Is it really too much to ask for more effort to go into the separate control needs between PCs and consoles since this seems to be current business model for many new titles.

Or in the case of Deus Ex 2 'we gave this a shite new name so it would appeal to the console retards - oh and shite gameplay too' ; it needed more effort put into the seperate gameplay needs between PCs and consoles i.e. the former can actually be remotely sophisticated. Only played the demo and the inferiority to DX1 put me off. Way to lose a sale, Ion. 

If you're finding the combat button-mashy then maybe you need to sit down for a second and rethink how you're doing it. Springing off of walls and jumping over heads is fun for the first third of the game, but after that blocking and retaliating is what you need. The only exception is the big fat guy who can hit you even while blocking. He takes a huge wind up you can see comming a while away and attack to interrupt it.

I didn't think the final battle needed to be hard. PoP is a puzzle game and the battle only serves to being colsure to the plot. I don't think the gaming public at large understood Sands of Time, which resulted in the sequel. I worry that gaming is being taken over by fratboys and is getting mainstreamed in a bad way. 

I've only played up to the first boss, and I'm thinking of just getting a refund tomorrow. Mushy controls. Horrendous first boss. Feels like Ninja Gaiden done by EA. 

do you actually *need* to have sp1 and sp2 installed in order for the game to work? i don't want to buy it and be forced to apply the service packs... 

The game is half combat and half puzzles. The last puzzle in the game forces you to use all of the acrobatic tricks you'd learned up until that point. The last fight in the game really should do the same for combat -- specifically, almost all fights in the game involve juggling multiple opponents, so the boss fight should involve using that skill. Fighting against 1 vizier, then 2 viziers, then 4 viziers in order to win would be a really nice way to 1. use the existing "you have to beat him three times" mechanic, 2. make each round more challenging than the previous, and 3. make the player use all of the fighting-multiple-guys skills he learned throughout the game. A boss fight is not just to provide closure; it's also supposed to be somewhat climactic. I don't think SoT's boss served that purpose at all. In fact, having the prince kill him in a cutscene might have actually been better than the current fight.

You're probably right about my button-mashy complaint; it wasn't until late in the game that i began to use the block button very much. 

Having the prince kill the boss in the cutscene probably would have made more sense. There was already a lot of cinematics before though, maybe they just wanted to break it up. I really consider the post-dagger level to be the boss. It makes sense that for a puzzle game the boss be a puzzle, not a baddie. 

Shambler: Dunno what your problem with the camera was exactly. I found that generally it was very well behaved and made navigating the environments fairly simple. However, there were a few spots where the camera angle changed just as I was making a jump, which also affected the controls. There was a spot where I was required to leap from some stalactites and the camera kept changing and I kept falling down into the abyss.

Also, I found fighting easier when I zoomed the camera out, but then sometimes it would close in. I'll admit that the default camera wasn't so hot for the fighting sections all of the time.

My problem with the game was the drawn out fights. Sometimes I would find myself fighting the same battle for around ten minutes, but nothing was really changing, only more monsters were appearing and I was becoming bored.

I stopped playing the game fairly near to the end because of the battle in the lift up the tower which lasts forever. That bitch kept getting killed and I just couldn't cope with the stress of losing because of her inadequate AI. "JUST STAND IN THE CORNER OUT OF THE WAY AND LET YOUR MAN TAKE CARE OF THE SITUATION!" Jesus. 

My girlfriend bought me a PSP as a combined birthday/christmas present... initially with no games, although I bought Ridge Racers and Lumines myself. So far it seems absolutely fantastic, with only a few problems.

Ridge Racers is brilliant. I never really got into the Playstation/Arcade games (mainly because I never had a PS) but I've always been a fan of arcade style driving over semi-realistic simulations like GT.

Ridge racers has a fantasic sense of speed, and really simple handling - although not so simple that you will master it straight away. There are three types of car, and each one differs in the way you can perform drifts (drifting, or sliding around corners is perhaps the main characteristic of Ridge Racer's driving model.) I think later on in the game you need to use the car which has the most drifting ability to win

My only real criticism with the game is the difficulty. I am finding progress on the PRO league very hard now, although BASIC was really easy - there hasn't really been any kind of gentle difficulty curve. The computer car in 1st place tends to start about half a lap in front, and even after driving a near flawless race, it is very hard to place first (which you need to do in order to win a league.)

Lumines is a simple puzzle game, where you groups of four blocks of two colours (orange and white) in order to create squares consisting of four blocks of the same colour. The game is played to music, and the choice of music affects the speed of a timer bar, which sweeps across the screen and deletes the blocks.

If you are skillful, you can arrange MANY groups of four or more before the timer bar sweeps the screen. This can give large bonuses - so far I've managed about 18 groups of four at once, but there is a picture in the instruction booklet of a 40 bonus multiplier, so I think I:ve some way to go yet.

The PSP also comes with a demo disc, containing game and movie trailers as well as music video clips. The PSP screen and audio capabilities do a seriously DAMN FINE job of displaying movies and although I'm unlikely to buy UMD movies for my PSP, I'd certainly consider renting them for a long train ride or something.

Which brings me onto the minor(ish) problems I've noticed with the PSP. One, the batteries don't really last long enough (anywhere from 3 to 6 hours, depending on the application, although I tend to get nearer 6 playing games.) This lack of battery stamina could be a problem on long journeys, although the rechargeable battery is removeable, so you could take a couple for a long plane journey.

The second problem is that movies are supposed to be region encoded. The only time I would be likely to use the movie playing capability of the PSP is for long plane journeys (and potentially train journeys in the UK, I've used it a lot in Japan on the train, but I'm less worried about it getting nicked by some puffer coated thug.) If I could rent a movie at Heathrow, and drop it off at Kansai or wherever, then that would be great IF they movies were special region free discs. Train journeys are less likely to present a problem, since travel would generally be limited to one country. Of course, I have a Japanese PSP, so any movie rented outside of Japan would need to be region free also.

Hopefully Sony will see this potential problem and address it (many people have said they are not interested in buying UMD movies in addition to DVDs, but IMHO, a rental market for UMDs could be successful.) Maybe then I won't have to sit through hours of awful in flight movies, viewed on the worlds smallest screen, with the worlds most uncomfortable headphones. I would sleep through it, but I can't sleep on planes for some reason.

Has anyone else managed to get a PSP that wants to give some thoughts? I'm also still interested in the Nintendo DS, although my first impression of it wasn't so great. Any thoughts on those anyone? 

I don't remember if I mentioned this before, but I:ve been playing Flat-Out a lot at work. The demo was great, but the full game is so much better, thanks to the inclusion of multiplayer. Flat-Out took over the office network as most popular game for a while, with two separate servers needed to cope with the demand (the player limit is 8, unfortunately.)

Generally, Flat-Out is brilliant, the driving model is brilliant with a great feeling of control given to the player (this was using an XBox game pad) when executing drifts and turns - although it certainly takes some practice to get used to turning so early. The single player mode is very long (with three cups, each consisting of 12 or so races) although not too difficult. The bonus games are a fun diversion, but could be better implemented. Multiplayer is where the game really comes into its own, although that may be partially due o the lack of similar competition.

There are a few problems. Sometimes the physics feel a bit random, with cars flipping at the slightest impact, and drivers flying through windscreens for seemingly no reason whatsoever (although this is more rare.)

The multiplayer set up menus are quite poor, and don't allow for any pre-race (or mid-race) chat. The option to change car class restrictions is also only available when starting a new server, which can be annoying.

Problems aside, Flat-Out is certainly the best PC racing game I've played in a while. It's well worth a try if you like your racing arcadey. 

My girlfriend bought me a PSP as a combined birthday/christmas present

she's a keeper. 

See you in.. several years! ^_________^ 

While I realize there was a community release of updated graphics packs, I'm not particularily interested right now. I'm gonna play through it like it was meant to be. 

So I read PCGamer's article about Age of Empires 3, and as an avid RTS-whore and general Ensemble fan I must say I peed on myself. That game looks incredible. Simply incredible. The graphics look great, simply incredible. They've incorporated the HaVoK physics engine in the game so when something blows up people get thrown into the sky with super neat but pointless physics. And the online looks great from what little they released. SPOOGE. 

Combat sucked a bit--or at least sucked a bit until I got the (spoiler) last sword and then started seriously wh00ping up on the sand baddies.

Puzzles were usually fairly nice and interesting. But I hated the bit where it was teaching you to jump from wall to wall to wall, though. It might've been nice of them to tell me not to press the jump button more than once for each wall or else he was just going to smash his face on it and fall to his death.

Graphics were absolutely lavish, though. There are some really cool vistas in there.

And re: final boss, he did get harder between the first and second iterations, if you didn't notice. But considering how much I hated the combat, and how little the game trained you with it, I think it was appropriate to have a weaker boss at the end. 

Still got Far Cry to play, but that might have to wait a bit.

Recently bought:

Vampire: The Pimperade: Hoe-lines - couldn't argue for a tenner. The more I read the booklet, the cooler it sounds. Haven't had a good FPRPG s3x0ring since Deus Ex.

The Chronicles Of Riddick: Escape From Xbox Mediocrity - looks good, reviews good. FPS business innit.

Painkiller: Battle Out Of More Irrelevant And Unthemed Hordes Of Nonsense - Vondur said it's "funneh". I must obey. Hail Comrades! 

Than:
If you like arcady racing games (and puzzle games for that matter), I really suggest checking out Trackmania. You can also make your own tracks, so that's another bonus. I think I've pimped the game here before, but *shrug*
Demo:
http://www.noos.fr/animation/trackmania/TrackManiaDemoInternet_Setup.exe

Phait:
Did you get the expansions as well, or just the base game? I highly recommend getting the expansions if you don't have them. If nothing else, they make the journal a hell of a lot more friendly to use (entries organized by quest rather than just by time--there's nothing like searching through 300 pages of journal thinking "Now where the hell was that guy who wanted this ring...?"
Let me know if you want some recommendations on mods at some point. There are nice graphics upgrades available and also gameplay tweaks that add quite a bit. IMO, I'd go ahead and add a few things now that really improve some aspects without really changing the game much...this site:
http://www.hiredgoons.net/MWFiles/
has some excellent things, especially if you're going to play a character who messes about with thiefly skills at all.

Shambler:
Make sure to get the patch for VtM:B. It fixes a few game-breaking bits of ugliness. Of course, you'll still have various non-game-breaking bits of ugliness that add the occasional taste of piss to an otherwise outstanding RPG concoction. Go Troika/Activision. 

The standard version. There was a version with the expansion pack, but I was short money. 

It's certainly quite fun and playable without the two expansions. There are many plug-ins that won't function with the stand-alone version, just fyi.

I just suggest writing down important quest-related info if you don't feel like paging back through the journal. (Also, sometimes sufficient info just isn't recorded in the journal. I have a few quests that I will never finish unless I consult a walkthrough, since I have no idea where the guy is that I need to report back to.) 

Nearly bought a DS today just for this game. I actually paid for one, but then realised (or was informed) that I didn't have any money and the cash machines aren't operating in Japan until 4th January. I ended up taking it back.

Still... I'm going to get a DS just for this game - I played it in a store for five minutes and NEED to play it now :)

pjw: I've been meaning to try trackmania for a while now. I'll probably try it at work soonish. 

Cheers man will get on the patch case. 

Here are some brief impressions of the DS. I haven't played much of anything except warioware yet, although I did buy another game with the DS (Band Brothers) which I was shit and, and I didn't like anyway and sold today.

I'll start off with the bad things I've noticed so far. First, the cheap looking silver coating is pretty scratch prone. I had the DS in my bag for a couple of hours of walking around and when I retrieved it from the gloomy depths, there were lots of little white scratches where the silver paint had come off. Crap.

The standard d^pad and buttons are tiny and I'm not looking forward to any game that requires heavy use of them. Aside from my complete lack of coordination, the small buttons were the main reason I was so bad a Band Brothers.

The touch screen is quite impressive. It seems fairly precise when used with the stylus, and has performed near flawlessly with Warioware (which uses the touch screen and mic only for input.) Band brothers didn't exactly make good use of the touch screen, which was another reason I decided to ditch it.

Warioware is absolutely awesome, I can't imagine a better suited game to the DS. The game is basically a series of minigames, which require the player to perform simple tasks. Each game lasts around 5 seconds before the player is whisked onto the next screen. If a task is failed, the player loses a chance.

The games use the stylus input really well, and are pretty instinctive, so you normally know what is required instantly. For example, the game might be putting coins into a wallet by dragging them with the stylus, cutting vegetables by slicing them as they fly across the screen, performing a circular motion on the screen to turn a crank or inflating balloons by blowing onto the microphone.

Although Warioware's USP is the use of touch screen, it makes good use of the dual screens of the DS, giving hints and info in the top screen, whilst the frantic action of the game is displayed below.

Warioware is a great game for killing time, and although you are bound to see the same minigame many times, the brevity of each task means that it is not easy to tire of them (unless you play the infinite stage challenge, which repeats the same stage over and over, increasing the difficulty each time.)

The graphics are simple and functional, but have a lot of character. The presentation is generally ace, and is bound to make you smile. 

Makes me want to get a DS, but no cash...
I'll buy one when they get photoshop running on it. =D 

Wario ware was great fun on the gba and I can imagine that the touch screen and microphone only makes it more interesting.

You haven't been able to try pictochat with anyone? 

That Trackmania game is complete and under horse shit. That's not remotely fun in anyway shape or form. I've played better racing arcade games on my PocketPC. That is complete ass and I fucking what my time back from you for trying that shit. 

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