The Daily Grind - Day Nine

Swear its getting harder to wake up in the morning, anyway good morning all,

Its a beautiful day today and a good day for gaming, to be honest I don't expect a massive gaming today. You see tomorrow will be four years with my lovely girlfriend and of course we both working, so we celebrating tonight and going to the restaurant we had a are first anniversary date. Add in I'm working this morning leaves me with little time, well I might have a few hours between both events so I will try and get some Resistance in and hopefully Warcraft! that time card was a waste.

So before I head off to work, seems the PlayStation Store is back! of course with plenty of error messages lol. Did have a quick nose and found that Burnout Paradise and Streets of Rage 2 are free for PlayStation Plus members so put those two on download, stopped looking after that since the error messages timed me out of the store. Will try again when I get back in.

That's it really for this morning, I better go grab my bag and head to work. See you all later!

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Afternoon, currently chilling and having a cuppa. Got to love this time year, the few days before E3 are always packed with announcements and hundreds of rumors go flying around the net. So this time got a few more trailers, Darkness 2 which looks amazing and makes me want to go back and finish the first one. Quite a few nice killer moves using the darkness this time around, just watch the trailer below to see what I mean.

Saints Row the Third as another teaser trailer, got to say the second one I found quite fun. It wasn't trying to be too real just a laugh and it did it well, course never finished it like most of my games but it's still on the list to go back too one day. Once I do that I might pick up the this one too, hopefully see some game play next week for it.

Blimey there still more information coming through on twitter, seriously wished it would stop! too many games! lol Right GAME is giving away artwork cards for Gundam Dynasty Warriors 3, sweet!!! ok better go order myself one. Said before I'm a huge fan of the warriors series and I love Gundam, one of my favourite anime. Be right back!

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And that's that sorted, got myself a drink while I was pre-ordering. ohhh my mate adwil24 just posted up something about an Uncharted 3 collectors edition. Hmm he's sent a screenshot from his phone, ohhh figurine and nice box and a necklace?? ok going to go look through the net for details so be right back again!

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Ok the details are over on IGN.com and it looks good, get the figurine of Drake. Necklace/ring and replica belt buckle, steel book case and a travel box to store it all in. Also listed is the pre-order bonuses for America but hopefully get all get that over here too, fingers crossed for an announcement soon.

Oh that reminds me, have you seen the launch trailer for Duke Nukem ?? looks awesome! seriously thinking about getting it thanks to the trailer. I've signed up the first access club so hopefully get the demo code soon to try it out, if you not seen the trailer then just check out below!

Right time for some gaming, well first try out the PlayStation store again to get some downloads on the go then onto Resistance 2. Which by the way is a lot better then first one so far, graphics have been improved a lot and it just feels more smoother. Loving the story so far and really getting into it

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Well just got back in and spending the rest of the evening watching a film, but before I go there as been several new announcement's again. THQ announced an arcade game Warhammer 40,000 Kill Team, looks like you control two space marines and taking on a ork hulk. Love the stompa boss at the end of the trailer

There is a few more stuff been announced but going to save it for tomorrow morning, will add it to day ten. Take care all and have a good night, again thanks for reading

~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Eight

Morning one and all,
Been relaxing all morning so time for some posting that I promised. As I said in yesterday's post there was quite a bit of stuff announced through out the day which I did not get chance to talk about so going to spend the time now going through it.

First up a teaser trailer appeared yesterday morning for Starcraft 2 Heart of the Swarm! and then found out there is a game play video as well for two of the campaign missions. Below is the teaser that was posted up, cannot wait!

Right going to take a few minutes to watch the game play since I've not seen it myself yet then will post it up here.

Wow it looks awesome and reminds me I need to finish Starcraft 2, good thing I've heard this is not out until next year. Anyway here is the game play trailer below and the official website link

Starcraft Preview Official Blizzard Website


Also the Sony fans are happy that a leak of Syphon Filter 4 came out, never played one to be honest and guessing its good since of the amount of fans. Shocked got leaked though, well actually I'm not but with days away from E3 you would think they would be a bit better with keeping the lids shut on announcements.

Speaking of Sony they did update their blogs yesterday saying by the end of this week the network store should be up along with all missing network features, and voucher codes will be emailed for the welcome back pack. No doubt the store will be inaccessible since everyone will be rushing on lol

Also it seems they going to be doing quite a lot of E3 stuff in the PlayStation Home(video streams etc), might check it out this year since you meant to be able to get some goodies for your avatars. Don't think I've evern been Home yet lol, should be a good experience to see.


Ah now here is something you might be interested in, Call of Duty Elite trailer. A video was put together by Activision to show what's it all about and I got to say the trailer describes it a lot better then from what I've read about it. The stats pages does look very cool and having all the map packs would be handy, have to wait and see for more announcements next week.

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Sorry needed a cup of tea to keep me going, need to have at least 20 a day :-p

So where was I? oh yes talking about yesterday new releases/announcements. A new trailer as appeared for Lord of the Rings War in the North, again not seen it myself yet so going to watch it now.

WOW!! I don't understand why I've not been keeping an eye on this game, it looks outstanding. Check this bad boy out and I need to find the release date for this game

More The Lord of the Rings: War in the North Videos

No date yet which is shame, hopefully next week will see an announcement for it. Dang that looks awesome, going to add that to the list of games.

Anyway there is still more to come, as I said yesterday was just madness with the announcements. Think E3 just started early to be honest with the amount of stuff. So next up is a Square Enix game for the 3DS, Heroes of Ruin. Band of heroes doing the box standard questing (cross between RPG and action adventure) but the game will be using streetpass a lot, it will allow you to trade items with other players and there will be daily challenges for more rewards and game play. Check out ign.com chat with the developers about the game, could be good I guess and the 3DS does need some more games.

Finally the last news for yesterday was the L.A.Noire Rockstar Pass details, you can now download it for 800 Microsoft points and it gives you access to several suits and all the pre-order bonuses that where being handed out. To be honest its a good value for what you getting, here is the link to shopto news page that covers what is included in the pass. Need to play the game first before I pick this pass up


So that was all the announcements yesterday and you can see why I did not stay up last night to add them to yesterdays daily grind, took me nearly an hour to write that up but then again I did keep getting distracted with all the nice trailers. So going to take a five minute break then start today's writing and getting on with some gaming!

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Right seems the PlayStation network is going down for maintenance tonight, maybe the store tomorrow then??? would make sense to be honest. Also before I forget this morning I found a e-mail in my inbox for the trailer for the Trooper Class in Star Wars Old Republic. They look pretty sweet and I'm pretty torn on what to play when this game comes out.

http://www.swtor.com/media/trailers/trooper-progression

Ohhh I knew I forgot something in the announcements section, if you into World of Warcraft did you see MMOChampion post about the new pvp mounts and some of the firelands mounts. They look awesome! check them out here


Right sorry that's it now for announcements, well until the twitter goes crazy with more news. So back to the important matter at hand, whats next on my play list since I've finished my Lego rental.

Well this year as quite a few sequels coming out and I've still not finished the prequels yet, for example Resistance 3 is coming out and Ive done the first one few months back but still got the second one to do. Uncharted 3 at the end of the year and I've not even touched the first one, not even picked up the second one yet since I've not played the first. Elderscrolls Skyrim takes place right after Oblivion which again I've played but always get side tracked, need to sit down for a few weeks and finished that bad boy.

So I'm thinking this what I need to do, finish this prequel games first so I'm ready for the new releases, as I said at the start of the year I do not want 2011 to be another shame pile. I want to get most of the games that come out this year that I pick up completed and so far I'm doing rubbish. But at the same time there is quite a few old games I really want to play right now and some of the new releases this year are sitting on my desk that I want to play as well.

You know what, new challenge! I'm going to set myself a summer challenge to finish all the prequels and some of the games I want to play right now by the end of this summer. If I do this it will knock a dent in that pile of shame I've got, get me ready for the new releases and knock my 2011 completion rate up as well. So it's settled then, just need to sort out what games will be in this challenge so be right back.

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Ok here we go...

Summer Classics Challenge

End Date: 31st August 2011
Goal: To finish the 2011 prequels I've got sitting in my pile of shame and to complete several old/new games that are tempting me to play.
The Games:

1. Resistance Fall of Man 2 - Ready for the 3rd this September
   
2. Uncharted - Ready for the 3rd this November
   
3. Uncharted 2 - Need to buy it first and only if I enjoy Uncharted 1
4. Elderscrolls Oblivion - Ready for the 5th this October/November
5. Starcraft 2 - Ready for the 2nd in the trilogy next year
6. Assassin's Creed Brotherhood - Ready for Revelations
   
7. Dawn of War 2 Retribution - Only got three races campaigns left to finish
8. Fable 3 PC - Been wanting to play it since it came out
9. Bulletstorm PC - Again for some reason I've really wanted to play it again on the PC
10. Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 - With all the marvel movies out really wanted to finish this
11. Crysis 2 - I got into it and I really want to finish it
12. God of War 1 & 2 - The hd remakes have been sitting there since I had them with 3, time to finish
13. Killzone 2 - I never finished this in time for 3, tried twice to get in so determined to finish it!
    
14. Killzone 3
    

So there we go, fourteen games waiting to be finished and Oblivion it self could take up the whole summer lol. Let's not forget I will be still getting rentals sent and new releases over the next few months, should be good to see how this turns out. By the way loyal readers if you got a shame pile why not join in and set yourself a goal this summer to finish some of those games.

Now I think it's time to actually do some gaming finally today, first I'm going to give L.A.Noire a little try since I've not opened it and I want to make sure I will like the game. If I don't I can trade it in and still get an high value back for it.

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Very impressive, going to stop now since I don't want to get into it just yet but looks like it will be a good game.

I think I'm going to start Resistance Fall of Man 2, I'm in the mood for a shooting game right now. Something easy to jump into with out too many complicated buttons or things to remember.

Well I'm stuck on a update for the game which is taking forever *Sigh* in the mean time I'm currently catching up on the blogs I follow.

Finally installed, time to play some Resistance!

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Well I'm back, its 11.24pm and I'm very tired thanks to work. I only had time earlier to do the first prologue level then had to get myself ready and leave. But once again I come

back to a few more announcements, first up is THQ announced Darksiders 2 which could be very cool. I kinda did like the first one but I really did not give it enough time (like most games) so could do with going back and playing it again.

The second one will not be out until next year and takes place with the brother Death trying to prove War's innocence, so the game runs parallel with the first one story wise.

Next up on the announcements is a trailer for Starhawk showing a eight vs eight game between the designers and artists. Got to say I'm impressed with it, I like the idea you can build the base up as you playing to combat with whats going on in the game. Could be a buy this time around unlike its a previous Warhawk game. Will be keeping an eye out for this in the streams next week

Well that's it for the current announcements, so I'm going to go and play a quick level of resistance then hit the sack. Will catch you all tomorrow and expect another long post since I hear Konami as a pre-E3 conference tomorrow so no doubt something to talk about. Anyway thanks for reading my madness and have a good one!

~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Seven

Good morning,
I'm not fully awake yet since I stayed up late to finish my book, was worth it though. Anyway seems I've woke up to some news, got to admit shopto.net news section is doing really well so far.

So the first news is that some information as arrived on the premium call of duty online service, named Call of Duty Elite. Got to say what was listed did not really sound like it was the worth the money, more stats and join groups based on same interests??? detailed information on perks and weapons???is that it? was hoping for dedicated servers or extra modes or bigger maps with bigger teams (16 v 16). They better make it more appealing at E3 or it will just flop, check out the news post here at shopto.net

Second news is the dates for the Uncharted 3 beta, for PlayStation plus members or inFamous 2 pre-orders it starts on the 28th June and then 4th july for everyone else which then ends on July 13th. Few details as well, like two maps and what modes have been announced along with the perks, could be good so might give the beta a whirl. Again check out the full information here at shopto.net

That's it for the news and I'm now jumping back into Lego Star Wars.

Score! just finished a conquest level and noticed that twitter had several new messages so checked them out and it seems theres been a leaked poster for Samurai Warriors 3 Empires on PS3. Sweet!! love the Dynasty and Samurai Warrior games

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Just had an hour break, drinking tea and playing with the dogs since I'm dog sitting right now. Anyway time to jump back in and finish off a few more planets, think I got like 7-8 to do then I've finished the separatists side. Just realised I missed a few republic levels since they where given at the start but still have to conquer them to get the 100% trophy.

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Think this is the last level for the Separatist side, well I hope so anyway! While I was gaming my twitter feed as gone crazy with lots of new announcements. What's with today? everyone seems to what to announce something, hope they saving stuff for E3 next week.

Ok maybe not, I've got three levels to do well one now since I just did the other two. Every time I finish a level I find another one.

Hooray! got the trophy finally, so just need to mop up the missing conquest levels on the republic side and then the space battles, which then I think that's it for the platinum trophy. Right going to make a list of all the planets that I've completed (space battle and both conquests on them) so far, I know there should be 16 systems so this should make my life a little easier.

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Done 6 systems so far and got to stop for the time being, work is having problems so got to go in early. So see you all later and I will post the details for all the new stuff that got announced earlier that Ive not talked about yet.

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Well I'm finally back and its only 11pm...*Sigh* still going for another system or two though, I am on 97.5% completion so cannot resist.

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three systems to go!!!

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woot! got the stealth wealth trophy which all the gold bricks now (all of conquest and space done), so time to sort out the last few missing trophies. First up I need to build the gold ship using the gold bricks which should be the last vehicle missing.

Done and now got the 100% completion trophy, so just missing two trophies now. Which should be the 50 radio uses and 3 arcade modes won in a row which should not take too long.

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oh sweet the radio trophy unlocked during the last arcade battle, very convenient. hmmm strange, arcade mode is done but still no platinum, dang missing a hidden trophy...time to load up a trophy guide site to see whats missing.

There we go, uh-oh trophy which is to use the force to take over a super droid and have it destroy 50 droids. According to the guide the best place is to replay the ambush level, time to load it up!

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woot done!! only needed ten droids, so I'm now the proud owner of the Lego star wars clone wars platinum trophy. Also can now send this rental back finally, it's only took me nearly a month to get through this game lol

Very happy gamer but going to call it a night since I'm total drained, tomorrow I will post all the announcements I did not cover earlier and the ton from a few minutes ago as well. Things should be getting back to normal now that rental is out the way. I have the morning off and work isn't until mid afternoon so I think I will do several posts to catch up. Anyway have a good one folks and thanks for reading

~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Six

Hello all,
Well I'm in the middle of getting ready for work and dreading it, bank holiday Monday/pay weekend for most and start of half-term. Least at the end of the shift get to see Hangover Part 2 with the girlfriend and get some gaming in on the evening/night.

Anyway I was packing my work bag found my 3DS in there with the battery dead again, forgot to check it on Friday night. Really need to get back into checking it for street passes after work then turn it off to save the battery life. Just checking Fridays stats now, lol two again and both the stores DS's. Some stats for my ds...

StreetPass Hits: 149
Plaza Population: 74

Still no puzzle pieces, dang it! really want to get some of these puzzles done without resorting to using my coins. Woot! the ultimate ghost is dead and my second play through of Street Quest is done. Love the credits showing all the heroes who took out the creatures, says the rooms cleared was 12 and met 86 heroes which sounds right since had to spend a ton of coins to get a white shirt hero to do the light spell. No one seems to like the colour white in my area

ohhh ultimate helmet is the reward and shaped like the ultimate ghost face! says I've finished and collected all the hats. oh well still going to do a third play through, reset and time for work so see you all later.

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Hello all, first before I get into any gaming I must say GO SEE HANGOVER PART 2!. What a film and now back to the normal madness of my gaming life.

So I just took a quick look at the blogspot stats for this site and I got page views in Romania! Germany and USA ... wow I feel popular, hope you enjoying the blog and would love to hear any thoughts or just general comments on your gaming life's.

Anyway I'm jumping back into Lego again since I'm determined to get this game finished by the end of the week.

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If I'm seeing this right I've only got two more planets to finish off in conquest mode for the republic, that is awesome!

Actually scratch did them in ten minutes so just got the admiral trophy, that was quicker then I thought. Going to start on doing the separatists side now.

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Starting to all come together now, just finished getting all the red bricks and it gave me enough trophies to hit Level 11 on my PS3 Profile. Anyway currently ending for the night and going to continue tomorrow, still quite a few conquest missions to do and then the space battles so maybe what two more days worth of playing then should be done hopefully.

Will be talking about my plans for my next games to play tomorrow so keep an eye out, anyway have a good one!

~Iznic

Just A Week Away Again

Welcome back to another edition of Just a Week Away. So onto the topic at hand, it seems someone decided that June should be the next huge release month with 10th June being the major day of the month. Already dreading it and don't think my bank account will cope with all this spending.

So what's coming out you ask? well let's begin this list...

Friday 3rd June

Hunted: The Demon's Forge
Have to admit this is looking pretty sweet so far, its a co-op dungeon action game. Think fantasy meets a shooter is the way they have been describing this game. Bascially you a mercenary team hired to discover the truth behind the disappearances of the lands villagers. The trailer looks good and with being able to do awesome co-op combat moves, the promise of a good co-op game and being able to make your own dungeon levels that can be shared I'm pretty much sold on this game.
GAME is also doing a special edition that's give two bonus levels (Assassins and Demons) and its the same price as the normal edition so think I will be going for this deal.

Friday 10th June

White Knight Chronicles II
Basically a japanese RPG, set one year after the first one which I've still not opened and just found out you get a copy of the first one remastered on the disk. Got to say watching the trailer the game graphics are pretty sweet, this is on my list to get but not sure yet if it will be a day one purchase yet.

Duke Nukem Forever
I've never played one before so I want to see what all the fuss is about, of course I'm not sure about a day one purchase. I do love my shooters but they have to be fun and have a good story to be day one pick ups, again though I have heard it's meant to be funny and a very good game. So in fact I can see it being either a sale item or rental, guess have to see closer to the date on what I do.

Red Faction: Armageddon
I loved the first Red Faction and really enjoyed the second one, but the last one did not really go down with me. Maybe I did not give it a big chance and I will try it again but this new one I'm really not sure about. Now adding in a horror alien theme just makes me think they trying to copy Dead Space, but least the game is going back towards more a shooter then open world. Probably be a rental at best unless something really amazing happens in the next few days.

inFamous 2
Super hero game, well anti hero. You get to choose to be good or bad with the choices you make in the game. Rental or sale pick up to be honest, don't get me wrong the idea behind the game series is pretty sweet and I love the cool powers and the choice to be good or bad in a open world. But the first game did not suck me in, it just got added to the pile after the first play session. Again maybe it was like Red Faction and I did not give it a fair shot and I will go back to it but I don't see a reason to pick up the second one on launch day.

White Knight Chronicles Origins
This as just appeared out of the blue without any word for me, basically its a PSP GAME and is set 10,000 years before the first one in the series. No difference really than the PS3 ones other then the story, so if I do pick up the second one I will get this one too. Although being on PSP pretty much guaranties it will be in the sale lol


Well that's the first two weeks covered and there's still more to come, stay tuned for another edition of "Just a Week Away"
~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Five

Morning all,
Been back for an hour but had a few things to sort before I started anything here. First up there was no post for yesterday since I did no gaming at all, so makes sense really. Since today is my only day off this week I've decided I'm going to be doing a ton of gaming, will be working on Lego Star Wars since I still want to finish it soon. Also want to put some time into World of Warcraft since that time card is just wasting away and finally tonight doing some multiplayer action with my mate Matt from work, no plans on what we playing yet though.

So let's kick this day off with some Lego action!

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Taking a small mini break to have a cup of tea, going good so far. I've done all the bounty hunter missions except one and about half way through the first story doing a 100% on free play. Don't think I will complete the game today but could get a good amount done hopefully.

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Roast dinner, second break time! doing well just got two more levels and the first story is finished. Picked up several more red bricks and got all the multipliers now and did some space battles for gold bricks. Still aiming for a good chunk of the game done by the end of the day

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Well its 4.10pm and I've just finished the first story to a 100%, took long enough and time for another break. Need a cuppa of tea to keep me going again.

While I was playing the playstation network login stopped and everyone started panicking, seriously people need to chill out. If it was bad they would say and people who where logged in would all be kicked. Anyway got my cuppa so going back to the game to start the second story, although first I need to look up that missing character for the bounty hunter missions so I can finish them.

Bail Organa, got to purchase him then the mission will unlock.

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Getting there, just finished the second story to 100% and its currently 7.30pm. I would say I've done well so far but going to continue, probably stop once I get hungry for tea. Right back to it!

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That was close! the page just came up with a error so copied the text over then it would not paste and thought I had lost the entire page again. Lucky the draft had saved an earlier version so was only just missing the entry I just made. Hope this won't keep happening, might have to work in word from now on and copy it over when its done.

Anyway basically its almost 9pm which is shocking on how long I've been going, so made myself a nice cheese sandwich since had a big lunch and breakfast. Also got myself another cup of tea, yes I'm British :p lol. Anyway I've got three missions left to finish all the stories, then three bonus missions to complete and so going to keep going.

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Well its almost 10pm and I've finally done all three stories to 100%, getting tired but not ready to give up yet. I'm determined to get as much as I can today done, so going to do the three bonus missions now.

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love the mini Lego Indiana Jones pit jumper game on the hostage level

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Finally 100% all the levels, time to do the mop up then its the long grind on conquest mode and space battles left.

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that's it for the night, its 11.40pm and I'm on 85% completed for the entire game. Really good run today, all the story done, most the characters unlocked, bounty hunter missions finished and most of the red bricks collected. Just have to mop up in the week now

Anyway thanks for the reading my madness and hopefully catch you tomorrow for another gaming session after work, won't be as long since going to see Hangover part 2 first :) anyway night all!

~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Four

Morning all,

Wow, I've made it to post no. 4 and I'm really shocked that I'm still sticking to this. Although the real test is this weekend, most weekends I spend at the girlfriends house. So between work, cinema, tv time and time with the girlfriend the weekend is pretty much a zero gaming time. I'm planning on taking my laptop with me so will try and keep this updated, might get some time to work on those blog posts I keep promising.

Anyway I've got an hour before work so going to do some Dragon Age Legends first, maybe even attempt Assassin's Creed Legacy again.

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Nice, Dragon Age as had a patch since there slight difference in the turn tiles etc but the awesome thing is two new character above level 20 to use. Sweet! Ok maybe not the new warrior sucks lol, just lost her in the first wave. Anyway better get my stuff ready since leaving in 40, once I'm packed will attempt assassin's creed.

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Hmmm that's not good, just went to grab a couple of DS games to take with me and found they missing, got the boxes but no cartridges. Phoenix Wright Trials and Tribulations and Mario VS Donkey Kong (first one). Better have a hunt for them when I get

Wow A.C. Legacy worked! did a few of the memories and really getting back into it. Hopefully it will work more often, will attempt their tech support again later and see if there is a reason for this no loading error.
Dang it, just remembered my 3DS again. Left it on sleep mode all night, better put some charge in it before I go to work and check out what street passes I got. Well I only got two hits which are the store copies, makes sense really since I was mostly doing tasks all day yesterday. But the good news is these two characters are max level so they should do some good damage against the final boss in the street quest game. Still no puzzles pieces, getting really hard to finish those off and only 20% health left on the boss

woot! hopefully today I can finish him later. Right time for work, so see you all later

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Ok I'm at the girlfriends and I might have spent a ton of money today, work had a lot of awesome bargains. First up I was able to get a Playstation Move bundle for £40.00, the controller, camera and the game Move Heroes which I thought was a bargain since the game is £40 itself (1,000 reward points as well on my card as well which is a £2.50 voucher). Then saw that Mindjack had been put into the deal of the week and was now £4.99, also another 1,000 reward card points too. Final deal was Yakuza 4 had dropped down to £16.99 and always wanted to try this series, again another 1,000 reward points for my card. So yeah I might have spent a bit, then got Bulletstorm PC for £13.99 from HMV which has achievements that stack along with the Xbox version so I could not resist.

Oh yeah! my mate found one! play.com is doing the replica retro lancer!!! not just any lancer its gold plated!!! oh my god!!! seriously bouncing off the walls right now. Put my pre-order down for one a few minutes ago, it costs £69.99 which is a bargain in my mind since I thought they would try for £100. September is going to be ace!

So yeah I've spent a lot today and increased my gaming s

hame pile by a lot, think I need to get that rental game finished soon so I can start clocking some of them. Anyway I'm cutting it short with today's post since I'm going to go watch a film with the girlfriend. Have a good one all and thanks for reading my madness.

~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Three

Morning all,
Bit later on today than normal but since I've got work this evening I let myself sleep in then chilled out by finishing one of the books I was reading. Will be on and off gaming today since I got a lot to catch up on, since for the last two weeks I've been busy and lazy at the same time so left myself with quite a few jobs.

Plans for today are Lego Star Wars again and to put some time into World of Warcraft since I've been wasting a time card, probably only used like four hours of it and I'm easily over the half way through it. Oh and yes the week away post is almost finished, did quite a bit last night and will finish it in a bit so I can post it up. So going to quickly pop on facebook and do some D.A.Legends and see if A.C. Legacy will work today, will write more in a bit.

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Well I'm back for a quick write up, A.C. Legacy still won't load up so forget it. But did get a few battles done on D.A.Legends so I'm happy there. Going to get on with some of my jobs then come back later for some gaming but before I do that, I did just see some surprising news on facebook.

One of the sites I follow have posted the Ghost Recon Future Soldier box cover they took off the xbox.com website, at the top is a Kinect Support line! Was not expecting that one bit, would be sweet to finally have a big name title using Kinect. Guessing the reason for the delay of the game would be to add that feature and maybe Move Support on the Playstation version?

Food for thought, anyway I'm off for a bit so catch you all later

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Just got in from work and now cooking myself some time, so you probably wondering what happened to the entries for earlier today after doing my jobs? well so am I. I typed up two huge paragraphs before I left for work and saved it in my drafts but come back to only find this mornings stuff and all my afternoon stuff missing. Very annoyed!

So I better do a quick summary, there was no gaming! basically my one small job took all afternoon and was left with less than hour before work. Tried to do a level in Lego Star Wars but ran out of time. Other then that, all I talked about was raptr.com have a new site which looks pretty sleek! course its now fully working yet which was annoying with adding game time (have to go to old.raptr.com).

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Right just finished my tea and now checking out the big news that I missed while at work, first up seems Assassin Creed Revelations as a teaser trailer so be right back so I can watch it.


Not bad for a teaser trailer, looking forward to the full trailer in a few weeks. More impressed with the screenshots though, made the above my desktop background.

Ok the next and final big thing is the announcement of Resistance Fall of Man 3 coming out on the 9th September and the announcement of the special edition/survival edition. So tempted but I just know its another £100 collectors edition and its what a week or two just after Deus EX (another £100 collectors edition). Also add in Gears of War 3 Epic Edition for £100 at the end of September too, dang it! but it looks awesome! *sigh*

The special edition will come with the following goodies:
* Steel book case
* Vinyl looking Disk
* Chimera Teeth Necklace (yes one you can wear!)
* Multiplayer bonuses (skins, head start, grenades etc)

Then the Survivor Edition comes with all the above and a resistance bag, deck of playing cards, journal, hip flask, chimera target range poster and toy soldiers. I want it!

All I need now is for the Assassin Creed Revelation special edition to be announced and the Call of Duty, then I can official say I'm broke for the year. Well it's quite late but going to try and do at least one level of Lego so I've done something today.

--------------------------------------------

Dog is being sick so pretty much zero time on lego so far, this day is really not turning out well so far. But did get two more levels done and unlocked half dozen more characters, should have all the different types I need now. Anyway calling it a night since its 12.30am and it's been along day.

thanks for reading another post of my madness,
~Iznic

The Daily Grind - Day Two

Good morning all, its a lovely 7.45am and I'm in the middle of my morning cup of tea and about to leave for work soon. Thought I would get this post started so I can just jump into some gaming later on.

So last night before I did hit the sack, I found myself stumbling onto a few things. First up xbox360achievements.org go and show the new retro lancer replica for Gears of War 3, I want!!! really hope this one makes it across the sea this time because it looks amazing (See below).

Then got updated on twitter with a bargain of the week, HMV have dropped the price of Killzone 3 Helghast Edition to £35. I did not pick it up in the end since it was costing way too much on launch but now I think I will, although I do have a special copy on the side still sealed. Probably trade that in since I get it in the box too, bought the special edition thinking we would sell out like normal only to keep getting more copies in. Sod's law that, you don't buy it waiting for price drop and it sells out for good. You buy it on launch and it stays in stock!

Anyway while limited editions where on my mind I thought I would pop over to play.com, I never got the Assassin's Creed Brotherhood Codex Edition since the price was too high. Was glad I did not do it in the end, since all my mates that did order it sent it back at least once due to breakages in the post. So thought maybe there might be a small chance of a price drop and still in stock. Course not but worth a try, did stumble on a nice find though. Assassin's Creed Revelation Limited Edition, no details yet what you get but can pre-order and its going to cost £59.99. Hmmm might put a pre-order down for this later, will see!

Right I better go, meant to be leaving in four minutes! doh!

-----------------------------------------

And I'm back! actually I was back around three hours ago but I've been catching up on things before I sat down to begin any gaming. I know this seems weird having the entire entry on one page, I was going to split it and post it in sections for each day but I could see myself posting part one and not doing any more. So keeping it all in one post and having it saved in the drafts until the day is over which will then force me to post it and get it done!.

Anyway back to what's happened today, well not much really in the gaming area so skip that. I have come home to plenty of gaming news from the looks of twitter. Two sec's while I have a quick look through to see what's happening.

Warhammer 40,000 Space Marines limited edition announced? yes please! Wow it looks awesome, check out the image below
THQ have done one amazing job, you get a 10" Purity Seal, Gloss Hardback Artwork Book, game soundtrack and a pack of 25 character information cards. Of course the game as well in a premium collectors box. Ok I was sold just by looking at it but there is a pre-order bonus as well! ohhh work as the best one too. Got to love working for GAME, we getting the Elite Armour pack!! Space Wolves, Black Templar (yes!!!) Iron Warriors and Emperors Children armour skins. Thank you THQ and GAME! I be right back, going to go pre-order

-----------------------------------------

Done, although its listed as £79.99 which is quite high, so hoping a price drop before the release. Especially with it listed as August the same time as Deus EX which I have the big £100 collectors edition on order too lol going to be costly. Just had to twitter GAME as well since the pre-order bonus is only listed on the standard not the collectors, hopefully both will get it.

So I think its time to get some gaming on, going to do some Dragon Age Legends and Assassin Creed Legacy first then jump over to the Playstation 3 to work on my Lego Star Wars 3 rental. Should be a fun evening me thinks!

-----------------------------------------

Well Dragon Age was fun until my character got hit with paralysis meaning I could not fight/heal which happened to be the character who had the next three turns, giving the dark spawn 9 attacks against me wiping the entire team out. Just plain unlucky!
So stopped for now jumping onto Assassin Creed but that as already started playing up with the bugs, first cant click any buttons and cursor stuck on loading then on refresh keeps coming up with error. Oh wait! its working now hooray!

ah great first mission to give me a chance item and the cursor error pops up...*Sigh* this is why I did not play Legacy for months, all the bugs with no fixes in sight. So far on refresh no.6 and still won't load, starting to get real fed up with this game...ok I give up, refresh 11 would not work and their tech support web page is not loading. Go Ubisoft! time for a game that does work, going to play Lego Star Wars.

-----------------------------------------

Sweet, I've only got four more story levels to do then it's onto the collecting and free play stuff. My plan is to finish the rest of the story tonight at least, already got one red brick unlock to get the x2 studs. So hopefully can get the next one by the end of the night as well, should be a good trophy haul by the end of the night.

-----------------------------------------

Just taking a mini break for a drink since just finished the story missions, so thought I would order the Helghast edition while I got chance. Loaded the site page for it to only come up as £44.99 now, £10 increase since this morning so no thanks. Save my money for one of the new releases coming up in June. Not too gutted about it but slightly annoyed, oh well. So back to star wars, need to get this rental game done and dusted so I can send it back.

Score thanks to the story I've got enough stubs to buy the next red brick increasing the multiplier to x8 now in total for all studs i collect. With that i was able to quickly get enough to get the mini kit detector red brick, so I'm now ready to start doing the free play levels to 100%. Got to love the lego games, fun and easy :-)

-----------------------------------------

Just made a cup of tea to keep me going but will be ending my gaming session, I got a few posts I need to do for the blog that I keep saying I will do. I got the upcoming June games to talk about which starts next week, then I would like to do a update list of what I think is game of the year so far. Then finally a post about E3, what I'm hoping for etc. Its been a good night anyway and I've unlocked quite a few red bricks, characters and finished the story so I'm pleased. Earned about six trophies as well so not bad at all.

So that's it for this entry, cheers for reading my madness!

~Iznic


P.S. GAME did get back to me and confirmed the pre-order bonus will be with the collectors edition

The Daily Grind - Day One

Captain's Log, star date 24 05 2011 ... oh wait wrong thing!

So my first Daily Grind post and I got to say I'm slightly nervous which is a bit strange since its a blog post. I was planning to do the first post tomorrow since only just put up the Prologue to this idea and its 9pm so most of the day is gone but thought what the heck, let's dive in.

It's been a crazy day for gaming for me, this morning i had a small amount of time to get ready before work and spent it watching the new Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 trailer. Now that's a game to be excited about, the fights look huge and love the London/Paris fights scenes. Also really hyper about the underwater scene in the tube, in fact I'm hyper about the whole thing. Looks amazing and if it stays like this then I can see it being a good contender for my game of the year. Really cannot wait to play the campaign as well, the last few I've really enjoyed and I do love a good story. So with E3 is in twelve days I'm hoping we get to see a lot more details about this. For those who have not seen the trailer (where you been?) you can play it below.

Back to the day, I was lucky enough to get a cool Battlefield 3 poster today and a Dragon Quest VI poster (see below). Both look amazing and I'm sucker for promo stuff, by the way if you work for a gaming company and want to send me some promo stuff please do :-D love t-shirts, posters, lanyards ... hell anything lol


By the time I finished work you can imagine I was hyper for all the new releases, going to be one hell of a Christmas this year. In fact I need to do some posts on upcoming games again since June is full of new releases I want. Anyway back to the rest of the day which was pretty quiet, played a small amount of time on facebook.

Love Dragon Age Legends, got into it to get the unlocks for Dragon Age 2 but for some reason I cannot stop playing it after I got them all. Its a fun game and this how I expect browser games to be. The other game is Assassins Creed Legacy, I'm enjoying it but finding it slightly hard to get into. The story is not gripping me and that's the one thing I like about most games, but it keeps drawing my back so it's doing something right.

Other then that I've pretty much done nothing else, I have had a rental game to work on which is Lego Star Wars 3 Clone Wars for the Playstation 3. I've had it to get the platinum trophy but not played it since it arrived really, which was back at the start of may. But think the reason I've not worked on it is that I've got this huge pile of games to play and I keep thinking I should work on one those instead, then spend ages wasting time trying to decide on which one to play. Going to have to come up with a plan to get through this pile, and I will work on listing everything soon so when I say a pile you will understand what I mean.

Anway think I'm going to call it a night so to speak, clear some of my mess in my room and do some upcoming posts on here and start fresh tomorrow. Thinking clock Lego first since its costing me to rent it then focus on some of the easier games so I can trade them in once I've finished them, but decide tomorrow on any plans. So that's it for now, signing out for this entry


Have a good one!
~Iznic

P.S. Told you it was madness and random ramblings!

The Daily Grind - Prologue

Ok let's jump back in time to last Sunday, I found myself spending a good part of the morning chatting with a mate of mine on twitter. He was kind enough to make me aware of the lovely 10th June which is turning out to be like last April/March with a ton of games coming out, so once again my bank account will be broke from the looks of it. During this conversation we also spoke about old games and the piles of shame that have been building up. Course everyone that knows me, knows I buy a ton of stuff and never play them. So that night I finally sat down and finished the last six to seven levels of Spiderman Shattered Dimension, was quite please with myself in fact for finally getting around to it.

Anyway on Monday I thought about doing a daily blog post, in this post I would talk about everything that happened that day to do with gaming. It would stay in my drafts and through out the day keep being added too until that night, which would then see it getting posted up.

In the day I think a lot about gaming, plan what I'm going to play next or think about what could help me raise my gamerscore or give me more trophies. What games I need to play or finish, what can be traded in when finished and what would be kept and of course I keep my eyes open for news on upcoming games. Pretty much all of this never gets put into my blog, the goal of this blog was for me to write down my adventure and yet the posts usually sound like this "played lego this week and finished it, was awesome". Then maybe a review several months later for the game which mediocre at best.

So that is why I've come up with this "The Daily Grind" posts, it will talk about everything and show you a inside look into my madness. And maybe with everything being written down I just might push myself to complete more!

PSP Remaster

Now I'm excited about this, Sony have announced today they doing PSP Remaster. Basically they will be bringing over to the PS3 classic PSP games in full HD, Dualshock support and of course exclusive features for the PS3. This sounds awesome and I love the fact they announced Monster Hunter 3rd will be one of the first games, really cannot wait to play Monster Hunter in full HD on the big screen. Nice thing too is that the saved file can be shared between the PS3 and the PSP, so you can continue your game on the go.

I'm looking forward to seeing what else they will bring out, fingers crossed for the PSP God of War's!




Source: Pushsquare.com

Review: Lego Pirates of the Caribbean

I think this year we are being spoilt for Lego games, barely a month ago we had the new Star Wars Clones Wars and now Pirates of the Caribbean (also got the second Harry Potter by the end of the year).

So this time we are jumping into all four films of the Pirates of the Caribbean series and I got to say it's spot on. I loved every minute of this game, they got Jack Sparrow perfect especially with his trade mark run and got to love when he accidentally hits a female character and gets slapped for it.

There are few new changes which are pretty sweet, first off by holding down Y or Triangle you can select any character you have unlocked (in the hub or free play) which I found great. Saved me so much time from having to keep running to a station to change characters. Of course there a few things changed just for this game, instead of red bricks you got red hats, liked that touch. Also for collectibles you got ships in a bottle (instead of mini kits) and Jacks compass, now this was a very nice touch. Basically using a jack character you could use his famous compass to find several treasure items on each level, the items can only be found in certain areas. When you in that area you can select it with the compass there a tree map line will appear on the floor which you follow until you find the X. I loved that, its just a quick simple collectible thrown in but it was really cool.

The only downside I found the game quicker to finish, but since I've played all the Lego games I can understand it would be quicker since I know what I'm doing. According to Raptr.com it only took me 20 hours where the rest usually take me 30+.

So overall I would give it full scores! I recommend this game to anyone who loves Lego, Pirates of the Caribbean, wants a easy 1,000 gamerscore/platinum trophy. Hell its a fun game, just go play it and you won't regret it.


Lego Pirates of the Caribbean (Xbox 360)
Score: 10 out of 10
Gameplay: Good
Graphics: Good
Story: Good
Length: Decent
Controls: Good

Afternoon

Been doing a few small changes here and there on the site, added a new banner which I know is a bit rubbish but it will do for the time being until I get some more time to make a nicer one. I still got plans to change the blog layout and colour design, but that won't be happening yet since I rather get some more time for posting first.

So anyway how's things for everyone? got any nice cool games? L.A. Noire is out this week along with a good line up as well (No More Heroes, Dragon Quest VI, Fable 3 PC etc.). Picked up a few myself but not had chance to try them out and yes my gaming pile as grown to a even worse amount. In fact the other day I finally opened all the parcels that have been left on the floor since Christmas, not only have I filled all my shelving but now I've got a huge extra stack of games sitting in the corner of my desk. It's a constant reminder of what I've got to work on and that I need a huge holiday off from work so I can work on them lol

I have made a little progress this week with the completion of Lego Pirates of the Caribbean (full 1,000 gamerscore) and finished Brink story campaign on solo (was not a fan). Also clocked Fantastic Four finally a couple of weeks back, so overall I was doing pretty well and getting through my pile slowly.

Oh and before I finish this post, I was able to get all the retail unlocks in the Gears of War 3 Beta. One of the best betas I've ever done and now looking forward to playing multiplayer when it comes out (shocking to say I never play multiplayer with strangers on Gears, just private matches with mates).

Anyway that's it for now, give a shout with your updates!
~Iznic

Coming Soon Chart #2

Not many replies this time around, anyway since the lack of votes for the old list they have dropped to the bottom of the chart. The numbers [ ] represent their past chart place, red - means they dropped and green ^ means a rise in the chart.

That's it for now on the chart, hopefully next time more of you will take part

Coming Soon Chart

Date: Start of May 2011

1. Gears of War 3 / Lego Pirates of the Caribbean
2. Batman Arkham City [3^] / Splinter Cell HD Trilogy
3. Mass Effect 3 [2-] / No More Heroes (PS3)
4. Battlefield 3 [1-]
5. Super Mario 3D [2-]
6. Infamous 2 [3-]
7. Sony NGP (Console) [4-] / Uncharted 3 [4-]



No Longer On the Chart
[2] Portal 2 (released)

Time to update the chart

Couple of weeks back I asked you guy's what you looking forward too and created a coming soon chart, well it's time for a update! Games come out, new trailers get released so people do change their mind.

So again I ask you what are the top three games/consoles you looking forward too? rank them 1-3 with the first one being the most you look forward too.
Here is my little list
1 - Gears of War 3
2 - Batman Arkham City
3 - Mass Effect 3

Quick Post

Sorry for the lack of posting guys but I've pretty much been stuck in a loop, sleep - eat - work - game - repeat. I'm pretty much nearly burned myself out with gaming thanks to several events, all of which decided to all be at the same time.


Basically got two gaming events going on right now, the Gears of War 3 Beta and the Spring Event for Phantasy Star Universe. Both end next week and both I didn't do anything of for the first few weeks meaning now all my time is being spent on them.

I am enjoying the Gears beta, I don't really do public multi player much but this time around I'm finding myself really enjoying it. I do see myself playing this a lot when the retail version is released. Just need to clock some more matches so I can get all those nice unlocks for the main game, should be able to do it all in time (I hope).

Phantasy Star? well the event basically as reduced the dlc bosses levels down so I decided to give it ago, paid for my first month and jumped in. Heard it can be a pain at the start but a lot of achievement hunters said that they where able to do it all in a few hours thanks too help from friendly high level players. Well I met a nice level 51 who got me the first two achievements (one of the hardest ones as well :-D) then the next three days went to hell, no help after hours of asking and the solo level grinding was horrible/painful. The game does not like new players and espically ones who have never played a Phantasy Star before.

It was pretty much all thanks to this game that nearly burned me out and so decided I could not do it anymore. So I just cancelled my subscription and thanks to a very nice customer support rep, I've also got refunded the remaining time I had left. Happy days!


So that's my week and half, I've done nothing else and way behind on well ... everything lol so again sorry guys. I will be updating over the weekend and most of next week, until then hope you having more fun and getting plenty of gaming done!

New Assassin Creed Game?

Very excited now, even if its a rumor! just noticed on xbox360achievements.org news feed that there might had been a leak on the Assassin Creed Facebook page for the next game.

Basically all they know so far is that its called Assassins Creed Revelations and could star Altair again, maybe like Brotherhood is basically for Ezio. Course all rumors and could be a prank like X360A said but still, got my fingers crossed. No doubt we will see some news in the next few months with E3.

That reminds me, I need to finish off Brotherhood so better put that at the top of games to play.




Source: Xb0x360achievements.org

Some more future games

One of are regular readers (Lesley) kindly brought this to my attention yesterday. Binary Domain: The machine Age Has Begun, very amazing looking game and done by Sega. Watching the trailer I did see a few scenes that remind me of Vanquish though lol.

Second game was reported by shoptonews.net (shopto.net gaming news site), basically a 3DS game called Beyond the Labyrinth a dungeon RPG. Looks a lot like Ico which if its true then this could be one hell of a game, now on my radar too :) check out the link above for shopto's page on what they found out.

Well that's it for this post, if find any more games give a shout.

Coming Soon Chart #1

Well it's the very first Coming Soon Chart for this site (well technically I did do it for the Brotherhood site before the merge but you know what I mean). Did not get as many replies that I had hoped, come on readers reply! lol so anyway this is what people are looking forward too right now.

Coming Soon Chart

Date: End of April 2011

1. Battlefield 3
2. Mass Effect 3 / Super Mario 3D / Portal 2
3. Batman Arkham City / Infamous 2
4. Sony NGP (Console) / Uncharted 3

Battlefield seems the most popular this time with two votes, followed by quite a list of games to be honest. Anyway next voting will be start of May and hopefully more of you will take part, until then have fun everyone!

Finally Can Post

Finally!!!

Sorry folks I did try to bring quite a few posts today but for some reason I got hit with a ton of 404 Errors which meant I could not edit pages or make posts. Now that's it back up I've just had time to do the few updates to the site design I wanted to get out of the way (Patch 1.1.1) and my 2011 stats have been updated as well.

Will over the next few days catch up with the posts I've got planned but for tonight this is it, sorry!

Hope everyone is been having a good time and got lots of gaming in. Also hope you not been hit too hard with the PSN down age, hopefully there's a bright light at the end of this tunnel for both us and Sony.

Anyway catch up with you all later

What are you looking forward too?

When "Brotherhood of Gaming" website was running, this feature was quite popular with everyone who visited the blog. Basically I was interested in hearing what people where looking forward too, you simply reply with the top three games you looking forward too (did allow new consoles to be included as well). With this info I had a mini chart listing the most popular games. So I thought why not start it again with you guys, hopefully it will get some of you readers commenting :-p no reason to be scared, I won't bite

So either comment here or over on the facebook page the three games/consoles you looking forward too the most, also put them in order as well please. Oh and expect me to be asking quite often, games come out, new things get announced and of course people change their minds.

For me it would have to be the following
1. Mass Effect 3
2. Battlefield 3
3. Sony NGP

Patch Notes

You will now find at the bottom of the page on the right the blog patch notes, it will show the current version and a nice little link to the patch notes page. Here you will find the list of changes to the site and when it was done, know it's probably boring to most but it will be listing any changes I do. So any new pages added or taken away, colour changes, or anything new completely will be listed here and the date it happened.

Get Mass Effect 2 Free

The lovely people over at Bioware are giving away Mass Effect 2 (PC edition) for free if you have bought Dragon Age 2. All you got to do is go onto their offer page found below this sentence and follow the instructions given.

Offer page link


It's really easy, all you do is register your online code for Dragon Age 2 (black emporium) then play a game of Dragon Age 2, this will log everything on the EA servers. Then you just type that online code into the offer page and it will generate the code for your copy of Mass Effect 2. Put that code into the EA Download Manager and start downloading, all done!

Just to warn you it is a 11gb download so get cracking! and the offer ends 30th April 2011

Upcoming Games Part Two

As I mentioned in my last post the last few weeks have seen an increase of new trailers, announcements etc and so here is part two of some of the titles I'm keeping my eye on.

Asura's Wrath by Capcom
It looks interesting and that boss battle with the guy bigger then the world could be sweet, reminds me a lot of Devil May Cry or God of War style. Hopefully will see a lot more footage at E3 this year and some proper game play stuff as well.

Source: thanks to xbox360achievements.org and capcomunityvideos youtube channel


Dragon's Dogma by Capcom
Capcom seem to be turning out the games in the bucket loads. This one looks amazing just a shame its not out until 2012, basically a mysterious dragon is terrorising the land and you been tasked to take it out. You be controlling a party of three on your journey while fighting plenty of monsters and critters on the way. The trailer looks amazing and i love the griffin fight, this is high up on my want list.

Source: thanks to pushsquare

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning
Another open world rpg that I have to say looks beautiful, the graphics stood out to me from the start and the combat system looks to be good if it stays like that. Not much information though on the story and that's one thing I like about my games, it needs a good story to keep me sucked in.

Source: thanks to xbox360achievements.org


So that's all of them guys, quite a few nice games have appeared and I've got a good feeling we will be seeing a lot more at E3. Any of these take your fancy? or have you found some more hidden treasures, looking forward to hearing your comments later.

Upcoming Games

Over the last few weeks there have been quite a few new trailers released, in fact there are quite few I did not know about until now. First up thanks to shopto.net, they posted up a new trailer for a 3DS game by Konami (makers of one of my favourite games Time Hollow), Doctor Lautrec and the Forgotten Knights. Yes it looks a lot like Professor Layton but it still looks amazing and well done but still no proper date just this summer so hopefully not too long of a wait.

Source: Trailer thanks to shopto.net


Next up again thanks to shopto.net is the game play trailer for Resistance 3, after playing the PSP retribution game and the first in the series (ps3) at the start of the year I have been waiting to see the third. The second in the installment is sitting on my shelf waiting to be played anyway back to the trailer, It looks good and could be a first day buy but I was shocked the release date is now September. Both Batman AC and Gears of War 3 are slated for then as well, so it could be a crowded launch and a later buy thanks to that which is a shame.

Source: Trailer thanks to sparkthesun youtube channel and shopto.net


Xbox360achievements.org have posted up a dev diary for the new Warhammer 40,000 console game Space Marines, a third person shooter which looks awesome. They really are trying to keep to the lore and I'm looking forward to jumping into the 40,000 universe, had in the fact it takes place on a forge world just makes it all the sweeter!

Source: trailer thanks to xbox360achievements.org


Well that's it for this post, there are few more trailers that I like but will post them at a later date. Got to admit this year is looking to be amazing for the gaming industry, just hope we have enough time to keep up with it (trying not to think of the back catalogue of games I've got to play lol).

Review: Ben 10 Ultimate Alien Cosmic Destruction

The things I play for achievements, basically welcome to the second Ben 10 game for the Xbox 360. A simple action and adventure game which has you battling several low level minions and complete several puzzles to move through the levels. Each level will also have a mini boss battle of some type then end the level facing one of the many villains from the show.

The achievements are quiet simple, finish a boss, finish a level and collectibles in every level. Of course they have thrown in there box standard achievements like get "x combo" and "destroy x amount of objects". I followed the lovely walk through guide over on Xbox360achievements.org to find the collectibles and they got a wonderful video on how to get the x100 hit combo, took a few goes but got it with no problem.

In fact I got the full 1,000 gamerscore in one play through, would recommend you trash everything in each level to collect the DNA points to upgrade your forms. This will also count towards the destroy object and DNA collector achievements.

The game is just ok, the story is very boring and you can skip the cut scenes with the B button. Game it self is quite easy to play, puzzles are not that hard and the controls are very simple as well. Hold down the left trigger will bring up the forms you can select and with the right analog you pick the one you want to transform into. Holding down the right trigger brings up the specials moves, just press either the A/B/X/Y buttons. Not many bugs, few clipping problems where I got stuck in a wall but nothing to warrant game breaking.

So overall I would recommend it if you got a kid that's into Ben 10 or if you after a easy 1,000 gamerscore/platinum trophy but don't expect anything amazing (best to rent it)


Ben 10 Ultimate Alien Cosmic Destruction (Xbox 360)
Score: 5 out of 10
Gameplay: Average
Graphics: Average
Story: Poor
Length: Decent
Controls: Average

Update

Thought I would throw in a quick update in between working on the site. Not really put much time into the consoles lately, the PC as took up most of my time playing Dragon Age Legends and RIFT. Just shortly after the last update I did I went and finished Lego Star Wars Clone Wars, got the full 1,000 gamerscore in it which was a nice boost and added another game to the completed list. Will try and get a review asap along with the other list of games I meant to be reviewing, very disorganised right now.

Of course since then I have picked up several more new releases so the completion percent is down in the dumps right now, really need to start clocking some more games. Only console game I am playing is my rental game Ben 10 (Xbox 360) which to be honest I've not played in the last few days since of work taking up most of my time.

That's it really for me, as I said it's mostly been quiet but hopefully the next few days I will be able to get some more game time in and have a nice long update for you.

Check out the Progress page for the updated stats

Gears of War 3 Beta Information

Well its nearly time for the Beta and I'm very excited, been reading the press release for the dates and the awesome unlocks you can get for the main game. So I thought I be nice and post it up here if you have not seen it already.

DATES

Bulletstorm Epic Edition will give you one week head start to everyone else, starts next Monday (18th April) and lasts until Sunday 24th Arpil.

Then the normal beta will begin for those who have codes for pre-ordering in advance, start date is Monday 25th April and lasts until Sunday 15th May.

UNLOCKS

There are several unlocks for the beta (these unlocks will pass over to Gears of War 3) with a wide variety of criteria to unlock them.

Flaming Hammerburst
Complete one match by Sunday 24th April (Exclusive to the Bulletstorm week start)

Flaming Lancer
Complete one match during the week of 25th April

Flaming Sawed-Off Shotgun
Complete one match during the week of 2nd May

Flaming Gnasher Shotgun
Complete one match during the week of 9th May

Beta Tester Medal
Complete one match during the beta, attaches to you profile in Gears of War 3 and can be shown in the multiplayer lobby.

Thrashball Cole
Multiplayer skin unlock, complete 50 matches (any game type) during the beta. There is a catch, you must then complete 10 matches as Thrashball Cole to permanently unlock the character.

Gold-Plated Retro Lancer
This is the hardest/longest unlock, complete 90 matches during the beta (any game type) and then score 100 kills with the Lancer to permanently unlock this skin.



So there you have it, the full list and got to say it does look like a lot to do but I'm hoping that the 60 matches for Thrashball Cole will count towards towards the lancer as well (would make life easier). Anyway so give a shout if you going to be on the beta and will have to organise a night to work on some unlocks together and have a laugh.



Source: Gears of War Official Site

Site Changes

This is just a quick post to say I've not forgot about the blog, in fact as you loaded you should have seen some of the new changes I've been doing to the site. First of course is my Easter banner, hope you like my newb skills.

Second thing is that the time chamber page as been taken down for the time being, need to redesign to make it look a lot better. In it's place you will notice now there is a 2011 gaming progress stats page, in the future when I update I will talk about what I did then just link to that page to see the stats. Saves me keeping copying and pasting, also saves having tons of huge long posts, will be doing also for the Golden Key challenge too so expect to see some changes on that page as well.

Finally I will be doing a patch notes page, bit like MMO's work. On this page it will keep record of the dates and whats major change to the blog, I know it doesn't sound that interesting but I like the idea.

Anyway that's it for this post, catch you all in a bit and hoping you been having a good few weeks of gaming.

So what's game of the year so far

Been meaning to post this for a while now, in fact I was meant to be updating every time I play a new 2011 release but oh well its here now. So what is game of the year for me so far? well check out the lovely list below, oh and a few things. First off the list can change since some of the games on there I'm still currently playing and finally I've only added games I've played which makes sense anyway.

Game of the Year 2011
-!Work in progress!-

1. Ghost Trick (NDS)
2. Bulletstorm (X360)
3. Lego Star Wars 3 Clone Wars (X360)
4. Pokemon Black (NDS)
5. Crysis 2 (X360)
   
6. Total War Shogun 2 (PC)
7. Homefront (X360)
   
8. Gray Matter (X360)

So what's got your game of the year so far? I know this list is going to change for me quite a lot since of the huge line up at the end of the year.