A Gaming Diary
Archive for June, 2007
Motorstorm (PS3)
Jun 23rd
Blimey.
My skills have gone. Or, rather, I can’t remember which routes are best for buggies.
Did one race, came tenth. Tried again, came eleventh.
Go! Puzzle (PS3)
Jun 23rd
The difficulty in Skyscrapers really ramps up after a few levels. I’m doing the third set of towers now (after skipping some infinite towers) and there’s no time to think at all.
Jumping Flash (PSP)
Jun 23rd
A slight problem. The boss of World 3 is quite hard and losing all your lives dumps you back at the beginning of the first level of the world. Which is a bit annoying.
Go! Puzzle (PS3)
Jun 23rd
That Skyscrapers game really is very good. I’ve unlocked the first infinite tower and I don’t think I’ll ever get a silver or gold star for it. It’s impossible.
Aquatica hasn’t got any better, unfortunately. I just don’t get on with it.
Jumping Flash (PS3/PSP)
Jun 23rd
There are now some classic Playstation games available to download from the Playstation Store. Three so far, in fact. WipEout, Crash Bandicoot and Jumping Flash. I’m tempted to give Crash a go, as I never did play more than the demo, back in the day. WipEout is quite tempting, too, but I fear it will have aged very, very badly.
Jumping Flash, though, I like. I grabbed a second hand copy a couple of years ago and enjoyed it, so I knew it still stood up today. Graphically, it’s really quite nasty technically, though there’s some charm to the design. The controls could do with some updating now we have two sticks. But the core jumping gameplay still stands up pretty well.
There aren’t many first-person platform games and jumping bits in first person shooters tend to be rubbish, so this still feels different, twelve years later.
I wish I’d known that to save my game I had to create a virtual memory card before playing, though. Didn’t take me very long to do World 1 a second time, though.
After playing it on the PS3, I decided to try it on the PSP. Took a while to get it copied across – you need to use a cable and I had to update my PSP’s firmware – but I got there in the end. Looks much nicer on the small PSP screen, but the d-pad isn’t quite as good, which meant I had to do some readjusting.
Also, there doesn’t seem to be any way to keep save files in sync between PS3 and PSP, which is odd. I thought the idea was that you could play the game on your PS3 and then take it with you when you’re gallivanting about town, so I might be missing something.
Anyway, hopefully more people will discover Jumping Flash now it’s on the Playstation Store. I’m not sure it quite deserves full “lost classic” status, but it is an interesting and entertaining trip down one of gaming’s evolutionary cul-de-sacs.
Go! Puzzle Demo (PS3)
Jun 23rd
Time to start up the old PS3 for something other than watching DVDs and see what’s come to the Playstation Store recently. First up, the demo of Go! Puzzle, which packages three puzzle games together.
Swizzle Blocks is a game where you rotate groups of blocks to make squares. It hurts my head a bit, but seems fun.
Aquatica is a block-dropping, field-clearing type of game with a twist – the twist being that it’s the worst one I’ve ever played. Puyo Pop, Lumines, Tetris, Columns, Puzzle Fighter, etc., etc., etc. are all better than this, based on what I’ve seen. Of course, it could get much better if I give it a bit more time and I’m probably being horribly unfair, but the quick little go I had didn’t grab me at all.
Skyscrapers seems to be the best of the lot. You have to jump across playing fields using only – and all – squares of one colour, in a strict time limit. I started to enjoy this one before the demo ran out.
The trouble is, that you only get five minutes before the demo kicks you out. That’s not even enough time to get through the tuorial for Skyscrapers – I had to start it up twice before actually getting to play the game. Anyway, the price is okay. £1.99 per game, or all three for £3.99. That seems reasonable to me. I shall mull things over.
Chocobo Tales (DS)
Jun 22nd
Yes, I played a video game for the first time in days. Didn’t play for long, but I beat a boss, progressed the story and played some mini games.
Pokemon Diamond (DS)
Jun 18th
Did my increasily-less-than-daily tasks, then took a quick trip into the Survival Zone. There’s still a town I’ve not been to, which I’m going to work my way towards, trainer by trainer.
Forza Motorsport 2 (360)
Jun 16th
So, I sold the anime Mini I’d bought at auction for more than I’d paid for it and used the cash to turn my 2006 Charger into an S-ranked super car. With that power it was almost undriveable, but not quite, and I finally managed to win the last Proving Ground races that had been a sticking point. Hooray!
Then I jumped back into my Lotus Elise and did the first couple of Amateur races, which I won with ease.
Chocobo Tales (DS)
Jun 16th
Well, some mini games are better than others, but I’m really enjoying this. Starting to build up a nice lot of cards, too. Mainly concentrating on green cards right now. Or yellow. One of them, anyway.
