Shortly after the 360's launch, the Xbox Live Arcade was filled with a nice mix of older games and new, original content. The possibility of getting inexpensive games without ever having to leave the house was an exciting one, and Live Arcade seemed poised to deliver all sorts of great content. But has Microsoft delivered? I say "No." The release schedule is inconsistent, and the service is lacking in terms of the number games available as well as the quality of those games.

I've had 1800 Microsoft Points burning a hole in my pocket for awhile now, and every so often I hop online and browse the Xbox Live Arcade in hopes of finding something new and fun. But it has been a long time since I've found anything that really interested me, and I don't think I'm alone. I'm not saying there aren't great games on Live Arcade, because there certainly are. Geometry Wars is awesome, Uno is a blast, Outpost Kaloki X is really cool, Pac-Man is always fun, and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 was our fighting game of the year. What I'm saying is that there simply aren't enough great games out there. Sure there are a few people that had fun with Frogger, Joust, Scramble, and New Rally-X for a couple of minutes, but I'm not one of them. If you're going to release barely-touched versions of classic games then they need to come out faster. Why has it taken so long for Ms. Pac-Man to hit the service? And for Pete's sake, where's Tetris?

I already mentioned that I'm a fan of Outpost Kaloki X, and Cloning Clyde was pretty cool, but a good portion of the lineup of original games leaves a lot to be desired. Novadrome isn't very good, TotemBall is lousy, Wik was kind of a snoozer (to me at least), and Bankshot Billiards is about as fun as...yeah, it's not fun at all. Live Arcade was supposed to be the savior for smaller developers who couldn't afford the high cost of competing with the likes of EA and Ubisoft in the next-gen arena. Where are all these awesome original games we were promised? I find it hard to believe that small developers are adverse to the idea of making downloadable games for a wide audience, and would rather spend their resources trying to woo publishers, so I suspect there's some untold issue behind the scenes where perhaps Microsoft wants too big a cut or is simply too demanding with their requirements. Who the heck knows? The only thing I know for sure is that there hasn't been a steady stream of good, original games for the service.

The introduction of Live Wednesdays, where we'd be blessed with one new game each week seemed to be, at least on the surface, Microsoft acknowledging that they could do better with regards to how they went about releasing games. The first month was promising, but even that hasn't worked out as there have been weeks where no games were released. You're telling me that they can't crank out 52 games a year? Nobody could get their act together and release Solitaire, Checkers, Chess, or something?

Oh, and let's not forget Street Fighter II which was repeatedly delayed, yet was still broken when it was finally released. If you want to see disappointment, check out Greg's or Jeff's video blog where they stayed up late (on a work night no less) for the game's release and then tried to convince themselves that it wasn't that bad. To this day that game is a sore subject around the office.

To tell you the truth, I don't even care what the reasons are for Live Arcade being less than impressive--I just want to play games and I just don't understand what's going on. I'm willing to buy games and I'm willing to buy them on the Xbox 360, but apparently Microsoft just doesn't need my money so I'll have to look elsewhere for my downloadable gaming fix. It's too early to tell how things will pan out for Sony's PlayStation Store, but it certainly has potential, and getting Gran Turismo for free was a nice way of getting on my good side. I've got a pretty extensive collection of classic games so the Wii's Virtual Console isn't as exciting a prospect for me as it is for some people, but I'm definitely planning on picking up some games here and there (even if many of them are overpriced), and so far they've stuck to the Monday release schedule, which is a good thing. Perhaps some competition will get Microsoft on the ball, but after them not even releasing a game last week, I'm not very optimistic.

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Get to know the people that bring you all of the great content on GameSpot in a regular series of short and lighthearted gaming-related interviews.

Episode IX: Greg Kasavin

As you've probably heard by now, GameSpot's editor-in-chief Greg Kasavin is leaving the site for greener pastures. Actually, he's leaving for another office building, but you get the idea. Greg's contributions to GameSpot over the years are innumerous, and even though he'll no longer be working at GameSpot his influence will continue to be felt for years to come. And even if all of us go crazy here and start writing twenty word reviews in Crayon when he leaves, you'll always be able to remember what Greg was all about thanks to this week's "Getting To Know GameSpot."

As anyone who has known Greg or followed his work will tell you, he doesn't like to talk about himself--he prefers to lead by example and let his work do his talking. In fact, he mentioned that he probably won't even watch this week's video, but he was a sport and took time out of his busy final week to share his thoughts on leaving GameSpot, college life, gaming with his wife, and throwing controllers. He even breaks out a video game character impersonation.

I'm pretty sure Greg's tired of people talking about him like they're at his funeral, and I don't want to get all hokey, but I do want to say that while I've only worked with Greg for a few months he's made an impact on my life in many ways. He was the person that recognized my passion and gave me an opportunity to succeed here, and he's always been willing to share his experience and knowledge with me regardless of how busy he was. Thank you for everything Greg, and good luck on developing that new Gizmondo game. I'm sure it will be the best game that system has ever seen.

If you've missed any of the previous episodes, you can check them out right here:
Andrew Park
Jeff Gerstmann
Ricardo Torres
Tim Surette
Jason Ocampo
Rich Gallup
Dave Toister
Alex Navarro

I have too many games to play and not enough time to play them. I'm guessing that I'm not the only one with this problem. Many of you probably already had a pretty significant backlog of games to play before the holidays and that was before you opened your presents and got...more games. I've been traveling most of my vacation, so my gaming time has been minimal. I helped two of my friends get their Xbox 360s set up, showing them all the cool things you can do and getting them going with Xbox Live, but I didn't get much time to play any consoles. Oh wait, I did whip my brother Josh twice at Wii Sports bowling--can't forget that. I was also able to play a lot of Elite Beat Agents while on my various flights. I'm currently on "Let's Dance" so I'm not how close I am to beating it, but it's a great game so far. Some of the songs you think you'd hate are pretty good, but there are a few that I thought I'd dislike that I do, in fact, dislike. Nonetheless, it's a heck of a lot of fun.

So now I'm home for a few days before we head back to work and I've got a stack of games staring me in the face. Where to start? I don't know. But I figured I'd make a list to show how horribly behind I am. Maybe you guys are in the same boat? Feel free to comment and share how big your backlog of games is.

Older games I need to play:

I love Katamari too! I just haven't ever had a chance to play this game. It's still shrink-wrapped, sitting on my shelves waiting for some love. I think I got behind on this one because I wanted to finish the first one before digging into the sequel. I'm sorry King, I'll collect things soon! Cows...Crabs...Beach Balls...Plants...Little Kids...Oh man, Earth is filled with so many things!


I'm one of those people that just hated the camera in the original MGS3. Now, to be fair, I didn't give it much of a shot. I had a ton of games to review at the time, and I spent an hour or two with the game and was so frustrated by the limited view (and endless codec yapping) that I threw in the towel. Yes, it sucks to have to put down what many people thought was the game of the year to go review some lame movie tie-in. But that's part of the job. Everyone says this is a great game, and I'm looking forward to finally "seeing the light."


Man, it's been so long I can hardly remember why I was so late to the RE:4 party in the first place (I know I waited for the PS2 version for some reason. Widescreen support perhaps?). I played it for about an hour (maybe not even that long) and I was getting torn up in that first village you hit. "Your action got into my slow, plodding Resident Evil series!" "Oh yeah? Your Resident Evil got into my action game!!" Ahhh!! What do I do?! I died. Tons. Like Metal Gear, I just had too many other games to review, and this one kind of got lost in the shuffle.

Newer games that I need to play, or haven't played enough of:

I waited to hear which version was better before digging into this one, and I've just begun to play it on the Wii. I wasted some time in the town, and just got to the first cave. Feels like classic Zelda so far, but man, I can't help but wish the visuals were a little better. It's got some great design, but it's tough to go from Gears to this. I know, it's not all about the graphics, but you can't help but notice the (often) pitiful textures. I need to block off a whole day and get into the game. Maybe that day will be today...

Okay, so I've been waiting to play this co-op with friends. Unfortunately, all the people I was going to play with didn't get the game until Christmas. I have played through the part where you drive the "NOT A WARTHOG", so it's not like I haven't touched it, but after beating one level co-op with my brother, I knew that was how I wanted to enjoy this game. My buddies have promised me that New Years Day will be our "Emergence Day" but we'll see. They're all married so you never know when the wives will decide they need to clean the gutters or something.

I hate to say it, but I'm a little let down by GH 2. I played it a fair amount before it came out, but when I got it home from the store and played, it just didn't capture me like the original did. I think the opening setlist is pretty weak, and while they got some great artists, I feel like they did a really poor job on some of the song selections. And how do you manage to destroy an Alice In Chains song like that? Grrr. That said, it's still a fun game, and I'm looking forward to opening up all of the songs.

I've spent a fair amount of time with this one, but I'm looking forward to playing more. My garden is level 20 right now, and I just spent waaaay too much time getting a bunch of my flying creatures to mate. Argh, it's such a pain getting those Sparrowmints to do what you want them to do. I've been playing the game without any help from friends or FAQs, so I've spent more time than most experimenting with different things, but I've really enjoyed the game much more than I thought I would.

Wow, this list is going to go on forever. Here's the rest of the list of games I need to play, or play more of:

Bully, Trauma Center (Wii), Just Cause, Tiger Woods 07 (Stupid character was on the debug), Clubhouse Games, WTF, Elite Beat Agents, Sneak King, Final Fantasy XII (Maybe?), NFS: Carbon, and I'd really like to play a bunch of the Virtual Console games, too.

Hmm, perhaps I should stop writing about the games I need to play and actually go play some games. Sounds like a good plan. I'm off to go rescue a boy from a monkey in a cave. It's Zelda time!

A couple of weeks ago I was reminiscing about Contra, the first video game I ever beat. I was curious as to what the first games were that you, the readers had ever beaten. Much to my surprise, I was inundated by readers telling me not only the first game they had finished, but the stories behind each game as well. I'd like to share some of the comments and emails here.

It seems I'm not the only one who counts Contra as their first. Thanks to the "Contra Code" many of you guys saved the world too:

Donkeljohn:
"I think Contra may have been my first too! None of the 2600 games I had were of a finite nature despite getting 6,000,000+ points in Asteroids."

Erik Olfson:
"I am right there with, as the first game I ever beat was also Contra for the good old NES, that is as long as it counts if you can use the lives cheat"

DiGiTaL_SiNs:
"Contra is probably my first game too, I beat it with my sister WITHOUT CHEATS after hundreds of hours playing and failing at the hanger level (Didn't know the cheat code, the Internet didn't really exist as far as I knew back then), but we finally beat the game! I remember that day clearly, the day I 'considered myself to be a hero'."

Of course many of your responses were about games other than Contra, and there were some pretty interesting stories to go with the diverse list of games:

Shasam712:
"The first game I ever beat was Super Mario Bros. 3. I got that game on the NES when I was about 6, when the NES was all but gone. Being young, I was pretty bad, but a couple of years later and I could jump on Goombas with the best of them. That was the first game that I took the time out to go and find out the secrets, get all those whistles and beat all those Hammer bros. It was awesome, and I enjoyed it. I guess that's what makes it a classic, huh?"

mYTH_2k4:
"The first game I ever beat was Contra as well. I still remember that a friend of mine gave me the Contra code and I beat the game (all by myself) in about 40 minutes. I was totally ecstatic when the game announced that I'd "succeeded in destroying the Vile Red" and I literally had goosebumps when I saw the credits roll. At that time it didn't matter whether even the worst player on the face of this planet could beat the game...what mattered was that I, a mere seven year old, had managed to destroy the Vile Red!! Ahhhh...Those were the days!!"

Rasgueado:
"suppose the first game I ever beat could have been a text adventure for the TI-82 called pirates that took both a cartridge *and* an audio cassette to load."

Kamicolo:
"My first game prolly was Sonic for the Genesis. I remember getting the Genesis with Sonic and Mortal Kombat. Stayed up all night when I got it. Boy was I selfish, my cousin wanted to play and I wouldn't let him."

Remy_Labue:
"Believe it or not, the first game I ever beat was Eureka's Castle (NES), based off of a puppet TV show on Nickelodeon back in those days."

Korubi:
"I don't think I ever beat Super Mario Bros. when I got it when I was only six or so years old. I think my first game was probably Crash Bandicoot."

CanadianEh:
"Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for the NES. All it took was a case of the chicken pox and a mother feeling sorry for me to get this game. If my NES still worked, I think I would play through it again right now."

MoDeS13:
"I can remember playing Dungeons & Dragons for the Intellivison and getting up to the dragon at the end but don't remember if I actually beat it. To answer the question, I think the first game I beat was Kung-Fu for the NES. Either that or Super Mario Bros.

Elsenorted:
"The first game I ever had was the old 3-in-1 Super Mario Bros/Duck Hunt/ World Class Track Meet. I focused on the magic of the power pad in Track Meet. I used the player one side so I had to jump over hurdles and I eventually defeated cheetah and beat the game. I immediately ran one victory lap around my house and laid down gasping for air since real life running was way harder than World Class Track Meet."

TheRadiator:
"For about 2 months, every night for a half hour my family would gather around and try to make it to the second 'area' of Donkey Kong Country on the SNES, over and over again (We couldn't figure out the save system quite right. Point and laugh, but the manual was since long gone. To this day I can't figure out exactly why, but we didn't get it). Then I figured out the save. Suddenly, I could get to a certain point, then - *GASP* come back to it later. Now I played the game during the day too. Then I got to the third area, and got stuck on the underwater level there. "Coral Capers" I think it was called. I was stuck there for years. Then, one day when I was 10, I dusted off Donkey Kong Country and beat the whole thing in one day. When Kaptain K Rool fell off that deck, I've never felt so happy in my life."

I'd like to thank everyone who took the time to share their stories. If I didn't use yours, rest assured I did read your response, but there were just too many great emails to share.

Well, that's about it for me, it's time for vacation. As you may or may not know, today's the last day of work for us here at GameSpot, but fear not, we'll be back on January 2nd. How are you supposed to get by without daily updates? Play more games, of course!

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For a little background on what exactly is going on here, you can check out Part 1 and Part 2.

If you're having trouble viewing the video because it's choppy, try watching it here.

Here it is, the moment no less than ten of you have been waiting for. That's right, it's the first 45 minutes or so of Beggar Prince, the first new Sega Genesis game to hit North America since 1998.

I don't want to give everything away here, but let's just say that I didn't get quite as far into the game as I thought I would. It's safe to say that I may have gotten a tiny bit further had I read the directions, but that wouldn't have been as much fun! Actually, I don't think directions would have helped all that much...

The video's pretty long, and I was going to zoom through a few parts, but decided against it--I wanted you to have the same experience I had. Hopefully it's good enough to keep you entertained, and if not, feel free to skip around. Watching an old-school RPG probably isn't for everyone.

So, what do you think? Is the Genesis poised for a comeback? Is bringing new games to an old system a good idea, or will the practice never yield anything more than quirky, below-average games?

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Get to know the people that bring you all of the great content on GameSpot in a regular series of short and lighthearted, gaming-related interviews.

Episode VIII: Alex Navarro

Just before the epic Mario Kart Holiday Bonanza, I was able to snag Mr. Navarro (I call him that so he doesn't assign me some crazy chess/fighting/music game) for a few minutes for this week's "Getting To Know GameSpot". Alex discusses game testing, wrasslin' games, his celebrity gaming encounter, and even answers a burning question about Burning Questions.

This will be the last "Getting To Know" of the year, but don't fret, it will return when we get back from vacation the first week of January. For anyone looking for a Beggar Prince update...I played the game today, filming my experience and capturing gameplay footage, too. Things didn’t unfold quite like I thought they would, but it probably makes for better video. Check back Monday for that.

As always, thanks for watching!

Yesterday I wrote about the email I received informing/reminding me that I was soon to be the proud owner of a newly-released Sega Genesis game entitled Beggar Prince. Little did I know that when I got home and checked my mail, the game would already be waiting for me.


I'll get to actually get around to playing the game at some point this week, but it was pretty late when I got home last night so I didn't drag out the Genesis right away. It's probably for the best. Can you imagine me trying to explain to Jeff and Greg that I was dragging at work because I was up all night playing a new Genesis RPG? But I did snap a few pictures, which I'll share here.

A few people suggested that we give the game a full review, and more than one person thought we should create a "Genesis Game of the Year" category. Neither of those things are going to happen (sorry), but I will be shooting a video blog detailing my first few hours with the game. And if the game's actually any good, I'll continue to write about it as I play through. Provided they look decent when captured via the Genesis' RF adapter, I'll probably post a few screenshots, too.

Like most Genesis games, Beggar Prince comes in plastic case with a large picture in the center surrounded by a grid and the Genesis logo on top. The back of the box has a few screenshots and a synopsis of the game's story. Here's little snippet:


"The snobby, selfish prince of Shatt Kingdom unknowingly aids a great threat to his world after he switches places with a beggar who looks just like him. Wanting only to escape the daily drudgery of his palace life, he has no idea what evil lies in wait around every corner..."



Opening up the clam-shell case reveals the game and a rather nice looking manual. The instruction booklet is printed on glossy paper and it's full color, too. You hear that current-gen publishers? A FULL COLOR MANUAL.



The game looks just like a standard Genesis cartridge, with one exception: a notch on the side that allows it to be played on both the Genesis (North America) and the Mega Drive (Europe and probably other places that I don't know for sure).

* I'll be doing the video blog thing this weekend, so that should be up on Monday.

While checking my mail this morning I got an email about something I pre-ordered a month or two ago but had since forgotten about:

Hello!

Thank-you very much for your support and patience! We appreciate your order.

I'm excited to announce that your order (SF-001: Beggar Prince for the Sega Genesis - Megadrive) has been shipped this afternoon (December 09, 2006)! You should receive your order within 3 - 6 days. If you have any questions or comments about your order or the shipment process, please don't hesitate to contact me directly. I'll be more than happy to respond to any inquiries.

It is very pleasing to be able to serve up a great new game to dedicated Genesis - Megadrive owners such as yourself. Thanks to your support, one of the world's greatest videogame systems will breathe in new life. Have a great time playing and enjoying Beggar Prince!

And remember... Never let dreams die!

www.superfighter.com

So, yeah, I have a new Sega Genesis game headed my way. Not just new in that it's still shrink-wrapped, but new like "It's a brand new Genesis game being released for the first time in 2006!" sort of way. Is it any good? I really don't know. In fact, I don't know much about it at all. I'm pretty sure it's an RPG, and I do know that it comes in an old-school Genesis case--that mostly sums up my knowledge of Beggar Prince. I'll be sure to write about my time with the game and I'll snag some screens and movies as well. After all, it's not every day that you get to play a new game on a classic system.

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Get to know the people that bring you all of the great content on GameSpot in a regular series of short and lighthearted, gaming-related interviews.

Episode VII: Dave Toister

Now that the PlayStation 3 and Wii launches are behind us, things are returning to normal, which means it's time to get to know more of the people here at GameSpot. See! I told you "Getting To Know" wasn't going away forever!

This week I spoke with Dave Toister, whom some of you may know as one of my victims in last week's "Button Mashing" episode. But Dave does much more here than lose to me on game shows; he also does all sorts of database-type stuff and keeps the GameSpot game library in order. So not only do we get to find out what game character Dave has dressed up as, but we also get to take a look at the thousands of games in the library.

Thanks for watching and keep an eye out for the next episode, which features the one-and-only Alex Navarro.

Like many of you, I've beaten many games over the years--too many to count. I beat Avatar: The Last Airbender last night (I'm reviewing it), and for some reason that got me thinking about the first game I ever beat. Much to my surprise, I couldn't remember the first game to ever surrender to my awesome game playing skills. I think it may have been Contra, but it could have been Super Mario Bros. or maybe some game I'm totally forgetting on the Apple IIe. But I'm pretty sure it was Contra, and here's the story:

I started playing games on the Atari 2600, but for the most part, you really couldn't beat a lot of those games. Most of them just went on forever, and the ones that had an ending were probably too difficult/boring to me since I was only five or six years old at the time. It was when my family moved from Indiana to Virginia that I was introduced to the Nintendo Entertainment System. Unfortunately, I didn't have one, so I had to go friends' houses to get my NES fix. Since I didn't have a system of my own, I kind of sucked and I spent most of my time losing to my buddy Jason in Double Dribble and Excitebike, getting pounded by the likes of Piston Honda in Mike Tyson's Punchout!, and just to mix things up I'd stink it up in Kung-Fu, too.

So we've established that I stunk because I didn't have my own system to practice on, but there was one game that even the crappiest players could beat (thanks to the ol' up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B,A,B,A, Start code), and that was Contra. The game was crazy hard with the measly three lives you were normally given, but the "Contra Code" gave you 30 lives to play with. Even better, you and a friend could play the game cooperatively and the code would hook you both up with 30 lives. If you ran out of men you could even steal lives from your buddy--always a good way to start an argument. Hooray for games that even the worst player on Earth can beat!

There was still some skill involved in my triumphant accomplishment, right? Maybe not as much as I once thought. As long as you were playing with someone good, playing Contra cooperatively mostly involved not falling off of ledges, keeping up with your partner, and letting them get the good guns so they wouldn't yell at you. The game didn’t feel super short back in the day, but in hindsight, it probably didn't take more than 30 minutes from start to finish. But finish it I did, and I got to watch the little island blow up as my helicopter escaped in the nick of time. 

So there you have it--the grand story behind the first game I ever beat. When I was a kid, beating a game was a real accomplishment and something I was proud of. It's still fulfilling to sit and watch the end credits roll, but it's not as exciting as it was 15+ years ago.

So how about you guys? What was the first game you beat? Is there a story behind it? Feel free to tell your story in the comments section or send an email to AaronT@GameSpot.com. If I get enough of them I'll post the best responses in a follow-up editorial.

*Since many of you have been asking, "Getting To Know GameSpot" will return this Friday.