24th February: GS Update

A random slew of games this week. Played some new ones, played some old ones, focused on some RPGs and did some multiplay.

borandi showed up yesterday ready to dominate. Total gamer score stands at 75,521. That is a boost of 740 points over last time! Another day, another milestone. The 75,000 barrier has fallen! He made some progress on Poker Smash, NHL 2K7, The Orange Box acquiring an amazing 10 achievements, NBA LIVE 07 picking up an amazing 8 achievements, Guitar Hero III, Undertow picking up 2 achievements, Two Worlds gaining an amazing 6 achievements, and before I even realized it, he was finished and I was sad.

Oh hey, time for the gamerscore challenge update too... borandi still has that going on and stuff. There's so much action in this one, you may pay for the whole seat, but you'll only need the edge!!111! Witness the spectacle. There are 4 other people rocking out on this thing which keeps it fun. Out of all those people, borandi is currently parked at number 2. With only one day left though, we need to make that last big push!

Also got through some gamerscore, hitting that 75k barrier. That's 10k since the year beginning. It might go up somewhat, as I've now started a LoveFiLM subscription for games and films, so I can start renting again. I've opted for the 3 games/films at a time for 18.99GBP/month. Just got the confirmation email, so I might see some games in the post by Tuesday. First on my list is Kingdom Under Fire, as I've had a couple of inquiries about whether I had it or not for online multiplayer. Then after that, it's Thrillville, Avatar and some other easy games.

Now for this weeks gamerage:

Rapala Tournament	0 -> 40 of 1000 1 of 30 Achievements
Splinter Cell D.A.	0 -> 100 of 1000 4 of 38 Achievements
The Orange Box	0 -> 205 of 1000 26 of 99 Achievements
Eragon	270 -> 540 of 1000 22 of 37 Achievements
Two Worlds	270 -> 800 of 1000 35 of 41 Achievements
Undertow	115 -> 165 of 200 11 of 12 Achievements
NBA LIVE 07	0 -> 650 of 1000 11 of 15 Achievements
NHL 2K7	535 -> 650 of 1000 12 of 17 Achievements
WARRIORS OROCHI	40 -> 110 of 1000 5 of 29 Achievements
LMA Manager 2007	870 -> 1000 of 1000 22 of 22 Achievements
Lost Odyssey	110 of 1000 4 of 36 Achievements
DEAD RISING	140 -> 240 of 1000 12 of 50 Achievements
Arkadian Warriors	190 -> 200 of 200 12 of 12 Achievements

I've always been a fan of fishing games, just out of blind ignorance I suppose. Rapala on the 360 got a bit of rap as it's not that indepth, it's a boring game and a significant portion of the gamerscore is glitched. However, I caught a few tiddlers - enough to unlock a 40GS achievement. Not many people have played this game it seems, as there isnt a significant guide for it.

I also started to play Splinter Cell Double Agent. A couple of training missions, the first story mission and half an online game. The online game was 'half' as my 360 froze mid game (it's been doing that since the repair). The game loading was slow, the controls are stodgy and clunky, and it's not really a fun stealth game. However, it seems a little boostable so I'll keep with it a little while.

I've been after The Orange Box for 360 for a while. I've got it on PC, and competed Portal and played some TF2, but never really tried the linear storyline. I didnt buy TOB, but a friend got it so I borrowed it. I completed Portal (again), and did most of the achievements on TF2 - just needing the 1k kills and the 'room of eight' achievements. I also started the single player HL2 campaign - it's going ok so far.

Bleh - Eragon is a long, boring, crappy game. I don't want to know the story line. I don't want to play through 18 levels, both on Normal and Hard difficulty. If they included points on the game for kills and so forth, it'd make this a more fun game. It's just that the combat is almost superfluous and boring, and most of the levels are just running though a stage trying to avoid the combat. But nevertheless, I'm now over half way through.

Now I've got the guide for Two Worlds, the game got a bit easier. I completed the rest of the storyline (including that final 370GS achievement), and now I'm searching around for all the 'visit' achievements and getting level 50. Should be straightforward - apart from the 'find everything' achievement. Hopefully this will get me the 2* RPG badge on 360voice too.

Undertow had a mixed myriad of achievements when it was released - especially the 'complete each stage on co-op' and 'complete each stage on ultra' achievements. Both of which I was able to complete thanks to rican ninja89. It was touch and go on some of the stages, but we pulled through with active defences. All that's left now is the 10k kills achievement. Thankfully, offline kills count too, so several hours doing the same level over and over should do it.

I've had NBA Live 07 a while, not really bothered to play it. However, I stuck it in with NickHarkonnen to see what it was like. 8 minutes and 150GS later, my interest was piqued. I looked online for a guide to the achievements, and got another 500GS in 15 minutes. The only achievements left are online ones which should be easy to get - apart from the 'play online with 1000 people on' achievement, given that when I saw the lobby, there was 27 people online.

I was able to get the 'win an online achievement' for NHL 2k7 this week. I now have to play as each team once, win 100 matches, play 30 online and quit 10 online. That gets me to 950GS - but the last achievement in this game is glitched, to 950 is the max. EA should sort this out. They fixed The Godfather - now fix this.

NickHarkonnen and I also did some Warriors Orochi. We just grinded out some abilities, and in single player I was also able to get some more characters. When my abilities are almost maxed, I'll go after completing the storylines.

I fired up LMA 07 with two leagues to go, at ~6pm at night. By midnight. I had the final achievements. Luckily, there was not much reloading needed, and I'm happy this game is finished. Game Complete!

I didnt get any more achievements in Lost Odyssey, but I played a while - now nearing the end of the first disc I think. The bosses are still hard, and the story is still excellent. Good stuff.

For the blast from the past game of the week (might be a new feature), it was Dead Rising. A game I regret not playing more. However, this time, with a little guide, I got the hang of driving round in cars and vans, running over zombies. This lead to the 1k kills and 10k kills achievements, and I picked up a couple of others on the way, as well as my first finish of 72hr mode. It should be easier when I hit level 50.

Finally, Arkadian Warriors. I finished it shortly after last weeks main post (hence the mini-update), with a few playthroughs of the first stage. Game Complete!

GamerScore:	73836 -> 76106
Zone:	Pro

Completed XBLA:	15 -> 16 / 45
Completed Retail:	35 -> 36 / 180
GS Completion %:	39.28% -> 40.06%

Country Rank:	130 -> 120
World Rank:	856 -> 813
Completion Rank:	2,394 -> 2,125

[Aiming for that 3* RPG badge on 360voice]

23rd September: GS Update

I didn't think I would see him yesterday, but borandi was back and ready for action. Total gamer score is 48,689 points. That is an increase of 215 points over last time! He rocked out to Blazing Angels, Marvel Ult. Alliance finishing an amazing 7 achievements, Guitar Hero II, EarthDefenseForce 2017, Carcassonne, Burnout Revenge winning an amazing 6 achievements, Smackdown vs RAW 2007 gaining 2 achievements, and then borandi went to get some food. I told him to bring me back something but I got seriously dissed.

Hmmm... I just realized... borandi must not have anything major going on in his life right now because we have gamed 30 days in a row! Can you believe it? Give us the badge for streaking! w00t!

Smackdown vs RAW 2007	860 -> 970 of 1000 27 of 29 Achievements
Burnout Revenge	0 -> 55 of 1000 6 of 36 Achievements
EarthDefenseForce 2017	0 of 1000 0 of 6 Achievements
Guitar Hero II	480 of 1000 32 of 50 Achievements
Marvel Ult. Alliance	120 -> 230 of 1250 18 of 58 Achievements
Test Drive Unlimited	360 -> 590 of 1000 32 of 46 Achievements
Pro Evolution Soccer 6	840 of 1000 19 of 23 Achievements
G.R.A.W.	145 -> 245 of 1000 10 of 43 Achievements
Aegis Wing	45 -> 75 of 200 6 of 12 Achievements
BOMBERMAN Act:Zero	250 -> 350 of 1000 20 of 50 Achievements
2006 FIFA World Cup™	500 of 1000 4 of 5 Achievements
PGR 3	35 -> 175 of 1000 7 of 25 Achievements
Chromehounds	120 -> 140 of 1000 6 of 49 Achievements
DEAD RISING	80 -> 140 of 1000 7 of 50 Achievements
DiRT™	370 -> 420 of 1000 24 of 49 Achievements

It's been retro game week this week. I looked through my played games list, and went through my list backwards a few for the games that I own.

Last time I played WWE 07 I had got to the point where I had to finish the last couple of belts by doing the challenges in the PC. I was having a lot of trouble - but I changed the settings so there was no ring-out or DQs, so I could get weapons out the side of the ring. That made most of the challenges easy, apart from the 2vs2 matches, as my partner would often get pinned in the first couple of minutes. The Kahli vs. woman match at the end was actually quite easy - I was able to keep doing grapples from behind to damage his head so it went red, then put him on the floor and kept damaging his legs till they were red, then it was an easy pin. I also went through the roster pinning everyone on hard mode, to get that achievement. Though I did it by choosing one wrestler to pin the next and so on, I should have got the 'win with every wrestler' achievement, but it didnt unlock (some sort of glitch). That hard mode achievement took around 3 hours to do though, so I might wait until next week to do the equivalent Legend mode achievement.

I took Burnout Revenge off my 'still to play' shelf and started to go through it. NickHarkkonen and I took turns in career mode, and I also did some online mode - which was very fun to play when I wasn't hitting random trees. EA have shut down all their sports '06 games servers, so I'm surprised they haven't shut down their Burnout servers yet. All the achievements in this game require a lot of playing, hence why I've only got a few easy ones atm.

Nick and I are on lvl 33 of EDF - another 20 to go until we finish easy mode. Health around 700 and it's very easy - we've even been doing some levels on the difficulty above easy to get some better weapons.

We also cranked out some GHII, with Nick starting his career mode on Easy. I did a couple of songs on Hard (I still can't get passed that one song, but I'm able to do the rest in that section) and one on expert.

Nick and I also did some Marvel Ultimate Alliance - a game I think is a lot better in co-op mode than single player. We've just been grinding through the main story - we've just started Act 2. It's a fun game, just a bit boring.

I got out some Test Drive Unlimited which I haven't touched in a while. My goal was just to get some easy achievements, but I also did the Island Tour race in my Koenigsegg CC8S - 118miles took only 44 minutes (I was doing 260mph in the straights) - which gave me 30GS. I was able to reach Champion level (needed 450GS) which unlocked a very easy speed race which gave $75k per win (so about $150k/minute). All that money has given me most of the collection achievements.

I'm now 20 games into Serie A on PES6. It's a long hard grind, but now only about 140 games to go until 1000GS.

I also played some GRAW which I haven't touched in a while. I was told of some cheats available for infinite HP, so I did the first 4 levels on hard :) Though there are still quite a few levels to go.

I played some Aegis Wing - using 2 controllers I got the 'combine with a friend' achievement, as well as the 'dont shoot for a level' one. I have 4 controllers, so I guess I can do the 4 ship formation achievement too.

Bomberman Act Zero is an annoying game, but I got a few of the Secret Panels now that there is a guide for them :)

Fifa 06 is an odd game - an easy 500GS and a very tough 500GS. The tough part is to do some challenges, and I was able to do another 5 this week. The hard ones are still to come though.

I've never played PGR3 seriously, so I went someway though career mode this week. I was able to get a platinum medal on manual for 60GS using the fastest car on the first speed track.

Also did some online with Chromehounds online, getting the '50 shots fired' achievement (i.e. 50 HOUNDs destroyed.

I haven't played Dead Rising since January 2nd - 5 days after I got my first 360. That was on a 13" SCART CRT, so now I'm using a 19" HDTV, it looks LOADS better. I'm able to actually do parts of the story - but I prefer mindlessly going around killing zombies :) I got to the gun shop with the psycho, but he killed me :(

I also did the online achieves for DiRT while I was still renting it.

GS: 47,769 -> 48,789

Completed XBLA:	11 / 28
Completed Retail:	21 / 104
GS Completion %:	41.89%
GS % (Non-Demo):	45.18%

Country Rank:	266/212000
World Rank:	1677/1543243