I'll just start off by saying that this blog post really doesn't have any direction or purpose. I've only been awake for a pretty short time right now and it's a Sunday. I mostly just felt like writing a blog today, I guess the content really doesn't matter as I'm the only one who reads these anyway.

I'm going to start off by talking about my current obsession, the Nintendo 3DS. I've been lusting over this system since it was first announced this past summer at E3. I haven't been this excited over a system in a really long time. Funnily enough the 3D aspect is probably the least exciting to me. That's not to say that I'm not excited about the 3D, but there are other features that I'm looking forward to much more. The connectivity aspects alone would make me buy it. Street Pass and Spot Pass sound like the coolest thing I've ever heard of in a portable game system. I think I watched the announcement video for the 3DS about a dozen times so far, the girl in it is actually pretty hot too. I like the fact that they're marketing it as a device that you bring with you everywhere you go. The tag mode on the DS was kinda lame and impossible to actually connect to someone randomly. It was really something that had to be preplanned with someone else if you wanted it to work. The charging cradle seems awesome too and so does the AR card games that come with it. I just wish that they would finally announce a launch date and price for it. The only thing that makes me sad is that this is just another step away from my favorite system of all time, the GBA. I do wish that they had continued to make Gameboys but I guess that the DS is the future now so there's not much to do about it.

I'll quickly touch upon the rumors of the PSP2 also. First of all I think a sequel to the PSP could be cool. They made some mistakes with the first PSP that really kept it from meeting it's true potential and I'm somewhat excited to see what they'll do next. However, with that being said, I think that the idea of a PSP phone, if the rumors are correct, is very stupid. I personally wouldn't be willing to switch cell phone carriers and get another phone just to be able to play games on it. I like my iPhone just fine and when I get a new phone it's going to be a new iPhone, not a PSP phone. I think that if they make this new system a phone then they're really going to cut their potential market in half. I'm sure i'm not the only one who wouldn't be willing to get a new phone just because it has the PSP name on it. I guess I'll just wait and see what happens when it's finally announced officially.

Lately I've been playing the Ace Attorney series a lot, I'm trying to finish the entire series now that I own all of the games. It was actually semi tough to find some of the early games. I've also been playing World of Warcraft lately, it's a lot better than it used to be years ago when I last played.

That's about it for this blog, it actually ended up being fairly lengthy for something that had no direction in the beginning. Well, until I'm finally playing Animal Crossing in full 3D, now you're playing with power!

Yesterday was the 10th anniversary of the release of the Playstation 2 in North America, I can't believe that much time has passed already. I have lots of fond memories of this system. The Playstation 2 is one of my all time favorite systems and, not surprising, was around during my "golden age" of video games. I call it my "golden age" because it was the time in my life when things were the best for me and I was playing video games almost non stop. I had lots of disposable income, so I got new games all the time and not much responsibility, so I was able to devote tons of time to playing them. I don't remember exactly when I got my PS2 but I'm pretty sure it was towards the beginning of 2002. One of the biggest tipping points in my decision to get it was that it had a DVD player in it and, at the time, most DVD players were still pretty expensive. My first game for it was Grand Theft Auto 3; at that point in my life I had never experienced a game like that before and I still consider it one of the best.

Many of my best video gaming memories come from the PS2. Playing Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance on multiplayer is one of them; same with lots of sports games like NBA Street, MLB the Show and various Madden games. I lost a lot of my life playing Metal Gear Solid, GTA: San Andreas, Splinter Cell, Max Payne and Final Fantasy X as well. I'm sure there are a bunch more games that I'm not remembering right now but those are just a few off the top of my head. I remember standing in long lines to get one of the Madden games and GTA: Vice City when they first came out too. Those were the only times in my life that I've had to wait in a queue to get a game.

I've heard recently that the Playstation 2 was fragile at the time but I never experienced that. I've had my phat PS2 for about 7 years now, after getting one replacement because Alexis dropped it on the ground, and it's still going strong. I've had a PS3, actually I've had 2 of them, but for some reason I guess my heart will always be with the PS2. I didn't have nearly as much fun with the PS3 as I did with the PS2 and eventually sold both of them after a short time. I consider myself a handheld gamer now and don't plan on buying consoles anymore due to cost, space, and lack of interest but I'll never sell my PS2. One day I'll even hook it back up again and start playing some of the games that changed my life almost a decade ago.

I'm going to start off this blog right away by stating, promising in fact, that I'm not going to trade in my PSP again. If I did it would be the third time and I would deserve to be banned from ever owning another Sony system. Here is my dilemma though: the games coming out for the PSP really suck/are basically non existent. It really seems to me that Sony just basically stopped caring, maybe they're already hard at work on the PSP2 (I hope they are), but it seems like all of a sudden PSP just up and dropped dead. It seemed promising for awhile too. I remember when they had all these great games starting to come out after they went around to publishers and made a big push for new games on the system, now it seems that "golden era" died abruptly. Honestly, the only other game that I want for the PSP is Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, that's it. I'm not even mildly interested in any other PSP game that is coming out soon or has been announced. It's gotten to the point that I haven't even bothered to look and see what getting released on PSN every week in a couple months, I even let my subscription to 'PlayStation the Official Magazine' expire. Oh well, I guess that's what happens. Anyway, in other news:

A couple months ago I finally got my hands on the crown jewel of my video game collection, the limited edition Japan-only Final Fantasy IV Advance Game Boy Micro!

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I've been wanting to get one of these for a long time and it cost me a lot of money but it was definitely worth it, after all the GBA is my favorite system of all time. Anyway, I guess that's it for this time, feel free to leave me a comment if you like my Micro or about anything else. Send me a friend request if you want too, I'm a pretty nice guy and I'll even message you if you want to talk about games. Also, as always my games list and now playing list are constantly updated so feel free to check them out if you're curious what I've gotten lately or what I'm playing.

While i was sitting around contemplating the things that matter in life the other day two very important things occurred to me. First, i should really start keeping a list of video games that i beat, a) because i really don't beat games by the truckload so when i actually do its usually a pretty important event to me and b) because it would be nice to be able to look back and see what date i originally beat a game on and how many games I've beaten to date. The second thing that occurred to me is that every year i **** and complain about how there's never any good games coming out in the summer months, well duh, i should be doing what every other gamer does and use the summer time to finally catch up on all the games that I've been stockpiling for most of the year and haven't finished. Getting back to me not finishing very many games for a moment, the reason why that is i believe is because i get so many games during the year that i usually will play about halfway through a game before i start playing another game and completely forget about the first game, hence me not finishing too many. Well you'll all be happy to know (or, more than likely, not really give a crap) that since i really started to buckle down I beat more games in July than I ever have in one month. My total for July is 4, Metal Gear Solid (PS1), Pokemon Platinum (DS), Rock Band Unplugged (PSP) and Professor Layton and the Curious Village (DS). I also beat The Legendary Starfy but i was one day too late to be able to add it to my July total. What I plan to do now is to continue catching up on games that i've let fall by the wayside this year such as Fire Emblem: Dragon Sword, Final Fantasy Tactics A2 and maybe finally start playing Star Ocean 2, i haven't even opened it yet. So to summarize, the summer sucks, you might as well catch up on old video games before September comes and the rush begins again.

P.S. Scribblenauts already looks like GotY material!! I can't wait.

It's been 2 1/2 years since my last blog post (I dont know why) and not much is new with me, you might even say that gaming wise im the exact same as i was in my last blog. I still love Nintendo, i still play my GBA games and DS games but there are a few new changes. I was lucky enough to track down a brand new Game Boy Micro, if you've never tried one then i highly recommend it, its easily my favorite device to play GBA games on. I've also got a PSP now (3rd one) and i vow to not sell or trade this one because im actually having a really good time with it this time due to better game purchases on my part and being able to buy games off of PSN. Also, i've started using my PS2 and Gamecube again for the first time in probably almost 3 years and i guess that's gonna have to be good enough for me because there's definitely no new consoles in my immediate future. Anyway, on to my state of the games address:

GBA

Still my favorite system of all time and surprisingly i think the system that i've gotten the most games for lately. As i said before, i got a Micro and that has definitely made we want to play GBA again and hunt down games that i didnt have. I'm not sure if my GBA collection will ever be complete but i now have more games for this system than any other that i own and i even have some really rare ones like Ninja Five-0.

Nintendo DS

I've been playing some really good games for this system like Clubhouse Games, Contra 4 and The World Ends With You. I would really recommend that last game to anyone who hasn't tried it yet, it's very different from most games. I'm looking forward to the new Guitar Hero that comes out later this month but the game that i'm most looking forward to is GTA: Chinatown Wars. I loved the GTA game for the Gamboy Advance so i have high hopes for this one too, i was hoping it would be coming out for the holidays but i guess not.

PSP

As i said, i just recently bought my 3rd PSP and am having a really good time with it. I cant really say which games i'm looking forward to because i just got it pretty recently so i dont know much about upcoming titles. I bought Castlevania: SotN and Twisted Metal 2 from the Playstation Store which means that i also had to upgrade my memory stick but i think selling downloadable legacy games is a great idea.

Well thats it for this time, hopefully it wont take me as long to post again. Feel free to check my game collection list, i always keep it current.

    Finally, the long wait is over.  The DS Lite is now proudly in my hands where it belongs.  I don't know how life ever existed before it.  I suddenly am finding myself playing old games that I haven't touched in months because the DS Lite is displaying them in a whole new way.  I just can't wait for the DS Super Lite in a year from now.

    E3 was great this year.  So many awesome titles for the DS were shown.  E3 also showed me that I'll eventually be getting an XBox 360 instead of a PS3.  C'mon, for $600 the machine should be capable of launching Nuclear missiles and telling me how well endowed I am every morning.  Speaking of which, the thing that has me in a constant state of arousal, probably until November, is the Nintendo Wii.  I know if you've been keeping up on my blogs you might say to yourself "I think that gamemasta114 is a Nintendo fanboy."  Well, you'd be right.  I don't care, I love everything that Nintendo puts out.  They could market a crap-flavored Pez dispenser and I would still buy it.

    Here is my most looked forward to games of the upcoming year.  (Note, this list is subject to change without notification.)

DS

Starfox DS

The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass

Final Fantasy III

Wii

Red Steel

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

Wario Ware: Smooth Moves

Wii Sports

So recently I've been thinking about how great it would be if I lived in Japan.  They get all the best video games and they get them way before we do.  I think I would love it there because of how crazy they go over Nintendo products too, just like me.  They seem like a very nice, polite society, I think I can make it work between me and them.  Plus, the only thing cooler than gamemasta114 is Japanese gamemasta114.  Think about it, I'm hanging out at the dojo, I'm bored or whatever then all of a sudden BAM, I whip out my DS and instantly have dozens of people to play against because the Japanese people love video games.  Here's another scenario, I'm on my moped delivering noodles when who's house do I arrive at?  That's right, Mr. Miyamoto.  We start playing Mario Kart and the next thing I know I'm working for Nintendo.

So that's why I think that I could be Japan's favorite son, Mr. Japan if you will.  I guess all that's left for me to do is to learn a completely different language, scrape together like $3000 to get there and then endear myself to the Japanese people.  Konichiwa, gamemasta114-san is coming home!!

Well, I guess that I haven't made a new entry since the summer.  I don't really know why, I guess I just haven't thought about it.  Anyway, here is what I've been playing lately.

Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King

All I can say about this game is WOW!  Everything about it is great, graphics, gameplay, story.  I haven't played an RPG this good in a long time.  I almost missed out on this one because I wasn't paying attention.

Animal Crossing: Wild World

I obviously wasn't going to miss out on this one.  It's everything that I thought it would be and more, I love it.

Final Fantasy IV Advance

I was pleasantly surprised with this game.  I never played it on SNES and I hated FF I&II Dawn of Souls.  I'm very happy that I got it, too bad I'm almost done with it though.

I've gotten other games too, I just didn't want to type forever.  Other games worth mentioning: Tony Hawk American Sk8Land for DS, Mario Kart DS and Paper Mario.  There's almost not enough time in the day for all the videogames I want to play.  I need to go play now.

Ok, I almost broke GTA:SA the other day when I couldn't beat the pilot school, and then again when I couldn't beat the first airplane mission for Toreno. Luckily I did it so I can keep playing the game that has so far consumed almost 40 hours of my life.

In other news, I'm extremely close to beating Final Fantasy X, I'm inside Sin now and I just beat Seymore for (hopefully) the last time. I'll be so happy when I beat this game, It's only taken me about 2 years now (not continuously, though.) I'll probley get X-2 after I beat this.

Attack of the $20 Games!!

I have no job so I play games all day which would be cool except I have to get a job very soon.

I'm becoming obsessed with GTA San Andreas, I play it all day long even when there's nothing to do in the game. It's getting to the point that it consumes my mind all the time. It's weird when you are walking around your neighborhood and all you think of is "Maybe I'll screw this hooker in the alley, then I'll crack her skull open to get my money back", lol.

By far the game that I want the most this year (possibly even ever) is Animal Crossing DS. I think that when I get this game I might lose my job again because I'll be missing a lot of work.

Maybe Nintendo should consider creating a "seedier" side to Animal Crossing. Tom Nook could sell illegal firearms behind his store at night. Your character could break into the other villagers homes at night and sell the stolen goods to Tom Nook. Maybe some of the animals could start some kind of a gang that terrorizes the village. Picture yourself fishing or collecting bugs, just minding your own business, when a group of animals with green bandannas over their faces drives by and starts shooting everything up. Ok, maybe not but it might be cool as an M rated alternative.

I guess this is all I have now, I'm going to go and take some steroids so that I can play more than 2 levels of Donkey Kong Jungle Beat in a row.