Another day, another set of games played. But first a pic I took during the week that made me giggle. 

My coffee shop, Gryphon Cafe, featured Vigor espresso. I had some, but it didn't give me any special powers ala Bioshock. Ah, the real world. So dull sometimes.

Monday started off with a few rounds of Ticket to Ride, Alan Moon's railroad board game adaptated for Xbox 360. I think Mark won 3 out of four matches. That's about usual. I left the game on in Quick Match as I played my next game on DS to see if anyone was out there. Nope. Silent as space. 

I played through all the classic Atari arcade games in this Atari Retro Classics DS collection for DS. I also played the Remixed versions which were all just reskins of the same gameplay. They all looked like the art style used in PaRappa the Rapper. Neat, but nothing special. All the games look and play great except for Tempest which seemed somewhat broken. I had my best game ever in Gravitar; nearly 10k points, and I actually cleared a planet. That game is tricky to say the least. Gravity sucks. 

Then I put in Nitrobike for the Wii, an off-road motorcycle racing game by Left Field Productions (the Excitebike 64 guys). You use only the Wiimote and hold it sideways, turning it left and right to steer. I guess I should've had that steering wheel contraption for the Wii, but I didn't really need it. The game controls pretty well, and when you activate your nitro, the speed is incredible. However, just like Baja 1000 from yesterday, when I got to harder courses, the controls really showed their true colors. I just couldn't get total control of my bike. Whenever I tried to brake or let up on the gas, I would lose control and swerve like crazy. I got a handle on it in one race, but then I lost it again. That being said, I liked the presentation a lot. It looked really good for a 2007 Wii game. 

Then I was back at Luigi's Mansion. I finished the game! Here's my final score: 

I discovered how mirrors work. How I missed that for most of the game, I don't know. And oh boy, did I have a time with that final boss. I was on the right track from the beginning but I didn't quite understand how to grab those spiky bombs with my vacuum. A quick peek at a walkthrough, and I was set right. Still, it took me several tries after that even before I won out. Amazing game! i loved everything except that c-stick. It's inverted and reversed and you can't change it. I don't know if they just did that to make it a little more difficult or what, but it plagued me the whole game. And could someone tell me why this hasn't been put on any virtual console yet? It was the fifth best selling Game Cube game. What gives?

Then for the last hour or so, I went back to Xbox 360 and played the original Xbox game, Armed and Dangerous. This is a third-person shooter where you play a team of humerous rascals with various UK accents. The humor is very Monty Python and is partly why I loved it back in the day. It has very silly weapons too like a shark gun that sends out a shark that swims in the ground and attacks your foes from underneith - weird, and hilarious to watch. I had a problem with playing it on Xbox 360, however. After a level or two, the voices cut out, and I couldn't hear the dialog. I think I'll play this on my original Xbox next time because the voice acting and writing is well worth hearing. 

That be it. Looking ahead to turkey day. Gobble gobble.