The gaming diary

[modest9797]

I played FEAR on my BEAUTIFUL XBOX 360.

[Silent Scythe]

Yesterday I beat the Snowpeak dungeon on Twilight Princess. I hope I can get through the rest of the game by the end of the month.

[phoenix1967]

Spent WAYYYYYY too much time on Sid Meier's Civilization Revolution last night...

[The Metamorphosing Leon]

More MoH: Pacific Assault. Finished Guadalcanal, played the silly but cool flying mission ("oh no marine who's never flown before, your pilot is injured, you should take his place and dogfight and bomb targets while we trained pilots fly in pretty circles!" is pretty much how it goes). Started the Tarawa mission, pretty tough, got frustrated at a point where I couldn't figure out how to proceed without using one of my revives--machine gun turret in an open field. If grenades were to actually go where I aimed, it would be easy...but I just got pissed and switched over to some Star Wars: Republic Commando.

[James]

Today I installed Grim Fandango on my Linux media PC downstairs in the lounge.

It took four bloody hours. I really don't know why I bother with Linux. I didn't even get the game working, it just took that long to install it.


Other games I've been playing: PGR4, GTAIV, Elite Beat Agents.

[logical123]

I played Sim City on the SNES for most of my day, then i played some Top Gear. 

Oh, i also played some Atari games.  Missle command, chopper command, video pinball, and Pitfall II.

Top Gear = awesome

It was my first snes game, and I played the daylight out of it.

[Feechy]

Today I played Earthbound and got to the Magnet Hill sanctuary. Also, I played Mother 3 and got thrown off a mountain in a refrigerator (Yeah seriously). Also, not totally gaming related but tried going to a game store called Retro Game Spot but realized 40 miles is a long way on a bike. And then I went to Gamestop to try to trade in some games but couldn't because I need to be 18 (Because I'll use the money to "shoot up my school or by crack" according to the lady).

[Wempster]

Once again, I have fallen into the pitfall that is Animal Crossing.  Not even the DS version, Im playing the GCN version all over again.  Revisiting old towns, doing old quests, lots of sea fishing.  I can still have lots of fun with this game.

[Feechy]

Right now, playing Mega Man: Dr Wily's revenge, I'm at Dr. Wily's castle. Also trying to find some good video game stores.

[Mr. Ksoft]

I played Halo 3 co-op with a friend of mine who invited me over to do so.
I don't have a 360, I have never really played a console FPS apart from the Metroid Prime games, AND as a young person with good parents I'm not even allowed to pick up games like those, so this was a very new experience for me.

I suck at aiming and I managed to stick myself with my own grenade 5 times. >_<

[James]

I got The Curse of Monkey Island working on the Linux computer downstairs. There's something different about sitting in an armchair playing a PC game on a tv.

Grim Fandango now works but only in a small window. It doesn't work with ScummVM so I couldn't use that to make it full screen.

The Linux PC is getting there.

[logical123]

Linux is awesome. I was running a server from home on the linux distro dubbed DamnSmallLinux(dsl). Worked quite well. What linux distro are you using James?

[James]

Linux is awesome.

No, it isn't. Ubuntu is supposed to be one of the easiest Linux to use but it's been the biggest pain in the arse I've had to drag myself through ever in the history of ever.

I was running a server from home on the linux distro dubbed DamnSmallLinux(dsl). Worked quite well. What linux distro are you using James?

I'm using Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron, recently upgraded from 7.10.

The only reason I'm using it is because it was free and I needed an OS for a rebuild of an old PC I had. I wanted to make a media centre PC in the lounge to stream videos and music from my bedroom computer onto the TV.

What annoys me most is when reading HOWTOs I follow them step by step then find out I haven't got a little component installed, which I need to install the other thing. So I go to install the little component and it says I need to install something else. Then I spent the last few months just trying to install the graphics drivers. I finally managed to do it but because I'm using an SDTV through composite, the picture turned out black and white and a silly resolution. After a lot of agro I finally found out I just needed to add a single line into the xorg.conf file to make it PAL. >_<

It makes me realise how user-friendly XP is.

[Tan]

Linux is awesome.

No, it isn't. Ubuntu is supposed to be one of the easiest Linux to use but it's been the biggest pain in the arse I've had to drag myself through ever in the history of ever.

I was running a server from home on the linux distro dubbed DamnSmallLinux(dsl). Worked quite well. What linux distro are you using James?

I'm using Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron, recently upgraded from 7.10.

The only reason I'm using it is because it was free and I needed an OS for a rebuild of an old PC I had. I wanted to make a media centre PC in the lounge to stream videos and music from my bedroom computer onto the TV.

What annoys me most is when reading HOWTOs I follow them step by step then find out I haven't got a little component installed, which I need to install the other thing. So I go to install the little component and it says I need to install something else. Then I spent the last few months just trying to install the graphics drivers. I finally managed to do it but because I'm using an SDTV through composite, the picture turned out black and white and a silly resolution. After a lot of agro I finally found out I just needed to add a single line into the xorg.conf file to make it PAL. >_<

It makes me realise how user-friendly XP is.

Windows is like the sports car you pay big cash for but have no access to hand's on as far as customization or tuning. Lots of options and features but little in the way of true performance. Linux is like the kit car or bare bones sports model you put together that requires a lot of hard work to master, but that tradeoff is price, performance and total control over customization and tweaking right down to every nut and bolt, or in this case the command line level.

With a distro like Ubuntu, you can extend the life of an older PC or laptop because it doesn't eat system resources like Windows does. It's not meant as a replacement for OSX or Windows, it's like the "soy" or "low fat" alternative that represents a challenge to experienced PC users wanting more control over their desktops or to circumvent the hurdles placed on PCs by hardware/software makers. It's also a place of development and experimentation of new ways of doing things. On a scale of 1-10, Ubuntu's user friendliness compared to other distros is definately a 10, but it doesn't have quite the same level of advanced control others do. Like an entry level version of Linux for those dipping their toes into the DIY pool. As you learn and grow, you move onto one of the other hundreds of distros for more specialized and better equipped distros to tackle your tasks. Gaming isn't a priority for linux and I doubt it ever will. Home networking, education and security with users in control are the main goals the community strives for. Putting computing back in the hands of the end user.

It's also a way for the small fish to develop tools and apps that can compete with the big corporations. To a PC enthusiast, making something difficult run under Linux IS part of the fun and success or failure you've learned something new either way. No different than someone who enjoys building/fixing cars or woodworking for example. The end result is only half the fun, the other half is getting there.

I know that sounds like a lame sales pitch or something but that's really what it's all about. It carries on the fun of computing like it was back in the 80's when every Joe/Jane Schmoe could code his/her own programs, games and a multitude of other fun things. That's why the C64, Amiga and other older platforms still enjoy popularity today. Linux is like an X86 extension of that hobby.

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On another note, I'm having a helluva fun time with Tenchu Z. It's like a Splinter Cell/Tomb Raider clone but with last gen graphics. For a $10 game it's quite enjoyable if simplistic. I'm also playing Dungeon Siege II as well, one of many brand new PC games I've had sitting on the shelf for a long long time.

[phoenix1967]

Offline multiplayer with den68 and friends.

We played 4P Split-screen on FarCry: Predator, The Club, Call of Duty 3 (a bit buggy for some reason so we only played a few maps... ), Stuntman: Ignition, and some Halo 3 (Slayer and Rocketball).