Fear of the darkrness

Well its Friday. I have a carton of that lovly Rubicon Mango juice (theres a Mango week? What about the Bananas?), I have some good music on so it means it must be time to “Get My Moan on”


So what is it with these modern games and the lack of decent light fixtures? Its like in the future the have forgot about the power of decent lighting. Its so damn dark! Id hate to be afraid of the dark as these games would be hard to cope with. Even worse if you have Melanophobia or the fear of your own refection as you will be seeing a lot of it. What happened to torches? Did they forget they existed? There common as muk these days. Maybe its due to in the future they can only use these new energy efficient ones and as we know they don't fit to well in torches and are a bit ugly. Ok its wrong to call them “NEW” as they have been out for a long time, but just look at one (Not not while they are on unless you want to see white dots even it that will counter that amount of blackness, but if you want to see white dots you can either paint on a pair of classes or on your eyes, one is ok the other will make you have eyes like M Bison).
I think the only one where I liked it dark is in DOOM3 some hated it I liked it, but at least that guy had a torch, but why didn't he think of strapping it to his head? Is sticky back plastic gone as well?
You would think that in the future its always night time. Like the sun dicided to go on holidays.
Now I know that night time missions are meant to be done to surprise the enemy, but what if they have a touch? Or that greeny night vision? Or worse still have learned from the years of games that a raid will probably happen at night and so have shut the doors to there base and are all wrapped up warm with a mug of coco. While muggins decides to go there at night threw the wind and rain and other assorted nasty weather that the weather man got wrong as he is blinded due to trying that painting white dots on your eyes trick (Kids don't try that at home).
I mean what if you are like me and end up playing these games during the day? Thanks now I have to close my damn curtains and make it look like im doing seedy things in my flat and stopping daylight from getting in.
All I ask for is the option of having decent light fixtures so if I wanted to surprise the enemy I could shoot out the lights so they know what its like to live in the dark.

Unless they are the evil mole men in which case we are all screwed!

ALL FEAR THE EVIL MOLE MEN!!!
THEY WILL RULE AGAIN!!!

Positively Crappy gaming experance

Well its sunny out side it cold be what is called “A nice day” and I'm stuck inside as there are things to be done round the flat. Ok I could probably go outside but I can't be arsed so I have a glass of Irn Bru and some Dio on (HE LIVED!!) so its time to “Get my moan on”
Pc gaming (not as in emulators). Yet another thing that I seem to hate in my massive hate filled mind (Ok its not all hate as I do have something called love that makes me feel wrong inside). I'm a simple person (no not like that) I like my gaming time to be spent playing the games not making sure if they will work on my PC. Just plug in and turn on (with a game in durr). Its one of the main reasons why I no longer own a Commodore 64, Amiga or Spectrum as spending five minutes listening to it whine is five minutes into some thing like the sublime Gunstar heroes or five minutes into ANOTHER FMV BIT in Metal Gear Solid . Heck there are games that I could finish in five minutes. So skip forward to what this moan is about and it is about PC gaming (If you hadn't of guessed from the first few words) it is a problem for me as I am the type of person that don't This moan is kinda triggered by Steam recently giving away Portal FOR FREE!!(is there anybody that really hates this game?) Que happiness from around the web, then que sadness as people like me have to mess around with loads of settings just to make sure it don't jerk around like a bad cam job of some new film. Well there's two main reasons why
For starters there's the “Installing” thing. I have the game on a disc in the drive. Why do I have to sit there waiting for it to install? Ok so I understand about the settings that have to be saved, but that's just a small file and now we have the main consoles (ok not the Wii) doing it. So what if it lowers loading time. If I have the disc in the drive that's the game I want to play. Where as I admit it is convenient to have your favourite games a click away all recent PC games are on DVD and that's about 4 gigs worth of stuff. Try installing a few of them on your hard drive then see how much space you have left)
There is also the hardware side of things. New PC hardware seems to come out every month. Ok so not all games need all this recent tech to play, but when it costs over a ton (that's a hundred pounds to other people) for last years tech so even when I have the money for it its retro already. This is why I am thankful for consoles its only every five years a new one comes out (unless its a hand-held as Nintendo seem to be making one of them every few months). Speaking of, isn't it time for a new console?
But there is good bits as well. For the most part PC games are fully configurable in the controls department. My Trackball and pad controls are really good (In the case of portal trackball was for looking and fire pad was moving jump and duck (note only half was held and the 360 pad is good for this)
Then there'ss also the moding of games this can usually make the games more entertaining (Look up Garys mod to see what I mean).

Overall PC gaming is a bit hit and miss for the likes of me because at the end of the day you do still see most of the PC games coming out on consoles and for the most part the most PC games I end up playing are a few years old and then there's the emulation and not forgetting games like Solitaire Free-cell and Minesweeper that are the most played PC games ever.
Thanks for glancing at this.

Tie-ins are knot good

Welcome to another moan.
For this moan I have just gotten pissed off over using the last tea bag and am listening to Anderson, Bruford, Wakeman, Howe's self titled album. Ok its not aggressive music as a matter of fact its damn good. So anyway its time to “Get my moan on” in one that is completely different from what I was writing earlier in the week
Right so movie/TV games its safe to say there are a lot of them, but are they any good? For the most part the answer is a big old “NO”. So why are they so crap? Well more often than not they are rushed out to make the release date of a film to make a couple extra quid and there lies the problem. Games should never be rushed out. As then they end up as annoying bug feasts of crap, but wait we are in the download age so now when comes out and it has a bug on it later on when the company in question are arsed they release a patch to make everything better. What of a simple matter of testing that sodding thing before it comes out? Oh wait no time for that just put the game in the slot press start and play about five minutes then pass it. (im not getting at testers here. They have a hard enough job as it is).
I think the Wii has the hardest time of all. Well think about it. Its easy for them to make a mini game pack, tag on waggle control's and make it out just in time for another shitty Cgi film that's now probably in “3D”. Go on I dare you to look at what's on at the cinema I bet there's one on there right now. Its become way to easy for them to make these “Films” now. Back a few years ago it was great now its bloody shite. Thank you Hayao Miyazaki for still doing things the traditional way and still having something that looks like its not a soulless shameless product placement feast of shite so there kids can annoy there parents to buy the toys, the clothes, the cereal, the games and go to Mc Donalds so they can have the Happy meal with the shitty little toys that probably break as soon as they get them home.
Ok im being a bit negative here there are examples of a “good” game based on a film and here seems to be the catch, but I wont spoil it for you have a look at these names.
-Ghostbusters – PS3/360/Wii/PS2 (ok maybe not as much that version)
-Goldeneye – N64 (Ok I don't really like it, but people do)
-Alien vs Predator – Jaguar/Arcade (different game)
-Aliens – Arcade
-Alien trilogy – PC/PSone/Saturn
-Die Hard Arcade – Saturn
-Xmen Children of the atom – Arcade/Saturn/PSone
There are seven.
Why am I mentioning them? Well they (for the most part) came out after the film there based off. Ok apart from the first Alien vs Predator games they came out years before and reverses this little rule.
There where also a load of great games based off Disney cartoons from the 80s/90s (Duck Tails and Darkwing duck to name two) and there's something about these. Oh wait there all by Capcom, Capcom used to do a load of movie games in fact look at the seven examples three of them are by Capcom.
And then theres the worst TV/Movie tie ins.
Superman – N64 – Ok this cam out years after and it based on the cartoon series.
ET – Regarded as one of the worst games ever
Supergran – Spectrum/c64/Amstrad CPC (Warning name may be lost on those of you not from the UK).
So if they are meant to be bad who keeps buying them?
Look at the parents of those kids. Them kids get brainwashed by these new kids films and so get there parents to buy them.
Then theres that bloke that I keep mentioning. The ill informed sod. He watches avatar and thinks that the game will be the same and hes right for the most part they are both shite.
And yet look at one of the children's movie makers I have mentioned.
Hayao Miyazaki he has siad that he doscent want games based on film works and yet there are a few references to his works in games
I wont plead to these big company's to stop it as they wont listen. They never listen to people requests.
Anyway I have typed my peace on this subject.
I am kinda running out of things to moan about. So I might have a generic “Suggestions” post some time soon.

On another note
If you type “Moaning sod” into google im the top five web sites.
Not bad considering I CLOSED ONE OF THEM!!!!

I am also going to be working on a “How to get your moan on” soonish

Shoulder of burden

Right I have my cuppa here I had some music on (it was the Panzer dragoon OST till it started to get hard to listen to while trying to get some work done while fighting off “Nostalgia attacks”) I have my parrot over looking my typing. So its time to “Get my Moan on”

WARNING!!!!
If you don't like the word “Controller” don't read this moan.
So I have done a few posts about controllers, but theres one thing that I missed out and its something that is on all recent controllers. What is it WELL HOLD ON IM GETTING TO THAT STOP BEING SO IMPATIENT! Honestly people these days they want things as soon as possible if I wanted things as soon as possible id be in the red money wise and I wouldn't go to the Tudor caff in Stockport. Ok im going off topic here an that topic shall be revealed NOW!!
Shoulder buttons.
*Stunned silence*
Ok don't all cheer at once.
Yeah these things at the top of pads that are meant to allow us more control and for the most part they do. Well ok thats a bit to positive for a moan. So on to what annoys me about them. Well for the most part there a bit out of the way. I will show you what I believe are the worst ones.

ARGH!!!
Yes the ones on the Intellivision controller. They are hard to press and as the controller its self is a load of crap they don't help matters as they require a lot of force to press the damn things and that makes games like Burger Time bloody hard to play and thats not easy to do with its disc controller.
Skip forward to the SNES ones these where great for F-Zero, but a major annoyance for Street Fighter as there was only four buttons on the front. Ok so some SNES fanboys will be foaming at the mouth at my slating of the SNES pad. ITS TRUE ITS NOT THE BEST!! The damn D-pad is rubbish when put against the Mega Drive one.
Skip forward a bit and we have the N64 with its three shoulder buttons L, R and Z and its god awful placement of them. Ok so there aren't that many games that use every button on the pad (Think THQs Wrestling ones are the only ones), but still its hard to have every button covered. I have come up with a way, but its not easy and not comfortable Id have a picture of this position (easy there) but I have no hands free to take it. Then on to the GameCube that looks like its some kind of kids toy, but at least THE “Z” BUTTON IS IN REACH!!
Skip more time to the Saturns first UK pad What the hell? THESE THINGS ARE LIKE TORTURE ON MY FINGERS!!! Ok so in the early days of the Saturn no games really made a lot of use of them (Panzer Dragoon is probably the one that made the best use out of them in the early days)and Sega sorted it out with the mark 2 pad. Then they went a bit mad with the strangely titled “3d controller” aren't all controllers 3D anyway? Well fans called it “The Fat Controller” these days its called “Sir Topham Hatt” as calling something “Fat” isn't very fucking PC (I really hate those fags they have spoiled TV and are probably the reason why Till death do us part isn't on TV). The shoulder buttons on that where more like triggers of a gun and interestingly there was a code for some games so that they played better with that pad or the Dan Jevons control method as it was known to Sega Saturn Magazine readers. That pad then lost two buttons (why?), got a shitty d-pad (WHY?) and gained a few ports (the pad could be detached from its cable for some reason) and became the Dreamcast controller and the rest became history.......Well it became the Xbox pad and that was bigger than Sir Topham Hatts hats arse and even less fun to use. I mean it had two new buttons called “Black and White” where these some kind of viral advertising for the “Black and white” game that never saw a port on the console?
That was more or less sorted with the “S-controller” that was quite nice to use, but still black and white where out of the way. Then came the strangely titled “Xbox 360” (Note to idiots ITS NOT CALLED JUST XBOX!! If you are that lazy as to abbreviate some thing that is already short call it a 360). That pad is ok. Even if the guy that moved the analogue sticks round is a prick.
During the time of Segas last reign as console makers a little known company released a console who are they? They where Sony and there pad had FOUR SHOULDER BUTTONS!! Because two weren't enough (It also had a crappy D-pad that looked like four arrows pointing to a place where treasure was hidden, but no amount of digging found anything of value) there where not well placed, but as we all know Sony likes to steal ideas and make them there own. The PS2 controller changed them a bit and made them a little easier to press, but still the L1 and R1 ones where a bit outa the way. The PS3 ones are more like triggers still the same pad only the back buttons are now made with First Person Shooters in mind (Maybe thats why theres so many of them).
Well thats the home consoles sorted now for handhelds
This is a new thing as the first one to have them was the GameBoy Advance they where ok I guess then to the SP. Oh dear.
CRAMP IN MY HANDS!!!
Who ever made them that small and that hard to get to needs to be chinned.
Then the Micro haven't had the chance to play on one at length so can't moan about it.
Then the DS FUCK IT!!!
DS lite SAME!!
Dsi SAME AGAIN!
PSP take the same idea as a PS one pad and fuck it up.
Well thats all from me this week next one is burning round in my head (its ok I pored some water in my ear to put it out), but I have been asked “How do I find things to moan about?” So I might end up doing something about that.