A Gaming Diary
PS3
PixelJunk Monsters Demo (PS3)
Jan 25th
This is a Tower Defense clone, with a difference. The difference being that you control a charater who has to run around avoiding monsters, collecting dropped money and gems and building and upgrading towers. It’s all set to a soundtrack that’s charming for about five minutes, when it suddenly flicks a switch in the brain and becomes the single most annoying piece of game music I’ve heard in years. Still, there are options for that sort of thing and the game itself seems great, with a difficulty level set somewhere between moderate and hard.
As it’s only £3.49 (possibly for a limited time) and Sony already have my money I might actually buy this at some point.
Singstar (PS3)
Jan 19th
Got four new songs today, none of which I can sing. No surprises there. As well as those, my wife and I took it turns to choose songs to duet from our existing library and it was great until my voice cracked and died. Cough cough, like.
Singstar (PS3)
Dec 17th
Another game I played with my wife. It’s wonderful. The Singstore is great, letting us populate the song list with songs we love, not just what’s on the disc. And I seem to be getting better. You know, at singing. I’m actually learning to control my voice and I’m starting, just starting, to be able to get roughly in the right place without having to rely on the blue line. I’m still awful, though. X-Factor audition awful, even, but I am improving. It feels good.
SingStar (PS3)
Dec 7th
Played every song on the disc once last night (in Duet mode) and then downloaded seven (!) more from the SingStore, which we’ve not tried yet. I really wish I could actually sing. Or at least sing well enough for SingStar. Though I actually did okay on Feel Good Inc., No Surprises and Lovefool. And didn’t totally suck on Hey Ya, either. And I got to do the “give me some sugar, I am your neighbor” bit, which pleased me and disappointed the wife.
As for the question of how good it is, well, it’s SingStar again, so it’s great. I have no interest in uploading any performances, as public humiliation isn’t my thing, but the SingStore is going to be great.
PixelJunk Racers (PS3)
Dec 3rd
We came to an understanding this weekend. Previously bitter enemies, I no longer think that the game’s completely broken. I can even see that it hits all the unambitious targets that it aims for. However, it doesn’t work with my brain and I don’t think I’m ever going to get any fun out of it.
Uncharted Demo (PS3)
Nov 12th
Tomb Raider meets Gears of War, or something. Jungle exploration and jumping, punctuated with gunfights where taking cover is of paramount importance.
Luckily for my wallet, I didn’t much like it. Yes, it looks nice. Yes, it seems to have a nice balance of combat and exploration. Yes, it’s got some loevely touches. But the aiming controls are horrible. I didn’t have any troubles using the PS3 controller for Resistance, but it’s taking far, far too long in this game to get the cursor over my enemies. In the time it takes me to pop out of cover and actually get my cursor over an enemy I’ve been shot to ribbons. Give me some sort of aim assistance or a 360 controller and I’d probably enjoy it, but as it is I just found it too frustrating to play for long.
PixelJunk Racers (PS3)
Oct 26th
Based on first impressions, I’d have more fun eating the £4.99 this cost a penny at a time than playing this.
It’s a top-down racing game where you can only move between lanes, rather then freely across the track. It just feels clunky and I have the same problem with it that I’ve always had with these games – my brain can’t handle having the movement controls working relative to car, not the screen.
Gran Turismo 5 Prologue Demo (PS3)
Oct 19th
What is the world coming to when we get a demo of a demo?
Anyway, I only managed one race which I had to pause every ten seconds because the kitten kept trying to grab the needle on the speedometer. Weirdo.
First impressions, though? Well, it’s Gran Turismo again. And that’s it.
Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction Demo (PS3)
Oct 15th
Well, it looks nice and it’s all very solid. However, it’s also quite dull. I’m not sure if I missing something, but there didn’t seem to be anything much to this. Run down the linear path provided, jump over gaps, shoot and/or melee enemies. Which, um, could describe a lot of games, good and bad. It’s just that underneath the gloss this seemed to lack any life. Maybe it’s that it was so incredibly easy. I did die once, due to a mistimed jump, but that was it. The rest of the time the enemies barely seemed to touch me and when they did, there seemed to be an almost unlimited supply of health packs around.
Oh, and the fact that you can’t invert the y-axis in the demo is absolutely unforgiveable.
It’s possible, I guess, that I’m being overly harsh because I don’t want any more games on my Want List, but that didn’t stop Bladestorm from taking me by surprise and winning me over.
LocoRoco Cocoreccho (PS3)
Sep 25th
Yes, yesterday not only did I turn my PS3 on, but I actually played a game on it.
A game that cost me the princely sum of £1.99.
A game that I played for about fifteen minutes before turning off.
A fun, charming and cute fifteen minutes that I shall return to, mind, don’t get me wrong. Why on earth Sony are marketing this as an “interactive screensaver” I don’t know. It’s a game, pure and simple. Not a very big game, but the price of two quid is pretty spot on. More of this sort of thing, please.
