I don't know if anyone knows about this but on DVD players there is a button for changing the angle of the scene,if you did know it would seem that your in a secretive club similar to that of the freemasons because to my dismay this much overlooked function has been kept a secret from seemingly every major film studio...

Seriously though i have never once used this button on my dvd player,every other button on my remote control is blank through wear and tear but the angle button remains shiny and pristine like a sofa with a plastic sheet on it.

as far as i'm aware bluray has a similar function,lets hope they use it this time around

if you know of any dvds that make use of this function let me know which ones and im gonna compile a list

OK people the time is nigh, time to use our civil right that our father and their father and their fathers before that fought for, we get to vote for what game we think deserves to win in several categories and theres a lot.

so head on over to

http://uk.gamespot.com/best-of/?om_act=convert&om_clk=features&tag=features;title;1

make great uncle ezekiel Proud

SOME OTHER NEWS

got me some fancy new pics on my profile as per yesterdays post but actually i changed the blog image now too so gimmme teh feedbak!!

and check me out i'm now a tagger king ,have a gander at my emblems !!11

good times

Now that the lights are coming on at gamespot, ive decided to do a a little sprucing up of my profile.

inspired by other users on the blogs. Pain9000000 and Colmilliosive jiggled it up a bit so it should work nicely on the default view let me know what you guys think...

also i joined raptr, looks like a cool idea so im giving it a go, conider joining up and add me as a friend if you like :P

:)

cheers buft

Once again I find myself in the dilemma of last minute Christmas gifts, who's to blame for this? Is it the shops with their damned last minute sales... the longer you wait the better the price gets or is it the calendar people for not adding more than 365 days this year?

Whoever's fault it is will have to fix it for next year because I for one am sick of running round every shop in the country on Xmas eve, now I know what you're thinking "Buft you have had all year to buy presents for people" well this year I did plan ahead for several weeks now I have been running around picking up gifts and knick-knacks for every Tom, Dick and Harry that ever glanced in my direction. At least that's how it feels.

Anyway so here I am penniless again waiting for my last pay check before Xmas so I can buy the last remaining few presents and because I get paid on Xmas eve that means I'm in the same boat as last year and I'm sorry to say that means several people are going to be receiving less than satisfactory presents.

Next year I'm going to go into military training that's but only if I fail to bribe the calendar people.

Here's to next year and its 400 days

HIP HIP ... HOORAY!!!

If I'm being honest the first thing I want in the new generation of gaming consoles is the ability to play with people on other consoles and on PC/Mac. The reason I say this is because I absolutely hate that I have some really great friends with whom I play a lot of online games.

On one hand I play a lot of Killzone 2 online and I made some great buddies on there. Not all of them have an Xbox either through financial reasons or maybe just a preference to PS3, on the other hand I also play a lot of halo 3 as well and I have a stack of people I enjoy playing with there as well. That's all well and good you might say those are both console exclusives and you're not going to get those cross platform but then I also have call of duty on my Xbox. I play that more often than any other game and I find myself thinking about how great it would be that I could take my Killzone buddies and my halo buddies and make them my call of duty buddies.

Imagine in the next gen games, rather than worrying which console had the best online community the only thing you had to worry about was which console version had the most ideal control scheme for that kind of game. For instance I like the Xbox controller for racing and first person shooters but I prefer the PS3 controller for fighting games.

They done cross platform before on the pc and 360.shadow run is one example so let's see more of that next gen and across all the formats

I opened a new topic in system wars so bounce on over there and have your say(link below)

http://uk.gamespot.com/pages/forums/show_msgs.php?topic_id=27128285&msg_id=318379275#318379275

at this point ive been awake for almost 3 days,ive slept a bit but im so very tired

i plan on doing a yearly review later but for now i just want to mention a few things from last nights awards

gratz go to naughty dog for winning GOTY with uncharted 2

and the new videos for batman, tron, star wars and halo reach have got me super excited today.

thats all for now later peeps

I have posted several reviews on this site. recently i was looking through them and i noticed a theme, people don't tend to recommend my reviews.the problem is my writing i never tend to think about the structure of my games and quite honestly i never give it any thought what so ever.

so i made a pledge, better reviews orno review at all.

so i joined a union the league of reviewersand i asked whats wrong with my reviews and how can i improve them. At this point i would like to say thanks to loopy_101 and lolhahaDEADfor there continued feedback.

and with a little elbow grease and a pen i sat down to write. so here it is my review for DJ Hero. it has been updates since i posted this so if you get a chance have another look :)

please leave whatever feedback you can,its much appreciated doesnt matter how brutal just go ahead and leave it at the bottom of the page and recommend my review if you found it helpful.

Sometimes I wonder what it's like to be the partner of someone like myself, a gamer, someone who spends all their free time in front of the TV or pc screen, pressing buttons and being generally dead to the world. I wonder what it feels like to have all your queries met with responses like "in a minute" or even just a grunt. To put it on a way that a gamer would understand I looked at it like this, imagine mass effect but only the entire dialog is replaced by grunts and empty promises of things done later. I placed an example below.

This is a homage to those much overlooked companions, the ones that stick by us through the thick and the thin from the dizzying lows that was buying terminator salvation for the 360 before reading a review to the euphoric highs of finding a copy of modern warfare 2 for £26 in Sainsbury's.

This is my girlfriend, she is also a member of this site and I would like to tell you a quick story which reveals how I came to this conclusion.

Today we went to Belfast, the trip for all intensive purposes was for Christmas shopping but because I would miss my much played Xbox 360 and the bus journey is too bumpy too play the PSP I was promised as many goes on house of the dead as I could get out of the pocket of change I was carrying. Upon getting there we did the much needed shopping and while hauling the bags around we came across the store that plays host to my favorite arcade game ever. The shutter was down and it had a massive sign that read large retail unit for sale.

Disaster! The day for me is ruined and through a combination of sulking and complaining about the pile of change now burning an uncomfortable hole in my pocket i manage to ruin her day as well, this continues for about an hour when she finally gets fed up with me and goes for a walk, she then came back slightly later with a huge bag but says nothing.

Finally when we get home I decide to take out my days problems on some virtual opponents the only problem I have is that I can't find a game that fits my mood, just then the aforementioned bag appears and she shows me what it is, to make up for my frustration she has bought Me DJ hero.

Just to show you how big a gesture this is for her, not only did it cost her a lot of money but it also means that I will spend the next week ignoring her for the same game she has just bought me. That means for her trading off her own happiness for my happiness and that kind of sacrifice cannot go unnoticed any longer.

In conclusion I would like to say this, sometimes your partner might be giving you hassle about taking the garbage out while you're trying to pwn noobz in call of duty, sometimes she might even be getting kidnapped by an angry gorilla with way too many barrels, but remember there are times when she will be throwing hearts at you while an opponent mercilessly squats you in halo 3.if your partners there right now turn round and kiss them though don't tell them why because that will only mean they can use it to get you off your games :D

At first I tried to draw up a list of arcade games that where inch perfect recreations of the original arcade game, I soon realised that this was a fool's game there are hundreds if not thousands of arcade games that have been ported pixel by pixel into the home console market.

Next I tried to draw up a list of the most popular home console ports but i just ended up with a list of fighting games .Street Fighter 2, Soul Edge, Tekken and Virtua Fighter all made the list but i wanted it to cover a wider range of genres.

So finally I rewrote the list to cover a list of games that, for me at least, brought that magic of the arcade right into my living room. So here we go...

Outrun

This arcade hit was originally released in 1986 by Sega. The game was very simple you play a man in a fast car with a bubbly blonde in the passenger seat, the lady is impressed by speed so your job is to make it from checkpoint to checkpoint within a set time limit to ensure you get the girl.

The game features a multiple routes for you to choose, this is done just before the end of every checkpoint with the road splitting in 2 letting the player decide which way to go.

This game made the list because it's a prime example of a game that is fondly remembered as an arcade masterpiece, requiring thousands of coins to master and which has been ported to nearly every console that ever existed from the Commodore 64 right through to the Xbox and spawning sequels and online versions on the Xbox 360.

Moment that brought the Magic home:

Loading up the game and hearing Magical sound shower blasting out of your TV.

Time Crisis

This on rails shooter was initially released by Namco in 1995 and subsequently ported to the original Playstation in 1997. The game tells the story of a special agent called Richard miller aka the one man army to solve the problems of the fictional republic of Sercia which is in turmoil after an attempted coup in which the president's daughter has been kidnapped.

I added this game to the list because for me it was one of the first on rails shooters to make the jump from arcade to home console without any control issues, time crisis overcame this by coming bundled with the Gun-con controller.

Moment that brought the Magic home:

The first time you plug in the Gun-con and playing through that first chapter only too look round and realise you're in your own house.

Tekken

Tekken was initially launched in 1994 in arcades around the world by Namco and was ported as a launch title for the Playstation console in both Europe and North America. The game features a cast of characters with various martial arts techniques competing to win the king of the iron fist tournament and win the one billion dollar prize money.

The game was one of the earliest fighting series to introduce 3d game mechanics and is also noted for its control scheme which rather than relying on buttons corresponding to the strength of attacks mapped the controller buttons to the characters limbs. The game received praise from the martial arts community because the characters in the game realistically mimicked their real life fighting ****.

As an additional note for this game I had a hard time deciding if I should include this or street fighter 2, I have included Tekken purely on the basis that it was an introduction into 3d gaming for thousands of homes across the world.

Moment that brought the Magic home:

Loading up your console and seeing your combatant battle it out in 3d for the first time.

Contra

Contra is a run and gun action game originally released by Konami in arcades everywhere in 1987 and later ported in 1988 to the NES. The player controls one of two armed military commandos named Bill and Lance who are sent on a mission to neutralize a terrorist organization called Red Falcon that is secretly planning an alien invasion on Earth.

Although the home console ports are not exact replicas of the arcade game I decided to include this on the list because it brought the punishing difficulty normally associated with arcades right to your sofa. Many games at the time included easier check points, more lives or easier enemies. Contra made none of these concessions simply giving you 3 lives and pointing you at the first level.

Moment that brought the magic home:

Restarting the game for the billionth time and rejoicing that you didn't have to add credits.

Daytona USA

Originally released in 1993 in arcades by Sega and was later ported to the Sega Saturn in 1995.This racing game puts the player in the driving seat of a stock racing car know as the hornet. Gameplay was simple you needed to complete the track in the allotted time limit and also beat all of the other cars on the field.

The reason for my inclusion of this on the list is that while other comparable racers such as ridge racer still relied on the D-pad for control, Dayton USA was both compatible with the Saturn 3D analog control pad and the Arcade Racer steering wheel accessory giving the game a much more arcade at home feel to it than other games.

Moment that brought the magic home:

Plugging in your arcade racer wheel and getting that level of emersion not previously seen in other racers.

In closing I would like to extend an olive branch to Tetris, which would have been included on my list here only during my research I discovered that it was originally launched on PC, then console and was later introduced to arcades in 1988.

Thanks for reading and leave your comments in the usual place.

Arcade cabinets that make you look foolish

Are you afraid to play it?

This list looks at games which implemented features into the arcade cabinet which improve the users control over the game, unfortunately for the shy of heart this also means waiting until the arcade is empty until you play them.

So let's take a look at some games many of us would consider to be the scooters of the video game world...

Police 911

Police 911 is an arcade shooter released by Konami in 2000.gameplay is similar to that of other on rail shooters such as time crisis and house of the dead. The story is that you are a police officer fighting the mafia and attempting to stop its members from trafficking guns from Japan to the USA. this game itself is considered a spinoff from the time crisis, although it doesn't share the same game world the game play mechanics are very similar you move along on rails hiding behind cover only exposing yourself (not in the rude way) when you want to fire off a few shots.

The biggest innovation with this particular game and the reason for its inclusion on this list is that Konami installed 3 sensor bars on the cabinet. This meant that the player had to physically move in order to duck out of the road whereas with time crisis you just pressed a button with your foot.

The main reason you will be afraid to play this is that all the ducking and diving makes you look as foolish as those people who fall asleep on the train and wake up with a yelp when they dream they are falling.

see crazy cop shooting action here

Cops

Cops is an arcade game released by Atari in 1994, the game is a hybrid shooter/driving game. Upon starting you get to pick which you would like to do. The gameplay is all done in video with the aim of the game to shoot the criminals and avoid shooting innocents and your partners.

The game makes my list not only for having both a light gun and steering wheel on the cabinet but for playing the theme tune for cops the show really loudly during its attraction loop... bad boys, bad boys wactha gonna do when they come for you(if it's in your head now I'm sorry)

The reason you won't play this game is that the soundtrack plays throughout the game and nobody wants to be associated with that. I couldn't find any gameplay so below is just the theme song

see it here

Dance Dance Revolution

Dance Dance Revolution is a bemani game introduced in 1999 by Konami. The aim of the game as everyone knows is to copy the instructions of the computer using only your feet and the directional buttons on the cabinet. This is all done to the beat of a song selected by you the player.

The game makes the list because it added a dazzling array of lights bells and whistles to the cabinet as well as adding a controller for dancing on instead of the traditional push buttons.

The reason you won't play this game is that no matter how good you are at the game it's impossible to look in any way sane while you're up there. Later models now even warn people nearby by announcing that you're ready to dance. This game is on the list but other bemani games should also be considered here. I picked DDR as it's the flagship series for the genre.

see some dancing magic here

Also a special mention to one game that even makes playing it at home embarrassing because of some highly provocative Wii remote waggling... the honour goes too cooking mama thanks to a crazy oversight by the developers some of the hand actions required lead to some red faces around the TV for family members over the age of 13

i have more articles on arcade games still to come,thanks for reading leave comments in the usual place :)