The Clan of the Cave Bague

Ok, it’s a sorry state of affairs when your games console posts more frequently than you do. Given that the thing is basically posting drivel, I’ve switched off the auto-post. Anyone strange enough to actually WANT to read it can do so by clicking the 360 blog link at the top. For everyone else – well, I’m afraid you’re just stuck with me.

There’s been loads of stuff happening of late – my oldest lad is currently at primary school for the last day – he starts secondary after the summer. This is a Scary Thing. He’s too wee to go to high school. He was at his P7 Prom last night (which is in itself an odd thing – since when did we have proms in Scotland? When I left primary I was kicked out the door and told in no uncertain terms never to come back). Anyway, a splendid time was had by all.

UGVM Retro Week came and went without event. Despite being quite excited about it, I only managed a couple of goes of The Hobbit and Wheelie – I have too strong an Oblivion addiction at the moment. he amount of stuff to do in the game is simply huge and tends to distract me from the main quest, somewhat. Which is fine

I told Chewbury ‘Hey man, it is time to play games’ and YAY! he listened! Gamer score is 335. He made some progress on Oblivion, and without even blinking! Ok, maybe he blinked once…

Chewbury is making me proud and his opponents jealous… even if they are bots or mindless AI sometimes! Check out the 335 gamer score! He opened up DEAD RISING, Geometry Wars Evolved, Oblivion, and I think there was some random Live Marketplace browsing, but I wasn’t paying attention.

Chewbury showed up yesterday ready to dominate. Total gamer score stands at 335. That is a gain of 40 points over last time! He opened up Prey finishing 3 achievements, and then I told him to keep playing but he didn’t… out of spite I think.

Someone ask for a weekly recap? Even if you didn’t, here it is: If you are an Xbox, you might be jealous that Chewbury showed up to game 6 days this last week. Happy happy joy joy! We added 40 points of gamerscore which ain’t too shabby. Getting 4 achievements can do that to you. I was there. I saw it!

If I had a DOLLAR for every new game I played during the week, I would have 4 bucks! w00t! I can now add Gears of War, LUMINES LIVE!, Prey, and Band of Bugs to my collection… unless they were rentals or demos or betas. I couldn’t tell. Also, by my expert calculations, Chewbury’s favorite game last week was EarthDefenseForce 2017. He played it on 5 of the days.

And that is the news for now… Check back next week… same bat time, same bat channel…

We played games yesterday… No really… I have proof! Chewbury might have told you otherwise, but we really did. 295 points of total gamerscore means we are teh awes0me! He played EarthDefenseForce 2017, and after that powered me down without even saying good night. I mean what the heck?

Ok, so I played this to death as a wee tot. At the time, the ability to type actual English (well, nearly) into a computer and see the characters in the game respond. It wasn’t my first adventure game, though, having spent a silly amount of time playing DEC Dungeon (i.e. Zork I) on a VAX, but it was the first adventure on an ACTUAL COMPUTER in my bedroom, and therefore amazing.

As adventures go, it’s a little flawed. The self-drawing vector graphics allow a fair number of static scenes to be drawn and still leaving room for a couple of dozen locations. Not bad for a little 48K machine. The adventure is, of course, very linear but not without its challenges. Like this one:

The Goblin Dungeon. Never has there been such an annoying construct in a video game. The sheer pain of being captured and slung into this room over and over again is sheer hell. When I completed this game as a lad, I skipped the whole goblin dungeon bit completely, so I never got the Ring, never met Gollum, and thus only really completed half the game. Well, time to address that. I’ve started playing again as part of the uk.games.video.misc retro week and – well – I’m in the Goblin’s Dungeon.

I didn’t think I would see him yesterday, but Chewbury was back and ready for action. Total gamer score is 295 points. He made some progress on Band of Bugs, EarthDefenseForce 2017, as well as stared off into space… thinking about the one that got away.

When someone makes a mistake there is typically some kind of gift involved… Maybe I can get a new faceplate out the missed day of gaming yesterday… It is totally like Chewbury to do something like that.

I thought maybe the power was out yesterday… imagine my surprise when Chewbury hit the switches! Gamerscore stands at 295. He opened up EarthDefenseForce 2017, and yeah… wow… my processor hurts…