Friday, July 28, 2006

Ham-Ham Wrap Party

I stayed up late last night to fulfill my goal of the week - to finish Hamtaro's Ham-Ham Heartbreak! And with the exception of a couple of minor items I did.

I'm not sure what drove me to finish this game. Part was the really cute hamsters, part was the little ham-chat moves they did, but mostly it was a fun story to follow that never got so hard as to be frustrating. I knew that if I just kept coming back that I'd be able to complete it and that isn't something that I feel about most games.



(*** SPOILER ALERT! ***)



I did think it was odd that the game "ended" (in the sense that the credits rolled) before the game was really done. While I had beaten Spat (who turned into a Harmony look-alike lol), not all the Ham-hams were happy. One was still in the Spat Tower locked room! When I did get the final couple together (tip: have 2 glass beads by the end), I was treated to a quick glimpse of each of the couples I had helped. That little wrap-up summary and Harmony's "blessing" on the last couple (Hamtaro and Bijou)...well, let's just say that sad things aren't the only reason for tears. Kudos to the design team! And how do they come up with such sweet music for game endings?!?!

Thank you, Hamtaro, for a truly memorable experience! I'm looking forward to the next one (coming sometime late this year?) and I think I'll have to revisit the original GBC game.

Monday, July 24, 2006

Monday update...since I was out on Friday

Actually got through a few games this week.

FFXI and DSII continue. We got the Tele-Yoaht and Tele-Dem scrolls this week as well as a bit of leveling. While fairly easy, DSII is proving to be a very enjoyable game. There's more strategy involved during battles than DS - you can't all just bunch up and whack stuff till it dies. If you don't retreat when necessary, your party members lie in a pile and are killed again as soon as they stand up. Only downside is that our levels are under what all the special rooms require. Shows us what our levels would be if we were playing single player (but it wouldn't be much fun).

Hamster madness continues.

Played 3 Xbox racing games over the weekend. Two of them are going up on eBay this week - Forza Motorsports and Toca Race Driving 2. They should just put "Steering Wheel Required" on the boxes. I wasn't able to stay on the track for half a lap with these using the standard controller. I've played HOURS of Burnout games on this same controller on the Xbox and haven't had anywhere near the kind of problems I had with these. However, I was very pleasantly suprized to see how good NFS:HP2 is. Either they copied Burnout or vice-versa. Only difference is NFS isn't about crashing, it's about getting away from the cops. One thing I don't understand is why they didn't use the Xbox controller's triggers. Must have been a direct PS2 port.

Got to play a couple of hours of Stubbs the Zombie. I really enjoyed eating the brains of hapless civilians and police, turning them into my army of the dead, but I couldn't help feeling like the game wasn't quite finished. There were a few points where scenes changed a little too abruptly, making me think they were planning some kind of boss battle or something and didn't have the time or money to do it. But I'm not complaining - it was alot of fun!

Tried Polarium on DS and it's joining the racing games in looking for a new home. Why would someone make a game for a system with 2 color screens that only uses black and white tiles? And this is the first game that I've played that I couldn't understand what the tutorial was trying to teach me! (Update: After talking to a friend at work who has played it, I'm going to give it another try. Might as well - isn't work spit on eBay. :P )

Lastly, I just made (barely), my goal of getting F.E.A.R. installed and tried out this week. Great game - and it looks really good on my new flat screen. ;) Only drawback of games like this is that since I played the demo, I'll have to replay those same areas during the first part of the game. Oh, well.

Next weeks goal: Finish Ham-Ham Heartbreak!

Friday, July 14, 2006

Another Friday update....1 month plus later

I didn't mean for these posts to be so far apart, but shortly after the last post I had a fairly life-changing event happen and am just now getting back to a new kind of normal. I'll write about that in my other blog after I add the keyword "diabetes" to my profile. :P

As for what I played this week, one thing hasn't changed...still playing that damn hamster game! I got badly stuck this week and had to resort to an FAQ. Who knew you needed to ram other hamsters to get important info? I must be getting close to done. There's only one area I haven't opened up and my meter is nearly full. Then I think I'll start a shorter game...like Pokemon!

Also played the opening bit to the original SiN (that still sounds wierd). I remember (and still have) the game when it came out. I think I stopped playing it because a) it ran like crap on my computer, and b) I kept killing the civy's.

Just got my second DS today - the first one was returned due to a stuck pixel on the top screen. This one will get checked this evening for any problems. Got it with a TMNT game which I didn't particularly care about, but it was only $10.

Haven't updated my "games purchased" page for weeks (same reason as above) but I don't think I really need it anymore. Basically I wanted to see what my buying habits were and it pretty much boils down to 3-4 games a week. Some weeks I go nuts and others I don't get any. Instead I've been working on a master list of all my games. I've come really close (and sometimes beyond close) to getting games I already have. This way I have something to check. I've even added stuff like on Xbox games if they are compatible with the 360. Kinda cool.

Project for next week: Get F.E.A.R. installed and play some.