I've played both extensively; I would like to call myself a gamer at heart who got his addiction started playing on the SNES. And the one title that sealed my love of games would be Chrono Trigger. The gameplay, the story, the characters... it was all put together so well for the time it was made. I'm also a big fan of the Final Fantasy series, but it couldn't hold a flame to Chrono Trigger. It's such a staple of my childhood that I could not name a single game better than it, even modern games. I wholeheartedly support naming Chrono Trigger the best SNES title of all time, hell, I'd call it Square's best work. And I feel pity for the new generations that may never get a chance to experience it. So I recommend that any of those that haven't played it should pick up an emulator and a Chrono Trigger ROM and experience what I'm trying to get across in puny words.
As a gamer who's played both extensively, I wouldn't really recommend them if you have high standards out of a game. Both are utterly different, even though they're both labeled as Action RPGs. I'll give you a breakdown of C:LoS as I've mostly recently played that. Castlevania: LoS Pros & Cons (+/-) + Long gameplay + Very action-oriented + Puzzles included + Upgrades to your health/magick possible if you "explore" + Linear leveling progression (defeat enemies, gain exp, unlock attacks) - Linear storyline/gameplay (it seems like you can do a lot of exploring, but you're mostly pushed around a set path to progress) - Storyline feels rushed (you get a narrative from Patrick Stewart's character's POV, that's about it) - No real difficulty, even on the highest setting. - Enemy AI is infuriatingly stupid. As far as Dragon Age II goes... a lot of people say it became dumbed down and lost a lot of its original gameplay aspects that made Dragon Age a big hit. Compared between Dragon Age and DAII, I'd definitely replay the first one more than the second one, for about the same reasons. But that's not saying I didn't enjoy DAII, I still enjoyed it, and you might too.
Cleaning the laser sounds like my most viable option, and the most cost effective out of any other choice. Thanks for the suggestions; My room isn't spotless, a bit dirty perhaps, but it IS just a little dusty. To google!
It's about that time of the year again here in the central United States - the summer sun shines and things are heating up. Kids are out of school and running about or taking a swim. People board up inside their houses and turn on the air conditioning or break out the seven million fans they stashed away for winter. And gaming still runs strong all year round, but not for this poor sod. I've had a few, serious issues with Microsoft in the past - My first console I received as a kid for Christmas, only a month after the launch date. It worked for a few good years, and ultimately RRoD'ed on me. A sad time indeed. It was replaced not long after, but I was still a kid then. I was prone to leaving my 360 on for hours at a time while I was away at school. Eventually it just wouldn't even turn on again. Figuring I was just having bad luck, I had it replaced again. This one lasted for another few years before the disc drive went faulty and wouldn't even read a single disc. And now? It hasn't been more than a year since I've purchased my Xbox 360 Arcade as a quick, cheap replacement to the older 360. I essentially just swapped the hard drives for the memory and went from there. It's happening. Again. It's hot, no doubt. But our house is locked up, with fans and air conditioning units running just about all times of the hour with a regular temperature around 70 degrees. My room is small and a bit cluttered but there's a unit in the window with a fan blowing on my 360 at all times. On touch of the vents, it's mildly warm. The power supply is rather hot, however, and I've yet to try setting it up near the fan as well. Anyway, on with the meat of the topic. I just recently came into possession of several new games - Prototype 2, Dead Space 2, The Witcher 2, Bioshock II, Divinity II: Ego Draconis, etc. And none. Of them. Will work. They will boot up and go for maybe 5-10 minutes on the start-up screen, or during gameplay, and then it freezes. The music still plays for a few seconds, then cuts out. I have to do a reset of the entire system, it's crashed so hard. The only exception would be The Witcher 2, which does a soft freeze from time to time. The issue? Most, if not all, of my older games can play for hours without an issue. Not a single one. Hell, Dragon's Dogma, (which I got maybe 2-3 weeks before any of the above mentioned games) works perfectly fine. I've tried deleting useless memory usage (older game data, etc.) and even did a system cache clearing. Nothing seems to work. And every time this happens, the vents are fairly warm. Which led me to believe it's an overheating issue. But now I think it's the disc drive, or something else. If it was an overheating issue, wouldn't all of my games be prone to this senseless freezing? Come, forum members. Lend me your advice. I don't want to spend any more money on a new Xbox 360. I need a permanent solution. Getting rid of the games is not an option - I got them because I was tired of all my old games. Sending my console into Microsoft is not an option either. The warranty is still usable, but even then, I don't want to wait a month or longer to play. I need something to do aside from sleeping or idling about the internet when I come home from being on my feet for 8 straight hours at Walmart. It can also read all of my DVDs, which leads me to believe it's something beyond the disc drive. My 360 has become a glorified DVD player. And I prefer Blu-Ray instead.
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