Still running your 360 in SD?

Might I suggest you pick yourself up one of these?

A 19″ Widescreen monitor, for just over 100 of your English pounds, strikes me as a fantastic bargain. If anyone reading this is running their Xbox 360 on a standard definition set, I’d suggest they seriously think about upgrading.

Me? I’m tempted to get one for the bedroom…and the kitchen…and the bathroom…

E3 Reaction: Console Monogamy?

E3 is now well underway; each of the three key players have finished their press conference events and revealed their new toys. Sony and Nintendo - and Microsoft, to a certain degree - arguably have a lot riding on E3 this year. Both Nintendo and Sony have new systems on the horizon, and Microsoft faces a challenging holiday season in the face of competition from their two rivals. But the average gamer must ask: Where does that leave me?

With the launch of the Xbox 360, I took a long hard look at my gaming habits and made some changes. I've been an avid gamer ever since I can remember, starting out with a Commodore Vic 20, upgrading to Commodore 64, and then onto an Amiga (with one megabyte memory upgrade, no less). I've owned a SNES, a Megadrive (or Genesis, if you prefer), the ill-fated MegaCD, the even more ill-fated Atari Jaguar and more. I've been playing games long enough to have played  a little game called Karateka, and remember being awestruck by a demo of Jordan Mechner's exciting new game "Prince of Persia" at a gaming conference in London.  I still own a Dreamcast, I've tried and discarded the PSP, DS, and other handheld systems. My insatiable hunger for every gaming system on the face of the planet knew no bounds. Until now. It seems my insatiable hunger is somewhat satiated.

In the past, the prospect of only owning one system seemed ludicrous. There have always been games which are only available on one system, classic titles like Ico that allow you to easily justify ownership of a system. In order to be able to play every single one of these titles, it's necessary to own every system. But these days I find myself with less and less time to play games. Perhaps that's not strictly true; A more accurate description might be that I find myself less inclined to spend what little free time I do have playing games. Some might say I've finally "grown up", but I've never considered gaming to be a childish interest so I wouldn't subscribe to that. Unless by "grown up" they mean "got a job, had a child, and bought my own home". 

Backwards compatible eh?

I noticed that Microsoft have released a new update for the backwards compatibility functionality on the Xbox 360. Despite the fact that one game I'd like to play wasn't mentioned in the update notes (Manhunt) I gave it another go.

Previously, Manhunt wouldn't run, and would report an error along the lines of "this game isn't compatible with your current resolution".  Having applied the latest update, the error is "your VGA cable doesn't support the PAL-50 mode that this game requires. Use a different cable". Thanks Microsoft, are you going to buy me a screen that supports that different cable too?

So Microsoft appear to be admitting that the VGA cable and PAL 50 games won't work in backwards compatibility mode. Which, in my book, is a poor show. 

Dead Rising Screenshot

I was just flicking through the screenshots of Dead Rising on C+VG and was quietly entertained by them (the clown with twin chainsaws looks interesting). This particular one is a thing of wonder though:

Dead Rising

Dead Rising is a funny thing. The more I see of it, the more I look forward to it. And yet the more I see of it, the more I fear it might be crap.

I'll be buying it regardless. Even if I this video is the last one I see of it, I'll be buying it. Why? Here's a brief list of highlights from that video:

• Hordes of Romero-style zombies
• Zombie + Shower pushed through head = blood shower!
• Hordes of zombies with cones/dustbins/etc on their heads
• Braindead style splatter on the main character
• Shaun of the Dead style plate throwing (record throwing too? I hope so)

There are several other cool things in the video too. I highly recommend you download it and see for yourself.

DOA4

My verdict on DOA4: Single player: Bobbins. In order to beat the final boss, I simply removed my left hand from the d-pad and spammed kick. More advanced tactics didn't work. Online play: Bobbins. In order to cope with lag, someone had the bright idea of making the game run at 1/2 speed. Or 1/4 speed. Or slower. This, essentially, makes playing DOA4 online a complete waste of time. I've yet to have an online match run at full speed. Graphics: Lovely. Yes, it moves well, and it looks lovely on an HD set. But… Clipping: Bobbins. There's a terrible amount of clipping. The "realistic" hair does some very odd things at times, and the characters glitch into each other quite a lot. This destroys any illusion of graphical goodness. Overall verdict: Terrible. Good graphics (and bounce) do not a good game make. Quite how this became the best selling game in the UK, I don't know.