I actually posted this in response to some of the garbage that I came accross glancing at the System Wars forum  at GameSpot, and didn't want to loose the thought, as I'm actually writing a piece on "System Warriors" for another site:

I try not to pay too much attention to the System Warriors, but I noticed alot of people slagging 1UP.com for giving their beloved Resistance an 8.0 rating, which is a good score. Generally when a game scores 80% on my personal scale, it's one that was completely worth playing.

I honestly don't know why people always resort to conspiracy theories like "MS/Sony/Nintendo paid off XXXX to write that review", but in most cases its simply not true. If anything, publications like GameSpot, IGN, 1UP, Game Informer, GamePro and the like make arrangements to have exclusive interviews, pre-release reviews, video footage and screenshots.

Anyways, I'd just like to point out that 1UP.com is actually "Copyright © 2002-2006 Ziff Davis Media Inc. All Rights Reserved. 1UP and the 1UP.COM logo are a trademark of Ziff Davis Publishing Holdings Inc."

Ziff Davis Publishing Holdings Inc. also happens to own something called, get this:

OFFICIAL PLAYSTATION MAGAZINE

...which has been promoting Sony's consoles since the days of the original PlayStation. The fact that they will no longer be publishing after January 2007 is moot. I'm sure people on this lovely forum have said in the past that OPM was not credible for for PlayStation reviews just as they would consider Nintendo Power biased towards Nintendo.

Ziff Davis also publishes Electronic Gaming Monthly, which has been in circulation since 1989. Along with GamePro magazine, it was one of the only reliable and trusted ways for people to get video game console news for quite a few years. Whatever your opinion of these publications is you must realize that publications (not including those such as Nintendo Power or Oprah Magazine), whether they be online or in traditional print, don't stay around for that long if they don't have something relivant to say to their audience with their content, be it editorials, reviews or hard facts.

While promotion of products is very important to Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo and billions of dollars are spent advertising not only to consumers but to the media as well, it is simply ignorant to think that reviewers all all "paid off" by companies.

The editors of publications like GameSpot, IGN and 1UP are (for the most part) journalists at heart, and speaking as a man who's wife works in the field, and are generally hired because of their ability to be objective. Those that are not don't last very long working for independant media and instead move into public relations, or work for tabloids...or Fox News.

...well not quite, but Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam is a pretty fast, slightly frustrating take on extreme sports racing.

I find it frustrating because I come from the analogue stick world when it comes to racing games, and even Tony games on the consoles. I'm having a helluva time with the DS Lite's crappy little D-Pad when it comes to double-tapping  for flips and "up-downing" to manual.

The Wi-Fi play is probably the best yet of any DS game, but I'm suckin it up so bad, I'm embarassed to play :P

It's a shame that I can't make the controls work for me, because they did an awesome job putting this game together. There's even 17 licenced "mall punk" tunes crammed in there.

Oh well, it's a sale for Vicarious Visions (Activision's awesome handheld department), and $17 or $20 towards my copy of Final Fantasy XII...

...which is awesome by the way. Having a wife with a press pass is great, cause I got it about 2 weeks early (not that leaked beta), and have put about 15 hours into it. Hated it at first because of the MMO feel, but it really gave me a feeling like I was on a grand adventure after the intro, which is about 4-6 hours. Awesome game. Good enough that I pre-ordered the collector's edition even though I have a fully packaged "standard" version already.

.hack is getting some playtime around here too. Simplistic battle system, but about on the same level as Tales of the Whatever. Great style to it, and I never played the first 4 games. The whole fake MMO thing is great. Fantasic soundtrak. This one qualifies as an underrated game in my books.

Also started into Phantasy Star a bit. Man, SEGA has gone downhill since I got my Master System. The voice acting is sub-par for this day and age, and I just can't get past the terrible camera issues that Sonic Team manages to slip into their games. It's pretty decent all-around, but I won't drop $10 a month to play it.

Got my Phoenix Wright 2 import this week. It's, uhm...just like the first one. Funny that an import can be cheaper than a domestic release that I'd have to wait another 3-4 months for.

Played therough Justice League, Family Guy, Tiger Woods 07 & Scarface lately, all on XBOX. Will be reviewed soon, along with Snoopy vs. the Red Baron (PS2), Touch Detective (NDS) and Summon Night 2 (GBA).

3 Wiiks to go...

Yup. My Wii is bought and paid for. Canadian retailer Zellers started "Pre-Selling" the Wii on Saturday, Sept. 30. The catch is that you have to buy 2 games with the system, Rayman Raving Rabbids & Excite Truck. We were planning to get Rayman anyways because it looks like the most polished of the launch games, and my wife likes pretty colours :P

Excite Truck not so much, It looks like the trucks are very "floaty" and imprecise to steer to me. I may end up trading that one in on day one or two for an extra Wii remote. Ended up cancelling my software pre-orders at Futureshop too.

The Zellers (Target in the USA) I went to only had 10 cupons for Pre-Sells. It's a pretty big store, so I assume that number will be an average chain wide. We actually took out a store credit card to buy it, so we can take a few months to pay it off too, plus we got bonus "rewards points".

Anyway, yeah, My household has a Wii, and I'll be playing it by 11:00 AM on November 19.

Logging countless hours on Disgaea 2 still. That game is totally consuming my play time. Even the stunningly beautiful Okami is on hold.

Mario VS. DK 2 & Rocket Slime are both great DS titles to check out, but again, I haven't given them much time.

Did have a chance to check out Valkyrie Profile 2 the other day, and can't say that I was very impressed. The battle system is way too simplistic for me. I'm not sure why GameSpot's review said it was hard either. I had no troubles getting through the first 8 hours at all. it's a very nice looking game, but it seems very limited too. Something about it just isn't sitting right with me. I'm actually going to trade it in towards the new Tales of _ game coming out next week.

It's getting pretty darn cold where I live, so it's a perfect chance to curl up with my wife and some good games and DVDs.

Down side is that it really affects my Cerebral Palsy making my left side extremely stiff. Lots of tea, hot chocolate and chili helps with that though :)

...The summer drought is over :D

I highly suggest checking out Cooking Mama. I bought the Japanese version back in March, and it still stands out as one of my favourites. It should find a home with Trauma Centre/Phoenix Wright fans. It's also selling like hotcakes (pun intended) already, and will probably get scarce fast. Check out my review from March, and get $20 together.

Mega Man ZX is just what I was hoping for...a tough-as-nails 2D scroller. It's weird though, the Japanese version had alot of voice acting in it that was simply removed for the USA release. No loss iff you never knew it was there I guess.

Mario Hoops is another game I got upon it's Japanese release. It's hit or miss really (another pun there). It's entirely too easy all the way untill the last team on hard mode, and the stylus controls are of the "love it or hate it" variety.

...and Harvest Moon DS.

Long time waiting for this one, and after Magical Melody it's somewhat of a letdown. It's still Harvest Moon, and still addictive though, and the touch screen inventory management is sweet. I hope Rune Factory gets translated sooner than later.

On the home side, I'm completely addicted to Disgaea 2. It's just great. You can spend hours just fighting through the randomly generated maps of the Item World. If you like Turn-Based-Streategy AT ALL, and have a PS2, you really should have this game.

Grandia III is a game I gave a shot because I found it for $30 (CDN). What an underrated game. Very nice graphics and music, but the battle system is really where it really shines. It's pretty short, but a great RPG experience all around.

...anyways...go play something!

What can I say, I'm a sucker for Pac-Man. I also like lighthearted games I can play with my wife, or my friend's kids.

"While it's not on the same level as the series that inspired it, Pac-Man World Rally is a solid choice for people looking for a family-friendly combat racing game. It can be easy enough for your 5 year old sister or daughter on Easy and Normal difficulty and hard enough to give dad a challenge on the Circuit Mode's Nightmare difficulty. Most importantly, it's fun to play alone or with a friend, and should nt be passed of as just another Mario Kart clone."

Full review can be found here.

You can also check out the Intro movie below.

[video=IX1nxTGr5bsIvTDZ]

Sony shipped out ATV Offroad Fury 4 Demos to Playstation Underground members this week. I got mine today and just played through it.

I can't believe that they've put 4 of these out in one console generation. What I can't believe even more is how similar this one is to the first 2 (I never played 3). I normally put section headers in reviews, but then again I normally don't review demos.

Graphics: Technically, um, functional. For a first party published title this late in the console's life cycle: damn ugly. There's a winter level that's particularly bad looking. Very low resolution textures, bland palettes and lots of aliasing. Games like this should do a good job of making the dirt look, well dirty. Instead, the dirt that flies up from the vehicles looks simply ugly. There's not enough shades of dirt to give it a very textured look at all, and on the aforementioned winter level, there's no real blending of dirt and snow, just hard lines. Other than a camera that's a little closer to the rider, it feels very much like the original ATV Offroad Fury engine that Rainbow Studios developed almost 5 years ago. I was very unimpressed.

Gameplay: The addition of buggies and trucks in the Rallycross mode is a nice change of pace from the otherwise stale gameplay. The trick system is pretty much useless and unsatisfying, and mapped to 2 face buttons. Most racing games these days have bonuses for high trick scores or great drifting in the form of speed boosts or other power-ups. From what I can tell, this game rewards you with nothing other than a score. Presumeably in the final game, there will be unlockables tied to high scores. It's just not very fun to try for said scores.

The vehicles in the demo contain no branding of any kind. You get a generic ATV and a generic bike, buggy, and truck. The actual driving physics are decent enough and easy to pick up and play. It's also very very easy to beat every race with very little challenge. Compared to MX vs. ATV: Unleashed, Freekstyle or even FlatOut, I didn't find this demo very fun to play through.

Sound: There's a few nameless rap tracks that loop endlessly in races, none of which are very decent. There's a song about "Icey Chains" that really gets on my nerves. During one of the longer demo tracks it looped 4 times and when I played the next track, It looped another 3 times. The vehilces simply aren't loud enough and come off sounding like electric lawnmowers.

Value: Well it's free. There's 6 different tracks to try out. There's a supercross race, a rallycross race, a national race and two point-to-point races. There's also a freestyle track to mess around with. Took me about an hour to play through it.

Tilt: Well, I won't be buying it. It was nice of Sony to send out this disc, but it may also be shooting themselves in the foot at the same time. I assume this will be in next month's PlayStation Magazine as the feature demo. Do yourself a favour and check that out, or rent it before you drop 30 or 40 bucks on it.

-- Brian J. Papineau

So I just bought The Best of She-Ra thinking that it ws part of the He-Man series I've been collecting for a year. The company producing the DVD sets, BCI sad that they couldn't license the whole series. Well, it turns out that they did. he He-Man / She-Ra sets all come with postcards dne by famous comic artists and documentary features. I wanted to make sure my He-Man collection was complete, but when I opened the She-Ra set today, I found that the cards were the beginning of a new set. Boo to that. I never really got into She-Ra. By the time He-Man was ending I was 9 or 10, and had moved on to Thundercats, Transformers and such. I'll probably end up buying the whole set if the wife likes it. Oh, and on a side note...We're getting "officially" married at the end of the month. We've been together for 4 years and have been "Common Law Spouses" for a year...

Well, this game's been out since February, but GameSpot only let me add it to my collection a couple weeks ago. I played through it again, and can safely say that it's still the best NDS game that I've played.

Full Review

Learned out how to rip movies from PS2 games...

Atelier Iris 2: The Azoth of Destiny - Opening Animation

[video=dXJiljD95bsMvDLf]

Suikoden Tactics - Opening Movie

[video=KnFgw2Ct5bsMvDHZ]


The Conveni 4 - CGI Intro Movie

This is one of those quirky imports I've played a lot. It's a simulation about running a convenience store.

[video=JyA0kGH45bsMvD_e]

As promised, here's my first review from the bit Generations series. I'll try to get a video up later today.