Annual Summary (2010)

Whoa! What a year, in total I've bought 2 games consoles: a PS3 and a DSi XL, dozens of games, accessories, used the DSi Ware shop for the first time, made my very own online game FAQ and made my very own blog - Nintendoheap!

I'm so happy about all of the gaming achievements I've made this year. I finally reached level 65 on Call Of Duty: Waw for the Wii thus being rewarded with a flamethrower and an M1 Carbine rifle (many hours of hysterical laughing whilst burning Nazi soldiers ensued). I made a online strategy guide and FAQ for Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars for the DS system and posted it on GameFAQs. I also finally beat Rayman DS after years of hatred towards it. I've finished many games this year, but there's still loads more to complete. I was also introduced to Minecraft by a couple of friends - and i haven't stopped playing it ever since! The first game i bought this year was Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings for the DS system. I have yet to finish it. The last game i bought was only this afternoon... I'd been eagerly awaiting it... Red Dead Redemption! And... of course a PS3 came with it too!

Now onto the main subject... my personal game of the year!

This one is a toughy. I've enjoyed many great games but these are the ones that stood out to me the most...

• Monster Hunter Tri - Wii
• Dragon Quest IX - DS
• GoldenEye - Wii
• Minecraft - PC

Monster Hunter Tri has kept me going for way over 40 hours - i thoroughly enjoyed the single player campaign and online multiplayer. Buying new weapons and armour was great and beating the crap out of massive monsters (especially the Jhen Moran) was really fun. The music was great and Cha-Cha added a certain humour to the game. It has its ups and downs - especially when i kept getting Disconnected online and when my friends weren't on. I still love this game and continue to "Lol" when a high level Great Jaggi kicks my ass!

Dragon Quest IX is this years best RPG for me. I've loved every second of it. The 3D battling was great, the storyline was compelling, although i was unable to connect online with friends - beating bosses was just as fun and grinding through grottoes was too. Some parts were a little loathsome such as scaling the big tower at the end and any big caverns where you don't know where you're going. After i finished the game i found there was not much else to do so lost interest a bit. Multiplayer is key if you want to play more after the single player story. I loved playing this DS title too!

GoldenEye Wii was a great FPS for the Wii and a remake of its N64 predecessor, it didn't have the best graphics nor was it as good as Call Of Duty, but this game has a certain charm and character i don't get when playing through all out battles in COD. It's more a stealth game where sneaky about unnoticed is the key to survival. The weapons were very cleverly made-up and suited the spy feel. The scenes where you had to use the wii remote and nunchuck to dodge and avoid attacks whilst fighting Alec or Xenia were brilliant. The Multiplayer, needles to say is amazing although it doesn't have the clean smooth matches and feel that COD does. The only thing that lets this game down is its graphics as the Wii is no match for the PS3 and Xbox 360s superior visuals - this leaves some scenes ruined by out of key mouth movement and bodies morphing through objects etc.

Minecraft is this year's best Indie game for me (yes, it's even better than Linerider!). It may not look that good... in fact it looks terrible but that's the charm that Minecraft has - it's made of blocks! The gameplay is good... if you know what you're doing! There are no instructions or anything so online walkthroughs and FAQs are a must see for new users. I enjoy playing the game because it's so addictive! There's not much i can say (well... type!) about it, it's strange but so fun, try it out.



And..... my game of the year award goes too.........................

~~~ Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels Of The Starry Skies - DS ~~~

GAME OF THE YEAR AWARD 2010

http://www.nintendoheap.blogspot.com/

Have a happy new year everybody, may your gaming continue and your blogs as well!

Retro Finds: 2 - Final Fantasy Tactics Advanced, Metroid: Fusion, Metroid: Zero Mission

Wow! I made a few good finds in the past couple of days. I bought all of these together for no more than $30.00 i don't think so good deal i suppose.

My first impressions of these games are okay. Final Fantasy Tactics Advanced is great - it reminds me of FFXII: Revenant Wings for the DS through its similar TBS gameplay. It also has some of the same enemies from FFXII as well. I haven't done much yet but I'm still finding it fun. There are laws against using certain spells which annoys me a bit and it's a bit limited and linear for a Final Fantasy game.

Metroid: Fusion came out 2 years before Metroid: Zero Mission, but i prefer it as it seems to have a more professional, informative and overall more lengthy introduction and i personally think the music's better!  I've always loved the Metroid series and it's good to see it in its original roots. It took me a while to get it to work - there must of been a little bit of dust inside the cartridge.

Metroid: Zero Mission is also very good. But I'm not enjoying it as much as Fusion. It doesn't tell you much, so you're just left running around having no idea where to go. The hunter ship doesn't seem to have made an appearance yet either. I still enjoy blasting enemies with the arm cannon and the game also seems to require more thought and more adventure than its predecessor.

3000 views!

This blogs been online since March, i think - so that's about 9 months. Anyway, i've just reached my 3000th view which is pretty cool - only 8 followers, but i hope that figure will soon rise!

I just wanted to say, thanks for reading my blog guys - and happy holidays!

Gaming All The Time

 ~ Gaming All The Time ~

Playing through my games

In a suped up gaming room

having fun beating bosses

eating all the way

Doughnuts and chocolate

Making my tummy full

Oh, what fun it is to play

all of my fun games

Oh, video games, video games

Gaming all the time

Oh, what fun it is to play

All of my fun games

Video games, video games

Gaming all the time

Square Enix, Rockstar Games

Very good design 

A day or two ago

  I though i'd buy some games

And soon my game collection

Was too big for my shelf

I had to find some room

Before my shelf collapsed

I went and bought a brand new cupboard

And shoved them all in that

Oh, video games, video games

Gaming all the time

Oh, what fun it is to play

All of my fun games

Video games, video games

Gaming all the time
PS2, PS3,
And even the DS

 



Retro Finds: 1 - Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories

I don't know how rare this Game Boy Advance cartridge is here in America but where i live back in England it's worth a good £70 or more online. I just bought it for $9.99 which is like £7... I don't know if Gamestop realized it was that rare or whatever, but I'm pretty chuffed i managed to get a hold of it! I've been playing it on my brother's DS Lite as my DSi XL doesn't have a GBA slot.

It's pretty interesting to play. I've played through all of the Kingdom Hearts games and i think it is nice to see the series portrayed through sprites instead of 3D modelling on the home video consoles. The game does look good and the animation of the sprites is very well done - it looks good compared to some other lazily animated GBA games I've played in the past. The controls are good when your travelling the overworld but when it comes to battle it can get a little frustrating. The game revolves around cards and you have to keep switching through them and playing it strategically instead of some small time button mashing. This sometimes leaves you accidentally using one card and wasting it when you wanted to use a different one.

But hey, Kingdom Hearts rocks and this is the game that bridges together the first and second one. At the moment i'm finding it fun going back to worlds I remember from the first game and beating the bosses again.

There was actually a Playstation 2 port made, but that was never released to the UK as far as i know.

An Island Of Adventure

Yesterday i got up at 8 o'clock (which is hard, i know) and had my breakfast. Reason: Iwas going to Orlando, Florida's Universal Studios - Island Of Adventures theme park! Well that's a mouthful in itself!

Anyway, I'll skip the boring parts and tell you what i did all day...

When i got there, I went through the entrance and made a new world record of "Fastest time that foot has been run over by baby stroller after entering a theme park." The first thing i did was get a ticket for "The Wizarding World Of Harry Potter" which was available to me between 11:00am and 12:00pm.



The exterior temple of the "Poseidon's Fury" tour



It had only just turned 10:00am so i went over to "The Lost Continent" section of the park and joined the 20 minute queue for "Poseidon's Fury" a tour around the (fake, of course) ruins of Poseidon's temple. It turned out to be a terrible 3 roomed nightmare where your "Tour Guide" was just talking and screaming most of the time - no-one was listening and only stopped to watch a short movie projected on a waterfall which involved Poseidon and some evil jerk fighting in slow-motion. It kinda sucked yeah.

The massive Hogwarts Castle which holds "The Forbidden Journey" ride

After that I managed squeeze into the overcrowded "Wizarding World Of Harry Potter" and join the queue for "The Forbidden Journey." I had to store all of my loose belongings in a locker and walk through the line till i arrived at a moving platform where a robotic arm held dozens of benches (with 4 seats) aloft. You get in them and pull the guard over your head. Then it takes you high up and starts dropping, ducking, diving, ascending, descening, turning so your on your back, weaving and rotating in the air whilst you're constantly moving and watching clever hologramic images give you the impression that you're flying over Hogwarts. After I got off my legs were weary and i only just managed to retrieve my belongings from the locker narrowly missing being trampled by hordes of overexcited Potter fans. It was fun and awesomely cool - but i prefer to stay on ground level!



Butterbeer!



After that dizzying ordeal i ampled over to the Butterbeer stand. Incase you haven't read the books, butterbeer is a frothy beer like beverages served at the bars in Hogsmead - the town the park was built to look like (snow and all)! It turned out to be an overpriced cream soda but much, much sweeter - it was very nice and i got funny looks from passersby on many occasions after taking a sip as it tends to give you a nice frothy moustache!



Honeydukes Sweet Shop!



After visiting both a remake of the Honeydukes sweet store from the books and buying a "Chocolate Frog" and some "Berty Bott's Every Flavour Beans" and visiting Zonko's jokes store i sat down at a seating area and chomped on the "Chocolate Frog."



The Flight Of The Hippogriff rollercoaster!



The chocolate frog gave me enough energy to enjoy "The Flight Of the Hippogriff" a small 30 second rollercoaster ride. Once again i faced an obsurdly long queue but in the end boarded the front of the rollercoaster with my sister and quietly savoured the last few moments of my feet touching the ground. My brother actually chickened out on this ride! But i cannot blame him - he's not the rollercoaster type. Anyway, the coaster took a sharp drop right at the beginning which gave it enough speed to turn fast curves at uncomfortable angles thus making everyone scream - happy days!

It was a really fun day - and now i'm exhausted and my legs ache from both the Harry Potter rides... especially the first one! Youtube it.

Phantom Hourglass

I got Phantom Hourglass for $15.99 dollars preowned yesterday at a local Gamestop. I thought that was a pretty good price for a very good game, so i went in there and bought it.

I hadn't played a DS Legend of Zelda game until i bought this, and, i have to say, it is fresh, new and amazing! The first thing i liked was the fact that everything was in that sort of toon style - the colours, their faces and everything, it made me laugh looking at some of the earlier characters in the game. The second thing, and the thing i most enjoy about the game so far, is how well the game uses all of the DS' functions. whether it be simply using the stylus to move Link rather than the D-PAD, to blowing into the microphone to put out burning candles. At one stage you even have to close the DS to imprint a crest onto your sea chart!

I'm really enjoying this game and it's a fresh RPG without the typical leveling up system like Dragon Quest IX and Final Fantasy. It's just you and the game! I'll post a review soon!

Gamingheap Review - Geometry Wars Galaxies

  Geometry Wars Galaxies  -  Gamingheap Review

I bought Geometry Wars Galaxies for the Nintendo DS yesterday. It cost me $19.99 at Gamestop.

Geometry Wars Galaxies is a retro arcade shooter, and a remix of previous versions. The aim of the games is to survive as long as you can in over 60 different planets and get the highest score you can get before losing all 3 of your lives. Endless hordes of enemies spawn in from around the planet and you must utilize your laser and your drone to defeat them before they get too close and destroy you. There are 14 enemies including everything from Snakes to Weavers. Each one acts differently. Whilst some may home in on you, others will randomly move about the planet. It is possible to obtain bronze, silver and gold medals by getting high scores. The more medals you get, the more Geoms you collect. Geoms are currency and you can use them to unlock more galaxies and planets. You can also use Geoms to upgrade your drone (which fights alongside you) with different modes such as Defend and Snipe. Killing more enemies in planets rewards you with experience points which in turn level-up the specific mode your drone was using.

You can use the touch-screen to direct your laser or the A, B, X and Y buttons to fire in different directions. Using the D-PAD you can manoeuvre your ship in and out of enemies. Your drone will move on its own and carry out different tasks depending on what mode you set it to.

After an enemy ship has been destroyed you can collect Geoms from them which add to your total at the end of the level. Collecting Geoms from deceased enemies also rewards you with a multiplier. Each one you collect adds to the multiplier. The maximum multiplier is x150 which gets you very big scores! When you die your multiplier is lost and resets back to 0. Sometimes there are enemies all around you and it is necessary to use a Smartbomb. Smartbombs are activated with the L and R shoulder buttons and destroy all enemies on the screen. This however has its setbacks. It doesn't add to your score and not all the enemies wiped out by the Smartbomb drop Geoms for you to collect. You usually get 3 per planet and lives and Smartbombs can be recollected by killing more enemies and collecting their Geoms.

The music is also very fast to match the games fast-paced gameplay. There is a lot to watch on the screen as all of the geometric shapes are different colours and bullets fly off every surface making the game look more appealing, but also making it harder to spot where enemies are creeping up on you. The stages are all different shapes which adds variety and some of them have obstacles and even vortexes that suck enemies to the centre of the planet!

Overall the game is very impressive and the online Nintendo WFC support allows you to post your scores online and compare with players from around the globe. The music is great, it all looks great, but there could be a little bit more to the gameplay and it can get a bit repetitive. This game isn't for everyone, but it is a nice arcade shooter that draws you in. I personally really enjoy playing it!

My Rating: 7.5/10



Christmas Holiday!

Yipee! That's right, i'm going on holiday for christmas this year... to Florida! It'll be my 10th visit to the sunshine state - and at christmas time, it better still be hot! I'm staying in my normal villa with 5 bedrooms a lounge, a garage and a private swimming pool! I've taken in the fact that i will, hopefully, be getting my new PS3 when i return to England. But, hey - there's a load of Gamestops i know out there so there's no worry in just buying a dozen DS games (DS games are the only games i can buy out there that will work on an English console).

The only thing stopping from getting there is the 9 hour journey by plane - i hate travelling by plane because it's really cramped and the food is... Bleugh! There is movies on the plane though, they ought to keep me occupied for at least 3 hours!

Gamingheap Review - Minecraft

 MINECRAFT  -  Gamingheap Review

Minecraft is a brick-based First-Person Sandbox game that can be downloaded from http://minecraft.net/ for 50% of whilst it is still in the Alpha version. I actually got it for free when the servers crashed in late September.




Title Screen for "Minecraft."
It always has a irrelevant, meaningless comment at the top right


Basically - There are 5 different worlds you can save your game in and it autosaves when you exit Minecraft itself. The Minecraft worlds are all randomly generated, so you'll never get the same map twice. Minecraft cycles through day and night, each lasting about 5 minutes from my experience. At night, if the difficulty setting is set to easy or higher, monsters (mobs) will spawn at night and will come after you to kill you. When you die you drop all of your items where you died and return to the world's spawn point. When you get back
to the location you died you can pick them up again but 1 item will usually be missing.

It is highly recommended that when the game starts (in the day) that you collect wood by demolishing trees with your fists and making planks by going to your inventory and putting the wood into one of the crafting squares.


 

Chopping Trees for lumber


Then by putting 1 plank in each of the 4 crafting squares you have a 3x3 crafting workbench instead of the standard 2x2.




Making a Workbench in the Inventory


After crafting tools like pickaxes, shovels and hatchets from the planks, you can begin to
mine ores like coal and iron from cliff faces. By this time night should be drawing in. Next, most people construct safe places away from the mobs by making caves in the side of mountains and patching the entrance up. They also put up torches to keep monsters away and light up the darkness.

Minecraft is all about collecting materials from around the world your in and crafting them into useful objects which you can build with. For example arranging 8 cobblestone pieces around the edges of a 3x3 crafting grid will reward you with a furnace and smelting iron ore and coal within that will give you iron bars. These can then be used to construct iron tools, armour, weapons, mine carts and mine cart tracks. There are many things to make and places to explore. You may stumble across a cave at some point and with torches in your inventory you can light it up and begin to search for rare ores. Animals also roam the Minecraft overland and killing them will give you the specific animal's produce (chickens will give you eggs and feathers and cows will give you leather hides.)




Watching sheep trying to enter my
house and failing miserably


The further down you mine, the rarer the ores you will find, but it will get dark so you will need to place torches to light up your mines. But, mind out! You may come across some lava! Lava will drain your life hearts killing you slowly find some water quickly and put yourself out! The good news is around lava - diamonds tend to appear and they can be used for all sorts of things.




The entrance to my vertical mine.
It reaches to the very bottom of my world!




Climbing down a ladder to the bottom of my mine.




Creating a "Branch Mine."




A natural cave at the base of my mine.




A large red-brick tower i constructed. It reaches
Minecraft's vertical height boundaries!


Minecraft is a great little game with a big idea. The game's mechanics work very well most of the time and when they do slip up a bit it's only a minor glitch which is expected in an Alpha version of an Indie game. The gameplay is addictive and will get you working on large scale buildings and models in no time. The controls and gameplay are also really easy to learn and exploring is fun to do. The large scale of the worlds mean you rarely have nothing to do. This game may not look very appealing - but... boy... this is living proof that graphics aren't everything!

My Rating: 8.5/10

Woot! Snow! And Minecraft!

Yessss! Over here in England we've finally got some of the good old white powder! Too much of it! Gatwick airport has shutdown and all of the roads are covered in it! There's more due tonight as well! There's already 6 inches of it. When my Dad returned home after being stuck on a stationary tran for nearly 3 hours we went up town to get some provisions such as milk, bread etc. It was freezing cold and our treck through the snow was extended when all of the local stores were out of milk except the furthest possible shop away from us.

When i got back i took of my wellies warmed up and sat down to another session of Minecraft! Yes, i downloaded Minecraft for free when the game's servers crashed back in late September - i haven't played on it since last weekend. If you've never heard of Minecraft then don't be suprised. it's a new Indie game that's just had a massive popularity increase so you should here loads about it pretty soon!

Basically it's a large first-person sandbox game primarily made out of bricks named "Chunks." 2 of these chunks are equal to the player's height and it's possible to destroy them with your fists to obtain materials from them to craft certain objects. For example collecting wood and crafting it in your Inventory into specific shapes will reward you with a variety of new tools such as hatchets and pickaxes to doors and minecarts. The official forums are booming with information and there's now even a Wiki site, "Minepedia"

Check those sites out for more info - here's a link to the offical site... http://www.minecraft.net/

And... A video - the first of a 40+ series of X's Minecraft adventures!