Nobuo Uematsu has long been one of my favorite videogame music composers, ever since I played my first "proper" Final Fantasy game in 1991 (that being Final Fantasy II on the Super NES, more appropriately known nowadays as Final Fantasy IV). Through over ten iterations of Final Fantasy, Uematsu has evolved his style while keeping certain trademarks alive.
Of his works, it's quite likely that the most recognizable tunes Uematsu has composed are the themes that play when players are forced into battle. Well, duh: With a standard battle theme for each game, it's the piece of music most repeated throughout a player's experience. Well, that and whatever standard theme exists for an overworld map.
Seeing as I have recently re-integrated myself into the world of Final Fantasy for the sake of studying VIII's junction system, I thought I'd kick off the upcoming holiday by bringing back the little music quizzes I used to do. This one, as I've telegraphed above, involves the battle themes from the first nine iterations of Final Fantasy. As such, it won't be quite that difficult; after all, these are some of the more recognizable tunes in franchise history. But who wants to break a sweat during a holiday? It's a time for fun and relaxation, so it's probably best not to start off with something maddeningly difficult. (I'll save that for Saturday.)
With that, allons y! Follow the link to the youTube video and keep this window open to leave your answers / guesses in the comments.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb4HQbl2bos&feature=player_embedded
(Sadly, the Gamespot video uploader doesn't want to cooperate, so I'll have to refer you to the version I uploaded on youTube for the time being. Please bear with it--I'll try to upload another version soon if I can figure out why the one I've been trying to upload keeps failing to encode.)
Merry Christmas, guys. Have I ever told you how much I love garlic? Because I really do. You know, I.. I downloaded End of Eternity's battle system demo. I just wanted you to know that.
After playing though the demo on both difficulty levels, I must firstly note that the instructions may be hard to read if you don't know Japanese.
Thankfully, it's not full of kanji and uses surprisingly much katakana (not as much as FFXIII, though), so I got the hang of it pretty quick. Anyways, there's also a tutorial trailer available on the Japanese PSN, so you should download that if you have some problems.
The Newcomer version is fairly easy for anyone, though -- the screen practically tells you which buttons to push. Square for target selection, X for attacking. You have a certain amount of attacks to use. Between attacks you also have the chance to push square for special actions, like jumping into the air like a gazelle with 7 guns attached to its horns or launching the enemy high up in the air so you can combo more. You can move freely, and every time you beat a bunch of enemies, you progress to another room, filled with some more enemies. And so on.
Seriously, I can't describe it better -- just go and download it, dammit.
The battle system's a fun change from the usual, and pretty damn cool looking. So yeah, do check it out.
Did any of you follow JUMP Festa? There was some pretty good stuff there. Not only another lot of Vesperia DLC announcements (Raven as Heihachi, Yuri as Mitsurugi, Flynn as Chopin!?) and Last Window (Hotel Dusk 2) or Etrian Odyssey III first screens, but real news as well! 
In other words..
The new trailer for FFXIII Versus! Well, more like a teaser. The phrase "Real or Fantasy" lingers on the screen for a second, and then up pops the video. Noctis (main dude) stands by a highway and gets into a vehicle. Then across the screen come phrases "Work in progress" and "Revelation will come next time". Oooo, what revelation!? Also, I hope "next time" doesn't mean E3.. x.x Damn it. That's the trailer for ya, though. You weren't allowed to have cameras in there, so that's why you probably can't find the vid.
In other news! Mistwalker CEO, Final Fantasy creator, Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey producer Hironobu Sakaguchi mentioned in his Mistwalker blog that the new RPG he's been teasing since March 08 will finally see daylight in March 2010! 
Or, at least, we'll catch a glimpse of it. Hopefully it won't be another disappointing game, like Blue Dragon or Lost Odyssey. Just sayin'.
Even MORE Square news! Tetsuya Nomura, most known for producing Kingdom Hearts, was interviewed in this week's Famitsu, where he mentioned TWO new titles!
"There's a title that's yet to be shown that's progressing faster than expected," he commented on one. He didn't mention whether it's a new IP, but said: "Development is progressing smoothly. Voice recording has started." About the other, he informed that "It's not totally new, but there's one more more unannounced title. Please look forward to the announcement." How mysterious! 
Anyways, that's the news for ya. Now, what's been keeping me busy? Well, besides reading books, I finished Braid! The story and ending, just.. wow. Wow! The game was simply awesome. I'll post a special blog about it next time, so please look forward to that. Also, if you've got a tenner to spare, use it on Braid.
Been playing a lot of Disgaea 3, still haven't gotten the Platinum in Katamari Forever.. Luckily, Vagrant Story will come to EUPSN today after all. as sir Ben said! Oh, speaking of him, I ordered myself a little something that's strangely similar to his avatar.
Cool, huh? Sure, it might not arrive before new year, but I'll still be in Christmas spirits at the time.
That's my blog, see y'all around and have yourself a MOTHER OF FREUD THAT HURT!! Stop with the orange launcher already!
Don't you just love it when somebody says that they'll do something and they end up not delivering the goods? I know I do. In my last blog, I told you guys I'd do a video blog and, well, I didn't deliver. I'm sorry about that. Things have been hectic around the office and at home, with the Holidays just around the corner, that I haven't had the time nor the desire to do a DBoy's Den. However, I have some vacation time coming my way over the Holidays, and I'll do my best to make one.
Moving on to video games now. Just yesterday, I completed Assassin's Creed II. It took me a while to get through it, but it wasn't because I had a hard time with the game. I just took my time and did a lot of stuff on the side, like assassination missions and so on. I really enjoyed the game a whole lot. Everything within Assassin's Creed II is a huge improvement over the first game. The combat flows evenly and elegantly, as does the parkour, and the story and characters are a huge step up from the previous game. As for the ending, it's a lot let disappointing than in the first game. However, I found myself wondering where Ubisoft are going with the series after witnessing this somewhat eye-widening ending. Regardless, Assassin's Creed II is a fantastic game which you should check out, even if you didn't like the first game. It's a very strong contender for my Game of the Year, that's for sure.
The next games I'll be playing might surprise some of you. Actually, these are two games I've downloaded off of Xbox Live. One of them is a classic. The other one came out at the beginning of 2009 and is part of the Games on Demand. I purchased Indigo Prophecy and Red Faction: Guerrilla. Why those two games? I decided to get Indigo Prophecy after watching Giant Bomb's quick look on the game. Actually, I wanted to get that game a long time ago, but never got around to doing so. Also, with Heavy Rain coming in 2010 from the same developers (Quantic Dream), I thought now would be as good a time as any to check it out. As for Red Faction, I saw it on the Games on Demand service and decided to download it. Never got around to playing it in January, and I'd seen that a couple of people had been playing it lately, including GameSpot's own Kevin Van Ord. Should be quite fun destroying everything.
If you guys want to know what my Game of the Year will be, amongst other things, you're going to have to head on over to "that other website I write for" to get the lowdown. We're doing a Best of 2009 special over there, and I hope you guys will come on over and check it out. Also, I've asked for Borderlands for Christmas (hell, I didn't know what to ask for this year), so I might be playing that on Christmas day and afterwards. Add to that the video blog and I'll be a busy bee during the Holidays. Nonetheless, I hope to see you online during that time so we can get some gaming on together.
Have a safe and happy Holiday. See you guys soon.
What are your favourite games of 2009?
My are the following:
- Street Fighter IV
- Silent Hill: Shattered Memories
- New Super Mario Bros. Wii
- Little King's Story
- New Play Control! Pikmin
- Assassin's Creed II
- Metroid Prime Trilogy
- Punch-Out!! Wii
I still have yet to play the following:
- Batman: Arkham Asylum
- Modern Warfare 2
- Mario and Luigi: Bowsers Inside Story
- Uncharted 2
Another bargain bin buy, couldn't help meself
- Damnation (X360)
Hi guys, how have you been? im doing great!! having lot of fun learning and gameshastra
iPhone game dev is pretty interesting ^___^ but ya Mac is a little annoying to use.... -___-"
anyways what are your updates??
i was kinda busy with stuff, got net recently and have been playing a lot as usual
im posting a link to pics of my new gaming room ^____^
My birthday (22nd November) went pretty ok.
I bought the THQ Steam Game Collection, it was a steal!!! ^___^ i got games that i wanted for sometime now
Ty Reetesh for it
And my dear friend Gagan is getting married next year, congrats bro
I finished MW2 in one sitting, awesome game but too short again
According to me Uncharted 2 is GOTY 2009 !! Uncharted 2 FTW!! ^__^
I had fun playing the game and the co-op is fun witht friends will play more of it soon nowadays addicted to War3OTA well actually from a long time now
Ill be voting for the GOTY 09 awards tomorrow morning.....
Have a loads of game updates to check as i didnt have net for sometime now and games to buy AND games to play
bye tc n keep gaming!! ^____^
...that Santa's bringing me some games (plural!) for Xmas.
I'm hoping Assassin's Creed, MX vs ATV Reflex, and New Super Mario Bros. Wii. In any case, I'll be happy with whatever I get.
I know I won't be finished with Fable II by Xmas, so I feel somewhat guilty that I will have multiple games sitting on my shelf waiting to be played. But I guess that's what you call a positive problem.
That's it! I can't take it anymore! SW keeps digging it's grave lower and lower. Seriously, I haven't not even posted a single thing in over a month! A month! That's a new record of SW inactivity! SW died a year ago, this time, it is rolling all over it's grave. SW isn't what it used to be! All you see now is news and that's it. Why call it System Wars then, when it should be called "System Wars"? Most of the good users I know are either banned or have moved on, so there's less comedy at System Wars each I went there.
Whatever.
I, magiciandude, officially retire from System Wars!
RIP System Wars
Posting there since 2005 and ended at 2009.
I dont think I have been Level 38 before. I will cherish this moment because I doubt I will be Level 38 for very long.
I will give a little update while Im here.
I am still of the ciggies. Been off them since the start of September. Ive had the odd one or two when I have been drunk but always regret it the next day. I have no desire to start smoking again properly. Im still going the gym as well and steadily getting fitter and losing weight which is good. Uni is going well. I have had to change my dissertation a few times which is annoying but the work is getting done. Only a couple of weeks left for this semester but I still have a lot of work to do. I havent even started distributed systems yet and I hate Java so it is going to be a tough one.
Game wise I havent been playing much. I completed Uncharted 2 a while ago and loved the game. I keep threatening to play Dead Space again but havent yet. I bought Dragon Age for the PC but cant say Im a fan. I like RPGs but I found Dragon Age to be too complicated. Theres just too much to learn. I will stick at it and see if I get better.
Christmas shopping is almost done. Only a few more smaller presents to get but they can wait for a week or two.
Thats it for now.
So I was checking out some Modern Warfare 2 information today when I decided to pop my head into the forums. In particular, I went to The Virtual Underground. It was quite sad to go in there and see that it was a shell of its former self. I clicked on some of the profiles of people I used to know, people I haven't heard from in forever, and saw that many of them hadn't logged onto this site in over two years. I used to share lots of thoughts and feelings with these people, on topics about more than just video games, and now they are effectively gone, their old profiles and posts remaining as ghosts that haunt my old home.
It's sad for me, as GameSpot played a very important part in overcoming my depression in 2002. Some bad things had happened in my life and I literally had no one in my life except my family. Posting on GameSpot gave me a sense of friendship that I needed at the time and it helped me pull myself out of depression and back into the real world. I'll always have a soft spot for it in my heart. I guess that's what makes it even more sad to see what this place has become to me.
It's still an active site with a thriving community, for sure, but for me it will always seem a little dead. 
1. 
This is not a movie for everyone, some people will hate it, others will love it. One thing is for sure though, It's going to burn in your memory (and i know the pic says 2007 but it's rereleased so.... )
2.
This is the ONLY animated movie that had evoked so many emotions since the Lion King. And for good reasons.. this is a bloody good movie.
I hope This Is It will be on the list but yeah... I don't think so..
Some students at Full Sail were doing some sort of Survival Horror game, and wanted me to do some music for it. SOoooo, without any further ado:
Feel free to leave comments folks. If you'd rather want to be a stalker while commenting, you could always use my Facebook. Enjoy!
So, I just got home and my plans to jump right into Aion: Tower of Eternity have been temporarily put on hold while I wait in a queue to get into my chosen server. Right now the wait time is sitting at 22 minutes, but it said something similar about 10 minutes ago, and when the number changes it's not always moving in the right direction. Anyhow, since I can't play just yet I figured I'd post an early impressions-style reviews blog entry about the game. And, since I'm having some trouble accessing the reviews blog right now, it's gonna end up here instead - at least for the moment.
In case you're unfamiliar with Aion, it's a new MMO from NCSoft that's been available in Korea for a while, but which officially goes live here in North America tomorrow. I preordered the game several weeks ago, so I was able to get in on the "headstart" launch that went live at noon yesterday. After seven or eight hours of play I'm still only level 12, but I'm starting to get a good feel for where the game is headed I think, and so far I'm liking it a lot. And here's why, in an easily-digestible bullet point format:
- Character Creation
Aion's character creation tools are extremely powerful - like, EA Sports powerful. Sure, you can just pick a head, a body, and a hairstyle if you don't really care for this stuff, but if you want to recreate Pygar from the movie Barbarella, you have the option to tinker with just about every facial feature imaginable. The flipside of the character editor is that it gives you the freedom to make unrealistically proportioned characters with, for example, heads that are far too small for their bodies, or with tree-trunk arms and legs bolted onto a puny torso. Save for some presumably PVP-minded players opting for the tiniest character they can come up with, though, most people appear to be opting for something that at least resembles a human being. - The Launch
Perhaps it's not surprising given that the game is already out in Korea, but queues aside, Aion's launch has been an incredibly smooth one thus far. I was able to get into the game around 10 minutes after the announced midday start time, and although I was disconnected about 10 minutes later, I've experienced no problems since. With new players descending on the starter areas like a swarm of hungry locusts, content was getting devoured quicker than it could respawn, but getting quests completed was rarely a problem. - Combat
So far the assassin that I've spent most of my time playing as is a lot of fun - somewhat similar to a rogue in World of Warcraft, but with less emphasis on stealth. There doesn't appear to be a combo system as such, at least not in the WoW-rogue sense, but you can chain attacks together and, rather than having to map every move to a different button, every move in a chain is mapped to the same button. So, for example, after I perform my "Swift Edge" attack, I then use the same button to perform a "Soul Slash" and, when I reach level 22, I'll be able to press it a third time for a Rune Slash. It's been done before, but after sinking so much time into WoW and into organizing dozens of different buttons, it's a feature that I very much appreciate. - The Visuals
Even if I end up posting a dozen of these blogs before I'm ready to write a full review of Aion, I think I'll find it tricky to ever do so without mentioning how great it looks. The aesthetic is somewhat similar to that of Guild Wars, but with superior animation and the CryEngine under the hood. I posted some new screenshots, taken on my relatively modest home PC, to the gamespace today - definitely worth checking out. - Flying
Perhaps the most unique thing about Aion is that, from level 10 onwards, your character has angel-like wings that you can use to fly. Initially, you can only sustain flight for one minute, but my understanding is that increases as you level up. Also, you can only fly in certain zones, which seems a little odd, but is necessary so that you don't just bypass enemies and stuff completely. - Gathering & Crafting
Although I've trained as a weaponsmith, I've yet to spend much time crafting - there are a lot of materials that need to be purchased in order to work with metals it seems, and I came close to bankrupting myself long before I was able to craft a simple steel dagger. Gathering is interesting in that, rather than having to train in order to learn how to pick things up off the ground, everyone can do it. So, providing you take the time to pick flowers and fruit early on, you'll find that you're able to mine iron and gather other higher-level resources later on. Bag space is an ever-present concern, of course, but these things seemingly stack in massive numbers (I have 110 of one resource right now), you get big bags (known as "cubes" in-game), and there's a bank/warehouse system with both character-specific slots and account slots that can be accessed by all of your characters on the same server. I'm a pack-rat by nature, so bag space is always a "thing" for me, but right now it's not taking up nearly as much of my time in Aion as it always has in WoW.
And, with that it looks like I'm ready to get back into the game. Be sure to go and check out those screenshots, and expect more Aion coverage from me in the near future.
Cheers
It's more dangerous than heroin. Lately I've been playing non-stop on Xbox Live off The Orange Box. I've played as the Engineer class the most by far, but I have to say the Spy is my favorite. Here's an awesome Pyro pic, he's good too.
Spy's sapping mah sentry.
...and hosted by me!
You can find it here. As those of you who've been following the podcast will know this is my first time hosting it... and don't worry, it's not going to become a regular thing.
As explained in the intro, Guy's been struck down by swine flu, Luke's off on a super-secret mission for us, and Mark is having fun moving house... which left me. I rather enjoyed the challenge, and think that our brief show worked rather well, under the circumstances... it'll take more than a few piggy sniffles to get the GSUK podcast.
Hope you like it.... we've got all the usual segments (though the news discussion is a little brief), and have two competitions to give away 20 Champions Online beta keys and 5 signed copies of Ashes Cricket 2009 on PS3. So go give it a listen... and be gentle.
Part of my own volition, part out of necessity.
I've been waffling for a long time about buying a home server or making a home server - my girlfriend and I each have our own computers and the process of backing each of them up is a painstaking process as I run back and forth with an external hard drive and complete the process every couple of weeks or so. I could automate it, but that requires spending money. Then again, I have had failed hard drives before and the prospect of losing import files, photos, and videos is not pleasant. Especially with a kid on the way and the **bleep**-ton of photos that will come from that.
I'm also on a budget, which means no more reckless spending. So I bought a simple little D-link DNS-323, which is basically a dinky processor and OS crammed in a metal box that fits two hard drives. It acts as a network drive (or drives), a print server, and will stream media to both the PS3 and Xbox 360 and iTunes on both our computers.
It's kind of neat, although I quickly realized that while my router is competent when it comes to sharing the internet, it only does 100mbps networking - no 1000mbps gigabit. So the hard drive peaks at about 12MB/s for writing data...which means my initial 400GB backup took a LONG time. Almost as long as the 10 hour cloning of my old hard drive.
During all of that, though, I quickly realized how disorganized all my computer files are. They date back to the mid-90s and are piled in folders that at the time seemed to make sense. Only now I have gigabyte upon gigabyte of random files dumped in random locations and the slow, slow process of digging through them all and figuring out where they belong is driving me insane. It's like what I do at work part of the time, since we also have files from previous employees and directors dating back to the 80s and there were no systems of electronic organization.
Of course, once I do organize them I have to figure out a system of keeping it up to date or I'll just have to drive myself nuts again in a year's time. I also want to set up scheduled, automatic backups now, which is part of the reason I bought this little NAS. No more running around with a hard drive doing it by hand!
If you have a ps3, you need to at least play infamous through once! that game literally took me by suprise. i could not put it down! it is a mix of grand theft auto, fable, and spiderman all in one! it is so much fun. i played through as an evil guy (i always play as a good guy, so this was really fun for me). this game is the best game for the ps3 so far this year! can't wait for more greeat games this year!!
I'm back from a very long sleep, and i know that everyone whom i've added as friends will not welcome me back, but i hope that any would talk to me, i know that i wasn't loging in on gamespot very long, but i swear from now on i will try to be on it as long as i can, posting in forums, helping unions, and most of all having fun, so please could anyone help me.^_^
P.S. My level went down from 17 to 16, but i don't care as long as i have fun with the ones who will support me.:3
I've now read 2 Million Posts on Gamespot. The exsact number is 2020303. A hell of a lot, considering I've only posts 10300 something. Ive also realised that By This August I would of been here for 6 Years. Thats nearly as long as Secondary Education. Time flys when your having fun right?
Chelsea Qualified for the Chamions League Semi Finals, fantastic 4.4 Draw at Stamford Bridge saw us through (we won the first leg 3.1) , to now Play Barcelona. Should be a fantastic game.
Also, Wrestling Wise, my favourite guy, Mr Kennedy should soon be back after being drafted to raw. Can't wait for that.
Still havn't rung microsoft about the xbox 360. Been playing a lot of poker atm, is filling my time up, so am not missing the console that much.
