A Gaming Diary
Archive for November, 2005
Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land
Nov 24th
Hooray!
A combo of 56,540!
I’m great!
Well, no, I’m rubbish, but I’m great by my own low standards.
This is one of those rare games that makes me want to write a thank you letter to the developers, because they’ve really done so much more than they needed to. It’s such a nice package.
Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land
Nov 23rd
Hmm, I’m getting better, but I can’t seem to download a custom board. I’m sure I’d selected one on the web site, but when I go to the download art menu it says it has, but I can’t find it anywhere. I’ll have to check the web site. (EDIT: Yes, as soon as I checked I worked it out, no worries.)
Anyway, custom boards aren’t very important. What is important is that classic mode is excellent and knowing that every run will add to the stats on the web site make even rubbish runs seem like they have a point. Even though goals got in classic mode don’t seem to count as far as the web site’s concerned.
I’ve done a 12 trick combo now. And a combo that got me over 30,000 points.
I know, I know, lots of people can do combos in the millions, but 30,000 is good for me, okay?
Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land
Nov 23rd
I know, I know, worst title in the history of gaming.
But it’s the first online DS game out in the UK, so how was I meant to resist?
Setting it up to go online was incredibly easy. I typed in my SSID and WEP password and it got on the network without a single problem. In the world of wireless networking that’s incredible. I even had a chicken here ready to sacrifice. I guess I’ll have to keep him as a pet. I’ll call him Alamo.
Didn’t do much apart from test it out, mind. I did a couple of classic runs in the wireless section and was awful. I guess I need to play offline to work things out and upgrade stats and stuff. Seems to be a decent Tony Hawk game at first glance. I’ve had a few years away from them after getting incredibly tired of the whole thing around the time of the fourth game, so it should feel at least vaguely fresh.
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
Nov 21st
I failed a mission! I was runing from the cops and my car blew up. I got out, but my passenger didn’t. Ah well. I went exploring instead. Found a sniper rifle, so had a nice MWA HA HA HA HA moment and then went home for my tea.
As you do.
Doom RPG
Nov 21st
It’s excellent.
Yes, I’ve decided.
It’s just fun and is very good for wasting on the bus. It’s not too deep, but when has Doom been deep? This has lots of monsters to kill and secrets to find and barrells to blow up and passcodes to type in and… and… well, that’s more or less it, but it’s all very playable. For about a fiver, you really can’t complain.
Recommended.
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
Nov 20th
This is odd. I’m normally rubbish at missions in GTA games, but I’ve done loads now and I’ve had to redo one of them, as far as I can remember. I’m sure the difficultly level will ramp up soon, but it’s been fun so far.
Just protected a casino from a rival game, which I just managed to scrape through. Okay, so it’s been designed so you can only just manage to scrape through it, but still. I’ve quite enjoyed the missions so far, actualy, rather than finding them necessary evils.
Most of them have been in-car missions, mind. On foot, things just get random.
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
Nov 20th
Wow. Actually did some missions.
I ‘whacked’ some people ina construction site, then helped someone collect money from his ladies of the evening (which involved beating a couple of pimps to death with a baseball bat) and then rescued some of the family from a gas station hold up that had gone horribly wrong.
And people say these games are violent!
Only playing because the batteries in my DS decided to die and because I’m feeling to lazy to play Shadow of the Colossus. It’s a good filler game.
Sonic Rush
Nov 20th
Zone four finished.
I still have no idea if the game’s any bloody good or not.
I just can’t tell.
Sonic Rush
Nov 20th
Not only do I die because I miss jumps, but it’s so colourful and it moves so fast that I can’t even tell what I actually failed to jump on. I’m just running and the game keeps making me go faster and faster and faster and faster and I can’t see what’s happpening and then I’m falling off the bottom of the level. Again.
I’m getting to old for this shit.
Yes, okay, so you can make a very, very fast Sonic game. Well done. Now how about one that’s actually playable for those of us who haven’t got the reflexes of a bluebottle on speed?
Shadow Of The Colossus
Nov 20th
Well, phew.
Colossi seven and eight disposed of.
Number seven didn’t take very long.
Number eight… did. Over an hour, in fact. Firstly because it took me ages to work out what I should be doing. (I wasn’t missing the obvious, I don’t think, but the solution did make sense once I figured it out.) Then it took ages to actually kill the bugger once I knew how. Not helped by the fact that I got careless when I’d got him down to a sliver of health and then had to start all over again. I think that was my least favourite out of all the ones so far, but it was still good fun. It just wasn’t as awesome as the others. A bit too small, I think, a bit too standard.
The music in this game is something special too. It wouldn’t be nearly as atmospheric and intense without it.
Anyway, phew. Bed time soon, I think. Certainly no more gaming.
