A Great Day For U
We got our Wii U yesterday. I haven’t spent a TON of time with it yet, but so far it’s pretty sweet.
Luke and I got to Gamestop at about 11:00am, and it turns out they said we were the first person to come pick theirs up! At first I thought, “Well that’s lame, when I was younger, I would have been waiting at the door for the store to open!” But then he said that Wal-Mart got a ton of them and decided to do a midnite launch, so a bunch of Gamestop people cancelled their pre-order and went to get it at Wal-Mart at midnight. That made me feel better. There’s still some gaming and Nintendo fanaticism left in the world.
We decided to go with the “Deluxe” package. It comes with some extra stuff like stands, a charging dock, and the game Nintendoland. Along with (I think) double the internal storage space of the basic bundle. So for the extra $50 it’s certainly worth it over the life of the console. Which is pretty much forever I guess, seeing as how my original NES is still in working order. Nintendo makes some quality stuff!
I asked Andrea before she left for Wichita this weekend, “Do you want me to wait until you get home to open it?” She said “Yes.” And it’s a good thing I asked, or else I would have just tore into this bad boy! But as I’ve written before, and as lame as it sounds, opening the package on this kind of stuff is a big deal for a geek like me! And actually it kinda made me happy that I’m married to somebody who thinks its kinda a big deal too. I mean she did want me to wait, right?
When she got home Luke had just woke up, and it didn’t take long for us to pop it open. Everything was perfectly wrapped. I didn’t document any of it… if you want to see what’s inside, just go to Youtube and search for “Wii U unboxing” and pick from any of the 2300 results.
It didn’t take long for the contents to get strewn all over the basement. We had to move things around. Unhook old stuff, hook up new stuff.
The keyboards on the floor were Luke’s doing, haha.
We decided to move the Wii to make room for the Wii U. Since the U will play all the Wii games anyway. The Wii console will now be queued for installation into my current backburner project, the “retro” room. More on that in a later post though.
Luke was trying to be helpful. Or… just trying to figure out what all these new thingys do.
There’s Luke with the gamepad dock…. in his mouth.
Here’s that queue I was talking about for the Retro Room. Years of fun on this table!
So we got it all set up, and after about a 90 minute wait for the System Update… we FINALLY got to play! Boy, I don’t know how excited kids on Christmas morning are going to be able to handle that brutal system update… It was about to drive me nuts! But alas, we are up and running! I’ll do some more gameplay impressions soon! For now, I gotta get to work!
Tuesday Top Ten: Games I Never Played
I consider myself a pretty big gamer. But prepare to be assaulted with uninformed impressions and some things that are completely wrong. For whatever reason, here’s the Top Ten games I’ve just never got around to playing. I made the decision to not do any research on these games whatsoever other than searching for screenshots. So you’ll get my 100% ignorant impressions to follow.
10. Dance Dance Revolution: DDR is totally the kind of game I could get hooked on. But it’s also the kind of game you completely suck at your first several goes at it. It was big when I was in college. I’d watch my friends play it, and they were pretty good. Rather than get spanked 10 out of 10 times, I always passed on the opportunity to play and chose to watch instead. I probably wouldn’t have remembered this game if it weren’t for its psudo-appearance in Video Game Highschool.
9. Mass Effect: I know literally zilch about this game, or series of games. Except that they are supposedly pretty damn good. I never played them because I don’t believe they were every on any system I owned. Xbox exclusive??? I honestly don’t even know what system you can get these on. Yes that’s right, that’s how clueless I am about this series. But I hear it has a great story, and I am a sucker for even a crappy game with a great story. But supposedly, these are good, right?
8. Starcraft 2: I would have put just “Starcraft” but I have technically logged about 20 minutes at a LAN party getting my ass handed to me in the first game. But Starcraft 2 is something I’ve never even witnessed in motion, let alone played. Seems to be pretty popular though. Only RTS game I have any real experience with is Rise of Nations which I absolutely love. I’d love to dive into this one, but I hear it has a pretty steep curve.
7. Pokemon: I was a bit too old for the Pokemon craze, so by the time it was really coming on strong, I remember thinking it was “for kids”. As time has gone on though, I’m starting to think they were actually pretty good games. Hell, I just found out Pokemon is an RPG!
6. Zelda II: The Adventures of Link: This is the only Zelda game I haven’t played if you don’t count the CDi games (who does?). You know what’s pathetic… I even have it in my collections. I could have probably done just a top ten games I own… but never played. Maybe after I beat Metroid Prime.
5. Portal: Every review I’ve ever read of this game calls it a masterpiece, and some say Portal 2 is even better. I have no excuses for not playing this one. I just… you know… have been playing Pilotwings 64 instead… or something.
4. Metroid: Yup, it’s true. I’ve lost all credibility as an old school Nintendo fan. I haven’t even played the original Metroid on the NES. I’ll turn in my Official Nintendo Seal of Approval.
3. Final Fantasy VII: It was Final Fantasy X that made me a fan of the series. Since then I’ve been on a slow quest to play as many of them as I can. In part due to the cost of the game now, I haven’t gotten around to playing it. And I refuse to play games like this on an emulator. There’s just something about playing the game on the original hardware. So until the pieces fall into place, I still haven’t played what many consider to be the best Final Fantasy game.
2. Almost Every FPS Game After Perfect Dark: Once dual analog hit… the first person shooter genre left me behind. I had perfected the FPS on the N64 to the point it was all hard wired into my brain. Circle strafing and elevated aiming were as natural to me as popping my knuckles. Every since then, I’ve had little desire to play any other shooters. Mostly for fear that I will un-learn what I spent so long perfecting.
1. World of Warcraft: Playing Guild Wars all these years and lurking on forums, I’ve read countless comparisons of that game to World of Warcraft. The sheer number of players and often getting caught without anyone to play with in Guild Wars has certainly tempted me to give the game a go. But I definitely can’t commit myself to a monthly subscription for a game. It would be money burned 5 months out of the year, and something tells me that if I jumped in now, it would just feel very dated. Even still, considering that WoW probably has more game hours logged than any other game worldwide, and I still haven’t played it, makes it number one on the list.
My collection isn’t that bad…
At least not as bad as this.
I ran across this auction on eBay. It’s totally fishy to me because it was listed once under the story that some kid died and the parents were selling off his collection. They claimed not to know anything about this stuff, but they consulted a “Nintendo Expert” that informed thim of the value of the collection.
The seller seems like a real tool. It looks like they got barraged with messages about the auction. They posted a bunch of negative questions on the auction with a bunch of a-hole responses. Then the auction was cancelled and re-listed without mention of the kid dying.
If I had to guess, this is a scam auction. But it appears this collection does exist… somewhere.
Of course, if you want to find out if the auction is legit, it will only cost you $59,000.
10.7.12Wow. OSU Marching Band plays video games
[youtube=http://youtu.be/sAzzbrFgcUw]
10.2.12Tuesday Top Ten: Retro Gaming Wishlist
This is a new feature I’m going to try to do every week in an effort to get myself blogging more regularly. If you have any ideas for a future Top 10, leave it in the comments.
This Tuesday Top Ten isn’t a list of the top 10 “best” retro gaming items. It’s simply my top ten items I’d love to be able to add to my collection. If it’s retro, it’s awesome, and it’s not on this list, then I must already have one… I guess.
10. Gameboy Advance – Indigo color: I still maintain that this was stolen from me. I couldn’t simply misplace something like this. Regardless of what happened, I haven’t seen my original GBA in a long long time. Now, I have the GBA-SP which is awesome, and pretty much superior in every way over the original, but I spent so much time with my GBA back in the day, trying to find just the right angle to catch the light. Not to mention it’s somewhat more comfortable than the GBA-SP. I’d love to have one back just for the nostalgia.
9. Sega Genesis: I’ve never owned a Sega system. But the Genesis is the one I’m most familiar with. I remember playing it occasionally at friends houses. I also remember having to firmly choose one side or the other… and I chose Nintendo. But no sense hating on Sega any more. Now I’d just like to play some of the great games I missed out on.
8. Atari 2600: One word… “Woodgrain”. I bet this thing looked pretty damn slick in 1978. I also used to have an Atari 2600 I picked up at a garage sale back in my youth. I never appreciated it for what it was back then though and myself ended up selling it at a garage sale. Now I finally figured out what it’s all about. HIGH SCORES! I grew up in the era where the point was to BEAT a game. But these games were designed to push the gamer to their limits. No matter how far you got, you always could have gone farther. The games were short and repetitive, but that was the point.
7. Real Pinball Machine: Video games are all well and fun. But there’s something about the mechanical pops, clunks, and dings of a pinball machine that is entrancing. I was never all that good at pinball, and that’s obviously because I never had a pinball machine of my own to practice on.
6. Colecovision: The Colecovision had to have blown some minds in 1982. It was one of the first home consoles to deliver graphics that were close to what you actually saw in the arcades. Playing Pac-Man on the Atari 2600 for instance was an… approximation of what Pac-Man looked like. But playing it on the Colecovision looked damn close to what you would actually play in the arcades. It had graphics approaching NES levels years before the NES was released. But the video game crash of 1983 ended pre-maturely the Colecovision lifespan. It’s an interesting looking console that actually has some very good games. And there’s probably $60 worth of copper in the Colecovision power adapter.
5. Original Gameboy: When it comes to playing Gameboy games, you have a lot of options. GBA, GBA-SP, Gameboy Color, Gameboy Pocket, Gameboy Light, Super Gameboy, Gameboy Player, and probably the worst choice to play a Gameboy game on is the original Gameboy itself. But there’s just some kind of nostalgia there of staring at that green screen, feeling the ribbed plastic in the palm of your hand and listening to those tinny little sound effects pop out of the speaker. The only reason to have a Gameboy is to remember what it was like to play the Gameboy. From a time when portable games were mostly limited almost entirely to segmented LCD displays and handheld poker games, the Gameboy was pretty friggin awesome in its day.
4. Mame Cabinet: Now we’re getting serious. This kind of setup is way out of my price range, but this list isn’t meant to be realistic anyway. First off a MAME cabinet is in short, an arcade cabinet that plays all kinds of arcade games. There’s a ton of old arcade games I remember playing, and you’re hard pressed to find an arcade theseday, and when you do the are kinda dingy, creepy, and filled with “out of order” signs. I would completely have a blast building one of these, and PLAYING one of these.
3. PacMan Cocktail Table: What’s better than gaming? Gaming and cocktails! I remember coming across several of these over the years. Laundry mats, hotels, Taco Tico’s. I haven’t seen one in the wild for a long time. But in my basement I think it would be the ultimate conversation piece. A conversation that ends with finding out who’s score is highest. These are pretty pricey, but there are also plans available on the internet to build your own. This would be another great platform to run a MAME machine.
2. Gameboy Micro: The little GBA Micro didn’t have much of a spot light. It came out around the same time as the Nintendo DS. The GBA Micro was probably Nintendo’s hedge bet incase the DS didn’t take off. After over 150 Million DS units now sold, we know how that story ended. Nevertheless, the GBA Micro was a great little system, and probably the one I see the most useful today. Portable consoles are still just a little too big to be considered “pocket sized”, but the GBA Micro is absolutely perfect for sliding into your pocket and ready to play at a moment’s notice. Due to the limited sales, used ones are going for more than I’m willing to pay right now since I have my GBA-SP that will do all the same stuff. But maybe someday I can justify it.
1. Vectrex: The Vectrex is my holy grail. And I’ve pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I will never have one. A used Vectrex in good shape is pushing beyond the $300 mark. That’s a pretty hefty price to pay, and one that’s really hard to justify to the wife, let alone myself. But ever since I saw it, there’s just been something about it that struck me as awesome. Maybe it’s the different screen overlays for each game. Or the crunchy sound effects. I guess at it’s core I love it because it is such a potent example of what cutting edge technology was in the 80’s. The styling, bulkiness. Something that today looks incredibly antiquated, but in its time was fresh, new and exciting. It’s a wonderful juxtaposition of time and gaming that I think makes it so interesting.
Vacation Concludes
Well it’s obvious that a big chunk of my time was spent playing the launch of Guild Wars 2. It’s phenomenal. You don’t need to go all out like me, but if you want to get on board, it’s $60 at buy.guildwars2.com. No I don’t get any kickbacks or anything. I’ve just really been having a lot of fun, and it would always be cool to play with awesome people like you. And compared to the price of a Wii/PS3/Xbox360 game, I think it’s an incredible bang for your buck. I wish my computer was beefy enough to Livestream some of my gameplay, but I’m only getting about 35 FPS as it is… so if you want to watch some action, head over to www.guildwars2live.com.
Luke and I played a lot this weekend. He sleeps until about 11AM so I’ll hear him wake up and go to greet him, and it’s so cool watching the big smile on his face every time he sees me first thing in the morning. Usually it’s 6PM or so until we see each other for the first time, so it’s been really cool spending more time with the family. I was able to give Andrea a little help with the daily household stuff, so it was KINDA a vacation for her too.
He is officially walking EVERYWHERE. He will rarely crawl at all anymore. I think he realizes his little fingers can reach more stuff when they’re off of the floor. Andrea took him to the store to use up the rest of his giftcard he got for his birthday and got about 20 different Hotwheels cars. He has a blast with those things on the coffee table. He’ll roll them to you, and you’ll roll them back. And he’ll pick out a car he wants you to play with and hand it to you (and usually take from you whatever car you WERE playing with). It’s gonna be so fun when he’s a little older and we can set up a bunch of the race track and go down the stairs and over furniture.
While I would be feeding Luke I had the laptop set up on the counter in the kitchen. I got to watching Tabletop, a show that Biebs turned me onto a while back where Wil Wheaton plays various boardgames or card games with internet notables. It’s a pretty fun show, and if nothing else introduced me to some pretty cool games I didn’t know existed. Or maybe it’s my social substitute for real people coming over and playing real games. I can count on one hand the number of times we’ve used the poker table for actual games of cards. But that’s just part of being busy, and having busy friends.
The repaired lawnmower is still working fairly well. Though I noticed there’s a crack where the wheel mounts on that same corner of the mower. It’s just a matter of time before it reaches its end of life. Until then I’m going to keep mowing on. The garden is out of control. Or rather the grass in the garden. I don’t know how you’re supposed to grow stuff like pumpkins and watermelon. The pumpkins are okay, but the watermelon vines have almost completely been swallowed up by the grass. I can’t mow it, or I’ll mow over the vines. We’ll see what happens. I’ve got about 3 watermelons on the vine right now, and had a recent explosion of pumpkins. I was worried we were only going to end up with 4 or 5 small ones, but since the heat wave ended, there’s probably 10 new ones and a couple are getting pretty big!
I never did get around to rotating the tires on the cars, but there’s always next week for that. There’s a lot of stuff I can do car wise, especially on my car. But it’s all minor stuff. As it cools off earlier and earlier I get more excited about working on the cars. It’s just hard to get motivated when it’s 90+ outside.
So all in all it was an awesome vacation. I didn’t play GW2 continuously, and honestly, I’m going to take my time with the game and relesh every bit of it. Like I talked back when I was playing Skyward Sword… you only get to play a game for the first time once. Most of all, it was a great mental refresh. Work can get the best of me sometimes and I really was starting to feel burnt out. I go into tomorrow knowing that it’s going to be crazy and hectic, but I’m almost ready to deal with it. I mean heck, I could probably hang around here for another week and not miss that place, but eventually… I would. I really do enjoy what I do.
So I’ve got a few more vacation days in the bank for the rest of the year, which feels good too. Might take some long weekends, or save them for the holidays, I dunno. Maybe actually go somewhere on the next vacation… but honestly… my favorite place on earth is home.
08.28.12Willed Into Reality
Context shot so you get a sense for how friggin’ massive this thing is.
Guild Wars 2 was announced 5 years ago. To put that in perspective, when this game was announced, the Wii and PS3 were brand new.
Then shortly after the game was announced… nothing. Years of nothing. To the point where you wondered if the game still existed. Arenanet would be asked when the game would come out and they just would say, “When it’s ready.” And then a couple years ago information really started to flow.
When it was finally announced that you could buy the game, it STILL didn’t even have a release date. Nevertheless I pre-purchased… in full… the Collector’s Edition (which you see above). I never in my life have spent so much money on a game, let alone a game that will come out… “someday”. Luckily today is that day.
I’ve written extensively on my early Guild Wars 2 experiences and if you follow this blog I’m sure you will hear a great deal more in the months and years to come. What you’ll find here are some detailed pictures of the Guild Wars 2 Collector’s Edition. There are ALOT of pictures so be sure to click the link to continue reading if you want to see all of them. Otherwise it would take up the whole front page!
The Box
Looking through the window.
You’re next!
Keep reading to find out what’s inside this lovely treasure chest.
Rants of Two Old Dudes – Episode 6
We talk a lot about computer repair and how the average joe just doesn’t trust us.
Also Guild Wars 2! Fun stuff!
And more general merriment.
We are considering changing the name of the podcast, as the only episode with two dudes (regardless of age) was the first one.
DOWNLOAD HERE
08.19.12Lazy Weekend
Well I really wanted to get a lot of stuff done this weekend. Probably NEEDED to get a lot done. Then I came down with a stupid cold. Not a debilitating cold, by any stretch, but enough to say, “Ah, screw it.” So instead of doing things like rotate my tires, I spent a lot of time on the computer, hanging out with Luke, and napping.
I did get the yard mowed. But upon finishing the last section, the bracket that mounts the handle to the mower itself complete cracked and came loose. The metal on the deck of the mower had rusted so much that it had no strength left. So I’m tasked with either fabbing up a bracket to replace it, or get a new mower. I’ve thought real hard about getting a riding lawn mower… but just can’t justify the expense.
Finally got around to installing WordPress on my server here in the basement. http://web.bgwillers.com Been thinking about doing that for a long time since I had just a basic placeholder page there. It’s password protected for now, but don’t worry, you aren’t missing out on anything, it’s just a blank template. I haven’t decided what I’m going to do with it, if anything.
The one thing that I didn’t get done this weekend that I really could have was beat Metroid Prime. I can’t believe I’m still talking about this game. What I’ve done is put myself in a circumstance where I’m not getting any games played. I don’t want to admit that I don’t like Metroid Prime… I think it’s a fine game. But for some reason it just feels like work to play it. And I don’t want to play any other backlogged games until I beat that one. The problem is I’m getting to the point that if I don’t play it again soon, I’m going to forget what’s going on and have to start all over. I don’t know if I should just give up on the game or what.
Back to work next week. Then the week after that VACATION! I can’t wait!
08.18.12Rants of Two Old Dudes – Episode 5
Alleged Xbox 720 Dev Kit. Would you spend over $20,000 on that? What could possibly be inside?
Sorry for the delay getting this posted. This week it was just Biebs and me. Topics include the supposed Xbox 720 Dev Kit that sold on eBay for $20k+. Wii U innovations. Maleware and how to avoid it. And lots more!