10,000 g's

So - I passed 10,000 gamerscore points on my beloved xbox. That's a pretty decent return I think. Of course, looking at my achievements, I've got around 2,000 of those from Oblivion and Fallout 3 combined...

Don't tend to get many achievements in sporting games, as I tend to play one team, for a whole season - case in point Madden 09, my Steelers team need one more win to make the playoffs, but it means I haven't mined all the achievements for 'running 200 yds in one game with McGahee', as I never play as the Ravens. Same for FIFA 08, I've no interest in playing the same game over and over again in order to complete 15 tackles without conceding a corner. I'd rather guide the Saints* to European Glory.

Mostly, I get achievements for finishing games, my favourites, Oblivion, Fallout 3 (just downloaded the Pitt - going to see what happened to Heinz Field), Mass Effect, Call of Duty 4 and Viva Pinata.

Here is me and my xbox...

* Don't laugh!

Fallout 3 (or, as expected, OCD in disk form)

I'm addicted again. Along with the 150plus hours I spent playing Oblivion, a fair few of which was spent arranging my magical swords and armour in my castle, I've got the collecting bug again. Fallout 3 is simply brilliant (also broken in many ways, but we'll ignore most of that) and has me traipsing around another online world collecting things.

(spoilers ahead - maybe)

I've played through once, saved the world and all that, so now starts the serious business of finding things, unique items, sets of armour and so on. Luckily (or perhaps not) the game is full of easter eggs, like the Rube Goldberg machine, the crashed alien spaceship and the dog to keep me going.

Having played through as goody two shoes (no really, someone in the game called me that), it seems to be much easier to just kill everyone and steal all the cool stuff, so that is what I am doing currently.

Still, I wince occasionally when I make it back to my flat in Tenpenny tower and look at all the loot I've accumulated (I've arranged it on the shelves...).

Ah well.

What type of Gamer am I?

Apparently, according to www.mygamemug.com I am a Helping Hand. It says a lot (generally nice) things about me based on the answers I gave to about 30 questions.

Not sure I agree with all of it though. Seems to suggest I don't like FPS's. And that if I did end up playing one on line, I'd probably be all helpful and supportive. Course, anyone that's seen me play Call of Duty will know that I tend to charge screaming at the opposition as soon as the game starts - usually getting myself very killed in the process.

But - then again, perhaps Brigadier General Spacmonster's tendency to get himself killed very often because he's not watching where he's going very carefully means that I don't take the game at its competitive value, for me, it's fun, and if TrickyWooToo kills me 3 or 4 times in a row because I keep running at his hiding place (becuase I know he's there see...) before I figure out how to get him, it doesn't bother me.

So anyway perhaps it's not %100 reliable.


The Helping Hand

Deliberate Sociable Fun Veteran (DSFV)
Generous, helpful, kind...a few of many positive attributes people see in you, the Helping Hand. Nothing satisfies you more than helping your teammates or friends out in all the games that you play. You may even look to assist people in some cases if there is no one around asking for help. In fact, the enjoyment that you receive from helping people rivals that of solving a puzzle, winning a battle, or achieving a hard objective in a game.

Heavily social intensive games tend to be what you enjoy the most although you can probably find something to take pleasure in with most games. For instance, if you happen to find yourself in a competitive first person shooter, you'd probably take the support class. We recommend you stick to games (and crowds!) where people will appreciate you more; these include more casual gamers seeking fun and excitement from games rather than the serious competitive ones.

My xbox is not happy...

Speaking of green - I guess this is what I get for going away for a while and ignoring it!


As long as it leaves the axe alone, I suppose I'll be happy. Should probably get round to playing Braid though.

Viva Pinata: Believe

Okay so this is one of the funniest things I have seen in bloody ages.



It helps if, like me, you think that Horstachios are cooler than Master Chief I suppose. Makes me want to go and hang out with my Cinnamonkeys again after too much time spent chasing strippers around Liberty City.

WALL:E - best film I've seen in a good while...

Ah Pixar. When they make a film for adults, they can't be beat. I loved the Incredibles - it just had so much going on, on many a level, with great acting and some top superhero jokes appealing to my beloved geekery. Unfortunately they also make films for kids, and sometimes forget about me and my needs, so I've never really got on board with films like Cars.

WALL:E - as you can imagine, made me hopeful. It's a film about a robot, which puts it in line with some others of my all time favourites, Silent Runnning*, Short Circuit, Iron Giant, and the rest, with the human cast reduced (literally) to bags of mostly water.

It's also, sort of, post-apocalyptic, hitting my second geekery button full-on, delivering a stunning vision of earth; rusted and overrun with discarded technology. There's a scene focusing on the rotting hulls of several huge ships - which can't help but bring to mind ship breaking in the developing world.

And, in the ultimate test - I now want my own WALL:E. Where did I leave my Gamecube...

* No it is not about Bruce Dern. Or trees. It's all about the drones.

Lego Indy

Is out this weekend, but I managed to get a sneaky go last night up in Nottingham.

As definitely expected it looks like it's going to be bags (definitely satchel man bags a la Indy) of fun.

First impressions were good I played through most of the Well of Souls level and there is definitely more emphasis on team play than in the Lego Star Wars titles.

For example Indy has a whip to swing across gaps, but can't jump half as high as Marion can (but then as I've explained before - Indy was never the most athletic of action heroes...)

As ever the humour is pretty irreverrent, as you might expect Indy is pretty terrified of snakes, and in the section I played - naturally titled 'Why does it always have to be snakes?' the game gets a lot of mileage out of it, and not just in the cut scenes, Indy's fear of snakes gets into the gameplay as well, needing more of that co-operation stuff to get by the scary things.

Will have to wait though - off to France tomorrow, so any more Indy gaming is postponed till next week.

Image: Lego Indiana Jones from Flickr User Dunechaser

Nintendo DS

Some things, are just great. I've recently come into possession of a Nintendo DS and The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass. I'm a huuuuuge Zelda fan having lost many a long hour to the series.

However, as I didn't really get into it until it turned 3D (having done most of my gaming on the Amiga rather than a NES/SNES) I've, wait for the shock, never actually played a 2D Zelda before.

Phantom Hourglass, is, admittedly, more of a top down isometric style view, but the game play has more in common with the old style 2D stuff than with the others I've played.

This is reassuring to me on many levels - firstly, I've already happily whiled away a lengthy train journey exploring dungeons etc, only mildly embarassed by blowing at the DS and talking to it when the game requires.

Secondly, it reconfirms my belief that I like innovative interesting puzzle games the most (after having gotten into Call of Duty and its ilk on my Xbox) and am therefore an interesting and suitably geeky gamer that doesn't value HD gun fests above interesting puzzles.

Thirdly - It's gotten the missus interested. She's probably spent as much time on it as I have (but hasn't got as far - ha!).

So all that's needed now is to find her a nice blonde friend and a couple of green outfits and I'm away.

Mario Kart next.

Wail!

Wail!
Originally uploaded by spacmonster

Deader than a dead thing what is very dead. In warranty though. Hopefully Microsoft's wonderful customer service will see me right.*

Ah well, at least I still have my gamecube - Wind Waker anyone?

* What? - they might be monitoring the interweb for references to RROD...

Memories...

Crikey, just been thinking about old games (hey - what else is there to do at 2.30 on a work day) and reminding my younger colleagues of the days when games consoles were made of wood...

Many a happy hour spent on this lovely thing on an old black and white portable telly.

The fireman one was my favourite.

Sensible World of Soccer

Aah - memories. Winning the European Cup with Stenhousemuir in their awesome purple shirts, signing Matt Le Tissier who could score from literally everywhere, Signing the same five cheap, speedy players for every club you manage (Valentine? Thomas Lagerlof anyone?)



Yep - I got Sensible Soccer off of XBLA and it feels like I'm twelve again, when footie games only used one button and were slightly more interesting than girls.*

Happy days.

* Alright - that last bit isn't true - more easily accessible than girls is probably more likely. In fact, just plain accessible is more likely, being that girls didn't like talking to me when I was twelve - probably because I talked about Sensible Soccer all the time...

Very, Very, Shiny

Like Capt. Mal Reynolds stumbling in after a bar fight, the short-lived but much beloved sci-fi series Firefly will soon make an unexpected return, not as a TV show, but as a massively multiplayer online game.

I really, really want's it.

Band of Brothers?

So I went to play soldiers at the weekend, and it taught me a few things.



Firstly - riding a bike and going to the gym are nothing compared to being a soldier, even a fake one. Eight hours of running through fields and woods and hiding and crouching and running is hard. My legs still hurt and it was three days ago.

Secondly - I'm pretty good at shooting people. What I'm not good at is not getting shot. Which effectively cancels out how good I am at shooting people.

Thirdly - I quite enjoy taking these things seriously and trying to learn about military tactics (even if, as part of the glorious in defeat red team, our tactics disintegrate steadily as we get picked off one by one by Andy the Sniper) which was good because the guns were crazy effective so you actually had to pay attention to cover fire and position and range and all sorts or you got deaded.

All in all - something I'd do again, especially as the guys promised tanks, claymores, satellites, UAV's, handguns, shotguns and Hummers for the next time we go.

Geeky boy overload...

www.warfighters.eu - for all your war simulation type needs.

Link

Link
Originally uploaded by Dunechaser.

No Hood - but still very cool...

Three - One!

Won my first game of football on the t'internet...

3-1, against some French bloke.

Still ranked 100 millionth worst Pro Evo player in the world.

Its a start though.

Happy!

I'm a very happy bunny this morning...



Not only is Mudhsuden Singh Panesar tearing the Aussies apart but I also won an Xbox last night.

Been playing Viva Pinata...



But my fox keeps eating my rabbitses...

Sonic and Jo

Sonic and Jo
Originally uploaded by spacmonster.

We were looking for place to eat lunch, but found a giant blue hedgehog. I also met Richard Jacques (legend), so this was a thoroughly SEGA themed day...

Found Another Video of Mike...

Different Mike this time though.

Had almost forgotten this...



Download as well! Is destined for the Ipod I think...

BAVGA's

05102006304
Originally uploaded by tobybarnes.

So I went to the BAFTA's last night, drank too much, tried to play Ghost Recon after 3 vodka apple and elderflower cocktails and said hello to John Colshaw (I couldn't find Andy Serkis).

Anyway - this is the Sony table which was next to ours, weighed down with gongs (really weighed down - i managed to get my hands on one of them and they are bloody heavy) for LocoRoco and Shadow of the Colussus.

Twas a good night and really necessitated the sausage, egg and cheese muffin this morning...

Might post a picture of me in my penguin suit at somepoint...