Showing posts with label Skate. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Skate. Show all posts

Monday, August 25, 2008

25th August: GS Update

Ahaha! I am back! *BIG FANFARE* No really, its all about the gaming.
Are you ready for a recap? I know I am! Giddyup: If your Xbox is depressed, try playing seven days in a row like borandi did last week. It has a way of making you a bit giddy... The gamerscore increase was just insane. I didn't think it would be possible to get 1730 points in such a short span of time but we did. Who knew 209 achievements could be worth that much? Ok I knew that...

For the record, we played 11 new games over the last week. They were Beijing 2008, Braid, Bully Scholarship Ed., ET: QUAKE Wars, Fable® II Pub Games, Guitar Hero: Aerosmith, NFL Tour, SEGA Superstars Tennis, SOULCALIBUR, Summer Athletics, and Universe at War. They were all fun... in their own little ways. Also, I think we can all agree that borandi's favorite game last week was ET: QUAKE Wars. He played it on 3 of the days.
Lots of games played - some completed, some bought, some traded, some rented. Some fun, others not so much. Let me explain...

SOULCALIBUR

SOULCALIBUR

0 -> 200 of 200
12 of 12 Achievements

I've got the original in the Soul Calibur series (Soul Blade, PSX), and even though I'm not too keen on fighting games, the Soul series is the best. Though this XBLA version is a cut down copy of what was originally released - campaign mode has been cut. That was the best bit!!! But I heard this was some easy GS, so I got it and completed it. With the x360a guide, it was a cinch. Easy stuff. Game Complete!

Unreal Tournament® 3

Unreal Tournament® 3

0 -> 290 of 1000
12 of 50 Achievements

I had some HMV credit and had two options - wait a little while and get Too Human (where the demo was OK), or get UT3 which I know would be a little grindy but FPS fun. Well I got UT3 :) My brother and I blitzed the campaign mode in co-op, and I done a little in multiplayer. What's best is me + 15 easy bots, hyperspeed, small map, automatic weapons. There's a reason I got 457 kills in 20 minutes, 380 ahead of 2nd place :)

NBA 2K8

NBA 2K8

0 -> 210 of 1000
12 of 50 Achievements

I bought NBA 2k8 and NHL 2k8 from Gamestation a couple of days ago in the 2 for 20 range - bargain!!! So I got the easy achievements out of the way - 15 three pointers, 60 points in the paint, etc. The achs are almost identical to NBA 2k7, so we'll see how it goes. The hardest part is the blocks, which I'm working on.

Guitar Hero III

Guitar Hero III

430 -> 455 of 1000
40 of 59 Achievements

Only one achievement of note on GH3 - the 250k notes hit in career. It came randomly, during a track which I failed - so even failed tracks count. I'm on my way to getting the 100mil total score and the $300k total across career.

Rock Band

Rock Band

245 -> 265 of 1000
14 of 50 Achievements

Not much to report on Rock Band - I got the Jet by doing Expert Guitar/Easy Vocals myself. However, my brother came over this bank holiday so we could go after the Endless Setlist (he can do expert bass, I've done expert guitar). We got upto the PR Firm, and we need another 200 stars to get into the Hall of Fame, then another 300 stars to get to the setlist (or something like that). Anyway he'll be back late September, so I'm hoping to get some more achs then.

The Simpsons™ Game

The Simpsons™ Game

75 -> 185 of 1000
14 of 44 Achievements

It looks like a lot of people have the full 1k in The Simpsons Game, so I bought it to spend some time on it. I've only played a little so far, but I'm well on the way to completing the story mode. Will get back to you when I do!

WCP All In

WCP All In

0 -> 10 of 1000
1 of 39 Achievements

My brother bought this game, so while he was here we popped it in and I got the achievement for playing a year of career mode. This meant skipping 52 weeks. Easy GS, though the game could look better. I'll borrow this off him and play it more some other time.

Fable® II Pub Games

Fable® II Pub Games

200 of 200
11 of 12 Achievements

I've never played the original Fable. But apparently I missed out. Like I should be put in front of a firing squad sort of missed out. So in order to get into the mood, I got the Pub Games, an XBLA game so people can try and get gold for their character in the main game before it comes out. Or, they could put their character in debt. Either way, the Pub Games consist of 3 games of chance, and a myriad of easy achievements if you've got a turbo pad. Seriously, for most of them, hold down A and bet away! Eventually, some skill is required, like the 'get a jackpot on each game' achievements. THe only one that was hard was the Keystone jackpot, which took 4 hours to get. I haven't completed it yet - still one achievement related to linking the game to a Fable 2 character. I'll get that soon when the game comes out :)

Beijing 2008

Beijing 2008

0 -> 300 of 1000
15 of 50 Achievements

I traded in a load (about 8) DS games for some credit, and with it I got Beijing 2008, Bully and The Simpsons. As a fan of Olympic style games, I was wanting to love Beijing. After playing it, yeah I like it, but the developers could have done it in a much nicer way. There are lots of events, but the control system is terrible, and the starting system in races is poor. The achievements are really hard (as in you need a perfect to get them) and they really could have looked at older track and field type games and thought 'what could we improve' rather than 'what could we screw up'. Wait until its a tenner, then buy it. A borandi top tip!

skate.

skate.

170 -> 390 of 1000
20 of 44 Achievements

I decided the other day to go take the task of getting all the games from my MGC.net profile, and get them 'above average' GS. Well skate. was the closest game which I own, so I went online. The easiest achievements seemed to be the online ones - get 600EXP in trick events and 600EXP in races. I was already 300/300, but it took 4 or so hours to play ~60 events to get 600/600. Though to be honest, it was fun. It's a shame single player mode is bit gay (but the control system is nice).

Devil May Cry 4

Devil May Cry 4

0 -> 20 of 1000
2 of 46 Achievements

DMC4 is supposedly a great game worth playing. Well I got it from LoveFilm, and I find it a bit meh. Most of the game is unlocked as you play (so it's not pick up and play), and generally requires 3 or 4 playthroughs. Each playthough is ~21 stages, each 10-20 minutes long. Well, I have a thing against games with those long stages if you can't save in the middle. It's a hack and slash type game revolving around stylistic fighting with a theme towards the dark and dreary. Maybe I just need to play it more - I'm upto stage 5.

Braid

Braid

0 -> 80 of 200
7 of 12 Achievements

Braid has been the centre of some controversy in the XBLA market. Some people hate games that cost 1200 MSPs (like Braid) purely based on price. Others say it's too short. The rest say its a pure masterpiece and worth every penny. Overall, the game lasts 4-5 hours and is a brilliantly made 2D platformer that is visually stunning as well as innovative to the genre. 1200MSPs = ~$10 for 4 hours play? That's a bargain compared to going to see a film. Try the demo, make up your own decision. I love it.

SEGA Superstars Tennis

SEGA Superstars Tennis

0 -> 290 of 1000
16 of 45 Achievements

This game has been out a while, so I was glad to get it for 15GBP from GAME. It's a brilliant tennis game mixed with every fabulous SEGA franchise under the sun - Jet Set Radio, Channel 5... all with real tennis and real minigames. A great game in single player, and superb for versus mode.

Summer Athletics

Summer Athletics

0 -> 1000 of 1000
37 of 37 Achievements

After Beijing being a little disappointing, I was glad to hear that Summer Athletics' achievements would be a lot easier. Well, suffice to say, they were. As a vet of these type of games, this was easy, though some people over at x360a are having problems. Using the x360a guide (and helping add to it a little), the achievements fell. Overall, the game is lower quality than Beijing and could seriously take some hints. I'd suggest people buy Beijing over this. However, Game Complete!

Bully Scholarship Ed.

Bully Scholarship Ed.

0 -> 150 of 1000
7 of 38 Achievements

Bully is a game I've been wanting to play for ages - if not just for the 'Kiss 20 boys' achievement. It's been out on the PS2 a while, and came to the 360 (with some extras) about 5 months ago. I found a copy cheap, and it's a brilliant game. Rockstar have excelled themselves again, and I should really play this more. BRB...

Sunday, February 03, 2008

3rd February: GS Update

This week starts a regular regime of me working 9-5 each weekday, then using other time to fit in gaming and everything else. As such, no real hard grinding unless it's at the weekend. This weekend, it was Blue Dragon!
borandi is making me proud and his opponents jealous... even if they are bots or mindless AI sometimes! Check out the 71,307 gamer score! That is a gain of 55 points over last time! He rocked out to Blue Dragon acquiring an amazing 6 achievements, and then I came out of my trance and realized it was all over.

Oh, guess what? Our gamerscore challenge is going strong... If you want to see how good I'm doing, check it out! There are 3 other people rocking out on this thing which keeps it fun. Out of everyone, borandi is holding on to the number 2 spot. But, there are still 5 long days left! We need to keep heading for the top!
Ah yes, 360voice are doing an excellent competition this month. If you're part of a contest, one lucky winner each day wins 1000MS points - and there's some other stuff to win. I've enabled 'auto contests', which means I'm added to one automatically each week. Good stuff.

In other news, I received my UK 360 back from repair this week. Technically, it only took 14 days to turn around. However, I was expecting a brand new system, with a HDMI port. This time however, the motherboard got replaced, thats all. Got the free month of XBL though. At least now I can play my games that dont work on my US console.
110 -> 345 of 1000
20 of 43 Achievements
535 of 1000
11 of 17 Achievements
0 -> 170 of 1000
17 of 44 Achievements
480 -> 490 of 1000
33 of 50 Achievements
120 -> 490 of 1000
16 of 25 Achievements
0 -> 80 of 200
4 of 12 Achievements
0 -> 115 of 200
7 of 12 Achievements
535 -> 660 of 1000
12 of 22 Achievements
Game of the week is Blue Dragon. I've essentially spent a day and a half on this game this weekend, just going through the story mode. I'm now near the end of the third disc, just finishing up some extra dungeons and leveling up the characters. I was able to do the 'Perfect Moon Lasers' achievement - that took 20 or so tries with help from the guide. The guide for that achieve was good, but far too complicated for the time that it gives to do that achievement. Along with that, I've been mastering classes for my shadows, and finished all the Quick Time Events. Achievements left involve 'Master All Classes' for each character, get level 99 on each character, 2 mechat shooting stages and finish all the collection achievements. If I persist, hopefully this will be done by next week. =D

Even though I didnt get any NHL 2k7 achievements this week, I did assist in helping some people get the 'Win an 8 man online tournament' this week. As a result, they've joined my league. I'm now one person short for the achievement, and its an easy 115GS if another person does join. If you're interested, the tourney is called 'borandi' and the password is 'nhl'. I'll happily join yours to help you get the achievement. Apart from that, this game requires me to 'Play with every team', 'Win 30 games online', 'Quit 10 games online', and to 'Win 100 games'. One achievement is glitched, so 950GS is the max score for this game.

I purchased Skate while my UK 360 was broke, only to find that it didnt work in my US 360. Now, I can play it, and it's quite fun. Difficult, but fun. I've played someway into the story, and done ~50 matches online. I also managed to get the 3 wins in a row achievement, thanks to some deathracing. What I think is great about this game is that you can get 10 achievements, and still only have 50GS. This is for the easy stuff, like 'Upload a video', etc. I'll try hard to do as well as I can on this game - with any luck, persistence will be rewarded.

I also picked up GH2 second hand from a friend who didnt want it any more. With my new skill (and persistance on 'Cult of Personality' on GH3), I tackled Hard mode on GH2 with ease - until 73% of the way through Freebird! However, I got the achievement for all the extra costumes, thanks to some money for going through Hard and someway through Expert. This let me get the 1* badge for music on 360voice ;)

I spent the early part of the week pummeling though WarTech. I came across a hitch - two characters come across the most evil boss in their story modes. I can't defeat it with either one of them, but I was able to get the other 6 story modes done, as well as all 8 characters score attack modes (as boss battles are not a factor in that mode). Along with that, I managed to find one (1) person online to battle with. I won with ease, which I thought was strange, until I saw my opponents win loss record - 0-117. He didnt put up much of a fight, so I'm wondering why he wasnt attacking that much. Nevertheless, that one fight got me an achieve worth 100GS. I'm not complaining!

The game this week on XBLA was Rez HD. I missed out on Rez when it appeared on the Dreamcast, and everyone I knew who had it said it was great. So 800MS points later, I picked it up. Rez is a short game - it can be completed in ~80 minutes. I got to the final boss with maximum lives and died though. I got achievements for doing the first four stages, and hopefully someone will post a guide soon to get the rest.

I also picked up Spyglass Board Games for 400MS points. I needed some points for the 2* Social badge on 360 voice, and looking at the achievement guides, this old game seemed to be quite easy. It was - one hour got me 115GS and all the offline achievements. No-one plays this online, so I'll find a boosting partner for the rest.

I also got back to LMA Manager 07 - the game which ended my UK 360 last time. Easy enough, I finished that season I had started. Now, 4 seasons remain for that full 1000GS. Each season takes ~5hrs to do, so one weekend I'll finish this one.

GamerScore: 70,382 -> 71457
Zone: Pro

Completed XBLA: 15 / 44
Completed Retail: 34 / 158
GS Completion %: 42.58% -> 42.87%

Country Rank: 142 -> 137
World Rank: 910 -> 905
Completion Rank: 2,007 -> 1,954

Extra note - Phantasy Star Universe, a game in which I have 1000GS, has now released some extra DLC for some extra achievements. Three downsides to this - extra content costs 1600/2000 MSPs, requires online play (9GBP/mo), and my completed retail score will go down next week. Damn. I liked PSU, but this is annoying.