Posting schedule and new games coming soon

I've finally got things settled down on the capturing front and I'm pretty sure I can set a schedule and stick to it for when I'm posting videos.  It's subject to change, because, well, I'm a girl and I like to change my mind.

I've currently got three games going at the time.  Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga, Dark Souls and Rayman Origins.  So I'm going to post a new video in one of those games three days a week.  I'm almost done with lego Star Wars so I'll be looking for a replacement for that game when I'm done.  For now, I think I'll post new videos Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays.  I might add to that as I get more games filmed and edited.  We'll have to see.  I would eventually like to get to a point where I'm posting 5 to 6 times a week.  But I'm not there yet.

I've actually done a lot of filming in two other games.  I don't want to spoil those for you now, you'll just have to wait to see what they are.  I think they show a good mix of the types of games I like and the systems I play on.  One is a fun classic and the other is one I would never think of to pick up and play, but I actually found that I like it a lot (except for a pesky boss battle that I'm stuck at). 

Now that I can capture from any of my Playstations or Nintendo systems, the possibilities have really opened up for what I can film.  I'm so excited.  Except for Nintendo's posting videos of their games "system".  I'm doing some research on that.  I'd love to post Pikmin videos, but while Pikmin (the original) is listed on their "white list", Pikmin 2 is not.  Does that mean I can post Pikmin 2 videos?  That's what I've got to find out.  But that's an issue for later on down the road.

While filming is fun and the editing sometimes isn't, I don't mind.  I'd much rather spend my day being frustrated over some editing issues than the work I do for my job.  I get more satisfaction out of the editing than anything I do for my employer.  I'm getting better at the editing and I hope it shows in my videos because I sure do love making these.  And I can't wait to show you what else I've filmed.  Stay tuned.

A picture is worth a thousand words

There are just some creatures that make you smile: Pikmin, Mendokans, Chocobos, Moogles and Raving Rabbids. You'll have to click on the link to see the picture since I couldn't resize it small enough without distorting the image.

My game case looks like a photo album

Have you ever opened an old photo album and sat and stared at the pictures? Some things you probably remember but then you see a photo of something you don't remember at all; or a photo you forgot even existed. I experienced this the other day, not with a photo album but my game case.

When I buy a game I put the disks in a folder. Four places for a disk on each side of a page. When the case is full it's about 4 inches thick. Currently it's over flowing. I have no more open slots and only disk #1 from Lost Odyssey is in the case. A couple of years ago I never thought I'd be able to fill it. Now I've got to figure something else out. I'm going to have to replace the case soon because the straps on the spine are tearing and one of these days they're going to rip right through. But having all my games in one place is fantastic and it makes things so much easier to haul them around if I go somewhere else to play.

But while dain was fiddling with my and his systems trying to get his dashboard back I opened up my case and decided to organize it a bit. All the games are alphabetically by title (regardless of system) except my latest purchases Lost Odyssey and The Orange Box which were stuffed into the last two slots open. I started at the back and started pulling out the disks and stacking them up so I could place the newest ones into order.

There were a few times when I pulled a game out and thought "hmm, I own this?" or "have I every played this?" or "when did I get this one?" Some of them really surprised me. Some of them brought back a lot of good memories and made me want to put them in again and play them. Some of them seemed like I was seeing them for the first time. And some of them made me feel guilty. Guilty that I've owned it for so long but haven't played it hardly at all.

One of the biggest shocks to me was looking at my Playstation games. I remember when I'd flip through the case and all I could see was Playstation games. Even after I owned a Game Cube and Xbox it always seemed like my eyes went straight to the PS and PS2 games and glossed over all the others. I always thought I'd play Knights of the Old Republic someday (I finally did) or I should give Pikmin another shot(the first couple of tries were terrible, but I love the game now). Instead I'd put in SSX Tricky, Dark Stone, Legend of Dragoon, Bust-A-Move, Dark Cloud, Time Splitters or Xenosaga. Or any number of other games. I've only finished a couple of them because I had so many to choose from that there was always something else to play.

Now when I flip through the case it's the Xbox 360 games that my eyes are drawn to and I tend to gloss over everything else. I had to pull my Game Cube games out of there a year ago. Because those disks are smaller they'd fall out every time I moved the case. Those are now sitting in a Gladware bowl that's the perfect size for them. Those games don't get looked at at all. Their like the photos stored in a shoebox just waiting for you to put them in an album.

Now that I've looked through them and really seen them all I want to play them all. You know, take a couple of days off from work and do nothing but sit in front of the TV and play games. I want to relive those glory days of the older systems and games. I want to experience memories for the first time. I want to laugh and cry and scream at the screen just like you do with old photographs. And like an old photo album my game case is a reflection of who I am as a gamer. From embarrassing baby photos (A Bug's Life) to prom night pictures (Time Splitters). It's my gaming life right before me eyes. If you ever stop by I'll have to pull out my "photo album" and show you. You'll know more about me than you ever wanted to know in the first place. But isn't that what photo albums are for anyway?

Why do we replay video games?

Gamer Informer online had an interesting article about why we replay video games. I had to stop and think about it for a bit to try and see why I replay video games. Here's their eight reasons and my take on them.

#1 - Financial Limitations
It's been awhile since I've had some financial limitations on my game buying experience. It's not that I make a lot of money or I've won the lottery, it's just that I've refined my tastes in games a lot better. There was a time when the Game Cube and original Xbox came out that I wanted both but couldn't afford them. My brother dain and I compromised. He was making more money than me so he bought the Xbox and I bought the Game Cube. We'd meet up at my parent's house and share systems. Once I realized that I just couldn't play Xbox games once a week I re-examined my budget and found away to buy an original Xbox (refurbished).

I've bought several games because they were popular (Grand Theft Auto III) and haven't liked them, so I eventually sold them back. Since then I've tried to be informed about games and only buy the ones I think I'll like. I have gone out on a limb for games that looked interesting without knowing anything about them (Pikmin) but now I do a little bit of research before buying.

#2 - Nostalgia
Yes, I go back and play older games because I miss the game play. They also remind me of when my life wasn't filled with so much responsibility. Games can be an escape not just with their game play but also with the mind set they can put you in. I will always love Legend of Dragoon and I think as long as I've got a system to play it on I will always be going back to play that game. Final Fantasy IX and X are also like that for me.

#3 - Old Games/New Tricks
I'm not a glitcher. I don't use cheat codes (unless I absolutely can't get through an area without one). So picking up an old game just because someone figured out how you can get through one area without dying doesn't do it for me. I might pick it up because the first time through I struggled to beat a boss using wind based weapons but then I find out fire based weapons work much better. I like replaying games to see if there was a way I could have gotten past a point a little easier without using any cheats. Games that now have downloadable content will get a second play through by me. Same game but new stuff is always a good thing.

#4 - Unlockables
Unlockables are good. Playing a game where the choices you make determine what future missions are available is also a good thing. I like the fact that how you play the game and the decisions you make effect what actions and story lines are available to you. If you pick the good story line (being a saint in Fable or good in Knights of the Old Republic or a by-the-books soldier in Mass Effect) and having that determine what you can and can not do (even if only in dialogue choices) makes playing the game a second time to see what things are different a good game. And the "New Game+" option I first encountered in Chrono Cross (I think) is fantastic. How much do you hate getting to the end of the game and finally getting that ultimate weapon but there's only one battle left to use it in? Let us keep what we've got and start all over with the enemy adjusting accordingly.

#5 - Difficulty, Co-Op and Multiplayer Modes
I will never play a game the first time on the hardest difficulty. I'm just not that good of a player. I always start out at easy or normal. Once I've gotten a feel of the game I usually can do better but it takes me a while to get to that point. I like playing Co-Op games. I don't have to start at the beginning with someone but jumping into a level with someone else is so much easier then doing everything yourself. And if you're playing a level ahead of where you are in your single player game once you get up to that level you'll know what to do. I can't tell you how many times this has helped me in a game. For multiplayer games I will always enjoy going back and playing Star Wars Battlefront. Partly for nostalgia but partly for the fact that you can get more people in a Battlefront game than you can in a Gears of War game. The more the merrier I say.

#6 - Achievement Points
There is one thing I don't like about difficulty level achievements. If you play a game through on Hard you get the achievement for that but also the achievement for Easy and Normal as well. To me (maybe because I always start on easy) you should have to play the game at each level to get those achievement points.

And what are you going to do if you finish BioShock and realize you're missing a journal or two? You could load up a previous save or you could restart the game. Either way you're replaying the game to get that Historian achievement. A lot of games have achievements that aren't possible to get in just one go through. Mass Effect is a perfect example. If you like a game enough to replay it for achievements then why not? If you like the game have fun with it and enjoy it second time around as well.

#7 - I can't quit you - addiction
For a while there I was addicted to Star Wars Battlefront. I had to play it every night. It didn't matter what kind of mood I was in or what things I should have been doing after I got home from work (like laundry), I just had to play the game. I went through a similar thing with SSX Tricky for the PS2. There are certain games that strike just the right chord in you at just the right time and you just have to play them. It's a drug and you need your fix. And there's nothing wrong with that . . . unless it interferes with living in the real world. It's a lot safer addiction than tobacco or alcohol or other drugs. And those people that are dying playing World of Warcraft have a lot more serious issues than just a game addiction.

#8 - Who the hell needs a reason?
Exactly. A good game is a good game no matter how new or old it is. And there's nothing wrong with playing a good game.

Ah, the good old days

If you don't see me on my Xbox over the next couple of days don't panic. I'm still here. I'm just reliving some of the old days and playing on my PS2. Something I haven't done in a long time.

You see I've really been in an RPG kind of mood lately. I've got several RPGs for the Xbox but for most of them I'm having a hard time reading the font on the screen. I don't know what it is about RPGs on the Xbox but it seems the developers are using the smallest font possible for the stats and menus. I don't know how many times I had a character die in Lost Odyssey or Blue Dragon all because I couldn't read their HP stats to know they were in trouble. But as much as I loved those games my frustration level was much higher. Now, I can appreciate the developers not wanting to fill up the screen with text (except during the dreams in Lost Odyssey) but at least make it readable on a standard TV . . . and by people with bad eyes.

Instead of letting my frustration overwhelm my desire to play an RPG I decided Sunday night to reconnect my PS2 and get back into playing Final Fantasy VII. That is the one official New Year's Resolution that I haven't achieved yet this year. It had been so long since I played that game I wondered if I would remember even how to play.

The first thing I had to get use to was the controller. Something that previously seemed like an extension of my own hands felt awkward and clumsy when I first picked it up. It felt small and insubstantial compared to the Xbox 360 controller. It took awhile to get use to but old habits never seem to go away.

Another thing I noticed was that my PS2 makes more noise than my Xbox 360 does. And it takes longer to boot up. But on the other hand I didn't have to log in to start playing the game.

Once I got into the game it didn't take me long to figure out what to do and where I was in the story. And compared to the font sizes in the 360 games the font size in Final Fantasy VII was HUGE! I could read it even without my contacts or glasses. That's such a nice thing for my tired eyes. I could play for hours without having to strain just to see what's on the TV. There was no danger of my characters dying because I couldn't see their hit points (Cait Sith did die at one point but that's because the enemy did a suicide drop on Cait to end the battle so it's totally not my fault--and yes I play with Cait Sith in my part . . . sometimes).

It's nice to get back to the good old days of playing video games. I don't know how long this will last but maybe I can really book it through FF7 and try another couple of games before the urge to go back to my 360 overtakes me. Who knows, but with these feelings of nostalgia I might even go back to my N64 or Super Nintendo or give in to the longings to play Pikmin on my Game Cube. Ah, those were the good old days.

Boogie Bunnies is brilliant

In an attempt to clean up my Arcade games on my 360 I decided to play the demo of Boogie Bunnies that I downloaded awhile ago. I'm glad I did.

The game play is not that much different than what you've seen before if you've played Bust-A-Move or Bubble Pop (or is it Bubble Burst). You have brightly colored shapes in a grad and you launch a colored shape to get three of the same connected to make them disappear. Every now and then the grid moves closer to you and more lines are added to at the top. In Bust-A-Move you fire from a fixed pointer in the center at the bottom of the grid. You can bounce the ball off the walls to get it into a space your fixed position might not allow. But Boogie Bunnies is a little bit different.

Instead of being stuck at a fixed position on the bottom of the screen you can move side to side to pick the best column to launch your bunny at. It's kind of like Space Invaders in that sense. But Boogie Bunnies adds a twist to the mix. You can also rotate around the grid and launch your bunny from the side. Yes, that's it. If you don't have any good placement for that blue bunny at the bottom but you just wish you could attach him (or is it a her?) to that second row from the top, now you can. Just swing your bunny over to the edge of the grid and things will rotate slightly so you can glide up and down the outer edges of the grid. This is a great way to set up combos and save yourself if you're running out of room at the bottom.

And while you play just listen to those cute little bunnies. They say "Hi" and laugh and you can't help but be touched by the tremble in their little voices when they start to say "Uh" as they get close to the bottom of the screen. If any of them fall into the crack of the ice (on the Arctic level) their sad voices should make you feel guilty for not saving them. And those bunnies sure do love to dance.

I knew I was hooked on playing this game, after only one session, when I was in the shower this morning wondering if I was going to have enough time to get in one more game before I went to work. I remember doing that with SSX Tricky many times. And being late to work many times too. Yes, I did get in a game this morning and picked up a couple of achievements too. And no, I wasn't late to work . . . this time. I'm sure they'll be other morning when I itch to get in one more game before I have to do something else.

This game reminded me a lot of Pikmin for the Game Cube. It's also another game I tried to play before work, but was more difficult to squeeze in. I bought Pikmin because I thought the cover looked cute. That's all. I had no idea of the game play or what type of game it was. I'm really glad I made that leap for Pikmin and that's the same leap I made with Boogie Bunnies. I liked the little snap shot image I saw in all the advertisements. Didn't know anything about the game so I downloaded the demo first. I'm glad I played it because it put a smile to my face. You should pick it up too. If not you just might hear a little tremble in my voice when I say "uh".

My Favorites Games - Game Cube

Okay, you'll still have to wait on the my favorite games for the N64. I know I've got more games stashed somewhere I just haven't found them yet. So I'm moving on to the Game Cube.

My brother and I both had a Playstation 2 and would meet up every Saturday at my parents house to do laundry. We'd play games all day long. I remember when the Xbox and Game Cube came out. Neither one of use was making enough money to get both systems so we came up with a plan. He would get the Xbox and I would get the Game Cube (he was making more money than me at the time). When we'd meet up on laundry days we'd bring those systems and share. (See mom and dad we can share our toys.) The only problem was the games.

We both wanted to play games from the other system at other times of the week. I wanted to play Hunter the Reckoning to blow off some heads. And He wanted to play some Pikmin to throw little leafy head creatures around. Within a month or two we both broke down and bought the other system. And while that put us both on a very tight budget for awhile neither one of us are sorry we did it.

Here are my favorite games for the Game Cube:

#1 Pikmin 1 & 2
How could you possibly NOT love this game? I knew practically nothing about it when I bought it. It looked bright and comical so I thought I'd give it a shot. I'm so glad I did. I've played this game through to the end 3 times but have never gotten past the last boss. I keep restarting it trying out a different strategy. And I don't regret any minute of doing that. When Pikmin 2 came out I was excited . . . but also a little intimidated. Now you have 2 pilots to control and 2 groups of Pikmin to order about. It's been twice the fun . . . and twice the frustrations sometimes but completely worth it.

#2 Super Monkey Ball 1 & 2
Monkey Target is a blast. Monkey Bowling is a hoot. And Monkey Baseball can get really hilarious. And that's not even getting into the mazes that will open up all those mini-games. Most of the can be down right frustrating until you discover the secret to getting through them alive. Once you figure that out it can be a little disappointing on some of the level but there's always more that will make you say "yeah right. How am I suppose to get through that?"

#3 Ikaruga
This was another game I knew very little about but could get cheap. I'm all for cheap game as long as they're good. And Ikaruga is good. In an old school kind of way. You fly a ship in a vertical scroller firing at things along the way. You have the ability to switch between a light and a dark ship that fires corresponding missiles at the enemy. Based on your ship color and the enemies bullets depends on how much damage (or health) you'll take. Figuring the whole thing out is half the fun. Can you do it?

#4 Mario Cart: Double Dash
I love cart racing games. And this time you can love it twice as much. You're not the only one racing to win the game. You've now got a passenger your opponents will have to deal with. You can mix and match who you place in the cart (and even mix and match your cart to your people) and each person has a different quality and ability they'll add tot he game. Do you want to toss a giant banana behind you as a special attack? They you better pick Donkey Kong or Diddy Kong as one of your players in your cart. And since your players can swap out between driving and throwing red koupa shells around there must be hundred of ways to tailor the perfect driving experience.

#5 Super Mario Sunshine
This is the Game Cube game I'm suppose to be finishing along with my brother. I have to admit I haven't played it much but I still like the game. Who knew cleaning graffiti off of the town walls could be so much fun. Or cleaning up what appears to be oil slicks. Have you ever wanted to fly or propel yourself forward with the power of water? Well now you can. I still have a ways to go in the game but I think my brother made a good choice when he put it on our "must finish" list. May only compliant is why does Nintendo still insist on putting the word "Super" in all their game titles (at least at the time this game came out)?

Honorable Mentions:
Mystic Heroes, Crystal Chronicles, Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, Gauntlet: Dark Legacy, Evolution Worlds