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A Gaming Diary
Assassin’s Creed (360)
Dec 6th
Played this for quite a while last night and – apart from the last ten minutes or so – I didn’t set foot in one of the major cities. I roamed around the kingdom for quite a while, fighting Templars, collecting flags and climbing Eagle Points, found a few more flags in the starting village and then made my way to Jerusalem, where I found the Assassins Guild and saved.
I throughly enjoyed it all, too. The more I play this game the more I like it. I’m still expecting it to get too hard and/or annoying later, but I’ve played for hours now and only done two of the assassinations. I think I’m having a completely different experience to people – especially reviewers – who decided to go through it s quickly as possible. It’s a game that gets better the more you breathe and the more you just mess around, I think.
Psychonauts (360)
Dec 6th
Well, this finally downloaded and installed itself, but that wasn’t the end of the trouble. When I started it up it told me there was an update available which I should download. So I sat and watched the progress bar move across the screen, only to then be told that there was an error and the update couldn’t be installed. Then I got kicked back to the dashboard. Starting up the game after that worked fine, though, and after much stuttering on the intro movies the game’s worked fine, with only the most minor graphical problems since. (Mainly one-pixel-wide black lines appearing on the screen now and again.)
As for the game, it’s exactly what I remember from way back when. The script, voice acting and graphical design are very, very good, but the platforming is merely quite good. I’ve not yet got to any of the controller-smashingly frustrating sections, so we’ll see how far I get through the game this time.
Half-Life 2 (360)
Dec 5th
While waiting for Psychonauts to download I decided to play some Half-Life 2, as it was in the drive. Really was the best and worst of the game in one small sitting. Some excellent fights against the Combine, some fun head crab shooting and then some really annoying bits with stupid physics puzzles and annoying jumping. Also, everything involving ladders is horrible.
I tried to play some Sonic, too, but the kitten wouldn’t let me. She kept trying to claw the rings out of the screen, which wasn’t a good idea at all, so I had to stop.
And Psychonauts didn’t finish downloading until after I went to bed, anyway.
Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness (PSP)
Dec 4th
Same as yesterday. Same level, same team, one Prinny died again, two characters levelled up.
It’s like Groundhog Day round here.
Team Fortress 2 (360)
Dec 4th
Again, a friends match turned into a no-friends match, so I had to leap into a random game. (After going through the final bit of the commentary I’d not heard yet.) This time I knew my limits and wasn’t as awful as I had been the other night. As the Pyro I got a few kills, as a Medic I did some useful healing.
Our team was utterly outclassed, though, and we lost every game heavily.
Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness (PSP)
Dec 3rd
Only had ten minutes spare this lunchtime, so just replayed a story level with some of my low-level characters. One of my Prinnies got killed, which was a shame, but I did level a couple of other characters up, so it was worth doing.
Bite-sized chunk gameplay at its very best.
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.
Kula World (PSP)
Dec 3rd
A great lost Playstation game, that has apparently been fetching massive amounts on eBay over the last few years. It’s a 3D, rolling-ball puzzle game and it’s quite good fun, though I’ve seen nothing yet to suggest that it’s some amazing lost classic.
Unless I’m missing some camera controls you need to memorise the layout of the levels as you sometimes have to jump to places you can’t see and only know about because you saw them earlier in the game. Which seems a little unfair to me.
Beats (PSP)
Dec 3rd
A download from the PSP store. It’s a pain the rear to use if you’ve got a Mac, as you have to use special PC-only software to download stuff which is, obviously, impossible. Luckily, things you buy appear in your download list in the PS3 version of the store, even if you can’t buy them there, so I was able to buy the game on my Mac, then download it on to my PS3 and then transfer it from that to the PSP. Phew.
Was it worth it? Yeah, probably. It’s a rhythm action game that uses your own music (so I guess it’s similar to that iPod game that came out recently that I can’t remember the name of and can’t play). I’ve tried it with Johnny Cash, Gretchen Wilson and CSS, to name a few, and while I never really felt the connection between the game and the music I did have fun. It’s pretty frantic, even on Normal, but not stupidly hard.
World Series of Poker 2008: Battle for the Bracelets (DS)
Dec 3rd
I guess it does what it says on the tin, but it’s really, really dull. Matches take hours and hours to play – I spent all of Saturday afternoon plugging away – and it’s really, really easy to win. It’s just a test of patience and forcing yourself not to go all in on ridiculous hands just to try and make things slightly more exciting.
Still, I got to play against Jennifer Tilly, which is something.
