TGH is fairly new altogether, starting mid-December last year by the guys behind That Gamer Podcast and That Podcast Network. I had been one of their forum moderators for the first couple of months while also writing a couple of community articles before I was given the offer to join the writing team a couple days ago.

What this likely means for AGM itself is probably nothing to begin with, as I don’t update very often. If I have anything that comes to mind in which I don’t think fits on a larger gaming site (which won’t be much, really) I will likely post it here. This blog will likely remain inactive otherwise as I reconsider the future of my ancientcave.com domain altogether.

My first “official” article should be going up soon. Until then I do encourage anyone who looks at this to check out That Gamer Hub. It’s currently a small but golden community with a bunch of crazy people working behind the scenes.

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn is a game that I have been waiting for since it was announced at last year’s E3. Now out in Japan and hitting North American stores on Monday, I keep looking back to my preorder receipt, anticipating the game that it will get me on the day it arrives.

Earlier this week, I found an article on Destructoid where the developers seemed to draw inspiration from the commercial for the US release of Golden Sun back in 2001. For those that remember the style of GBA commercials around launch time, they usually took real life scenes and created them into something out of the game they’re advertising. The one for Golden Sun was quite bizarre:

Quite sure I’ve never gotten attacked by an opera house chandelier that turns into crystal dragon.

Now, as far as Golden Sun: Dark Dawn is concerned, Camelot seemed to have had a good memory, (especially for a commercial that didn’t even air in their country) and decided to make something of it.

And the rest is all history:

However, the one piece that everyone was waiting to hear was a bit unexpected. Nintendo officially announced that the 3DS will launch in Japan on February 26th, 2011 at a price of 25,000 yen. ($297 USD, $306 CAD)  Although it was disappointing to hear that we were still a good half away from getting our hands on the glasses-less 3D handheld, many agree that such a move could ensure that Nintendo’s supply meets demand, as they had predicted that they will sell 4 million units in its first month. (Which is probably more than the number of Wiis they manufactured in the first year.) This will also allow poor men like me to save a bit up before diving into a preorder.

Aside from the launch date and price, Nintendo also revealed some of the features that the 3DS will have:

Miis
Yes, the miis are invading your handhelds. Mii creation has also been enhanced by being able to take a photo of your face and creating a unique mii face out of it.

Communication
The 3DS has a tag mode which will always be active while the 3DS is sleeping. The device will pick up other systems and exchange mii and game data with them.

Multitasking
As an example, if you ever got stuck on a game and are connected to the Internet, you can press the home button to return to the home screen, start up your browser, go to GameFAQs or whatever, look it up, then go back to whatever game you were playing. Multitasking definitely isn’t a new feature, but seeing as the only the iPhone does it on the portable front right now, it’s definitely a step forward. It’s also a reason to be lazy, as if I’m playing a game in bed and get stuck, I don’t have to get up and go to my computer to check a FAQ.

Handheld Virtual Console
Words cannot describe this one for me, so I’ll let The Lonely Island express how I feel here. [NSFW]

My only worry about this is what will happen when the inevitable 3DSWare comes out, if VC will take a backseat like it has on the Wii.

A load of games were announced as well, although most of them skip my mind aside from previously announced titles such as Kid Icarus Uprising and Nintendogs + Cats, but I do know one title that was announced was Capcom’s Megaman Legends 3. (The fact that Capcom Unity was talking about it makes me think they plan on bringing this one over here, unlike Rockman Dash 2.)

That’s really all I have about the 3DS. Hopefully Nintendo of America will announce a more concrete launch date and price for over here within the coming months. Until then, it’s time to save up!

The big news that will be coming out of this conference will, of course, be the launch date and price of the 3DS. Whether or not any launch info will pertain to areas outside of Japan, I don’t know. However, it’s no secret that there have been rumors of leaks abound.

• A Japanese company manufacturing 3DS accessories had revealed that they will be releasing said accessories on November 20th, 2010 in a tweet that has since been deleted. Source
• A german tabloid had stated that the 3DS is scheduled for launch in Spring 2010 at a price of 200 euros. However, this can prove to be false as this would fall under Nintendo’s launch window, being after the end of the 2010 fiscal year. Image
• There are also rumors that a Gamestop employee leaked info from the company’s database that the handheld will launch in the US on November 22nd. Even moreso it was leaked that Dragon Ball 3DS would have a November 11th release, which adds more fuel to the fire and adding that the date could be even earlier than that. That being said, 3DS preorders may start taking place tomorrow as well. Source

We only have a few hours until we know the truth for sure.

Until then, this is what I’ve predicted:

Release: November 20th (JP), November 28th (NA), Q1 2011 (EU) (I had to spite all the people saing Nov. 22nd)
Price: 249,000 yen/$269.99 ($299.99 CAD), 200 euros – (NA preorders to start either tomorrow or Thursday)
I’m predicting that the design of the 3DS won’t change all that much, but am hoping that the start/select/home buttons along the bottom of the touch screen will be moved.

It seems like it was only a few years ago we were talking about games going HD and starting to use wireless controller. Our favorite franchises (or at least those that weren’t a Nintendo franchise) were updated with even more glorious visuals and we no longer had to worry about our controllers ever getting tangled together, or ever wondering which controller is which due to the facts that these wireless controllers have light patterns.  Even before that, when it came to our televisions we had been playing in the standard definition era from the Intellivision to the PS2. The move to HDTV was inevitable as the install base grew, but when it comes to today’s advances, do we really need these in our games? Are we ready for them?

Motion controls are something that we’ve all experienced firsthand using the Wii. When you look at it a certain way, some people might think “it’s about time Microsoft the Sony finally stepped up.” Meanwhile, others moan and groan as to what this means for our PS3s and 360s. This might promote more people to go out and buy consoles, along with Kinect or Playstation Move, but as for the core gamers that have been playing these consoles for the past four years, does it worry us that this could possibly bring in a new era of shovelware? I’m sure there are a few skeptics out there already that are predicting a new video game market crash, much like the one of 1984, purely on motion controls and their knack for making developers create games that are no more than just mediocre minigame compilations that will not hold the interest of someone “seriously into gaming” as developers start to shift their focus to soccer moms or families wanting to waggle, as we’ve seen many times during the Wii’s lifespan. This is even more apparent when you look at Microsoft’s debacle of an E3 press conference this year. Are we doomed to a gaming future of driving with an invisible steering wheel, or petting animals?

Now, really, obviously we aren’t looking at a potential market crash (unless you look at today’s economy as a whole) but you have to wonder with all of these garbage motion control games coming out, how much longer until we see the equivalent of E.T. on the 2600?

Motion controls sometimes don’t even work in some environments. Believe me, I’ve had two rooms that did not have an ideal setup for motion controls with my Wii. The first involved a TV sitting on a stand hanging over my bed. The other one has the TV sitting on an unstable shelf with the top of the TV just below my chin when I’m sitting down. It isn’t noticeable so much if I just have to point the remote at the TV, but if I have to switch between a sideways remote and a pointer like you have to do in Super Paper Mario or Metroid: Other M, more often than not it doesn’t work. What’s to say that Kinect and Move won’t have the same issues on a “poor man’s gaming setup?”

This doesn’t take away from the fact that, if you look at the Wii’s gaming library, most of the games that use motion controls to begin with are shit, and there aren’t enough games that utilize Wii Motion Plus, technology that’s built-in with Move and Kinect.

And as far as 3D goes… did we really need it?  Heck, barely half of gamers have an HDTV to begin with. The rest of us are all sitting close to our TVs and squinting so we can read what’s on screen. (At least if you’re playing a game by EA, you are. Even with the 3DS, what does 3D really mean to me? More headaches. I’m not attracted to the 3DS by its ability to project a 3D image without the need for glasses. I’m attracted to it because of its projected game library and the fact that I’ve always been a fan of Nintendo handhelds. Chances are, I’m going to be playing with 3D either low or off most of the time because I tend to get very headache-prone. I don’t need the frequency of my migranes going up.

To be completely fair, 3D right now is completely optional. Playing a 3D-enabled game on an HDTV isn’t going to give people playing on a 3DTV any more of an advantage, and heck; Maybe they’re not playing with 3D on either. I still think it’s ludicrous that HDTVs have only been commonplace for a couple of years now and now everything is transitioning to 3D. It’s like computers in the late 90s and early 2000s; Nowadays you can’t have a TV for a month without it becoming obsolete. I think I’ll skip 3DTVs altogether and wait until we have holograms.

Look at it this way. If you’re limited on space, why go out and buy a 3DTV for thousands of dollars plus the cost of glasses, when you can get a moderately sized HDTV for $250?

That’s really my take on this. From what I’ve gathered most core gamers would rather push buttons than waggle. Only a slim majority of them are on HDTVs. As far as motion controls are concerned, maybe the devs are noticing these trends and therefore making mainly casual motion games because of it? Who knows? The worry for me there is that more focus will be put into these new systems, alienating the core market just like what we’ve seen with the Wii. 3D isn’t a concern for me yet, but I still think it’s early to try to push it as mainstream where we still live in the age of HD. It’s a luxury, but not a necessity.

That’s all. That’s literally all I have to say about it. Microsoft had a great E3 presser last year and it seriously went down to this.

Microsoft’s press conference was pretty much all about Kinect (the official name for Natal) and some of the games it can do, and although you may have been satisfied if you were a more casual gamer, for a more hardcore gamer like myself it was an absolute disappointment.

What I’m sad about is that I almost feel tempted to pick up the redesigned 360 they introduced at the end, which will include a 250GB HD and built-in N-mode WiFi for the same price as the current 360. (The redesigned 360 was also shipped today and will be available by the end of the week.)

Due to a lack of legitimate comments I initially decided to enable registrations and then require people to be logged in to comment. Unfortunately, WordPress has no native anti-spam measures to keep them out and what do I get as my first registration?  Yeah.

So, for the time being, commenting has been disabled until a solution involving user registration, including anti-spam measures, is found.

Update: Comments have been re-enabled, but due to the lack of legitimate comments on older posts, commenting will be automatically disabled on all posts after 7 days.

I do not know what is wrong with it. However I will try to find a way to fix it.

UPDATE: The issue seems to be with Chrome; The RSS feed link on both Firefox and Internet Explorer is working correctly. If you use chrome, just ass http://blog.ancientcave.com/index.php/feed/ to your RSS feed reader of choice.

So… for the first quarter of 2010, with a bit of help from GameFAQs:

(Note that this is for North America only)

Nintendo Wii

Jan. 26th: No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle
Jan. 26th: Tatsunoku vs. Capcom
Mar. 23rd: Sakura Wars: So Long My Love

Xbox 360

Jan. 5th: Bayonetta
Jan. 6th: Mass Effect 2
Feb. 9th: Bioshock 2
Feb. 9th: Dante’s Inferno
Feb. 23rd: Lost Planet 2
Mar. 2nd: Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Mar. 9th: Final Fantasy XIII

Playstation 3

Jan. 5th: Bayonetta
Feb. 2nd: Gran Tourismo 5
Feb. 9th: Bioshock 2
Feb. 9th: Dante’s Inferno
Feb. 23rd: Lost Planet 2
Mar. 2nd: Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Mar. 9th: Final Fantasy XIII

Nintendo DS

Feb. 16th: Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth
Mar. 17th: Pokemon Heart Gold/Soul Silver

Playstation Portable

Feb. 9th: Dante’s inferno

PC

Jan. 26th: Mass Effect 2
Feb. 2nd: The Sims 3: High End Loft Stuff
Feb. 9th: Bioshock 2
Mar. 2nd: Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Mar. 16th: Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight

Yes, this is real footage of me playing Dissidia. I haven’t played it much since Zidane is only level 1 here (I recorded this for a friend, actually) but you can see just how I fail so far.

I like fighting games more nowadays, but I’m always shy around them. I’m a fairly average gamer in skill as it is, but it’s fighting games especially that I don’t do well in. All the unique button combinations and techniques were always difficult to grasp. After constant beatdowns at the hands of my friends in Street Fighter II I thought I’d never bother with it again… until many years later (around 5 or so years ago) when I borrowed my friend’s copy of Soul Calibur II. I think I held onto it for months until I finally got my own copy of the game and gave it back to him, but still… Although I got quite decent playing, I’m still stuck in the realm of fighting mediocrity.

And here’s might be why, using Dissidia: Final Fantasy as my basis for this.

1.) I always play the easiest/high tier characters
Let me get this out of the way first; I’m not a Cloud nor a Final Fantasy VII fan, but I tend to run him a lot if I go through Dissidia’s arcade mode… why? Because he’s just so darn easy to use. I can start a bravery attack from far out and likely catch my enemy off guard… same goes with his HP attacks. Plus, his unique trait is to be able to smash his enemy like a baseball, all the way to the other side of the stage. You can just mash away if cloud in the early going, with the occasional dodge thrown in; It’s not really that hard.

Cloud is my highest level character so far, maybe because I did his story on my bonus day, but still. He’s easy to use.  Fortunately I’m not alone on this, since multiplayer matches are riddled with Cloud everywhere, even if it’s partly to do with his rabid fanboyism that I oh-so-dislike.

Yet, I’m still not that good with him.

2.) I always play on the easier difficulties
Even moreso in Dissidia is the fact that I already find the slightly higher level fights to be fairly difficult. (Though, because this is more of an RPG Fighter than a normal fighter the situation is kind of different.) I spend most of my time earning PP in normal arcade mode because of the fact that I find it easier. That, or when I’m not grinding I’ll shoot the enemy down a couple of levels and just have some fun beating on them.  I usually don’t take up a great challenge all that often.

3.) I’m a button masher

Yes, it’s true.  When it comes to FPSes, I spray.  When it comes to fighters, I mash.  Whenever it’s time to attack I start mashing the circle button, or the square button, or whatever button I need to mash to get whatever done. I’m not even paying attention as to whether or not I actually have to press the button or not. All I know is… I know which button to press… just not when. (Unless, of course, it’s an EX burst)

4.) I use spam attacks

You know how I like to fight? I pick Ryu and it’s all obvious from there. Hadouken! Hadouken! Hadouken! Hadouken! Shoryuken! (Whoops) Pretty much the same thing in Dissidia. Once again with Cloud, I use his aerial attack that initiates a chase all the time. Attack, if miss attack again, hit, chase, attack again, rinse, repeat, etc… It’s quite sad. Same goes with Terra and Blizzara. Attack, attack again, attack again, attack again, etc… I’m starting to think that Terra can be quite cheap in that sense, too

5.) I fail at comboing
And finally, this probably goes without saying that if I mash and spam, I can’t combo. Well… sometimes I can; I once found a basic little air combo while playing Melty Blood: Act Cadenza but that’s about it. I can maybe pull off two attacks in a row, but that’s it. I’m too busy spamming Terra’s Blizzara to care though.

So yeah, that’s the skinny.  I suck at fighters. Dissidia is a different beast of its kind, though, and you can’t compare it directly to other fighters, but the same basic elements apply. It doesn’t matter that you can air-dash around massive environments and sent people a hundred feet in the air with a single buster sword swing.  Still, I have fun with Dissidia, despite my suckage.

I’m getting better at it, anyway.