Now Playing - "Big, pointy spears."

Early in the week I was playing some more of Monster Hunter Freedom Unite (PSP) but not really getting anywhere. I'm still on the start of the High Rank quests, I've unlocked 7 star and done a few of them but I usually end up getting badly violated when I try any of the hunt quests. I've also been trying to get a total of 5 Kut-Ku Ears to go into Psychic Vision Gems for my Kirin set of armour. I've managed to smash enough to get 4/5 so far, but I've put the game down in the last few days, partially out of boredom, partially due to uni and partially down to frustration at the difficulty/my suckiness. I need to get a whole bunch of money to upgrade my armour as High Rank is a bit of a difficulty spike, and one that is slowing my progress down as lot.

I didn't do anymore of MH co-op in uni, as the other guy had got stuck at the same bit I was stuck at for ages, the Four Horns quest where you need to hunt Diablos and Black Diablos. Instead, he had picked up Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies (DS) so we played some multiplayer on that. I'm really tempted to start playing it again, as I really enjoyed that game and I've still got absolutely tonnes of grinding and postgame stuff left.

So its more been a week where I've just played games here and there, mostly on my Ipod when I get a chance. I downloaded Angry Birds (Ipod) after a recommendation from a friend. Man, this game is addictive! Really well worth the price of £0.59 I'd say, as you get around 10 worlds to play through. I'm still on the first one (2nd page of levels) and liking how its going so far. Really random and funny puzzle game, I guess you'd call it.

I finished up Infinity Blade (Ipod) finally, after around 6 generations. Annoyingly, I didn't get the achievement as I've still not set up my Ipod to get the internet at my cousin's place where I'm staying at the moment. I'm far from an achievement whore, but its just I don't know if I can actually get that one now, and thats like...the one that proves you've finished the game. I guess its just me being a pedantic ass. Still, I enjoyed the game at times, but I was forced to play it in small chunks of time as the Ipod does heat up quite a bit, and the controls seem to be a little fiddly at times. This leads to some immense frustration when you try and parry an attack when you are wanting to simply block it. This usually leads to painful death. The game has some really nice sharp graphics and textures, and a fair amount of customisability. I liked buying and improving my gear. I still didn't figure out what mastering items did other than giving you +1 into your stats (very useful at times.)

I also picked up Bit. Trip Beat (Ipod) - I had seen some of the Bit. Trip games on a stream and I was kind of interested, but I think it did look quite hard. I think it was Bit. Trip Runner that I had seen, not sure though. There were some really good reviews for this one though, at least on the Ipod and I liked the look of it, so put down the 59p for it. I've tried it once so far and I quite like the way it works. Its a rhythm game where you use a Pong type paddle to return the beats to the other side and progress. Its REALLY trippy. I was playing at night just before I went to sleep and it tired my eyes out really quickly, as I had to focus quite a lot on the game. I quite like stuff that has an interesting twist on rhythm in games, I like Gitaroo Man as it was one of the first I played, and I like stuff like Space Invaders Extreme as well, as the gameplay in that is well integrated and linked with the soundtrack. I think I'll enjoy this one, I've gotten a bit bored of all the generic Guitar Hero type games coming out.

I also tried out Flying Hamster Free (Ipod). One genre I'm wanting to get into more is 2D sideshooters, this one looks quite cute and simple, but I still suck at it. Its far from the awesome but ridiculous difficulty of Ikaruga, but I am quite intrigued by this. Again, the only thing turning me off is the slightly higher than normal price point of the full game. Not sure if I'll grab this one.

I was a big fan of the Space Invaders Extreme games, so I'd wanted to try the newer one that recently came out on a few platforms. I picked up Space Invaders Infinity Gene Lite (Ipod) just because of a few average reviews on IOS and the higher price point for the full game of £2.99. You really don't get a lot in this free version, which was a bit dissapointing. I wasn't hugely impressed with what I'd played either, I think I might pick Infinity Gene up on another platform if I am to buy it some time. To be honest, I think the poor reviews are for the Lite version and not the full version.

It looks a bit like I am turning into a casual gamer :O ! Of course, this'll never be true. I'll play something nice and hardcore this week.

Now Playing - "Might as well piss on a frog"

I'm in the middle of quite an intensive bit of the uni's trimester at the moment. We've got Class tests coming thick and fast; one each week for each of the 4 modules. I've done 2 of them so far-Fundamentals of Pharmacology and Pathology and Geometrical Optics, the latter of which I find rather hard at times. (Largely due to the lecturer's way of doing things (craply)) Anyway, this is about the games I got a chance to play this week, not uni stuff. I played a little bit of Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey (DS) over the first few days of the week, but its not a game I can ever seem to get much time put into. Once I finish up the other game I've been playing, I'll try and concentrate on this one for a bit. I am liking the way things are going, and I reckon I have some strong demons on my side. I'm just under 24 hours into the game, and I'm a few quests into the Carina sector. (That might've been where I was last week...I really don't think I've made much progress)

I'll try and get past this boss later tonight perhaps, if I get some time. I've got a few TV shows to catch up on.

Prinny: Can I Really Be The Hero? (PSP) I picked this one up on Thursday, started it up and got absolutely addicted to it. Its some kind of wierd combination of my suckiness at these games and my obsessiveness coming together which means I keep playing until I succeed, even if that many poor Prinnies die. Platformers do seem to make me rage though, A LOT. I'm about 9 and a half hours through this game and on the final stage now. Its quite hard at times, but its really quirky and fun, it has a lot of really awesome geeky references, anything from Star Wars to Dragonball Z. If you like the Disgaea games or if you are just a fan of platformer type games, check this one out. Its been worth the £8 I payed for it by a mile. 

Some of the gameplay could have been tweaked here and there though. I've had a few cheap deaths that were unavoidable surely. I'll get knocked by an enemy and sent flying into other enemies or off cliffs. Maybe they left that in intentionally though.

Monster Hunter Freedom 2 (PSP) I borrowed this off a friend in my class at uni as he's a big fan of the series and I said I was interested in trying some of the games out. I've only put about an hour or two into it so far, just to see what it was like. It plays very much like the demo of Freedom Unite I played, apparantely the games on the PSP are all incredibly similar, just with more or less content really. The stories are pretty much non existant, but what you really play these games for is the amount of quests, items etc there is to get through. The controls though, really need improved for me. I don't see why they cant map the rotate camera to the shoulder buttons. That would be much more intuitive for me. I had some fun with the mindless slashing of dinos. I think I put it down in a bit of a rage though when I couldn't time the cooking well enough to get a Well-Done Steak. I'm really crappy at timing related stuff like that, and for such an early quest, this seemed to have a RIDICULUOUSLY small window of opportunity to cook the item needed for a quest. Take the steak off too soon, you get a Rare Steak, too late and you get a Burnt Steak. Maybe I was just doing it wrong or something...but it seemed bizarrely hard.

I might pick it back up at some point, to try and see some more of the quests, I've barely made a dent in the training quests.

So other than Prinny, I didn't put much time into games this week. A combo of studying for exams and football during the evenings. I'm nearly done with Prinny though! =D