To many seasoned pros of gaming and its culture the jerk-wad gamer is a common and inescapable foe, one which makes every level headed and rational gamer quiver with fear. We often get lumped together in one big sweaty pile with every other gamer/stereotype by the media these days and these kinds of gamers give us a proverbial black eye from their irrational behaviour. You know the kind I am talking about the annoying people on Xbox Live that say nothing but racist slurs, the hyper active 12 year olds (you must note that only 12 year olds and proper adults play online) that force you to mute them before they make your ears bleed and last but not least, the ranting angry gamer.



Of all these stereotypes and generalisations (both terms I hate but they are necessary evils in this world) the angry gamer causes me more chagrin than any other. This particular type of gamer, although prolific before the internet forums and/or message boards, is more prevalent in the web 2.0 world than ever before. Having more of a say should really be a positive thing but as we all know it can severely backfire into our collective faces. There will be one gamer saying things like “ARRGHHH EVLENTY!!!111 Jack Thompson is wrong and I’m going to cut his balls off then eat them with soup OM NOM NOM NOM!!!1113453”on any given message board, or at least something to this effect. Now I’m not saying that I expect perfection from the gaming community, far from it, but some people could do well to find some tact before they next log on to their computer.

In recent years the gaming culture has been under fire from many different lawyers, so-called experts and what can only be described as crazy people (or a mix of several in some cases) about the increased violence and inclusion of adult themes in a still fledgling entertainment sector. One thing you must remember is that the previous generation still think of videogames as Nintendo and Mario, bright happy colours and child friendly images. Parents look to the media for advice, albeit a flawed way of parenting it still has its advantages, and see “Super violent game with sex in it goes on sale soon” and get horrified by the thought of their little Jack soliciting sex from a bunch of pixels, then killing the pixels afterword’s to get his money back (Jack was ever so prudent). I am not saying they are right I am trying to say that some parents lack the interest or education to actually find out for themselves that games have matured since the day-glo days of the mid-eighties.

This is the point that the angry gamer stereotype comes into play, for he is the bearer of all things true and pure, except that stash of porn he likes to call Betty, riding his high horse and dousing the uncouth peasants with hot frothy knowledge juice. Except they don’t, what they do is just start shouting at people illogically and, in the majority of cases incoherently, much like a frustrated local would do to try and get a foreigner to understand how much of a douche the local actually was. The one thing that this ‘type of gamer acheieves is cementing the tarnished view of gamers as raging sociopaths with little to no interpersonal skills and a penchant for that 12 year old girl next door(who he suspects played against him on Xbox Live the other day).

If you are going to try and combat the mainstream ignorance of any kind of speciality then please do it in a calm, cool and logical way. Never fly off the handle at people because they haven’t grown up on the same games that you have, don’t claim they have relations with your dog because they can’t see at first why games and movies are seen as completely different beasts and in the public eye can share no commonalities of themes. Think things through before you commit them to the annals of internet archives, if they even sound remotely irrational re-word it so it is not so offensive or condescending. If we all try to do this from time to time, maybe one day our image will improve.

This brings me to my final point in this already-too-long cblog: the upcoming episode of Podcastle. If you do listen to this amazing Destructoid podcast you will have heard last week’s episode and suffice to say it was pretty damn amazing, hard to top in fact. To top the last feat of podcasting they have managed to get Jack Thompson (of legendary game violence hating fame) to semi-agree to come on the show. Now I not for one second think he will turn up, and if he does he will basically ignore anything the crew say. This fills me with more dread than anything else as we all know how angry Jim can get. We all take it in good jest because we know he is kidding about but to outsiders this would be less apparent and the last thing we need is Jack Thompson running around brandishing clinching proof that we gamers are not fit to play games because the crew couldn’t control themselves. Please for the future of all gamers, do try and be considerate and as inoffensive as is possible.

P.S: In before the flames. Before anyone one says “your preaching to the choir” think about how many members of the Destructoid community can be classed as Angry Gamers.

In this blog I want to explore the importance of single and multiplayer in both modern and �retro� games. There is a strong dichotomy between the experiences of single and multiplayer parts of any game once which seems at first glance to be heavily unbalanced, to take an extreme example Unreal Tournament has at best a mediocre single player experience but this happens because the developers spent the majority of its gestation period working on the amazing multiplayer.

Throughout the years of gaming I have experienced there have been many times when my friends have came over to my house and we went in search of good multiplayer games. These games tended to either have non-existent or hollow single player experiences, at least that is what we thought. Many people resorted to playing single player games using the hot swapping technique of playing for ten minutes or so then passing on the controller to the next person. This was enjoyable but at the same time it lacked the fun that proper multi-player experiences had in heaps.

This leads me to the question are single and multiplayer experiences mutually exclusive or are they dichotomous? Can great single player games still have great multi-player components or are we always going to have games such as Bioshock for great single player fun and Counter Strike for our multiplayer jollies? Let�s have a look at the games that have great examples of both kinds of gaming experiences.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare � PC, PS3, 360 and DS



Ok maybe a slightly controversial title to start this off with but bear with me. For those that have endeavoured to drag themselves from the extremely well rounded multiplayer component of this game of the year title will no doubt have found their way to the great campaign. Normally FPS games have their campaigns added on almost as an afterthought but Infinity Ward seem to have nailed the intensity of modern warfare and it moves along at a blistering pace. From war torn Middle Eastern countries to...war torn eastern European countries the single player experience is never boring or repetitive. Even if you never touch the online modes or the split screen you will still feel satisfied by your purchase because of an excellent single player experience (with arguably the best ending of any FPS of last year). It does have some minor flaws such as it�s as short as a very short thing but it has replay value in spades.

Starcraft - PC



This game is pretty well known in pro-gaming circles as a well balanced, excellent multiplayer RTS and is the national sport of Korea*. Many people would be happy to while away their days planning epic zergling rushes against people from across the globe, but beyond this lays another face of the Starcraft package. The single player campaign. The campaign has a very interesting and almost deep storyline full of twists and turns which makes full use of all three races. I won�t spoil the story for those who haven�t played it but it is safe to say it has one of the best storylines of any RTS ever made, with the exception of the warhammer ones (but they cheat due to the back stories were made years before the games were).

Super Mario Bros. - NES



There is not much I can say about this title that has not been said before. It is one of Shigeru Miyamoto�s first masterpieces and the birth in earnest of the 2D smooth side scrolling platform era. If you haven�t played this game then you probably have been living under a rock that is in the middle of Galactic space. Everyone knows the story by now unless you are the previously mentioned intergalactic hermit, Princess Peach gets kidnapped by Bowser, King of the Koopas and you have to go save the cock-teasing bitch from said Freddy Mercury-esque monster (see leather arm bands). The game itself is a master class in 2D platforming and is hugely enjoyable but if your friends come over and want to kick back, drink some brewskis and play some games you can bring in Mario�s ever present brother (wa)Luigi and save* the princess together. As the multiplayer is the same game as the single player you may bring issue with this particular title but I feel it�s inclusion is fair because there can be multiple players in the game and still be as great as it is on your own

Marathon � Mac OS, Apple Pippin and PC



This game was one of Bungie�s earlier projects (yes they existed before the Halo trilogy, or Oni but we don�t like to mention that game to many people as it has been proven to strike them down with mediocre fever) and stands as a testament to the quality of gaming that can be had on Apple�s nicely designed hardware and software. If you haven�t had a chance to play this wonderful game because you didn�t have access to a Mac back in �94 then I suggest you go download the freeware versions of all three games right freaking now. This game had an epic and grandiose sci-fi story about a human ship that was converted from Demios, one of Mars� two moons that is being attacked by aliens. It pits you as a superhuman cyborg and most of the story is revealed through crew logs accessed at the computer terminals. These terminals also give the player mission information from the ships main AI Leela and the two lesser AI�s Durandal and Tycho (the relationship between the two adds another dimension to the story and rings a bell when you think of Cortana from the Halo games). This game had superb single player story mode which instead of having you run to the exit as quick as possible actually had you complete objectives (much like their Halo games, is anyone else beginning to see a pattern here). Apart from the great single player the multiplayer was amazing as well with a well balanced death match mode which could hold up to 8 people at a time. This was later modded to have co-operative play by the massive audience that it garnered on the Mac.

From these examples we can deduce that as time has went on the truly great single and multiplayer games are becoming somewhat of a rare beast but that is because budgets keep getting bigger and bigger and plunging money into a campaign for an primarily online game just doesn�t make sense anymore. This begs the question; does this fledgling industry stifle creativity solely on the basis of profits? Many games that are seen as innovative rarely enjoy financial success these days; take Okami for example it's developer had to close down because it failed to light up registers around the globe. The visionaries of this industry will continue to follow their dreams I feel but will they feel the ever-present breath on the back of their necks from the corporations hungry for profit? Another interesting question this raises is what makes the smash hit innovative games perform well at retail? Is it all down to hype? Marketing? Word of mouth? Sometimes I wonder if companies decide how well a game is going to do when it is still in development and sink in the amount of marketing dollars they think will be appropriate then, instead of throwing money into a worthless project?

There have been many great games with both stellar single and multiplayer experiences. However not all games have this, some games are just not suited to multiplayer/single player experiences and they rightfully remain isolated from other players and/or deep campaigns but the ones that try and up hold this dichotomy are truly great and show us that games can excel in both arenas.

* may be innaccurate

I recently returned from my jaunt to the lovely town of Glasgow, Scotland. That's a lie, it is a hellhole of the highest magnitude but has an awesome music scene, so I go there ever few weeks to see some bands. Today I went to see Mindless Self Indulgence, one of my most favourite bands!



Now your wondering why I've yet to mention games in this cblog but yes there is a game related point to this pointless post. Ironic isn't it? There was many strange and wonderful outfits at this gig but the most interesting were two men dressed as seminal Nintendo creations Mario and Luigi who were called up on stage to perform a song with Mindless Self Indulgence. Epic times were had by all, and Jimmy Urine (singer of aforementioned band) signed the Mario Bros off with "Keep it 16 bit guys!"!

For the uninitiated I started this blog some months ago about the games that I have been playing recently on my shiny PS3. I wrote about 6 of these blogs and then purchased a 360. Since I split my gaming time between the two, and frankly no one read my blog before I thought I would re-invent it as Confessions Of A PS3 And 360 Owner! Here is the first edition!

This week I have mostly been plotting the slow and tortuous death of all at Konami for the evil, vile monster of a mess they have made with the Konami ID�s and the MGO beta. I awoke on Thursday morning turned on my PS3 and saw that the MGO beta was up for download on the newly-sexed-up PSN store. So like a good little MGS fan I downloaded it as fast as I could and then installed it. At this point I went and done some work for the horror that is university then came back to it about 2 hours later. I then went to run it and it tells me I need to update it, fair enough I thought it will need some tweaks before it goes live
and select the recommend option (Peer 2 Peer torrent style). I then realise what a nightmare this was becoming as it failed to start and told me to restart, �first day server load� I said to myself and restarted the game but after 10 attempts I give up and left it.



I went back to it the next day and eventually after trying several more times to get the download to work actually download the update although as my internet hates torrents takes an excruciating 4 hours to complete. It then happily informs me I have to get a Komani ID which rings a dull warning bell in my head as I remember reading on Destructoid about problems with it. Surely enough this disaster unfolds before my eyes and as of writing this blog still haven�t managed to obtain one of these elusive creatures.



Apart from slowly torturing myself with that endeavour I have been putting some serious hours into the lovely Gran Turismo 5 Prolouge on my PS3. I have written a review of this a few weeks back so I will sum up my impressions of it briefly. The online racing I really like, it has been nothing but a pleasant experience with little to no lag and friendly racers. The main game itself is as solid as ever and the only major problem I have with it is the lack of damage but at this point damage would be non-canon almost and would kind of wreck my experience of it (no pun intended, IRC has put me off them for life ).



As well as that I stupidly bought myself Call of Duty 4 for the 360, now if you�ve ever read the previous incarnation of this blog before then you will know pretty much everyone featured CoD4 at some point. I am up to the second last mission on the 360 now, and although I finished it on the PS3 beforehand it�s still enjoyable especially the sniping mission. I�ve actually managed to level up more than I have on the PS3 version (just about to hit lvl31) and I find that the online is very similar to the PS3 version except with possibly more annoying idiots that sing into the headset. Thank god for the mute button! There is no perceivable difference between the two versions just like Infinity Ward said and I applaud them for this feat! I purchased the �Variety Map Pack� and found it to be very enjoyable for all the maps expect Creek which, far from being redundant and unplayable, just lacks the tightness that most of the other maps have. The map pack is a great addition to the main game and well worth the 800 points.



I have started and have managed to get to level two on Ikaruga but I have yet to get past it as it seems to like to force me into submission. It is an incredible game with very tight controls, personally I love it. The intensity of the levels and the strategy that the polarity switching mechanic brings to the game really set it apart from run of the mill shmups. If you have completed this game you truly are a better person than I. I would readily recommend this title to all who enjoy shooters and/or masochism, well worth those 800 measly points



Finally I have started the very wonderful game that is Lost Odyssey, developed partly by the lovely folks over at Mistwalker. Some of you may know that this is headed by ex-Final Fantasy producer Hironobu Sakaguchi and as such feels like a half brother to the oft-great series. If you have played Final Fantasy X you will be right at home although the battle system is quite different and the interface reminds me of Final Fantasy VIII. So far in my 4ish hours with the game I really have enjoyed my time with it and really like the characters. I don�t particularly like the Picture In Picture effect they have used heavily in the cutscenes but that is just a personal thing. This grievance is more than made up by the wonderful �Thousand Years of Dreams� feature as each story is heartbreakingly tragic and supremely well written. This game is a must buy for any RPG fan that has a 360, truly this is it�s first great JRPG. (PROTIP: if you hate grinding stay the hell away from this game!)

Anyways folks it�s late over here in the land of fry ups and heart disease (Scotland) and I will bid you all adieu. Thanks for reading or commenting TL;DR it is much appreciated and hope you enjoyed this re-tooled format! Godspeed!

Well today my monthly issue of OPM UK came through the letterbox, less than five minutes ago in fact. This month it was a bit late and now I know why, it has the first PS3 review of GTAIV as far as I'm aware. It's not the first review of the game that honour goes to OXM (I think the US verison).



For OPM it's a fairly long main review about 9 pages that is excellently written as per usual. It goes in depth into the integration of the phone into the game, the new shooting mechanics and even the mulitplayer. The review showers the new game with praise and even says "It's the best GTA game ever, for my money". As you could have guessed by now it got a 10/10.

It isn't all praise, once again the camera can be a bit dodgy and the helicopters are a pain to fly as always but it seems to have not affected their view of the game much as the positives outweigh these tiny faults. Damn I can't wait for my special edition to come through the letterbox on the 29th :)!

Now let�s get one thing out the way before I start this review. I am both a racing game addict and a huge Gran Turismo fan. Evidence to this effect can be found in my trusty dual shock 2 which has both broken X , Square and analogue sticks which randomly stop responding now and again. This obviously will add some bias to this review but I will try to get over that. Hopefully. Possibly. DAMMIT IM ONLY HUMAN!!



This game is not Gran Turismo 5 but as the close minded people would say �it�s only an extended demo�. In many ways this is true, however in others it is not. It does feature the Eiger Nordwand track from the GTHD Concept demo. The main difference that instead of only about 10 cars this has in excess of 60 �dream� cars (why the Citroen C3 would be a dream car is beyond me). It also deviates from GTHD in that it has actual racing in it instead of time trials and drifting competitions. A welcome change I hear the racing game nerds say. It does however retain the leader boards but only for your online races. Yes, online racing in Gran Turismo. You heard right. Oh dear lord its sweet. Any way enough about that and on to the review for real.

I rarely get this excited for games that I actually set my alarm on my holidays no less at 9am (the shops in Edinburgh don�t open till 10am, they are so inconsiderate). I went to bed extra early on Thursday night...well Friday morning, 2am. I woke up in an excited but tired mood to realise it was 12pm. Dammit. I decided what they hey and went on to my laptop.
Then I got up and went downstairs to stick on the heating and water (as it was freezing in my house) then back upstairs to my laptop and surfed Destructoid for a bit whilst my bath was running. Once all that was over with I headed up to Edinburgh. I got to the bus stop to find a bus had just left �Don�t worry about� I said to myself �the buses are every 5 mins�. So I didn�t worry about it and continued to listen to some Chiodos (first album naturally) and the bus did turn up. I got into Edinburgh some 20 minutes later and wandered over to the nearest centre of evil (short hand for Game the UK�s equivalent of GameStop). Picked up one of the many, many display copies and went to stand in the cue. I got to the register where the sales assistant asked me if I wanted to purchase a controller with the game because it was half price if I did �I already have 4�. Then he tried to sell me a steering wheel �I don�t have room/that much money�. Then he resorted to the age old pre-order angle �Want to reserve GTA4?� �I already have a pre-order� (somewhere in the region of a year old on Amazon) �Is it with GAME?� �No� �Pity you could have got free stuff here� he says under his breath. �Well I could but what are the chances of me getting it on launch day if I preorder now?� �Well you probably wouldn�t� �Exactly, now can I pay for this copy of GT5: Prologue?�

Long story short, I get home and opened it up. I stop for a moment and smell the sweet smell of victory that the Americans won�t have this for another 2 weeks. It�s a strong smell. I turn on my PS3 only to realise I still hadn�t downloaded the new firmware update. This takes up about 15 mins then I turn on GT5:P. It tells me I need to install the game�s data to continue. Fair enough if it helps load times. That takes another 10 or 15 mins and then tells me to restart the game. O...K. So I boot it up and then it tells me I need to download an update (this is getting annoying). So I download that only to get an error message 10 minutes later telling me �Oh sorry the download didn�t work whoops!� Now I was angry. I restart the game to get it to download and it eventually does, I assume this is down to server load being the first day. Then the download installs with a handy caution �All prize credits will be transferred over but there is a possibility that Save Data and Replays will be lost�. Oh fun! So that installs and I FINALLY restart the game to be greeted by the intro movie. Oh dear lord its sweet. Better than ANY GT intro I have ever witnessed.



Then I get to the main screen �My Page� as the manual calls it, which is nicely laid out if a little cluttered. At the top of the page there is a label with �Gran Turismo 5: Prologue Spec II� which indicates this is version 2.0 of the software (I hear that the Japanese original is constantly updated with new features). Below that is a map of the world with red dots which I can only assume means players or lots of players as they are generally focused on Europe and Japan. Beside that a clock with the time and then a weather report for all the various tracks. Below that there is a calendar and below that is a line of symbols that correspond to the various actions that can be taken.

I get a warning telling me I have no car and should head to the dealership symbol to purchase one, which I do. I get a Ford Focus ST in black. Then I head to events and try out the game. It has definitely been refined even from the GTHD demo. The physics are completely different much more stiff and the cars feel different to drive. Once again I turn off all the driving aids because I�m hardcore and go to race some races. Two things become immediately apparent: no damage but that is to be expected from the game now and the cars still follow a predetermined path. However they do try to pass each other which I think is brand new but I may be wrong there.

After that I tried my hand at online mode which is as it says online racing. I am actually quite surprised at how smooth it can run, don�t get me wrong if you have a bad connection in your race you will be able to tell, but when it is good it is excellent. My hat goes off to Yamauchi for waiting so long to perfect it. The only problem is the lack of voice chat, the online mode in its current state does not support it but I suppose it stops the douche bags coming out with stupid insults when they lose. The drivers I encountered were a mixed bunch, some were good, some went out of their way to cause havoc on the field. This is just something that you will never get away from in online matches I suppose. It took very little time to get into a race online, far less than any other racing game, or any online enabled game for that matter than I have encountered. I did run into server maintenance error once but it may again be due to first day load.



The thing that annoyed me the most however was the lack of tuning. I was actually shocked that there is no way to upgrade your car. Sure you can play about with gear ratios and tires but you can�t buy new power trains or such which considering how engrained it is in the Gran Turismo experience I really can�t understand how this was overlooked and deemed not important for the release of this Prologue. Another thing I have noticed is some minor slow down from time to time in races which although not immediately apparent does grate after a while of noticing it.

Overall I think this is a solid purchase for the price, �25 in the UK, but it does come with some caveats. It is not Gran Turismo 5 toned down or without the full roster of cars. It is nerfed in many ways (most prominently the tuning) but it is still highly enjoyable nonetheless. I�m not going to attach a number to this review to make you all feel better or even a buy/rent/leave scale; I�m just going to say it�s up to you if you want this game. If you are a GT fan then it will probably already be a must buy but if you like racing games in general it is a good purchase. It will keep you occupied till GT5 appears sometime next year.