No more feeling guilty when you hand the video clerk a copy of “Disney Universe”

With my recent console dilemma I was stuck with PS3 games from Gamefly yet no PS3 to play them on. I only have a handful of games for the 360 so I wanted something new to play for a little bit to tide me over until Gamefly can send me a 360 game. Enter the Redbox. I had never used one before, and Netflix has always fulfilled our movie needs just fine. Now that Redbox offers games too I figured I would finally give the service a whirl.

In case you don’t know, Redbox is a giant vending machine located in certain grocery and pharmacy stores that dispenses movies and games. You select your title, slide your credit card through, and they pop the disc out for you to take home. You have until 9:00pm the next day to return it and only pay one day charge ($1.20 for movies, $2.00 for games). If you keep it longer it’s an additional days charge per day. The really neat thing I discovered is that you can go onto their website and see what each kiosk offers, as each one not only has a few different titles but you can also see which discs are available and which are currently being rented. You can even rent a disc off their website and have it reserved so you can pick it up later!

So at 8:00 this morning I jumped online and looked at what each of the four kiosks within a five-minute drive from my apartment had available. The closest one to me was at a Food Lion grocery store, but they didn’t have anything that jumped out at me. I did see that the second Harris Teeter down the road (there are two about three minutes apart) had Saints Row the Third available on the 360, so I drove down there and had my first Redbox experience. It’s very simple, just push on-screen buttons to choose your discs, complete your order, slide your credit card, and out come the discs in nice plastic cases. So for $2.00 I have this game from about 8:15am today until 9:00pm tomorrow for only $2.00.

Now to see what all this “penetrator” talk is all about

Mind you, I don’t think this is a substitute for Gamefly. It is cheaper in the end to rent from Gamefly and they have a heck of a lot more choices. But if you want a new title to try out for a night or two while waiting for Gamefly to ship something, I highly recommend hitting up the local Redbox kiosk.

I’ve been pretty busy the past two days, and that will only continue to the weekend. Yesterday I went down to my parent’s to help my Dad stack up some winter wood (ended up being two cords worth…which averages between 2000-4000lbs a cord depending on the wood. I also went shopping with my Dad and helped him pick out a new HDTV, and then went back to their house to install it. I also lugged some loot from our apartment and my parents house to Shell’s Dads house to prepare for tomorrow’s garage sale.

Today was a lot more prepping for the trip down to Shell’s Dads house. I also ended up doing the weekly grocery shopping this morning since we will be gone all weekend.

And tomorrow is the big day. We’ve been planning this garage sale for awhile now, and I’m looking forward to finally getting it over with. We have tons of junk to unload on whoever wants it, including plenty of DVDs, CDs, and even some of my old video games, not to mention a crud load of clothing and other stuff. It runs from 8-4, so by the end of the day I know I’m gonna be exhausted. We’re staying over her Dad’s tomorrow night also, and then heading home later in the day on Sunday.

All I know is that I miss my games!!!!!!!!

So this documentary is basically about two guys who compete for the high score in the arcade version of Donkey Kong. While I thought it would be interesting to see “professional” gamers go at it, I quickly realized the kind of people that play games professionally are vain, inconsiderate, arrogant, and all-around losers. Let me introduce the two main players in the game.

Above is the defending champion, Billy Mitchell. This mullet-toting weirdo has been known as one of the best gamers ever due to his high score in Donkey Kong. He enjoyed a simple life of selling hot sauce by day and being a gaming ambassador by night. However, this arrogrant prick is exposed as the jerk he is when a newcomer challenges his score.

Steve Wiebe is the challenger. After getting laid off, he decides the smart move is to purchase a Donkey Kong arcade machine, place it in his garage, and spend his life practicing and mapping out the patterns of the game, so that he memorizes when to make which moves. Doing this causes him to ignore his wife and kids, which is apparent when the one kid runs into the garage while he is playing and shouts “wipe my butt daddy!” So what does this father-of-the-year candidate do? He gets mad and ignores the kid as he keeps his attention to trying to reach a high score.

So the documentary basically follows Wiebe’s quest to conquer Mitchell’s high score. As you watch, you see how annoying these people actually are. Wiebe gets a high score on his home arcade and submits an video of it. Mitchell claims it cant be accepted since its his own arcade, so he could have tampered with it and cheated. Mitchell even has friends go to Wiebe’s house, where they basically break into his garage, tear apart his arcade machine, and snoop around his garage looking for proof of tampering. So then Wiebe goes to “neutral ground” at an arcade and invites Mitchell to come and defend his title. Mitchell refuses to come. Wiebe tries the same thing months later at another arcade. Mitchell refuses to show again, yet has his friends give him up to the minute news of how Wiebe is doing, and you see Mitchell’s friends trying to get pressure on Wiebe to mess him up as he plays. Wiebe succeeds in beating Mitchell’s high score on a neutral arcade machine, and it is accepted by the official video game high score agency, Twin Galaxies. However, to prove what a jerk Mitchell is, he then submits a video of himself beating Wiebe’s new high score, which is retarded since he originally disputed Wiebe’s video high score.

I think the biggest thing I got out of this documentary was that professional gamers are jerks. While I love playing games, it is a hobby, and nothing more. I would never let it run my life the way it has done to the losers in the documentary. These people put their need to have a high score come before their families, friends, and personal life. I mean, Wiebe is a middle school teacher, and yet he puts his planning and such aside so that he can go home and play Donkey Kong. You really see how games have altered their lives, and shaped them into being jerks. While Wiebe appears as a simple loser who puts games first, Mitchell is portrayed even worse, being an arrogant baby who would die if his precious name was no longer #1 on the Twin Galaxies website. I mean, come on, its just your name on a screen…who gives a crap?! What kind of life is that, where you neglect your wife and kids so that some other nerds will look up to you and buy you a Coke when you go to an arcade?!

The documentary was very enjoyable and entertaining, as I had a blast cursing out the losers on the screen. In my opinion, Billy Mitchell does have the high score…of being a deuche bag!

So Steve recently got me into Cyber Citizens, which is a add-on of sorts to Cyber Nations. Cyber Citizens is a free to play browser game which uses google maps. Basically, you move your citizen about the main city of your choice (I play in NYC), and do stuff. Your citizen can get a job from companies run by other players, and then use those funds to purchase stat upgrades from shops run by other players. For example, you can get a job creating pizzas (which are used to increase your nourishment level) and then take that money to purchase vitamins (which increase your energy or strength rating.)

A big part of the game is combat with other players as well. If you are in range of a player on the map, you can choose to attack them. The game takes both players health, happiness, energy, and strength into account for the battle, which gives the stronger character the advantage. The chance of winning is based on how much stronger one player is than another. By attacking other players you steal their money and items, which are pretty much equipment which give increases to certain stats (video games = happiness, weights = strength). However, if you spend too much time attacking other players, you will have a warrant issued for your arrest, after which cops (who are players) or bounty hunters (any player) can attack you and attempt to bring you to jail.

All in all, its a pretty good game, and has proven to be a good waste of time. If you decide to join, use my referral code here, so that I can get some in-game bonuses. I look forward to seeing some fresh meat in there so I can beat you up and steal your stuff!

Today was the 20th anniversary of the U.S. release of the Sega Genesis. Since Im writing this, you are correct to assume that I owned a Sega Genesis back in the day. My first console was the NES, and eventually it was time to upgrade. I had two choices…the SNES or the Genesis. I dont remember why, but in the end the Sega won. I loved my Sega, until the day I replaced it with a PS1. Talk about brand loyality! However, I was happy with the PS1, and have since not strayed, still rocking my Ps2 and PS3. But I digress.

Sega was sweet. I remember how sharp and beautiful I thought it was, especially the original Sonic games. Sega had quite a few awesome multiplayer games such as  Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, and that cowboy shooting game I always forget about (not MadDog for the Sega CD, the cool side-scrolling one.) I also loved Road Rash, and they freakin’ NEED to make a new version of that for the next-gen consoles. WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU WAITING FOR EA?!?!?!

Then came the six-button controller, and I had a blast using that with Street Fighter II, the BEST fighting game ever made. I popped sooo much time into that game. Oh yeah, there was also that Eternal Champions fighting game, which was weird. It was a neat premise, but I remember it being REALLY slow, like all the characters were extremely groggy.

I also had a collection of Disney games, both because I liked Disney when I was younger (and I still do dammit) and because of my younger sister. We both played those games, like Aladdin and Lion King. I remember when she would play to a certain point where she got stuck, then I would take over and get her past a level or two, then she would play again. The ol’ pass-and-play. Oh, and we also used to play the crap out of NBA Jam. That game was the shizzle back then. Someof my all-time favorite catchphrases from a video game are “He’s Heating Up”,  “He’s on Fire!” and “The Nail in the Coffin!”

So yeah, I had some great experiences with my Sega. Once again, I dont know what made me choose the PS1 over the Dreamcast, but I think I made a good choice, and dont regret it. In memory of today, I will pop in some Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection on my Ps3 and rock through some games.

So as many of you may know, I recently purchased my first smart phone (BlackBerry), so I had to prepare for the increased monthly bill to compensate for the internet usage and whatnot. My plan was to cancel my old phone’s insurance, drop down my text plan, and to cancel Gamefly, in order to kind of break even.

Well, I dropped the insurance and texting, but not Gamefly.

My Gamefly account renews on the 8th of each month. So on August 7th, I sadly went to Gamefly’s site to cancel my subscription. When I clicked “Im sure I want to cancel”, it took me to a new screen with an amazing offer. Basically, they said “Hey, give us another chance. We’ll only charge you $8.99″. I was paying $15.99, so this was a steal. I was tempted for mere seconds before giving in to the savings. Plus, I had not finished InFamous yet, and was sad that I was getting ready to send it back without beating it.

So anywho, Im keeping Gamefly for an additional month. But I wonder how often I will be offered this $8.99 deal. For example, if I go to cancel come September, will they give me this awesome offer once again? Im curious, but I can definitely swallow $9 more than $16.

On a side note, I had a suggestion that I submitted to them numerous times via e-mail and surveys. $15.99 is expensive for their lowest plan. I suggested they do something similar to what Netflix does. We have the $8.99 deal, which is one movie out at a time for an unlimited number of movies a month. However, that is not Netflix’s lowest price. I believe the lowest is $4.99, and it is also one movie at a time…however, the catch is that you can only do it twice a month. I think Gamefly should do this. I can see them creating a $9.99 plan in which you get one game at a time, but only get a maximum of two games a month. Its more affordable, and I wouldnt have to keep being a jerk and cancelling and then renewing Gamefly as my financial stability shifts.

Either that, or mommy and daddy need to get me a years subscription to Gamefly for Christmas this year…

I beat the game last night, and then played a bit more of the online co-op with Steve, so now its on its way back to Gamefly.

I was tempted to purchase it. It was a very fun game. The campaign mode was great, and was supported with an awesome storyline and combat system that actually made you “feel” like a Ghostbuster. The online mode was differentiated enough to warrant many playthroughs, as the random modes and maps made each round unique.

However, in the end, there were a few things that stopped me from making the purchase. First and foremost, I was not keen on dropping $40 for a game. But also, I was a bit disappointed at times with the campaign. For starters, why the heck not make it co-op. For about 95% of the game there is always another character on the screen with you. Just make it so that someone else can play as him. If the campaign did have co-op, I would have made the purchase without a second thought.

Also, the campaign mode was very short. It was a bit too quick to get through, and only had something like five stages (I forget exactly how many). While it was an awesome story, it could have been longer. Thus, the lack of co-op and a short playthough make the game, to me, have a low replay value. While the co-op mode is interesting, it is not expansive enough to warrant making the purchase solely on that.

For example, with Resistance 2, there is the single player campaign, and the co-op consists of several different missions across something like five maps. So even if the campaign sucked (which it somewhat does, compared to the first Resistance), the co-op is so awesome and the replay is so high that it warrants a purchase just for the co-op. Unfortunatley, Ghostbusters does not fit into this catagorey, so while the co-op is fun, it is not fun enough to convince me to purchase the game.

So I want to take this time to thank the Ghostbusters game. For about two weeks it instilled me with a lot of fun times, both online and offline, with myself and with friends. And Im sure that if I happened to walk into Gamestop sometime in the very far future and find a copy for $20 or so, I will most definitely pick it up. But for right now, it is my sad opinion that Ghostbusters does not warrant purchase. There are other games with higher replay values out there that should be purchased in its stead.

Dont take this the wrong way though. Ghostbusters is an awesome experience, and should not be missed. So go out and rent it, or if you have some extra cash squirrelled away, then go out and buy it. Its not a game you can hate, but one that may leave you a tad disappointed, as there were such little, simple things that could have been included to make it the game of the year.

So I put about an hour into the game so far, so heres a quick thought on it.

First off, I like it. I think the graphics, voice acting, and everything else is presented in a great way, which I think does reflect, to a degree, the Ghostbusters.

The single player gameplay is of course the heart of the game. You play the new Ghostbusters recruit, so you run around with the four other guys. I didnt like this idea at all. First off, you’re not even given a name. When they attempt to introduce your character, Venkman jumps in and says, “I dont want to know any names.” I thought this was very lame. I dont see why you couldnt just alternate between playing one of the four Ghostbusters, since your character is always paired up with at least one of them.

Now as for the gameplay itself. Obviously, you are busting ghosts. You use the main proton gun to weaken the health of the ghosts. Once they are weakened enough, the beam switches to a containment beam, which acts as a lasso. You can then whip the ghosts around the room, slamming them into the environment to further weaken them. Once they are weakened enough, you can throw down a trap, direct the ghost over the trap, and then direct him into the trap. To break up the ghost catching, at times there are general enemies which you will just have to blast until you destroy them.

Also, you spend a lot of time ghost hunting. You need to use the PKE meter to track a ghost down. For example, at times ghosts are hiding in objects or something, so you have to scan it with the PKE meter in order to flush them out so you can start busting them. You also use the PKE meter to scan the environment to get data on the ghosts, as well as unlockables and other bonus content. As you bust ghosts and such, you get money, which can be used to purchase upgrades for your beams and traps.

A few things I’d like to whine about. First, is the lack of a save point. Not so much that I cant save manually whenever I want, or that I need to find a place to save the game, but the fact that I dont know when the game is saving at a checkpoint. Thus, if Im playing, and I want to finish, I dont know when its safe to turn the game off, because I dont know where the last checkpoint was.

I also found the ghosts to be somewhat of a pain in the butt. They will charge you and knock you down, and the thing is that they do it so fast, with little warning. In most games, you can get a sense of a pattern or something, so you know when an enemy will attack. But not here, you will find yourself knocked to your ass several times out of nowhere.

Overall, its fun, and Im enjoying it. Its definitely got a staying power, and I’ll hold onto it until I at least complete the single player campaign. Hopefully at some point I’ll get to check out the online multiplayer modes.

I’ll pop up a fuller review later on, but so far the game is awesome.

Well my plan worked. I sent Far Cry in about two weeks ago, and then removed all games from my Gamefly queue except Ghostbusters. The plan worked…I came home from class today to find an awesome e-mail in my inbox informing me that I would be busting ghosts in about two days.

Needless to say, Im excited. I’ll have a review later this week (probably Friday) after I get to play it some.