So those of you who are members of the (awesome and wonderful) Forever Harvest Moon Union will know that the new Harvest Moon Sunshine Islands game was released in the US on the 10th November. Since I stay in the UK I decided to import myself a copy because Natsume are rubbish with release times in the UK - they tend to be at least 3 years after US release dates, and I simply didn't want to wait that long :D

So I pre-ordered myself a copy from Gamestop (in order to get the preorder bonus) which cost me about $44.98 (or approx £27 in my money, not including the conversion fees my credit card will charge me for buying in a non-GBP currency), including shipping. I didn't think this was too bad, but it was considerably more than I'd usually pay for a DS game...

..So you guessed something was about to go wrong right? Yeah well my game arrived this morning, and I was told by the delivery man that I owed an extra £19.79 (roughly $33.10) for import tax that had been slapped on by our stupid government! That nearly DOUBLED the cost of the game!

As you may have guessed I'm absolutely raging as I write this, and am about to go and send someone from customs a very, angry email. That charge has brought the cost of a simple little DS game up to more than I would ever even consider paying for an Xbox 360 game! I've imported quite a few games before too and I've never had to pay anything on them... to go from nothing to almost £20 is pretty shocking in my opinion, especially seeing as I had almost no way of finding out how high the charges would be before I ordered my game, and I had no way of refusing to pay them.

This has completely spoiled what would otherwise have been quite a good day for me, I don't even want to play Harvest Moon anymore :evil:

Right so I was tagged by pakhair, so now I have to post a blog containing 10 facts about myself that you may or may not already know :) Then I have to tag 3 or more other users, who have to do the same thing again!

So first off, here's my 10 facts!

1. I love chocolate, and sweet things in general. Dessert is always my favourite part of a meal :D

2. I hate people touching my toes because I'm scared they might break off :lol: (I know it's silly but I can't help it! lol)

3. Rammstein are one of my all-time favourite bands, and I'm going to see them (again) in Feb next year *excited*

4. My first proper games console was a bright green Gameboy Colour

5. I would LOVE to do a parachute jump

6. I donate every month to the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SSPCA)

7. I have an amazing boyfriend who I have been with for over 3 years now :)

8. I am fascinated by vampires, and wish I could be one :twisted:

9. I drive a black Seat Ibiza who is lovingly called the Vengabus lol

10. I play the Dancing Stage Universe games on my xbox in order to get some exercise :D

Next the users I choose to tag are:

KriobaKeys

lordcin

and AudioPrison

So now you guys have to do a blog like this too! :P :D

p.s. Sorry about the lack of 'white space' in this blog, Gamespot keeps taking it out whenever I hit 'Preview' Grrr....

Just a quick blog to let everyone know that I won't be online on xbox live for a while - my console got the E74 error last night so I've got to send it back to get repaired :(

I'm really quite annoyed at it because while I do play it quite alot I don't use it excessively, and in my mind a console should never break down unless it is used an extreme amount (or is dropped or whatever). Microsoft really need to get their act together, I recently read that the breakdown rate for 360s is about 54% - which is completely insane!

In the mean time I'll probably be playing my Wii, DS, PS2 or computer... but I miss my xbox already lol

Ok so here it is as promised - the obligatory birthday blog! :D

Well that's it, I am officially 21 today! I'm very, very difficult to shop for so most of my relatives just game me money so that I can get myself something - I feel rather rich at the moment :lol: I still don't have a clue what my boyfriend (apart from Left 4 Dead GOTY edition, which I asked for) or my friends have got me though because I've not seen them yet- my boyfriend is taking me out to dinner tonight (in a nice Italian restaurant yumyum!) so I should get some presents then! I think I'll wear my pretty leopard-print dress...

As for my friends I'll see them tomorrow night because I'm going out to celebrate, but I'll probably not get my prezzies till Sunday (since I don't want to be trailing them round pubs/clubs as they will inevitably get lost or broken). As some of you will already know I've decided to have an 'Animals' themed night out to celebrate which should be a great laugh! Me and the girls are very excited as we LOVE to make fools of ourselves by going out dressed like complete loons (but still looking good at the same time lol) :lol: I am going out as a leopard, and the other costumes I know of are ladybird, bumble bee, cow, cat, and baboon lol Not sure what alot of folks are coming as though cause they won't tell me!

Anyway I'm away to have a shot on Star Ocean: The Last Hope, that my mum got for me :)

Hey there guys! I just thought I'd better post a blog to let you all know that I'm not going to be about as much for a while, I'm finding that this website (particularly posting on everyones blogs) is gradually taking up more and more of my time which could be spent doing other, more constructive things- e.g. building up a portfolio so I might actually get a job one day.

So I'll still come on every so often and try to comment on a few blogs, but if I miss one or two then please don't be offended. I'll also be pretty inactive in most of the unions I've joined (sorry guys) but I am going to try to keep active in the Forever Harvest Moon union, as I helped to set it up and it's something that I'd really like to be a success (if anyone reading this is a fan of harvest moon and hasn't joined yet then what are you waiting for??? lol)

I'll probably be back online on Friday for the traditional birthday blog, but in the mean time I'm off to teach myself XNA :D

Happy gaming my gamespot chums ;)

Ok so a few of you may know that I've been taking advantage of LoveFilm's free 30 day trial to rent a few games that I've been wanting but have been hesitant to buy incase they're rubbish lol. Well basically that trial is up in 2 days, so I went online a minute ago to try to cancel my account before I got charged, but found out you can't do it online, you need to do it over the phone. What a pain. So basically I phoned them, got someone in an Indian call-centre (who, to be fair, actually was quite easy to understand) and found out that because I currently have 2 games rented out, if I cancelled my account tonight and they didn't get the disks by tomorrow (overnight delivery, I doubt it) I would still get charged about £15 for next months rental before my account was cancelled. They're a bunch of sneaky @?£*!?&% this lot lol. So basically I asked the woman (very politely- after working in customer service for several years I've learnt that you don't get anywhere by being rude ;)) if there was anything she could do, and she offered me 2 months for the £15 instead of just the one! So if you add in the free month that I've already had, that adds up to 3 months of game rentals for just £15 - awesome! I'll remember to cancel earlier next time though.

With all this renting my gamerscore has got a massive boost, I'm now just under 17K :D My bf is still at over 32K though so I've still got a while before I catch up to him!

I also just noticed today that my Gamespot level has gone up again, I'm now level 18 which apparently is "Flicky." I'm not sure what (if any) game that is in reference to, so if anyone knows then let me know!

Some other, random bits of news-

• I'm still busy job-hunting with little to no success, people just don't want to hire games programmers with no experience :( I'm kind of at a loss what to do.
• It was one of my best friend's 21st birthday night out the other day, we all went out to the pubs/clubs dressed as neon fairies in tutu's and wings and such lol Needless to say a very good night was had by all, although I don't think I will ever drink tequila again :lol:
• It'll be my 21st next month and I'm still completely undecided as to what I should do. I'm currently considering an 'Animal' themed night out cause I found a pretty sweet leopard costume on eBay that I want :D If anyone has any better suggestions then feel free to post them here!
• My mum has brought home a new clock which 'dongs' on the hour, and every half hour (it's a real antique one) and it's driving me insane. Tonight is the first night I'll have to sleep with it in the house so I'll see how it goes, I'm usually a really heavy sleeper (I've slept through the fire alarm :?) so hopefully it won't wake me up. I turn into the hulk if I do get woken up though... so it may not be in one piece by the morning :lol:

Anyway I'm just waffling now so I'll shut up :D Hope everyone is well!

Hey guys! Not posted a blog in a while so here's a quick update on a few things going on at the moment:

First of all I've just reached level 17 here on Gamespot! Yaaaay lol Level 16 went past really quickly (kind of a shame really - I liked being a Magician Lord lol). Looking forward to lots more levelling up in the future :)

Next, I've just managed to break 13K gamerpoints on my xbox live account so I'm quite pleased (and before anyone says anything I know that's not really very high - there's people out there with over 200K points!!!). I've been competing with a guy from my work for some time now, he was really annoyed that a girl could have a higher GS than him so he started saying he's going to get all these games just to beat me and stuff. It was all talk and now he's waaaay behind me, and I'm rubbing it in as much as I can whenever I see him :twisted: (I've been kinda sneaky though and signed up for a 30-day free trial at LoveFilm so I can rent games for a month for nothing lol not telling him that though!)

In other news I'm now completely finished my degree, and am actively seeking work in the games industry! So if anyone knows of places looking for programmers (or even testers, I just need to get my foot in the door!) then put in a good word for me :D I'm also trying to get some more part time work, just to get some cash because I'm pretty poor at the moment lol I'm barely getting any hours at GAME at the moment because they're trying to cut back on staff as much as possible, so there's no overtime available unless someone phones in sick :( Kinda sucks cause I love my job...

And finally, here's a list of the games I'm hyped about at the moment, and plan on buying once they're out (if they're not out already) and once I've got money!

• Prototype - death, destruction and superpowers, what more could you ask for? Some free-running? Yeah ok, we'll stick that in too lol
• Sacred 2: Fallen Angel - Looks quite alot like Diablo 2 which I played alot when I was younger, hopefully this will be just as addictive!
• Golden Sun 3 DS - one of the few surprises of Nintendo's E3 conference, loved the old games, hope this one's just as good :)
• Left 4 Dead - Yeah, I know, it's been out for aaages but I've still not managed to grab myself a copy lol I will get it sometime - promise!

Hope you enjoyed the blog :P

Power to pyjamas! *flies off into the distance*

Hello! Not posted a blog in a while so here's my latest update!

Well firstly I would just like to share with all you pokemon fans out there that I now have a 100% legal Shaymin on both my Diamond and Pearl games :D A few Game stores have been holding Pokemon events so me and my bf went. I'm really happy now seeing as Shaymin is my favourite of the ledgendaries (who couldn't love a little green hedgehog??? lol) Don't despair if you're reading this and want to get your own - I think the events are running until next Friday at selected stores so check the official website to see if you can get one too :)

Also I am currently in the process of starting up a new union for one of my other all-time favourite game series - Harvest Moon! If anyone is a fan of the series (you don't have to be as obsessive as I am lol) then feel free to comment below and request an invite -if you message quickly then you might even get to be a charter member! Ooooh the excitement :lol:

In other news I am approaching the end of my 3rd year at uni now, once it's over I will (hopefully) have a first class degree in Games Software Development! I'll actually be able to put letters after my name (BSc) :D lol I'm currently looking for a job in the games industry (ideally programmer but I'll take anything tbh) but it's not proving to be easy to get your foot in the door- everyone is wanting experienced applicants but they're not providing any opportunities for graduates like myself to get any experience :( I'm going to keep applying and hope for the best.

Ok so I'm bored, got coursework due in tomorrow, and I decided it would be a far better idea to make a list of the games that I'm wanting at the moment :lol:

So here goes (in no particular order):

1. Saints Row 2 (360) - I thought this game looked absolutely terrible until I actually spoke to a few people who had played it, seems I'd been looking at it too seriously! Now I think it just sounds like a great laugh :)

2. Prince of Persia (360) - Loved 'Sands of Time' but sucked at it lol this one's supposed to be a lot easier so I'm definetely gonna get it!

3. Golden Axe: Beast Rider (360) - This looks like it's going to be one of those games that's really bad but I'll like :D I loved Viking and most people I know didn't so I think I'll probably like this... I'll most likely rent it before I buy it though...

4. Pokemon Ranger: Shadow of Almia (DS) - What can I say, I'm a sucker for Pokemon :)

5. Rise of the Argonauts (360) - Again this will probably be terrible but I loved Jason and the Argonauts sooooo much when I was younger that I've got to play this - if only to relive my lost childhood lol

6. Infinite Undiscovery (360) - Love my RPGs, not got properly into one in a wee while (little while for those who aren't from Scotland :lol: ). I know this didn't get brilliant reviews but I'd like to try it for myself.

7. The Last Remnant (360) - Pretty much the same reason as above

8. Star Ocean: The Last Hope (360) - Ditto

Wow there's alot of 360 games in there :L I'm going to be pretty busy over xmas I can see lol Not that I've got the time - I've got exams in January :(

So what's everyone else thinking? Anything you think I've missed that I absolutely MUST play? :)

Hey guys just thought I'd post a wee blog to say that I've been playing Wii Fit for the past few days and its AWESOME haha, seriously anyone who has a Wii and is even vaguely interested in doing a bit of exercise once in a while should get it :D

You even get your own personal trainer who takes you trough all the exercises and stuff - if you think about how much that would cost you at the gym (not to mention membership fees) then the £70 price tag doesn't really seem that steep anymore!

Plus it's almost worth buying for the balance games alone coz they're so much fun - I can go bedroom skiing now :P