If it’s one thing that many older gamer remembers, it’s the little stores back in the days that sold video games, allowed you to trade them in, and whatnot.  Even in today’s age where game retail seems to be dominated by GameStop/EB Games, these small stores still exist.  One said store is GameDeals, a little second hand store in New Westminster (suburban Vancouver) situated within walking distance from Columbia Station along the Expo line.

Just recently, GameDeals’ manager Brian Hughes finished a five episode series in conjunction with Dissapointed People centered around their store that was presented by ScrewAttack:

Although I’m sitting on the fence as to whether I actually liked the series or not, as soon as I found out that it was a real video game store in Metro Vancouver, I literally left to check it out.

Walking into the store to me was like walking into a ScrewAttack feature; If you’ve seen the series, you already know what it looks like.  This really is a true gamer’s store, covered wall-to-wall with gaming memorabilia, fanart, various trinkets, and games and systems that go all the way back to the Atari 2600. The prized possession of GameDeals, it seems, is the fact that they were able to get their hands on the limited edition Megaman 9 box. If you’ve got money to spend, they’re selling it for $500.  To be honest, I thought I’d never see that box with my own eyes; I just did today.

You can find just about every current gaming mag you can think of here, plus they have tons of merchandise, including their own t-shirts that they sell for 10 bucks. (They’re the same ones that you see in the video.)

Contrary to what you might think by watching the final episode above, the staff here are competent and are all nice.  I was browsing around the store when the owner, Brian Hughes, walked in and such. As I went to buy a t-shirt for myself along with a copy of the latest Nintendo Power I cracked a joke from the series.  When I told Brian that I had actually found out about the store through their ScrewAttack feature, he literally said “You’ve gotta be shitting me!” It seems that he wasn’t expecting the store’s popularity to rise. I told him what I thought about the series and how I wasn’t sure if I really liked it or not, and that ScrewAttack had quite a big community: I’m sure he’ll gain a handful of new customers as a result.  There actually was one member of the SA community that had already been there and didn’t realize it.

One other thing I found amusing about the store was the fact that they had cheeky signs in all their display cases that had some amusing lines such as this:

“She bangs! She bangs!”

Another interesting fact is that in April of 2007, a couple of thieves broke into the store overnight. The security cameras inside the store caught the whole ordeal, and after Hughes looked at the videotape, he put it all together and uploaded the camera footage to YouTube.  The robbery made local headlines and the criminal was actually found and arrested.  The story has a happy ending for both sides, though, as the criminal turned his life around afterwards and even paid for the store’s losses after getting out of jail and rehab.

GameDeals is the type of store that’s by gamers, for gamers. You can walk in there and feel like you’ve walked into a place where you’re already known and welcome, and I would highly recommended this place. If you live in Metro Vancouver and still need incentive to go, a lot of the new games they’ve gotten are significantly cheaper here than they are at department stores and retail chains.  Go check ‘em out!

First off, the blog; I’m still kind of on-and-off as far as updating goes. Unlike my days doing Chronicles of a Bowman I’ve never really been engaged in one single thing in order to be updating it as recent as I have over there. Along the way came some RSS difficulties in which a backend functionality plugin managed to cripple the feed with unnecessary whitespace (which has now been fixed) and integrating comments with IntenseDebate, which so far has been nice but there hasn’t really been anything as far as comments go.  I am planning on writing a review on Rhythm Heaven soon, which I must say I’ve thuroughly enjoyed from start to finish.

And now, onto some random crap. NOTE THAT THERE MAY BE SPOILERS PAST HERE

My friend and I just love the Ace Attorney series; When we’re not busy playing whichever game in the series that we decide to play, we’re pointing our fingers at each other, shouting “OBJECTION!” or “IGIARI!”, or using some stupid punch-line from a Phoenix Wrong movie, or we’re talking about the ever disgraceful Kristoph Gavin and how a fan video to Miku Miku Ni Shite Ageru seems to have depicted him as having a thing for blue-haired angel lolis whose name means “skull” in English.  As if it wasn’t as bad as it is that he has a scar on the back on his right hand that pulsates in the shape of a skull. It was at that point that my friend reminded me that he also seemed to get a nosebleed from looking at Trucy.  Now I’m convinced that Kristoph is a big, murderous pedophile with a thing for young magicians, (Trucy Wright) aspiring artists, (Vera Misham) and bokusatsu tenshis (see below video… kinda) alike. At this point I think it’s time to trade in Apollo Justice. </sarcasm>

For those whose curiosity I’ve sparked, I’ve embedded the video below; view at your own risk.

Anyways… onto other things before I drive myself insane.

It seems in the past while I’ve actually put a lot of focus into the DS and PC.  Now, I have an ailing PC; It definitely can’t run some of the more recent games (except if it’s a medium to low end game like Unreal Tournament 2004 or Braid.) My computer is in bad need of replacing; If not for the fact that its specs are already crap as it is, the external sound input/output jacks just randomly fried and I was also an idiot and FALCON PUNCH‘d my screen, and so this poor laptop is confined to my desk as it requires a monitor that I borrowed from my friend. Unfortunately for me, I have more important things than to replace my computer, so I guess I’m stuck with this craptop and my friend’s monitor for a while.  I do like the fact that I can run Braid on this computer, since it’s a game that I’ve sorely missed out on last year due to my lack of a 360.

But yeah. Nothing’s been happening on the PSP or Wii front as of late; All the games I want on the PSP are coming later this year, and there hasn’t been much out on the Wii for a while. (Well, excitebots came out which is looking to be good. I haven’t checked any non-professional reviews though.) Most of my “binges” of sorts have lately been for my DS; the big one of course being my DSi which I got a couple of days after launch. I really do like it; I’ve been having more fun with it as of late; I took it to the rink a few days ago and just snapped a few pics, and also took a few more around the house. It’s obviously not a replacement for my 6 megapixel samsung, but it’s fun to mess around with.

The DSi Shop isn’t much of anything yet, and honestly I’m not expecting it to be much of anything, as I continuously remind myself week by week when I look at WiiWare. I did however end up getting Dr. Mario Express and the two old WarioWare minigames with my free 1000 points.  Although nothing on DSiWare really seems to be all that great, as they’re either apps, low-key games, or just smaller versions of already-existing DS or WiiWare games, there’s a few things that I’ve been eyeing that might pique my interest in the not-so-distant future.  I know Moving Memo is a free app that just about everyone is going to get once it becomes available. Japan also just got a Sudoku game/app on it. That might be a buy for me as well. I don’t know how or why I suddenly got into Sudoku, but at least my brain gets some stimulus now, outside of sports and music at least. (When you play seven sports, scorekeep hockey, and could be umpiring baseball soon, then yeah…)

Continuing on the story of my DS binge, my game collection has significantly grown as a result. The new year has seen me acquire Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon, Retro Game Challenge, GTA Chinatown Wars, Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, Rhythm Heaven, and Disgaea DS. That’s quite a bit; Maybe even too much if not for the fact I traded in Final Fantasy IV and a couple of other games that I no longer touch.  What it comes down to for me is as long as I have the money to feed myself, to take care of my monthly expenses and still have a bit left to do whatever with, I’m good.  Anyway, the latest of those of course was Disgaea DS, which I found used at EB for 20 bucks and bought it because of how popular and outrageous this game is, despite it being a remake of the original PS1 game.  I haven’t really been able to wrap my head around the game yet, though. I’m still kind of lost playing through the first episode, and it’s really difficult to get an effective party going and have the money to properly equip them.  I’m not a huge SRPG buff but I think I’ll like this game as much, if not more, than I like Fire Emblem. Depending on how much I like this game I might end up picking up Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero? on the PSP, which would likely be something more of my type with its platformer goodness. Just another game to add to my wanted collection for the PSP this summer, alongside Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce and maybe Dissidia.

On the PC front it’s all been about the MMOs really, mainly free ones.  If you know me you probably know that I spent nearly two and a half years playing MapleStory and have since been hopping around from one MMO to another.  Right now I’ve kept most of my MMO action away from the RPGs and onto the more sporty types, like ijji’s Drift City and Ntreev’s PangYa, which they just relaunched in open beta after OGPlanet closed down their version of the game earlier this year. (Speaking of PangYa, I bet you didn’t know that Super Swing Golf and Super Swing Golf Season 2 are Wii versions of PangYa.) Still, though, I tend to mix in some Phantasy Star Universe into that every once in a while. I blame Phantasy Star Portable for getting me hooked on that one.

Phantasy Star… Phantasy Star… aw damn. You mean I have ANOTHER DS game on my wishlist for this summer? Yes, I’m talking about Phantasy Star Zero here.  Man… and I thought the rash of games coming out last Christmas was gonna leave me broke…

You may also know me as an Olympic enthusiast, and of course I’m ecstatic about the Olympics coming to my hometown next year. There’s even a chance that I could be volunteering. That aside, I’ve been periodically checking for updates on Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games on both the DS and Wii, and so far I like what I see. There’s already been quite a few screenshots also posted, and to be looking at a speed skating screenshot where the inside of the Richmond Olympic Oval actually looks like the inside of the Richmond Olympic Oval is kind of exciting… at least for an Olympic-loving gamer.   I know it probably won’t be the hardcore gamer’s cup of tea, but still. It’s the Olympics, it’s video games, and it’s Vancouver.

Other than that, I can’t think of much to ramble on about. It’s getting late; I gotta get to bed and I’ve got laundry to fold.  To sign off, here’s a video to get you excited about today’s official announcement for Marvel vs. Capcom 2 on XBLA and PSN:

Don’t worry. There are no “Kirihito-chans” in this video.

On a day where Canada is marking the one year countdown to the start of the opening ceremonies for the 2010 winter games, Sega decided to mark the occasion in their own way by uploading a teaser video on YouTube for their second Olympic-based game following their Mario and Sonic mashup of Beijing 2008, Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games.

A short video, it starts with a computer generated flyby starting with the stone “Inukshuk” (which in reality is prominently displayed on Whistler mountain) culminating with Mario, Sonic, Eggman, and Wario at the boardercross start on [which I would believe to be] Cypress Mountain.  There’s nothing special about the video other than the announcement about the game itself.

The press release on Sega’s website goes into greater detail:

Developed by SEGA of Japan, under the guidance of Shigeru Miyamoto, Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games will take players to lifelike Olympic venues where they can choose from a legendary cast of playable characters, including new faces to the series to be revealed later this year. Following the phenomenal worldwide popularity of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games, which has sold over 10 million copies worldwide, this fresh gaming experience will feature completely new Olympic Winter Games events from the official competition schedule including Alpine Skiing and Speed Skating with more events announced throughout the year.

It then goes on to detail some of the new gameplay options, such as co-op play, (which I’m guessing would entail either speed skating relays, figure skating, curling, or hockey) and the ability to use the Wii balance board.

Now, I wasn’t to big on Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games but even though I don’t think this game will be spectacular, I do get a warm feeling about this game; If not for the fact that this is Vancouver’s Olympics or my involvement in them that we’re talking about, then it’s more about the relation to winter sports and the fact that my main source of income involves hockey and that in the winter I ski on a weekly basis at one of the Olympic venues.  Even if this game isn’t all that great, you can probably expect me to be picking up both versions of this game.

Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games is currently scheduled for release late this year on the Nintendo Wii and Nintendo DS.