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New Game – Trials Frontier

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Yes it is a freemium title & is stock full of in-app purchases but so far I've managed to play without any paywalls. I've unlocked the second bike 'Tango' & I'm currently upgrading so I can take on Butch.

It has the same one not go appeal of the XBLA games just a shame the leaderboards are UPlay registered. Gamecentre leaderboards would have been better.

You use fuel for each track you race & this replenishes over time. Parts are needed to upgrade bikes which you get from a roulette wheel when completing a track.

A world map unlocks new tracks when you complete various missions.

I've got quite a few silver times but not a single gold yet. I think these will come with more bike upgrades.

Now to go find my UPlay username & password ...

WarioWare DIY: leaving it until the last minute

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As part of my drive to get the most out of Nintendo WiFi Connection before it gets turned off, I've downloaded all the extra puzzles for the Layton games, loaded up games with online leaderboards such as Geometry Wars Galaxies, and played a last few games of Mario Kart DS and Tetris DS.

Deep in the DS pile was WarioWare DIY, which I'd never even unwrapped.  I've no idea why, since I loved all previous games in the series, and the idea of programming your own games seems inspired.  So I started it yesterday, playing through Mona's games, going through the initial game building tutorial, and then wondering how I could unlock all the other characters.  I built my own game (Smash TV, so called because in it you must smash a TV), followed the other tutorial, and still nothing.

This morning I found that you have to wait until the next day for the next character to unlock.  Obviously.

This wasn't a huge problem, though, since I went online last night and downloaded loads of extra games.  Some were built by professional games programmers, others came from the "weekly games" which I understand were generated by users.  I had to download one game at a time, which was dull, but it meant that I could then play loads of games last night with varied levels.

None were as good as Smash TV though.

Completed – Football Chairman

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After winning the Euro Shield & finishing 1st in 76/77 season. The 77/78 season saw Oxford United complete the Quadruple winning all three domestic cups & taking the Champions League.


There is now nothing else left to achieve so I'll walk off into retirement.



Uncharted: it is just a shooting game

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The developers of Uncharted were very clear that they wanted this to be a cover shooter with a bit of platforming thrown in, it seems.  Following the story, Drake has worked out where the treasure is buried, and we've descended down through mausoleums and libraries, using doorways that nobody else has known about.  You'd think this was the perfect opportunity for platform exploration, but no - somehow the enemy have got into these areas as well and continue their work to make Drake die.  It just feels really tenuous.

Something else I notice - when describing this game, I often call the main character "Drake", rather than projecting myself into him.  It's clear that Drake worked out the location of the treasure, since I had no part in it.  Wherever there are puzzles, Drake is the one who finds the correct page in the notebook which give the answer in an obvious way.  When there's a new weapon, Drake is the one who quips about it being a great find.  I'm not - I don't find guns exciting at all.

So when I misjudge a jump, it's Drake who falls to his death, not me.  I feel pretty disconnected, all in all, and as a result I notice inconsistencies in the game world more than I should.  For example, Drake can jump across 30-foot gaps with ease, but struggles to reach ledges a few inches above his head - indeed, he even seems to crouch when he's jumping just so they're out of reach.  When running around the roof of a church, falling off the narrow planks results in instant death, but a similarly large fall elsewhere is fine as long as you hang from the platform.

I'm up to chapter 16 now, of a total of 22.  Given this, I'll push through to the end, but I'm disappointed there's been nothing really new in the last few chapters.  The only difference is with the story and the introduction of two new enemies - a sniper with a laser sight (who drops a pistol, not a sniper rifle), and enemies with bigger machine guns.  I did find a sniper rifle on a crate, but it had only five bullets which makes it massively limited.  The highlight of last night's gaming, in fact, was a chapter where I had to guide a jet-ski upriver, over rapids and avoiding exploding barrels (and, of course, people shooting).

999: completed!

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It was the good ending - I had managed to fulfil all the requirements through the story (more by luck than judgement, I fear), so I found out about the experiments of the past, the identity of Zero, the way that bracelets worked, and the truth behind the multiple doors marked with a 9.  If you're going to play this yourself, don't read any further.

There were many questions left unanswered.  Of course, the whole game ends on a cliffhanger note - where are June and Santa, what was Lotus doing by the side of the road, will the timeline heal itself to allow Akane to live?  Was Akane there the whole time through the story, or was she just imagined?  When she felt faint, was that because Junpei was facing puzzles that might have led to him being unable to get to the incinerator?

Some of the mathematics towards the end of the true ending were a bit of a stretch, as well.  Suddenly moving to base-27 and then converting that to a digital root was very odd.  Revealing that June's bracelet was number nine means that there were two number nine bracelets and no number six - but a convenient O which is six as a digital root.  It felt that after playing the game according to the rules, everything was being broken at the end.

Still, an intriguing game, which shows how videogames can present a story in a way that film or books cannot.