Gaming Journal Archive- 2000
December 19, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
If the news of Microsoft supposedly "removing" Digital Anvil founder
Chris Roberts from the company is true, it has to send a shiver down the
spine of everyone with a Microsoft publishing deal. If Microsoft disliked
Roberts for whatever reason and was able to "remove him from the company,"
couldn't it do the same thing to anyone else it doesn't like?
For those of you who don't know, Roberts created the Wing Commander
series at Origin before founding Digital Anvil, and he is now planning to
work in the film business. Hopefully, Roberts' future movie endeavors will
be better than his first (the terrible Wing Commander movie). Watching the
Wing Commander movie generally brings out thoughts of, "Don't quit your day
job, pal." Well, Roberts has now quit his day job...
Just when I thought that Sony's online plans couldn't get any more shaky,
news has surfaced that Sony is in PS2-related negotiations with America
Online. Apparently, Sony is interested in getting its hands on the slowest,
least reliable Internet service in the world. We can only hope that these
negotiations fall through faster than Vince McMahon's efforts to buy WCW.
In their actions against video game violence, senators Randy Minton and
Marvin Parks showed exactly how much they really know about the video game
industry when they also called for "a ratings system to provide consumer
information regarding the content of video and consumer software games."
Is it just my imagination, or has the Entertainment Software Ratings Board
been around since 1994?
December 12, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I considered it bad news when I found out that Traveler's Tales is
developing the next game in the Crash Bandicoot series. If you want to
discover the extent of this company's "talents" in the field of action-
platform games, go play A Bug's Life or worse yet, Rascal (both for the
PlayStation). After Konami acquired the publishing rights to future Crash
games, what the hell were they thinking when they gave the development
contract to Traveler's Tales?
Then again, this is Konami we're talking about. This is the same company
that let Appaloosa develop several new Contra games for the PlayStation long
after it became clear that Appaloosa isn't exactly a top-notch development
studio. (Appaloosa went on to develop the equally shallow Ecco the Dolphin:
Defender of the Future for the Dreamcast.)
On the bright side, there is always hope for turn-arounds in this
industry. Visual Concepts was a crap developer for years before finally
striking gold with the NFL 2K and NBA 2K series. Ironically, the same goes
for the original creators of the Crash series at Naughty Dog before the
first Crash game was released in 1996. Hopefully, Traveler's Tales will
turn its fortunes around with Crash for the PS2 and Xbox, because if it
doesn't, the Crash Bandicoot name will be soiled forever.
December 1, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
It's ridiculous that Nintendo still won't officially confirm the
existence of a Metroid game for the GameCube. It's one thing to not give
away gameplay ideas about upcoming games so that you don't give ideas to the
competition, but what's wrong with confirming the existence of the game if
you own the copyrights to it? What is Nintendo afraid of, that someone else
will sneak in and publish a Metroid game right under its nose?
The developer of the next Metroid game, Retro Studios, even posted a job
listing in its web site that seeks people who are interested in working on
a Metroid game for the GameCube. So, I think it's pretty safe to say that
Retro is working on a Metroid game, unless of course the company gets its
kicks from hiring people under the false impression that they're going to be
working on a Metroid game, only to blind-side them by assigning them to a
completely unrelated project...
Speaking of Retro Studios, am I the only one who remembers that it was
founded by a bunch of former Acclaim/Iguana employees whose track record
isn't dramatically different from a little company called Titus Software?
Retro is known to be working on a football game and a first-person shooter,
and we can only hope that they turn out nothing like NFL Quarterback Club or
Turok. It's appalling to see so many publications speak of Retro Studios
with as much esteem as Rare despite the horrible track record of Retro's
employees.
November 21, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I still can't get over Sony's lack of an online strategy. If the
PlayStation 2's online gaming network isn't up and running smoothly by the
end of 2001, Sega will continue to gain market share. Even if Sony's
network does launch as scheduled (and that's a big if), you have to keep in
mind that even by the end of next year, the majority of US homes won't have
broadband available to them. Like many other Americans, I would have signed
up for DSL access a long time ago if it were available in my area, but it's
not.
Meanwhile, Sega's talk about the Dreamcast "evolving" has me worried
about the company's future. Hardware add-ons can be successful, but only if
they're optional rather of mandatory. If Sega ends up deciding to release
Dreamcast games that require upgraded Dreamcast hardware (not the current
hardware), the company will be out of business within five years. Didn't
Sega learn anything from the Sega CD and 32X debacles?
Speaking of Sega, it's a shame that Segagaga will never be released in
the US. Playing as Sega's CEO and trying to lead the company to the top
could make for a great video game. I can just see the in-game messages now:
"Apathetic public refuses to buy your game system despite the fact that it
has a great price and lots of AAA games..."
November 14, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
What's the deal with the "Comic Mischief" advisory on some video games?
What parent is really going to say, "Animated blood and gore is fine, but no
comic mischief for you, little Johnny!" I have also noticed that casino
games are given the warning of "gaming," as if no other video game contains
"gaming." It would be a lot less confusing if it said "gambling" rather
than "gaming."
In an attempt to provide a boost to its sagging brand name power, Disney
has added the word "Disney's" to the beginning every movie and video game it
releases or licenses (Disney's 102 Dalmations, Disney's Tarzan, etc).
Shoving itself down the public's throat is what led to the decline in
Disney's business in the first place, so shoving itself down the public's
throat even more is not the answer. In some cases, the naming scheme is
just plain goofy... anyone up for a game of Disney's Emperor's New Groove?
The more I play SSX Snowboarding, the more I respect Electronic Arts for
being both a huge publisher and a top-quality developer. Most video
companies are none of the above or maybe one of them, but certainly not
both. EA is the complete opposite of a company like Infogrames, which has
bought all of its success and couldn't develop a good game if its life
depended on it.
November 10, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
With 3DO posting a huge loss in the latest financial quarter (as usual),
I can't help but wonder whether the company will ever turn itself around.
The company's CEO Trip Hawkins was one of the founders of Electronic Arts,
so you would think that he knows something about how to run a successful
business. As evidenced by unprofitable quarter after unprofitable quarter
over the years, 3DO is in big trouble that is only getting worse. If the
company wants to be alive five years from now, it needs to stop pumping out
three crappy Army Men games per month and focus on making quality games for
a change.
Ironically, it is probably 3DO's financial struggles that have convinced
it to rely so heavily on Army Men (it's either that or a complete lack of
creativity). When the company first started showing signs of going under,
it would be very easy for a marketing executive to say, "We need to focus on
established brands like Army Men."
There's nothing wrong with that statement on its own, but 3DO has over-
done it to the point of absurdity. This has led to consumers associating
the name "3DO" with the words "horrible games." and so rather than digging
itself out of the proverbail hole, 3DO is only making it deeper. Who knows?
Maybe 3DO just wants to project the image of being a complete failure of a
company so that Infogrames becomes interested in buying it...
November 7, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I really get a kick out of the way executives in the video game industry
always manage to come up with fluffy quotes for press releases, even when
the reality of the situation is grim. Here are two recent examples:
The News: LucasArts has decided to make the N64 version of "Indiana Jones
and the Infernal Machine" a rental-only game that will only be available at
Blockbuster Video.
The Spin: LucasArts' VP of marketing Mary Bihr says, "This distribution
arrangement represents a unique opportunity for LucasArts and Blockbuster,
and will greatly benefit Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine."
The Reality: In other words, "The N64 market is so weak that we didn't want
to do a full-fledged retail release for the game, and this is the next best
thing."
The News: With Eidos Interactive in a pathetic state of affiars, the
company's CEO Charles Cornwall has finally left the company.
The Spin: Eidos' new CEO Mike McGarvey says, "Charles Cornwall has made a
substantial contribution to the company and has been one of the key
architects of its intensive acquisition and investment program."
The Reality: Hmm... which "acquisition and investment program" are you
referring to, Mike? It's not the one that helped create the company's
current mess, is it? Also, I want to take this moment to say that Charles
Cornwall was a great CEO in every possible way, except of course in the
areas of making a profit and releasing good games...
November 3, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I can't decide who is more out of touch with reality: Nintendo's Hiroshi
Yamauchi or Senator Joe Lieberman (check out the current issue of Master
Gamer News if you don't know what I'm talking about). Yamauchi is a true
genius for realizing that the best way to drum up desperately-needed third-
party support for Nintendo is to insult the entire third-party development
community. Aren't Yamauchi's insults like the pot calling the kettle black
considering the fact that Nintendo has released more crappy games that good
ones over the past couple years? Anyone up for a game of Mario Party or one
of the many Pokemon re-hashes on the market?
As for Lieberman, his "challenge" to the creators of video games, movies,
and music is ridiculous. Apparently, Lieberman thinks that the best kinds
of "challenges" are the ones where someone basically says, "Do what I tell
you, or I'll make laws that force you to do what I tell you." Of course,
Lieberman didn't use those exact words, but he may as well have.
After receiving Lieberman's mass e-mail, hundreds of executives in the
game, movie, and music industries must have opened their mailbox and
thought, "Damn! More spam!" Ironically, the one thing that Gore and
Lieberman aren't attacking at the moment is the Internet, which makes sense
because as he once claimed, Al Gore invented the Internet...
By the way, Sony's PlayStation 2 commercials are among the worst ever
produced for any video game product. Seriously, this campaign is right up
there with the Sega Saturn ads that focused on how the Saturn had more
processors than the PlayStation.
October 31, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
A little bit more play time is needed before I can pass judgment on any
PlayStation 2 launch games, but I can already say that I'm impressed with
the controller. I wasn't exactly looking forward to the Dual Shock 2
controller because I have always thought that the Dual Shock 1 was slightly
less comfortable than the original PlayStation controller. I was happy to
discover that the Dual Shock 2 is actually a very comfortable control with
incredibly responsive analog control.
It's a good thing, too, because PlayStation 1 controllers don't work on
the PlayStation 2 like they're supposed to. I don't know whether this is
true for many launch games, but in the case of at least one high-profile
game (SSX Snowboarding), I was unable to get my PlayStation 1 controller to
work with it. In a much more pleasant surprise, it seems that the
PlayStation 2 has no problem with loading any of my PS1 saved game files,
not even really old ones like Resident Evil 1.
In a somewhat related note, am I the only one who is taking an "I'll
believe it when I see it" attitude to Bloomberg's report that Capcom might
delay Resident Evil PS2 until 2002 to avoid cutting into Onimusha's sales?
Bloomberg also claimed at one time earlier this year that the PS2 would come
with a built-in hard drive and 56K modem. Is Bloomberg way off the mark
again, or would Capcom really do something that (to quote the WWF's Edge and
Christian) reeks of so much heinousity?
October 24, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
3D Realms' co-owner Scott Miller recently had some interesting, but
short-sighted things to say about the Xbox. According to Miller, the
system's downfall will be the fact that it's extremely easy to port Xbox
games to the PC and vice-versa. Miller said, "It's hard for me to imagine
any top developer making a hit Xbox game and not wanting to also make a PC
version to capitalize on that already established and huge customer base."
Miller continued, "Thus, it's going to be very, very hard for Microsoft
to get exclusive hit games on the Xbox, and that is the only way a console
can become a leader, by having exclusive super-hits... What this means is
that few people who own a PC will have any reason to buy an Xbox." Miller's
comments appear to be insightful on the surface, but they're not when you
dig a little bit deeper.
Miller's statements ignore the fact that millions of gamers in the US
alone simply can't afford to spent thousands of dollars per year to keep
their PC up to date, and so they choose to focus their game-time on
consoles. Also, you mean to tell me that the people at Microsoft aren't
going to do absolutely everything in their power to sign a lot of Xbox games
to exclusive contracts? Of course they will; they're not stupid. They
realize that the scenario explained above by Miller would be a nightmare for
the Xbox, and they're going to make damn sure that the nightmare doesn't
come true.
October 20, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
For those of you who haven't already heard, Imagine Media has killed
Games Business and Total Games. Games Business was the market-leading trade
publication, and Total Games was a mass-market magazine from Chris Charla
that was just about to launch before getting the axe. Imagine Media has
been its own worst enemy over the years by killing its highest-quality
products, from Ultra Game Players to the Next Generation disc to PCXL
(which I seem to miss more with each passing month).
I realize that Imagine has a responsibility to its shareholders, but it
also has a responsibility to its readers that should count just as much.
And call me crazy, but I don't think that killing all of the company's best
products over the years is a very nice way to appease the company's most
loyal customers. It's almost as if an Imagine executive stood up one day
and said, "I've got it! The way to catapult this company to the top is to
heartlessly kill all of our great products one by one!"
In Games Business' case, it has been clear to even the most casual
onlooker since the beginning of this year that its business model was flawed
and needed to be changed. Rather than making the necessary changes,
Imagine's management chose to do nothing and hold steady with the status
quo, which could do nothing but lead to the eventual death of the magazine.
I'm sorry, but I don't feel sorry for members of management when they have
to kill a magazine if it was their own ineptness that led the magazine to
be in such a poor financial state in the first place.
If Imagine's management is too incompetent to make financial successes
out of fantastic products like Ultra Game Players, PCXL, and Games Business,
then it's only a matter of time before the company's not-so-good products
die off too. If Imagine ever kills its last remaining great products (Next
Generation Magazine and Daily Radar), the downfall of this formerly great
company will finally be complete.
October 17, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
The Microsoft Xbox and Nintendo Game Cube are scheduled to be released
within months of each other in late 2001, but the two systems' third-party
alliances appear to be drastically different. No third-party publishers
have announced their support of the Game Cube yet. That doesn't necessarily
mean that the Game Cube will have horrible third-party support, but it does
demonstrate the reluctance of companies to stand up and pledge their strong
support for the system as many did with the PlayStation 2.
Meanwhile, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that almost every single
third-party video game company in the world has pledged support for the
Xbox, with only three notable exceptions: Square, Electronic Arts, and Enix.
All three of these companies are expected to sign on as Xbox developers in
the near future. It's clearly way too soon to say that the Xbox will have
more great games than the Game Cube or vice-versa, but it's also clear that
based on early indications of third-party support, the Xbox will have a huge
edge.
On another note, Intel must be relieved that the Federal Trade Commission
has finally ended its investigation into Intel's business practices.
Understandably not wanting the FTC to ever change its mind, Intel's
president Craig Barrett did a little FTC ass-kissing by saying, "The closure
of this investigation reflects the constructive and professional
relationship between Intel and the FTC throughout this investigation."
Intel and the FTC... hottest couple of the year?
October 13, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
If you would have told me a year ago, "Sony will have executed zero TV
and print advertisements less than two weeks before the PlayStation 2's
launch," I might have mistaken you for a Wal-Mart employee. I'm also
surprised that based on early word from people who have seen the PS2's first
wave of commercials, they're underwhelming to say the least.
We all know that Sony is capable of producing great marketing, so perhaps
it's just not concerned with great marketing anymore because it figures that
the PS2 will sell itself. Or perhaps the disappointment over the PS2's
first wave of commercials has been overblown, much like the initial hype
surrounding the system after it was announced, and much like the anti-
aliasing issue. We won't know for sure until the commercials hit the
airwaves, whenever that may be...
It seems like there's at least one absurd lawsuit filed per week in the
video game industry, and last week was no exception. As reported in Master
Gamer News, Nintendo is suing numerous companies for financial damages and
the rights to 55 Pokemon-related Internet domain names. Many of the 55
domain names in question are just fan sites that aren't really harmful to
Nintendo in any conceivable way.
October 6, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Id Software must be frustrated with all the controversy about the newest
Quake 3 patch (see Master Gamer News for details). The old saying, "You're
screwed if you do and screwed if you don't" applies to this story. When the
staff at Id Software doesn't releases patches that change their games,
"They're not supporting their fans." When they do release patches that
change their games, "They're changing the games too much and screwing them
up."
As if there weren't already enough absurd lawsuits clogging up the
system, a lawsuit was filed a couple weeks back by former volunteers at
Origin who want financial compensation for their work on Ultima Online.
When you try to think of what kind of legal grounds these people could
possibly have if they knowingly signed up as volunteers, the thought that
naturally comes to mind is, "Show me the wage law that says volunteers are
supposed to be paid." It doesn't exist. Volunteers don't get paid; that's
what makes them volunteers.
Microsoft's parental control system for the Xbox (which is similar to the
V-chip) is actually a comfortable middle ground between the two sides on the
issue of video game violence. Developers will be able to make their games
as violent as they want, and parents will be able to control exactly what
their kids can and cannot play. To me, that seems like the best of both
worlds.
October 3, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
If you're worried about how difficult it might be to get online with NFL
2K1, don't be. Getting up and running with NFL 2K1's online features is a
breeze; it's actually much easier than setting up the Dreamcast's web
browser. You only need to know three things to get connected: Your user
name and password with your ISP, and your ISP's local access number. Once
you're online, the game servers are conveniently broken down by region, so
it might only take you 30 seconds to start a game with someone.
I have spent a lot of time playing the game using both SegaNet and my own
Internet Service Provider, Prodigy Internet. Note that I'm referring to the
newer service called Prodigy Internet, not the old AOL-like service called
Prodigy. Prodigy Internet is actually one of the fastest ISPs in America
for web surfing and downloading, so it says a lot about SegaNet that it's
always much faster than Prodigy Interent when it comes to online gameplay.
NFL 2K1 is still playable using Prodigy Internet, but it's much faster using
SegaNet.
If you have a Dreamcast keyboard, and a surprisingly large percentage of
NFL 2K1 players do, you can chat with your opponent(s) simply by typing in
what you want to say and pressing enter. If you don't have a keyboard, you
won't be able to chat with anyone, but you will be able to see what they
type.
All of the people in a game see the same post-play animations and listen
to the same commentary. Speaking of the commentary, does NFL 2K1's color
commentary have some sort of personal vendetta against NFL coaches? It
seems like every time there's a good play, he always ends up saying, "You
can't coach that!"
September 26, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Nintendo recently issued an overly-wordy press release to announce to the
promotion of Perrin Kaplan as Nintendo's vice president of corporate
affairs. Is she a PR person? No, says Nintendo, she "oversees public
affairs activities for the Western hemisphere, including the US introduction
of new Nintendo hardware systems and video games." Oh... so you mean she's
a PR person? No, says Nintendo, she's "the architect of Nintendo's
corporate communications, as well as relations with the public and the
government."
Are you trying to say that she's a PR person? No, says Nintendo, she
"provides counsel to Nintendo Company Ltd. regarding global corporate
communication strategies." The sad thing about all of this is that none of
these Nintendo quotes were written by me; they were all legitimately in the
press release. Being a PR person is a more than worthy occupation, but you
wouldn't know it from reading Nintendo's overly-wordy press release.
I also couldn't help but laugh at the lawsuit filed against Infogrames
for allegedly "looting GT Interactive's inventory of video games,
distribution rights, and royalties." Isn't that what generally happens when
one company buys another company? Infogrames legally owns GT, so they also
own GT's video games, distribution rights, and royalties. What's the
purpose of buying a company if you don't acquire its assets?
September 19, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
A new video game magazine called Game Live is offering free lifetime
subscriptions at gameliveonline.com. Apparently by "Live," they mean, "It
goes to press at least one month before you'll ever see it." Game Live
plans on making money not from subscription payments (since there won't be
any), but from advertising. Wait a minute... didn't this business model
already fail in the US with the Incite line of magazines?
The Game Boy Advance will probably sell well regardless of what Nintendo
charges for it, but Nintendo is definitely going to lose out on some
potential sales if they charge $100 for it (which is the price they're
currently "aiming for"). Back when the Game Boy Color first came out, I
remember that in every conversation I had with a friend in which the topic
of the GBC came up, their immediate reaction was, "Eighty bucks is too much
for a portable gaming system, period." A lot of people are undoubtedly
going to feel the same way about the GBA's $100 price.
Last, but certainly not least, the news of yet another Intel CPU recall
has to have Microsoft just a little bit nervous. Will the Xbox CPU be
Intel's latest screw-up, or will they release a glitch-free product for
once?
September 15, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
When the Xbox's technical specs were first released and it was revealed
to be much more powerful than the PlayStation 2, what I said at the time in
Master Gamer still holds true: "It's coming out a full year after the PS2,
so it damn well better be much more powerful." Now that the Game Cube's
specs have been released, I can't help but feel disappointed. Not only does
the Game Cube not blow away the PS2 technologically (which it should since
it's coming out a year later), but the PS2 is actually more powerful in many
key areas.
Still, technical specs are technical specs and games are games, so the
Game Cube's relative lack of power doesn't necessarily mean that it will
ultimately lose to the PlayStation 2. What it does mean is that Game Cube
developers will have an uphill battle to fight, and that doesn't bode well
for a company like Nintendo that hasn't had good third-party support since
1994.
In an unrelated note, the fact that the Spyro franchise is being taken
away from Insomniac brings back bad memories of Twisted Metal being taken
away from SingleTrac and Crash Bandicoot being taken away from Naughty Dog.
I've never been a big fan of Spyro or his games, but it's still unfortunate
that game franchises never seem to be left in the hands of their original
creators anymore.
September 8, 2000
By Contributing Writer Chris George
I recently found something on the Bust A Groove 2 CD that surprised me
quite a bit. I put the game in my computer's CD-ROM drive so I could
listen to some of the songs from the game, but I found a lot more than
songs. Unlike EA's last Tiger Woods game for the PlayStation, there are no
unauthorized South Park videos or anything like that, but there are sound
files of the endings and the Japanese versions of the songs.
Each sound file tells the story of each of the main characters and how
they came to be. Heat was in an accident, Bi-O got an axe rammed into his
head by his son Gas-O, and so on. The Japanese songs were also nice to
listen to, and you can realize what was cut for the US release and what
wasn't.
All of this still begs the question: Why weren't any of the endings
included in the game? Was the game rushed to meet a deadline? Were the
endings originally meant to be unlocked? Is Enix just a really lazy
company? Only Enix knows the answers to these questions for sure. You
can't see the video of the endings on the CD, but at least you can hear the
audio. If you rent Bust A Groove 2 (or make the mistake of buying it), be
sure to pop the CD into your computer and give it a listen.
September 5, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I know I'm not the only person who was disappointed to hear about
Westwood's decision to not authorize or create any console versions of
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2. As a huge fan of the original Red Alert,
I've been waiting too long for a kick-ass sequel (and no, Tiberian Sun
doesn't count).
It's no longer a valid approach for a company to use the excuse that
console games don't have the PC's almighty mouse and keyboard set-up. The
Xbox and Game Cube may or may not have a mouse and keyboard available for
them, but the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2 definitely will. In the case of
Red Alert 2, the graphics engine is so ancient that the Dreamcast and
PlayStation 2 could easily handle it. Hopefully, Westwood will reconsider
and Red Alert 2 will end up being released for at least one video game
console.
Earlier this year, I said that Perfect Dark is the N64 game I'm most
excited about. Now that Perfect Dark is out, the only N64 game I'm really
looking forward to is WWF No Mercy, which is due out this November. The
developers of No Mercy at Aki have a solid track record of making every
single game in the series significantly better than the last. WWF
Wrestlemania 2000 was a huge leap over WCW Revenge, and No Mercy will be a
must-have game if it's just as huge of a leap over Wrestlemania.
September 1, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Like most gamers, I have decidedly mixed feelings about Nintendo's Game
Cube. At this early stage in the game, there doesn't appear to be a whole
lot about the system that's overwhelmingly awesome or overwhelmingly
crappy. One thing that I do feel strongly about is that it's a mistake for
Nintendo to not bundle any modem with the system. This decision shows that
Nintendo is not as committed to online gaming as Sega.
What has the world come to when a company can't release a product called
SongBoy because it's too similar to "Game Boy"? I guess if you ever have
a baby and the doctor says, "It's a boy!" you should immediately notify
Nintendo of this, because they apparently own the rights to the word "boy."
It's also ridiculous that Sega of Japan (SOJ) is making so-called
announcements about how disappointed they are with Dreamcast sales in the
US and Europe. SOJ doesn't exactly have much room to complain because the
Dreamcast has sold much, much better in the US and Europe than it has in
Japan. If SOJ is disappointed with Sega of America's record-breaking sales
performance, how do you think SOA feels about SOJ's completely pathetic
sales performance?
August 29, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
It's been a long time since Final Fantasy 8 was released, and for some
reason I still haven't taken the time to finish it. Even stranger is the
fact that I have no desire to ever do so. How could this be? It's a game
from Square, and a Final Fantasy game at that, and I may never see its
ending. For a long time, I didn't know why I lost interest in the game,
but now I have thought of a few reasons.
First of all, the story line was so lacking that I wasn't drawn into the
game one bit. I don't have much room to talk on this subject since I only
got half-way through disc two, and Ivan keeps telling me that FF8's story
gets better as it goes along. A good RPG should have an awesome story line
throughout the entire game. It shouldn't be boring through the first two
or three discs and then all of a sudden start to pick up.
Another thing that distanced me from the game were the characters. Not
only were the characters not charming or interesting, but I also found all
of the sequences with Laguna to be more confusing and boring than
entertaining. Yeah, I know, it will all be explained before the end of the
game, but here again, RPG players shouldn't have to endure boring and
confusing scenes before getting to some good ones.
I also dislike FF8's battle/menu system, which is way too complicated
for its own good. When I first started playing the game, I had no idea how
to manage my characters and I felt downright lost. I could just let the
computer handle all of my junctioning for me, but where's the fun in that?
I like my RPGs to have some level of character customization, but not so
much that it's confusing.
I might dust off FF8 and give it another go if there's a severe drought
of RPGs in the future, but that doesn't look like it's going to happen.
Feel free to send me an e-mail at jimmy@mastergamer.com if you share my
thoughts on FF8, or if you think I'm completely insane.
August 22, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
The depth of Virtua Tennis' World Circuit Mode has cemented its position
as one of the very best Dreamcast games on the market. This mode strikes a
delicate balance between participating in normal tennis matches and
training-focused mini-games. The matches get progressively harder as your
rank advances from #300 in the world to #1, and it's nice that you're never
forced to partake in one match over and over again until you beat it.
There are always several new matches to choose from, and you also have the
option to go back and re-play stages that you've already won.
The World Circuit Mode would still have the potential to grow tiresome
if it weren't for the ingenious mini-games. All of these mini-games are
somewhat abstract, while still forcing you to rely on skills that you could
use in traditional tennis matches. In the vast majority of these mini-
games, you could fail 12 times before finally beating it while still having
a great time even as you fail. Beating the final level of one of these
mini-games unlocked a hilariously goofy outfit, which consists of jean
shorts, a Hawaiian t-shirt, and a giant flower in place of a tennis racket.
Achieving a rank of five or higher in the World Circuit Mode unlocks a
doubles match against two incredibly hard players who get a max-serve every
single time and have reaction times that are second to none. One of these
players is known only as King and the other is known as Master, which may
or may not be Sega's thinly-veiled tribute to Master Gamer...
August 18, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I've got to question the judgment of Infogrames' decision to re-package
Unreal Tournament this fall as Unreal Tournament: Game of the Year Edition.
Unreal Tournament will become one of many games to have the words "Game of
the Year" on its cover, including Goldeneye 007, Zelda 64, Half-Life, and
Homeworld. The result could be that consumers who don't read the fine
print won't understand how there could be five "Games of the Year," and
that could lead to confusion and distrust among casual gamers.
I don't know about you, but I took at least one thing in Kelly Flock's
recent Games Business interview with a grain of salt. What I'm referring
to is Flock's insistence that Sony Online is going to be an Xbox developer
in addition to a PlayStation 2 and PC developer. Back when Flock was the
president of the now-dead 989 Studios, he always made it a point to
establish how "independent" 989 was.
There was just one problem with that: 989 was wholly owned by Sony. If
you took Flock's word for it, 989 was just like any third-party publisher.
He claimed that they didn't get technical information from Sony before
other companies (when in fact, they did), and he claimed that they could
create games for other consoles besides the PlayStation (when it fact, they
couldn't, or at least they never did). Now Flock says that Sony Online
will make Xbox games? I'll believe it when I see it.
August 15, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
If you read this week's issue of Master Gamer News, you know that a web
site called Swapoo has generated a large amount of controversy recently.
The name would imply that Swapoo is a service for swapping poo, but it's
actually a file-swapping service for all kinds of files, including video
game ROMs. Swapoo's founder Jeff Freeman claims that the service was
designed to facilitate the swapping of freeware files that are supposed to
be free, not ROMs of commercial games. Freeman told USA Today, "I didn't
plan on this being as popular as it is, and I'm concerned about the
swapping of copyrighted files."
Of course, just because the swapping of commercial games "isn't what
Freeman intended" doesn't prevent him from being liable for the illegal
activity that takes place on Swapoo. The bottom line is that Swapoo is
Freeman's product, and he is responsible for ensuring that no illegal
activity takes place on Swapoo. If he is unwilling or unable to do that,
he should be held accountable in court.
In an unrelated note, I couldn't help but laugh when I read the warning
label that Sega is going to place on Jet Grind Radio when it's released in
the US this fall. The line that I thought was funny for its sheer
absurdity was, "Graffiti is art." Regardless of how great Jet Grind Radio
may be as a video game, graffiti in real life is most certainly not art.
It's annoying, and it's a crime. If graffiti is art, then I suppose
mugging an old lady is art as well, and let's not forget carjacking...
August 11, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
I spent a lot of time earlier this week with Marvel vs. Capcom 2 for the
Dreamcast. Not enough time to write a full-fledged review, but enough to
give you some impressions on the game based on my experience with it. The
animated characters and polygonal backgrounds are beautiful, but the real
attraction here is the gameplay. There's a lot of strategy involved with
managing all three of your characters and your hyper combo bar.
Another thing I liked about Marvel vs. Capcom 2 is the mind-blowing
amount of playable characters (over 50 in all). Most of these characters
are unlocked as purchases in the game's "shop," with the currency being
points that you earn in battles. It's very similar to Soul Calibur's art
galleries, but much more valuable since you're unlocking actual characters.
The only complaints I have with the game are its music and difficulty
level. It's hard to get pumped up for a fight when the character select
music keeps saying, "Gonna take you for a ride!" every two seconds. As for
the difficulty level, maybe I just suck, but I had trouble beating the game
on difficulty level two out of six or so.
August 8, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Virtua Tennis has replaced Perfect Dark as my most-played game for the
past couple of weeks. As is the case with most great games, practice truly
does make perfect in Virtua Tennis, or at least close to perfect. My first
time playing Virtua Tennis was against a friend of mine who is really good
at tennis in real life, and he completely dominated me in every match we
played.
After playing the game exhaustively for several weeks, I invited my
friend over to play against me again, and this time I won all three of the
head-to-head matches we played. What's really great about Virtua Tennis is
that whether you're kicking ass or getting your ass kicked, it's always fun
because every single point is an entertaining, back-and-forth struggle for
victory.
Whenever Jimmy Payne starts to give me a run for my money in Virtua
Tennis, I call into action my patented Erotic Grunt Technique. As the name
implies, I grunt erotically when my player hits the ball, just as some
tennis players (like Monica Seles) do in real life. This causes Jimmy to
lose his concentration for a split second, which often results in an easy
point for me. A flustered Jimmy will then say, "Stop grunting like that!
I can't concentrate!" The trick is to never grunt with every single hit or
in any other predictable pattern so that you catch your opponent off-guard
with every single grunt.
Playing against Jimmy wouldn't be anywhere near as fun as it is if he
didn't get so easily worked up and "into" the game. Most points won
against Jimmy result in the sheer joy of watching him flail his arms
wildly, or yell "Damn you!" or say "I was so close!" He still keeps a good
sense of humor by sayings things like, "I've got you right where I want
you" when I'm up five games to none and it's match point.
July 28, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
After getting almost all the way through Resident Evil: Code Veronica
about a month ago, I stopped playing the game without beating it for some
reason. I don't know why, I just did (I think that has happened to
everyone at some point). I finally started playing the game again a few
days ago, and it's just as good now as it was back in March.
One of the things that Capcom does so well with the Resident Evil
franchise is give each game plenty of its own plot twists, while still
tying all the games together. They don't do it illogically by making up
past events on the fly; everything is affected by things that actually
happened in past games. So instead of a gamer merely saying, "Oh, that's
interesting, I never knew that happened," they are saying, "Good lord! I
remember that! Those bastards!"
On a completely different note, something funny happened while I was
playing Perfect Dark with Ivan our friend Peter, and for once, I wasn't the
one who was humiliated. On the Grid arena, Ivan was above me and I was
firing at him from below. Ivan thought he was being clever by hiding
behind a pillar, but Peter told him to watch out because I was firing
like a madman right below him. Ivan half-jokingly said, "Don't worry, he
can't get me behind this pillar..." Right after Ivan said that, I strafed
to the right a little bit and killed him. Then, to twist in the knife just
a little bit deeper, I mockingly said, "That's going in the Gaming
Journal!"
July 25, 2000
By Contributing Writer Rob Pecknold
I made the decision (mistake?) to get a Japanese Dreamcast in March of
1999. I felt like I was in gaming heaven. Beautiful graphics, games no
one else had... I was a virtual lexicon of import Dreamcast information at
the time. And then the drought came. Not the game drought.... the money
drought. Keeping up with import gaming is tough from a financial
standpoint, and I eventually just lent the system to a friend and forgot
about it.
I got my system back last month, and all seemed well in the world. A
fortnight or two ago (c'mon, fortnight is a damn cool word), I came into
enough money to buy a Dreamcast game that definitely intrigued me. The
game was Jet Set Radio, the in-line skating, spray-painting masterpiece
from Sega. I won't go into too much detail about how hard it was to get
the game (just don't be surprised if the next game you get from express.com
IS THE WRONG ONE). When I did finally get the game, I immediately became
addicted to it.
The graphics, the music, the style... everything about the game exudes
"hip" and "urban," two buzzwords that haven't applied to a whole heck of a
lot of games in the past. Jet Set Radio is one of the best Dreamcast games
I have ever played. I can only hope that when it's released in the US as
Jet Grind Radio, Sega leaves the music and quirky aspects of the story mode
intact.
July 21, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Last night, I had a very freaky dream about playing video games. I was
in a big building with a bunch of elevators in it, and after going through
at least a half-dozen different elevators, I finally arrived at a dark
arcade that had an un-labeled fighting game in it. I thought it was one of
the Tekken games for some reason, but it could have also been a Street
Fighter game because one of the characters resembled T-Hawk from Super
Street Fighter 2. Back when SSF2 was released T-Hawk stood for Thunder
Hawk, not Tony Hawk.
Anyway, I picked a character and was going against another person, who I
couldn't see. I really kicked this guy's ass by constantly hitting him
with big, powerful moves. Then whenever he would try to come at me with a
powerful move of his own, I would hit him with a weak, fast move to knock
him off-balance and stop his attacks. After I finished this guy off, my
uncle who has never played a video game in his life was standing there
watching me play for some reason.
My uncle complimented me for being so dominant in the previous game, and
said that he wanted to go against me himself. We both picked our
characters and were ready to go at it when I woke up. Don't you hate it
when you wake up at the worst possible moment in dreams? There's only one
way I'll ever be able to stop thinking about this dream, and that is to
force my uncle to play me in a bunch of fighting games the next time I see
him. He's going to play against me whether he likes it or not!
Speaking of waking up in the middle of a dream, that recently happened
to Master Gamer's Jimmy Payne thanks to me. One day this week, Jimmy was
supposed to come over to my house to play games along with a mutual friend
of ours. I called him at about 9:30 AM and he was still sleeping. I got
someone at his house to put the phone right up to his ear without waking
him up. Then I yelled, "GET UP, MAGGOT!" at the top of my lungs. There
was an audible scream as Jimmy apparently jumped right out of his bed
because I scared the heck out of him. Everyone involved in this dastardly
deed thought it was really funny... except for Jimmy, of course.
July 18, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Whenever I'm playing a three- or four-player game of Perfect Dark, I
always go out of my way to hunt down and kill campers at all costs. My
friends have labeled me "The Anti-Camper" because whenever they're sniping
from above, using the FarSight's Target Locator, or using any other
arguably cheap tactic, it's not long before I make them pay with their life.
I like to antagonize Jimmy Payne about being a camper even if he's not
camping at the moment because it's fun to watch him get all pissed off and
red in the face as he exclaims, "Shut up! I'm not a camper!"
I thought I was pretty good with remote mines, but my friend Peter puts
me and everyone I know to shame in this category of the game. Not only
does he detonate his mines at precisely the right moment, but he's also a
master of psychology with them. He always manages to make you think there
are remote mines planted where there really aren't, and much more
dangerously, areas that you think are safe are probably packed with several
mines. When I have three friends over and we're playing a four-player game,
I don't have to do much when I'm teaming with Peter in a game with remote
mines.
July 11, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
It has been almost two months since this madness began, and I am still
addicted to Perfect Dark. When I first unlocked the Villa level, I thought
it sucked for multi-player, but now that I've played it for hours on end,
I think it's one of the best multi-player levels in the entire game. This
level is strategically laid-out and intricately-designed in many ways. It
lets you run around shooting randomly at everybody you see if you want to,
while also offering more depth for those who are looking for it. I know
the Villa level so well that I am now capable of hunting down human-
controlled prey without them ever knowing what hit them.
One particularly memorable game took place earlier today between my
friend Peter and I. We played a 1-on-1 game in the Villa level with a frag
limit of 20 and no time limit. Neither one of us are the kind of players
who would ever give less than a 100% effort in any game, which makes it all
the more bizarre that this game played out the way it did. I started the
game absolutely on fire, jumping out to a 19-4 lead (just one kill away
from winning).
Don't ask me how it happened, but I then suffered a Quake 2-style
transformation from "Invincible Ivan" to "Idiot Ivan," and Peter scored
nine unanswered kills. Just when it looked like Peter might actually pull
off one of the greatest Perfect Dark comebacks ever, I managed to kill him
one more time (with a CMP-150 shot to the head) and win the game 20-13.
That had to be the most tension-filled Perfect Dark game I've ever played
because it really looked like Peter was going to come all the way back from
a 19-4 deficit.
July 4, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
After playing many Dreamcast games, specifically the ones made by Sega
itself, I've noticed a lot of quality. However, one thing that seems to be
missing from a lot of Sega's games is longevity. The lack of longevity in
Sega's is the number one reason that most of the company's games are rated
"Good" by Master Gamer rather than "Awesome." Sonic Adventure, Crazy Taxi,
and Space Channel 5 all seemed like must-have games when I first started
playing them. All of them were an absolute blast for the first couple days,
but it's simply not worth it to spend $50 on a game that you can easily
finish in one weekend. After the initial excitement of these games wears
off, there isn't much left to make you keep playing.
In fairness to Sega, they have tried to rectify this problem to some
extent. They could have easily done a straight port of Crazy Taxi from the
arcade to the Dreamcast, but they chose to add a second course and the
Crazy Box mode to give the game more replay value. Sega always seems to
add lots of little details to their games, but I would rather see more
added to the actual meat of the games. Hopefully, Sega recognizes how big
of a problem this is and will make the games in their fall line-up
entertaining for weeks or months on end rather than just days.
June 30, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
A start-up company named Indrema is preparing to launch the L600, a
video game console based on the Linux operating system. Indrema realizes
that the L600 will never compete on the same level as the major systems
from Sony, Sega, Nintendo, and Microsoft, but they hope their system will
achieve some level of success nonetheless, as in about 500,000 systems sold by
the end of 2001. The system is set to launch this fall with the cheapest
model costing $300. The L600 is a pretty impressive system technologically,
with a 600MHz CPU, a graphics processor supplied by Nvidia, 64MB of RAM,
and DVD playback. Unfortunately for Indrema, none of this matters without
the games.
The L600 would seem to be doomed to failure even if it could
automatically play all Linux-based PC games, because Linux-based PC games
aren't much better than Mac games from a quantity standpoint. Unfortunately,
the L600 can't even do that. Developers will have to go out of their way
to make their Linux-based PC games compatible with the L600.
Despite the fact that it will supposedly be very cheap and easy to do
this, how many developers do you think will take the time and money to do
it when they could be working on games for so many other platforms with
installed bases that are so much bigger or are going to be so much bigger
(PlayStation, PlayStation 2, Dreamcast, Nintendo 64, Dolphin, Game Boy
Color, Game Boy Advance, Xbox, PC, etc).
The L600 is supposedly just a few months away from being released, but
not a single developer or publisher has announced their support of the
system. Indrema has said that it expects Linux coding house Loki
International to support the system with ports of some of their Linux-based
games, but will that be enough to make it worth paying at least $300 for
the system? I don't think so.
June 23, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Perfect Dark's safe camping spots (or lack thereof) can be summed up
best with this example: In one of the first games that I played with Jimmy
Payne, Jimmy thought he found a good camping spot on one of the levels. He
said to me, "Hey, I found a great camping spot! Nobody can get me here!"
The second after he said that, one of the computer-controlled Simulants
shot and killed Jimmy, thus disproving his whole "nobody can get me here"
theory. I still tease Jimmy about this incident regularly.
Most of my time spent playing Perfect Dark this week has been with my
good friend Chris Perry. Chris used to always kick my ass in Goldeneye no
matter how hard I tried, but we're actually just about evenly skilled in
Perfect Dark. Chris loves to use the FarSight's "scanning for targets
through walls" feature, and I love to sneak up from behind him while he's
doing this, shoot him in the head, and yell, "I am the anti-camper!"
Chris and I also spent a little bit of time playing Wrestlemania 2000
together, and it was much less fun than Perfect Dark. As great as
Wrestlemania 2000 is, it's much less skill-based than Perfect Dark in
multi-player because once you start a pre-set sequence of events in
Wrestlemania, there's no way out of it. For example, if your opponent
knocks you to the mat with a running clothesline, it could be a long time
before you have any chance to fight back again.
June 20, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
I went over to Ivan's house this past Saturday to play Perfect Dark with
Ivan and our friend Peter. We ordered a pizza, half of it with ham and the
other half with pepperoni. Ivan and Peter looked at me funny when I
suggested the ham, and they didn't touch any of the "ham-infested slices"
once the pizza arrived. Eventually, I got a craving for a pepperoni slice,
but there was only one left and Peter wanted it. Naturally, we decided to
settle our dispute in the next game of Perfect Dark, with the winner
getting the last pepperoni slice.
Ivan put the weapons on random, and one of the weapons that showed up
was the proximity mine. Peter and I threw proximity mines all over the
level, while Ivan tried to win "honorably" (as he put it) by shooting us
with weapons. Of course, Ivan's strategy didn't work too well as he
blindly ran into proximity mine after proximity mine. At one point, he re-
generated right next to three promixity mines and died instantly, causing
him to yell, "I hate proximity mines!"
Finally, at the climax of the game, Peter and I had each had 19 kills
and it was first to 20 kills wins. Ivan ran into yet another one of my
proximity mines, causing me to seemingly win the game. Unfortunately for
me, there is a period of a few seconds in Perfect Dark between the final
kill and the end of the game. Sure enough, in those final few seconds, I
wasn't looking where I was going and I ran into one of Peter's mines. This
boosted Peter's frag count up to 20 and mine back to 19 due to the suicide,
so Peter won the game. I was pretty pissed off at first, but the tension
broke when I saw that Ivan died a record-breaking number of times in the
match (32). Ivan held his own in the rest of the Perfect Dark games we
played, but I think it's safe to say that proximity mines are not one of
his strengths.
June 16, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I had a lot of fun this past week playing NBA 2K with a friend of mine
named Babak. We had much more fun with the Create A Player mode than we
did with the actual game. The first player we created was a guy who was
seven feet, six inches tall and more fat than Rikishi. We gave him a huge
blond afro, big goggles, short shorts, knee-high socks, dorky-looking shoes,
tattoos of the Dreamcast logo on both of his arms, and just about every
kind of clothing accessory you can imagine (arm bands, wrist bands, knee
bands, etc).
On the screen where you enter the player's name, it says "First" where
you're supposed to enter his first name and "Last" where you're supposed to
enter his last name. Rather than thinking of a name for our newly-created
player, we left it the same so that he's actually named "First Last." We
also entered in "1960" in the "Year Graduated" column and "Rookie" in the
"Years Played" column, which means that this guy graduated from college and
then waited 40 years before deciding to join the NBA.
Then, of course, we had to create First Last's little brother, Middle
Last, who is about four foot ten and weights 80 pounds, with toothpick-like
arms and legs. Finally, we created the last of the Last bunch,
appropriately named Last Last. This is the only semi-normal member of the
family. He looks just like a normal guy (kind of like Vince Russo with his
beard, actually).
After all of this player-creating, we signed all three Last brothers to
the Bulls and played a Bulls vs. Bulls game between us. The hilariously
bloated First Last ran up and down the court about as quickly as you could
expect from a 65-year-old, 400-pound man. Middle Last isn't much bigger
than one of First Last's legs. One time they bumped into each other in the
low post, and so of course, Middle Last went down like he had been shot and
suffered a broken arm that would supposedly keep him out of action for five
weeks. The moral of the story is that if you're ever playing basketball
with a guy that weighs four or five times more than you do, don't go
bumping into him like you're Shaquille O'Neal.
June 13, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I've been playing a lot of Perfect Dark lately, including some multi-
player sessions with Jimmy Payne. One particularly memorable game I played
with Jimmy was a free-for-all between me, Jimmy, and two computer opponents
or sims (one colored yellow, and one green). This game had no time limit;
the first player to get 20 kills would win. It seemed like whenever Jimmy
and I encountered each other in the game, one of us would kill the other
and then the yellow sim would kill the remaining player. No matter which
one of us killed the other or how we did it, the yellow sim was always
there to pick up the pieces and score an easy kill. The phrase, "That
yellow bastard got us again!" was uttered on more than one occasion during
this game.
Jimmy and I also got in our fair share of kills on the yellow sim, and
the green sim (who finished with about 10 kills). Finally, it was coming
down to the wire. The yellow sim, Jimmy, and I all had 19 kills, so the
next one of us to get a kill would win the game. All three of us ran into
an area at the same time, and Jimmy appeared to be targeting the yellow
sim, so I did the only thing I could in that situation: I killed the pre-
occupied Jimmy and won the game! Of course, Jimmy was pretty pissed off
and claimed, "I was two seconds away from killing the yellow sim and
winning the game!" Sure you were, Jimmy. Sure you were...
June 9, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
I'm sick and tired of hearing game developers bash Resident Evil as a
means to further their own agenda. In a recent interview, the producer of
an upcoming survival horror game called Run Like Hell said, "I don't know
how long people can be scared of slow-walking zombies. It's like, 'Walk,
walk for your life!' And anytime you can walk away from an enemy, I fail
to be scared." Statements like these show how ignorant some people really
are.
Even if you don't consider the fact that the zombies are much faster in
Code Veronica, those aren't the only creatures in any of the Resident Evil
games. What about the fast-moving hunters that can kill you with one swipe,
the bandersnatches with the ability to reach across the room and kill you
out of sight, or the gremlins that jump from the ceiling and pounce on you?
Another thing I'm sick and tired of is hearing about the PlayStation 2's
dreaded "jaggies." Get over it, already! The PlayStation 2 still has more
graphical capabilities than any other system on the market, with or without
"jaggies." Besides, I'll take jaggies over the N64's bleeding color
effects any day of the week. One last thing I'm sick and tired of is
people writing columns about things that they're sick and tired of...
June 6, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
This past weekend, I played Perfect Dark for a while with former
Contributing Writer Peter Hassett and current writer Jimmy Payne. I'd say
that Jimmy probably won the most games, but almost all of the games were
very competitive. There was never one person who was completely dominating
everyone else, and there was never one person who was playing
embarrassingly bad.
My best games took place towards the end of Peter and Jimmy's visit,
including a couple of games in which the only weapons were the Slayer,
Devastator, SuperDragon, and Rocker Launcher (all of which are either
rocket launchers or grenade launchers of some sort). I had been
complaining all day about how I didn't really like those weapons, but all
three of us were surprised that I actually did very well in those games.
In the very last game we played, we set it up so that whoever had the most
kills after ten minutes would be the winner of the game. Peter and I were
tied with four kills apiece when we started to hear the ten-second
countdown to the end of the game. Sure enough, Peter killed me with about
three seconds left and won the game by one kill. D'oh!
May 30, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
The response to my feature Where's The Hype? has been mostly good so far.
Game hype can be likened to commercials for TV shows or movies. Whenever I
see a commercial for a TV show that I regularly watch, I always mute the
volume and turn my head so that the commercial won't spoil any funny
moments. Commercials for TV shows are useful for the sake of discovering
new shows that are surprisingly good (like Malcolm in the Middle), but
they're useless to me after that. The same kinds of scenarios play out
with game previews. They did a good job of initially establishing that
Shenmue is going to be a major game, but after that, I'm not interested in
reading every little Shenmue tidbit I can find.
I finally ended a Road to Wrestlemania mode in WM 2000 as the WWF champ
(playing as Stone Cold Steve Austin). By accomplishing this difficult feat,
I unlocked one of the greatest wrestlers to ever live, Shawn Michaels. One
thing that I really hate about Wrestlemania 2000 is the way the cage
matches are done. If your opponent starts climbing the cage and you don't
start shaking it right away, you have no chance of stopping them from
escaping the cage and winning the match. This makes for some frustrating
losses (and some cheap wins) in an otherwise well-balanced game.
May 16, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
The Bloomberg news agency hasn't faced much backlash for the almost
completely false PlayStation 2 news story they published in mid-April.
Bloomberg's report said that the US PlayStation 2 would come with a built-
in hard drive and "narrowband modem" (which means 56K modem). Bloomberg's
news story was picked up by many video game magazines and web sites, many
of which reported the story as fact.
Then E3 came around Bloomberg's report turned out to be false, a
surprisingly small percentage of video game magazines and web sites said
so. Instead, most of them made a big deal out of Sony's announcement that
there is a slot in the back of the PlayStation 2 where you'll be able to
install a hard drive at a later date. This is not news. Sony announced a
long time ago that the PlayStation 2 would eventually have a hard drive
add-on. As for Bloomberg's claim that the PlayStation 2 would have a 56K
modem, that turned out to be completely false as well. Of course, Sony
could still decide to release a hard drive or 56K modem for the PlayStation
2 this year after all, but it's extremely unlikely now that E3 has come and
gone with no major announcements.
There needs to be some sense of justice and accountability in the press.
Otherwise, what's stopping everyone from spewing forth bogus stories like
Bloomberg's? There will always be web sites write such false stories, but
I expect better from supposedly-respectable publications like Bloomberg.
May 12, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
It's kind of depressing for me to hear about all the E3 stuff going on
considering that I would be there myself if I were healthy enough to make
the trip. I had my plane ticket, hotel room, and everything else booked
and ready to go, but I still can't make the trip. Hopefully I'll recover
enough in the next year to be able to attend next year's show.
In the meantime, this year's E3 report takes much more of a news-
oriented slant rather than hyping a bunch of games like most other video
game publications. Here's one thing I've noticed in a lot of E3 articles
this year. It seems to me that most games now claim to have "seamless
transitions between real-time cut scenes and in-game action." It's the
most over-used video game cliche since "realistic lighting effects."
Words cannot express how disappointed I am with Excitebike 64... no,
wait a minute, they can and they did in the review. I played NHL 2K with a
couple of friends a while back, and as expected, we had a pretty good time.
I still believe that NHL 2K is much more of a fundamentally solid game than
NFL 2K or NBA 2K, it's just ruined by that damn scoring trick. It's not
even a matter of someone telling you what the trick is; it's a matter of
being able to execute it. Once you can do that, you'll be unstoppable
against the computer and any people who can't do the trick.
May 9, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
What's this? A journal entry by me instead of Ivan for once? Yes, I
have finally stopped playing Code Veronica long enough to write about it in
the Gaming Journal. While playing Code Veronica, I have noticed many
connections to all three Resident Evil games, with connections to Resident
Evil 3 being the least common. An example of one of the rare RE3
connections is the way the hunters come bursting through doors sometimes,
much the same way that the Nemesis does in Resident Evil 3.
It scared the hell out of me the first time a hunter came bursting
through a door because I actually activated it myself. A small robot
appeared and hung from the ceiling projecting a beam of light back and
forth across the floor. I wanted to see what would happen if you ran into
the beam, and that's what caused the hunter to appear. Let's just say that
in order to find out how scared I really was, you would have to do my
laundry...
Another thing that Code Veronica has going for it is the great camera.
Almost every single area in the entire game has the best camera angle there
can be for the situation, whether it creates suspense or prevents you from
seeing an enemy lurking in the corner. Another nice thing about the game
is how Claire's scenario and Chris' scenario are nothing like each other in
terms of the monsters you fight and the people you meet along the way.
May 5, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I've been playing Speed Punks and Wrestlemania 2000 lately (Speed Punks
for the sake of the review, and Wrestlemania because it's still incredibly
fun). I did have fun with Speed Punks a little bit, but moments of joy
were vastly outnumbered by moments of frustration.
As for Wrestlemania 2000, I'm now playing through the Road to
Wrestlemania mode as Stone Cold Steve Austin, and so far I only have two
losses. Another thing that Wrestlemania 2000 does better than any other
wrestling game is perfectly balance the difficulty level. WCW vs. NWO and
WCW Revenge were both unbalanced in that one difficulty level would be way
too easy and the next would be way too hard.
I've been noticing a lot of PlayStation previews lately that say
something like, "The developers of this game are discovering lots of new
tricks that can be done with the PlayStation hardware." The truth of the
matter is that developers are always doing that with every video game
system they work on. Game journalists just talk about it when a system is
old because sometimes there's not much else to say.
May 2, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Most of the time I have spent playing games in recent weeks has been
dedicated to Wrestlemania 2000. Say what you will about Smackdown, but I
still believe that Wrestlemania is a far better game. Smackdown has much
more shallow, arcade-style gameplay with a very limited selection of moves,
whereas I just saw several moves in Wrestlemania yesterday that I had never
seen before. Sometimes Wrestlemania 2000 can be really frustrating, but I
still keep coming back for more no matter how much it angers me sometimes.
One thing that really sucks about Wrestlemania 2000 is how you get
stripped of the World title the first time you win it. Vince McMahon comes
out and awards the title to The Undertaker even though you just won it. I
just finished a Road to Wrestlemania mode where I got just one World title
shot the whole time. I won the title in my one shot, only to be stripped
of the title and never get another shot at it. I was really hoping to
finish the season as the champion because that unlocks Shawn Michaels as a
playable character. Now that I can't play as HBK, I think I might play as
Jeff Hardy or Steve Austin in my next Road to Wrestlemania mode.
April 28, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Recent rumors point to Unreal Tournament being brought to the Dreamcast
in addition to the recently-confirmed PlayStation 2 version. Epic Games'
vice president Mark Rein would not confirm or deny the rumors, but he did
say that it would be great if the game were brought to the Dreamcast or
other systems. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't get too excited
about this because Unreal has been teasing a console appearance for years.
Nothing ever became of the PlayStation version of Unreal. A Dreamcast
version of Unreal was rumored for what seemed like years, but it never
materialized. Now we're supposed to be excited about rumors of Unreal
Tournament coming to the Dreamcast? I'll believe it when I see it.
I think Sony has under-estimated the importance of having four
controller ports. It doesn't make much of a difference if it's just you a
friend playing games, but it makes a huge difference in groups of three or
more. I've got many more PlayStation games than Dreamcast or N64 games,
but whenever I have more than one friend over at a time, the PlayStation is
the least-played system of the three. There's a reason for that: Nobody
wants to sit and watch two people play a game while they wait for their
turn.
I haven't had a chance to play Resident Evil: Code Veronica much yet,
but Jimmy Payne showed me the intro and it's freakin' amazing. One thing
that the cut scenes in Final Fantasy 7 and 8 lack is sound. Some of them
have great music, but there aren't any sounds coming from the characters.
The realistic sounds of Claire gasping for breath as she runs like hell
during the intro really get across the feeling of fear that Capcom was
going for.
April 25, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
The biggest difference betwen Final Fantasy 6 and the other Final
Fantasy games I've played is that FF6 is much harder. Come to think of it,
FF6 also seems to be harder than Chrono Trigger, Lunar, and Wild Arms.
Maybe I'm just finding it hard because you're supposed to run around
leveling-up your characters, but I hate that and never do it. The
encounter rate is high enough as it is without me running around for the
sole purpose of getting into battles. From what I've played of FF6, it
doesn't seem to be worth the extra effort, because the game itself is
nothing spectacular thus far. With Wild Arms 2 coming out soon, I'm
probably going to go for a long time without playing FF6. Hopefully I'll
enjoy it a lot more when I eventually pick up where I left off in the game.
In a completely unrelated note, I've been trying to get Jimmy Payne to
finish Final Fantasy 8 for some time now. It seems that he got about
half-way through the game or maybe a little less than half-way, and decided
that he didn't really like it that much. I've been trying to tell him that
FF8 gets better as it goes along more than any other RPG I've ever played,
but to no avail. You, the Master Gamer reader, can make a difference in
the life of this malnourished, slightly smelly gamer. Just e-mail him at
jimmy@mastergamer.com and tell him to get off his ass and finish the
game...
April 21, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
For those of you who haven't already heard, Imagine Media has killed PC
Accelerator Magazine. The June issue will be the magazine's last.
Apparently, the heartless bastards that make up Imagine's top management
were concerned that PCXL "only" had about 110,000 readers after less than
two years in existence, and so it wasn't making enough money in their
opinion.
Judging by the bloated Imagine masthead in the new issue of Next
Generation, Imagine has no problem hiring what seems like 50 new suits who
add nothing to the editorial content of the company, but God forbid they
should fail to kill a magazine just because it only has 110,000 readers.
Never mind the fact that PCXL was the freshest and funniest video game
magazine ever produced. PCXL was also one of the only magazines on the
market that was entertaining to read from cover to cover, and that
statement comes from someone who can't even play PC games because his
computer is three years old.
My four favorite Imagine products ever are Ultra Game Players (which
management killed), Next Generation Online (which management killed), PC
Accelerator (which management killed), and Next Generation Magazine. If
they ever kill NG Magazine, I will lose what little faith I have left in
this once-great company.
April 18, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I played Star Wars: Jedi Power Battles more than I would have liked to,
hoping that maybe I would like the game more if I played it more. If
anything, I like the game less as I play it more because it's so damn
repetitive. It's a shame to have a license as good as Star Wars wasted
away by a company like LucasArts that's not particularly skilled at making
games. At least they're letting Verant do Star Wars Online instead of
making it themselves.
I've been getting mixed feedback about my feature The Most Promising
Games Of 2000. It seems like I'm always bashing this or bashing this
because I'm so damn jaded, and I don't intend to change that anytime soon.
You can go to any number of other sites if you want fluff-filled crap. I
wrote the feature because I wanted to write a "positive feature" for a
change, as a I highlighted the games that have actually managed to intrigue
or excite me, while also mentioning possible downsides to each of the games.
One of many things I'm sick and tired of reading in other video game
publications is, "You'll love Game X even if you hate Genre X!" No you
won't. If you really hate baseball games, you're not going to like MLB
2001 no matter how good it is. If you really hate fighting games, you're
not going to like Soul Calibur no matter how good it is. The statement in
quotes above is just another method of hyping games that's more than a
little deceptive.
April 14, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
Sim Theme Park wasn't fun for more than a few days, but I couldn't stop
playing it for those few days. The first few theme parks in the game were
incredibly fun to build and maintain, but after a while I felt like I was
doing the same thing over and over again. All you really have to do is
research and build everything you possibly can. As you progress through
the game and build more and more parks, it doesn't really get harder to
reach the point where you've built everything you can. More complicated,
yes, but not harder. The only difference in the later levels is that once
you've reached that point, you have to wait a lot longer before you meet
the level objectives.
No matter how far you are in the game, the Artificial Intellignence
never seems to improve. It's maddening to see that one of the dominant
thoughts in the park is "I want a burger," then build a burger store in a
central location, and then watch as no one goes to it for months. Just to
see if it made any difference, I lowered the price of each burger from the
default $60 (explain that one to me) to only $1, and as a result it got
about two customers per year instead of zero. The same goes for shops that
sell French fries.
April 11, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
In anticipation of what could be the last Nintendo 64 game I'm ever
going to buy (Perfect Dark), I've been playing a lot of Goldeneye lately.
Even though it's old, it's still a lot of fun, and it was really years
ahead of its time. As I've been playing through Goldeneye, I have thought
of some things that I'd like to see in Perfect Dark.
-Sharper images. It seems like Goldeneye is way too blurry, and all the
colors looked washed together when you're looking at something from a
distance. Hopefully, the high-res mode in Perfect Dark will solve this
problem and help make the graphics look amazing.
-Even better Artificial Intelligence. Goldeneye had some great AI, but
there is still plenty of room for improvement. What Rare needs to do is
successfully translate the AI of the enemies in Goldeneye into Perfect
Dark's multi-player bots.
-More sniper scenarios. The best level in Goldeneye's single-player mode
might have been the very first one, where you could snipe the enemies from
a distance. It was never overbearing because if at any time you didn't
want to snipe, you could charge in full-steam-ahead and kill the enemies
that way.
-Better music. While Goldeneye had some decent music, none of it was
really memorable or good enough to make you want to buy the soundtrack (if
there was one). And some of the music in the multi-player mode just plain
sucks. I'm hoping that Perfect Dark has catchier music that really gets
you pumped up to kick some ass.
-More detailed multi-player arenas. One of Goldeneye's biggest flaws is
the overly-simplistic design of its multi-player arenas. In addition to
their generic graphical appearance, Goldeneye's arenas also have a low
amount of secret passages and shortcuts. Hopefully, there will be a lot
more to do and see in Perfect Dark's multi-player levels.
April 7, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I've been telling all of my friends about Sega's new pricing strategy to
see what kind of reaction they have. Somewhat surprisingly, despite the
promise of a free Dreamcast or $200 cash, most of them say, "I'm not going
to sign up for SegaNet. I'll just wait for the PlayStation 2 to get cable
modem access." And to this I say, "Why, dammit, why?"
Before anyone gets too excited about the future broadband capabilities
of the PlayStation 2 and possibly the X-Box, remember that the broadband
scene is very over-hyped, or at least cable modems are. Cable modems are
inherently stupid because the more people that have cable modem access in a
particlar area, the slower each person's connection is. As a result, cable
modems will probably never be extremely fast and mass-market; it will
always be one or the other.
Think about it. Right now cable modems are way too expensive to be
mass-market, so not a lot of people have them. If and when cable modems
become cheap enough for almost anyone to afford, you better believe that
millions and millions of people are going to get them. And of course, when
this happens, they will become much slower because of the inherently stupid
design described above. The future of the Internet is DSL, and even that
won't be mass-market for a few more years.
No matter what the future of broadband is, the fact remains that the
Dreamcast will have broadband Internet access by the end of the year, and
the PlayStation 2 won't have any Internet access at all until 2001 at the
earliest. This whole debate goes way beyond the Dreamcast-PS2 topic. I'm
sick and tired of hearing people say, "I'm not going to buy Product X
because I'm waiting for Product Y." If Product X is out now and it's worth
the money, buy it!
April 4, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I recently found Eyes on Me (the romantic song from Final Fantasy 8) in
MP3 format on the Internet. I had mixed feelings about the song when I
first heard it in the game, but now that I've been listening to it more, I
think it's great. Then again, maybe I'm just more sensitive to that kind
of song with all the things that have been going on in my life outside of
video games. (Awkward silence, followed by the sound of crickets chirping)
Hmm... maybe I should stick to talking about games in the Gaming Journal.
Anyway, I'm still playing through Final Fantasy 6 in my spare time. By
spare time, I mean time not spent harassing Sega representatives with
probing questions that I know they will never answer. After hearing the
hype for so long about how FF6's opera scene is one of the best scenes in
any RPG, I was very disappointed by it. I'm not sure why so many people
like it so much. I don't find the music with the fake singing to be
touching at all, although that could just be because I've been spoiled by
the real singing in Lunar and FF8. I also find it annoying that there are
very short time limits at various points in the scene, and failing to meet
any of them results in you having to start over from the beginning of the
entire slow-paced scene.
March 31, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
The more I play WWF Smackdown, the more cheap finishes I encounter.
There are way too many abrupt finishes in the game, way more than there are
in real life. One time I was defending the European title against Mark
Henry (playing as Chris Jericho), and I dominated him for pretty much the
entire match. Then, out of nowhere, Henry put me in his finishing move
(a bear-hug), Jericho gave up immediately, and I lost the European title.
I have also been playing Pokemon Stadium a lot. When you first turn on
the game, the very first thing you hear is Pikachu saying "Pika" in a very
annoying and embarrassing voice. There's no better way to annoy someone
than to repeatedly reset the N64 so that they have to listen to this over
and over again.
March 27, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I've been playing a lot of WWF Smackdown's Season Mode as Chris Jericho.
At first I was losing just as many matches as I was winning on the medium
difficulty as I got used to the way the game works. Once I figured out a
few tricks, I could easily beat any computer opponent. I won't name the
tricks here so that I don't ruin anyone's enjoyment of the game, but I will
say that they're basic things that don't involve anything fancy or
complicated. I loved Smackdown at first, but I seem to like it less and
less as I play it more.
Another game that I've been playing a lot is Final Fantasy 6 for the
PlayStation. I still say that FF6's encounter rate is too high. There are
way too many battles in the game, but it's worth it to get through them
because of the great story line and wide array of likable characters. The
music in the game is also excellent. I love the main theme that plays on
the overworld map and at the beginning of the game. The battle theme does
a good job of getting my blood pumping almost every single time, and that's
quite a task considering how many battles there are in the game.
March 24, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
I completed Fear Effect over a long four-way weekend. I played it for
hours on every single one of those days because I just couldn't stop
playing. Before you face the final boss, you have to decide which
character's ending you want to see. I picked Hana, and I think it's worth
it for me to go through the game again and see what happens to Glass.
I have also been playing The Sims a lot lately, and I just got my hands
on some cheat codes that give you lots of money. I don't usually use cheat
codes, but once you eventually get tired of doing the same thing in The
Sims, the cheats make the game fun again. I'm spending money like a
madman. So far I have a sound system and a big-screen TV in almost every
single room.
March 17, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
After I stopped playing Final Fantasy 8 a few weeks back, I was left
with no RPGs in my gaming library to play. The next big one on the horizon
is Wild Arms 2 (set for May 1), followed by Lunar (tenatively June 1),
Chrono Cross (August), and Final Fantasy 9 (October). That's a lot of RPGs
to be released over a six-month period, so I thought I might wait it out
and not play any RPGs until Wild Arms 2 comes out. This lasted for a
couple of weeks, but I can't take it any more, so I bought Final Fantasy
Anthology and I'm now playing through FF6.
So far, I've only had time to get a few hours of gameplay into FF6.
It's a very good game, but one thing that really annoys me is the extremely
high encounter rate. Maybe I've just been spoiled by the Encounter-None
ability in FF8, but the encounter rate in FF6 seems to be much higher than
it is FF8, FF7, Lunar, and Chrono Trigger. It's the pain in the butt when
you're in a dungeon and you keep getting into fights every few seconds.
Not only is it annoying, but it discourages exploration and going out of
your way to reach treasure chests.
March 14, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
I've been playing a lot of Carrier lately, and frankly, I'm sick of it.
The characters are unimaginative, the hallways all look the same, the
enemies aren't threatening, and the story line never goes anywhere. If all
of that doesn't add up to a frustrating experience, I don't know what does.
I've also been playing The Sims for the PC, which is painstakingly slow
on my Pentium 1 computer running at 200MHz, but unbelievably fun nontheless.
It's great fun to be able to build a house and then play around with the
people inside of it. You can also do some pretty sick things to the Sims
in the game if you really want to. For example, if you don't like a
particular Sim, you can build brick walls around him or he, and they will
eventually die of starvation. You can also invite a bunch of people to a
pool party, and then remove the ladder from the pool. All of the Sims in
the pool will eventually be too exhausted to swim, and so they drown.
Some of you might be thinking, "That's sick!" Quit complaining, because
it's a heck of a lot less violent and gory than blowing someone away with a
rocket launcher in Quake.
March 10, 2000
By Contributing Writer Rob Pecknold
I have finally stopped playing Asheron's Call. For some reason, I
reached a point where I found the game to be more annoying than fun. Most
games reach this point; it just took Asheron's Call a lot longer to reach
it than most games.
My newest gaming obsession is WWF Smackdown. This game is AWESOME.
Master Gamer's official review (by Ivan) will be up within the next couple
of weeks, but for now I am having a total blast playing this game. The
season and pre-season modes are incredible on their own, but add onto that
a sickening amount of game modes, and you have yourself a winner. Check it
out if you get the chance.
March 7, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
I had a huge party for my birthday on Saturday, March 4. It's weird how
most of my friends that came over like the Dreamcast and PlayStation more
than the Nintendo 64, yet we played the N64 more than the other two systems
combined. This is mainly because of Wrestlemania 2000 and Goldeneye.
Wrestlemania is even better in multi-player than it is in single-player.
I played as Chris Jericho in four-player free-for-alls. I was doing pretty
well until one of my friends who was playing as Kane put me in the choke-
slam and then the tombstone for the win. Goldeneye is still somewhat fun
with a group of friends even though it's two and a half years old. Nowhere
near as fun as Wrestlemania, but still decent fun.
Later on in the day, I was surprised by the arrival of my two former
next-door neighbors and best friends from when I was growing up. I hadn't
seen one of them since before my surgery last year, and I hadn't seen the
other for years. The three of us used to play lots of sports games
together, so I showed them NHL 2K.
March 3, 2000
By Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne
Resident Evil 3: Nemesis is one of those games that gets better and
better as it goes along. When I first started playing it, I was kind of
disappointed because it seemed like it was just a re-hash of Resident Evil
1 and 2. I didn't realize that I was wrong until about half-way through
the game. Things start to really heat up and become original after you use
the trolley to get out of the inner city. In particular, the clock tower
brings back a lot of fond memories of Resident Evil 1.
Another thing I like about RE3 is the bonus game called Mercenaries that
is unlocked when you finish the main game. This mini-game adds a lot to
the overall package because it gives you a reason to keep playing the game
after you've already beaten it. By killing lots of enemies in a short
amount of time, you can earn money to get a machine gun, gatling gun, and
all of the weapons with unlimited ammo (including the rocket launcher).
Ever since I unlocked Mercenaries, I've been playing it more than I've been
playing the main game.
February 29, 2000
By Contributing Writer Rob Pecknold
I've been playing Asheron's Call quite a lot recently. The newest game
update, Shadows of the Past, adds more to the game than any update since
the first one (The Sudden Season). Online RPGs have a way of sucking time
away from my life like no other kind of game can. Asheron's Call actually
seems to get more and more addictive as I play it more. I'm still having
fun with it even though I've played it for well over 100 hours. Of course,
your experience with the game (should you buy it) may be completely
different. You could meet up with a bunch of pricks who spoil your
enjoyment of the game, or you might find that you just don't like online
RPGs for one reason or another. But if your experience with Asheron's Call
is anything like mine, you'll love it.
February 25, 2000
By Ivan Trembow
In this update, I added Final Fantasy 8 to the second tier on the list
of my favorite games of all time. I thought long and hard about whether to
add FF8 to the first tier or the second tier before I finally made my
decision. I kept thinking to myself how much I love FF8 and how it might
deserve to be placed into the first tier, but there are already four games
there. I can't add every game that I "really, really love" into the first
tier, or it would be too big and the impact of a game being placed into the
first tier would be greatly diminished. So in the future, I think I'm
going to try to keep the first tier at four games or less.
FF8 didn't deserve to bump Lunar, FF7, or Chrono Trigger out of the
first tier because it ranked lower than all three of those games in my
in-depth RPG feature. In the future, I think I might insert every RPG I
finish into the RPG feature so that I can determine where they stand in
relation to the other games. This year alone is going to see such hot-
looking games as Lunar 2, Chrono Cross, Final Fantasy 9, and Wild Arms 2.
February 22, 2000
By Contributing Writer Rob Pecknold
The more I play it, the more things disgust me in Ultima 9: Ascension.
The game is great overall, but there are plenty of little details that
annoy me. For example, there is supposed to be a "romance" (I use that
term loosely) between the Avatar and the main female character, Raven.
This has got to be one of the worst-scripted romances in the history of
gaming. Unlike the love between Alex and Luna in Lunar: Silver Star Story
Complete, which was very believable and didn't culminate until the very end,
Avatar's relationship with Raven is terrible. Alex and Luna's relationship
was enhanced by the incredible writing that the Lunar team at Working
Designs produced. The writing for Avatar and Raven's "romance" segments is
more pathetic than the annual Eataholics Anonymous Marathon. This is an
actual conversation from the game:
Avatar: So, Raven, why don't we drop anchor and just, you know, relax for a
bit?
Raven: There will be plenty of time for fun later, love, but you've got a
job to do!
That's the friggin' definition of bad writing. Origin's writers do
nothing to beat around the bush that the two may be sexually involved.
On the contrary, it's thrown in our face like a wet rag in gym class.
Horrible moments like these decrease my respect for the game and its
developers.
February 11, 2000
A good friend of mine recently told me about two islands in Final
Fantasy 8 that have tons of Draw Points on them for awesome spells like
Meteor, Ultima, Full-Life, Flare, and lots more. At first I thought maybe
my friend had heard a false rumor somewhere, but he said he had actually
been to the islands in the game, and I'm close enough friends with this guy
to know that he wouldn't lie about something like this. Sure enough, I
found both islands.
You need the Ragnarock to access both of them. One of them is called
The Island Closest To Heaven. It's a very small island in a cluster of
islands near the north-east corner of the map. Just land on all the
islands and you'll eventually find it (press O to go to the menu screen and
you'll see the name of the island you're on). The other island is called
The Island Closest To Hell, which is much bigger than the other one. If
you're on the world map, press select a couple times until you're on the
biggest view of the world. The Island Closest To Hell is the western-most
island on the entire map. Going to these islands repeatedly will give you
lots of great spells, which are very handy against the tough final boss.
February 4, 2000
Another journal entry about Madden 2000, you say? Well, I'm still
completely addicted to the game even though football season is over, so I'm
still writing about it in the Journal. I've been refining my craft in the
general manager aspects of Madden 2000's Franchise Mode. I've got it down
to a process that seems to work exceptionally well, but I still have to
keep it up every year so that the entire dynasty doesn't fall apart. My
team ratings have been 100 in offense, defense, and special teams for years
now, even with free agency and retirement eating away at the team's
prosperity every year.
My addiction to the actual gameplay in Madden is starting to diminish,
but I'm just as addicted as ever to the general manager aspects. Just to
see how I good (or bad) I really am, I think I might start a new Franchise
Mode as the Browns and simulate every single one of their games just to see
what kind of team I can build over 10, 20, or 30 seasons. I'm sure I would
be losing a lot of games at first, but I'm also sure that I could
eventually get it up to the 100 rating that my current team has.
The system that EA has in place with the Franchise Mode really is
brilliant in every way. Now all they need to do is continue to add new
wrinkles to the formula every year so it doesn't get stale, and increase
the accuracy of the simulation results. The sim results are decent, but
still nowhere near as good as they should be. It just doesn't make sense
that the same exact team can be 13-3 one year and 9-7 the next year.
January 28, 2000
Final Fantasy 8 is a game of extreme highs and extreme lows. I have
been practically drooling from having so much fun on numerous occasions,
and I have also been bored out of my mind on numerous occasions. The
"drooling" times are much more common than the "bored out of my mind" times,
but I'd still rather not have the "bored out of my mind" times at all. In
particular, I found the gang's adventure in outer space to be very boring,
although it serves its purpose of laying the groundwork for everything that
happens after that. (I won't say anything more than that on this subject
so that I don't spoil anything for anybody.)
One thing that's continually improving as the game goes on is Squall's
personality. At first, Squall seems like a very rude and abrasive person
with no good reason for being like that. As I said in my FF8 review, he
seems like a prick. But as the game goes on, you see that he acts like he
does for the same reason that many people act that way: They don't want to
get too close to anyone because they fear the pain of losing someone close
to them. Squall becomes more and more likable as the game goes on. He
still acts like a loner sometimes, but so do I, and that doesn't make me a
prick, does it? (Don't answer that.)
January 21, 2000
I became less addicted to Madden NFL 2000 this week due to the
increasing lack of difficulty. At one time, the medium difficulty level
was challenging for me, but now I'm winning all of my games by at least a
couple of touchdowns. This is probably a combination of my increasing
skill level and my increasing player ratings in the Franchise Mode.
Whatever the case, I had much more fun when most games were competitive.
I would normally change the difficulty level to hard in this situation, but
you can't change the difficulty level in the Franchise Mode for some
unknown reason. So I'm left with two choices: Keep going in my current
Franchise Mode and not have much fun due to the lack of challenge, or start
a new Franchise Mode and lose over ten seasons' worth of shrewd roster
moves. Neither choice is very appealing.
January 14, 2000
I've been playing Madden 2000's Franchise Mode a lot lately. I've been
simulating the regular seasons and then playing in the playoffs if my team
makes it that far. This is necessary because I can't possibly play through
30 full regular seasons, but the results of the simulations are often
unrealistic. For example, I've used my general manager skills to boost the
Redskins up to an overall rating of 97 out of 100, and yet in the last
simulated regular season, they went 8-8 and missed the playoffs. That's
not very realistic. Still, I've been playing Madden a lot more in the last
couple months than I did in the previous few months.
The other game I've been playing a lot recently is Final Fantasy 8. At
first, I thought FF8 was great, but not quite on the same level as Chrono
Trigger, Lunar, Final Fantasy 7, etc. Now it seems that I like the game
more every time I play it. The Limit Break trick really cuts down on the
amount of time spent in tedious standard battles, and the story line has
plenty of surprising twists and turns. Of course, I still need several
dozen more hours of gameplay to determine its place in history among the
aforementioned classics...
Back To The Newest Gaming Journal
Back To The Main Page
© 2001, ivan@mastergamer.com