's a joke? (P.S. WTF minimum character limit)

They're retranslating Symphony of the Night. This probably means no more awful/awesome voice-acting sequence at the beginning.

More like stolen in the hopes of making a profit.

The EB I work at gets about 3 of them every day or two. Traded in. Still in their packaging. -shrug- Works for me. I get cheap, unused Wii controllers.

There is a VERY good reason why Metroid and Super Metroid have a lot of similar stages. I'll let you figure it out yourself, though.

There's no reason to play a handheld for hours at a time. Sure, it can be done, but the systems aren't really designed for that in mind. In fact, a major criticism of the PSP when it launched was that the games were designed like console games: long endeavors requiring you to play for an extended period of time. This works fine for consoles, as one rarely boots up their PS2 to play for 30 minutes or less, but it undermines the philosophy of a handheld. Namely, the ability to get a quick game in here and there when you're waiting around for something. If you're looking for a long, indulging experience, grab a 360 or something. If you want a handheld that perfectly embraces what portable gaming is all about, the DS is the de facto choice.

Actually, the 50GB BD is a dual layer disc. A standard-size BD disc is 25 GB per layer.

I second this with a vengeance. I went bowling with some friends last week, thinking that I do alright in Wii Bowling and I should have no problem at least keeping a respectable score, breaking 100 easily. Oh god, I was wrong. So very wrong.

How can you not like Jumpin' Jack Flash? I know the EBA steps (taps? moves?) are a bitch, but the song itself is a classic!

You're still missing the point. This isn't about a hypothetical winner of the "System War." It's about current value. It's meaningless to compare the 360's launch to the PS3's launch. Why? Because you aren't buying the 360 at launch, you're buying it a year after launch! You're essentially trying to invalidate Microsoft's smart decision on being the first to market by claiming that we should "give the PS3 a chance." Again, I state that the Wii seems to have absolutely no problem selling, despite the 360's head start. Why must we cut the PS3 slack in this department? From a different standpoint, Sony and game developers had a full year extra on top of the 360 to spend polishing system features and games, yet the PS3 launch is almost identical to the 360's lackluster one. To put this another way, imagine a hypothetical scenario between two music players: Player A has been out for a year, costs $200, supports all file types of music, can connect seamlessly to the internet to download songs, and has a wide range of accessories available. Player B has just released, costs $300, supports two file types of music, can connect to the internet to download songs through an unwieldy process, and has a small pool of accessories available. Company B promises more music file types and accessories in the future. Why would you buy Player B? It's more expensive and offers less than Player A. B's only saving grace is that its maker promises to make it a better player in the future, but there's already a better product on the market. It's irrelevant that Company A released their player first because it's not about the history behind a product, it's about the value it offers at the present.

Why did you quote me? I agree with you.

That's a completely illogical way to compare the consoles. It's impossible to compare the ethereal "future PS3" to the currently-1-year-old XB360. All we can do is compare two available products at present and examine which one holds more value. Right now, it's undeniably the 360. Besides, if we waited a year to compare them, then the arguement would be "Why are you comparing a 1-year-old system to a 2-year-old system?" Also, the Wii seems to have little problem selling despite the 360's lead. If one system released a year late can compete directly with the dug-in competition, why must we coddle and baby the other? Aside: My EBGames currently stocks about eight PS3's. We sell about one a week. We've recieved about three shipments of Wii's, with three systems per box. They sell as soon as they come in, and we get at least five to ten people a day calling/walking in and asking when our next shipment is.