Pinball Mania

Have you ever played pinball? It comes free with Windows, since its Win98. You have? Whats your high score?
Beat these - and comment here - and post me the pics.

You don't want to know how much time I played to get thse scores! :P
Enjoy!

Unreal II : The Awakening

Just completed Unreal II : The Awakening. I played it on the XBox. One of the few Atari games I played I have played recently.
Considering the game was released quite a while ago (4th Feb, 2003), the game has decent graphics and physics. The characters are well modelled, but their movements are not. There are various points in the game where I have appreciated the thoughts the developers have put into so that I could not cheat (:D). (One of these is in the level Avalon II where if in co-op mode the game actually waits for both players to move up onto the tower not allowing one to stay down to kill the Skaarj too easily.)
It took me about 30 hrs of game play to get done. There were times when one of my room-mates, Pranav played in the co-op mode.
The story-line is fine but predictable. The voice-artists seem to be completely disinterested to put emotions in what they are reading and that kind of makes you skip quite a few of the animated scenes between stages. These animations are not great pieces of art themselves but coming from a graphics stint I certainly appreciate every little movement on the screen.

But overall I would give the game a 6.5/10. Though I did point out the bad points that hit me most, there were various others. But the game-play is quite good and the weapons are pretty cool too. I especially liked the Shotgun and the alternate fire on the Rocket -Launcher. Neat thinking.
I also liked playing the defensice levels where we go around setting a perimeter and ordering the marines on their guards and placing gun-turrets and plasma walls.

Will be starting a new game soon. Any suggestions?

I want a Wiiiiii

The war of the video-games is on Xbox360, PS3 and Wii are trying really hard to win the marketplace and seriously I don't care who wins among them.
I know that I love to play all .. yeah ALL the games and think its completely unfair that I would not be able to play some game just because I don't have its corresponding hardware (which costs atleast 500$s)
I have a regular Xbox (that my friends gifted me on my 2005 birthday) and keep playing Halo2 and other games that can be played on it. With Halo3 on the horizon, Xbox360 is going to be something to have. PS3 though boasts of a much superior hardware than the 360 (and a higher price). And then there is Wii with its awesome WiiMote.
I think, that if I have to enjoy my games with my friends (who are not hardcore gamers) Wii is the best. I know that the self-reflection on the captain's helmet is great graphics programming and hardware capacity from the 360, and the 8 processor Cell is a great hardware that PS3 can boast about, but not all the people I play games with care about this stuff as long as they have fun. (We can have fun playing a simple game of cards too right? )
Ofcourse, we can all have our own opinions (and gaming consoles), but all I am saying is "IF I HAVE TO HAVE ONLY 1 FROM AMONGST THESE 3, I WOULD CHOOSE THE WII UNDER CURRENT CIRCUMSTANCES"

I think this video here will prove my point -


By the way in the picture above the order is (L->R) Xbox360, PS3 and Wiiiiiiii!

Hello Halo

One of the most awaited software/drama/game or whatever you want to call it, thats going to be released in 2007 is Halo 3. The viewer count of most recent trailer that was first released in a Monday Night Football game proved it. According to me, not only did the trailer win new people into the Halo community, but also bring hopes to those who were enraged with Halo 2's ending. ( I sure was) For those who were so enraged that they forgot it... the end is with our hero, Captain saying.. 'Finishing the fight'. Yes 'finishing' .. 'ing' the fight. But then he does not, not then. But he will in 2007 and that makes a good tag line for Halo3 - Finish the fight. Oh yeah... been waiting for that. But after I saw the trailer the first thing I had to do was... yessir you guessed it.. see it again! So I did and there are lots of places that host the video. I personally checked it at the official xbox360 page. Though the official Halo3 webpage is on, it still is awaiting content I suppose. The next thing I did was sign up as a beta tester for the game. You can do it too through the halo3 webpage. And now I just have to buy a 360. Hmmm... was actually planning to get a Wii, so I guess I need to buy both (snigger). The most awesome part of the trailer for me is the fact that the trailer was not a movie that those guys at Bungie Studios prepared, it is the engine! It is the game! Sweet. That is definitely the best thing to do. The engine certainly boasts a lot. Check this video where the Halo3 team explain various features of the engine along with the game, story and music. Oh yeah... the music. It definitely is an important part of the game. Without its sound-track, Halo 2 or even Halo 1 would not be the games they were. The video does a great job of providing an overview of the creation of the sound-tracks. Anyways, I don't want to take the fun and excitement away from the trailers with these boring words. Go check them out