Phantasy Star Universe

Normally I let game news be game news; you all are observant enough to check it out on your own, but in this case it is more of an excitement thing. I don't keep it a secret that Phantasy Star Online consumed my life for far longer than it should have. I have memories of missing class, parties, you name it to play this game.

In fact, PSO was the original reason I got into the industry that I am in. I developed my very first website for PSO, thus catapulting me along a path that ultimately landed me my current job as Chief Programmer at {The Code Shoppe}. You could say that PSO had something of an impact on me.

Anyway, when they first announced Phantasy Star Universe, I was torn. I couldn't decide whether I wanted a stand alone, offline RPG successor to the Phantasy Star series or a completely redone online game. I still have no idea which I would prefer but it looks as though it may be another foray online. I could not be happier!

Very little information has leaked as of yet, but Sega finally opened up the official website which contains a few interesting screenshots and tidbits. You can also check out the 1up interview of Yuji Naka for even more info. I am very excited about this and will keep you posted as more news surfaces.

Pics courtesy of GamesAreFun.com:

Comments (1) | Permalink | Lee Babin | 3.23.2005

Gran Turismo 4

Thanks to IOGC.net, I have begun to catch up on the backlog of games that I truly need to play at some point in my life. First on my list was the highly anticipated Gran Turismo 4. I finally had the opportunity to pop it in the PS2 this weekend but sadly the magic that I had expected from it did not engulf me.

I don't know whether I am simply tiring of the genre or what, but GT4 simply did not move me in the way I had expected it to. Don't get me wrong, this is a BEAUTIFUL game. Gran Turismo 3 still stands to me as a benchmark for how games can look and GT4 surpasses it on many, many levels. The background environments are stunning to witness and the car models are like some beautiful photograph.

For those of you who own HDTVs, be prepared for a treat. This thing supports full HD, indluding a 16:9 ratio and superb wide-screen capabilities. To witness GT4 running on my 57" widescreen HDTV is to witness the PS2 truly pushed to its limits; the developers of GT4 really know their stuff.

With the high point of my GT4 experience out of the way, let me get into the lows. The real problem I have with this game is that it feels exactly the same to me as GT3 did. To tell you the truth, after playing through GT1 and 2, even GT3 was starting to get a bit stale for me, but at least the overall technology jump was enough to get me past that. This time, the jump is simply not high enough for me to get past the same old gameplay.

You will get new licenses, race some of the same courses (there are some new additions, thankfully), collect cars, upgrade the vehicles, blah, blah, blah. Everything you might expect from the GT franchise is here and for some that is probably a blessing. For me, it just simply is not cutting it any more. I don't know whether I am just getting sick of the ultra realism involved with racing in GT or whether I am tired of collecting the same licenses over and over again, but redundancy, thy name is Gran Turismo.

I know there are tons of you out there who swear by the franchise, and don't get me wrong, this is a damn solid game. It is a true work of beauty and everything comes together wonderfully. That being said, I guess I have just grown out of this genre. Until the franchise does something drastic to reinstate my interest (online capabilites, *ahem*), my love for Gran Turismo has simply been eclipsed by my hatred for repetitiveness.

Pics courtesy of 1up.com:

Comments (0) | Permalink | Lee Babin | 3.21.2005

My Journal

I tend to use my blog as something of an editorial / article page. I write reviews, script previews; sometimes I even complain about differing issues. The whole purpose behind a blog however is to keep track of one's thoughts. I hate to use the word "journal", but that is in fact what this is. I want to go back to my blog in 5 years from now and reminisce about where I was at the time. Therefore, this blog is not so much about gaming as it is about what is going on in my life; told as only an insanely sick man on two Bradasols and some Neo-Citran could tell it.

At Home

I suppose I should explain that last comment. Yes, I am rather sick right now, no it isn't going to kill me or anything. It is just a painfully annoying virus of some kind that has kept me off my feet (and out of work) for the last two days. Thankfully I have found that the right mixture of Bradasol, Neo-Citran and Tylenol Cold and Sinus has sealed the illness away to a mere buzzing in my sinuses.

Another rather important aspect of my life right now is the fact that we have just sold our condo. It sold in a surprising one day, yes the first day on the market, for around what we wanted to get for it which is very thrilling to me and Dianne. We were not however expecting such a fast sell so we are now scrambling a little to find a new house to buy. We are more than likely going to build a home and so that means that it will not be ready for about 7 months or so. Thankfully Dianne's parents have agreed to put us up for a nominal monthly rent charge until the house is complete. During the time at Dianne's parents I plan to save mass amounts of money and eat the finest Vietnamese cooking on this side of the ocean.

The move could not have come faster for me. Condo life is truly the simple life (no shovelling snow, no mowing the lawn, etc), but there are certain annoyances that come with it. For one, I cannot make full use of my surround sound system for fear of upsetting the neighbors, enough said. Second, we cannot have nice sized parties. The last one we had ended with me getting chewed out by cops. I hate getting chewed out by cops. Third, there is always some sort of maintenance happening and it is never quick or easy. Today and tomorrow we have no water in the building from 9 until 5. Wonderful.

In any case, we are considering a couple of areas around town including a beautiful north-west area called Panorama Hills which looks ideal for raising children, or perhaps Okotoks (a small town to our south) which is wilderness pristine.

at Work

Work is going well for me and the whole crew down at {The Code Shoppe}. The contracts keep pouring in and I find myself with sometimes more work than I can take on at any given time.

We have several larger sized contracts in the near future set to go and some of our older projects are soon going to go live. Feel free to check out {The Code Shoppe} website for more details.

Apart from my primary job, I have also accepted a contractual position to write a PHP book. I enjoy writing and I enjoy coding so I suppose it goes hand in hand that I could combine the two. I think it is a very exciting opportunity for me and I am highly looking forward to the challenge.

I am, on the other hand, slightly nervous at the prospect. I have never written anything near the size of the project I am about to partake in and so I have a few butterflys in my stomach. I truly feel though that this is a very spectacular opportunity for me and I know that if I take on the challenge, the rewards will be well worth it for me in the end.

On the Web

Anyone who knows me realizes that I love my job. The reason why I love my job so much however is because I truly enjoy working on web related projects. That being said, with having to code every day all day, some of my personal projects get somewhat left to the wayside. I finally found some time to work on a few of them however.

First up, a modification I have been meaning to make ages ago is on my blog site, BabinPlanet.ca. I dupe all of my blog entries onto that site in case someone finds it from out of blue and so that I have a back-up of my blog handy. I find it amusing that I managed to build a commenting system for 1up before I managed to find time to implement it into my own site. It was bugging me to no end, so I finally got around to inserting a comment system onto my own blog site. You will notice that it looks very similar to 1up's blog commenting system since I am very used to, and enjoy immensly, the way it is setup.

Another major site that I maintain that hasn't been updated in far too long is The Crew Album. It is mainly a a photo album for our family and friends. I had rigged up a custom CMS (content management system) for it in the past, but it was just too slow to update. Thankfully I found some open source gallery software and put it to use. After a painful install, I now have a gallery that I can more easily manage.

In Gaming

Being the nerd that I am, gaming is a rather large part of my life. My current agenda is as follows.

On the portable front, I have finally finished off Final Fantasy 1 in the Dawn of Souls collection. By finished off, I mean completed going through all of the optional dungeons and toasting the big, bad bosses contained within. Interestingly enough, the hardest fights in that game came from not the last bonus dungeon, but from the second last. I won't spoil who they are, but they were some fairly strategic bouts for such an archaic game.

I will have a review up of that as soon as I am able and I now turn to the black sheep of the Final Fantasy family, number 2.

On the console front, me and Dianne continue to race through Shadow Hearts: Covenant, neck and neck. It is such a wonderful game that I continually find myself amused by it. It is the kind of game you can sit down with for 12 hours straight and not get bored. The game keeps throwing new ways to play and cool story twists at me so that I cannot put down the controller. Any game that can rope both me and the wife into it like that deserves some massive praise.

I also find myself doing a bit of business with a company called the International Online Gamers Club which does the whole online rental thing. Basically, it seems to be a win win deal. Canadians finally have a website they can go to and not have to pay extraordinary US rates and US citizens can take advantage of the weak Canadian peso dollar. I should be receiving my first games from them today so I will keep you informed, but check it out if that sort of thing interests you.

To Conclude

Well, that about does me in for now. I hope you have enjoyed hearing a little about what is going on with my life, I know that it will come in handy down the road for me. Take care all, hope to speak with you soon!

Comments (168) | Permalink | Lee Babin | 3.17.2005

Page: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] [37] [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] [43] [44] [45] [46] [47]