Me In Numbers by Allison James

A "point of interest" blog entry, methinks! These are some numbers related to me.

20.4: My current age in years
1991: My year of birth
1: My address's current number
3: The number of residences I've lived in
2: The number of countries I've lived in
14: The number of years of my life spent in school
2: The number of schools I've been to
1.3: The number of years I've worked for YoYo Games
52: The number of games I currently have on YoYo Games
45: The number of games I currently have on Game Jolt
1,208: The number of editables I've started in GameMaker (excluding any I no longer have - I have most of them though)
8.7: The number of years I've used GameMaker for
5.0: The version number of GameMaker I began with
47,660: The current play count of my most played game on YoYo Games, madnessMADNESSmadness
84: The current play count of my least played game, 1n23g4r
2003: The year of creation of my first GameMaker game, Gemocide
2011: The year of creation of my latest, The Inverse Man
-9,999,996: My current reputation on GameMaker Community (thanks Mike Dailly...!)
5: The number of fonts I've created
2: The number of fonts I've created that aren't "lost"
11: The number of music tracks I've created (estimation)
4: The number of issues of RekameMag I've created
10: The number of issues of GMTech I contributed to (initially spellchecking, later reviewing)
3: The number of issues of OverByte I contributed to
95%: The likelihood of me subscribing to someone on YouTube if I find their videos consistently entertaining
15%: The likelihood of me subscribing to someone on YouTube if I find their videos consistently entertaining and if they hassle me to subscribe
73: The number of videos I have on YouTube4: The average IQ of someone who starts a comment on any YouTube video with: "First", "Thumbs up if...", "[dislike count] people..."
2: The average IQ of someone who reposts threatening chain mail actually thinking it's true
176: My current friend count on Facebook
A lot less than 176: The number of Facebook friends I could truly consider friends!
1:6: My current Twitter Following:Followers ratio (49 following, 298 followers)
2,207: My current tweet count
34: The number of numbers listed. So meta!

The Long Road Home Pt 3 & RekameMag Update by Allison James

I'm typing this on an iPad, as a train takes me from Edinburgh to York. It's sixteen minutes late from Edinburgh - I have eight minutes between the original York arrival time and the York departure of the third of four trains which are to take me from Dundee to Redgrave, home. Bloody delays.

And yes, as much as being stranded in a city of bizarre accents for about an hour longer than I wanted is on my mind, I'm mainly thinking about how £10 for 24 hours of only-decent internet accent is shocking, and how using the iPad keyboard to type is like using a worn ball mouse to point and click. It fundamentally works, but it sucks.

But I'm happy! I'm going home, where parents, pets and friends reside, and morning wake ups and having to prepare my own meals don't. Where my bed is more comfortable (put a single, sharp spike on my Dundee flat's bed and it'd be an improvement) and my room is... well, more compact, so that doesn't count as a plus.

There's also events and places I'll get to go again. Car boot sales - got an original Game Boy and copy of Tetris for 50p at the last one I went to. Summer fetes, the nature reserve, Norwich... Er, ew.

It'll be a good couple of weeks though, definitely.

Other subject time! I'm slowly but surely working on a new issue of RekameMag (search it on GMC if you're interested, iPad's copy and pasting is diabolical). Got three articles and two reviews so far; Darrell "Dadio" Flood may be working on another article.

Anyways, to cut a long story short, I'm open to any and all decent Rekame-page-long articles and reviews to put into it. I figure having a variety of people doing content would be cooler than all just me jabbering on. Of course, I CAN do it all by myself, but yeah. Thought I'd quickly mention that since it may not be a huge amount of time until I throw it out.

If you are interested, comment here, email me or add me on MSN at nal(at)nalgames(dot)com, or add my Skype account, nal-games. As long as the quality is decent enough I'll slap it right in.

Last topic is naturally game making. I've not done anything for over two months, mainly because Innoquous 4 destroyed me. Though it's not done quite as well as I'd hoped, it's respectable enough, and those that played it did enjoy it. It second placed in one of the last Bytejacker Free Indie Rapid Fires, sandwiching itself between two excellent-looking games.

I'd rather like to enter the GMC Jam, but that comes entirely down to self-motivation and whether I'll have time, given it's over two of the first three days I'm home. If that doesn't happen, I'm sure I'll be able to conjure up some sort of quick inspiration burst at some point in the near future. I don't like game making droughts!

Anyway, that's all for the day. I'm either going to enjoy the countryside or watch a filthy comedy film now. Guess which one.

Duke Nukem Forever: First Access Demo thoughts by Allison James

I've seen a ton of people outraged at Duke Nukem Forever. It's of course been in development for ~13 years, going through development hell as 3D Realms, in a quest to make the game perfect, kept messing with the engine it was using. It's won a pile of vapourware awards for its constant date setbacks and rumoured cancellations.

But now, in a surreal twist, it's almost here. As in, legitimately. The game is complete and is going to be out (in UK at least) in six days now. It's an odd feeling. What's odder is that, thanks to a preorder perk, I've just been able to play a demo of it now. Playing a game that's been in development since I was 7. Jeez.

Now, I went into the demo with very low expectations. Games like Too Human have ruined my expectations of games that have been set back multiple years and are infamous for it, and a lot of people have reportedly cancelled preorders of the game thanks to their poor experience with the first access demo. I can only conclude these people a) have no ability to switch their brains off and just have fucking fun, b) were expecting a Call of Duty/Halo/Battlefield-beating FPS, or c) think they've outgrown Duke. The jokes are juvenile, the FPS aspect isn't the strongest ever, but through this stuff, there was not one point in the demo when I didn't have a big grin on my face.Your first control of the game sees a lovely prompt on screen - Press L1 to Urinate. Yep, you're looking down the hole of a urinal. One piss later, complete with Duke remarks, and you can... well, run into a nearly toilet cubicle, fish out a piece of soggy shit, and start hurling it around the room like a child. Then you can run into a debriefing room, rub all the tactical notes off a white board and draw a big dick with a nazi symbol on it. That's literally all before you get your hands on a gun.What can be noted is that you don't have to do any of this. I'm sure a lot of faux-mature people will scoff, skip it all and be left with the run of the mill FPS. For anyone else, that just wants to have a laugh, they can pick that damn piece of crap up, enjoy Duke's numerous wisecracks basically deriding himself for such a disgusting act, and watch the stains created from throwing it at things quite realistically deforms itself around whatever it lands on!

So, skipping all that, your first use of a gun comes in the form of a boss. Yep, no grunts yet, just a huge monster that can fire electric pulses at you and charge at you, on a huge American football field. It's not a difficult boss once you realise where the stockpile of ammo is. Once he's fallen, you can climb up him, rip off what seems to be some sort of breathing apparatus, then score a touch down by kicking his eyeball straight out of his body. Again, for anyone wanting a serious game, it's stupid. But with your brain turned off, it's silly and funny.

The second and demo-final mission sees you in Duke's van. You drive for a little while, running over grunt enemies and turboing across a ramp (good feeling), but then the gas runs out. You walk to a very nearby mining facility, where some pig-alien-thing enemies shoot at you in a more stereotypical FPS action sequence. A little while in, a big-ass armed ship comes at you, which you can take down with several RPG rocket shots. You then wander through a tunnel area, using minecarts to bridge gaps and collecting pipe bombs, until you find some gas. A quick climb up a load of scaffolding and you can hop into a minecart, be carried rollercoaster-style back to your car (very fun), and fill it with the gas. The demo ends at that point.

Now, that was two goddamn levels. In two levels, I flung shit at a mirror, played on a whiteboard, played American football with a newly defeated boss' eyeball, drove a truck into enemies and turboed it across ramps, used a shrink ray to kill shrunken enemies with a well-placed stamp, killed them long-distance with a sniper rifle, took out an airship with an RPG, performed acrobatics across scaffolding, used nightvision to navigate dark tunnels, rode a minecart through the majority of a level, and listened to silly but often hilarious Duke remarks throughout the whole process.

My top three games of the year so far, respectively Portal 2, LA Noire and LittleBigPlanet 2, are safe in their places. I get a strong feeling, howver, I'm still going to enjoy the full Duke Nukem Forever game.

But yeah, if you a) have no ability to switch your brain off and just have fun, b) are expecting a Call of Duty/Halo/Battlefield-beating FPS from DNF, or c) think you're above a few silly, juvenile jokes, then don't bother with it.

Is Nostalgia a Good Thing? by Allison James

Time and time again, I see people lauding the likes of Super Mario 64 and The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time as the two best games of all time. Being a PlayStation-only user for most of my life (I've had an N64 ever since they could be bought for £10 at car boot sales, and now having a full time job and a steady flow of money I'm finally able to whore myself to all of the new consoles the minute they're launched), I didn't get to play either of these titles until long after their initial release. I just don't get how they could be considered the best. I pretty much despise the camera in both games, and they can seem slow and glitchy to me at times. Sure, they're not bad by any admission, but the best? Meh!

However, the moment I think about PS1 games, or even SNES games, they suddenly seem so much better to me. The thing is - are they? Are they fundamentally better, or is my brain just jaded with time and memories? While there are some games (Ape Escape and Spyro both spring to mind) that I can still today play and love - and I got Ape Escape relatively late, a year or so after I got my first PlayStation 2 - others, when I replay them expecting a blast back to the wonderful past, I just get hit with a wave of old, outdated gameplay and flaws aplenty.

Crash Bandicoot is one of these. I'm far too used to being able to control the camera in games with the right analogue stick - it's intuitive and works fantastically. In the days of PS1, not everyone had a controller with analogue sticks. In place, L2 and R2 turned the camera left and right - fiddly as all hell. But Crash Bandicoot took it one further - you could control the camera in the same way you can control an avalanche. That is, you can't. The camera is fixed to follow the level route, a claustrophobic, linear path. What makes the game (almost) unplayable for me nowadays is that judging where you're going to land is very difficult. And the games demand you hop carefully across tiny platforms even in the first set of five levels. As with Mario 64 and OoT, it's not a bad game to this day. It's just aged and flawed.

Some games have it even worse. One of the first games I played for PS1 was called Mr Domino (or something like that). I doubt I'd touched the game since the 20th century until I rebought it off eBay a few months ago. What I got was a very, very, very bad game that bore no resemblance to my fond, happy memories, and went so far as to take a big, domino-shaped shit on them.

The thing is though, some games have aged incredibly well. I only recently got to play through more than just the demo of PS1 game Tombi, as it's expensive as heck to get a hold of. But it's amazing. It's original, it's a side scroller so it's not plagued with all the problems games attempting 3D for the first proper time had, and it's funny and cute as heck.

It's not just PlayStation either - games like Super Smash Bros and Mario Kart 64 on Nintendo 64, and any highly rated 2D platformer on NES, SNES, Master System and Megadrive/Genesis, are still fantastic fun (though also pretty difficult, and old platformers' tendency to destroy your progress when you run out of lives makes me angry).

Happens with other media as well. Think back to whatever children's TV programmes you watched as a youngster. For me, that's shows like Budgie the Little Helicopter, Finders Keepers, Art Attack, SMart, Alphabet Castle, Playbus, ZZZap!, Fun House, I could go on all goddamn day. I recently watched an old episode of Budgie, and yep - childish, godawful writing and storyline, bad voice acting, and the animation was cheaply done too. Yet it was my favourite TV programme 15 years ago. And think what you will of the music you grew up with - if someone released a song today that was as any '80s or '90s song would go, today it would be laughed right off the charts by today's artists.

So is nostalgia a good thing? It depends. Its problem is that it lures you into revisiting memories, which can sometimes bring up fond results, but can also sometimes irreparably break said memories.

Favourite Games On… PS2 by Allison James

Following up from Favourite Games On... PS1, I feel it's only natural I do one on its successor, the PlayStation 2. Now, I'm sure many would disagree, but in my opinion the PlayStation 2 is the best console that's been released to date overall. Why?

It was the most powerful console at its time of release. It was slightly outdone by the Xbox (and maybe also the GameCube, I'm not 100% on that), but they came later. It was more powerful than the previously-released Dreamcast though, which while far from bad, had a lot of dodgy-looking games.

Everyone says "quantity over quality". In console perspective, this could be applied to the quality of the majority of Wii games compared to how many there are. But PS2 had both. Sure, it was subject to a lot of shovelware - it's the best-selling console of all time, go figure - but it had an absolute ton of amazing games. This was further boosted by the excellent PS1 back catalogue, nearly entirely compatible with PS2. Even the old controllers and memory cards were compatible. While I love PS3, it really did drop the ball here - controllers weren't happening at all, memory card data was only transferable with a £12 adaptor, and only earlier PS3 models play PS1+2 games (many of which either didn't work or were faulty, such as the popular Ratchet and Clank series which ran at about 5FPS before crashing entirely).

Thanks to the huge quality game selection, this blog entry will probably end up long. I'll probably forget some too. For that reason, I'll bundle series of games into one "point", then for points I have of particular instalments, I'll go there afterwards.Anyway, let's get to it!

Ratchet and Clank series
Games: Ratchet and Clank, Ratchet and Clank 2: Locked & Loaded, Ratchet and Clank 3

Insomniac and Naughty Dog are two companies that have consistently created amongst the best exclusive PlayStation games around. For the PS2 era, Insomniac dropped the Spyro the Dragon series to create Ratchet & Clank, a Lombax (made-up animal with long furry ears, a cute face and a less-cute blood lust) and a little robot that doubled up as a jetpack/hoverpack combo. It was my favourite platformer series on the console (Psychonauts, more on that lower down, isn't a series). Platforming games are amongst my favourites anyway, so I fondly love R&C. The only weak R&C in my opinion is Gladiator/Deadlocked - it was a tad too enclosed, though still enjoyable for a while. R&C is the only series by Insomniac or Naughty Dog that they've kept making across a generation too - Naughty Dog currently make the spectacular Uncharted games for PS3. For the PS2 though, they made...

Jak & Daxter series
Games: Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, Jak II: Renegade, Jak 3, Jak X

While Insomniac was establishing the new series, Naughty Dog were doing exactly the same. They left Crash Bandicoot to die at the hands of other developers (though one of the PS2-era games was okay, see later) and created Jak & Daxter. This was a very unique-feeling series, and one that underwent a huge evolution between the first and second instalments. Basically, Jak and Daxter are two friends, but Daxter has been turned into a lizard-like creature. As with R&C, you control Jak while Daxter is a generally-passive character, who pops up for the odd segment but normally sits on Jak's shoulders and makes amusing remarks. The first game in the series was a bright, vibrant platformer made up of seamlessly-joined, interesting levels. Jak II introduced a city setting and gave Jak guns! It made the two games very different but both very fun. Jak 3 advanced the idea of II, putting you instead in a wasteland city setting... before throwing you back to the city of Jak II, war-torn and burning down.Disappointingly, it seems like the Jak & Daxter series is pretty much forgotten - the original trilogy is a stunning threesome of games I would happily recommend to anybody. While R&C were slightly stronger, J&D has that fantastic "feel" - mixed with the storyline that beautifully closes itself completely at the end of Jak 3, and the evolutions the game kept undergoing, they're brilliant in their own right. A couple of years ago it had the obligatory second-hand-developer okay-but-not-fantastic sequel, which was pretty much ignored and thrown straight into bargain bins. I've not played that game yet but the reviews do not fare well. Jak X is more noteworthy, as it was made by Naughty Dog. It's essentially to J&D as Crash Team Racing was to Crash Bandicoot - a strong, fun kart racer featuring all the popular characters.

Grand Theft Auto series
Games: Grand Theft Auto III, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

There's not a series that's gone from niche to popular quite as swiftly as Grand Theft Auto did. It is now one of the most popular game series there is, thanks to its depth-filled, living sandbox world in which you can do missions, OR wander around the city doing odd jobs or just pissing around. Grand Theft Auto III, the first 3D entry, spawned countless copies of the GTA formula, most to all of which are plainly not as good. The "GTAIII" trilogy, the three games listed above, make up one of the finest sets of games out there. All long, challenging, with beautiful worlds, a variety of missions with interesting storylines, memorable characters and landmarks, and extras that boost up how long you'll spend on them, this trilogy was flat-out brilliant.Each has its strengths, too. GTAIII was the last of the series to include a mostly-original soundtrack. Vice City and up featured 100% licensed tracks. While that's fine, III's soundtrack was unique to the game - it was also fantastic, and I'm really disappointed there's no official way to buy it in a CD set or download. Vice City, set in the titular city, was based on Miami and set in the 1980s, so its feel was unmatched. It's beautiful to see, beautiful to explore, and all in all the best-designed location. And San Andreas had the scale. Five times the size of Vice City, San Andreas is not one city, but an entire US state made up of three cities, a massive farmland/field/forest expanse complete with farms, tractors and the appropriate country radio, and an equally-massive desert. While not quite as dense as Vice City was, the sheer length of the story mode, the interesting and huge area (exploring it was, for me, 100 hours of gameplay, at least, easily), and everything else it did bigger than its predecessors, make San Andreas a fabulous game.

Gran Turismo series
Games: Gran Turismo 3: A-spec, Gran Turismo Concept 2002: Tokyo-Geneva, Gran Turismo 4

While not my favourite racing series (it hasn't been since Burnout stole my heart), Gran Turismo is inarguably a very high-up series of games. Favouring realism (sans crashes) over arcade gaming, it's any gearhead's dream game. You buy a cheap car with your starting money, use it in some simple races to make cash, use that to get a better car, etc. Once you've got a good car, you can instead plow the money into tuning it up in a multitude of ways to make it faster, better-handling - whatever you desire. A large number of tracks and different vehicles (while 3 actually had less than 2, 4 made up for it by shooting the numbers into orbit), and a plethora of modes and races, made both of the main games during the PS2 era long-lasting and great fun. I include GT: Concept purely because I have fond memories of the day I blew the £25 I'd got from my parents as a reward for doing well in my Year 6 SATs on it. It wasn't a bad game, it was just short, a la the "Prologue" instalments of GT the creators seem to be desperate to release to make some pre-money.

Ape Escape series
Games: Ape Escape 2, Ape Escape 3

Ape Escape on the PlayStation 1 was stellar - probably my favourite platformer on the system, and would unquestionably be if I disregarded the Spyro series. Therefore, I had to get Ape Escape 2 and 3 when they respectively came out for the newer system. Good move. While they're not as fresh as the original was, I defy anyone that loved AE to not love its sequels too. Ape Escape 2 added a few slightly needless items, such as a big-ass magnet you could use to move metal blocks. Ape Escape 3 ditched the new weaponry and instead added a "morph" system, where different unlocked morph costumes gave you temporary extra abilities. Neither of these were particularly necessary additions to Ape Escape, but neither were game-breakers either, and as I say, more Ape Escape is good Ape Escape. Ape Escape 4 is supposedly in production - if it disappears, I'll be sad.

TimeSplitters series
Games: TimeSplitters, TimeSplitters 2, TimeSplitters: Future Perfect

Another series which has a supposedly-in-production fourth instalment, though TimeSplitters' is a little more doubtful. Which sucks, as TimeSplitters 2 and 3 are, without a shadow of doubt, my reigning favourite FPS games of all time. Why? Because they're different. I've played all four of the current latest Call of Duty games, and to be completely honest, they all felt like the same game. I'm sure fans could argue with me on that, but I don't give a shit. The majority of the other newest FPS games are exactly the same. The Medal of Honor reboot, Killzone 2 and 3, Halo (all except that crappy RTS spinoff), they all, to me, look almost exactly the same. TimeSplitters was funny. No, scratch that. TimeSplitters was hilarious. Funny story, funny characters, funny dialogue. A ton of variety thanks to the story's gimmick basically throwing you wherever in time, and in location, Free Radical wanted you. Fantastic multiplayer. An array of challenges and arcade modes. You could also play the story in co-op mode.TimeSplitters was a tad weak - the story didn't exist and of course twin-stick shooters were a new idea. But its sequel was nigh-on perfect. Future Perfect broke a couple of things, namely the lack of any passive segments in co-op (it was more like one-player story mode, plus someone else randomly dumped in), the control scheme, and the lack of extra segments to story mode if you played on a harder difficulty. But where it broke things, it added things with a more engaging story mode - the story itself could, as I've discussed with mates in the past - easily be a movie, and the levels themselves are more interesting.Please, Crytek UK. Finish TimeSplitters 4. Until it's out, I'm hoping next month's Duke Nukem Forever can provide my fix of non-yawn FPS-ness. Failing that, I'll try the recent Bulletstorm.

James Bond 007 Series
Games: Agent Under Fire, Everything or Nothing, From Russia with Love

In the PS2 era, James Bond got it good. Two strong FPSes, Agent Under Fire and Nightfire (not included in my list purely because I didn't, until recently, get to play it), followed by two arguably stronger TPSes in Everything or Nothing and From Russia with Love. EoN is, in my opinion, most noteworthy - it's essentially an unreleased James Bond story in film form. It even has a surprisingly good theme tune!If it's of interest, Agent Under Fire was the first PS2 game I ever played. I can very vaguely picture the booth I played it in, and I believe it was in Norwich, in its Big W store (which became Woolworths... which then became dead. Sad face). I didn't own it and properly play it until later, but it was still bloody good fun. I also have good memories of when I got From Russia With Love - it was during a 2006 holiday with a good friend that, though I lost contact with, I recently found again! Had a good chat with him :)

SSX Series
Games: SSX, SSX Tricky, SSX3, SSX On Tour

The PlayStation 1 era had the Tony Hawk series. The PlayStation 3 era has the Skate series. PS2, however, had no clear extreme sport winner for me. It was the time when Tony Hawk games were still good, not attempting to one-up Skate's "realism" formula by packing in a plastic board and making the game sluggish, linear and boring. It was the time some developers that were trying to mimic Hawk's successes were doing it well (see Aggressive Inline and Dave Mirra's Freestyle BMX 2 lower down). But it was also the era of SSX.SSX took realism and shot it out of a cannon. SSX didn't care. It's a snowboarding game that ramps the arcade aspect, the OTTness, and the outright fun, up to 10 or 11 depending on how much you like Spinal Tap. Its levels are interesting as hell, something most people hadn't nailed given the need to have the majority of it as snow. It's one of those dealies that's easy to pick up, hard to master, but if you're playing split screen, it's also one of those games people won't care that much if they lose. They're still having a blast.SSX Tricky was essentially the original with tweaked levels and other minor differences. SSX was a launch title so it was nice to have the updates and corrections. SSX3 dropped all the old levels and replaced them with one huge mountain made up of several courses. While it meant the loss of the more extreme levels like Tokyo Megaplex (see link on "interesting as hell"), it kept the amazing format, tightened and improved the control system to near-perfection, and the fact you could spend half an hour on a single, unbroken downhill slope made that half an hour amazing fun. On Tour was a slight dip in quality as it slapped in all the crappy graffiti and "cool/rad/etc" crap I've come to despite given how much it appears in games nowadays, but it was still a tightly honed, well designed game that was great fun to play. Rock on, SSX Deadly Descents. I await your challenge to Skate 3!

Tony Hawk's series
Games: Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4, Tony Hawk's Underground, Tony Hawk's Underground 2, Tony Hawk's American Wasteland

While another series that fell to an ever-increasing need to add grungy bullshit, Tony Hawk's games in this era were always strong. Tony Hawk's Skateboarding and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 (a confusing jump for Europe - I'm aware THS was Tony Hawk's Pro Skater elsewhere) took a frankly weak genre of the PS1 era and turned it into a fantastic, addictive pair of games. The first two PS2 entries, Pro Skater 3 and 4, continued this with yet more interesting levels. Pro Skater 4 was the first to ditch the career mode format of 1-3 in favour of a "hunt for goals, but do it in your own time". This made THPS4 the first game with a personally-enjoyable career mode.Tony Hawk's Underground added walking and an actual story to the entire game, something no Tony Hawk's game has done well since. Behind perhaps THPS2, and not behind it from a purely game-quality-today perspective, this makes Underground my favourite in the series. It was interesting to play through, had some amazing, truly memorable levels, had a fantastic level creation mode, and a plethora of new features. THPS2 was an advancement but instead took stylings and characters (including Phil Margera and Wee Man) from Jackass. The story wasn't as there, more just appearing as a weak excuse to go wherever, and the game was silly, but still strong.American Wasteland was the same, but better to me. Pretty much every challenge you did involved taking some arbitrary object; this was then all collected in one massive empty plot. The more challenges you did, the more "American Wasteland" turned into a massive, enjoyable skatepark. By the end of the game, the rest of the levels meant nothing. The makeshift park was where the fun lied. It's also the first to be notable for joining all levels seamlessly, albeit in a weak way - long, skatable corridors where the game would slightly chuggily unload the previous level and load the next one hidden from your view. (American Wasteland also added bikes, though only the trailer linked above reminded me of this - they were forgettable.)The Tony Hawk series had a couple of decent PS3 outings in Project 8 and Proving Ground, but Black Box introduced Skate and quickly stole its crown. As previously mentioned, this was where a plastic skateboard peripheral was introduced to Hawk's games. RIP, series.

Dave Mirra's Freestyle BMX 2

An extreme BMX game shouldn't work. The Tony Hawk's Pro Skater spinoff, Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX, disproved this, though it was not as fun as its skateboarding friend. But, for me, Dave Mirra's Freestyle BMX 2 was the game that made BMXing a fun in-game activity. (It's also the only BMXing game I like to date - and it doesn't look like it's going to get much competition any time soon.) Its huge levels, great soundtrack (who woulda thought Ozzy Osbourne and Sum 41 would work on the same playlist?), strong engine and fantastic for the time level editor (one day we'll get a skating level editor akin to LBP/MNR's editor. One day) made the game a keeper and a laster. If only they'd included split screen free ride!

FreQuency & Amplitude

Before Guitar Hero I/II and the Rock Band series, Harmonix were... well, still doing music games. But they were a lot different, and a lot more original (Guitar Freaks anyone?). FreQuency and Amplitude gave you eight or so paths. Each represented one instrument in the track you choose to play. As you're moving up the paths, you will see little dots on the paths fly past you, either on the left, centre or right of the path. When they hit your ship, you hit a corresponding button (square, triangle, circle or L1, R1, R2) to "play" it. Play all the dots in two bars and that path is auto-completed for the next 14 bars. At that point, hit left or right and you move into a different instrument.This was a highly, highly addictive format in its own right. But then, you could also make remixes of the songs. You get the same tunnel, but instead you loop around eight bars of the song, and choose when to progress to the next eight. There are also no dots - you place your own and this makes the music. Given it was a time when I couldn't afford new games, I think I made around 50 FreQuency remixes. It really was that addictive.Both games lasted ages, but neither game sold well and there's not been a sequel to the series since, sadly. They're a little tricky to find nowadays, though eBay usually has them at not-too-extortionate prices. If you have a PS2 on hand, and even a remote interest in music games, for the love of god, try these two games!

Gitaroo Man

Along with FreQuency and Amplitude, Gitaroo Man makes up my trio of rhythm games that were cracking to play but undersold. This one is completely different, and difficult to describe, so here's a video. With a Japanese vibe, music that will lodge itself in your brain for ages, and a sharp, evil difficulty curve that still makes you want to try again anyway, Gitaroo Man is another great game.

Final Fantasy series
Games: Final Fantasy X, (to some extent) Final Fantasy XII

Most people that like Final Fantasy seem to believe VII was the best in the series. Some of those same people will attack anyone that says otherwise. Now, as a not-too-big RPG fan, FFVII, and all the other instalments on PS1 and below, kinda bored me. They were okay, don't get me wrong. But eh. For some weird reason, Final Fantasy X didn't have that effect. I actually played through the entire game, and while there were certain RPGish things that annoyed me - random encounters being the major one - I loved it. The story was strong, the original soundtrack was one of the best I've heard, and the game was just flat-out beautiful.Final Fantasy XII I didn't like quite as much. I just didn't get into the story at all. I also have no idea what's going on with the battle system, and what it's trying to be. I loved the removal of random encounters though - the fact you can actually see the enemies, and run around the bastards, made me a very happy person. But the meh-ity I got from XII hasn't left me yet - I bought Final Fantasy XIII half a year ago for Xbox 360, and I haven't bothered playing it yet.

Sonic Heroes

I hate that this gets on the list. I don't know why (oh hang on, yes I do, Sonic is shoddy). But Sonic Heroes was, for me, actually just a bit fun. The music was godawful, Tails and Knuckles were their usual crap self, and whoever voices Sonic needs to hit puberty, but the levels were colourful and fun, the stupid player-swapping was minimal, and it seemed to be slightly better-designed than the Dreamcast Sonic Adventure titles (which were still okay, but nothing more).

Burnout Series
Games: Burnout 2: Point of Impact, Burnout 3: Takedown, Burnout Revenge

The Burnout series is one that started off okay, but as it progressed, grew up and up. Burnout Paradise is without a shadow of doubt my favourite Generation 7 driving game, and come to think of it, probably my all-time favourite too.I still remember playing the original - an everyday arcade racer, until you crash. Cue the car contorting in slow-motion, flying tens of feet into the air. The problem with the game was that the crashes were awesome, but lost you races. You had to avoid the coolest aspect of the game! Burnout 2, the first one I personally owned, introduced things like Crash Mode, which actually rewarded you for crashing. That isn't where the game got its best though - that lies with the next instalment, Takedown. In Burnout 3, you could take out and crash enemies by ramming them into other cars, walls, or by T-boning or even landing on them. It took a fun game and made it a blast. Revenge was even better, with tighter, far-better-designed levels, "traffic-checking" - the ability to shoot pedestrian vehicles smaller than yours into your opponents, and more ways of taking other people down. Ace, ace game, and would've been my favourite PS2 multiplayer game had Mashed not been invented (see below).

Pro Evolution Soccer Series
Games: Pro Evolution Soccer 3, Pro Evolution Soccer 6

I'm not big on football/soccer games. Never have been, doubt I ever will be. But, for multiplayer fun, you can't go wrong with a quick PES match. They're great, as they're short fun, BUT if you buy an outdated version, they're cheap as heck. In no other genre would you see a year-old game sold for £5. Instalments 3 and 6 are the two I had for PS2, both barely different from each other but both good fun and cheap to buy.

Aggressive Inline

This is one of the other games capitalising off of Tony Hawk's success that pulled it off well. Aggressive Inline is an extreme rollerblading simulator - far more fun than it sounds - with a strong engine, massive and varied levels, and a ton of fun to be had. It didn't sell very well (perhaps because of its premise), which is a damn shame. As well as the levels being large, there's a ton to do in the game. The career mode gives you numerous interesting tasks to complete in each level, some of which permanently deform it (example - one in the first level where you have to grind two chains holding up a boulder in a movie set - doing it breaks the chains, sending the boulder rolling down a pipe and smashing into a wall).

Shrek 2

This is a game that was far more fun than it had any right to be. From first impressions anyone would think it looked like any other crappy 3D platformer slash CGI movie tie-in. It's actually got a weird amount of depth, is interesting throughout (if a bit naff), and its killer feature - a co-op mode. Get two people co-operatively playing Shrek 2 and you'll be amazed how fun it is. As a heads-up, you can often get brand new copies of Shrek 2, mostly on GameCube, off eBay for a few quid.

The Warriors

As a Rockstar-published game I always expect the game to be good, but they often then exceed my expectations and turn out to be great. The Warriors, and Bully (see under this entry), are two instances of that. Based off the equally good 1970s film (the game is actually predominantly a prequel to it), The Warriors sees you as part of a gang gaining prominence over other gangs in New York. Much of the game is kicking the crap out of your enemies, but there's looting and rioting, exploration, and even some stealth, which is weaker than, say, Metal Gear Solid, but not bad either. You can replay missions, which is great as some of them stand out. You get to hang out in the Warriors' HQ between missions, where you can gain skill, slap around fellow Warriors for the heck of it, go exploring, or play a great Final Fight-esque side-on beat-em-up minigame.

Bully / Canis Canem Edit

Bully (or "Canis Canem Edit" in Europe), is one of my two favourite games of all time, along with Psychonauts, listed below. Another Rockstar title, this takes the GTA formula and applies it to a school setting. While familiar due to the GTA-ness, Bully is simultaneously one of the most unique real-world-like games I've ever played.Set inside a school, every mission in the first part of the game is what you'd expect. A hilarious panty raid mission which sees you climbing up a trellis into the girls' dormitory, sneaking around stealing undergarments and hiding in cupboards and behind doors to ensure you're not caught. A fairground in which you can actually ride on the rides, or participate in events. Some addictive minigames in arcade cabinets, such as Con-Sumo, starring a hungry sumo wrestler that goes around eating fish and battering enemies. A plethora of side-missions and hidden items with associated rewards - finding all 100 hidden blue rubber bands gets you a rubber band ball weapon that's great fun to use. You can skateboard. You can unlock a go-kart and use it to drive around the entire place. You can snog girls. Hell, you can snog guys!The game's natural progression is always impressive though. Throughout the first chapter you're confined to the school. It's a huge campus and there's a ton to do, though at the end of the chapter you're kinda hoping you're not going to be locked in for the whole game (though it feels like it). Then huzzah, Chapter 2 hits and you're allowed out! What you then see, more and more as you go from chapter to chapter, is a huge city made up of all the areas that no other game seems to get right. A peaceful residential district with limited traffic, flowers everywhere, the works. A somewhat broken-down industrial/lower life area, with huge factories and slums. It's rich in exploration potential. As you play through the game, missions become less schoolboy and more bringing down maniacs - the fun keeps branching and branching, to a satisfying climax and subsequent chapter where you can simply clear everything up to hit 100% completion.And that's why it's my joint all-time favourite game. It feels amazing. It looks amazing. It plays amazing. I want a sequel. Now!

Psychonauts

Aaaand here's my other favourite game. Psychonauts is the definition of original. Set in a colourful psychic camp, you're being trained to hone your powers for good. Powers like telekinesis or setting shit on fire. The camp is the "overworld", providing a huge area for exploration with shops, characters, and plenty to do. But then there are the main levels. This is where the game goes genius.Levels are actually people's minds. You use a little door to go into people's minds. That level is based on the person's characteristics, career, preferences, things like that. The tutorial level is in a teacher's brain - he of course thinks up an obstacle course. And, as a guy dressed up in army captain clothing, the level is very war-ish. There are so many perfect levels it's difficult to say. One sees you go into the mind of a postman. In the best mission of the game and my favourite single mission of all time (second would probably be Three Leaf Clover from Grand Theft Auto IV, not that that's relevant!), The Milkman Conspiracy, you move around a twisting, turning city (the postman is insane so his mind is twisted!), gravity never staying in one place, gathering items so you can pretend to be in certain occupations for a number of guards that will only let you past under these circumstances.Another fantastic mission puts you in the mind of a general. The level is akin to one of those strategy board games where the layout is hexagonal and you can move certain spaces each turn. The level is literally this, but you can switch between large (so you can move pieces), and small (where you actually explore the board game world as if it were real, including enemies and suchforth that don't/can't hurt you in your large mode).I love this game so much, I must have bought it for ten people now over Steam just because I want the word spread. Tim Schafer's made some excellent games in his time - Brutal Legend and Stacking of recent, and Day of the Tentacle and Grim Fandango of the past - but Psychonauts, in my opinion, is the best thing he's done.

Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis

I'm not a fan of management simulators. I didn't mind Theme Hospital and The Sims, and I enjoyed Theme Park World, but for the most part they don't click (I can enjoy them most if I cheat for free money/no consequences so I can just be creative - the inclusion of an infinite money cheat in SimCity 3000 but not its sequel SimCity 4, is the sole reason I prefer the earlier game). But Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis, I could get into. It's essentially a "build a Jurassic Park theme park" game.Do I know exactly why I liked it so much? Nope. But it was bloody good fun, and well made!

The Sims

As mentioned above, The Sims was one of the few management sims I get along with. Again, most enjoyable with cheats, the PS2 version of the original The Sims was second for me only to the PC version of the same game, which of course is more receptive to patches that give me infinite money. The PS2 version has a nice story mode, though.

The Simpsons Series
Games: The Simpsons: Road Rage, The Simpsons: Hit and Run

The Simpsons haven't had it good with games. Having played Bart vs the Space Mutants on both Commodore 64 and NES, I can deduce it is a bad game. The only pre-PS1 Simpsons game I ever liked was some arcade version I barely remember in which I believe I went around as Marge hitting people with a vacuum cleaner. I quite enjoyed The Simpsons Wrestling on PS1, though it was rubbish.But the PS2 didn't have it too bad. Two pretty good Simpsons games, only split by the godawful Simpsons Skateboarding. Road Rage was a ripoff of Crazy Taxi - Crazy Taxi (see below) was awesome, and Road Rage was a competent ripoff with Simpsons characters, so it was a funny game to play. Hit and Run was a Simpsons take on GTA. This one actually had its own merits - interesting missions GTA wouldn't touch with a bargepole, a lot of good content, and all-in-all was pretty fun. Yeah, it was flawed, but it wasn't bad at all. Given the state of older Simpsons games, things could be much worse.

Mashed: Fully Loaded

Best multiplayer game ever. I'm starting my thoughts on this game with that. Like Micro Machines but more realistic, more brutal, and more hilarious, Mashed sees you on one of many great racing circuits, not going for laps, but for getting far enough ahead of your opponent and/or being the last car alive. Weapons dotted around let you shoot, blow up, or mine opponents, unleash a dazzling flash, set oil slicks underneath you which will mostly affect people on the next lap, or fire shotgun shots out of both sides of your car. You can also take people out by sideswiping them off the edge of a levels or just stuck behind something as you drive far enough ahead.Levels are varied and often complex, but the best level is arguably the simplest. Basically two straights of solid ice joined with a couple of snowy 180 degree turns, Polar Wharf sees you trying to ram the heck out of your opponents... or if they're doing it to you, braking or generally messing with your acceleration so they eliminate themselves. It's addictive and intense, enhanced by the more people you can get to play it - four-player Mashed is hours of fun. It's one of the games that I still play today with friends, and one I can thoroughly recommend to anyone looking for a multiplayer blast.

Crazy Taxi

A brilliantly original arcade game from Sega, I originally played Crazy Taxi on Dreamcast at a 1999 motorshow in Birmingham. I still remember picture-perfectly trying to grapple with the then-new-to-me Dreamcast controller! This was the first game I owned for PlayStation 2 as well, so it's a double dose of pleasant memories. Although I wish there was a no-time-limit mode - something they never added after three main instalments (I have Crazy Taxi 3 for Xbox and there ain't one there, anyway) - it's addictive and demands speed to keep your run going as long as possible, picking people up, haring across shortcuts and dodging traffic to get them there, then picking up the closest next person and repeating. It's out on various DLC platforms for current consoles, so if you're intrigued by what I've said I highly recommend you give it a try.

SingStar Party

I have no idea what made me get SingStar Party for Christmas 200? (probably 2004, not sure). Perhaps it was how I got EyeToy Play the year before and it wasn't good - I needed a Christmas peripheral that was fun. I actually rather liked SSP though! I'm not a good singer but I seem to have just enough not-tone-deafness to be able to ace particular songs on it. Perhaps most notably, I was very good very quickly at Tiffany - I Think We're Alone Now. And Scissor Sisters - Take Your Mama. Sigh, I wish my voice was deeper!

WWF/WWE Series
Games: WWF SmackDown!: Just Bring It, WWE SmackDown!: Shut Your Mouth, WWE SmackDown!: Here Comes the Pain, WWE SmackDown! vs Raw, WWE SmackDown vs Raw 2006

Though I'm currently a big fan of the WWE programmes (Raw, SmackDown, NXT and Tough Enough) and the PPVs, back in the PS2 era I had no access to them. I occasionally caught episodes at a friend's house, but without the broadband to see them over the 'net, or the Sky to see them when they were broadcast, I couldn't watch them. It didn't stop me loving the games in PS2 era though, which advanced from good to great. Just Bring It is the only entry in the series to date that allowed 8-player matches, oddly, while SvR2006 had a highly addictive GM mode that hasn't been seen since. 2006 was also the last game in the series to use a control scheme established with the original PS1 title WWF SmackDown!. 2007 and onwards used a system which was evil to get used to, but much more intuitive once used to it.

Metal Gear Solid Series
Games: Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater

Metal Gear Solid 4 took the series to a new level of good, but 2 and 3 were still excellent games. Dubbed "Tactical Espionage Action", the series reinvented the stealth genre, creating a tense but gripping set of games with a complex storyline, numerous characters, and now-(in)famous long cutscenes giving the entire game meaning. As long as you're not the kind of person that can't live without shooting something every five seconds, you'll enjoy the heck out of all of the Metal Gear Solid games (if you've not played them yet but want to, consider going through them in order - it's not necessary but MGS4 is even more epic than it was before if you "get" it all). I know I did!

Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex

For most people, Crash Bandicoot died somewhere between Crash 3: Warped, the last Naughty Dog platforming instalment, and Crash Bash, the final PS1 instalment which was not a Naughty Dog game, but was so genuine it felt like it. It's easy to forget The Wrath of Cortex, by Traveller's Tales, the first PS2 instalment and the first platforming Crash game not to be made by ND. To be honest, I wouldn't've known that if I hadn't had the TT icon shown instead of a wild ND logo animation normally shown with the games. The Wrath of Cortex was pretty darn good.It may not quite have been as tight or as original as the PS1 versions, and the bosses in the game are outright evil, but The Wrath of Cortex was more than worthy of the Crash title. Interesting levels, some of which introduce new ways of playing (the hamster ball is great fun), and the fact it wasn't broken, meant that for any Crash Bandicoot fan, this should have gone over just fine. I've heard the follow up, Crash Twinsanity, was on the same level as TWoC, though I've not played that yet so I cannot pass judgment.

Katamari Damacy Series
Games: Katamari Damacy, We Love Katamari

Another game that screams originality, in Katamari Damacy and its followups you control a big sticky ball going around "picking up" any item that's smaller than the ball itself. As you pick up items, the ball of course gets bigger, so you can roll up more and more items. Some stages see you going from a metre in depth, to picking up islands, to entire continents, to rolling around in space and picking up the Earth itself, all in one mostly-seamless size transition.While difficult, and with a control system that requires a lot of getting used to, the Katamari games are addictive as all hell, and the more you get into them, the easier it seems to get. Very, very cool. If you ever see a Katamari game, I definitely recommend you give it a shot.

Second Sight

One of two psychic action games released coincidentally near to one another (the other being Psi Ops, which I own but have yet to play), Second Sight was a diversion from TimeSplitters creator Free Radical - a much better diversion than TS-killing son of a bitch PS3 game "Haze" was. Second Sight saw you as an insane guy with psychic powers breaking out of a mental hospital with said powers - why shoot a guard when you can make him float, or make a computer float and fire it at him? An original game, though imperfect execution meant it was time they could have spent making a new TimeSplitters. But, grudges aside (which I will reserve for Haze), it was a strong, interesting game.

Fahrenheit

A spiritual predecessor to the better-selling PS3 exclusive "Heavy Rain", Fahrenheit ("Indigo Prophecy" in the US) was a game in which you played multiple characters, including an insane man who, through weird flashes would murder people, then suddenly wake up and realise what he'd done, and a policeman looking for that same person. The game was played with a gesture-based system Heavy Rain inherited, in which actions such as opening a door were done by moving one or both analogue sticks to mimic the appropriate action.It was mainly set in real time, so it was scary as hell when, for example, you hadn't found and cleaned all the bloody spots in your apartment then suddenly the cops were knocking on your door demanding entry. That was perhaps the game's only flaw - the lack of "triggering" of things like said cop entry meant you often had to replay the same segment, perfecting your routine so you could properly progress (it wasn't like Heavy Rain, where screwing up actually altered the ending instead of forcing you to replay stuff).

Cold Winter

I got this around the time I got my PS3 - I can't remember if I got it just before or just after, though I think it was just before because I seem to remember the dilemma of having to revert to the PS2 to continue playing the game. Anyways, Cold Winter is a bloody FPS game, well-made but one of those games that undersold quite harshly. It cost me £5 brand new and I don't think it was that old. It had an interesting system where you could combine collected junk into more useful items, such as battery, clumps of plastic and suchforth into C4, but for the most part was your everyday FPS. Strong game though, with interesting settings and enough to keep it apart from the stampede of identikit war shooters that still run rampant today.

WipEout Fusion

Probably my favourite WipEout game - I never got into (or tried to get into) the PlayStation 1 instalments, and WipEout HD + Fury for PS3 were good but short and a little limited. Fusion had an immense soundtrack (I will always love BT - Smartbomb), great graphics for the time (which still aren't bad), and was addictive and fun.

Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie

You'd never normally associate movie tie-ins with good games. This game isn't just good, it holds a particular merit which is even more surprising for a tie-in. It's the most atmospheric and immersive PS2 game I know. It has no HUD - the few guns you have just run out whenever the hell they feel like it, and health is represented by that "heartbeat + black and white screen = low health, regeneration for high health" system many games seem to be going for nowadays (though at the time it wasn't common). It was a first person game, though rarely a shooter - most of the time you were running through the jungle, away from dinosaurs of vastly varying sizes, occasionally finding a spear to chuck at something or light on fire first.While most first-person games aren't all that scary since you can shoot something the minute you see it, getting chased in King Kong by a dinosaur your size, with its evil face and sharp teeth, was legitimately terrifying. And don't get me started on the goddamn T-rexes.Mixed in with the first person sections were third person bits where you played as King Kong. These felt like a different game altogether - gone was the immersion, but in its place were some great fun segments where you powerfully bounded from platform to vines, into the face of a T-rex. A minute or so of beating the crap out of it then Kong sits on its body, takes each of its jaws into a furry hand and breaks the bastard's jaws. It felt cruel, but you felt genuinely in power when doing it.

Rez

I'd bundle this with FreQuency, Amplitude and Gitaroo Man in the Underplayed Rhythm Action games, but it's not really rhythm action. Rez is an odd, odd shooter, which uses music and visual effect to suck you in. It's a game that demands you play it in the dark, with quality headphones on - it's less of a good game, more of a fascinating experience. Recommended though.Interestingly, some countries bundled the game with a "vibration controller", that essentially pulsed to the game music and actions. Guess what someone did with that!

Lego Star Wars

In a time when any game plastered with Lego or Star Wars was probably crap (there are a couple of exceptions but the majority of the games fit the rule), the idea of a Lego Star Wars was mind-blowing. It should have been bad. It wasn't. It was a mind-bogglingly decent game, which while suited for children mainly, I have to admit I rather enjoyed (and played through fully) myself.A fantastic way to silence kids for hours on end then, but at the same time not only an enjoyable for all experience, also a way-paver for a slew of equally good Lego games based on other popular franchises like Harry Potter, Indiana Jones and Pirates of the Caribbean.

True Crime: Streets of LA

One of many GTA clones, True Crime: Streets of LA was admittedly somewhat passable. The story mode was alright, and the levelling up based on whatever fighting style you desired was interesting, but its major fault was the city itself. A watered-down version of real-life LA (but just as large), True Crime's setting was repetitive and very easy to get lost in thanks to the lack of landmarks or anything else that would allow you to pinpoint exactly where you were (something GTA got 100% right).My favourite part of True Crime, oddly, is some of the weird glitches! Hitting cars in certain ways could send them skyrocketing into the air. There was a pool of water on one of the very edges of the map that was exploitable as all hell - driving cars into it could have them float, fly, sink, or sink and eject Nick, the protagonist, into the air. Pushing pedestrians or other cars would do the same.The other fun aspect was the ability to search any pedestrian you wanted. Some would have drugs, others may have weapons. If you find something, you can cuff them and push them to the floor. Not the longest bit of entertainment in the world but good for quarter of an hour of giggling now and then.

State of Emergency

I believe this was the first Rockstar-published PS2 game. I may have been wrong. Either way, it was the first majorly controversial title on the system. Essentially, you go around a mall teeming with rioting people, kicking the crap out of bad guys. A special goal will occasionally rotate and have you do different things for extra points, such as using particular props in your slaughterfest. It actually follows a similar point system to Crazy Taxi - it's time limited, but doing goals and killing the right people adds to your time. An expert could go on forever.Like other mall massacre games such as Dead Rising 1 and 2, State of Emergency quickly grew boring, but a day or so later and you'd be wanting another go at it. A pretty good game, if somewhat one dimensional.

Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly

Crash Bandicoot had it pretty good with his first second-developer PS2 title. Spyro the Dragon, whose PS1 games I prefer to Crash's, didn't have it quite as good. Enter the Dragonfly is buggy, plagued with evil loading times, and not too well designed. So why does it make my list?I adored Spyro. Literally adored him. I've played through his PS1 outings multiple times, with Spyro 2 and 3 being two of the only games I've 100%ed. And I loved doing it. The game was as close to perfect as any PS1 series was capable of getting. So, despite its flaws, imperfections, and annoyances, I still liked Enter the Dragonfly. It was more Spyro. It's also one of the last games to resemble Spyro in his earlier days - the reboot changed stuff and I just can't bear to see Spyro killed like this any more.

Destroy All Humans Series
Games: Destroy All Humans, Destroy All Humans 2

An underplayed pair of games, even I only got to discover Destroy All Humans because a friend took the plunge and bought it. What I discovered was a very fun alien simulator, in which you can use alienish powers to attack... or probe... people. You can ride a UFO and do your dirty deeds from inside that as well. Destroy All Humans 2 didn't add much, but it was a second helping of fun so I never complained about it. Sadly, the third instalment, Path of the Furon, a PS3 and Xbox 360 game, was utter crap - glitchy, unfunny, and handled by a different developer - and buried the series.

Yu-Gi-Oh!: Duelists of the Roses

Back in school year 8 (age 12-13), Yu-Gi-Oh! cards were a temporary fad. I maintain it was only because those of us that bought into the franchise were sad that the meteoric rise of Pokémon cards had an equally meteoric fall when every school banned them. I never actually bought a pack of Yu-Gi-Oh! cards, I was a dick - a friend gave me a few cards, one of which was a first edition dealie. I used a mixture of cunning and fibbing to trade up until I had enough to sell for £75 when the fad died down.One success the series had (the animé was shite) was the gaming that came out of it. I've played three of them - Duelists of the Roses for PS2, Forbidden Memories for PS1, and some World Championship game on GameBoy Advance. Forbidden Memories was and is my favourite, but Duelists of the Roses was also a highlight due to how different it is. It isn't just a translation of the card game, it actually gives it more of a board game feel... and gives you 3D monster fighting to enjoy.Even now, when I couldn't give a flaming fart about Yu-Gi-Oh! or its trading cards (which aren't half as good as Pokémon cards, by the way), I can still boot up one of the games and enjoy it.

Metal Arms: Glitch in the System

The "underplayed, awesome game" pile increases. This one flopped majorly, yet is one of the strongest PS2 games I know, which is the saddest thing. Metal Arms: Glitch in the System shares a couple of traits with Ratchet & Clank, but for the most part is a highly entertaining third-person game, with a variety of weaponry and powers to explore and enjoy, amusing enemies and dialogue, and in general a heck of a lot of fun to be had. It also had an ace up its sleeve in the multiplayer mode, which, if you could get other people to actually play the damn game, was yet more amazing fun.

Whiplash

I'll end the list with a platformer that is genuinely funny - Whiplash. You play as some sort of raccoony-squirrel thing. I should research this, but that takes effort. Your sidekick is a talking rabbit which can talk (you can't). Now, not only is said rabbit your sidekick... he's also your weaponry. You are essentially escapees of a horrendous plant that attempts to fuse animals. You two are chained together and due for fusion, but break out. To attack people, being the bigger animal, you swing that rabbit right into the head, stomach, goolies, whatever you want of the people. You can also use the poor sod as a circuit breaker or a path-clearer. A commentator, who the rabbit dubs as "that guy from the movie trailers", will communicate with the two runaway animals and give them clues and ways to go.

Anyway, that's my exhaustive, yet probably still incomplete (my memory fails me), list of PS2 games I've loved over my ten years or so of owning one. If you haven't owned a PS2 yet, it is honestly a perfect time to get one now. They're very cheap to pick up (any car boot sale will likely have several people selling PS2s at around the £10/$15 mark, and I wouldn't anticipate a commercial game retailer like GAME or Game Spot to be selling them for any more than £20/$30, still well worth it). The games are even cheaper, with tons of them going for £1 second hand wherever you look - and since the PS2 is still an active console - just - game retailers still sell their games. If you don't mind Wii graphics (or heck, even HD console users shouldn't give a shit - if you do, stop being so shallow) then the PS2 will suit you fine.I am yet to foresee a day when I'll stop playing mine.

Disclaimer: All linked YouTube videos remain property of their respective owners. Not all linked videos are of the PS2 versions of the games, though in these cases a similarly specced system - PC, Xbox or GameCube - footage was used instead and represents little to no difference to the PS2 version. Also, people need to stop dubbing crap music over gameplay footage. Seriously, it's horrendous.

My Take On: Religion by Allison James

It is and always has been a touchy subject. For some people, religion is their life. For others, it's a big part of it. It's everywhere - in our language (for Christ's/God's sake, goddamn, holy [swear word], etc), in our events (Christmas/Hanukah/other, Easter etc), in our buildings (probably 99% of villages, towns and cities have at least one church or chapel, larger places often having tens of them). Everybody has their own take on religion, here's mine.

I personally am agnostic - the belief that no human can know or prove the existence of one or many higher powers. If one or many was ever proven, somehow, I wouldn't deny it either. But I do not dismiss most other religions altogether.With Christianity, there are some things I like about it. The general upbeatness of many of its members, and the positivity around it, I love. There's a "feel" to it which is just nice. However, I cannot believe in it. While I understand the majority of the Bible is not factual, but a compilation of stories with positive end morals, there's some of it that's contradictory to itself, some of it that's outright mean (scare tactics with the whole Hell thing?), and anything that forbids things or restrains freedoms isn't great.

Preachers are my number one hate of Christianity (not that it can 100% be blamed for them) - single-minded, loudmouthed dicks that go around pushing their beliefs on other people and just end up turning them off it all for life. You do get preachers, minor (people on the 'net, for example) and major (the ones that go into towns with loudspeakers), for other religions too, including atheism/agnosticism - for the record, I dislike them all. Live and let live, heck.

My number one hated trait in any religion that has it is when they strictly forbid doing anything with anyone of any other religious belief, encourage attacking of other believers, etc. Basically, the trait that causes every single religion-based war that has happened in the past, and every one that will no doubt happen in the future. Why would anybody want that? And why would anybody think a higher power exists/ed that wants/ed that? It makes no sense to me and only ever results in deaths, and no converts.

That's generally my thought on religion though. I like the togetherness experienced by people that share one, but dislike the conflict between those that differ. I don't like pushiness of anybody and their religious beliefs (including those that do not believe in a God or multiple gods) - I've made an educated and informed decision on my religious beliefs and anyone that tries to change them will only make the case for me turning to theirs worse. And to extend, I don't like that there's so many of them.

If everybody else is willing to believe in Goduddhallanesh, heck, I'm in.

Ideas for Life: "Unpasswords" by Allison James

This is an idea I've come up with, though I'm sure I'm not the only person to have thought of it.

Wherever there are accounts, there are reports of scamming, hacking and stealing. On Facebook, people can have their identities nabbed or false statuses/etc posted under their name. On things like Habbo and Second Life, if you've put any money into them, your account is seen as valuable. If you follow some kind of notorious "get free credits/money" link associated with these games and give them your password, it takes one guy just a few seconds to empty your character of everything he or she has. On banks and PayPal... well, I'm sure the huge amount of phishing you've heard about, or even noticed through dodgy spam emails, has shown you how scammers are out to get your money.

So my idea for life for today is the Unpassword. When you sign up for an account with any website, you put in both a Password and an Unpassword. What exactly is an Unpassword, then?

The idea's this - if somebody tries to sign in with your username, and the Unpassword as the password, they get shit for it. It could be their IP on the site's blacklist, some sort of tampering to their computer, whatever you like and whatever would be most feasible (I have no idea what'd be best).

So what do you do with your Unpassword? Simple - if you ever get one of those spam emails, virtual life free-credit website things, anything like that, you don't give them your password. You give them your unpassword. They try logging into your account with it - they lose, and you could be notified when you next sign in (properly) that there was a dodgy attempt.

Especially for minor-league scammers this would be a massive deterrent. I'll use Habbo as a good example, as put simply, anything you scam off people in Habbo is only of any use in Habbo. Imagine every item/credit you'd ever scammed, locked out of your reach because you'd tried logging into someone else's account with an unpassword. Are you going to want to keep doing this? Heck no, you're not.

I'm sure high-end scammers would work their ways around these things, but the more they did, the more websites could pile crap on anyone that used an unpassword. After all, 100% of people trying to log in with it are doing it for negative reasons. It's not like the massively flawed thing you see on some sites where 3-5 incorrect logins place a quarter of an hour lock on the account itself.

That's my idea for the day anyway. If it's of any interest, my PayPal password is "saybyebyetopaypalaccess15".

Ripoffs by Allison James

If there's one thing that irks me about gaming, it's the sheer number of ripoffs of other games that exist. I'm not talking about games that are similar to one another (eg any FPS and Doom/Wolfenstein 3D), games that take popular (or even unpopular) games, change a few things then slap it out to the public and smile.

The source of inspiration for this is an iOS game I bought out of intrigue a month or two ago and have only just gotten round to playing, the uncatchily titled Pirates vs Ninjas vs Zombies vs Pandas. Yeah. It was 59p and I was interested to see what sort of odd game that title could hold. To my deep disappointment, it's basically Angry Birds. The premise is that for each level set (near-identical to the sets you get in Angry Birds) you're one of the four different titular groups, taking on another one. Essentially, each one has its own little traits (like the different birds in AB), and the enemy sits stationary (like the pigs) in a physics-affected castle (guess), waiting for you to be slingshotted/slungshot/whatever at them. Every mechanic is the same, down to the bonuses for unused "ammo" characters and for the number of blocks you break/damage.

The worst thing about the game is that for quite a while it was sitting very, very high in the iOS charts - above Angry Birds itself at one point. These guys were profiting quite heavily off someone else's concept. This sickens me - it's not quite as bad as just selling the game with ripped sprites, but it's damn close.

I don't get the mentality behind it at all. I struggle to imagine the concept meetings the PvNvZvP team members had.

"Let's think of a great new game!"
"We could rip off Angry Birds to get lots of money!"
"Well gee whizz, you're fantastic!"

I guess from that perspective it pretty much worked. But that brings me onto ripping off within free, independent development. There's no monetary gain to be had from this, so anyone that's a part of it is in it for two things - the fun, and positive reception.

Now, where along the line of thinking is it even remotely plausible that stealing somebody's ideas for your own use will garner positive reception? 95% of the time, the person you stole from will be well-known in the development community. Within ten plays someone will have recognised what you've done, and you'll start eating the backlash. From there you can either apologise and either credit the original developer or take the game down, or you can deny it's a ripoff, shoot your reputation in the foot (which you'll have done anyway, but this makes it oh so much worse) and never get it back, or at least not for a long time and a lot of making up for it. Both the fun and the positive reception die during any of those routes.

Note that this doesn't include fangames, where you are showing your appreciation for the original game (though this is still pretty unimaginative when you could show your appreciation by referring people, then put your skills to better use), and instances where you take the idea, turn it into something of your own accord, then credit the original developer (much better, as it shows initiative and appreciation in one).

It's a mentality I will never understand, and thankfully have never had in the past myself, though I've definitely been inspired by people before - see Ne Touchez Pas and FKR, inspired by Mark Essen's "Flywrench" and Cactus' "xWUNG" respectively, but I've always given credit where credit is due and have had a reason to create both (simplification of a complicated concept, and a different take on a similar concept respectively).

Nintendo 3DS still rocks, by the way. But the games are currently a bit shit - mine serves as a Pokémon Black upscaler at the moment! If you also own a 3DS and would like my Mii gurning on it, then scan my current YYG avatar with Mii Maker's QR Code scanner. (Apologies to readers in the future that are interested in this after the next YYG avatar change, whenever that inevitably happens!)

Nintendo 3DS: First Impressions by Allison James

Nintendo's 3DS, their sixth (as far as most people would concerned) portable device line following the Game & Watch series, GameBoy, Virtual Boy, GameBoy Advance and DS, goes with the standard Nintendo formula - family friendly + interesting gimmick + relatively cheap + relatively low-end technology. It's also their second attempt at 3D following the disastrous Virtual Boy. Thankfully, it's learnt its lesson. No more red and black games. No more goggles on legs. No more "portable, but not really". And no more Waterworld.

I'll start with the bit that is the main focus, naturally - its 3D capability. Now, I hate that phrase that always gets attached to the 3DS - "you have to see it to believe it". Unfortunately, it's right. Although the viewing range is feeble (tilting up and down is fine, but go five degrees left or right and the 3D will turn into a weird graphical effect similar to those little Pogs (or whatever) with scratchy plastic surfaces that you can tilt to get different images. The slider is a nice addition - you can fine tune it to your eyes very, very easily, or turn it off if you start to get a headache (some people get them after five minutes of 3D, I find that I can watch it for around an hour as long as the slider's adjusted properly). It's worth playing in 3D when you can though - the polygonal graphics, which aren't fantastic (PS2-Wii-ish looking maybe?), suddenly burst into life and look really good.

However, 3D isn't all the 3DS has going for it. It also features a number of "Augmented Reality" items, including built-in games and general fun. Two front-mounted cameras allow for the 3DS to map out the area infront of you in 3D. It can then "add" objects or items to that world. A set of six included physical cards enhance this further, allowing specific items and models to be added accurately to your surroundings. The first game you get when using the first card starts with target practice, dotting targets around your desk or whatever you have infront of you. You move the console, and indeed yourself, to aim at these targets and shoot them. It is VERY, VERY intuitive - I cannot state that enough. There's none of that slight pausing if you're using the likes of a Wii remote to make sure you're on target - you can just judge it perfectly, as the game world is your world.Just as you think it's reached its peak with plopping targets around, you realise that there's a hole been dug into the desk, and you still have one target left to shoot - but there isn't one. It's not until you reach over the virtual hole that you discover one last little target down there. THEN, it goes another level. A dragon spurts out of your work surface - it's long and fast. (Woof.) Then, out of the blue, it lunges at you - with the 3D effect on, this can make you jump until you're used to it. You actually have to get out of its way sharpish, shooting its neck until it bites the dust.

The other feature of the double-front-mounted cameras is to take 3D pictures. These are saved to the 2GB SD card that comes pre-inserted into the 3DS' SD slot (mouthful), or whichever SD card you've replaced it with. As with everything else, the 3D works a treat on these photos, though the pictures taken are disappointingly pretty low-resolution. You can then whip out the SD card, stick it in a computer and look at them there. Mike discovered a great website, 3dporch, where you can then upload these photos, and others can view them by saving them to their own 3DSes, with a pair of red/cyan anaglyph glasses, or just in 2D. This is a picture taken by Mike of the YoYo Games office with a 3DS - gives you an idea of the resolution it takes pictures at, or the effectiveness if you have the glasses or 3DS.

Onto the actual games. The launch lineup is... poo. Thirteen games, three of which are Nintendogs and one of which is Rayman 2. That's nearly a third of the launch lineup which can immediately be laughed at then ignored. I personally got Pilotwings Resort and The Sims 3 with mine - the game I felt would be best for trying the 3D (though it's trumped by the AR stuff packed in!), and the game I felt I'd be likely to play the most, respectively. Both games are alright, but when alright is the best the system can offer, meh. The future of 3DS gaming looks far more promising, though. While Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Metal Gear Solid 3 are both old games, they're also both very good, and should be given a new lease of life with the extra stuff (though I'd rather have seen Wind Waker than OoT - personal preference). The new Mario game in production is almost certainly going to be strong, if familiar, as is Mario Kart 3DS. My personal biggest looking-forward-to is Professor Layton and the Mask of Miracle. A new instalment of the game that single-handedly made me give a shit about DS again? Yes please!

If it's of any interest, the boxes are pretty similar to the DS'. In Europe at least, it uses a white box, and has a number of rounded rectangles cut out of the plastic so you can poke the inside of the coverart. The cartridges themselve are weird - they're a much lighter grey than DS games (though not white), and they have a single little tumour-like dimple protruding from the top right hand side to prevent trying to stick them into original DSes. Could probably cut it off and try it anyway, but it'd be a waste of time.

Hardware-wise, a couple of complaints. The entire thing is shiny. Y'know what that means? Fingerprint vacuum. It's very pretty for the five seconds you don't touch it, after which it requires frequent wiping to keep clean. Even the buttons are shiny. The design is a downgrade from the likes of the DS Lite - the lid is very slightly bigger than the body, which produces a weird aesthetic to it. It's miles ahead of the original DS though. The hinge also feels a bit of a downgrade - while it goes to default positions fine, it's loose in any other position and so difficult to adjust to the angle you may want it. I quite like the analogue nub/stick it now has, though I question why they didn't one-up the PSP and give it two of them (PSP2 now going in the double-stick direction). It renders the D-pad awkward to use though - it's too far down the system so you can't grip it properly AND use the pad.

The stylus on the other hand is a major improvement. Gone is that thin, short bit of plastic - in its place comes a sleek, thicker metal number that, with the magic of telescopy, can double in size with a quick yank. It also feels more solidly held within the system when not in use too, producing a satisfying click when both removed and replaced. Lastly, the docking station that comes with it is flat-out amazing. You can still plug the 3DS straight into the wire if you'd rather, but with the dock it's a quick plonk to charge it, and a grab to get it back. Either charging method still lets you use the system.Its battery life isn't great, taking more time to charge than the 3 hours of use you'll get with using it normally. It's a little stingy, though if you're at home or just stationary in general, docking it when not the main focus of attention becomes second nature very quickly.

So, final verdict? I love it. Well worth the £187. If you're tempted by it and have the money, I can't recommend it enough. It doesn't have a good library, but that's only now. It will improve drastically in the future. And with all the packed-in features and games, I can confidently say you could actually get hours of fun out of it without even having a dedicated game. Call it an investment if you please. The 3D is immersive and unobtrusive, being compatible with nigh on everything (except original back-compatible DS games) and easily removed or tweaked. The AR is just flat-out amazing to use. The potential of the games to come for it is undeniable. It is just a very high-quality system in general. I'd put it as the single most-improved Nintendo hand held I've bought (I've been around for the GB, GBA and DS before it) - fun, interesting, often amazing, feature-packed. And that's just first impressions.

Ideas for Life: Relative Rating Scale by Allison James

It seems every piece of media in the world gets rated nowadays. Magazines, websites, all sorts of things exist to get reviewed and a number slapped onto them. I'm personally a big magazine fan - I get Official PlayStation Magazine and PC Gamer UK every month, and magazines like PSM3, Xbox 360 World and Official Xbox Magazine to fill the empty half of the month where I've read the two regulars.

But the rating systems irk me a bit. A great game will get the perfect rating, then a significantly better game will be stuck to get that same rating despite being better. An instance of this - Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was given a 10/10, with 10 rewarded in each individual aspect too, in the old Official PlayStation 2 Magazine. This was, like, 17 issues in - the magazine ran for 100, covering the entirety of the PS2's popular lifespan. Sure, it's a very good game. But perfect? In comparison to some of the other stunning games PS2 got? No way.

Another annoying thing with current rating systems is they falter when non-significantly-different sequels to games come out. Dynasty Warriors is the perfect example - there's been, like, seven of the main games, and they differentiate so little it's almost embarrassing. But magazines, peeved by this, kept rating the sequels lower and lower. This is despite them being technically superior!

So my idea is this - a relative, uncapped rating system. There is no perfect score. It starts with 100 being as high as is expectable at the time, and 0-10 being god awful. So you could have given Metal Gear Solid 2 a 95-100, yeah. But by the time games like TimeSplitters 2 and GTA: Vice City come out, they could start nudging 105 or so. The stellar games late in the console's lifespan could be getting 150-200, with even the lesser games in the 100 region thanks to their ability to get more out of the system. Then, when the console's successor comes out, the games could continue to be compared to this system, with the likes of Metal Gear Solid 4 perhaps getting 250.

This would also be good for the repetitive sequels. Dynasty Warriors 193 could get the same score as Dynasty Warriors 192, which is fair - but all other, more original games would be constantly raising the average bar, leaving that game behind.

While it's true there's no "maximum" to aim for (and it'd mess with aggregation sites like Metacritic), the highest-rated game at the time could be the one to beat. Anyway, I just feel this would be a superior way of handling ratings to the current "GTA: San Andreas - 100%! GTAIV - wait, shit, 100% as well I guess!".