The Thread of Gaming Randomness

[Sirgin]

Fun video from ScrewAttack:
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/46682.html

And another one:
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/46851.html

And another one:
http://www.gametrailers.com/player/46952.html

You really got to see the last one, the ending is hilarious.

[froggin ashbowl]

i dont know if anyone's touched on this recently but has any other company besides Nintendo have a "seal of quality" or anything like that? seriously, when i buy a new game i am now asked if i'd like to pay an extra dollar for "gameguard". i suspect either (store) greed tactics or a falling out between retail outlets and manufacturers. when i decline the gameguard, i get an attitude from the sales guy/chick and i find myself arguing about the concept of customer service and such and that 60$ plus tax of enough of my money. it may not seem like alot of money but a dollar is a dollar and why should one pay for something that was granted only 10-15 years earlier? apparently many people paid anyways

[Tan]

i dont know if anyone's touched on this recently but has any other company besides Nintendo have a "seal of quality" or anything like that? seriously, when i buy a new game i am now asked if i'd like to pay an extra dollar for "gameguard". i suspect either (store) greed tactics or a falling out between retail outlets and manufacturers. when i decline the gameguard, i get an attitude from the sales guy/chick and i find myself arguing about the concept of customer service and such and that 60$ plus tax of enough of my money. it may not seem like alot of money but a dollar is a dollar and why should one pay for something that was granted only 10-15 years earlier? apparently many people paid anyways

While the Nintendo Seal of Quality is a standard by which they guarantee the software is compatible with your Nintendo hardware, it has no bearing on software quality or factory defects. All it means is that a game with that seal is guaranteed able to be played in the hardware it's advertised for.

Gameguard is a warranty in which they'll replace your copy should something happen to it physically, similar to a hardware warranty you'd buy for anything else. Whether it's a good deal or not depends on how you treat your discs, who uses them and the condition in which you bought it in the first place.

[froggin ashbowl]

While the Nintendo Seal of Quality is a standard by which they guarantee the software is compatible with your Nintendo hardware, it has no bearing on software quality or factory defects. All it means is that a game with that seal is guaranteed able to be played in the hardware it's advertised for.

Gameguard is a warranty in which they'll replace your copy should something happen to it physically, similar to a hardware warranty you'd buy for anything else. Whether it's a good deal or not depends on how you treat your discs, who uses them and the condition in which you bought it in the first place.

well it was to my understanding at the time the nintendo seal was to ensure not only would it play on said system but that also it was a game coded into a complete and competent game. take atari's E.T. for example- it was a slop job. it barely met the criteria to even be called a game. i played it many times when i was young and still doubt that it could be "completed". i'd get trapped in that pit and have to reset but i guess maybe the "seal" was nothing more than a marketing buzzword and eye catcher; something to reassure players that nintendo games had more integrity than the "other" games i guess.

your explaination for the game guard sounds better than what i was told by GameCrazy employees. i was informed that if you bought your brand spanking new game, opened it and found it cracked, scratched, or even if the condition was perfect but failed to work on your system, THEN you could return it for immediate replacement. otherwise, without the gameguard, you'd have to send the disc to the manufacturer. i never got any impression that it covered defects based on how one treated their disc.
remember when people got their halo 3 limited edition copies? a good deal of the discs came off the spindle during shipment thus receiving scratches. i just think it's shady and parasitic to lay the outcome of good customer service based on whether or not one paid the buck or not.

[Izret101]

90% of all warranties are bullshit.
Gamegaurd is a waste because when i was working at gamecrazy if there was some problem with the game itself we replaced them on the spot(i never had to do it myself so the problem was rare if it happened at all).

As for Nintendos seal of quality actually look at it.
It was reduced to just being a seal YEARS ago.

[Cobra]

I use to always assumed the Nintendo & Sega seals of quality referred to the quality of the game itself and it meant they guaranteed a good game.

[Sirgin]

I use to always assumed the Nintendo & Sega seals of quality referred to the quality of the game itself and it meant they guaranteed a good game.

Everyone knows that's just not true. There are horrible games with those seals, too.

[Izret101]

The Tapwave Zodiac makes an appearance in Stargate SG-1 episode "The Quest (Part 1)".

Added this to hardware trivia.

We were watching TV sorta talking and i saw it and just said Tapwave Zodiac!
To make sure i was right i looked up a picture of it online and i was i totally rock.

[froggin ashbowl]

Here's a random videogame related thought-
I think it's so damn sad how i get parents who walk into the pawn shop i work at and get a loan on their children's system and games.
I know of one mother who makes good money working prison security yet, comes in once a week to to either pawn or pick up her son's 120 GB 360. Poor guy doesn't have much of a chance to fill that HD in the slightest.

[Sirgin]

I know of one mother who makes good money working prison security yet, comes in once a week to to either pawn or pick up her son's 120 GB 360. Poor guy doesn't have much of a chance to fill that HD in the slightest.

That's sad. If she makes good money, why would she need to pawn something all the time?

[Izret101]

Blows the money on something else knowing she can always loan out that 360 for cash.

[froggin ashbowl]

It's really sad. At least that lady was able to pick up on the 360 loan while others let their children's systems stay in for 2-3 months before redemption.
Sometimes I question the morality of the nature of the business I work in; although, come to think of it, I get paid crap wages (like everyone else) and manage to pay rent, bills, gas, food, car insurance and feed a cat single handedly, without giving up gaming god-like goodness.

[gamepopper101]

I know this isn't gaming but isn't it just awesome?

[Sirgin]

I finally got round to trying out video on the PSP. And...it works just fine.

I had to search a bit to find a decent video converter. I first installed "PSP Video 9", but that's an ad-infested piece or junk, so I searched for something else and found "SUPER", which is pretty damn stacked with options. I tried converting using the MPEG-4 codec in SUPER, but for some reason my PSP doesn't recognize the files that I ended up with, even though they were MP4 files. Then I tried converting with H.265/AVC and that works perfectly. 480x270 resolution, 1248kbps video and 256kbps audio. A two minute video (original file being an HD video) is still like 20MB, so to save space I'd use lower bitrates.

I can recommend "SUPER" to anyone who is looking to convert videos for the PSP. It can convert just about anything else on the planet as well, but I only used it for the PSP.

[Izret101]

Didn't you post about using video or pics on the PSP ages ago during a train ride or some thing and i asked if it was porn?

EDIT
No point in me checking since it probably happened after 2k9.
Just another useless post from me. Move it along nothing to see here.