Ol’ Chinatown.

So, since I finished RE5 the other day I’ve been able to spend some more quality time with Chinatown Wars, the new GTA on the Nintendo DS. And I gotta say, its a pretty good game. And I never thought I’d say that about a GTA game… maybe the DS is a magic handheld.

First place to start is the visuals. Even though this entry into the franchise returns to the classic top-down view of GTA, I have to say I love it!! This game captures everything I loved about GTA. And I can’t get enough of it. I think I’m on a measly 40% completion at the moment, and I’ve been playing it on and off over the last few days. Enjoying every moment. Even though the game is top down, you can see its in full 3D. And I think that’s the most impressive thing. They have essentially rendered two of GTAIV’s islands into the DS. And its quite an accomplishment to behold.

The only weakpoint is money. Getting money in this game is so damn easy, I mean, with the drug system its pretty hard to not be filthy rich. Which is good for those who are newer to the franchise. But I feel it makes money more of a expendable thing. Especially since it means even if you get busted all you need to do is deal a few drugs before you can buy back your entire arsenal of weaponry. But if it works, it works.

The new “Wanted” system is a bit strange as well, and another element I am currently uneasy with. This time you have to eliminate a police car for each star you have before you can lose that wanted star. This sounds nice in concept, but speeding along the highway the police will wipe themselves out nearly all of the time, leaving you to just speed on away weaving through traffic watching as your pursuers bite the dust.

More on the game at a later date.

Any Moment Now…

I hear GAME are sitting on their copies of Resident Evil 5 waiting for one of the department retailers to break street date so they can get those copies out on the shelf. The question is: Wh0 will crack first?

Well, let’s have a look shall we.

Gametraders broken Killzone 2’s street date on February 24th.
A mystery retailer broke Street Fighter IV’s street date on February 17th.
K-Mart broke Fable 2’s street date on October 18th.
A mystery retailer broke Spore’s street date on September 2nd.
Online stores shipped out GTA4 ahead of street date on April 25th.
A mystery retailer broke Dawn of War 2’s street date on February 17th.

Now, as we can see from that list, usually one retailer gets antsy in Australia and puts out games with stock they are working. So right now all it is, is a matter of time. It’ll be out later today or early tomorrow are my predictions. Who knows how this will go.

But I’ll post it up here as soon as I know more.

UPDATE: Still nothing. DAMMIT! I’ve been riding the Refresh button on Kotaku and PALGN like crazy too. Leaving in about 40 minutes. Will go and see GAME and post up what they say when I get home.

One Outta Two Ain’t Bad

So I didn’t end up going down to Yahtzee’s conference. To be fair, I couldn’t be stuffed. It would have been cool no doubt about it. But money wasn’t really on my side this week, so it was beyond my expenses.

However, I did play GTA4. And it was fun. Not worthy of all those perfect scores from what I’ve been seeing, but it was fun. Definitely an improvement over the rubbish that is GTA:SA. San Andreas was a big leap into the pit for Rockstar, selling it via controversy. GTA4 brings it back to a reasonable level of controversy.

I found the visuals to be pretty and such, music was typical of an awesome GTA compilation. But underneath it all, it had the same GTA mechanics. I didn’t find doing story mode very interesting at all and mostly stuck to the random car theft and police mayhem.

GTA4 is fun but overrated (as usual)

However, the PS3 itself is sleek and sexy. Can’t wait to pick mine up next month with MGS4.

*hype*

Also, I have finished The World Ends With You and am starting my review tonight. If all goes well it should be up in a matter of hours. At the latest, a couple of days providing my University workload doesn’t weigh me down too much.

The Weekend of Gaming

Somewhat full weekend coming up.

Got The World Ends With You to finish at some point, I think I’m about halfway… expect a review sometime next week if your lucky. On Friday night I’m going over to my friend’s place to play some GTA4 and see just what all this hype is about… I’ll post my thoughts on the game upon my return on Monday.

And probably the biggest (gets its own paragraph) is I’m probably going to see Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw’s conference at GAME ON on Sunday afternoon about “What Makes A Good Video Game” so that’s probably going to be awesome. Let’s see if this opinionated critic has as many good ideas as he enjoys shooting them down. Haha.

But seriously, good weekend lined up.

Although I have to fit my Traditional Cosmologies homework in there somewhere… that won’t be fun.

If I May…

So yeah, its May now. Woo. A non-video game related event (my 21st) is drawing nearer rather rapidly… should probably look into organising something.

So you may be wondering why I’m blogging today. Well having overcome severe frustration I finally unlocked the last two characters on Mario Kart Wii! Huzzah!! However, that doesn’t mean I’m done, there are star rankings to get on cups and more expert staff times to unlock if I want all the karts and bikes. But does that really concern me at the moment? No… not really. But truth be told, I’ve found myself bored of Mario Kart, even of its online. So for the first time in a week, Brawl graced my Wii once again and its found its home there.

Sorry Mario Kart, having better online doesn’t beat out a game that is just plain more fun (plus it can actually be fair) in the long run.

Seriously, it is almost like Nintendo were setting out to eliminate skill needed in video gaming with this installment. Items have been bad in previous games but in this one they are just plain shocking!

Coming first on the final lap, about to cross the finish line. Brace yourself as you are likely to be hit by several blue/red shells or some other annoying item that will knock you down. Its even worse if its a close race as you can easily fall from 1st way back to 8th. A such example was I’d just been hit by a blue shell, knocked me down a couple of ranks. Then as I was recovering I was hit by a Red Shell, knocked me down another couple. And then to top it off someone with a Star drove straight through me.

To Hell with items!

Yahtzee hated Brawl. Well I’d hate to see what he’d say about this game. My God, about twenty times worse in lack of skill needed AND in annoyance of obtaining unlockables.

But still, a fun game to have out when a party is happening.

Brawl is better though.

Wii Fit is nearing release down under, ads are popping up everywhere and its getting a lot of marketing time over here. I’m actually interested to see what will sell better down under. GTA4 or Wii Fit. Both have different audiences, both are guaranteed big sales.

It’s going to be an interesting race. I like neither games, but in the end I’m supporting GTA4. Real games are too good to resist, however I do not detest Wii Fit’s target crowd. I just think it’d be better in the long term to just get a gym membership.

Adios.