Stanfords Finest

As a poor student I once was marooned in Chester for a summer. This being the grim naaarth I had nowt to do but wander the streets entertaining myself with only a black and white Gameboy for company. I would go into the second hand shops and buy random carts in the hope that one would throw up some kind of classic gaming action. Alas, it wasn’t to be and all were complete and utter rubbish. As the Gameboy was almost an obsolete format at this time there were many carts to choose from and I placed myself in the shoes of somebody who had say 30 quid to spend on one game and how they would view their purchase. When I get the same game for pounds then I have a different perspective and I can more or less throw the thing away when I discovered how bad it was whereas if you save all month for the same title you stick with it in the hope it’ll get better. Tenchu: Dark Secret on the DS is one of these games. I am sure there are people that have bought this (for a reputed $50 in the US) and are persevering with it hoping it will get better but they would be kidding themselves. I love a stealth-em-up like the next man and have always had a yearning to play this on the PS but I never got round to it so I was pleased when it arrived on the DS. The PSP version looks very good indeed (more-or-less a straight port I think) so I was hoping for good things. (more…)

What is the best game in the world ever? Any fule will have a story to tell but I tell thee this and you should believe me when I say that Advance Wars Dual Strike is the best game ever made. Ever. Yes, there is this game and that game but for sheer depth, replayabilty and addictiveness nothing else really comes close. I lost my PSP on the plane to Bangkok last Christmas which is a lesson to anyone thinking it is a good idea to get pissed up in the free bar in business class – there is a downside mine being that my broken PSP is now in the hands of some poor air stewardess and her family. Fair play to them and that broken piece of shit. Enjoy. Anyway, being as I was now gameless I had few options open to me in the ‘’portable gaming’’ stakes – was it to be another PSP or back to the DS that I had run down on these pages little under a year ago? Well, seeing as my main criteria was PORTABLE gaming then there was really only one choice – a DS. Say what you like about the graphics and games when it comes to practicality and portability then DS is the only choice. My PSP broke after too much travel because the widdle drive cannot take any kind of stick and had bust and the more I think about it the more I can see the PSP is a rushed prototype that I am sure will be much better than the first incarnation once the PSP2 is launched in the future. Also, in my defence I did have the original DS and the new model is very sexy and small and so damn practical. All this plus the ability to zipped .nds files from the interweb via the R4 card. Lovely jubbly. By the way the PSP is the same price as DS here so there were no financial constraints here only gaming and practical reasons for the purchase. (more…)

When I switched on my PSP just now it had a new feature I was previously unaware of; Dualshock. I thought that Sony had neglected this feature but no, just now whilst inserting a UMD the whole thing started vibrating. Not only that but a low pitched hhhhmmmmm as the disc spun round. So less than six months on and after me eulogising my cock off about the PSP being far superior I have now been made to look a bit of a twat as my PSP has just gone and broke on me. (more…)

We are judged on our actions rather than our words. I can tell you about what I intended to do when I moved here and how I was going to learn the language, play Mahjong and take up Dragon Boat racing but it’s all just yada yada yada. One of the first things I actually did after being here for a week or so was to track down the surprisingly hard to find video game ground zero of Hong Kong. Next to food, water and housing seemingly the most important thing on my priority list was to find out where all the computer games be at. I was under the illusion that when I got here that I would be surrounded by games all of the night and all of the day but it wasn’t to be and there are only a very small amount of stores selling a very small amount of games in the shopping areas of Hong Kong. I knew that there had to be somewhere where I could find better product and judging by the amount of people playing PSPs on the MTR there was obviously a market out there so where did they go?

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I was passing HMV and saw this going for £15 so I said YES! As soon as it was in my hands I ran all the way home and slotted it in the back of my PSP like a crackhead with the first rock of the day. Similar to when you buy a new jazz mag, it was difficult to know where to start or finish especially when the line up consisted of 720, Gauntlet, Spy Hunter, Super Sprint and Paperboy…oh man. Incidentally, I seem to remember some of these titles being Atari games or am I just going a bit senile? Who knows or cares but I started with my ex-lover; Spy Hunter.

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When the third Grand Theft Auto came out years ago for the PS2 I was talking to my then work colleague about the game. He asked me if it was good and I said it was the best game I have ever played with such conviction he probably thought I was bit of a twat. He bought it anyway during his lunch hour. The next day he said it was the best game he had ever played with the same conviction. (more…)

The Kids have it so easy. Back in the days when Hip Hop was Hip Hop and computer games were new and exciting it was almost impossible to find out what was happening in each respective “scene”. I’m talking late 80’s and there was NO coverage of hip hop in the UK. Nothing. Zilch. The only way we, the kids, could find out what was happening in Hip Hop was via Tim Westwood’s Capital Rap Show which was on between the prime time hours of 2am and 4am every Friday night. There were no magazines, millions of intercunt sites, 24 hour specialist TV stations or radio, not counting Tim of course. The same could of been said of computer games. Although the art of the veejo game is still shunned on mainstream TV there are now specialist shows on satellite and there are more mags and books and interweb sites than you can shake a Konix Joystick at. For both genres all the bases are covered a thousand times everyday.

As gamers we survived on one magazine, Computer and Video Games, to bring us arcade and multi-format news. The other magazines were great for computer games but there was no arcade or console news so we were largely fucked on that front. Arcades for me had their magic years in the late 80’s and early 90’s. This was when Sega was at its prime and arcade games looked like the works of gods compared to our monochrome speccy graphics. I could only worship for the odd couple of hours once or twice a month or until my 10p’s ran out. Entering the arcades was ecstasy and I would stand and watch the Out Run and Space Harrier machines shunt all over the shop as they chewed 10p after 10p. Each visit to the arcades was like a journey to paradise and once our money was done we would come away with nothing but memories. With this in mind you can imagine how precious the gift that came with one issue of C+VG was – a tape of the Out Run and 720 arcade game music. To play the tape would invoke all the memories of being “there” and having this object created some tangible link to the arcade game we were still playing in our minds. I found this tape the other day – somehow it has remained with me and I am so glad. Just looking at it makes me feel good. So here it is, to be forever immortalised on the interspazz that The Kids take for granted. Enjoy.

I had my DS for a year. It’s dead now. I sold it on Ebay. We did have fun together but it was time to move on. The moment of clarity was during Mario 64 DS – good, if uncontrollable, version of the 64 classic. I suddenly wondered why I was playing a portable N64 game. It was for nostalgic reasons and although Nintendo did try their best to add more features it was a 10 year old game. There are many games for the DS that are great but all are largely rendered unimpressive due to the ickle screen. Metroid looked good but what is the point when the screen is too small for the game. When the DS was launched it was going to change the way games were designed due of the Dual Screens. It didn’t of course. Developers put all the action in one screen and then shoved a map or other peripherical feature on the other. I gave it a chance and willed Zoo Tycoon to be a game to get my teeth into but I found it to be so bad as to be played once. So I flogged the whole thing and went with the PSP. It couldn’t be any worse could it?

The PSP is better than a DS. Better graphics, sound, screen and games. Yes games. Of course you can’t get a dog simulation on a PSP but then it depends which demographic you are. I’m not in the 12 year-old-girl camp. There is one simple marker to judge a console – a decent footy game. DS had none. PSP has two and one of which is Pro Evolution Soccer. I don’t care if I can’t shout into a microphone or draw a cock on the screen but I do wish to lead England to victory against the Hun. The PSP won’t bark at another PSP but it does let me manage Southend United. I can’t collect coins or mushrooms but I can shoot terrorists in Iraq. I can even be a John courtesy of GTA.

The PSP does have a number of faults of course – 6 hour battery life, memory cards and loading times but all are worth it and are exaggerated in most reviews I have read. I do miss the instant feel of the DS and I wish I could sling the PSP in a bag but these are minor points. I have experimented with my two lovers and I’ll take my gobby, over-reaching Sony over the safe but boring DS. That’s Essex for you.