Entry 1001: Blog: 1

The magnificent wonderful XBOX 360. The machine that has
dominated the games market this last few years and which
threatened to destroy the SONY hold on gaming. Thank goodness
the Wii stepped in to help is all that I can say...I am 
not impressed. 

I finally bit the bullet and bought an XBOX 360 Elite. I had
to get their flagship model to compare with the PS3. No good
getting their arcade one. I have been playing a magic game
called Bayonetta which has been ported to the PS3 with supposed
problems. The issues are graphics, frame rate slow down and
loading times. SEGA released a patch to deal with the loading 
which basically alowed you to install onto the hard drive.. Anyhooo...

My review...

First up it is heavy, nearly gave a heart failure carrying the
box back to the car. Also I was faced with the usual sales crap
about warranty issues, battery charging controllers, HD cables etc
So the bag was full by the time I got home

My biggest gripe was the money I had to shell out for the XBOX Live
The box boasts XBOX Live then charges you for it.. Not so on the PS3

Anyway... Let us not be too judgemental

I opened the box with all the bags stuck together with selotape
which is a pet hate of mine being a collector. Clip bags would
have been nice. The unit was in the top of the box and fit perfectly
so you struggled to get any fingers round it. That dispensed with
you had the usual array of wires that you will never need, and
a set of headphones and head mic..I would have been happier to
have dispensed with the head set and had a HD cable

The instructions for assemby were easy to understand and I 
plugged stuff together. Amazingly the power supply is like the
old Amiga, so now you get this brick on the floor where ever
you use the thing. There is no obvious power saving light feature
other than a plugged in notice on the brick so I guess you would
have to have the brick visible to see if it was on.

The controller. That dam controller. Microsoft mimic but never
ever get it right. Who the hell uses this thing. It is heavy 
still and a pain to use. Add to that the batteries and the
fact you gotta keep charging the batteries up. So annoying that

Having switched on I struggled for ten minutes or so filling in
the details and immediately got MS emails. This time I used and
obscure email address so I can dump it

Most annoying was XBOX Live and the stupid avatar. I got the 
feeling that Mr Gates and co were trying to be the cool guys
You know with the ' Hey dood... Give me a high five ' . You have
to pick a 'fabric softener' style character that suits you...
I don`t want to be a person .. I want to be a dragon or a Lemming
I got so angry with that...

The interface... What interface ? It's about as user friendly as
Microsoft. They haven`t got a clue... It was like opening junk
mail.. You know thhose letters you get that you think are 
important but after wading through loads of leaflets you just
bin. So difficult to understand.. Especially as I just wanted
to open the disc tray

And so to the acid test.. The game. In went Bayonetta, and guess
what .. It was worse. The image is darker. The picture is not as
sharp. The load times are the same and the game was ruined by the
controller. Pointless exercise

I may love my PS3, and I have never ever had any love for Microsoft
but seriously, I do give kit the benefit of the doubt, but sadly
the XBOX 360 Elite is very poor... I judge things immediately. 
Maybe that is a fault of mine, but over the years I have generally
been right. The Amiga was a joy to play with from the minute I
switched her on. The PS1 was a dream console....

I shall not be using the XBOX 360 Elite.. It goes into the collection
and gets stored without use along with all the other Microsoft crap
I have ever had the misfortune to collect. 

Entry 1001: Blog: 2

Bayonetta: For classic button punching action with
an obscure but great story line you just cannot beat
Bayonetta. She is your classic overloaded sexy babe with
a serious attitude problem, and no morals. She is confident
powerful and unforgiving. Being a witch from the dark side
seeking out her past and pretty much killing everything
that comes in your way, you play to gain strength, skills
and weapons. Not many weapons I have to say. Everything
is bought from a shop in game from the devil.. and costs
a fortune. Fortunately you can track through some of the
earlier chapters in the game to earn cash. You get the usual
game trophies along with ingame awards. Beating the game 
as ever unlocks stuff. 

Bayonetta is the star, however. The animations are classic.
The one liners are laced with sexual innuendo. The artwork
is simply breathtaking, and the game is fluid and very
enjoyable. Loved it to death.

As to the plot... Well she is one of a kind. An Umbra Witch,
a human witch that made a pact with demons of the dark arts
There is this guy called Balder who turns out to be Bayonetta's
father who posseses something called the left eye. Bayonetta
has the right eye.. With both Balder can summon Jubileus the 
final boss... There is a myth or treaty that if both the angels 
and demons work together, there will be a big armageddon. 
It's all about the balance of light and dark and who controls
this. Matters skip backward and forward through time as 
Bayonetta tries to remember her past...Bayonetta struggles 
through her adventure fighting those that seek out the right
eye which is a gem worn on her chest. 

As ever with these style of games the story line is incredibly well
structured, and being Japanese about life and life forces
and who controls them. A titanic struggle between good and
eveil. Bayonetta, is tainted as an evil witch, and is constantly
reminded of this by one of the characters in the game.

All in all a splendid plot and a great concept. 

Entry 1001: Blog: 3

I have been playing World of Warcraft for 22 months now from
the original game through to the Burning Crusade and then onto
Northrend and the Wrath of the Lich King. I have to say I have
thoroughly enjoyed the experience and have no regrets dedicating
so much of my time to it. I have levelled seven Level 80's and
was about to level my eighth when I stopped... And why?

The game has serious problems now. It is a MMO and relies on the
activity of others to make it enjoyable. Sadly that is where I 
have a problem. I really only like playing on my own and 
can do so successfully to level 80. Sadly after that you need
others to progress. And what is worse, from the tone and level
of behaviour of many that frequent the chat channels in game I just
wouldn`t want to have anything to do with them. The game has been
simplified to allow most to get to 80 and do endgame challenges
This has meant the beloved areas of World of Warcraft have been
dumbed down to make it easy to hit 80. To be honest, you really
don`t need to play the original game anymore, you can boost your
way to 80 with a new feature Looking for Groups and just do dungeons
piggy backing off higher level players. This ultimately results with 
most of those playing just living in a place called Dalaran and never ever
needing to go out into the World of Warcraft. What this results in
is a stagnation of the game really. And I have seen matters getting
worse over the last few months. Folk are getting disgruntled and bored
and moving on... And so it is that I have put my game away.

World of Warcraft is addictive... and takes up most of your play
time. Blizzard created a game where you needed to be active for
a long time to be successful, and that has been it's trademark
Trouble is if you also want a life outside of WoW, you really cannot
progress in the game. 

Loved it to death... But all good things come to an end.
Seriously, do not play this game unless you have oodles of months
to spare. It is very addictive and a super game. The penalty though
is everything else.

So in the end I levelled seven Level 80's, all Alliance.

Prediction: People will migrate to Star Trek when
the game comes online... Sad though, WoW need its mass
appeal to survive. Once the masses leave, the thing will
just crumble and die. I do hope Blizzard have spotted 
the cracks appearing

What you going to do when the war is over

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Last updated 28th February 2010

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