groze

I still have all my GCN games. Never sold any, and the ones I had lent have already been returned. I have 24, 25 games, I could list them if I tried, but I'm way too tired for that.

Here's a picture of my cat, Romeu, just lying around (never mind the quality, the photo was taken with a very lame phone camera): I'll try to post some pictures of my guinea pig (Damião) and my dog (Pituxa).

Yes, it is, and it was my very first attempt to find the goddamn music, but the most recent Martini ad listed there dates back to 1999...

Shino, I think that ad is exclusively portuguese, as RFM is a national radio... unless there's an international release of the advertisement, in which case it's possible for non-portuguese members to identify the music... And how about Martini's "El Toro", still no available answers? (^o^)

We used to have Lucky Charms here in Portugal when I was just a little kid... man, I miss those, they were the BEST! Why did our breakfast cereal distributors ceased sales, I will never know... and now we're stuck with Corn Flakes, Chocapic, Nesquick, Cheerios and a few more... I want my Lucky Charms back... Oh, and there was another brand, Crépitas, which absolutely OWNED all the other cereals' faces. Truly. Don't know if you have them over the UK, though...

Since I'm way too lazy to search among the vast multitude of result pages google gives me, on the subject, I though I'd better start a thread in here, we might as well help each other... Having recently found out who the artist playing the song in the latest Levi's tv ad is - it took me quite some browsing skills in order to discover that, by the way, so you can see how much of a lazy person I truly am -, I'm now trying to know what song, performed by which artist, is that on the 2007 Martini commercial ("El Toro", the one with George Clooney playing this 20s, 30s movie playboy, and Leonor Varela castrating an ice sculpted bull ). If anyone knows the answer, I'd sure appreciate if you told me. This song is quite hard to find, since the commercial is an european exclusive, and most forums regarding commercial music are northern-american. As northern-americans don't actually care with what goes on outside their country/specific state, it's difficult to ask them, as they all just go "huh?!" immediatly. Though I'm looking specifically to an answer, this thread serves the purpose of any other member with a question on the matter (commercial songs/music) having their doubts cleared, so, ask away.

The guy that uploaded what I call a practical video guide on How to Quit WoW just praised my comment on the video... LOL! Check it here. He makes it look like I'm stepping forward, or something, assuming some kind of disease or condition, though... (-_-) Still, it's good to know we're not the only ones seeing things this way...

Hungary (orange):

Spain (does it even count? It's right here, almost next door) UK (only England and Scotland - an aunt lives near London, we visit her almost every summer; my second-year uni english teacher, being Scottish, urged us to make a trip to his country, so I joined with a few friends and randomly wandered Scotland) Egypt (Cairo; Alexandria; Luxor; Assuan; some primitive imperfect pyramids in some place called Sakkara, or something like that...; the Mount Sinai - when going with overly religious people that insisted we went there; a cruise along the Nile) Israel (I have WAY TOO catholic parents that took me there when I was 13) Greece (mostly Athens, though we sailed a few islands) Azores & Madeira (a cousin lives in Madeira; visited the Azores when I was really small, I don't remember much of it) Turkey (once again, doing religious travels with my parents, we failed to see most of the touristic spots, while travelling to those more religion-related) Germany (Berlin, visiting an ex-girlfriend... LOL) Italy (well... as in Germany, visiting a napolitan ex-girlfriend I met through Erasmus student exchanges (>*o*( O.o) )

I also have a beard, and I'm also portuguese, but I bow before the sheer magnificence that is Beardy Man. No copying intended, do realize that - I have grown a beard for some years, now. So, here: One with glasses (please enjoy the decorator's admirable taste) One without them

3/5 Average. I personally like Lloyd (more as a character than the artwork for him), and the effects added are cool, and all, but there sure are better avatars out there. EDIT: In a rating of 1 to 10, I would give it 7, I guess... 6, probably.

I couldn't agree more, somme. Exactly one of my points.

Same guess here. But, no, I didn't make any of those, as well. No new online friends. And I highly doubt that any of those guys made online friends on wow, as they seem to only be interested in aimless competition and random creature/player slaying.

No new ones, Hem, just lost the already mentioned one and a few others I didn't talk about, as the text is quite big as it is and I didn't felt like adding to it.

I see myself as a videogame enthusiast, though more on the nostalgia, retro kind of thing, and I actually had a videogame-addiction problem that made me undergo therapy in order to overcome it. I kid you not, it was that serious. Considering myself that, I have no problem talking to anyone about videogames and all related subjects. The problem is that a while ago, the guy whom I've always taken into account as being my best friend started playing WoW. At first it was ok, we went out to the same bars for as long as the same time we always used to, but soon things got a little different. He just wouldn't talk about anything but WoW, using MMORPG specific language all the time, even when relating to real-life matters - this, in english, has none to little impact, as all language used in-game is obviously the same as natives use to communicate amongst each others, but, in portuguese, believe me, it's just lame, particularly when people don't know how to pronounce words in english, and just say them as if they were written in english but read in portuguese. Most of the people we used to go out with started avoiding him, and it eventually ended up being just the two of us out in a bar, while I listened to his continuous praising of the seemingly astonishing wonders in WoW. Things got even worse when he started to go home earlier than usual, and when I got home there he was, Busy, on Messenger, playing WoW. We eventually stopped seeing each other a few weeks ago, as he started going out with his cousins - the ones that introduced him into the game - instead, since they are the only ones that endure an all-night-long conversation on the subject, and now spends his entire time playing the damn game. He doesn't study, doesn't work, he barely sleeps. I'm worried about him, he's my friend and I do care about what happens to him; I tried talking to him, but he refuses to listen... So, yes, I loath WoW for taking my friend's life and turning him into something other than himself. Moderation is key, but is it that easy to accomplish moderation with games that demand you dedicate a great deal of your life to them?

Sorry for the humongous apparently WALLOFTEXT-effect text... I seem to have the same problem when writing in portuguese (though when writing in portuguese, especially when it's about writing essays that teachers and researchers in university need us to do, that's actually required). If you're just not in the mood to browse all through it in order to find out my opinion, it can be summed up like this: "TP=WW" Hardly a sentence, but there's obviously no WALLOFTEXT effect in there, now, is it?

Hurray for Libra people! LIBRA KICKS MAJOR ARSE!!!

I think the only rare GCN game I own must be Ikaruga... it has been said that Geist and Killer7 are rare, too, well, I own those too... and The Legend of Zelda: Collector's Edition (far from being an actual truly collector's edition, as a matter of fact). Oh, and Capcom vs. SNK 2 EO. Of the previous, I would only consider Capcom vs. SNK2 and Ikaruga to be rare. Two games I don't have but wouldn't mind owning at all, and that I reckon are pretty hard to find are I-Ninja and Sphynx and The Cursed Mummy. Furthermore, being portuguese, I would add that, as far as I'm concerned, every single GCN game is rare and otherwise impossible to find out here. If it wasn't for amazon.co.uk, I wouldn't have as near half the GCN titles I do - which, by the way, are not that many.

Now that I got to see more than artwork for this game, it is actually getting to be one of those games making me willing to buy a Wii, along with No More Heroes, Soul Calibur Legends and Super Mario Galaxy.

I don't know why, I'm not a big fan of Naruto, but I really wanted to play Naruto: Clash of Ninja European Version. It seems like a solid enough beat-em-up fighting game. Maybe I'll buy it someday, it seems to be Wii-mote compatible (right?), so maybe I'll play it when I have enough time and money to buy a Wii (I'm still waiting for Metroid Prime 3, No More Heroes and Super Mario Galaxy to come out, they're the only titles enticing for me to even consider buying the damn thing... so far all the other games look like gimmicky ports). EDIT: It's absurd how I totally forgot about the brilliant Beyond Good & Evil... of course that's one game I would love to play on the Cube. I never played Chibi Robo, that seems to be one of the favourites around here, but, then again, I don't even come close to regretting it. Just not my kind of game.

Dynastagal, I wouldn't have recommended Paper Mario 2 if it wasn't an RPG. It is an RPG, not a platformer (like Super Mario Sunshine, Mario 64, or any other Super Mario platformer, for that matter). The Paper Mario series are a series of RPGs in the line of Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars (I don't know if you're familiar with it, so just go check it on Wikipedia, or something like that), and are not, I repeat, are not platformers.

Hmmm... hard choice... I think I would go with 1. The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker/ Twilight Princess ex aequo; 2. Killer7 3. Resident Evil 4/REmake/Zero ex aequo It seems quite unfair, now that I look at it, especially when bearing in mind all the amount of ex aequos I had until I narrowed it down to "just" these six titles. Deal with it. My opinion is no "Universal Truth", I'm absolutely aware of that.

Try Baten Kaitos (though I'm not a fan of it myself, RPG and J-RPG fans usually praise it), Skies of Arcadia Legends (Dreamcast exclusive port with added extras) or Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (not quite a "pure" RPG, but some think of it as a strategy-RPG for some reason). And there's always the brilliant Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door, despite being fairly rare and, therefore, not that cheap. Well, I guess none of the above are all that cheap, mostly due to the fact that some stores, including online ones, take advantage of the fact that the Wii is GCN compatible and are trying to sell GCN games as if they are Wii ones and, as so, are selling them at almost their launch retail price. Still, you're sure to find places in which you might get them for their lowest value. These are all the GCN RPGs I can think about, ToS aside...

Sticking strictly to the point being discussed (WW vs TP), I would have to say it's a very hard choice, as both games made quite a bit of an impression on me when I started playing them, but soon that hype faded. Wind Waker feels fresh enough, with the toon-shading, and all. I don't agree with all the people saying it lacks the feeling or "soul" of the Zelda series, I mean, I play Zelda since I was 5, maybe 4, and I'm now 24, my first Zelda experience ever being - that's right - The Legend of Zelda (8-bit), I never had a problem picturing Zelda with cel-shaded graphics (before even knowing what cel-shading was); while OoT pictured Link and Hyrule with "realistic" graphics, that's not as real as it seems, as there are parts in the game in which there seems to be a rudimentary engine aiming at toon-shading already; well, back to the Wind Waker, it featured better gameplay than previous generation 3D Zeldas, top notch animation (particularly facial animation), huge (though mostly lifeless and deserted) overworld, cool items with an astonishing boomerang upgrade, rather good collection of sidequests and an actually nice story with an intriguing twist, but when it comes to how Nintendo chose to tell that story, the game gets notoriously and extremely flawed; as have been said before, the Triforce-"fishing" quest is dull and tedious enough for the game to lose points. Don't get me wrong, I played the game and loved it all the way, but that part could have seriously been improved; I mean, mini 5 minute-or-so dungeons for one, maybe two shards would have covered that situation quite well, IMO. On to TP. I had TP pre-ordered for about two years before it actually came out, so, yeah, I was expecting a lot more. Graphically speaking, since I only own the GCN version, there's nothing more I could ask for; the game controls are even better than those seen in WW (though the camera only has two levels of zoom, the third being first-person perspective, while in Wind Waker you had a full "zoomable" camera), I actually liked how they made defending automatic, à lá Zelda 2D, swinging the sword while running/walking is a nice addition as well. The game looks artistic and graphically polished, with bloom lighting all over the place covering the overworld and towns. The general overworld enemies give you enough challenge, compared to previous Zelda 3D games, the story is good (not as good as Wind Waker, though), and told brilliantly, through well placed and orchestrated cinematics that help you get more into the game. There are more dungeons than those in WW, but Nintendo's statement of TP being the Zelda with more dungeons to date falls short of its promise, though they managed to have that "Ocarina" dungeon feeling fans have been complaining 3D Zeldas had lost. Link's wolf abilities and the adding of Midna are both rejuvenating factors as well. But the game soon stops impressing. Sure, the world is huge, plus the fact there are two dimensions to it (A Link to the Past, anyone?), but when you gallop throughout it, it doesn't seem all that big, at least not as big as it was first announced, with Nintendo saying that it would be virtually impossible to traverse the entire overworld simply by foot. Well, though boring and slow, it is, indeed, quite possible, I did it more than once. But that's not even where the real problems begin. I honestly don't know what kind of games have the guys at IGN been playing, when thay say TP has left them banging their heads against the walls with the sheer difficulty of its puzzles... difficult puzzles? Then, may we assume the people at IGN never completed Majora's Mask? TP is too fluid for its own good. Fluidity is a good thing, but we never get to wonder "OK, now what?", as the game is so tediously self-explanatory, giving not much space to the Zelda-familiar world exploration. Then, there's that crappy fortune-teller, revealing all the locations of the pieces of heart... sure, now you need to collect five, making gaining a new heart container supposedly harder, but then they went and placed that fat lady as one of the five or six NPCs you can actually interact with throughout the whole game, making her taking you out the whole fun of finding the pieces of heart for yourself. Sure, you can just ignore her, but, then again, since she's there, why not use her "services"? And, once you saw one or two heart piece locations, believe me, any other time around you play this game you'll remember exactly where they are with a little remorse for not having been you the one to find them all by yourself (does this sentence make any sense at all? Sorry for the somewhat lousy, confusing English...). TP also has some of the worse items in the Zelda history. I mean... that giant-top/spinner-thing... it sure looks cool, but it's useless, nonetheless... it also introduces you to the arguably ultimate useless item in Zelda gemes ever, the Dominion Rod. yeah, nice concept and all, but, for crying out loud, didn't they cover that WAY better in the Wind Waker with the command melody, thus avoiding creating an object whose sole purpose is to control inanimate objects? I, for one, think so... and, unlike other previous Zeldas, there's not much incentive in using the items outside their proper dungeons. Furthermore, I really have to say they ruined the best boomerang ever in Zelda games, the one in Wind Waker, when they turned it into that crappy wind-fairy-charged one used in TP, that looked quite cool in game trailers, but it's actually a big disappointment in-game... I mean... does it even actually stun enemies? Still, the game's bigger and deeper issue is the fact the bosses are the easiest bosses I've encountered in a Zelda game... plus the fact they already ruined the excitement of discovering some of the bosses' weaknesses, by releasing game demo videos in which the actual boss battle was shown... at least they could have endowed the bosses with more stamina and AI. Now... between WW and TP... I think they rank the same, for me. They both were games I really loved and enjoyed playing, stunned me in the most positive of ways, but also let me down on a few other issues. So I guess they're at exactly the same level, as far as I'm concerned. A Zelda game able to overachieve and surpass A Link to the Past is still to be released. The best Zelda ever. Period. And, while I'm at it, here's my Zelda series "ranking": ALttp>TLoZ>OoT>WW=TP>MC>LA/LADX>FSA>MM>TAoL>OoA=OoS (I never played Four Swords on the Game Boy Advance, or Phantom Hourglass on the DS, so those two games are not included). Please, don't get me wrong, I see myself as a Zelda fan, and I love every and single Zelda game made to this day (well... the official ones, excluding the absurdely bad ones released for the Philips CD-i, but that's obvious, isn't it?), and the last thing I want is to start any kind of discussion just because my personal opinion on somehting as subjective as one's preferences in a video game series. So... if you disagree, be free to reply, just try to do it in a positive way, and don't expect me to fuel any unnecessary argument. Once again, sorry for the long boring post and for the crappy English.

I own this game and though I'm quite happy with it (I'm not getting any younger, and it's really hard to find any worthwhile games out there, reminding me of the games as I used to know them, back in the day), Ikaruga sure is a polished, old-fashioned shooter, but, as people have already stated in here, it's hard. Very hard. I'm still to see the boss of the third level for myself, and I own this game for two years, now... Still, multiplayer is as fun as it gets with these kind of games.