That guy's a Maniac...

The only good thing about the Escapist has this to say: Gaming could be one of the most exciting new forms of storytelling in all media but you're all cancelling Pride & Prejudice to show the Friday night football. It's like being stuck at some excruciating wedding reception with a lot of extremely drunk and raucous relatives who are trying to get you to join in the conga. I do not have the same concepts of fun as you. I would not have a good time if I just let my hair down. Having to share physical space with squawking maiden aunts who still forward lolcats to each other makes me want to spit up my kidneys. Now bugger off and leave me to my cake. The whole post here . He's just specifically talking about stories in gaming but he could be talking about a lot of aspects of gaming.

We were discussing games we were playing the other day and as it transpired, neither of us had been playing games for 'fun' recently. Richie had been grinding a stupid achievement in Last Remnant and I'd been playing through Tatsunoko vs Capcom to get third and fourth costumes for characters I will never ever use. Also, some of the most vivid memories I have of games is ridiculous repetitive nonsense. I remember running in and out of the entrance to the Gold Saucer in Final Fantasy VII to a guy who trades one form of virtual money into another. Even worse was watching a friend dodge lightning bolts in Final Fantasy X. Capcom also brings on the pain in most of their titles, unlocking Tofu in Resident Evil 2 and getting the rocket launcher in Resident Evil. Me and my famly also spent hours and hours in the original Tomb Raider trying to get t his medipack. Turns out it was 'unreachable'. But I guess the question is, why do we do it? Are we having fun? Richie and I de

Please? As much as I'd love to buy one of the four OS CDs that were released in Japan it would be really nice if I could just get them off the disc. They are on the disc after all. Great thanks. IN RELATED NEWS. Sound tests. WTF? I do want to listen to the theme from Orbital Ring Systems Cargo Bay , a catchy little ditty from Tatsunoko vs Capcom but I had to steal music of the internet to make it happen. I would never ever have call to listen to the 34 different grunts that Alex makes in the game but sure, that's what you can do in the gallery. It makes no sense.

Round 2 of understanding gamerish (round one here ). Today we take on understanding scores out of ten. Many gamers lack a coherent framework for prolonged discussion of merits and downsides of commercial products. Combined with attention spans shortened by obligate internet use means that reviewers often use a simple one to ten scale, often at the bottom of a review to help the pressed for time gamers decide which game they should chip, rip or steal next. Unfortunately though rather than use the X/X system as a rough indicator of quality many gamers endlessly squabble over scores of their favourite games neglecting to notice that scores are merely one person's take on a game and that the reviewer's employer is probably a more important factor on what score that game gets than actual quality. Furthermore, many assume the one to ten scale to be a normal scale but it's actual more complicated than that . Here's how the gaming scale works. 0 - Not often used at all even for

I don't know how many other people spend a lot of time on the Wii's Nintendo Channel but it is a mine of useful information. Aside from hit and miss video uploads and video series that don't go beyond one or two videos, you can view records for virtually every Wii game released, including reviews by the people who play them. Players not only review the games they play (using a sliding scale) but they rate whether they think hardcore or casual gamers would appreciate the title and whether the game is best played alone or with friends. The number of times played and the average play time are also recorded. The Games Anyone can view this data by going to the Nintendo Channel and seeing All Recommendations. Unfortunately, the list that is brought up doesn't contain all reviewed titles and from what I can work out there may be some regional filtering. I can't work out why this is, the legend to the list describes the games as those currently available . However, No More

Thank. God. . Nobody likes Mega Man.

When we can't play games, read games or think about games in our head we find time to watch videos of games. Watching game vids is a tireless pursuit. For every fun and interesting video out there, there are hundreds of poorly edited, humourless, boring and idiotic videos. Here's what we've been watching recently. Two Best Friends Play. Yes games can be thought provoking, worrying, scary, addictive, intriguing and brilliant. A lot of the time though they are stupid and embarrassing. The tropes of games aren't something to be mourned though! it is where the source of fun can come from. In a world where online grimfest shooters seem to be how our community mostly interacts, Two Best Friends play reminds us of happier times of goofing around whilst playing games with your buddy on the couch. The video above is our favourite of the series but all the others are worth watching. Fail of the Weak We're big Halo fans here. Oh yeah, sure it's popular so lets rip into