So guess what came today? Remember that commentsplosion contest a while back?


Mmmm, delicious rarity... Also, can you believe that the P&P was 42 bucks? Damn postal service.

FUCK. YES. To be honest, I still can't believe I won. This is the first time I've won anything since Game Network (old, shitty European TV station that eventually culminated in non-stop softcore porn) had a GBA + 4 games contest, but obviously that wasn't nearly as ridiculously limited and rare as this. Mad props to Mr. Sterling for allaying my fears when there were some problems with the delivery, and to everyone else who participated (especially the spam monsters!).

Also, having just come off Brutal Legend, I can say with utmost certainty that Warriors Orochi 2 is fucking brutal.



And that my face is obviously not.

My shooping skills fail.

As I write this (09/09/09), ten years ago launched one of the greatest (and riskiest) consoles ever made. For most, Sega's Dreamcast is considered the epitome of hardcore gaming and is synonymous with quality. Unfortunately, as history has proven time and time again, the vast majority of consumers favour easily digestible products that they can feel safe investing in, instead of new and groundbreaking innovation in the genre. The fact that Sega might as well have skipped the fifth generation (the Saturn was a great console, but Sega woefully undermarketed it and it had very few truly breathtaking games to speak of) thus letting Sony steal their rightful place as Nintendo's rival was what led to the death of the Dreamcast, as gamers became familiar with the PSX and its vast library of distinctly interesting but ultimately average games.

The '90s were a strange era for gaming. Sega and Nintendo seemed far more willing to experiment than ever before; on one hand, you had the Sega CD, the 32X, the Sega Channel and "blast processing" (a claim by Sega's marketing campaign that never actually existed), while on the other hand, there was the Virtual Boy, Mode 7 graphics, the Satellaview and the 64DD. Most were commercial and critical failures and I think were it not for Sega being completely and utterly dominated in the console wars, the Dreamcast would've never seen the light of day.

So, as disheartening as it sounds, I'm glad they got screwed over. So you all should be too, as the first 128-bit machine was arguably the greatest. To me at least, it definitely had the strongest lineup of games, including some completely bonkers stuff like Seaman.


Yes, that actually happened.

It catered to all types of gamers; the fighter crowd (Rival Schools 2, Marvel vs Capcom 1/2, Capcom vs SNK, Garou, Power Stone 1/2, Last Blade, Dead or Alive 2, Guilty Gear X, Soulcalibur, Street Fighter III), the shooter/shmup enthusiasts (Quake III Arena, Unreal Tournament, Ikaruga, Triggerheart Exelica, Gigawing, Bangai-O, Rez, Radilgy, Mars Matrix, Castle Shikigami 2, Last Hope and countless numbers of obscure Japanese shmups), the RPG nuts (Skies of Arcadia, Grandia 2, EGG, Phantasy Star Online, etc) and the list goes on. Basically, anyone could enjoy it. That was the beauty of it.

Personally, I feel that if Sega had kept supporting the console after its demise, not putting it in direct competition with the others on the market, we could've seen more classics. But I'm not really interested in what ifs. I'm thrilled they knew when to quit. I'd have really hated to see Sega go bankrupt and fade into obscurity, just like Midway is right now (when's the last time you've heard anything positive about them, by the way? Exactly).

Speaking of which, there weren't a lot of highly successful games and the ones that were barely broke a million. Sonic Adventure was one of 'em. Now I don't know how the hardcore Sonic fanboys feel, but I absolutely adored SA1. I feel it's easily the best 3D Sonic ever, and in the top 3-5 Sonic games of all time, period. Not only did it manage to keep the breakneck speed of the originals but also the meticulous platforming. Granted, the speed sections never really amounted to more than holding forward for a length of time, but it just looked so damn good, you know? The only fault I had with it was Big the goddamn Cat, a shoehorned-in giant cat with mental problems and a fishing rod. SA2 wasn't nearly as good; they removed the hub world, added some new, shall-we-say less worthwhile characters, somehow managed to make the voice overs even worse and relegated Knuckles to nothing more than a sidekick... Unbadical, man. From there, Sonic (as developed by Sonic Team; the Dimps GBA games are actually quite decent) only got worse, as we all know.

Let's take a minute to discuss Phantasy Star Online...

Androgynous elf things and overcompensating armour FTW!

All of these new-school XBL/PSN gamers don't realise how lucky they are. These days, absolutely everyone has internet access (broadband, mind you!) and online gaming is as simple as a few clicks away. Back at the turn of the millennium however... 'Twas a very different story. And let's not forget the mind-numbing drudgery of dial-up... Anyway, PSO was, at its core, an extremely simple hack and slasher with some RPG elements. Overall, it technically wasn't that great, but there was something about it. It had heart and character, something very few games possess nowadays. Its storyline was practically non-existent, but amazing graphics, beautiful music and easy-to-pick-up, hard-to-master gameplay endeared itself to all who experienced it.

But then, you took it online and a whole different ball game ensued...
Having never really been a PC gamer, I had no idea what to expect when I first connected. Would I be coldly received? Or would it be an enjoyable ride? As it turns out, most people didn't mind noobs, as long as they were respectful or at the very least had a keyboard to ease communication. In fact, they were more than willing to help out newcomers just for the fun of it. A far cry from today's griefers and 11-year-old XBL racists. It truly was the perfect community, up 'til the glitches started being discovered. Even then, it wasn't that bad. All you had to do was stick with your friends and you could get some great games going without a hitch (guild cards FTW; precursor to gamertags, perhaps?). Pretty soon I was taking down Dark Falz like he was nothing, bringing animal parts to Montague to forge weapons and piping for rare Rappies. Fond memories, man... But when Version 2 came out, they started charging so everything went to hell. I still played it a lot, just offline, and it was still surprisingly fun. For many people just like myself, this was their first true communal gaming experience and very few moments match up to that.

The Dreamcast sold just over ten and a half million units, making it the most commercially unsuccessful games console of the big name brands ever. Despite this, the community is still going strong to this day, even going so far as to release new games every once in a while (my personal recommendation would be the fantastic shmup, Last Hope). As for Sega themselves, they moved on to publishing, bringing more of their own franchises to everything under the Sun. Hell, they're even starting to revive some Dreamcast games on current gen systems; the sublime Marvel vs Capcom 2 was recently released on Xbox Live Arcade and Playstation Network with updated sprites and backgrounds, and the psychedelic aural shooter REZ was all HDed up and released a while back, to rapturous acclaim.

All things considered, if Sega were to attempt a Dreamcast Part Deux, there would be a few things they'd absolutely need to succeed: Innovative ideas (not lazily incorporated or completely irrelevant motion controls *coughprojectnatalcough*), a well integrated online gaming framework (not friend codes, goddammit) and Shenmue fucking 3. That'd be my dream... and I hope I see it before I die.

Because shit like this happens and hits fucking astronomical heights. <3



Now if Dtoid were a Post-Thrash Metal band that fucking kicked unholy amounts of arse, what would its name be?

Hey everybody, long time no see. I know it's been a while since I've posted anything personally relevant (partly because I'm lazy, partly because I've been pretty uninspired recently as should be evident by my blatant plagiarism of Jon Holmes' recent entry), so I'mma just take a few minutes and give some thoughts on the stuff that's been stealing all my free time recently.

Blazblue

Oh snap. There's been an enormous boom in the game's popularity around these parts, but I never expected it to take off the way it did. Obviously, with good reason. I ordered it from eBay and was anticipating it's arrival anxiously for a good 2 weeks, but man, was it worth it.

The game is fan-fucking-tastic. Arc System Works really hit the jackpot with this one. Breaking down it's elements: the characters are brilliantly realised (I'm especially fond of Jin and Noel myself), the gameplay is finetuned to beyond perfection (though CPU-controlled Hakumen gives me headaches), it's designed in a way I've never seen before (the 2D sprites actually look better than the characters in the opening animé FMV), and the story is actually interesting; a rarity for a fighter, especially a 2D one. Judging by how ravenously our community alone has received it, I think this is one fighter we'll be seeing for a long time to come, just like Third Strike.
Overall, top notch stuff. Good work, ArcSys.

UFC 2009 Undisputed

To be honest, I was never really interested in UFC or MMA at all before this game. I had downloaded the demo to my HDD, but not played it and it was only when I left it in my friend's house, he played it and told me how great it was that got my attention. Goddamn this game is good. Like, really good. Probably the best sports game ever made (at least, IMO).

The wealth of fighters on offer is pretty staggering, and despite the fact that there are only 6 fighting disciplines to choose from, everyone feels unique in their own way. The character models are insanely detailed too, and this is one of those games that an HDTV really makes a noticeable difference. You can literally see the fighters' faces get completely deformed and it's not unusual for someone at the end of the match to look like Sylvester Stallone.

During a fight, you can be knocked out at any time with a particularly well placed hit; these are known as Flash KOs, and I don't really know the criteria for them (which there must be some, since THQ said they were reducing the frequency of them in an upcoming patch) but they're pretty hilarious. 5 seconds into a match between a friend and I, he was KOed. He went straight for a takedown and met Shogun's knee. :)
Needless to say, this game is worthy of anyone's time, not just hardcore UFC fans.

Prototype

You had to have seen this one coming.
This game basically dominated my existence for a good week when it first came out. And I haven't even gotten around to finishing it yet, due to the large amounts of hilarity to be derived from terrorizing innocent civilians. The only real complaint I have with it is that some parts are pretty unfair, such as the game swarming you with hunters when you're almost dead, and other such nuisances. I suppose the graphics could be a bit better, but it all runs so smoothly without a hint of slowdown so who can really complain?
Also, it IS blatantly better than inFAMOUS, and anyone who says otherwise is a total berk.

Personal crap
So it's pretty hard to get a job in our current economic climate, wouldn't you agree? Which is why I've been forced to sell a significant amount of my collection to keep myself up to date with all these new releases. It sucks, but what can ya do? Either way, I got 65 big ones for Wii Fit (bought for 90) so that's a plus. It also gives me some time to get reacquainted with some classics I'd forgotten about, including Capcom vs SNK 2, KoF98 (XBLA), Garou (XBLA), Shenmue, and Alpha 3. Good times.
Also, for anyone interested, I gave my DS to my friend for awhile (he's never played FFVI so I gave him it and a copy of Advance and he fucking loves it so far, plus PokéPlat) but I plan to start doing Korg mixes again in a few weeks. I also joined his metalcore band as drummer, so that's pretty cool. :)

198MB. Currently downloading, so I can't comment on the changes just yet. I think it's pretty safe to say that
this'll be a strong contender for DL GOTY though.



I was always fond of the triple threat of Akuma, Gambit and Hayato myself. Also, (for anyone new to MvC)
considering Ken isn't nearly as vicious and prioritised in this as he is in SFIV, I don't think we'll see that many of
him... so that's a load off my mind. He'll probably be replaced by Magneto, Cable and Sentinel though, which (in
my mind) is worse.

On a slightly less melancholic note, the addition of custom soundtracks was a masterstroke. No longer will we
have to suffer through that song while deciding who to choose out of 56 fucking unique characters.

UPDATE: So it turns out the demo is ONLY 2 player offline versus. So I can't even play it.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUU-
Only six characters to choose from, too; I guess that's not too bad. It is a demo, after all. Those are
Strider, Chun-Li, Ryu, Wolverine, Spider-Man and Iron Man. On the other hand, there's a delicious
crispness about the new revamped UI that I like and a small guide to playing is included, which I thought was a
nice touch. Yes, that is literally all I can talk about. :(

As a child, I was pretty fearless. I'd sail off roofs, ascend the tallest trees I could find, eat random bugs for lulz, and generally do the sorts of crazy things associated with carefree prepubescence. But there was one species of creature that terrified me to my very soul (and still does), and those are spiders.

I was seven when I first got my hands on the pure ecstasy that was Ocarina of Time and I played that game so much that the analogue stick on my N64 pad wore out. I loved every second of my time with it, up until I encountered the dreaded Wallmaster.



This SOB encapsulated everything I despised about spiders. Its big trick was that it would invade your personal space with no provocation and snatch you right out of the dungeon, placing you back at the entrance. It wasn't just that annoying element though, it was the look. A disembodied hand, cut from the wrist, dropping on your head with nary a warning aside from a shadow forming under you (which, the first time, you wouldn't have the faintest idea what it meant), crawling around on its unnaturally powerful digits. If you dodged its snatch attack, then you'd have to fight it, mano-a-hando.

The first time it happened, I was (no joke) so scared that I quit playing the game for a solid week. During that time, I purchased the strategy guide and realised that it was shockingly simple to defeat. I cursed my cowardice and returned to the game, owning that MF easily.


Floormaster in Wind Waker, a relative of the Wallmaster.

Despite its straightforward nature, I still would never get over the initial shock I had the first time that bitch occupied my face. They appeared in a lot of other Zeldas and had a close cousin (Floormasters; far less scary ground-dwellers), but I still hold up that first time in Ocarina as the scariest video game moment of my entire life and I'm including Silent Hill 2, Clock Tower 3 and Forbidden Siren 2.

(P.S: I'll probably do a more in-depth Monthly Musing later this month because there's really not a lot you can say about the Wallmaster...)