Psycho Groupie Cocaine Crazy

How long this has gone on for I do not know, but if there are people like me out there who did not know of this before now, then this post is all that they need.

Psychonauts for £5.99 on Steam. Do it now.

Home Update v1.04: Shopping Centre

It's that time again; Home update time! And it brings a whole BUNCH of new stuff!

With an initial update of 13MB (then repeated updates of each space) we now have the chance to expand our wardrobe and furniture, in the form of:

-The Diesel Store - Here there are 17 tops for dudes and 4 for females (wtf? Bit unfair perhaps? Or maybe they assume most girls are guys, therefore will be wearing as little as possible) all pieces at £1.59 each

-The Ligne Roset Store - This is all furniture, so far with 3 new chairs (the first chair being free for some reason, so go grab it quick for now, and the other two being £1.59) and 4 snazzy tables (the first one being free again, the rest -you guessed it- £1.59).

-The Home Threads store - A bunch of stuff has been added to here. For guys there's:

-3 new hats.
-1 new pair of gloves.
-3 new tops.
-3 new trousers.
-3 new boots.
-3 new pairs of glasses.

Same goes for girls, 'cept there's only 1 new pair of glasses, but a new pair of earrings. Also, each group has a piece of clothing of Santa Claus (both male and female). Everything will cost you 59p each, except anything Christmassy, which is 79p.

-Finally on the Shopping Centre front, we have the furniture store, where we haaaave:

-2 new storage units.
-14 new ornaments.

Each costs 59p as per usual, cept the X-Mas tree and the snowman, which are 79p.

And there we go, apart from a couple of Loco Roco 2 adverts and posters, that's all that's been added to the Shopping Centre. New Home Square is being downloaded now, and I'll make another post if/when that's changed!

Your friendly Home lurker, AW.

(and yes I totally bought the santa stuff)

Home

It's like pulling a block out of a Jenga tower. There's always worry and anticipation, possibility for failure and humiliation, but when it goes right? Complete joy.

That's what it feels like in Home right now. After years of development, it's finally released and ready for god knows how many people to flood in thrusting and harassing their way to fame. I was worried that the servers would struggle, Sony never seems to be good at guessing them kind of things, but right now it's all pretty smooth. Octopus is reporting some instabilities, but it could be random, who knows.

Couple of things that we need to point out that are missing:

• Everything

Yeah, so much for the new Square, flying saucer game, and Watchmen trailers, (we already knew the clothes, furniture and game spaces were delayed a week) which were supposed to be as soon as you log in, but SCE must've thought better of it. Knowing them it's either coming tomorrow or next week with the rest of the content (i.e. Red Bull air race) but that's yet to be clarified.

So for you beta testers logging in now, don't be alarmed there's nothing new, but you newbies, go out there, make some friends, dance suggestively (in that order) and have fun.

What can we say? Home, is finally...Home.

Arriving Home

So, you know that bunch of Home invites that were recently sent out?

Guess what tumbled into my inbox at 11:24pm, seconds after I'd gone to sleep?

That's right. I'll see you all in Home.

(Rumour has it the NDA has been lifted, but I don't know the details about that yet. Will find out, then report as much as I possibly can about it.)

AW

Secrets No More

Posting so late on a Saturday night? My god, you barely post at all at the weekends anyway? What gives?

Well this is Octopus here, and I'm up late with some exciting news! Sony Europe held their annual staff briefing at the end of this week (everyone was there - this was why no-one noticed the Home e-mail bug), and I've done some digging to find out what Sony has up its lovingly sackcrafted sleeves.

Firstly, confirmation that there will be PSP versions of both MotorStorm and LittleBigPlanet (the latter of which has only been in development for four months). Expect MS towards the end of next year, and LBP in late 09, early 2010. Fits in to my guessed timeline - PSP2 at E3 2010.

On to PS3 now, and besides hinting at a March price cut, SCEE big boss David Reeves also showed a short teaser trailer for Uncharted 2 (name TBC) with some Aztec masks and a nice explosion. Killzone 2 was briefly teased and God of War III was shown off in such a way that no-one could work out if it was in-game or CGI. There were also murmurs of technological innovations for both PSP and PS3. Finally, Sony has much more planned for the PlayStation Network, but kept schtum on what this entails besides adding online content to Blu-Ray titles.

Hopefully we'll be seeing Uncharted 2 and God of War again at Gamers Day or PlayStation Day, whichever Sony decides to do this Spring. Roll on the next year of PlayStation!

Who Needs Sunshine When You Have Games?

Playing: Beats (PSP). Listening to: Skins OST.

Today was an absolutely gloriously sunny day in the North of South Korea (spoiler: not where I actually live), so I took the opportunity to head outside and ventured into my garden armed with my laptop. Unfortunately, my neighbours had decided not to switch their wireless box on today, so I was denied some Starcraft online action. I sulked for some time, before heading back inside and digging around for a prized possession of mine. And there it was: the Total Annihilation disk.

Now for all of those who don't know, which I assume to be quite a lot of people, Total Annihilation (PC) is another ageing RTS, and is one of my favourite games. Although the title would seemingly suggest the opposite, it is in fact a more tactical affair than the aforementioned 'Craft, and for that reason, makes it a lot more fun if you (like me) enjoy playing the 'long game' in an RTS. Which basically means working through the tech tree and deciding which units are the best for your strategy.

Unlike in Starcraft, where you research your way through the tech tree (a la Age of Empires), in Total Annihilation, things are done a little differently. There are three main types of units: Kbots, Vehicles and Aircraft that apply to most maps (there are also Naval units, and Hovercraft that turn up on occasion). Then, after building a Kbot lab for instance, you use it to create a Construction Kbot, which then can build an Advanced Kbot Lab, which can in turn build an Advanced Construction Kbot. Overuse of the word Kbot, methinks. And no, it doesn't go any higher than that, but this does open up a lot of different units. But getting the Metal and Energy levels to be able to build the advanced units does take some time, hence my favouring of the 'long game', compared to how Starcraft's AI will attack quite quickly, forcing you do build a quick defensive army of low-level units.

Point made: I love Total Annihilation. Moving on, I said I'd have some impressions of my recent PSP acquisitions, and although I haven't got far enough into Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops to form an opinion yet, I will share my thoughts on the PSP-exclusive (until the inevitable PS2 port) God of War: Chains of Olympus. However, this is far from a review, that would be cruel after only a few hours of play, so bear that in mind.

Apart from a brief spell with the GoW1 demo, I have never really played either of the previous God of War games, so no, I don't know any of the back story. But that is irrelevant, because at one point in Chains of Olympus, Kratos turned around and said "What treachery is this?" and I was made happy, forgetting the fact I had no idea what was going on. However, from what I've gathered, Kratos does not at all like being the Gods' bitch, which is understandable really.

Story aside, the gameplay is immense.I've never really been a fan of beat-/slash-em-ups (presumably the reason I haven't played God of War games before), but this is really great fun. The combos are slowly unlocked as you go around collecting red orbs to level up your mad skillz, so you can learn them at your own pace rather than them all being there when you start, which is what makes other fighters too overwhelming for me. Also, the fact you have to balance out your magic usage, blade-swinging and health gives the game an extra depth. There is one major problem though. Random insane difficulty spikes. They are the death of me, literally (well at least in the game). I've already come up against two in my playing, and I'm stuck at another one now. It's not a deal breaker, but it is annoying when they turn up, because they take a hell of a lot of time to get past. At least the loading times are fantastically short, which takes away some potential annoyance.

Now to presentation: the music in the game is top notch orchestral stuff, and so I was mightily glad about that. Sound effects are also great, and the voice acting and animation in the cut scenes is also spectacular. And so I get to the inevitable mention of the game's graphics. And yes, they are amazing; hell, they'd be amazing on PS2, on PSP they are astonishing. The first time I booted up the game to be given a fantastic view of the Persian attack on the Shores of Attica, and it was genuinely a moment of amazement. But one thing I will say is, due to the games use of the full-and-recently-unlocked 333Mhz of the PSP processor to chuck out this graphical awesomeness, the battery life of said console is lowered in comparison to playing other games, although not by too much.

And to the final, deciding factor of a game for me: FUN. I will buy games primarily on how fun they are regardless of graphics/story/anything else, as long as they promise a good time. God of War: Chains of Olympus is one game that has fun in spades, especially for someone new to the series like me. Overall, I feel that my playing of the game so far has shown how much work Ready at Dawn have put into this game, and pretty much the only downer is the annoying difficult spikes. Highly recommended: a solid A rating.

Expect to hear more from me soon, on MGS: Portable Ops, Patapon, SOCOM: Tactical Strike, as well as other games.

FO out.

Jumping Just Isn't Healthy Anymore

I'm finding it harder and harder to find excuses as to why my post count hasn't been rising lately. Already so early in the blogging, let's be dramatic and call it an era, and I'm shunning my responsibilities of supplying you, the loyal reader, with our ever-present, ever-important opinions!

Suuuure, I could blame it on work, or laziness, or even the fragment of a social life that I vigilantly clutch to my chest, but let's be ambiguous and say, no matter how much I toil away trying to find her, my princess is still in another godforsaken castle.

Far be it from me to actually use this blog to tell you about the ongoing mini-struggles that occur in my life; those are for me and my large supply of poptarts to deal with. Instead, I'll only provide you with morsels related to games, movies and things that are fun. Well, unless it's a particularly funny struggle. Then I got your back.

For the second time this year I ventured into the outside with my sights set on seeing another film. My previous outing to see Cloverfield with Octopus was an absolute delight and it's safe to say there was an abundance of enjoyment to be had. Unfortunately for Jumper, the next film I decided to see, this meant that the bar was raised almost as high as the Cloverfield monster itself. Hang on, sorry, I guess that could be considered as a spoiler. For the record, the Cloverfield monster isn't tall at all. I'd even go as far as to say it was of medium height.

Anyway, back on the subject of Jumper, it's safe to say I was not disappointed. Not because Jumper compared to Cloverfield (well to be honest, it could be compared. But that's like comparing a kick to the crotch to being smothered with pure-bred awesome*) but because I never held my expectations very high for it, it ended up surpassing them. Not by much, but enough for me to leave the cinema actually with some sweets left, for I was too impressed most of the time that I couldn't possibly eat.

Let's get down to the actual reviewing though (cue collective groan). Jumper at it's roots is an adventure, 'sci-fi'y film thing based around a kid called David (Hayden Christensen) who suddenly finds he has the power to teleport or 'jump' to any location he wants. There's some people called the Paladins who are just essentially religious extremists, or at least one of them is, thank you Samuel. L. Jackson, trying to kill Jumpers (capitalized of the 'J' to avoid confusion and childish giggling) for having the power of being 'in all places at once', a power only God should have. From then on it's essentially an orgasmic thrill-ride of action and fun, leading characters through emotional journeys with the viewer, ending in a satisfying climax.

Or at least that's probably what it intended to do, but I think some of these ideas got lost in the production, bless 'em. Instead, it was a fun movie to watch, where we got to witness one character's emotional development while the viewer just kind of tagged along, that ended in an adequate conclusion, but altogether leaving me unsatisfied.

There are several niggles I had with the movie, to put it gently. Firstly, there wasn't really much jumping to be had. I don't mean the teleportation kind, I mean the 'bend-your-knees-and-propel-yourself-from-the-ground-a-foot-or-two' kind. Not really the greatest niggle of them all and it's kind of stupid saying this, but when I first heard about the film, my mind had already made up what it's going to be like. It had imagined it to be focused on some sort of kangaroo (because they Jump) who gets into dodgy dealings with the mafia and has to repay his debt by whacking a few guys, but eventually getting emotionally involved with a female kangaroo who is the daughter of one of his targets, altogether ending in an epic decision whether he can choose to follow his heart and not kill her father, or be hunted down by the Australian mafia for the rest of his life. In the outback.

I know I practically just described Kangaroo Jack with guns and a plot line, but once my mind had made itself up, it's hard not to get it to change.

Another niggle I had with the film was with the casting of Hayden Christensen as the main character. For those of you who don't know, Hayden is the actor who played the older version of Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars films, episodes 2 and 3. Yes those ones.

Let me first get this across; I'm fine with the acting that Hayden delivered. I'm not that good of a critic when it comes to these things, but I know he didn't do a bad job of it. I'm sure he also sold a few tickets because of his frustratingly charming good looks. What I'm slightly peeved at is that when you're casting for a character who's got a prominent supernatural power, don't cast an actor who's notorious for previously playing a character with a goddamn prominent supernatural power.

The first time Hayden 'jumped' in the film, the immediate thought that ran through my head was "Wait, hang on. Did he just use the Force? Does that make him a Jedi? Or is he actually a Sith? Does this mean he's going to be using his jumping powers for the good of the Republic? Is that a lightsaber in his pocket? Where's all the other Jedi? Oh God I hope Jar Jar isn't in this." When you're a nerd like I am, it's hard to get over the initial 'omigod its anakin from star warz' train of thought. And when I was finally enjoying the film enough that I could forget about the presence of a Sith Lord, I was already halfway in.

I've a few other niggles, but they'd be spoilers, and I would not want to ruin the film for you. Yes, that's right, I recommend you watch this film. Don't ask me why, as I will not be able to tell you. At least not without a professional delving deep into my psyche.

And before you ask, no, it was not a lightsaber in his pocket, and neither was he just happy to see me.

*Yes, it does exist. You can get it in spreadable form too.
-Aquatic Wanderer