Keeping Video Games at an NES Difficulty Level

I'm not sure how many of you were around when video games first hit the market. Getting a chance to play the Atari and its myriad of games. They were all pretty simple yet challenging at the same time. You have your objectives and you try to complete them to the best of your abilities, but a lot of times, you end up playing with no end to the game in sight. Enter the Intellivision and the ColecoVision. Now these were definitely a step up from the Atari as far as graphics go. And the games that were released for the systems actually had some kind of finite extent to their stories. However, having a bevy of games that still provided no end to them just made things tedious and boring after a while. If anything, the difficulty in the Atari and ColecoVision/Intellivision era lied within the extent of the story line, in which some were infinite. So my idea is to move forward to the next generation and take a look at the original NES. Ah the NES. Such a treasure trove of epic games including but not limited to Super Mario, Final Fantasy, Castlevania and Metroid. I'm sure most people have had fond memories of playing certain NES games and can think back to the joy that was had when you did something spectacular. For those that were fortunate enough to experience the NES in its early days, do you remember how frustrating some games could be...especially when comparing them to the games that are released today? Stories could be told that would stretch to the end of days. Stories of how someone got screwed during a playthrough of Simon's Quest right as they were collecting enough hearts to buy that damn red crystal and died from a stupid skeleton hitting them juuuust right and killing them...forcing them to start collecting all over again. Or the time when you played Ninja Turtles and kicked ass all the way up to the Technodrome, only to lose your last turtle right outside the Shredder's door. I'm sure at the time, those moments seemed like the end of the world and you probably got angry to the point of putting the game down forever (I still refuse to turn a Link to the Past back on), but honestly, it probably instilled some major character in you, being able to withstand that kind of a beating and still say you have a love for video games. It's something that I believe is missing in today's generation of gamers. Having games provide you with so many save points sprinkled everywhere and power ups littered all over the place just makes the experience seem watered down now. There's no real challenge to survive knowing you have well over 3 lives to finish an entire game. There's no sense of urgency knowing that you have way more that 500 seconds to complete a stage. There is no major feeling of fear knowing that you can revive your fallen team mates without walking back out of the 6 floor dungeon and across a ogre infested forest with random encounters every 3 steps you take. The feeling of satisfaction just doesn't seem to be on the same level anymore. Having gamers get spoon fed and coddled with the games of the current gen seem to be turning them into softies. They consider games like Call of Duty to be too frustrating because of clever AI or games like God of War having puzzles that are too complicated. How sad. Try playing through a game of Maniac Mansion where the puzzles are not obvious at all or Final Fantasy where the AI knows when you are down to the last character in your party and nowhere near a town to revive them. Finish an entire game of Mega Man 1 & 2 or Battletoads and then let's sit down and talk challenging. So my proposition would be to take a step back and make games from this generation have the same sense of accomplishment as the ones from the NES era. Take away the plethora of save points, the multitude of power ups, the endless supply of continues and the range of difficulty settings. This generation of gamers need a swift kick to the rear end to toughen them up. It would strengthen our community as a whole and force us to harden ourselves in other aspects of life.
+10 cool points to anybody that can guess the game this ending belongs to

Anybody that would like to join myself of Dracula68 this weekend for some Burnout Paradise, send a message or friend request and we'll race. I will be on tonight for anybody that will want to play tonight. Tomorrow I will be online throughout the entire day, so feel free to join in at any point.

Police: Woman tried to trade salad for drugs

Associated Press Posted May 17, 2011 at 12:05 p.m., updated May 17, 2011 at 12:05 p.m. SALT LAKE CITY - A Salt Lake City woman has been arrested after authorities say she asked an undercover officer to give her drugs in exchange for a salad. KSL-TV reports the 33-year-old woman approached the officer who was working on a street corner known for drug sales. Police say she asked the officer for $10 worth of cocaine, but said she only had $2 and an Olive Garden salad in a to-go box. She told the undercover officer she could return a little later with more money or some gift cards to Olive Garden. Police allege another officer searched the woman and found a glass pipe inside a cigarette pack in her pocket. The woman was arrested and charged Monday with attempted possession or use of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia.

Just finished Bully Scholarship Edition last night 100%. Why the hell do they make getting 100% so ****ing difficult. Drink 500 sodas? Buy all clothes in the game? Walk 100km? Come on dude! Bah, whatever. I'm done. So on to the next game. Burnout Paradise should be coming in sometime this coming week. I'll most likely be trying that out and hopefully enjoying it.

So i'm looking at my gaming library and i'm noticing that my multi-player game selection is kind of lacking. Well, it's not really lacking, but after playing a **** load of Borderlands with Drac, i need something that can live up to that level of fun to have with another human being (insert joke here). I will still play L4D with MoonFoxx from time to time, but is there anything else anybody can recommend that would be equally as fun to play?

Time to go outside. Hope you all have a great Saturday AWK :) /sidenote - for all of those who don't think mods are not subjected to the rules on GS, just know that Jody is not shy about kicking us in the head when we step out of line. I just got kicked and it feels like my head is going to explode.

I am proud to say that i have finished my first non-DLC game with all achievements unlocked. With the help of Dracula, Sidburn, Yagr and CodingGenius, i have unlocked all achievements on Borderlands. For the record, i would usually never play a game to the point where i become and achievement whore. But with a ton of help from Drac, i was able to get the more annoying achievements. Thankfully, there was only a couple that required my to play online with someone and they weren't big hurdles to jump over. So now, i can actually play the game for fun and not worry about being 1 or 2 frigging ridiculous tasks short of getting an achievement. CONGRATULATIONS CHICKN!!!

I was able to finish Heavy Rain last night. I was kind of skeptical when i heard, but that game really was short. People had been talking about the ending and spoiling the game like crazy for a while, but thankfully my memory is usually pretty bad. So as i played, i didn't really know who the killer was. As i got to the end sequence, they kind of made it blatantly obvious who i needed to accuse. I'm not sure if the choices would be more plentiful if one or more of the characters died. The first time through, i was trying to be a good father (and i kind of hated Ethan at some point) so i made him mutilate himself at every turn. I'll play it again, though. This time, i want to be the worst father i can be but still save the kid...maybe. Perhaps i'll kill off a few of the characters just to see what happens. I'm evil like that.

I made it! I survived an entire 5 day festival with my brain and ass in tact. I have to admit, i skipped the closing ceremony yesterday but the rest of the days were full of various independent films, shorts and documentaries. The entire event had a high success rate, though there were a few films that were either too deep for my amateur mind or just seemed dumb to me. One of the documentaries i watched (and am so glad i got to see it) was one covering an incident that happened here in Florida. It was the story of the Martin Lee Anderson trial and the injustice that happened when the authority figures got off without being charged for anything. It really was touching because i was around when the juvenile detention center was built. I was around when the juvenile court house was built. I was around when the kid was killed. I was around when our town marched on the capital and protested. I was around when the jury declared the officers not guilty for killing the kid. It was sad and pretty ****ed up, but i'm glad i can say i was around for that. There were also a set of animated shorts i got a chance to see. There were one or two that tried to be overly deep, but i did like the majority of them. The first one they showed was really funny. It was about sushi (yes sushi) that was trying to escape a restaurant only to fall victim to an alley full of stray cats. The fight to get out the restaurant was quite funny. There were others that were really good, like a claymation one and one that was a stop motion animation. One film in particular that stood out was an animator that actually animated his work on a slate board. One of the films he had in the festival had people call his personal phone number and leave voice mail messages for him to animate over. People would call and leave whatever message they wanted for no longer than 30 seconds, and you would see him draw whatever he thought the person might have been doing or what they meant with their message. It was so cool listening to these voice messages and watching the guy draw the scenes as the people talked. There really were so many good films i got a chance to see. I don't know if i'd be able to cover them all in one blog :P I'm glad i went, though next time i think i'll put some more effort into attending the after parties. It seemed kind of weird with me being such a casual movie goer, trying to mingle with these films students and professors. Next time. For now, back to life as usual.

Seems like a decent story so far. BUT!!!! The controls on this game absolutely suck. That's it