S.C.G

Ordered! I love how quickly they send the e-mails out to let you know when something has gone up on the store. I'd advise anyone who wants the limited edition to pre-order quickly if the stock levels are anything like as low as Project Zero was... Probably not but you never know. : peace:

Battalion Wars 3? :p

It's not too much of a blow for me personally, I'll have Xenoblade Chronicles X to play in addition to finishing Xenoblade Chronicles before that - halfway done - then there's the new Project Zero for Wii U and even before that I've still got Project Zero 2 to play - recently acquired - plus I'm sure that Super Mario Maker has plenty of mileage left as I've barely touched the creation side and already lost countless hours - and lives - to other peoples courses. This is before even considering other non-Nintendo platforms of which I'm also invested in... I'm good until early 2016 at least! : peace: However I do get what you're saying about Nintendo games at Christmas, for me I still have fond memories of the Christmas in the late-nineties when we had an N64 with Goldeneye! Ahhh memories.

I was hoping for 3.2" Floppy Disk drive personally, complete with an Amstrad 6128+ emulator added to the Virtual Console complete with the ability to play games from the original physical media. But alas, it will never happen. In all seriousness though I would love to see some Amstrad games come to the VC even though licensing would be a nightmare.

Hmm let's see... While I don't like the idea of New Years Resolutions I suppose there's a few things I'll be working towards this year... I suppose I've been doing things for myself more which has helped in some small way. Driving... not so much, the more I see of people driving like idiots on the road and the thought of the astronomic costs, - the negative effect on the environment to an extent as well - the less I want to drive any more and I'm honestly fine with that for now. I definitely feel as if I've been more helpful, at home it's all those small things which are now just part of my routine, on the site I have tried to be more active - still catching up with my reviews though - and will continue with this, I've definitely been more helpful at work plus I've also been helping my brother recently in his pursuit of making a short film which is an on-going project I'm enjoying being a part of. : peace: As for games and films... I have at least finished a few games, of course not as many as I'd have liked but it's a difficult balancing act, I've definitely watched a few decent films this year though again largely thanks to my younger brother who is very much as into films as I'm into games; I'm definitely aiming to finish at least a handful of games before the year is out in addition to a good few films plus a load of comedy box-sets of that Mitchell and Webb look plus the Mighty Boosh that I'm watching regularly. So I feel fine with how this year has gone so far, as for additional goals if I can get a second part-time job and have a decent clear-out of games which I no longer want - not all my games obviously but I have a ridiculous amount of PS2 games, seriously... PM me if there's a PS2 title you're after - then I'll be pretty happy. With regard to perhaps setting a target for getting into a relationship, I don't see the point in setting a goal for that, if anything happens then great but if not then that's fine also, I've got more than enough to keep me occupied well into 2016 in any case just with trying to sort my life out a bit. Anyway N-E, we shall see!

I happened to click on the spoiler box and I'm only halfway through Xenoblade Chronicles but interestingly it has been so long since playing it that I don't really feel it's a spoiler for me - just so long as nobody explains it to me - but it's actually spurred me on to want to finish the game so this afternoon I have copied across my original Xenoblade Chronicles file from my Wii which I will copy across to my Wii U just as soon as I have installed the digital version which I'm downloading now. : peace: It's funny how these things work out. Oh yeah and Projext X Zone 2 looks... reasonable, I don't know if I'll pick it up when it first comes out though, I never finished the first; do you think it will come with a poster again? That's honestly a deal-breaker for me.

Well I've at least spent a few hours playing Star Fox Assault and looking at it now I'd have to say that on reflection it is a good game but some parts are still painful just as I remember them to be, obviously the Arwing sections are great but the on-foot areas just kill it for me sometimes; it's not the controls as they are fine but the fact that there seem to be so many enemies and the gameplay revolves around "destroy X amount of things" then you make so much progress, having say two things left to destroy but you're at low health and then if you end up losing all your health at that point then you have to start from the beginning which just isn't fun. Looking at my original file I can see why I ended up not opting to go for every single medal because as much as I would have loved to have unlocked the original Xevious - thanks Namco! - at the time for gaining all the silver medals - on some missions I had gold, some silver with a few bronze - it just doesn't seem worth it, certainly not for gold at least although it's nice to have something the aim for. All of the boss battles seem to be pretty decent though even if the Apariod enemies don't seem as well designed as the original forces of Andross you fight in the other games, in fact because they are more bug-like the on-foot sections remind me more of Jet Force Gemini or the EDF series. A lot of the dialogue is missing that spark too for me, the intro sequence is nice, as are the mission briefing parts but when you're in the missions many of the repeated sections of dialogue start to wear thin, especially when they are reaffirming objectives "Use a charged shot!" ... I know Peppy, but thanks anyway! There are some stages which feel more spectacular towards the end but just not quite as many great moments as I seem to be able to recall from Star Fox 64 which had plenty, based on its own merits it is a decent game which has some very decent visuals for its time and I was pleasantly surprised to hear that the sound is even better than I remember it because the last time I played through it I didn't have the surround setup I have now which I only bought a few years after the game came out. Namco alongside Nintendo definitely did the best they could at the time, while the on-foot sections do certainly add something I still feel that they take away part of the charm as well even if they were reasonably well-handled, plus let's not forget the multiplayer mode which definitely felt a step ahead of anything we'd seen before in the series. So in summary I retract my earlier comment of Star Fox Assault being awful as it does seem my memory has betrayed me slightly, it's a solid game with decent levels of presentation which just lacks charm in places where it was more present in earlier iterations; Star Fox 64 still has the best Barrel-Rolls though. And I still don't like Command that much, always felt like a game built on technical limitations... I have really high hopes for Star Fox Zero though, I'm really hoping it can recapture that earlier Star Fox feel combined with newer stage elements which hopefully will feel good to play without feeling shoe-horned in while retaining most of that trademark Arwing action which we all love. : peace:

OK, I'm at least going to give Star Fox Assault a fair trial, it has been a long time since I last played it after all, anyway earlier I dug out my Gamecube before going to work along with my copy of the game... I shall start playing it later and give my more informed verdict once I finish it this weekend. : peace:

I've only uploaded one course, feel free to use it if you like but it's rather basic.

But it's all so mysterious... hard to know just what to make of it really.

Lack of face buttons? Scrollable shoulder buttons? Flat form factor while presumably being small enough to fit in your pocket? Sounds like it could be a "Nintenphone" to me.

They were still padding though ultimately, I can remember some of the later on-foot sections being rather painful, I just pushed my way through everything the game threw at me when it originally came out. Perhaps I need to replay it, I don't know... it's not plain awful just within the context of the series it doesn't feel as good as some of the earlier titles, in comparison to some games released today it's still pretty decent. I think the first games probably spoiled us too much as they were just fantastic, as I said I still enjoyed Assault more than Adventures or Command because the former was a re-skinned game while the latter just doesn't make a lot of sense at all. Star Fox Assault makes sense on the whole though but I can just remember at times playing the on-foot sections thinking "what am I doing down here?" always feeling that I should be in a vehicle. Perhaps I'll replay it soon, my view might be different again but this is just from my memory of playing it probably around ten years ago - or however long it has been - so we shall see, I might even end up preferring Assault over Zero but for now the new game looks more tempting to me which is probably how I felt about Assault before it came out as well. We shall see. : peace: One thing is for sure though, Star Fox has definitely been a lesser utilised franchise, it deserves to be so much more, I hope that at least is something we can all agree on.

I'm not saying that I didn't enjoy it, in terms of enjoyment I'd probably rate the games accordingly... Star Fox 64 Star Wing Star Fox Assault Star Fox Adventures Star Fox Command At its time of release I enjoyed playing through it, but looking back it's just not as good as Star Fox 64 or the first game, something about the level design just feels off at times plus while the on-foot sections were certainly different I can recall them lasting a lot longer than they perhaps should have. I can at least recall three really solid stages at the beginning, middle and the end which were particularly enjoyable, they were all airborne as well. It seems that with Star Fox when it comes to trying out different methods of play, it's hard to strike a balance; Star Fox Assault should be commended for trying things which were different but I feel it's important to note which ideas just didn't work that well. Of course the same applies with Star Fox Zero but I think we still need to see more, especially what with the delay before it becomes apparent if this is going to turn out to be a return to form for the series; it could go either way but I like a fair amount of what I've seen so far even if it clearly needs balancing out in a few areas plus possibly even an adjustment to the art style which seems to be missing something at the moment though I'm not sure what. Time will tell but Star Fox as a series on the whole has always had a rather turbulent history, let's hope it can Barrel Roll through it.

Assault is awful, aside from a couple of levels. Command feels like half a game with awful controls, I know you can adapt to them but there's nothing quite like piloting an Arwing with at least partially traditional controls. Also some of those endings... I hope most of them aren't considered as being canon. On the other side of things, I'm genuinely excited for Star Fox Zero and news of this delay just means that the game will now hopefully get a chance to realise its full potential.

I don't know if I'll be on tonight but I do love the timing of this, either it's clever scheduling by Rockstar or the BBC but there is a programme on about the story of GTA at 9PM tonight which I was planning on watching so I'll almost certainly be interested in playing GTA V again soon thanks to the programme. Also I must say that these new online modes look like a huge amount of fun, especially Hunt the Beast which sounds hilarious.

Nope, my box appears to be unblemished. It makes sense logically though as there were probably an initial batch of boxes which had slight printing defects so I'm guessing Nintendo probably thought that it would be best to use those ones as give-aways. Unless you bought that one and got it signed? Either way if it wasn't rare enough with the signature of Charles Martinet then that printing defect probably makes it rarer still.

Best thing to do is load the game up, if you don't get an update - you should do as it's launch day now - then go along with the tutorial - only takes a few mins then once it lets you save the tutorial just exit to the Wii menu, load the game up again and you'll have the very brief day 1 update which after installing you'll then be able to play online to your hearts content! : peace: All in all... maybe fifteen minutes? Less if you rush the tutorial but it's all so charmingly put together that you probably won't mind messing about with the blocks for a few minutes, I certainly didn't mind, I even went as far as to make my first level before touching the online but if you just want to skip straight to playing other peoples levels then that's cool too; there are some good ones up there already despite the multitude of not so great levels. Do post your level ID in the thread if you get around to making one though, I'm looking forward to hopefully playing some N-E levels later tonight!

It's-a-Test! 1ED6-0000-0012-335D A really simple course but I'm happy with it.

Thanks to a last lot of unlikely codes including Wii Sports, Wii Fit and other codes without expiry dates, two purchased from eBay and the last one thanks to my brother who gave me his Pokémon White Version 2 code which gave me more than the last 50 points I needed; I have now ordered the final soundtrack which is also the very last one I needed for my collection as well. I can't wait to receive it, copies of it are pre-selling on eBay for £30 - £40 or more so I'm glad that I didn't have to buy one, also glad that I'm not too fussed about the Goodbye coin either, it's nice but not £100 nice.

Check your tracking info, mine says it has just arrived at Truro so surely your copy will be on the same delivery? Assuming it'll be delivered today.

That is a good point which I hadn't even considered but still, it's such an unrealistic scenario, I get that's the whole point of these promotional concept videos but it still doesn't make it any less amusing. :p S.C.G used Sunny Day! ... It's not very effective.

Nice enough if you already have a smart-phone, but it's not something I'd be buying one specifically for, then again it doesn't seem to be aimed at me in that case. I'm with @Glen\-i on this one... The trailer was clearly ridiculous, especially how you had people on the trailer who don't look like they'd ever consider playing a Pokémon game in their life and now suddenly are all "Hey! Let's all hook up and play Pokémon because it's on phones and is suddenly the coolest thing ever!" Yeah... not buying it at all. I've always liked Pokémon but seeing something that unrealistic in the trailer is just laughable even if it is a commendable "dream" of sorts. Those Gen 1 Pokémon though. :awesome: So yes, it's a nice concept, probably not for me but it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

Ridiculous and unacceptable behaviour from GAME right there, error or no error! You don't have to pay those bank charges, it's not your fault so I would urge you to talk to them if you haven't done so already as it will be mitigating circumstances. I'd like to think they'd be sending you the game for Friday after all that and for free as well! Though what is more likely is an apology from them plus a £5 gift card which is basically worth more like £2 due to their inflated prices... Personally I haven't used GAME for a long time, at least not for any pre-orders, only ever gone into the store less than a handful of times in the past decade never mind ordering online with them. I still use ShopTo for most of my gaming pre-orders - despite their now crap site, the service is still decent - but now for Nintendo stuff it tends to be the Nintendo Store UK all the way because somehow despite them being "run" by Zavvi, they get it right every time. But I know how it is though, one exclusive pre-order bonus is tempting which persuades you to place an order with the dark side of retail game sales, it's better to use the force though, for better or worse. : peace: [/cliche references] TL,DR - GAME = bad, Nintendo Store = excellent.

I know GAME can be more than a little bit over the RRP but how in hell did Super Mario Maker end up costing you £300 from them? Unless you went for the Wii U console bundle, is that actually the price of it?

Now I feel bad for being responsible for ending "GroudonGate" and the running joke that went with it... well only a little bad, as you have your own figurine now so it all balances out. I'll promise to make up for it by referencing your game-sharing antics more often, hows that? : peace: Also on that note, do you think that when you're over at DCubed's or vice-versa that you'll end up "back-seat designing" on Super Mario Maker? I can imagine that being rather fun. Oh and yeah... how about that Runbow game? Looks pretty decent... I might *buy it. (phew! I think my desperate attempt to get back on-topic worked!) *I know full well I'll be waiting for a sale price, but still... good intentions.