1st October: GS Update

From now on you can see my 360voice profile on the right hand side of this page as a little Javascript applet -->
But I'll still quote it here. Recently the guys over at 360voice have been moving their servers, so its all a couple of days backed up on logs and it's a bit skewiff.

borandi brought the pain yesterday... the good kind... the gaming kind. We are up to 50,349 points of gamerscore. Jealous? He played Bankshot Billiards 2, and did it while drooling over my awesome graphics and sound.

Harry Potter OOTP	0 -> 40 of 1000 3 of 41 Achievements
Bionicle Heroes	880 -> 900 of 1000 45 of 49 Achievements
G.R.A.W.	245 -> 420 of 1000 17 of 43 Achievements
Gun	920 -> 1000 of 1000 31 of 31 Achievements
Smackdown vs RAW 2007	970 -> 1000 of 1000 29 of 29 Achievements
Frogger	0 -> 15 of 200 1 of 12 Achievements
Bankshot Billiards 2	0 -> 80 of 200 5 of 12 Achievements
Halo 3	0 -> 115 of 1000 8 of 49 Achievements
Overlord	240 -> 280 of 1000 19 of 44 Achievements
Fatal Inertia	0 -> 120 of 1000 11 of 50 Achievements
Stranglehold	0 -> 235 of 1000 15 of 45 Achievements
Surf's Up	0 -> 1000 of 1000 29 of 29 Achievements

I rented Harry Potter today, played it for around 45mins or so. I'm one of those people who despises all Harry Potter paraphenalia - the books can burn, the movies can be peed upon. I avoid it at all costs. But my love of achievements outweighs my hate of Harry Potter, so I finally rented it. It's a very easy game (on easy) so far, and on mygamercard.net the average GS is 400+. It seems a bit long (25hrs+) though to complete, so we'll see how far I can get.

Ok so I'm back on the Bionicle Heroes. Now got 51%, with 7 stages to complete. Hopefully the save wont corrupt this time!! I got 1 achievement - the 2.5mill credits one.

Again with the GRAW this week - completed the game on Hard, with the unlimited health cheats on. The levels are quicker than I thought (3.5hrs for a completion), so now I need to redo the game on easy, then it's all the MP achievements to do.

I spent 4.5hrs on GUN yesterday - I basically played through the whole of the story mode, and finished all the side quests to get the 'all gold' and 'all weapons' achievements. The story mode is actually VERY fun, and I suggest anyone that likes the Wild West to play it, even on easy. I did spend about an hour doing one of the hunting quests - the black/great wolf. That is one annoying bastard! He's first in the badlands, and then to the west of the ranch if you're interested. The online guides are quite vague. But now this game is 1000GS complete, and back on the shelf. Totalled around 20hrs.

Ok WWE really got on my tits. After the last debacle, when the 'win with all wrestlers' achievement didn't unlock, it did after my third match going though on Legend. I then tried going through the Legend achievement using PPVs - so I could set up 8 matches at once. After 4 to 5 hours of that, the achievement didnt unlock. So I went to exhibition, hoping I didnt have to got through the entire list again. Thankfully when I went through alphabetically, it unlocked when I hit Cactus Jack. Another game 1000GS complete, though it wasnt an easy task - around 50hrs total.

This week there were three games on offer on XBLA - Bankshot Billiards (1200MSPs to 900MSPS) and Frogger/Hardword Spades (each 400MSPs to 300MSPs). When they first went on sale, some Microsoft employee made a mistake and put a 50% discount! At that time, I got the Billiards, but then had a nap for 8hrs or so. I came back to see the other two were back up to only 25% discount. Bastards.

But I got them all - Bankshot Billiards is your typical pool game. It's rather bland, and not many modes after the standard ones. Not really worth 600MSPs tbh though. Some of the achievements are on modes that take a couple of hours, so I'll grind them at some point.

Frogger is a load of balls - the frogs move a fixed distance, and you die if you barely hit an exhaust. The achievements look quite hard, so it'll be a while before I get these.

I also played Hardwood Spades, for about 5 seconds. It looks weird.

Yes, I got Halo 3. I spent all week saying the beta was shit, then my girlfriend got it for me for my birthday (the 25th). Haha go figure. It's an ok game - better than GoW, but like I've said before, I'm not a console FPS fan. The story mode is quite bland - point, shoot, repeat. The difficulties are exponential - I tried it on legendary, only not to get past the first set of mobs. Bastards! I also played some online, but the Matchmaking is a joke - I often get into a match where it's 25-5 in Team Slayer (my fav mode). I'm often on the losing team. You can see my Halo 3 profile here.

My girlfriend also bought me Overlord - I've gone a bit further in the story, still on 0% corruption. I'd just before the final smelter, so I guess I'm half way.

Fatal Inertia reminds me of those N64 cheap budget racing games. Easy to pick up and play, but no real depth of options and a bit bland on the graphics. If you get stuck on a point, its fairly linear and cant get past it until you do. Achievements are either very easy, or require time on them.

I've always been told that Stranglehold should be a good game - and it is, for only the first couple of levels. Then it gets very similar. Lots of point and shoot, very linear, and it's just the same style tricks over and over again. MP is crap - everyone has super high HP (thus it needs 20secs of two people shooting one other person, then only one of them gets the kill) - and the weapons are quite unbalanced (the machine gun does next to no damage). Graphically, its exceedingly good. I liked the bit where you destroy half of the famous Terracotta Army.

I dont care what anyone else says - I enjoyed Surf's Up. Its a straightforward kids game, like a linear Tony Hawks' game but surfing. I got around 800GS in two hours, and the other 200GS in the another two. There is a bit of collecting to do, but it's very easy. Each round takes around 3mins, and there's only around 11 rounds in the game. Another 1000GS complete :D Total 4hrs.

I also passed 50k GS doing Surf's Up =D

GS: 48,789 -> 50,699

Completed XBLA:	11 / 30
Completed Retail:	24 / 109
GS Completion %:	41.70%
GS % (Non-Demo):	44.75%

Country Rank:	230/213174
World Rank:	1534/1550045

8th September: GS Update

From 360voice:

borandi is the best... he treats me right, I treat him right. It is a good thing we have going here. Gamer score stands at 45,574. Not too shabby! That is an improvement of 75 points over last time! He opened up Overlord acquiring 2 achievements, Gears of War, Rockstar Table Tennis winning 2 achievements, as well as checked out what was new in the live marketplace.

And the games:

Gun	920 of 1000 29 of 31 Achievements
DEAD OR ALIVE 4	10 -> 80 of 1000 4 of 45 Achievements
Rockstar Table Tennis	20 -> 355 of 1000 14 of 29 Achievements
Gears of War	590 -> 650 of 1250 32 of 57 Achievements
Overlord	170 -> 240 of 1000 18 of 44 Achievements
Track and Field	200 of 200 12 of 12 Achievements

I got out GUN out again for the sole purpose of getting the last two achievements - 'All gold' and 'All weapons'. In order to get the first involves finding 44 different points on the map - thankfully there's videos for that. The second requires the game to be completed 100% - all sidemissions included. When I last played GUN, I used the level select to get the first 920GS - only downside is that by changing the level, your weapons and such go missing. :( I might have to play through the game fully at least once to get the other GS.

DOA4 was one of the first games I bought for my 360, after having come second in a local tournament, despite not playing it before. Well, suffice to say, real people are easier than the crappy CPU controlled characters that counter every move you do. Bastards. I used an online guide to set up the time attack (single) achievements - gold, silver and bronze time. Downside is, if you get the gold first, you have to re-do it in the particular timeframe to get the other two achieves. Utterly stupid. This game also only lets you quit out at certain points - so if you're stuck in sequence, you'll have to wait until the end before you're allowed to press start. DOA4, you're going back on the shelf.

With Rockstar Table Tennis, I was able to boost for 280GS with rican ninja89 for the online exhibition achievements. I also started playing it a bit more, and now I'm confident with the game. I've beaten the first three circuits (some games were rather comfortable) and only have the all-pro circuit left. Though the CPU is starting to get quite hard!

With the GoW map pack now being free, I was able to download it and do a couple of offline Annex achievements with two controllers. Took around 60/90 minutes to get the 60GS, but now I'm 50%+ on GoW :)

I rented Overload again, and it's still a fun game :) I went through a little more of the story mode, and did some smelting achievements. I'm also back to 0% corruption, thanks to killing a couple of bosses.

I also played Track and Field online a couple more times - though these games I was against people who couldn't really play, so easy wins for me!

If you've been following my blog, you'll know that I've been awaiting Two Worlds - an Oblivion/Diablo/Guild Wars style RPG. Well I recieved my 'Collectors Edition' this friday (that was when it was released here), only to find that the bloody thing is region locked!! I still haven't got my UK 360 back from MS (they recieved it the 28th August), so I'm a bit peeved!!

Also, a couple of dates for your calendar:

• Eternal Sonata (17th Sep, US; November, UK)
• Beautiful Katamari (19th Oct, US; unknown, UK).

Both are pre-orders on my list!!

GS: 45,109 -> 45,644

Completed XBLA:	10 / 27
Completed Retail:	21 / 100
GS Completion %:	40.78%
GS % (Non-Demo):	44.01%

Country Rank:	307/210435
World Rank:	1933/1533094

20th August: GS Update

Long time since an update - I've been very lazy :P Several things have happened since the last update - the major one in this post will be the fact that I passed 40k GS :)

Gears of War	80 -> 590 of 1250 30 of 57 Achievements
Gun	0 -> 920 of 1000 29 of 31 Achievements
Ninety-Nine Nights	100 of 1000 1 of 10 Achievements
Saints Row	110 of 1000 10 of 43 Achievements
Track and Field	0 of 200 0 of 12 Achievements
Golden Axe	190 -> 200 of 200 12 of 12 Achievements
Smackdown vs RAW 2007	860 of 1000 23 of 29 Achievements
NCAA® Football 07	345 -> 790 of 1000 44 of 50 Achievements
Rockstar Table Tennis	0 -> 20 of 1000 4 of 29 Achievements
College Hoops 2K6	0 -> 1000 of 1000 5 of 5 Achievements
MLB 2K6	0 -> 1000 of 1000 5 of 5 Achievements
Madden NFL 07	990 -> 1000 of 1000 46 of 46 Achievements
Cabela's Safari	0 -> 350 of 1000 13 of 30 Achievements

Ok a slight change to my achievement listing... I'm not listing games I played just for 5 minutes or to get updates :p Again, this roots to the lazy thing.

Well as you may have read before, Gears of War is not one of my favourite games. Mainly because with First Person Shooters (FPS), I'm a big mouse/keyboard player, and the controller is harder to control. Well I did some achievement trading with a buddy on my friends list - rican ninja89. In return in getting the 50 consecutive title wins on WWE Smackdown vs. Raw, he took me through Gears of War on insane difficulty. I've never been through the game before, and it took about 8 hours to kill the final boss. The upside to this, is that I'm more confident in playing GoW, and I've played some online and I'm enjoying it. I'm still always last (=D) but I'm getting about 10 kills every 30 mins. Only downside is when it's a round full of squealers... :(

I've had GUN on my shelf from easter, and cowboy games aren't really my thing. But while only several of my games work in my US/NTSC 360, I've been willing to play anything. I had noticed that a few people in my buddy list had 1000GS, so it could be an easy game. Luckily, I checked online before playing. There is a nifty level select 'cheat' that can be used to get most of the achievements - even the 'Complete on X difficulty'. The only ones I have left are 'Get all Weapons' and 'Mine all Gold'. The weapons one is a bit annoying, as sometimes after a level select change, you lose all the weapons. The gold may also be hard, but there are guides online. If someone is doing these achieves using the level select, the delivery and hunting achievements are easy if you do the final one in the list first.

I tried doing a few stages for Ninety Nine Nights. It's sooo boring. It was fun for around 5 minutes when I got it....

Saints Row is a bit better - its the GTA before GTA4 gets released. Previously I had been focusing on doing the extra activities (and got bored), but this time I went in the main storyline, which is nifty as it's a three pronged attack with the different factions. At the minute, my character is a fat git with multiple piercings wearing a yellow santa suit. Go figure. I didn't get any new achievements playing it today, but I'm now 25%+ in the story.

I only played the Track and Field demo, but this is the sort of game I grew up on - button bashing olympic competitions. When I can get hold of some cheap MS Points, I'm getting this! So far my best 100m time is 9.07secs, but I remember years ago getting under 8s. For some reason, this game doesnt like me using B and X alternately to run, so I'm having to use the analog stick.

I also boosted with rican ninja89 on Golden Axe - we both needed the online co-op, and he got the 'complete undefeated' achievement too. Another game I can chalk up as complete!

NCAA 07 is just as fun as when I played Madden 07. I'm going to have to get Madden 08 when it's released here. Well on NCAA 07, I now have the game achievements (it took a while to get that blocked punt achieve), and now need the season achievements. That 60 years in franchise is going to be so annoying to do (online it suggests around 8 hours of constant simming...).

Rockstar Table Tennis is a game I saw before I left for the US that I wondered if it was any good. Having played it, it's a good game. But I'm really, really bad at it. The first two games were very easy, then the competition final was very hard. Luckily, some of the achievements are for merely winning X games, and I can boost for most of the offline ones.

College Hoops 2K6 was an easy 1000. Well 4 of the 5 achievements were very easy, the last one (6 blocks with one player) required me to take two controllers to do it. For some reason, blocking in basketball games has never been a strong point of mine. Another complete game :)

MLB 2k6 was also an easy game - with both of these 2k games, you can adjust sliders so the CPU cant really do anything. Awesome :). One achievement gave me some grief - the 'Rob a Home Run' achievement. After looking at some online suggestions, the one on the achieve360points.com forum worked.

Madden 07 is FINALLY complete! I can now join the list of 17 UK people to have completed this game with 1000GS. Though I'm still using my US 360, thus I'm still listed as US :p

Cabela's African Safari is fun - there's nothing like shooting deer with a nice *bang*.. in a simulation only of course! I'm about 2 stages in, and about 6 to go.

Thus: 3 retail games complete, 1 XBLA game complete!

GS: 39,029 -> 43,294

Completed XBLA:	9 / 23
Completed Retail:	20 / 92
GS Completion %:	41.98%
GS % (Non-Demo):	45.62%

Country Rank:	1178/834395
World Rank:	2059/1514704