I must say that it is quite funny watching all of the loudest EA critics and boycott organizers collapse like the Yankees against the Red Sox in the ALCS. I won’t name any names, or point any fingers, but MVP Baseball will probably not suffer much at the cash register this season. At least, not because of some EA boycott.
I’m still standing strong though, as are others. Of course, I haven’t purchased an EA Sports game in many years (and never a baseball product), so I don’t count.
I no longer can remember how long I have anticipated the release of Gran Turismo 4, so last night, opening the wrapper on the game was pretty anticlimactic.
I put in the game and was greeted by a kicking intro sequence with beautiful graphics, Panama by Van Halen blearing. That got my blood pumping.
The game allows you to do a one time import of GT3 game save info for licenses and credits (to a maximum of 100K). I decided to do this to save me some license time. I have no idea why, but only my “a” and “b” licenses were imported. It looks like I have to earn “ia, ib, and s” for GT4 gaming goodness. It has been so long since I did a license test in a GT game that I do not remember how many tests had to be passed to earn a given license. In the case of GT4 it looks like you have to pass 16 tests. I quickly did the first 4 or 5 for “ib” status and earned bronze for all. It looks like I may have some work in store.
The license test yielded a glimpse of what is in store for the much hyped improved physics. At first glance, the physics have been overhauled; weight transfers were easily noticeable and the in car camera does a great job of providing a feeling for what it is like to get jerked around in a car. To this effect (I have not read the manual) it looks like there is some sort of g-force gauge meter at the bottom of the screen. I assume the ideal is to keep everything nice and centered, but the indicator moved left and right, I suppose simulating lateral weight transfers. I will have to investigate further.
Over recent weeks I have played a decent amount of GT3; racing for trophies, buying cars, and generally working on my “completion” percentage. I did not think about building up a cash reserve to import into GT4, so I pretty much had nothing for the GT4 import feature. Too bad because I could not start rally racing or even buy a new car. More on that later.
GT4 features this world map crap (for lack of a better description) that has you going all over the place to find car dealerships (both new and used), places to race, places to tune your car, and special events. It has been a while, but it is rather like GT2 – I like the GT1 and GT2 model better.
I have never liked buying used cars. I play GT to live out for the driving experience – why would I want to play with used cars? I find the concept rather aggravating. I can see having to take license tests because you have to learn how to drive to race, but there is no reason to have used cars. Personal preference I guess.
I started off the game by purchasing a Honda PRELUDE Si VTEC ’91. The car was slightly less that 8K, only had 49K miles, and had a robust 194HP. I figured that the car was not my ideal, but it had a solid bang for the buck, was fairly upgradeable, and had good power to get me through the initial round of races.
So I quickly took off the beginning racing section, and won the 5 Sunday Cup races to win a prize car. I do not think this is too much of a spoiler, so I will name the car: Autobianchi Allz Abarth ’79. Doubt I will use it much; it is not interesting, has almost no HP, and does not look fun to race.
After that I needed something more fulfilling, so I found some Family Cup series that allowed me to race on the wonderful Nurburgring. Wow! What an amazing course. I’ll say this – in real life I would have been dead several times over. Thankfully, GT4 allows me to safely live out my fantasies of racing on the ‘ring. I can only imagine that racers back in the day had nuts the size of Texas, or were plain insane. What a traffic course.
It looks like these Family Cup races give you an option to “handicap” the AI. I adjusted to -5 (figured my car sucked) and easily won by 19 seconds. I will have to experiment more to see if the CPU field is adjusted based on the type of car entered in the race, or if it is always the same lot. At any rate, there are plenty of real-life tracks that should be a ton of fun once I have a better car.
Noticeable in all the races I entered, especially the Nurburgring race, was tire wear. I am not sure if it is always on, or if I just happened to pick races where it mattered. Tire wear did not play a big factor in the Sunday Cup races, but I could tell a difference on my second lap at the ‘ring. The car handled noticeable different my second time around. Of course I became more brash as I adjusted to the physics engine, but it is nice to see tire wear becoming such a prominent part of the game at this early stage.
I need more time before I comment on the legendary lack-luster CPU racing AI. I am not sure if it is the same, better, or worse. Hopefully I can make some sort of conclusion on this issue after a few more hours of game play.
Overall the handling of the cars is amazing, the visuals are stunning, and the sound effects are suburb. The GT series has always been noted for great presentation, and GT4 does not look to disappoint in this regard. The new visual effects of shaking the screen when you collide with off road barriers, and the nice way the screen seems to “dip” under braking are all welcome additions to the series.
I was very disappointed that I could not initially race in the rally dirt and snow courses. Tires for dirt and snow cost a hefty 22,250 credits, which is a lot when you are only winning 600 a race in the Sunday Cup. Hopefully I will be able to accumulate enough money in the next couple of days to see if the rally mode is enough to replace CMR2.0 as my favorite rally game.
After a couple of hours of playing I am .8% complete, I have accumulated 48 A-spec points, I have logged 42 A-spec racing miles, I have a 6/6 win ratio, I have earned 6 trophies and 1 prize car, and I have accumulated 3,500 prize credits. GT4 is a wet dream for anyone that demands they get countless hours out of a game.
At this point I think it is fair to say that fans of the series are going to be enthralled with the game. Others are going to have a serious “been there, done that” feeling. Me? GT4 makes me want to finally buy a decent wheel, and setup a racing cockpit in the den – my wife will never allow that (big ass racing cockpit in the den), but one can dream.
The World of Warcraft servers are down during prime elder gamer playing time – that sweet spot between when everyone is asleep in the house and when your wife stumbles into your den wondering why you haven’t come to bed yet. Many an evil creature has been killed, nations conquered, and sports team dynasties built during this time of the day.
Oh well, guess I’ll get my beauty rest tonight.
Finally! With little fanfare, GT4 shipped last night. I assume it will be safe and sound at home by the time I get off work, but will anyone care? I plan to post my usual disarray of opinions and such, but I am feeling really unmotivated to play this oft-delayed game.
I have never been a Microsoft (M$) hater; I made plenty of money in the early stages of my career writing applications for Windows, so I am normally fairly reserved when it comes to attacks on M$. But not this time; it is just getting too much to stomach.
So why do many IT folks hate the evil empire? Because of the stupid stuff that M$ does to stifle creativity, and hinder competition. Their unfair practices are fairly well documented so I am not going to go ranting this morning on the subject.
Now M$ has tried to patent IsNot (as an “is not” operator) in “BASIC like” languages. Many of the readers here may not care, but for those that do, keep your fingers crossed that the patent is denied.
M$ is also at it again trying to “stick” it to the competition by including “special” code that prevents Windows applications running under Wine from receiving updates. For those that do not know, Wine is a great application that allows Windows applications to run on top of Linux systems. M$ claims that it is trying to prevent software piracy by not allowing illegal software to receive updates, but alas, as usual M$ is not being truthful with consumers. Apparently, there is a specific module of code that checks to see if users are running Wine. If they are, too bad, so sad, no updates for you! It does not matter if all your software is perfectly legal; Wine and Windows updates apparently will no longer mix.
M$ has to make money; I understand that, but it does not mean that I have to like their tactics.
I am fairly conservative by nature, and I really enjoy the O’Reilly Factor, but I am sick and tired of passing the buck to explain why certain segments of society misbehave. It is a fairly well known fact that O’Reilly thinks that “Rap Culture” contributes to juvenile delinquency. I disagree with this thesis.
Last night on the O’Reilly Factor there was a segment linking 50 Cent to gangster violence. I will admit that the “message” in 50 Cent’s songs is not exactly wholesome. I listen to some of his music (love me some “Candy Shop” – listed to it twice this morning), but blaming gangster behavior on 50 Cent is just too much. Seriously, the very nature of gangs is based on respect (as if I am an expert after playing GTA), sex, and violence (I can read the news).
What bothers me the most is that everyone from religious zealots to the media to misguided parents is always searching for a scapegoat to explain why good kids go bad; Dungeons and Dragons, music, video games, TV violence, and even Smurfs. It is just too much. Let’s just admit that some segments of society are completely f’ed-up regardless of the music they listen to, the games they play, and the amount of time they spend watching TV.
At the end of the day the problems run much deeper; poverty, discrimination, broken marriages, out-of-wedlock babies, lack of respect, poor public education, and the list goes on. I admit that I am very blessed. I grew up in a good home (my parents did divorce when I was very young). I lived in a nice neighborhood with prosperous families, and my parents provided me with a good education. I may not know what poverty is like, and I may never know how it feels to be discriminated against based on the color of my skin, but I do know that I have values, a decent amount of morality, and a firm grasp on my religious convictions. In other words, I am fairly well grounded.
I am not saying that I am perfect, but I have not been influenced to the point of misbehavior based on various forms of media. Growing up I played Dungeons and Dragons, I scratched many a record looking for stupid messages, I have played video games most of my life, I watched violent TV and movies, and I am even ashamed to admit that I watched the Smurfs. I was listening to Prince the day my step-father told me that Prince was not allowed in the house; nice and protective of my dad, but I guess he was an ignorant bloke. Prince was “bad” so he was not allowed in our house – of course I said screw that and kept on listening to this day.
Have to blame it on something …
If you have to ask about records, then please do not because it will make me feel too damn dated.
I recently returned from a house hunting trip to College Station, Texas. During that time, I didn’t play one minute of World of Warcraft. I must say that it was much more difficult than I thought it would be to simply miss a “few” days. I kept thinking to myself, “You know, that Intel graphics card in my Dell laptop might just be able to handle WoW over the free Marriott DSL connection.”
And since I didn’t actually have the WoW discs with me, I thought, “You can always use a second copy of WoW.”
Bringing your wife along on these trips crushes any gaming on the road fantasies you might have. I may be able to get away with hours of bliss in the den fortress of solitude in my house, but I can’t run and I can’t hide in a hotel suite.
I fired up WoW when I returned home, killed a few alpha wolves and stags, and my world was back in order.
Thanks for the warm welcome! I hope to continue to bring my, shall we say, unique viewpoint to the Recycle Bin for many years to come.
Those of you who read my former site know that I am a big 24 fan. The episodes continue to get better every week. But I would like to officially be on record as having identified the eeeevvvvvil ex-husband many weeks ago. I told you then that foreign accent equals evil character in 24-land.
I am going to write a couple of reviews for Gamernikki over the next few weeks. One of my old internet buddies is an editor for the site and it seems that PC game writers are hard to find these days. So I decided to help him out. Plus the site is very good and brings back fond memories of yesteryear when people wrote quality reviews for the price of a free game.
Not having to mess with SPAM filters and web site settings has freed up some time for gaming. Thanks Jonathan!
Life often has a way of dealing us the strangest of surprises. Regulars here know that I am not what anyone would call a fan of online gaming. In fact the only online game that I play is OOTP6 (and really this is passive online gaming), in the IOSBL.
In a strange turn of events Chris Johnson, the commissioner of said league, and owner of the The Elder Gamer blog, has decided hang out over here for awhile:
Jonathan and I spend a lot of time dealing with attacks and hacks of sorts. Since he actually knows what he is doing in this 24-esque conter-terrorism unit we run, I figure there are safety in numbers – so the elder gamer is moving [to CG’s Recycle Bin]. I like to write, but this SPAM has got to go … Elder gamers never die, they just find new sites to write for…
I am honored that Chris has decided to lend his talents to this humble site. Chris is a great writer, so anyone that is not familiar with his work is in for a real treat.
Welcome Chris!
I know that Wipeout has one of those cult following things going for it, but I have never really understood why. I remember playing the demo on the disk that came with my PlayStation (has it really been almost 10 years?), but I did not think that much about the game at the time. Somehow I ended up with Wipeout and Wipeout XL, back in the day when I was addicted to “buying” games. Seriously.
At some I am sure I played the games, but they did not have a lasting impression. I even remember the carefully placed Red Bull advertisements before I had any idea what Red Bull was – some sort of drink, but what kind?
The point to this entry is that I have been going through my gaming library and selling things that I no longer “have” to own. I came across Wipeout and Wipeout XL last week and my oldest son asked about the games. I told him that we could play if he was got good marks for behavior at school and at home (no sassing mom!) this week. Today I made good on my promise.
Wipeout XL is a blast! I cannot believe that I missed out on this game. The graphics still hold up nicely; sure, they are not next generation quality or anything, but they are certainly not bad especially with the PS2 option to clean up PSX graphics. The level designs are superb, the overall atmosphere of the game (graphics, menus, stylistic approach, music, etc) is simply great. And now I understand the cult following thing – the gameplay is second to none for a futuristic racing game. I am impressed by the wide complement of ships, and the fact that each one actually behaves differently, which in turn requires different strategy.
It is always cool rediscovering an old classic, and it is even more rewarding to experience a new (or rather older) game for the first time. I have so many untapped games in my library that I have a feeling that there are plenty more hidden gems besides Wipeout XL.
Of course now I have to resist the temptation to just go and preorder the Wipeout game for the PSP, but if Wipeout XL (and hopefully the original Wipeout) hold a good deal of replay value then I think I may have to join that before mentioned cult.
For anyone keeping up with my stupid Best Buy saga, things have finally been resolved in favor of the good guy (that would be me). Let me first say that I appreciate comments, suggestions, and well wishes from those of you that have posted. I am sure I would have continued to fight the good fight, but just knowing that pretty much everyone thinks that I am in the right, and Best Buy is out to screw us over made the fight worthwhile.
Yesterday I took my new iPod Photo along with all my old iPod stuff (box, manual, cables, head phones, etc) back to the store as soon as it opened. I found the first service person I could find, told the lady the abbreviated version of this sad, sad, tale, and then I demanded that I be given all the parts for the iPod Photo or I should be given a new iPod 40GB 4G. Either way the store was going to take back all my original stuff. I was damned determined to get the situation sorted out right then and there.
Of course the lady had to get the story manager, who happened to be the same lady (well, not really a lady; rhymes with switch) that “helped” me the night before. I figured it was going to get ugly.
In the end, I won. I did have to go through a ridiculously stupid process of exchanging out item for item. My original box for the new iPod Photo box; my original headphones for the new iPod Photo headphones. On so on and so forth. It was really unbelievable the manager actually made (not really; more like show) me put the iPod Photo in the iPod Photo Dock to make sure that it actually fit. She was really being a true bitch. There I said it; sorry, I was trying to refrain.
Bottom line Best Buy sucks, Best Buy customer service sucks, Best Buy Service Plans suck, Best Buy store managers suck, but perseverance pays off.
I now have a shinny new iPod Photo 40GB 4G. Nice stuff, that color display and pretty album pictures and longer batter life. Yea me!
For those keeping score at home, I have been trying to get Best Buy to replace my broken iPod. So far, so bad. I am not going to go into all the gory details, but I will say that on Monday I was told I should know something by Wednesday. On Wednesday I learned that the system board was bad, but nothing could be done until I spoke with the Geek Squad manager.
So today I finally get to talk to the manger and he agrees to give me a new replacement iPod. I win! Or so I mistakenly thought.
For starters, this whole buy it online, pick it up in the store is a shame. I ordered my iPod through bestbuy.com, picked the iPod in the store, and paid for my product service plan in the store at the time I picked up the iPod.
Guess what? If you buy online, your product info is not on the store system. So I have to go home, and come back with receipt info. But wait, there is more! Info in hand does me no good because apparently there is no way to replace an item in store that was purchased online. The standard Best Buy store software does not handle such a return. Freaking ridiculous. Oh yes, there is still more.
I get the store manger to work out the details of the exchange, so I am almost on my way. I was then shocked when I was told that I could only have the iPod, not the actual box. Sounds like a stupid policy, but I guess they did not want me to get an extra pair of headphones. Not sure how that would damage Best Buy, but I finally relented and told them to give me the damn replacement iPod so I could go home.
I then realize that they have given me an iPod Photo 40GB 4G. Nice, but I tell them this is a mistake. No one seems to care. At this point I get a little concerned and ask again for the software, manuals, etc because I figure something has to be different. The Geek Squad guy tells me everything is the same. Once again I relent and say screw it, and head for home with my new iPod Photo, happy that I have a working iPod.
As I was leaving the store I decide to go back to the counter and ask one last time for the manual. The Geek Squad guy realizes that he made a mistake I should have been giving a regular 40GB iPod, not the photo version. The guy is nice enough to give the instructions.
So now I am home and I am an unhappy camper. I do not have the right software, I do not have the right dock (the iPod Photo Dock is actually different than my standard iPod 4G doc), and I do not have the photo cables that are included. It will cost me $70 bucks to get the right dock and cables, which makes this not such a bargain.
I guess I have to go back to the store tomorrow, demand a replacement 40GB 4G or the box and other crap.
Talk about the agony of defeat. This whole ordeal has been something out of Wonderland.
I got my repaired iPod back last Friday, but unbeknownst to me, the damn thing will no longer output any sound. So I went from a static filled output that did have output, to absolute silence.
So I go back to Best Buy last night and give them the run down. Of course the guy treats me like I have the Black Death and am trying to pull a fast one. I am not sure why customers have to justify why they are bringing in something for repair, but I guess if you have a 40GB G4 iPod, you have to justify your actions.
The manager-type of the Geek Squad tells me that his iPod specialist will be in on Wednesday, and if he cannot fix it then they will give me a new one. Of course I cannot get this in writing, so knows what will happen. I just want the damn thing to work again, and I do not care to have to wait another three weeks for the repair guys to do nothing, which is basically what they did last time. How can you swap out a HDD and not verify that the unit actually plays sound?
The Best Buy customer service has been horrendous. A decent store would just give me a replacement and return the original back to Apple as defective. According to the manager-type, there is sort of a lemon law in effect – I have to send it in for repairs four times before they will replace the unit. I am now on repair order two.
Next steps? I will wait until Wednesday to see what the iPod specialist can do – apparently he is something short of God, and the only person trained to do a little more than a soft reset. After that, if I do not get a replacement I will have to call my credit card company, and maybe call Apple.
It was a long week on the work front, so pretty much nothing in the way of blogging activities. A few random nuggets:
All for now. Don’t forget to buy your significant other something special for Valentines Day!
After starting out on two-stars, I quickly decided that I was actually too good (hurray!), so I had to adjust to make the game challenging. It is amazing to see the difference between two and three starts. On two stars, the game more or less plays at your pace, it some to you, and you can knock it in the net relatively easy. Not so on three stars.
I was immediately surprised by the difference in difficulty. For starts, the game does not feel cheap. This is important for gamers that are not really that gifted. The CPU just plays within the bounds of being smart, not unrealistic. The CPU now takes charge of the ball on offense and aggressively seeks to move the ball forward and shoot when given the opportunity. Likewise on defense, the CPU moves forward to challenge the man in possession of the ball. Smart all around.
One of the things I noticed right away was the increase in fouls; not necessarily cards, but fouls are called much more frequently. The CPU also makes smart decisions about clearing the ball, or playing back in order to gain opportunities to move forward.
Since moving to three-stars my games are along the lines of 1-0, and I actually loss a game 1-0. That kind of sucked since it was the first time I have been defeated in WE8, but I was outplayed, did not mount a serious attack, and did a piss poor job of maintaining possession. In other words I deserved to take the loss.
I will continue to post more as the mood strikes.