the 16-bitter

Those who know me and know my writings won't think this list is that much of a departure. The PS3 has been giving me chills for the longest time, and it is very unsettling to know that a console maker has completely lost sight of the gamer in the process of dominating all forms of media. I hope the gaming population is as fed up with Sony's crap as I am, so they'll finally take a hint and butt out of the industry.

8. No must-own titles
Very few consoles actually pull this one off at launch, but at this moment I don't see anyone spending $600 to throw down on Resistance. The launch-lineup was particularly weak for the PS3, and games aren't coming out fast enough to keep gamers interested. Many people purchase the PS3 in anticipation of a few titles, namely Metal Gear Solid 4 and Final Fantasy MCVILLIXXCMVII or what not, but as we're going to find out, many third party developers, even ones who have been true to Sony in the last two generations, aren't going with the PS3. So far, the only title worth anything is Resistance, and I'm afraid that's not going to be enough to push consumers to empty their wallets. Perhaps one will come soon, but for now, early adopters of the PS3 are the unlucky ones.

7. Installs
One of the benefits of console gaming over PC gaming was that there was never an install necessary to play and enjoy a game. Just pop the disc in, and you're off. Not so with the PS3. Sure, you have the option in every case that's appeared so far, but when the alternative is a poor loading speed I bet many gamers will choose to take up a bit of their hard drive to play a more efficient Ridge Racer. The problem is, even if you are able to sell a kidney to afford the "budget" model of the PS3 with the 20 gig hard drive, the installs are around 5 gigs themselves. So you can only play four games without horrible loading times before you either have to do an install or buck up and wait for the game to load. The 360, on the other hand, needs no reason to have installs, as its DVD drive is faster than the PS3's Blu-Ray drive by almost double, and the 360 has more ram to store whatever data is coming in. So, while 360 users can fill their hard drive with music, movies, and retro game downloads, PS3 owners will find that they're managing hard drive space a little tighter.

6. Backward-compatibility problems
As racketboy just illustrated, the PS3 is having some graphical problems when playing PS2 and PSX games. Apparently the PS3 upscales the graphics, but somehow in the process the PS3 brings out the worst in it's older sister. Jaggies, which have been a 'problem' with Sony's hardware in the past, are brought out in full swing. In fact, they look horrible. It's amazing that Bleem! and Bleemcast! were able to make PlayStation games look better, where Sony themselves overlook this major feature of thier new system.
Apart from graphical issues, apparently the PS3 is selective in its backward-compatibility-ness. Feel free to correct me with more current news I might've glazed over, but last time I checked, 200 or so games from the PS2 catalogue have been overlooked, and won't play on the PS3. While this is completely better than the Xbox 360's monthly backward-compatibility updates, it still isn't how Sony pushes it.

5.The Sixaxis controller
Perhaps playing catch-up to Nintendo in the realm of controllers caused Sony to overlook what makes traditional controllers good: They have weight, to ensure that you can hold onto them; and they don't hurt you. The Sixaxis controller is too light, enough to make it feel cheap. Cheap to the point that spending $50 USD for a new one seems insane. And the weight also affects how well you're able to hold onto it. While playing the demo unit at my local Best Buy, it slipped out of my hands... Twice. And I wasn't getting down with NBA '07 so much that I would knowingly toss it around in a bout of fury. The triggers are what hurt. For some reason, Sony figured that they better hop onto the trigger wagon with this console, but they executed it horribly. Instead of the triggers nicely disappearing into the controller for pinch-free gaming, the triggers are just flaps. There even is a visibly underside to the triggers, which has been absent since the first trigger (the Saturn 3D controller) probably to protect from pinching. Other than that, I found my fingers slipping off of the triggers, as they're flat and not rounded off, and when the trigger's fully pressed it's at an angle at which it's nearly impossible to keep it pressed. And no rumble? Please. Believe it or not the controller can and does make or break a console.

4. The PS3... isn't a great system
I'm talking about specs, here. To PS3 fans, and to Sony, the PS3 is probably the best system available. What, with 6 or so processors, HD compatibility and a Blu-Ray drive, what could be missing? Well, RAM for one thing. How does Sony and its fans think that 20 thousand vertices, 800 detailed texture maps, character controls, game engines, and the operating system all to be running in 512 Megs of RAM? Well, not very well, apparently. Perhaps Marvel: Ultimate Alliance's developers overlooked some of the 'finer coding' necessary to make a decent PS3 port, but this video illustrates what a straight port to the PS3 will look like for the next few years: Shit. The framerate is something to gasp over. Other than the RAM issue, the Blu-Ray drive reads at a pittly 9.0 Mbps. This, of course, in contrast with the other 'graphics intensive' platform, the 360, whose DVD drive reads at 16.0 Mbps, a whole 2 Mbps short of being double that of the PS3's Blu-Ray drive. What does this all mean? The Blu-Ray can feed little over a half the information to the PS3 that the DVD drive can to the 360 in the same amount of time. So, the long and short of it is, sure, the PS3 can handle more processes at a time than the 360, but it is bottlenecked by the comparatively slow uptake of the Blu-Ray drive, especially when coupled with the limited amount of RAM the unit has. The PS3 is simply not as powerful as Sony would have everyone believe, and as far as performance goes, the 360 is faster, stronger, better.

3. Lack of 3rd party support
Namco announced a few weeks ago that it would take sales of over 500,000 units on a specific game for them to make any sort of profit from developing games for the PS3. If this is true, then it would take 100,000 more units sold than last generation's "Greatest Hits" to make a profit. If that isn't enough, the SDK is notoriously hard to work with, and is the most expensive to buy of the current generation. On top of that, even, is the announcement that Sony might be charging games developers to host demos of their games on the PS3's download service. And knowing Sony, it isn't going to be a paltry sum. We have news, nearly every other week, telling us that this or that game isn't going to be a PS3 exclusive, or these companies aren't going to make many Sony exclusives anymore. It's too early to really tell what effect this will have on the PS3 market, but early and perhaps late adopters might have issues finding their favorite games on the PS3.

2. Price
Even if Sony is losing almost $200 USD per console, $599 USD is too much to pay for two hopeful titles (Metal Gear Solid 4 and Final Fantasy XIV), regardless of what power the console has. The inclusion of the Blu-Ray drive in the PS3 pushes the price of the console up astronomically, as the slower 1x Blu-Ray players retail for around $1,000 USD. And, as I have illustrated, even the Blu-Ray is slower on the uptake than a cheaper, and faster, DVD drive. So Sony definitely didn't have the gamer in mind when they chose Blu-Ray. As much as Sony and PS3 fans will vehemently deny it, Sony included the Blu-Ray drive just to further their standing in the format war. (But even that is going unsuccessfully.) Sony could have replaced the slow Blu-Ray drive with a faster DVD drive, and perhaps added more RAM, and made a faster, better console which might have been both cheaper for them and for consumers, and they might've even made money off the console a lot earlier.

1. Sony has no mind for consumers
Bold statement, I know. But I have been screwed over by Sony on more than one occasion. And I'm not the only one. I bought a CD a while back and wanted to transfer it to my iPod. Well, apparently, Sony thought that was a bad idea, and instead the CD installed spyware on my hard drive. How fantastic. I'm sure Sony had the consumer, and not themselves, in mind when they decided to infect my computer. Another day, I bought a PSP, hoping that I could play my favorite classics on the go, and still 'enjoy' what little the PSP had to offer for commercial gaming. But apparently Sony has a habit of thinking that when people make homebrew, God kills a kitten. So, due to Sony's huge ego, again, I was out money, and was left with a pretty useless piece of plastic. I'm sure in restricting development on the PSP, Sony had me, the consumer, in mind. Plus, the battery recall from hell, wherein Sony sold batteries that exploded. Sony also has a way of creating stalemates in court against those who do like consumers. The Bleem! project was halted because they couldn't afford court costs, and all they were doing was reviving the PlayStation (much better than Sony did). Lik-Sang imported PSPs to other countries, and they were sued into oblivion, even though many of the buyers were parts of Sony. Sony is a terrible corporation which aims to control every aspect of the media, and in the process, loses sight of those that are supposed to buy their crap: the consumers, the gamers, the music listeners.
I leave you with a spine-chilling quote from the former marketing manager of Lik-Sang, Pascal Claryss:
"Blame it on Sony. That's the latest dark spot in their shameful track record as gaming industry leader. The Empire finally 'won', few dominating retailers from the UK probably will rejoice the news, but everybody else in the gaming world lost something today."

Well, there's the weekly list, and I am as bitter as ever. Comment below.

Posted by Rayek at 4:22 AM | Permalink | Comments

I can't believe the hype the VC is getting. "The ability to play retro classics on the Wii is something we can't wait to dive into..." [ign]. Gaming publications, blogs, and news websites are going mad with reviews for these games 'dug up from the depths of the past', and presenting them as if they were brand new (EGM and Gamespot, just to name a few). Consumers all around the world are salivating to pay for games they own already.

I can't wrap my brain around this.

Did these games not exist before the Virtual Console? It seems that every gaming publication is reviewing these old games again, just because they're coming out in a new form, almost as if the games weren't noteworthy on the original hardware. What makes a service that forces paying for emulation a cause to revisit these classics, where at any other time it would have been inappropriate? A game mag focused on news is traditionally not the place for reviewing games that are more than a month old, much less games that are up to eleven years old. When hackers finally found out a way to emulate the N64 on the PC, did any game mag review every N64 game, now available on a new platform? What makes the VC different? When coders found a way to run NES games on the Dreamcast, did anyone flinch in the gaming media? Sure, perhaps they gave it a nod or two, but they did not break down, and write features on how the emulators played, or review every game playable on the emulators. It's times like these that the niché gaming mags, like EDGE Retro and Retro Gamer actually have an advantage, and they aren't necessarily stepping out of their element to review things they wouldn't normally review. I mean, hell, they probably reviewed the games months before they were announced as VC games, because they were worthy games before they were Virtual Console games. Unlike with the major gaming press, these great games had worth because they were great games, not because Nintendo found a way to make people pay for them again.

Then why does the average gamer listen now, when they wouldn't before? Retro Gamer's been screaming Gunstar Heroes for years, and the 'now' generation hasn't given one look at it. But as soon as it's being offered on their new-fangled Wii they go ape shit, and pay more than they should to play it. Hell, gamers who actually own the games they're going to buy again probably weren't going to play the games at all until they're being prompted to pay for it.

Why do consumers even fall for this bullocks? Sure, Nintendo's been preaching their stance on the target audience of the Wii as being 'non-gamers', who might not have an NES sitting dusty in the closet, or a Genesis in the garage. But to the rest of us (i.e. the majority of the buyers of the Wii) probably either have one or all the consoles planned for release on the Virtual Console, and perhaps already own some of the games. And almost all of us will buy them again. It's a sad day when a company gets away with selling you something you already own. For me it's not a hassle to play Gunstar, Ecco, or any Genesis game that's being offered on the VC for that matter, because my Genesis is hooked up to the TV at all times. I also have the roms of all the games the virtual console is offering, playable, on my PC. I even can take them outside with me, to school or work, on the GP2X. I am the extreme instance, but even if I had only one of these many screens covered, I still wouldn't be so dumb as to pay for what I've already got. If I wanted to play a classic game on a console that it wasn't meant for, I'd burn some Dreamcast emulators to a 3 cent CD and throw some roms on the disc. I have more games on one Dreamcast disc than is on all of the Virtual Console games available in every region around the world. I have more Genesis games on my PC and in cart form than ever will be available for download on the VC.

Is it that the average consumer does not know of these alternatives? Probably they do. They've probably taken advantage of at least one of the ways I use roms. So why would they buy the games if they already have them? The only reason I can find is, simply because the games are there. They exist in this form, so it has to be done. No American consumer would ever pass up a chance to buy what they already have just for convenience. Laziness. Where consumers can put dollar amounts on the price of getting up and changing cords, or even pressing a button. To some, 10 bucks is a good price for never having to get up and switch a cartridge. Yes, this is the picture perfect Virtual Console player, and it works as such. As unsettling as it is for me, that's the strange reality that we find the 'average Joe Q. Consumer' in.

The case for emulation:
*It's free, it's portable, it's open, it's non-exclusive.* An entire library of games is at your fingertips to try out. And if you're clever enough, you can take these classic games anywhere. Play them on your Dreamcast or PS2. Hell, buy a GP2X and a TV out cable. It has more uses and will probably be used more often than the Virtual Console. Emulation is what you're paying for on the Wii anyway.

The case for true retro gaming:
*Pulling out a console from the recesses of the closet, dusting off the top, untangling the cords, finding the games you had played an enjoyed years past, plugging the system it into the TV, and experience what it actually was like.* There is no replacement for this experience. Even if you're looking to play a brand new game you haven't experienced before, retro consoles are cheap, many of them are hardy beyond comparison, and the games go for practically nothing. Owning a cartridge, and downloading the game featured on that cartridge, simply isn't the same. The games were designed for a specific console in mind, and if you want to be true to the original vision, they must be played on the original hardware.

Conclusion: I love retro gaming, I love finding new games from the past that I've never even heard of before, and exploring their ins and outs. I even dig any way that will make gamers aware that just because it isn't 'new' doesn't mean it blows. But making gamers pay for this service? Gamers being duped into paying for this? This is ludicrous when the alternatives are: A) the same thing, but free and with a bigger selection; and B) actually owning the games. It's even more ludicrous when gamers re-buy the ones they already physically own. It's rediculous that people now consider playing and reviewing these games acceptable, just because they've been released on a pretty new box. I love the Wii, I like the idea of the Virtual Console, but the way it's being recieved screams at me the horrible relationship between the stupid consumer and big business.

Posted by Rayek at 1:10 AM | Permalink | Comments

I'm a little late this week, but bear with me...

Well, there are many gamers out there who love a console launch holiday. All the buzz whizzing past, all the news of companies playing dirty, and picking sides. This weekly list is kind of the opposite; things not to be excited about. Don't get your hopes up, folks.

5. Wii ports disasters
(Not to be confused with Wii Sports disasters ;) )We all know it's going to happen. A great game is going to come out for the traditional control systems, and the developers and publishers are going to get the 'bright' idea of porting the game to the Wii, and it will be a complete disaster. Developers are going to have to limit their porting to worthy, Wii-like games, I don't think the third-person, action-adventure standard will work well as a port. Sure, Twilight Princess makes 'good work' of the Wii controls, but upon playing the game, it's obvious that the game was designed for the GameCube, for better or for worse. While I'm excited about the multiplicitous ways gaming might be going on the Wii, the standard, I'm afraid, ain't gonna cut it anymore. And until developers find a way to implement it well, we'll see plenty of crap ports over the next few months or so.

4. Dreamcast's "real" death
Being the newest system I own, I always look forward to brand new titles coming out for the little noisy white box, even if they are just straight coin-op ports. I utterly dread the day where I will not be looking forward to anything developing on the Dreamcast, and it might come some time next year. Last Hope has been suggested as a Dreamcast port, and Trigger Heart Excelsia looks to be another fantastic shooter, both debuting for the Dreamcast in 2007, but I'm starting to feel the support for this dilapidated haven start to crumble, and it's disconcerting. Especially when it's been supported so strongly, years after it's official death. It's going to be the end of an era, belive it or not.

3. Retro consoles burning out
Rocking a Sega CD? A 32X? Still playing them? Well, you're the lucky ones. It always seems that with one generation appearing, another disappears. If you have an Atari 2600, it's almost 30 years old now. An NES is 21 years old, and the years are starting to wear down on my Sega CD, and it's only 14 years old. I may be thinking pessimistically, but it's a subtle reminder to take care of your retro consoles! Show them some love! Play the systems you have in your closet collecting dust, because they need to be played to keep them alive!

2. Re-buying retro games
How great is XBLA? And the Virtual Console? What could be better? Owning the original cartridge, that's what; and playing the game on the hardware for which it was intended. Paying to play Gunstar Heroes on anything other than a 3-button, oversized Genesis pad is rediculous. Paying to play (yet again) another console iteration of Dig-Dug, as if all the Namco Museums didn't push the Dig-Dug card enough. Whatever happened to downloading roms to get your retro going where it wasn't supposed to? Want to play Gunstar on an awkward, not-Genesis controller, get DCGenerator for the Dreamcast, and do it for free. Want to replay your favorite SNK fighter against your friend? Download WinKawaks and go online with them, and do it for free. Re-buying games you have already is sheer bullocks.

1. The move to HD
Sure, the picture quality is great. But I don't want to spend thousands of dollars buying a TV that's smaller than my PC monitor. I certainly don't want to miss out on the nextgeneration of gaming because I'm poor, and HD is the "wave of the future", apparently. I'm completely fine with my 1980s RCA, as horribly 'old codger' as it is to say. Technology is supposed to help us, not bite us in the ass, and a 4,000 dollar HDTV is definitely a bite in my college-attending ass. I'm not looking forward to the time when I simply won't have an option.

These few things have been bugging me for a while, and it's almost all due to the new generation, butting out the old. I'm sorry, but better games came out for systems 20 years older than the PS3, and they weren't pushing HD, Blu-Ray bullshit.

Posted by Rayek at 3:34 AM | Permalink | Comments

Every week I hope to bring you readers a useless list of one thing or another, and this week I'm talking about surprising games. Specifically, games that caught me off guard in one way or another.

10. Snail Maze (Sega Master System)
The Master System is a very nice machine. I completely enjoyed lifting the sleek, sexy console of yesteryear out of the nondescript brown cardboard box (thanks to PayPal and eBay) and shooting missiles in 3D for hours on end, (me, sporting the Master System's technical wonder, the 3D Glasses on the right). That was how I started my nights about a year ago, but I wasn't prepared... The system itself has a little 'easter egg' of sorts that I happened to stumble upon, and it completely surprised me. I absentmindedly turned the console on and did something else in the kitchen. Then, by the power of Sega magic, the boring screen that usually says to insert a cartridge ("shit, or get off the pot") slid to the left to reveal... What? Then a wonderful bleeping music emanated from the screen and took me by surprise. After my eyes shot over to the screen to see what I was missing, all I noticed was that I had only 30 seconds left to do something. So without even thinking about how odd the occurrence was, or what I even had to do within the time limit, I hopped over the couch and started playing. Only when I was done did I realize that there was no cartridge in the system, and that my Master System had tricked me! That was one of the few times that a console (not a game) caught me off guard.

9. Sonic Adventure (Sega Dreamcast)
After playing and enjoying all of Sonic's other platforming odysseys I felt that nothing could go wrong. Sonic had an all-time fan in me, glowing true through the many hours I spent relentlessly pounding away at my three-button controller in anticipation of beating the pulp out of Sonic 3 and Knuckles. I was ready, more than ever, to experience Sonic in 3D. Apparently, Sega wasn't ready to make that jump with me. Sonic Adventure suffered from so many things that all altered my experience, and kept it from becoming the joy that was playing Sonic in 2D. The amount of speed that is prevalent in the series was really obscure in 3D, to the point where staying on the predefined path was nearly impossible, as one wrong move, and you'd be flying to your doom. The game had hints of Mario 64 written all over it, and my not being a fan of Mario's 64-bit outing, it definitely affected the way I played the game. This game is the kind that plays like shit, but looks amazing while doing it. It was gorgeous seeing Sonic rendered in 3D, but that was just about it. I was surprised by Sega's effort (or lack thereof), and I was surprised by how poorly Sonic translated into 3D.

8. Seaman (Dreamcast)
Something about the Dreamcast made developers look at games in an entirely new light, and Seaman is a game that plays to this. Taking the Tomagotchi craze to a new level, Seaman seemed gimmicky and of the not-too-fun variety of games, but hell, it wasn't a 3rd-person action-adventure title, like everything else out at the time. So I picked it up used at the local GameCrazy, and popped it in. I think for a month after that, I started and ended my days with Seaman. The voice recognition amazes me, to the point where, even after exhausting the long list of vulgarities I know, Seaman would come up with opinion on this or that. I was surprised to be taken in by such a game, to the point where I'd wrap my day up siting on the couch and looking into a fish tank, and occasionally calling him a fucker, then saying, "Just kidding".

7. Wii Sports (Wii)
I know what you're thinking, how cliché of me to mention Wii Sports at a time like this. Well, what can I say? Up until I played the predictable lineup I thought of the Wii differently. I wanted to play it badly, but nothing that I'd seen, read or played (yes, even the lackluster Excite Truck) convinced me that Nintendo's next console was worth a damn. Only when I played Wii Sports for myself did I change my mind completely. Not only did the game alter my perception of the Wii, I can actually say something that will lump me in with the beer-drinking, once-fratboy-now-dad Madden loving crowd: A sports game is fun.

6. Zoo Keeper (Arcade)
I admit to never playing this game on a real arcade cabinet.
Now that that's out of the way, I stumbled into this neat little gem when I was finding roms to fill my GP2X's SD card with, and I started playing it a week ago. This game has me hooked! I cannot stop playing. The game is simple: a cage in the middle of the arena lets go of animals, and as you run around the square, you build a brick wall that keeps them in. Seems simple. The trick is to let them all out and have a jumping fest! For every three or more escaped snakes, lions, or rhinoceros you are able to jump over, you get an obscene amount of points. I haven't thought about playing another arcade game until I get the top high score seat. I was caught off guard that such a random game, randomly falling into my lap could consume me as Zoo Keeper does. I couldn't even imagine how much money I would spend were there a Zoo Keeper machine within 100 miles of my house.

5. Metal Slug 2 (Neo Geo MVS)
This adrenaline-pumping, gorgeous game went in one ear and out the other when I was young. A night at Old School Pizzeria with a bunch of quarters in your pocket can, and will lead you to make a few discoveries, and at 16 I tried the game, and was horrified. Here I was, in the middle of the desert, a white man with blond hair and far superior firepower, shooting unequipped, goofy-looking "a-rabs". The political, rebellious bone in me prevented me from going further. And for years I wrote the game off as something unreasonably stupid and vulgar (which it might still be). But because of my political awareness I glazed over the most important part of playing games: It was fun. I put some quarters in the Neo Geo two years ago, and ended up being completely blown away. The detail of every small sprite in the game was developed so beautifully, it was a gem to look at. The game played smoothly, and was hard as bullets. It had so much character, flickering the developer's love in detail into my eyes. What a sight!

4. Skies of Arcadia (Dreamcast)
Because I wanted to experience the Dreamcast fully, I had to play through Skies. I just had to. One of two notable RPGs on the system that still captures people's hearts, Skies was supposed to be the normal, boring turn-based RPG in the vein of Final Fantasy. And in many ways, it was. What I was surprised by was that a game like that could engulf me to the point of trying to beat it. The story was pretty standard, the battle system was standard, and the graphics were alright. But something about it drew me in and held me. Up until that point I completely wrote off anything with more than three pages of text in the whole game as being stupid, Skies changed my mind by being everything I expected, but nothing that I was used to.

3. Samurai Shodown 4 : Amakusa's Revenge (Neo Geo MVS)
This game sent me on a huge hunt to find every SNK fighting game worth playing. A long, and dreadful hunt, sometimes ending in the discover of a Fatal Fury that should have been kept forgotten, but also unearthing some fantastic titles that have become my personal favorites, like Garou: Mark of the Wolves and The Last Blade. Amakusa's Revenge made me see fighting games in a different light, and after playing for hours on end, I just plain couldn't perform on my old favorite fighters, like Mortal Kombat, or Soul Calibur. The gameplay mechanic is such that just plain button mashing won't get you anywhere. Most of the characters require precise action to be effective, and this was unlike any other fighter I had enjoyed in the past.

2.Space Harrier (Sega 32X)
I was completely unaware of this game's existence until a great Retro Revival in Retro Gamer. I was drawn by the odd positioning presented in the screenshot, the fact that instead of a shooter that shoots up or right, like most of the retro games I'd played up until then, you controlled the player up, down, left and right, and shot away from the camera. Needless to say, I returned from a grand odessy to Seattle with Space Harrier for the Sega 32X under my arm, and a look of anticipation on my face. From the second the main theme started, I was hooked. For some reason, the frantic speed in the game, coupled with the instant pick-up-and-playability of the game drew me in like a black hole. I found myself writing down my good scores and trying to beat them, I wanted to finish the game before I turned 20 on a skimpy three lives. I even invested in a Genesis 6-button arcade stick just to get that tiny edge. Well, My 32X broke, and I haven't had the time or money to look for a working new one, so I have been feinding for it ever since last summer. I even plan on learning to code, just to add the Space Harrier machine to the MAME lineup for the GP2X so I can play it wherever I want. I'm in utter awe that any game, much less a cheezy one from the arcades, could consume my gaming life so completely.

1. Sonic CD (Sega CD)
I read all the reviews, complaints, and praises for this game before I bought it. I thought that nothing about a 2D Sonic would surprise me... I was wrong. Sonic CD created so many feelings in me that I wanted to burst open. Anger, frustration, sadness, and wonder all competed within me to control my being. In the midst of my fury, I'd find Sonic bouncing in an inescapable tunnel of bouncers, while the clock bore down, threatening to put an end to it. I'd find Sonic losing rings to things that I couldn't even see on the screen. I'd see Sonic bouncing up and down in a giant, inescapable room full of electrical cords. This game was far from fun, in fact, I'll venture to say that it's the worst Sonic game I have ever laid eyes on; and I cringe whenever I ponder picking it up again. When I read the praises of this game now, I just wonder, "Why? What's the trick? How could anyone find anything enjoyable about this game? What am I not understanding?" Sonic controlled horribly, the levels were designed atrociously, the day-glo graphics were ugly and quite annoying, and the soundtrack, even utilizing the Sega CD's CD-quality audio, was lackluster (I had the US version, I hear it isn't so bad on other versions, but the low quality of the game prevents me from trying to find the good ones). This wholly and utterly surprised me, as this was one of the last of the 2D Sonics developed for Sega's own consoles, and I thought I'd at least get Sonic the Hedgehog goodness, and not a migraine.

So, there it was, the first of many Lists of the Week. Feel free to comment below!

Thanks for reading the 16-bitter.

Labels: gaming, nintendo, retro, sega, surprising, wii

Posted by Rayek at 10:57 PM | Permalink | Comments

Well, not really.

It's blogger. Nothing more to say.

Hi, I'm the humble writer, the omnipotent voice, the teleprompter. This is a sweet blog on gaming. That's it.

Just so you know where I am, struggle to read this short gaming history of mine, it'll only take a minute or so.

I started gaming with, oddly enough, my grandma. She had a PC, and my favorite game was Commander Keen. I beat the game when I was about ten. After that, I became a strict PC gamer, because my parents were wholly against 'wasting time on things that aren't productive' (who hasn't heard that before) , and they saw the PC as a different kind of machine, somehow. Fast forward to High School, my first console purchase; a Nintendo NES. For 30 dollars, I had, arguably, the game console that reinvigorated the market in 1985. I was pumped. Until Freshman year in college, when I was asked to write about an aspect of Asian Culture and present my ideas to the program. Well, I reported on Sega. From then on, I made it my focus in gaming to own every peice of Sega console hardware there was to own, and I managed it all quite smoothly over a 4 month period, thanks to some wonderful folks at eBay.

So, you made it through that wall-o'-boring-text. Good. So, I'm a retrogamer, completely in awe at where this industry is heading, how so many of the greats of the past have been lost due to general shift in the market, and how little the gamers of today care for those we have lost in the frey.

Assuming you'll come back, I'll be commenting here and there about this and that in gaming, and hopefully throwing some nuggets of insight your way.

Thanks for reading the 16-bitter.

Labels: 16-bit, gaming, nintendo, ps3, retro, sega, wii, xbox 360

Posted by Rayek at 1:51 AM | Permalink | Comments