Bought my new(?) toy today; a Game Boy Micro. The device was discontinued in 2008 and was the last Nintendo handheld to use the Game Boy name (The Nintendo DS came out a year prior to this).
I’ve bought this in my sudden urge to play the earlier Pokemon games. While it can’t play original Game Boy games, I’ll be able to use it for the GBA titles Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald and as in the above screenshot, FireRed.
I’m pumped.
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My favourite console game would be this bad boy, taking you (and me) all the way back to 1999.
The best and greatest cart racing game, bar none.
Crash Team Racing was the inevitable racing spin off of the Crash Bandicoot series of platformers. The game plays pretty much the same as another inferior cart racing game for another console which shall remain nameless, but with all Crash Bandicoot themes. The humour is perfect for the game (A childish sort of humour, without being annoy), and the graphics for the time period (Playstation = POLYGONS EVERYWHERE) are nice.
The controls are solid and very intuitive, and everything just felt right. The game came together perfectly, and I still play it now and again, albeit with a Playstation emulator instead of an actual Playstation. Thinking about it, I reckon I’ve completed the game completely (All gems, tokens, trophies) at least three times1.
The game is amazing and talking about it makes me want to run through it all again, which I might actually do.
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When I was a kid, playing the demos contained on magazine discs, or in other games themselves was a thrill I had to have. There was nothing like buying a brand new copy of Playstation Magazine and feasting on the one playable level goodies inside. Hours were spent playing one level of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 with friends, boasting about how we’d accomplished tricks reaching 10,000 points. I remember playing the shareware version of Quake in awe, scared of the scene on the spiral bridge where the lights turn off, but you can still hear the grunts of your concealed enemies. I remember the glee I had when it turned out there was a full demo of Spyro The Dragon 2 concealed on my copy of Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, and played it almost as much as the actual game the disc was marketed as.
I treated demos not only like the trailer for the game it was intended, but as actual games. They provided variety when one couldn’t afford to buy lots of games, and when they weren’t readily available at our fingertips. Over time demo discs have stood the test of time, but I have to admit, lack the appeal that they used to. Nowadays they’re packed with full freeware games, mods for games you may already have, reviews, videos, and even more. Despite this, I’m finding I’ve grown less and less interested. I attribute this partly to the cheapness and availability of games online nowadays (I picked up Left 4 Dead on special for $7.50, and I gifted someone the original Aliens Vs Predators for $5), which means it’s not such a hassle if I buy a game and don’t like it. Demos were meant like movie trailers, in that they are meant to give us a taste of the game, to entice us to buy it by seeing how good it is. With prices being so low when purchased through Steam and the like, I’ve stopped looking at them.
This isn’t to say they don’t have a place in today’s world though. I did buy a copy of one of the many Xbox 360 magazines around, and it came with a demo for Ghostbusters, and Splosion Man. The single level of Ghostbusters was quite stunning, and if it weren’t for the fact that the game is a little expensive, I’d probably own it (the fact it’s single player is a bit of a downer too). Splosion Man looks like an addictive side scroller too, and the only thing stopping me getting that is an Xbox Live account.
What’s your standing in the world of demos? Do you play them still? Do you buy magazines with them still? I’m curious.
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