I've had a nasty habit of starting up games then not finding the time to finish them. This has led to a gaming queue that is going to take me weeks to dig out of. I've probably been accumulating these games since last fall when I moved into my new place and I was like "Unf I'll play games again". Anyone else suffering from this disease? Current games in queue:

Metroid Prime 2: Fixed all the power plants now I need to go back and get all the artifacts or whatever.

Final Fantasy 3/6: Got all the way to the ruined world. Just haven't finished out dammit.

Shinobi 3: I kicked much ass then had to put it down to do diapers. Keep forgetting to finish up.

Bionic Commando: Just started it last nite but it's definitely a queue candidate =P
Can you believe we used to play that game with no saved states? How technology has spoiled me...save states are cool too =)

Final Fantasy 7/10: Played thru a fair bit and was like "meh". Don't know how enthused I am to finish up.

Viewtiful Joe: Why the big hardon for this game? It's alright I guess.

> I've had a nasty habit of starting up games then not finding the time to finish
> them. This has led to a gaming queue that is going to take me weeks to dig out
> of. I've probably been accumulating these games since last fall when I moved
> into my new place and I was like "Unf I'll play games again". Anyone else
> suffering from this disease? Current games in queue:
>
> Metroid Prime 2: Fixed all the power plants now I need to go back and get all
> the artifacts or whatever.
>
> Final Fantasy 3/6: Got all the way to the ruined world. Just haven't finished
> out dammit.
>
> Shinobi 3: I kicked much ass then had to put it down to do diapers. Keep
> forgetting to finish up.
>
> Bionic Commando: Just started it last nite but it's definitely a queue
> candidate =P
> Can you believe we used to play that game with no saved states? How technology
> has spoiled me...save states are cool too =)
>
> Final Fantasy 7/10: Played thru a fair bit and was like "meh". Don't know how
> enthused I am to finish up.
>
> Viewtiful Joe: Why the big hardon for this game? It's alright I guess.
>
>
>
>
>
>

I don't think my upgrades will reach me 'till then, i'm still running on loaner parts.

But i've got at least 3 on my "mid-way through" list, and at least another 3 on my "will play when i get time" list.

Mid-way through:

1- LOTR BFME: The interface and gameplay mechanics are pretty lousy, but they work surprisingly well on the campaing modes, and so far, the campaings missions have been pretty fun ( i'm on the good side, scratching up all the extras after saving Minas Tirith ). 8/10 for campaing, 5/10 for skirmish

2- PoP Warrior Within: Great game, i'm loving it just as much as the first, if not more. I was not that far from the end, but now i gotta wait it out again. 10/10

3- Half Life 2: Didn't play it much as i was giving more emphasis to the other two. I've only just reached Ravenholm ( or is it black raven? ). Has been pretty fun so far, but i'm not enjoying it as much as most people seem to. Some of the "puzzles" are annoying, and the relentless motion ( no real break points ) makes it hard for me to get going. I like to tackle games an area or two at a time, but i can't do that in here. 7.5/10 so far


To-Play:

1- SW KOTOR 2: I've been hearing mixed feelings about this game, but i loved the first, so i'm looking forward to it anyhow.

2- Vampire, Bloodlines: The shitty performance and my at the time, lack of ram, made me put it on the back of the list, but it seems great.

3- Chronicles of Riddick: I hear good things, a friend of mine is raving non-stop about how great this game is, i'm still waiting till i finish a couple of others first before i give this a try.


The Master would not approve of this sig.

Bought Vagrant Story, Star Ocean II, Legend of Mana, Chrono Cross, and MGS at the same time for PSX and never finished any of them. For GC it was the same with Zelda: WW, F-Zero GX, Ikaruga, and MGS: Twin Snakes (thought I would finish that fucker if it had better graphics/first person aiming. Almost did, too). For PS2 didn't finish GTA: Vice City, Maximo, or Kingdom Hearts.

But I have gotten some games that I've been all over and replayed over and over trying to get 100%, such as Final Fantasy 9, Wipeout Fusion, Metroid Prime (part 2 I'm doing the same), Virtua Fighter 4, SSB:M, Outrun 2, Beyond Good & Evil, Resident Evil 4 (though I haven't bought it yet), etc.

> Can you believe we used to play that game with no saved states? How technology
> has spoiled me...save states are cool too =)

Holy shit man, that and the GBA Flash are perfect. When heading to the can, boring commuting, 5 minutes here or there, I just whip out my GBA with the flash cart and load the latest save state for my favorite NES game and I'm getting a little further each time. It takes a while but I've gone through a few of the old Mega Man / SMB / Double Dragon games.

> Viewtiful Joe: Why the big hardon for this game? It's alright I guess.

It's one of the more well done 3D 2D games. And it's one of the only for the GameCube. It's only alright but it's one of the only scraps we've been thrown as well.

> > Viewtiful Joe: Why the big hardon for this game? It's alright I guess.
>
> It's one of the more well done 3D 2D games. And it's one of the only for the
> GameCube. It's only alright but it's one of the only scraps we've been thrown
> as well.
>
Agreed there. I had it and got rid of it. When you get passed the flashy artistic style, slowdown trickery, and speed up the game is average at best. Try as I might I couldn't make myself enjoy the game all that much and got eternally bored with it about 1/2 way into the game. It was kinda sad but I think it actually had less variety in enemy targets than early 90s arcade beat em ups. After playing this one enough to get the bad taste out of my mouth (as some say) I had to fire up Final Fight and Double Dragon on the GBA to make things right.

Game is SERIOUSLY over-rated. And while there are not a ton of those type on the Cube, there are some. There are a couple budget games that were $15-20 that provide similar play, and also that Alien Hominid game as well.

Which will hopefully address the concerns you mentioned (lack of variety) and add much more value to the game. I find for some reason game companies aren't likely to put a lot behind an original concept even if it's a really good one. You can see how popular the first game in this series is despite the shorcomings as gamers crave the style of play. Hopefully this will send Capcom (and others) a message.

^^Already was released if you mean Viewtiful Joe 2. Much more or less the same, just now you can use the chick too as a player. Not certain if the PS2 copies came out.

On a humorous note, the Cube vers outsell the PS2 titles at a massive difference ratio.

Some years ago I started playing this one, at some point I stopped telling me I'd play later. Sometimes, when I want to play again, I start it, then I don't know what the hell I am and what I have to do, so each time I just leave it there. I should start another game, but I don't really want to since I've far in the game.


Testing underwear in outer space

> ^^Already was released if you mean Viewtiful Joe 2. Much more or less the same,
> just now you can use the chick too as a player. Not certain if the PS2 copies
> came out.

Oh, I thought it would have been a much bigger improvement... That's really too bad...

> On a humorous note, the Cube vers outsell the PS2 titles at a massive difference
> ratio.

Well, they already amassed a fan base with the first, and most marketing for the first was targetted towards Cube owners... Other than that I have no idea why that would be!

Biiiiiig list there. I'll break down a few categories.

"outdated graphics spoiled me"
Metal Gear Solid
Silent Hill
Resident Evil

"it just sucked"
Vampire - Redemption
Diablo
MDK2
Super Mario RPG
Spiderman the movie
Knucles Chaotix
LOTR - FOTR

"got bored with it"
Megaman X 5 and 6
Sonic Advance 3
Super Metroid
Yoshi's Island
Mario vs. Donkey Kong
Midnight Club 2
Zelda Majora's Mask

"computer problems kept me away from it and i just drifted away"
Farcry
Hitman Contracts
Fallout ( damn bugs )
Call of Duty

"played on the real thing to a long ways, didn't feel like playing all over on an emu"
Banjo Kazooie
Donkey Kong 64
Star Wars Shadows of the Empire

"didn't really gave 'em enough of a chance"
American McGee's Alice
Hitman 2
Conquer's Bad Fur Day
Megaman 8
Alien vs. Predator 2
Turok 3
Manhunt



And many, many more that i don't remember.

But i think that out of all of those, i could probably only salvage about 8 or 10 that i'd REALLY like to play through, the rest i'll probably leave to the dust.


The Master would not approve of this sig.

Xenogears - got to the end of disc 1 and havent played it since. The story is great but fuck me, anybody who complains about FF7 or any other game having long cut scene's obviously hasnt played this. Also, the combat is boring, the deathblow system is stupid because once you learn the newest one there' no point in using the older ones.

Vagrant Story - Great game but damn hard. I Got about 20 hours into it and got lost (everywhere looks the same), havent touched it since.

Parasite Eve 2 - Loved the first game, wasnt too crazy about the follow up.

FFX-2 - Square's attmept to make the game less linear by making it mission based fails imo. Ill force myself to beat it if need be before the english version of FFXII comes out, but I havent played it in a year.

Shadow of Memories - Thats Shadow of Destiney to you guys. Cool game, have been meaning to finish it, just havent gotten round to it yet.



http://www.emuchrist.org

Too god damn much.

Rocket: Robot on Wheels is a big one, as is Shikigami no Shiro 2 (I prefer to play it co op with my friend). Stuck in Phantasy Star II right now and I'm debating on just quitting since I'm not having much fun playing it anymore.

Most of the stuff I play, I'm playing on my powerbook at work since I never have time to play games at home.

I'm always buying games, then NEVER playing them. Usually I'll see a game for something like 9 bucks, and buy it - not because it's a great game, but because it's only 9 bucks. Case in point: PN:03. I rented it a while back, didn't bother too much with it, then saw it for nine bucks, and I picked it up.

I rarely play a game right through anymore. I'm a good portion through GTA:SA, but every time I want to play it, the kid wants to watch. It's pretty hilarious, I'll be driving like a madman when he's not in the room, but when he comes in to watch (he loves car games) I always have to drive in the lines, slow down, stop at lights, etc.

Here's a short list of games I've started in the last few months, and never finished:

GTA:SA
Prince of Persia : Sands Of Time
Metroid Prime 2
Burnout 3
Beyond Good And Evil
Sly Cooper

There's a couple dozen GBA games in there too - I find I ended up giving it the same treatment as the DC - now that I have access to EVERY GAME, I never end up beating any of them, simply because I didn't PAY anything. At least if these games were 30 bucks a pop, I'd try to get my money's worth out of them...

I just bought Tetris Worlds for PS2 today, I figure that'll get some lovin'.

> Xenogears - got to the end of disc 1 and havent played it since. The story is
> great but fuck me, anybody who complains about FF7 or any other game having long
> cut scene's obviously hasnt played this. Also, the combat is boring, the
> deathblow system is stupid because once you learn the newest one there' no point
> in using the older ones.

I like Xenogears' combat and think it's pretty cool. It's not the best but very original and doesn't add too much interactivity the way some RPGs do in fight sequences (Suikoden, etc). It's also cool that you can either be in mech form or person form. Other than that you're right the story is amazing and I think Xenogears has had that old school epic feel where many other RPGs seem like just another in the series. This and FF9 are the top PSX RPGs for me...

Rockman & Forte is referred to as the sequel on parts of the web because some didn't know it preceeded 8 on the Super Famicom.

I actually found FF9 to be my least fav in the series. Had some memorable characters (Vivi rocks) but nothing else really stands out for me. Its the only game in the series that i never beat the optional bosses (Ozma) with the exception of FFX-2 which im still playing. Despite its crap story, i prefered FF8 (which most people bag on) cause the combat rocked, even if the draw system sucked.

And yes Xenogears has a great story, but once you get to disc 2 it feels more like a movie then a game, and Xenosaga is twice as bad.



http://www.emuchrist.org

I bought it for the GBA and pretty much beat thru everything up to the level where Mei gets aced. It's just so goddam boring now that I can't play any longer. Back in the day just the enemy animations alone and such wonderous things as parallax scrolling could abate those feelings of boredom. Alas, technological advancement had to go screw it up with their high resolution graphics, pixel shaders and anti-aliasing. Damn you technology!

Let's make a deal. Never pick up PSII ever again and just consider it a great memory and nothing more. I had a bit of fun with it playing again but definitely nothing to warrant another play through. RIP PS II

> I actually found FF9 to be my least fav in the series. Had some memorable
> characters (Vivi rocks) but nothing else really stands out for me.

I thought that it was more old school than 7 and 8. It also had a pretty cool system of building up weapons/armor and getting special abilities without making it too monotonous. In my opinion it was better than the materia/draw systems. Also the "?" that comes up when you're standing over something is cool, much better than having to run around mashing the action button to make sure you haven't missed anything. You get to be on the world map fairly quickly but not for so short like FF8 so it's pretty cool. I liked the setting of the game as it is much different than any other Final Fantasy, and closer in fact to part 1 or 2 than what I've seen. The settings of 7 and 8 were good too but in this game, it seems like the plot/chars/story tied in together more than the other games'. It was just more varied and characterized and interesting. It also seemed to have more towns that were each unique and interesting... I know the others try to do this but some places just seem generic and with no character (but really isn't such a big deal).

> Despite its crap story, i prefered
> FF8 (which most people bag on) cause the combat rocked, even if the draw system
> sucked.

I've played FF8 but don't notice anything especially cool about the combat, what are you referring to? I thought the idea of using spells to add defense/attack/abilities was kind of a cool concept, but was ruined by the monotony of having to collect all of those spells.

I thought that the story was pretty good in that it didn't try to be anything it wasn't, it was a pretty good plot with interesting characters. The characters had more personality than the other games as they didn't really try to be so realistic, and suits the general optimistic feeling of the game. It seems more like they had fun with the game and were inspired to create all of these little nuances. I like that not everyone's human and they never explain it, stuff like that.

I liked the story/characters of 8 as well but it got too far out at the end (although the ending itself was good), 7's story was good as well. I dunno, can't say I hate any of 7/8/9's stories, and it's not the major reason why I like 9 best, although, out of all of them, 9 has the story that doesn't get so crazy near the end, blowing your mind with shit that instead seems out of place.

I like 7/8/9 all a lot, just 9 seems to be perfect in every aspect to me, and I can't find fault with it. At least according to my preferences.

> And yes Xenogears has a great story, but once you get to disc 2 it feels more
> like a movie then a game, and Xenosaga is twice as bad.

Don't seem so interested in Xenosaga... they should have just named it something else and not hyped it based on Xenogears.

> Also the "?" that comes up when you're standing over something is cool, much
> better than having to run around mashing the action button to make sure you
> haven't missed anything.

Yea, forgot about that.

> I've played FF8 but don't notice anything especially cool about the combat, what
> are you referring to?

Well its one of the only games in the series that has a last boss thats actually a challenge. FF5 is the only other game that springs to mind, but that battle is much shorter.
Its not like in FF7 where 1 summon of KOTR can kill the last boss, or FFX where its pretty much impossible to die.

>I thought the idea of using spells to add
> defense/attack/abilities was kind of a cool concept, but was ruined by the
> monotony of having to collect all of those spells.

The junction system rocked, but as i said before, the draw system sucks. Unfortunatley you cant have one without the other.

> I liked the story/characters of 8 as well but it got too far out at the end
> (although the ending itself was good)

Agreed. I remember finishing disc 1 and thinking "this is amazing", but then things just went downhill from there, and once all the time compression shit started it felt more like an episode of star trek then a FF game. But yes, the ending was great, probabley the best in the series.

> 7's story was good as well. I dunno,
> can't say I hate any of 7/8/9's stories, and it's not the major reason why I
> like 9 best, although, out of all of them, 9 has the story that doesn't get so
> crazy near the end, blowing your mind with shit that instead seems out of place.
>
> I like 7/8/9 all a lot, just 9 seems to be perfect in every aspect to me, and I
> can't find fault with it. At least according to my preferences.

To each his own, i just found that very little stuck out about the game compared some of the others. I mostly remember the humour (especially Quina), not much else.

> Don't seem so interested in Xenosaga... they should have just named it something
> else and not hyped it based on Xenogears.

Put it this way, it was 45 minutes for me before i got to make my first save.



http://www.emuchrist.org

> > I've played FF8 but don't notice anything especially cool about the combat,
> what
> > are you referring to?
>
> Well its one of the only games in the series that has a last boss thats actually
> a challenge. FF5 is the only other game that springs to mind, but that battle is
> much shorter.
> Its not like in FF7 where 1 summon of KOTR can kill the last boss, or FFX where
> its pretty much impossible to die.

Ah, yeah heh

> > I liked the story/characters of 8 as well but it got too far out at the end
> > (although the ending itself was good)
>
> Agreed. I remember finishing disc 1 and thinking "this is amazing", but then
> things just went downhill from there, and once all the time compression shit
> started it felt more like an episode of star trek then a FF game. But yes, the
> ending was great, probabley the best in the series.

I liked that the ending in 9 actually had an epilogue, wish the other games had had this, but other than that yeah it wasn't as good as 8's, which is probably the best

> To each his own, i just found that very little stuck out about the game compared
> some of the others. I mostly remember the humour (especially Quina), not much
> else.

Well I guess I didn't give such a good idea about what I like about the characters... Steiner's always wanting to protect the princess attitude was pretty well done and humorous, Cid (frog) when he sent you on that mission to find the potions that in the end do nothing was pretty funny, Zorn and Thorn were odd but good villains that were pretty entertaining and unique. The way they always avoided describing/showing Vivi's physical form was funny, and his unknown origins etc made for a cool story.

I liked that the main character was full of himself and rushed into things, that Vivi was the underdog, Steiner was an ass but he really knew better and was also really good friends with Vivi, it's pretty cool, you saw relationships develop in the group that weren't always revolving around the main character. Bah it was just interesting, heh. The Black Waltz mages were great too. Kuja was well done and had a wicked theme song.

I guess you could argue other FFs have had stuff like this as well. I guess it must just be preference... I must be in the minority though, not everyone seems to hold FF9 in high regard, it seems like out of all of the FFs, it's the most unnoticed.

> > Don't seem so interested in Xenosaga... they should have just named it
> something
> > else and not hyped it based on Xenogears.
>
> Put it this way, it was 45 minutes for me before i got to make my first save.

Guh... well it just doesn't seem as interesting as Xenogears to me anyway, I didn't even play it because the characters looked stupid. I don't feel like I'm missing much and I have too many games to play as it is. I might pick it up in the future or something...

So people assume that it's a sequel.
I don't remember the storylines of either (all of the Mega Man storylines are the same to me, storyline-wise), so I refer to it as a sequel, too.

> So people assume that it's a sequel.
> I don't remember the storylines of either (all of the Mega Man storylines are
> the same to me, storyline-wise), so I refer to it as a sequel, too.

Ah, well I just prefer the style from the older Megaman games compared to X or Zero games (one thing about X that's good is grabbing onto walls though)... None of this other character crap and you got old school Dr Wily and his henchmen robots & the Wily fortress. Not that there's so much wrong with Megaman X but as the series progresses the focus is less on Megaman and Wily is nowhere to be seen. Instead of basing Megaman X on Megaman they should have just used Zero and kept going with Megaman in the other series.

and it's a shame that the X series has been getting assfucked by Capcom for so long. In a way, it's a good thing they haven't been making any more original titles... :(

The good news is there's a Megaman X Collection coming to all current systems, so that should be interesting...

> and it's a shame that the X series has been getting assfucked by Capcom for so
> long. In a way, it's a good thing they haven't been making any more original
> titles... :(

Yeah I agree :/ The anniversary compilation was cool but they didn't give it the treatment it deserved and didn't give gamers what they deserved for being such long time fans and buying all their Mega Man games whether shitty or not.

Fuck I wish they had enhanced the graphics like they did in the Genesis version. Why couldn't they just use those sprites?

It's so much better looking:

Okay I won't list them but I've started piling the books on one of my bookcases. If I don't, I'll uncosciously feel like I have nothing new to read and I'll go raid the Sci-Fi and Business sections of the nearest library. It doesn't help that I'm hooked to a couple of editors that haven't dissapointed me yet (French, "Le Livre de Poche", collection selected and edited by Gerard Klein).

As for games... well... they just stay in my hard drive until some day I find them, play a bit, get bored, and then move to other stuff.

Too much to play/read, so little time...





[download a life]