So...this is kinda weird.

I was one of the few who ditched GameSpot back in 2007/8 when Jeff Gerstmann was fired from the site. For me, I felt like the people I learned to trust were all leaving and the people who were left behind I just didn't know and I guess to be fair, didn't care about. I trusted the opinions of those who left in the fallout (and some of those who left before) and GameSpot just didn't feel the same way. Ever since then I've been a part of the Giant Bomb community and wider still the Whiskey Media. I think the sense of community there was something I had never felt before and I've never really looked back since.

However, today comes the news that the gang is returning (in a certain way). Hearing Jeff talked about what happened, I knew that my initial thoughts were right, that he was fired because Jeff held his journalistic integrity and the powers that be over GS decided ad money was more important than integrity. It wasn't GS's fault, but I don't think there was any doubt that this place was tarred pretty badly by the event. At least that's how I felt. Now things have changed, those people aren't there anymore, but it doesn't change the fact that I feel strongly connected to what Giant Bomb has become.

I don't know why I'm posting here because I don't think anyone is paying attention to this thing anymore but I felt like it was something I should mention. Judging by the way things are happening, I probably won't need to use this account again as the two entities that are Giant Bomb and GameSpot (and Comic Vine to include the third) are supposed to remain separate. But I dunno, it felt fitting to write something here. Even though it's going to be separate (and I hope it remains separate), it still feels like a sort of return home. I became a member about 6 and a half years ago and a a good third of that time was here at GS.

Maybe it's more fitting to say that I'm not going home...but just moving back to the neighbourhood. So hello neighbours!

The ending

I LOVE YOU!

And there I was thinking that I wasn't influenced by advertisements.

Last Christmas, when my PS3 pre order felt like it would take forever (March just seemed to be too far away at that point), I was really interested in getting a Nintendo Wii, but the thing that put me off from getting it was the games. You see with the PS3, there were games I really wanted at launch which is why I went for it, but for the Wii I was only interested in one, Trauma Centre. Turns out when I was investigating, Trauma Centre wasn't even a launch title, and I didn't even know when it was going to come out. Then even when I looked they were sold out, and I just decided that I wasn't interested.

Skipping to last week to be exact, I see a television adverstisement. Trauma Centre: Second Opinion. The next day I went down to the local game store and bought the Wii with Trauma Centre. Jeez, I'm addicted to that game, it's so much fun. I nearly finished all the missions on easy but I don't even want to think of what that game is going to be like on the harder difficulties. Some of those missions are just plain tough.

Anyhow, Trauma Centre wasn't the only game I bought. I got Mario Strikers Charged cause that looked neat and I got Warioware: Smooth Moves. The thing is, I can see those games are really meant to be for multiplayer and here is the dilemma. I never really have anyone else round to play with. I bought the Wii on instinct because of one game and now I'm finding out that it's going to be wasted because once I'm done with that game, it's going to start gathering dust. I was at the store looking at all the other games on offer and I just had no desire for any of them. I didn't want Zelda, Red Steel...I definitely didn't want Wii Play despite the extra controller. I just don't want anything else. I mean Paper Mario looks neat but that's not coming out for a month. I had a look at the Virtual Console games and it just seems like a waste of money. I'm going to see myself playing games for a few minutes and then putting them down cause it was nice to revel in a bit of nostalgia but then that's it. I'm going to have to pay for an extra controller on top of that too.

And man, that console gets expensive if you want to get into the full multiplayer experience. £50 for a remote and nunchuck, multiply by three and that's nearly the cost of the console alone.

So I already have a PS3 and I'm very happy with it, but I indulged in a Wii because of one game. Was it the smarted choice? No, I don't think it was. Do I regret? Maybe, I guess it's too early to say. I just think that personally owning a Wii isn't the best choice. I only really play single player games and I do feel that console is aimed to get as many people involved. When that doesn't happen I really don't see there being much substance to that system personally.

I guess I'll get back to trying to do those UFRA Special Event races until maybe Paper Mario comes around before picking up that remote again.

Is it just me, or is anyone else totally excited by the new guitar and maybe the possibilities it will have? The new guitar has ten buttons. The usual five at the low end, and another five at the high end. They are the same colour in the same order and in the GS article, said the buttons maybe redundant. I'm thinking no way. Why not say on the more difficult settings, the high end buttons are what you use for soloing? How freakin awesome would that be? That would be closer to playing real guitar, playing the low end for riffs and the high end for soloing. That's my thought on it anyway. I really hope they implement that, it woud be cool.

The guitar also looks much cooler, a little more authentic looking.

Can't wait for this game.

I finished all the races for Ridge Racer 7, including the pretty difficult Opus racers. Although I've not got 100% yet, I have about 96%. That's because I don't have 100% with all the manufacturers, so I'll probably end up unlocking a couple of manufacturer racers as I try and get 100 pts with all of those. Pretty tedious if you ask me.

I guess I still have the UFRA Special Event races, but the first one is kicking my ass! Never mind the other 24 I think. But yeah, I was pretty proud of my accomplishment there. The hardest was definitely the Crinale Duel, but I think that was because I was going about it the wrong way, and with a little help online, I found out one of the setups to beat him, and after more annoyance I finally beat him. The other racers weren't as bad after that. Just learning the best points to deploy Nitrous to keep it as high as possible all around the track. The second you're out of NOS, you're done for. I think a little bit of luck is needed to.

I bought a PSP.

The latest update for the PS3 and PSP and the interconnectivity captured me and so I bought a PSP and quite a few games. Ridge Racer 2, Prince Of Persia Rival Swords, Gitaroo Man Lives, Everybody's Golf, GTA: Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories. The connectivity of the PSP with the PS3 is a little cool, but also a little frustrating. I don't like the idea of leaving the PS3 on remote play the entire time just so I can connect my PSP to it. I would like to be able to let it run the Folding whilst I'm not using it and then be able to connect to it with the PSP when I want, so it would cancel the Folding and resume once I'm done. It's also a bit laggy but it is impressive how it's basically the same XMB on the PS3 running through your PSP.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/6736809.stm

This news article irritated me to no end today. The part with the cathedral takes up a few minutes in the entire several hour game play. They make it almost sound like the entire game is set there. Also earlier in the day they were just saying characters shooting each other, making you think that you're shooting other humans. The video also made me laugh as it was a terrible quality video from youtube where you couldn't make out alot of what was going on.

What takes the biscuit, is all these groups with children who died in gun crime saying these violent games should be stopped. Essentially they portray that hundreds of kids are playing these games and are being influenced. Well for a start there are several signs of 15 meaning no one under the age of 15 is allowed to play, and this is by the BBFC that do all the movies.

What they don't seem to get is that this is fiction! I'm sorry, I'm terrible at history, but I don't remember hearing about an alien invasion which nearly took out the human race in the 1950's. That one escaped me in history class. It has annoyed me that they're so quick to blame video games. It's just yet another example of the closed mindedness of society.

On another, more happier front. I picked up RR7 again after leaving it for a month or two and I have two of the very difficult races before the offline content is complete. These are Opus races which involve the difficult special cars like Crinale (The Devil Car) and Angelus (The Angel Car). Once that is done, I still have the UFRA Special Events which seem even harder! So there is plenty to play with there. I still have other games to go through yet like FEAR (not really enjoying this so much to be honest), Motorstorm (slowly going through this, not as much fun as Ridge Racer personally) and NBA Street Homecourt (lots and lots of fun, really enjoying this). I've bought way too many games...

I mentioned Gitaroo Man Lives before for the PSP. I absolutely loves this game on the PS2. Infact I still have it, refusing to let my brother have it because I enjoyed it so much and was determined to get past Mojo King Bee on Master difficulty (I'm stuck at the same point on the PSP version!). So I was delighted when I first got the console to see it on the BC list. Then the horror when I put it in and it didn't play. I called the helpline and they told me to do certain things to the console which might explain why it won't play, yet it still didn't work. So surprise surprise when the next firmware update came out, and the game was removed from the list, and has yet to return. I really hope they get this working some time soon.

That's enough for now, I think.

So I followed the advice of Charlie2688 and rather than spend a whole load of money on a HDTV which wouldn't get fully utilised, I went with a HD monitor. BenQ FP241W, 24 inch widescreen, 1080p output with HDMI input. It's pretty sweet and the games looks absolutely amazing. I thought they looked improved on the normal tv but the improvement is just unbelievable. Really glad.

Ridge Racer has been getting the most play at the moment and it's a lot of fun. Just starting to get difficult as I'm being really challenged for the first time at about 70% completion. Played a little Call of Duty earlier which looks cool enough but I think Resistance is a better game. Just seems to be a little more different than the usual World War shooters.

Ridge Racer 7 is awesome, Sonic The Hedgehog sucks ass!

I knew RR wouldn't let me down. I've always loved these games ever since I found them in the arcades where I would spend hours and money on them. I just love the whole arcadiness of it and it might be why I've never been able to get into Gran Turismo. The way it looks and the way it plays, it's just a whole lot of fun and the grand prix stuff makes me feel like I'm working towards something. That something I don't feel when I play Motorstorm, which again is a fun game but it kind of feels pointless when I'm playing it.

I'm incredibly disappointed in Sonic The Hedgehog. I had some pretty big expectations of this game given the amazingly cool trailers and in the end it just sucks. It feels like it was poorly put together. I honestly thing they've been told to make a Sonic The Hedgehog for next gen. The intro FMV stutters like crazy, so I don't know if that's how it is or I have a buggered up disc, but everything else works fine for other games, just Sonic stutters. I just don't feel any enjoyment when I play it and it's a real disappointment.

Resistance is the surprise. I'm not big on first person shooters and the only one I've ever really played is Half Life. I'm really enjoying Resistance despite totally sucking at it. That's the difference with Sonic. I keep dying in that too but it feels like for stupid reasons, where as in Resistance, I'm dying because I'm not playing smart enough. I also have Call Of Duty 3 but I've not played that yet.

I got the Blast Factor demo and loved it so bought that and that's a great little game to play for a few minutes. Also got GT since that was free but not really into that. It doesn't help that it's not much of a proper game either. I love the look of it, and I like playing about with the Cross Media Bar. I got wireless up and running within seconds. I'm very happy with it at the moment, and now I'm seriously considering buying a decent HDTV so I can get the best out of it.

Don't know what anyone else thinks. I'm sure there are very different opinions. 

So when I preordered the PS3, in my stupid excitement I forgot to buy the extra things I wanted with the (bundled) console. So I bought two extra games ontop of the three that will come with the console, an extra controller and a SCART cable since I don't have a HDTV (yet) and wasn't sure if a SCART came with it.

So last week I get my stupid SCART cable for the PS3. Guess what comes today. The extra controller and the two games I ordered separately. No PS3. EVIL SWINES!!! Why couldn't they have just held it all off and sent everything together. Instead they tease me with the freakin games and controller that I can't use! The console will be coming tomorrow, but why not just ship it together? Isn't it cheaper for them? I'm not paying extra on it, but surely they are. Sounds dumb to me.

So here I am, staring at Resistance, Sonic and controller (with no USB cable to charge with which sucks, luckily the cable to connect my camera to the PC fits) and wondering what it would be like to play. I guess I'll find out tomorrow.

Idiots are such a tease...

HAHA! I got a mention on the Hotspot. I sent the e-mail about Skynet. I've tried to get mentioned a couple of times before but not had any luck. But now finally. Woot! Kinda stupid but I'm happy.