I tend to load my iPod up with a ton of gaming podcasts that I’ve subscribed to. Usually I’ll take it with me to work and when things are slow or dull (or when opposing hockey players are chirping at each other between their penalty boxes) I’ll turn one on and relax while I watch pucks, press buttons, sometimes write and occasionally tell a few tense hockey players to shut the fuck up. I rarely ever listen to my podcasts at home; I almost always listen to them when I have nothing else to focus on, as I don’t wanna miss anything.

I have about four or five podcasts that I like to listen to regularly; These are my own recommendations. Hit the jump to find out who I’m listening to.

(All of the podcasts I’ve listed are available on iTunes.)

Sidescrollers
Probably the first “video” site I came across that was centered around gaming was Screwattack. At first I only really stuck with their featured videos on Gametrailers, but I occasionally went to the site and that’s how I eventually started listening to Sidescrollers. Stuttering Craig usually likes to keep each episode short and they feature one thing each week, along with a quirky segment or two and always followed up with listener questions. (Something that pretty much every podcast I listen to does.) The Screwattack guys have always done a great job with this podcast and although I don’t listen to it much, anymore, it’s always good to come back to.
iTunes

The Electric Hydra
After the end of Podtoid, a couple of current and former Destructoid editors came together to make this podcast, taking from their old podcast’s older format. Hosted by Brad Nicholson, the Electric Hydra’s hosts will usually talk about their gaming experiences in the past week, touch on a few news stories, and sidetrack onto other topics that tend to get cheeky or even influence future podcasts. (B-B-B-Balls!) This can be a fun podcast to listen to sometimes, especially if Jim Sterling has played a fairly mediocre game in the past week. Depending on availability, the Electric Hydra sometimes records twice a week, with an abridged midweek version dubbed “The Early-Ass Morning Show in the Morning” which is pretty much the same deal with different people.
iTunes

Sega Addicts
Recording on Fridays, this podcast as you might guess from the name is mainly all-Sega. Now, I’ve grown up as a Nintendo boy in my childhood so I don’t always know what they’re talking about, but the obvious things such as Sonic, Phantasy Star, and some other recent Sega talk I can catch onto. Always a fun one to listen to, though the podcast becomes subject to some injokes, (MALE THONG!) but they manage to keep things entertaining. I actually enjoyed listening them recap the history of both Sonic and Phantasy Star a few months ago.
iTunes

Sarcastic Gamer (The Red Show)
SG is actually a series of multiple podcasts, though the only one I listen to right now is the main podcast, otherwise known as the Red Show hosted by the ever funny trio only known as Doc, Dave and Lono. This is a more low-key podcast that focuses less on current events and more on their thoughts with some comedy mixed into it. This usually allows for 30-45 minutes of satisfying, funny game talk and is not easy to forget to listen to. As well, they also have their own iPhone app with extra content. (I’ll admit, I don’t usually approve of hiding extra content behind money, but these guys are too golden to resist it.)
iTunes

All Gen Gamers
This one, which was initially drawn to this show through HappyConsoleGamer, (whom I’ve met once at a meetup at Gamedeals a couple months ago) this podcast is produced by a few guys with some well-known game-related Youtube channels such as gamester81, theEMUreview and PeteDorr. Probably the longest of all the podcasts that I regularly listen to, the hosts will generally spend the time talking on a single subject for an hour or two, which actually becomes very interesting regardless of if you fully understand what they’re talking about or not, while wrapping up with their gaming experiences in their past week. It’s common for them to bring on a guest on the show, usually another big Youtube channel or even Stuttering Craig from Screwattack, and a lot of the time it’s a really interesting to listen to as they tend to cover a lot of the not-so-prevalent areas of retro gaming (such as the Neo Geo consoles) that not a lot of people remember.
iTunes

Those are my recommendations as to what podcasts really stand out in there, with an honorable mention to Gaming Union‘s podcasts, which I will usually listen to when a MiniGUP comes around. Of course, if you’re just into this for news you’ll find it faster by reading blogs, though listening to podcasts always tends to be more immersive.

Okay, so, Sony stereotypes aside, September was likely a good month if you’re both a PSP owner and RPG lover such as myself. For four weeks straight, a new PSP RPG released that was able to catch my attention for each of those weeks. (Though one came after a second opinion.) This, to me, is a rare occurence, and really had me stretching my wallet for all of them.

So… what were the games that had me investing so much in the PSP recently?

Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep
For some, this would probably be “how typical.” For me, “how surprising.” I can humbly say that this is in fact the first time I had ever picked up a Kingdom Hearts game ever. (Except when I demoed Kingdom Hearts 2 very briefly at Disneyworld some four years ago now.) For a second, I have to forget about all of the rabid fanboys that this series produces and actually play a game. Since Birth By Sleep is a prequel to the entire series, I thought that it would be a good time to get into it. The game was already coming off of high player and editor reviews alike, and within an hour or so I could see why. The game, although not exactly like the other games in the series as I’ve been told, plays very well, has an interesting story, and looks pretty good for a PSP game. BBS has succeeded in making me want to try other games in the series… well… after hearing that 358/2 days was subpar, I will probably wait for the next Kingdom Hearts to hit on the 3DS

Phantasy Star Portable 2
Sharing the same abbreviation as the system is on, PSP2 could be overlooked if not just by the other games released before it, then also by the fact that Sega announced Phantasy Star Online 2 at TGS this year. That obviously didn’t stop me from picking it up. My friend had gotten me into the Phantasy Star series, starting with Online. Since then I had gone back and played the original turn-based games on the Master System and Genesis, but the Phantasy Star Universe games caught my eye, although it didn’t with some. Portable 2 expanded on a lot of the things that came out of Portable 1, all for the better. The game features online play, which seems like a rarity for PSP games nowadays, as well as bringing in some Universe traits as having a room you can customise and decorate. Also to the positive is the ability to block (if you have a shield) and having a single PP meter that regenerates, instead of having to manage PP for every weapon you’re using. It’s just fun all around.

Cladun: This is an RPG
What is Nippon Ichi without niche titles? Cladun is a 16-bit dungeon crawler-like game… with a twist. Aside from having your story character, you have the ability to create your own characters, right down to the pixel. Yes, you can create any character you like and even define the end boss. The game also features an very interesting powerup system, using the other characters you make to act as “shields” and power the main character up. This game can tend to be difficult at times, and can time some time getting used to, but all in all this game becomes an effective time waster.

Valkyria Chronicles II
How does the earliest game end up as my last game? I tried this out when the demo was first put up on PSN, hastily played it and couldn’t make any sense of anything. However, after reading about it quite a bit I decided to try it again, play it properly, and I ended up liking enough to buy it. Ever since then, I haven’t been able to put it down. Thing is, I’m not even that much into SRPGs, but Valkyria II just has so much going for it. It’s got warfare strategy. It’s got quirky characters that you’ll all get to know over time. It’s got… guns. (Okay, so guns doesn’t really mean much.) But really. It’s hard not to fall in love with the students that make up class G, and never have I played a game in where “grinding” (by repeating old missions) actually felt like I was doing something. You find ways to refine strategies, try different classes, see if you can try to beat each mission faster… It’s a rush. Although the story goes by month to month, you aren’t pressed for time, so it gives me all the reason to level up a bit, dive into each character’s story, and just keep me hooked. I think I might need help.

Probably the hardest thing out of all of these is balancing each of these titles. I don’t really put much time into my PSP at all, although Valkyria Chronicles II has changed that over the last couple of days, but a lot of the time I find myself wanting to play Birth By Sleep yet I know I’ve been neglecting Phantasy Star Portable 2. Always a problem when you’re a backlogger, I guess.

But who knows? Maybe I’ll end up getting through them all… some day.

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.

The outcry started on Friday, when Namco America announced on its Facebook page that they had no plans to localize recent games in the series, including Tales of Vesperia on the PS3, as well as Tales of Graces, along with its PS3 port Tales of Graces f. The comment was immediately met with upset fans and long-time supporters of the series and retro-game developer, so much to the fact that people started petitioning to have both Vesperia PS3 and Graces f released in the US on playstation.blog.share.

Then again, today, Tales Union reported that another comment similar to Friday’s wall post had gone up on Namco’s facebook page, this time not only mentioning that Namco is not looking at localizing Vesperia PS3 or Graces f, but for the rest of the series as well.

The new post, which has since been removed, has been met with great hostility by the Tales of fanbase, with angry fans spamming Namco’s page, with comments varying from people trying to encourage them that they do have a fanbase on this side of the Pacific, to mimicing how various other Tales characters would do the same, to just downright berating the company’s decision to leave them out in the cold. Namco’s has been trying to delete some of the more outrageous stuff but they have not been able to keep up.

It’s really disgusting to be honest; I can’t blame the fans. Yes, sales of the series over here haven’t been great, but Namco Bandai really tried to bring up the community over here after Tales of Symphonia, which is probably my favorite RPG of all time. Seeing games like Tales of Legendia, Tales of the Abyss, and even going to Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology. After Vesperia’s release, the only game they have localized in North America and Europe would be Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World back in November 2008. The other games released since then: Innocence, Hearts, Radiant Mythology 2, Vs., Graces, and new or in-developemtn games Narikiri Dungeon X, Vesperia PS3, Graces f, and a new PS3 game that was just announced today, have not even been considered for localization out of Japan.

It’s really unfortunate that it just had to come down to this. Will Namco see what they are doing and be swayed by this? Probably not. Will it leave a sting? I think so. Boycotting them obviously won’t do anything, but it’s always been on my mind from the time that I realized that we were probably not getting Graces.

I know the community isn’t taking this lightly, and neither will I.

Update: (Aug. 3, noon PDT) This grilling is still going on. No comment from Namco on the situation. People are starting to ask fans of the series to add a #talesfanunite hashtag onto their tweet when talking about the Tales Of series.

In this day and age, the Internet is bringing everyone together in new ways. From the days of usenet, to AOL chatrooms and IRC, followed by BBSes (now forums) we are now in an age where social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook are commonplace.

For most of the past fifteen years, PC gaming has had its place online in one way or another. At the turn of the century, that started to spread to consoles, starting with the Dreamcast and XBOX. Today, every current-gen console and handheld is online and part of its own distinct service; XBOX Live for the 360, Playstation Network for the PS3 and PSP, and Nintendo WFC for the Wii and DS. Nowadays, many console games ship with multiplayer modes that are strictly online, where in the past we would have split screen. As time wore on, the Internet has reshaped the way we play games with other people.

However, this does not mean that the days of local multiplayer are gone forever.

The best example of that came today. Those that are in the know might have known today was the day that meetups for Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies were held today at Gamestops across North America. Taking advantage of this, Gamedeals (the suburban Vancouver independent video game retailer you might have heard me talk about here) decided to have a DQ9 meetup of its own. This store is now twice the size that it was when I went there last, bigger than any EB Games or Gamestop that I’ve ever been in, and converted one of the back rooms into a lounge. A small group of people had gathered to play the game’s unique and somewhat revolutionary multiplayer mode. We all tagged up with each other to exchange maps and players, then split off into a couple of separate groups: A bunch of people tackling some of the more difficult treasure maps, and us lower level people grinding and working through the game’s story. The whole meetup, which was also attended by store owner Brian and the Happy Console Gamer, was a smashing success and reintroduced me what it was like to be surrounded by a bunch of other people, all playing the same game as you and having fun doing it.

It was a local multiplayer experience that you don’t see very often in this day and age, back in the days where kids like myself would be sitting out in the backyard with their Game Boys, or grabbing a bunch of friends and playing Goldeneye. (And if you haven’t heard, the Wii version will have split screen multiplayer, just like its predecessor, the way it’s MEANT to be played.) Back in the days, your specs or ping didn’t matter, only your skill. Your opponent was only across the room, not across the world, and trash talk was completely acceptable in some circumstances. (Though, not like the absolute bullshit trolling you see on XBL)

On the handheld side of things, though, I’ve been noticing a trend: A increasing number of games that are being released on the DS and PSP these days are going local multiplayer only. There are many games nowadays on both systems that probably would’ve worked nicely with an online multiplayer mode do not include these options; Everything is limited to whatever opponents you can find out there, though that’s not always easy. Then again, I’ve found that online multiplayer experiences on handheld games don’t tend to be of the same connection quality as you would see on a console. I tend to find more laggy people playing Mariokart DS than I do playing Mariokart Wii, and seeing how online races on the console counterpart can have triple the number of participants of its handheld descendant, that’s saying a lot. When you think of it that way, it was time to turn back the clock a bit. Even if the 3DS makes improvements in the online multiplayer area, handelds, and most video games in general, are still fit for the local multiplayer experience. It just brings a feeling that you can’t experience online.

And that was apparent in a back room at Gamedeals today, with people collaborating and talking strategy in order to take down a tough boss, or laughing when Zoma flattened half of an average-leveled party in no time whatsoever. Many people have talked about the collective experience, when people come together, for various things, and I think it was shown today in a new light how gamers can be reunited through the split screen.

A more interesting thing actually came out of that meetup today, and that was a group called the “Handheld Gaming Group” for Vancouver-area gamers. The plan is to meet on a weekly or bi-weekly basis and just play a game together for a few hours; All local multiplayer. Even today, where online multiplayer is prevalent, people are sticking to their roots, getting together and gaming together. Some people nowadays might ask “Why?” But I say “Why not?” It’s how I grew up.

There are probably as many MMOs out there that are “free to download, free to play” as there are ones that require you to pony up, if not more. Many times, this ends up making the game more accessible to all, however these games have their own set of challenges, all which contribute into how “Free-to-play” MMOs are run and the community that plays them.

That being said, I’ve been playing various MMOs for close to five years now, and I have my share of good and bad experiences. This list covers some of the more apparent bad experiences that you’re likely to come across. Hit the jump to find out what they are:

1. Whiners
It’s really hard to come in as a newbie and start reading forums, only to find the long-time vets complaining about a skill, job, weapon, etc… that was nerfed, or that their favorite “cash shop” item was removed or made more expensive. Or, maybe they’re just complaining that there’s not enough cake. F2Pers have this odd knack for just finding the most random thing to complain about and threaten things like cash strikes, sit-ins, or to just plain quit. (Good riddance) If it isn’t a trivial thing, it’s something that probably needed to be done, just like MapleStory needed to add a cooldown to a certain skill and add stat penalties for non-light element wands for the grossly overpowered bishop class.

2. Cash Shops
It might be free to obtain, free to play, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t ways to spend money on these games. In order to generate revenue, these games usually run on a microtransaction business model, which allows you to buy certain items for a small cost that can get you anything from a simple costume to an exp. bonus. These things can typically cost you in the range of a buck to around 20. However, most of these games have made it so that people who spend money in the game have a clear advantage over those that don’t or can’t. (Some games, however, allow you to trade or sell these cash-bought items in game, which eases this a bit.) Sadly, there are some publishers out there that put their efforts solely into generating revenue, and so most updates seem to simply just be cash shop additions, leading to gripe #1.

3. Griefers, Trolls, and Drama Whores
Griefers and trolls, in my opinion, have no place in a video game, on the Internet, or anywhere else for that matter. That won’t keep them from trying to make your experience a living hell, though. They will go about their business, try to stalk and harass you, steal your mobs, pretty much do everything that the “MMO bible”, also known as the “Terms of Service” tells them not to.  Most tend to not care if they get banned as they can just create a new e-mail address or a new account, and the publisher can’t stop them from making a new character on a second account. Ah well… that report button would come into good use. As far as drama is concerned, don’t even get me started on drama.

4. Hackers
Unfortunately, many F2P games tend to become a breeding grounds for hackers, not afraid to get banned since they won’t be losing any money by doing so. Most F2P games tend to have anti-hack solutions such as GameGuard and Hackshield, most which only seem to become effective at blocking legitimate programs from running and with hackers able to bypass them within hours of an updated version going up. Still, developers won’t come around to developing their own anti-hack solution and go with these third party ones, resulting in people messing the game up to the point where the game masters have a hard time keeping up with them. Some of the more popular games go through mass hacker crises on and off while some of the smaller ones tend to not really have hacker problems at all, though, so this happens more on a game-by-game basis.

5. Broken English
The majority of F2P games usually come from South Korea, the so-called Mecca of online gaming. Obviously when they come over here, they have to be translated, right? Usually when a new game enters the beta stages and starts to go into its early official service, it tends to contain a whole slew of grammar gaffes that can only remind us about Zero Wing sometimes.

6. Bugs
For some reason, there’s always two departments that seem to be lacking in F2P MMO’s. The first of those seems to be quality assurance. Although some are better than others, there isn’t an F2P out there that, at one point it’s been crippled by a bug in which the game has needed to be either brought down for an extended amount of time or rolled back. Some games have various major bugs pop up almost every patch, others every once in a while.

7. Lack of Presence From Game Masters
Companies hire GMs to promote and moderate the game. Most players see them as a PR person and usually base how they’re doing with how much they interact with the community at times, though it turns out that the job description of the game master is more than just hanging out in-game and banning the evildoers.  Some of these duties tend to leave the game unmoderated and things tend to get out of hand, and after constant problems with this the community starts to lose hope.

On the other hand, some publishers are really good at having their GMs respond to issues on the official forums, or by spending some time with the community that they’ve been hired to take care of. In other cases, publishers have created volunteer programs as well to recognize outstanding players and to provide a “player contact” for some of the more simple things, such as Nexon America’s “Maple Watch Leaf Brigade” for MapleStory, or Aeria’s “Game Sage” program across all their games.

8. Scammers
Scammers can pose a real problem. Fast. although I’m sure P2P games have this problem on a large scale as well, it’s a fluctuating issue in the F2P realm, especially with the playerbase usually being quite a bit younger due to the game’s availability.

9. “Update Lag”
Going back to the fact that I said that most F2P MMOs originate from Korea, the most advanced versions of these games are usually overseas as well. In just about every game there’s at least a small community dedicated to figuring out what’s happening in these Asian versions of the game in order to see what we may get. The only issue is… when would we get this content? For many games, it takes months or even more than a year to get that content out in the American versions, and usually that leaves the community in a shroud of pessimism.

Still, though, a few months isn’t all that bad, given the time it takes to localize a game for the western market to begin with. It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise sometimes.

10. Customer Support
Customer Support is that second “lacking” department with many publishers that I was getting at before. Don’t get me wrong: Many publishers like OGPlanet, Aeria, and GamesCampus have excellent support. (All of which I’ve had to deal with at one time or another) However, there are horror stories with other companies who seem to have left customer support out of their budget. Automated replies, extremely long response times of weeks, even months or even not at all, and replies that have nothing to do with the issue are all things that we see in the F2P world.

On the contrary, the community does bear slight fault to this, as I’m sure each publisher gets a handful of tickets that are either hard to understand, don’t have enough information, or is for something that they can’t do. (Usually dealing with people who lose their accounts because they forgot their password and the e-mail they associated to it, but that’s why you only keep one e-mail for personal stuff, people!)

All in all, these gripes are all a collaberative effort: Some are the fault of the community, some of the publisher and even the developer. Keep in mind that this doesn’t reflect on any publisher out there. As I’ve said a couple times there are some good publishers. Don’t take this is a “F2P MMOs are bad” kind of thing because a lot of them are actually pretty good. How do you think MapleStory got so popular despite the shortcomings of its developer?

So, go ahead, find a good free MMO you wanna play. Just beware some of these things if you know what I mean. You’ll have fun.

In October 2000, Pokemon Gold and Pokemon Silver had already been out in Japan for quite some time. I had a preorder for Gold, due out October 14th. It was a day I couldn’t wait for. I remember I didn’t sleep the night before and I showed up at the mall a half hour before it opened so I could pick the game up right away.  I took it home and played, played, played, and played the crap out of it. So much, in fact, that the only game that I have ever played more than my beloved Gold version is Tales of Symphonia.

Pokemon Gold and Silver introduced a lot of new things to the series that wasn’t around in Red and Blue: A real-time clock, day/night phases, pokemon genders, battle screen enhancements such as experience meters, new plot events, and Pokemon Crystal took it even further by introducing a playable female character, battle animations, a “second rival” (Eusine) and a forced legendary battle after the seventh badge; Something we’ve seen in every game after Crystal.

Nine and a half years later to the day on March 14th 2010, Pokemon HeartGold and Pokemon SoulSilver made landfall in North America. Just like before I had it preordered, although I didn’t rush out to get it.  As I unboxed the big package that the game came in (which includes the Pokewalker, which I will get to in a bit) and started playing, I came to realize that not only has all of that been improved on, but things that had been added later on had also been put into this game, along with a few new things.

So, now that I have the remake of one of my most beloved games of all time, what do I think of it?

Game Overview

If you were gaming when Pokemon was all the rage back in the late 90s, then chances are you know what this game is already about. For those that are a bit newer, Pokemon HeartGold and Pokemon SoulSilver are remakes of the second-gen games; Pokemon Gold, Silver, and Crystal. Summed up, it’s basically the same game with a lot of updates an additions to bring it into this generation of gaming. Aside from the obvious and necessary visual update there are new things such as enhanced touch screen functionality, (you can pretty much do anything except for moving via the touch screen) and most other things added to complicate the game. (Such as pokemon abilities) Additions from other generations can be seen by simply looking at the new Johto region map: Gold/Silver was the only generation not to have a Safari Zone; This was fixed by adding one by Cianwood City. A Battle Frontier was added where the Battle Tower was in Crystal, and a new type of pokemon contest, a more “athletic”-like competition called the Pokethlon, was added to the national park to try something different from the third and fourth-generation contests. The most apparent addition, however, is one long-forgotten from Pokemon Yellow. When you first start the game, you’ll notice that your lead pokemon now follows behind you as you walk around. You can interact with it in a similar fashion as you could with Pikachu in Yellow, and usually you’ll get a quirky comment such as your pokemon “breathing fire” and whatnot. The game of course features all the multitudes of additions made to the original Gold/Silver that has been seen since, such as the real-time clock, day/night phases, trainer re-matches, etc…

Chances are, old gamers who played the original will like this just as much. If you’ve never experienced the original games, now is the time to get this and see what made me play the living hell out of my Gold version.

How does it play?

I earlier mentioned that you can do just about everything with the touch screen, aside from walking. I wasn’t lying; You seriously can. The menu is now a permanent fixture on your DS’ bottom screen and can be accessd with a single tap. All of the menu screens from Diamond/Pearl/Platinum have been moved to the bottom screen for a more streamlined touch interface, and you can also toggle your running shoes on and off. Any time you talk to someone and a response is required it will pop up on the bottom screen. The only thing that does not utliize the touch screen as I mentioned before is walking. Unfortunately because of the design, it tends not to be very left-handed friendly, so if you’re like me you’ll likely still be using the buttons if you only need to access something on the bottom screen very briefly.

Online functionality was expanded compared to Diamond/Pearl/Platinum. A new Wi-fi plaza has been set up that allows you to just muck around and play minigames with a random group of people, ending with a parade. The Global Trade Station from the fourth-gen has also gotten an upgrade as well, turning into Goldenrod City’s new Global Terminal. As well as having a GTS in the far corner, this allows you to access various functions, such as peeking into PC boxes that people have decided to share online, and viewing uploaded battle videos. All in all, the new online features don’t really add much to the game and maybe aside from being able to upload and share battle videos from your VS Recorder, is pretty much useless. I guess as an added plus, you can enter your Wii number into the game and Nintendo WFC will send a message to your Wii message board whenever a GTS trade is completed.

The general plot, catchable pokemon, and other things hasn’t really changed, although you do have the ability to trade with the fourth-gen as well as import pokemon from any of your GBA games (Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald and FireRed/LeafGreen) given that you’re not playing on a DSi.

Included with every copy of the game is a device called a pokewalker. This fancy pedometer designed to look like a poke ball is in fact a minigame in itself. You can take one of your pokemon out of your box, and transfer it to the pokewalker. As you walk around with the device in your pocket, it will gain experience based on the number of steps you take, as well as watts, which can either be used to try to find items or catch pokemon on the walker, or can be transferred back to your game in order to unlock new “areas” on the pokewalker, which basically don’t really do much other than offer up different varieties of pokemon and items.

All in all, it’s a still well-rounded package. Newbies to the series will indulge in all the extra features added into this game while veterans coming back for a second time will enjoy the nostalgia induced by it, much like with FireRed and LeafGreen six years ago.

Pros:

• Utilization of the touch screen
• Bringing a classic game up to speed with the current fourth-gen games
• Nostalgia

Cons:

• Introduces useless online features
• The overall formula hasn’t changed (Although, you can’t really expect it to for a remade classic)
• No Mudkip (Because we all like them… okay, this one isn’t a real con.)

Do I like it?

Let’s do the math. It’s a classic pokemon game that clocks in as my second-most played video game ever, remade for the DS. Why would I not?  But really, Nintendo did a bang-up job recreating the second-gen in these two titles.

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

E3 has come and gone, EVO 2009 and well underway, and people have gone away for the summer. However, I’m still here for the most part, wasting away in front of the computer…

…Speaking of which, let’s talk about my computer.

My Dell Inspiron 2200

Yes, this is what my computer looked like before it started to fall apart; While I still played mediocre free Korean MMOs (see the screenshot again.) despite still being involved in the community today, before I had to buy a USB headset because my audio jacks fried, and before I had to borrow my friend’s monitor because my knuckles met with the screen and cracked it.

Yep, that was my faithful, beat-up laptop… until about four days ago.  Now it’s time to introduce you to my new baby:

My new laptop, The Toshiba L300

I can tell you this much: It’s nice to have all this desk space again. Even if the laptop was crap I’d be happy, but this one’s pretty damn good, and it wasn’t all that pricey either. Here’s just a quick overview of what this has. Of course it’s not gaming quality, but for now it gets the job done:

CPU: AMD Athlon Dual Core 2.0GHz
RAM: A whopping 4 gigabytes worth! (It`s so nice not to have to page stuff back and forth)
HDD: 250GB (AFAIK the brand doesn’t really matter. Laptop HDs aren’t that great to begin with.)
Video: ATI Radeon 3100, 256MB shared, Pixel shader 3.0, Vertex shader 3.0. Can actually play good games.
Optical: CD-RW/DVD-RW
OS: Vista Home Premium SP2
Other stuff no one cares about: WiFi b/g/draft-N compatible, 100mbit Ethernet, 56k modem, (They STILL make these things?!) Built-in webcam, built-in SD/MS card reader (SDHC supported)

I wasn’t initially going to get the Toshiba. There was an Acer laptop that I wanted that was about 30 bucks less but it was gone before I could get the chance to buy it. I ended up on the Toshiba because I overheard one of the sales reps saying that it was one of his preferred brands; That, and for an extra 30 bucks I got Home Premium instead of Home Basic, which also means I might be able to get a free upgrade to Windows 7, and an extra gigabyte of RAM. It was worth it.

Of course, this means one thing: I CAN ACTUALLY PLAY GAMES THAT OTHER PEOPLE PLAY. Of course, most of the games I’ve been wanting to play are by Valve, so here’s what I’ve been playing:

Portal: I actually bought Portal a while ago because I found out that I might be able to get it to run, albeit very slowly, on my old computer; It didn’t work, and so it sat there on my Steam account unplayed, undownloaded, unloved. After getting all of my stuff transferred from the old computer, the first thing I did was download this and start playing it; And I’ve had fun with it so far.  However, I haven’t been playing this as much as…

Team Fortress 2: Oh yes. I loved playing Team Fortress Classic. I knew my computer couldn’t run TF2 and was sad that I couldn’t play this. I ended up buying this after acquiring this computer and have gotten immersed in it… although for the most part I suck. I’m not all that bad, though. Earlier today I joined a fellow member from Maple Towers and started kicking some serious ass; I went in as a Heavy while he stayed back as a Medic and kept me healed. Needless to say I was bowling over people quite well; It’s the first time in a long time that I’ve finished anything with a positive KD; Although back in TFC my K:D would be absolutely unbelievable with the Heavy.

There’s not much else I want to talk about tonight; My mind is a bit fatigued. If I’m going to say something however, I’m once again going to point to OCRemix. If you remember I gave props to the guys who did the remix album for Tales of Phantasia and Symphonia: Summoning of Spirits.  Just today a remix album was released for another game I can relate to; Final Fantasy 4, titled “Echoes of Betrayal, Light of Redemption.”  I haven’t been able to listen to it yet since I just downloaded it, but if SoS was anything, I would really suggest checking this one out, too.

Anyway, that’s all for now. To close this post out, here’s a video of crash compilations… with some very good dubbing utilizing TF2 voices:

There’s only a handful or so games that I actually do finish; Midway through one game, I find myself jumping to another newly acquired game.  It’s been something that’s been happening since the days of the GBA for me.  Games for me come and go way too quickly and I find myself changing games faster than some of my friends change girlfriends. (I seriously wish I was joking about that… Fortunately those people don’t visit my blog… yet.)

So, let’s very quickly go over 10 games that I haven’t beat and should go back and finish.

10. Pokémon Diamond (DS)
I loved Pokémon. I loved it so much it was almost like a disease. My red version logged countless hours, well over 100, of playtime and my gold version even more.  Ruby didn’t go so well; I got right up to the end and I just lost interest.  Diamond took even shorter to fizzle out.  I’ve had this game since release and have only gotten about halfway through it.  I keep telling myself that I’ll get back to it if I ever find myself not wanting to play anything else on my DS, but I never had.  One day this will get beat. Once you’ve caught ‘em all, you don’t go back.

9. Megaman 9 (WiiWare/XBLA/PSN)
As a retro gamer, I feel ashamed that I had never played through an old Megaman game. It wasn’t until the crappy GBC Megaman X games that I really got a taste of how the series was like.  I had played some of the later ones (and of course Megaman Battle Network and Starforce) and had my fair share of frustration over the difficulty.  I decided that with Megaman 9 I was NOT going to miss out on.  After a lot of practice I managed to make it up to the third Wily stage, and then I just stopped.  I haven’t really touched the game all that much since except to do a quick endless mode run.

8. No More Heroes (Wii)
You can probably count the number of hardcore games on the Wii with two hands, but make sure you count No More Heroes in that count.  Not only does it feature some good waggle usage, a storyline that will make your brain implode, and a protagonist that is pretty much the king of otakus, it caught me off guard when the game’s first F-bomb occured not even three minutes into the game. (On a NINTENDO console, even. Moreso that a lot of people think that Travis’ “F**khead!” line is the best in the game.)  Sadly, I dropped this game just before the rank 3 stage and have yet to beat this game and its absolute greatness.  I guess Bishop really was telling the truth when he said that “a lot of gamers out there don’t have much patience.”

7. At least one Fire Emblem
At one point or another I’ve owned every Fire Emblem game to have come out on American soil… but have I beaten any of them? Nope.  I guess part of it is the fact I’m not that much of an SRPG buff, and also the sheer difficulty that this line of games is known for.  I definitely do have a thing about Fire Emblem though… It’s too bad one of those things is actually beating one of them.  Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon or Fire Emblem: Blazing Sword would be the two I would likely go after.  Maybe I outta take on this instead of Pokémon.

6. Megaman 2 (NES)
Just a bit before Megaman 9 hit WiiWare, I acquired Megaman 2 on the virtual console.  With 2 being called the definitive point of the whole Megaman series, I had to take advantage of it when it came around.  To be honest, I found the game to be quite simple for the most part (Heck, I even beat Airman with the megabuster.) until I got to Wily’s castle.  I had gotten all the way to the boss on Wily’s fourth stage but hadn’t taken it any further than that.  Maybe I should dedicate some time to finishing off both 2 and 9 on the same day? Who know.

5. Kirby Super Star Ultra (DS)
Ah, Kirby.  Kirby’s Dream Land was the first game I ever finished; And then after that I finished it again… and again… and again. All in all it only took about 15 minutes to beat KDL… Or about 5 minutes if you’re playing Spring Breeze, the abridged version of the original game as it’s seen in Kirby Super Star. Now, take note of the fact that I said Kirby Super Star Ultra. Having passed Milky Way Wishes, I’ve practically beaten the original KSS; Now I just need the motivation to get through the last few games.  Let me tell you, though: The arena is pretty tough.

4. At least one Grand Theft Auto game
I use to be a bit skeptical about the GTA games, as I might have said in my GTA Chinatown Wars impressions, and so I stayed away from them for a long time.  One day though I bought GTA: Vice City Stories on the PSP and thought it to be okay.  I was lucky enough to find out that I could get a good chock of the GTA series at the time (1, 2, 3, Vice City, and San Andreas) on Steam for 30 bucks, and so I went for it. I definitely wasn’t disappointed after all the time I spent playing Vice City and San Andreas, but I never really finished them.  It’s true that I’m still working on Chinatown Wars but not as fast as I want to be.  Maybe I’ll pull through eventually and get to finishing at least one of those.

3. Super Mario Galaxy (Wii)
What is wrong with me? Seriously.  I’ve had this game nearly as long as I’ve had my Wii and I’ve only completed… two galaxies?!  Super Mario Galaxy is said to be one of the best if not THE best mario game to have hit since Super Mario 64 and it just sits there on my shelf collecting dust.  It’s not like I have anything else to play on the Wii that I haven’t beat, other than No More Heroes of course, but if anything finishing this game at least once should be mandatory.

2. Mariokart DS
I got so close to finishing this… and then I just stopped.  I don’t know why but 150cc got really frustrating once I got to the Special Cup.  I only have two more cups to go (I can’t remember if there was a mirror class) but I just cant get around to finishing things up.  Ah well. I’ll get it done some day.

1. Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES)
Probably the most sacrilegious thing in the video game industry; I had this game when I was a kid. I could get up to Bowser’s castle and for whatever reason, I never wanted to finish it!  Man… I was a weird child.  I would seriously just waste my lives on the first status because I didn’t feel like fighting bowser. Even in later days, when I had Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3 and even today on the virtual console, I can’t see myself to beat it. (Although this time I’d actually do it if I could.)  One day, Bowser. One day…

So, those are only a few of the games I have yet to beat.  I can name off a whole bunch that in my collection that remain unfinished to this day.  Will I be able to get through this eventually? We’ll see.