Ditto was in the news again!

Apparently, Dittos* are going extinct, according to yesterday's newspaper the METRO.
.
This is stupid. Everyone has a Ditto right? And they aren't fished, you just catch them in the grass. I have a spare if anyone is interested.

Or find them at music festivals. But they aren't very good. By the time you have wasted a turn you are then in the unfortunate position in that your foe knows all your moves.

We hate it when newspapers get all their shit wrong. Stupid newspapers. Sadly I only worked out Ditto wasn't great when it dinged level 89.

*We know it should be Ditto not Dittos but we love annoying those wiki pricks who genuinely care about it. Because when the aliens find part of a server floating round in the space where Earth used to be, they're really gonna be concerned about the correct way of pluralising a fictional monster. Anyway if it does go extinct we won't have to worry about that.

So boring

Read it here. Basically, former who-is-that-guy-again? leader of the tory party, IDS has pulled a Vaz. This time though, avoiding Vaz's idiotic mistake a few weeks back, he appears to be aware of all the laws about selling stuff to people who aren't old enough to buy it all. He just says nobody pays attention.

He also comes out with:

“We are driving children to lose their childhood, and some video games are incredibly violent, like Grand Theft Auto. They are meant to be 18 but nobody cares what it says on the label."

Fuck off IDS. Just fuck off. When was the last time you took a bus after 11pm in this country? That's violence right there. Real actual violence. In fact for anyone living in London they probably see violence every week. I know I do. And then of course there are violent films on TV all day every day which anyone can watch with no restrictions whatsoever. Oh and books. When was the last time you got ID(S'ed?) for a book? And even then. Even if 1997 game GTA is destroying childhood why don't we tap into that powerful interactive medium that has such a brainwashing effect as to distract a member of parliament (and tipped to be a cabinet member) and use it to improve our youth's obesity problems or teen pregnancy problems or crime problems or literacy problems? Is that going to be on the agenda? Because the last couple of government funded video games were SHIT, didn't appear at all or were worse than educational software of the early 1990s.

That is the end of the above news item. The following news item is the Top Five Things About The 1997 PlayStation Game Grand Theft Auto Which Are Better Than Chingford, The Constituency Of Iain Duncan Smith:

1) The police actually catch you if you do too many crimes. They don't just put you on a list and then maybe accidentally pick you up or anything. In 2005/2006 only 25% of crimes committed were solved.
2) It is harder to get a gun in GTA than it is in real life in Chingford and Walthamstow.
3) It is impossible to commit a sexual offence in GTA but in 2005/2006 year there were 278 sexual offences in Chingford.
4) It is impossible to steal anything from a car in GTA but in 2005/2006 there were 3155 theft from a motor vehicle in Chingford.
5) It is impossible to commit a burglary in GTA but in 2005/2006 there were 1962 burglaries in Chingford.

So there we have it. Two unrelated random pieces of news.

Joke of the day

This one is from the only other fellowgaming celebrity Leigh Alexander.

"I prefaced this post with a reminder of the business realities major blog networks face because I find it hard to believe that Brian, who taught me quite a great deal about going the extra mile on news reporting -- because our audience deserves the whole truth -- would thumbs-up a porn star's "celebrity" advice column unless it were part of a larger and necessary Gawker initiative"

Brian Kotaku Brian? The whole truth? Good one Leigh. Good one.

Keith Vaz again (groan)

Theif and MP Keith 'clueless' Vaz, having got over being ridiculed for various tedious and hyperbolic lambasting of games based on no evidence whatsoever once again gets in the Daily Mail off the back of "outrage" at a big game launch this time over Modern Warfare 2.

Read all abaaaaat it here "Outrage as new video game lets players kill civilians in terror attacks".

Bored, bored, bored. Surely Mr Vaz has more important things to be sorting out? Or maybe he could plough back all that money he skimmed from the tax payer into fixing Leicester before attacking games?

Change the tune Vaz. You're so out of your depth once again. How about instead of knee jerking every time you want a bit of press coverage, you do some proper research into the non issues you soap box? God knows the UK government is so shit at supporting the games industry, to be even more damaging when you make moronic comments is insult to injury. Do you want to drive the games industry abroad? Idiot. Find a real issue to campaign on.

Sigh!

Yes people an exclaimed SIGH! This is the cause of the now doubly exclaimed sigh!!.



We are literally sitting two clicks away from a whole section on wikipedia called List of Disney video games by genre Mickey Mouse Series.

That Guys Interviews Again!

The other day we were reading the TGAM archives and laughing out loud at ourselves. Out loud. That’s pretty wrong no? But it was when we were reading the TGAM archives that we realised that WE ARE FUCKING GAMING CELEBRITIES!

Yes folks, without actually knowing it we went from mediocrity to gaming celebrity stardom. Like that news about the goose that levelled up and became a swan that time. Here is the story about how we discovered we were celebrities (this will probably be in our second autobiography when we publish our book now we are gaming celebrities).

We got a link on Kotaku once and not one of those news stealing links a proper link for creating something unique.

Our best friend totally met Pentadact, secretly James secretely Tom at University. He even emailed him to check and Tom emailed back. What a nice chap.

We insult Richard Cobbett on a regular basis and he doesn’t even hate us.

We interviewed that photographer who did the Devil May Cry shoot for Front magazine.

We are listed as an industry link on the RamRaider.

We got an emoticon from Graeme Norgate. A true gaming legend.

We once wrote to ONM magazine and they wrote back.

A guy we used to live with is in a photo over on Another Little Dissapointment. We have given our stalkers key information here!

One of us is credited in over a dozen video games!

We fake interviewed Leigh Alexander and then she left us a comment!

We got some love from Rock Paper Shotgun.

This pretty much cements our place as genuine gaming celebrities, which falls just under Z list celebrity in the following classification:

A list celebrities. You did something good once and didn’t disappear. Nowadays you can release crap albums or crap films and nobody says anything because you are that big.

B list celebrities. The people who make the world go round behind the scenes. Directors, music producers and authors. Nobody knows who you are on the street but you get just as many column inches, free coke and blow jobs from C-E listers as those A list fuckers

C list celebrities. Footballers and people who suck off footballers.

Bored of this now, SKIP DOWN PAST Z LIST THEN GO THROUGH THE PUNCTUATION AND THEN ONTO THE NUMBERS.

11. Gaming Celebrities. Famous people who are famous only for doing things related to gaming. Do not confuse Gaming Celebrities with Celebrities that Game (see 24) like that cunt Iaiaiaian Lee and the one who did James Bond after Pierce Morgan.
The first thing we did when we discovered we were gaming celebrities. We had a wank in the mirror, filmed it on a digital camera, transferred the video to the Wii and then did a 100+ piece video puzzle of us repeatedly wanking into the mirror. That’s how fucking next gen we are. Can you do that on an Xbox 360? No? For those of you having gay gaming celebrity fantasies about us around about now, we taped a flattened cardboard box to the mirror so we couldn’t see each others wangs. That would be gay. Except now that we are gaming celebrities being gay sometimes is fine.

The second thing we did when we discovered we were gaming celebrities. We got wank guilt and watched the news (Channel 5).

The next relevant to this post thing we did. Not wanting to miss an exclusive we interviewed ourselves thus improving out own gaming celebrity status considering that we are only the second gaming celebrity to be interviewed following that interview with lovely Leigh Alexander. Here is our first exclusive interview with gaming celebrities TGAM.

TGAM: Welcome TGAM.
TGAM: Hello and may I say what a fantastic pleasure it is to be here, getting interviewed by the World’s Second Best Gaming Blog in the World Ever.
TGAM: You flatter us TGAM but you must be used to all this, after all you did start your career writing for a gaming blog.
TGAM: Well, may I say what an refreshing change it is for bloggers having done some research before the interview.
TGAM: Well that is what you get here. Our commitment to getting the latest news to our readers is our driving force.
TGAM: Well in the states they are saying this year is your year TGAM!
TGAM: They say the same about you TGAM. Now tell us are you familiar with Family Reunion by Blink 182?
TGAM: Yeah. Yeah we know that song.
TGAM: It goes like this: ´Shit piss fuck cunt cocksucker motherfucker tits fart turd and twat
shit piss fuck cunt cocksucker motherfucker tits fart turd and twat
shit piss fuck cunt cocksucker motherfucker tits fart turd and twat
shit piss fuck cunt cocksucker motherfucker tits fart turd and twat´
TGAM: Okay, yeah.
TGAM: Then it goes ´I fucked your mom´. Is that song about your mom TGAM?
TGAM has signed out of chat.

So thanks to TGAM. I think you'll agree it was a great interview. Next week: Well hopefully it is someone that doesn't check the blog (= a shitload of people).

The Bona Fide list of confirmed Gaming Celebrities so far: Leigh Alexander, is he/isn't he Gabe Newell and us. For those entrepeneurs starting a gaminbg celebrity version of Heat we have 1500 photos of us, each one we are selling for £4.50, £3.50 for topless ones.

Breaking News

Internet fiend and Leaderboard legend the Hockster just gave us the tip-off about the new Resident Evil 4 HD version. We're pretty sure this is breaking so you'll see it in a TTECNK on lesser sites soon.

Here is the original:
Here is Resident Evil 4 HD. You can see that Capcom, fingers burnt from Resident Evil 5, have played it safe and set the whole thing in Asia land.
Can't racist yourself! Except you are being racist if you just racist yourself and not everyone. Try again Capcom.

That Guys Interviews.

Gaming is trying hard to be mainstream, even though it already is but not in the way many gamers gamers can appreciate because they are too busy grinding and cyberring to spend enough time in the real world. A world without elves and muscle men and barrels and princesses and invisible walls. One thing that might help the deluded to believe that gaming is more mainstream is if we create some Gaming Celebrities. That way we join the common woman by slating off how fat, ugly, beautiful, stylish, hideous and underweight our favourite gaming people are and we can OMG to our hearts delights every time Jeff Minter takes a crap and it makes headlines.

Our part in all this is to interview the top 100 gaming celebrities pushing them from blogosphere obscurity to the heady heights of celebrity and maybe see them take part in ice skating, ballroom dancing and orgies-on-islands television programmes like real celebrities do.

This is not Leigh Alexander.

We emailed over 500 gaming celebs and we've already got some great names lined up but first, it is our pleasure to reveal our exclusive interview with rising star gaming writer Leigh Alexander. Chances are if you follow the gaming blogs you will have discovered some of Leigh's excellent writing about games from reflective pieces on what it means to be a gamer to some thought provoking articles questioning some of the most common words in a gamers lexicon. Also, despite the fact she has two boys names she is a woman.

TGAM: Hello Leigh and thank you for taking part in our ambitious project and extra kudos to being the first one to get back to us.
LA: It is a pleasure and I kinda appreciate what you guys are doing but not necessarily the way you go about it.
TGAM: One of our most popular posts of all time have been, Danger Women in games. Are you familiar with The Party Song by Blink 182?
LA: Yeah. Yeah I know that song but
TGAM: It goes like this: 'Do you want to come to a party
My friends picked me up in their truck at 11:30
This things at a frat house but the people are cool there
Reluctant I followed but never dreamed there
Would be someone there who would catch my attention
I wasn't out looking for love or affection
So I paid my 3 and the girls got in free
Shine the beer and tequila and we headed into the party
And then in the backyard some terrible ska band
Someone in the background was doing a keg stand
This place is so lame all these girls look the same
All these guys have no game I wish I would have stayed
In my bed back at home watching TV alone
Where I'd put on some porn or have sex on the phone
Far from people I hate down from anywhere state
Trying to intoxicate girls to give them head after the party
And then I saw her standing there
With green eyes and long blond hair
She wasn't wearing underwear at least I prayed that
She might be the one maybe we'd have some fun
Maybe we'd watch the sun rise'.
LA: Okay
TGAM: Then it goes 'But that night I learned some girls try too hard
Some girls try too hard
Some girls try too hard to impress
With the way that they dress
With those things on their chests
And the things they suggest to me
I couldn't believe what this lady was saying
The names she was dropping the games she was playing
She dated this guy who now rides for Black Flys
How she's down with the Iwise well constructed disguise
Now I'd rather go dateless than stay here and hate this
Her volume of makeup her fake tits were tasteless
So I said I'd call her but never would bother
Until I got turned down by another girl at a party
So when you see her standing there
With green eyes and long blonde hair
She won't be wearing underwear and you'll discover
This girl's not the one and she'll never be fun
You should just turn and run because you'll find out that
Some girls try too hard
Some girls try too hard to impress with the way that they dress
With those things on their chest
And the things they suggest to me' Do you think that song was written about you Leigh?
LA has signed out of chat.


So thanks to Leigh Alexander. I think you'll agree it was a great interview. Next week: Well hopefully it is someone that doesn't check the blog (= a shitload of people).

Ciao! CZY1 1

Watch Tonight!

From the Graudian

Gameswipe With Charlie Brooker 10pm BBC4

Following in the footsteps of Screenwipe, Charlie Brooker's new show- you guessed it- aims its remote at the world of videogames. Whether you're a gamer hater or lover, Gameswipe- part of the Electric Revolution season on BBC4- shows how games can be just as dumb or brilliant as TV and movies. And Charlie certainly knows what he's talking about, having spent his early career causing mayhem at PC Zone. Graham Lineham, Dara O'Brian and Dom Joly are on hand to join in the pixellated fun.

Thoughts on the bit from the Guardian:

1) TV and Movie envy :(
2) Gamer hater or lover? Surely this should be game hater or lover? Who loves gamers?
3) Would have left out the bit about PC Zone, most people think that is a shop where you buy printers.
4) With the exception of Graham Linehan funny men from elsewhere on TV have no place here.
5) Videogame rather than video game? Controversial.
6) Forgot to mention the guys from Videogaiden, which is like writing a blurb for Diana's funeral and focusing on the cunts in the third row at the back and not the silly bitch herself.

Watch it! If it goes well we might see some semi-decent videogame TV shows on the idiot box in the UK.

Video Games Finally Harnessed for the Power of Good

A new video game created by celebrity scientist Baroness Susan Greenfield is set to finally harness the power of video games to make children do 'good things' rather than 'bad things'.

Ever since 1996, children have been playing video games to kill zombies, pilot futuristic spacecraft and connect gems of the same colour in a line to make them disappear. "And what we've seen is that children go out into the real world and do these things" Greenfield explains. "Scientists reckon that video games are more powerful than influences from parents, peers and even television".

"So rather than control them to manage a house of people as in the Sims or identify Pokemon footprints as in Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Explorers of Time, we've harnessed that power so that children will do better in life by playing this game".

The new game called The best you could probably do given your socio-economic background will launch ready for the Christmas period on every platform except the PS3. It is a rather unique game in that players choose their character and then the character will automatically run around stabbing people, eating junk food and getting teen pregnant. Players have to hold down buttons to stop them from doing bad things that we see every day on the streets in the United Kingdom.

In the hands on session we had with the game it seemed to be very promising indeed. The level we played was set in an inner city playground populated by families and drug dealers enjoying a Sunday afternoon. Following the opening cutscene the player immediately went to pick up some broken glass to put in the sandpit. By holding down Y, the character instead collected the glass and put it in the recycling bin. In a later section, holding down both buffers stops our character from having unprotected sex with a minor behind the Oxfam bins. One of the most memorable scenes on the game is a rhythym action action game which decides the fate of your characters money. Miss the cues and you see your character heading towards Costcutter to buy some Diamond White. Perfect the timing an he insteads posts it as child support money to one of the mothers of one of his children.

Before we left Greenfield confided in us "For far too long video games programmed by know nothings have been controlling people to do bad things. This is my video game and I've written like four books so it must be betterer".

The best you could probably do given your socio-economic background comes out in December this year and could well fix all the problems we have in this country. Certainly one to watch.

.Hack

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

Noooooooooooooooooooooo

Never go full retard.

Here's a little insight into the world of video games journalism. We've all thought about doing it but no journo with integrity would ever go through with it. Hell, we flew pretty close to the wind one time but we pulled out at the last minute.

However, Owen Good at Kotaku has broken one of the golden rules of games journalism. It's so meta we just don't even know where to look or to start reading it from.

Yes. Kotaku has lowered the community IQ by several hundred points by doing a top 5 list of other top ten lists. Click only if you are brave enough.

Oh and Owen, don't forget some of the top tens we've had here over the years including:

Cunzy1 1's Top Ten Non lethal Weapons in Video Games.

Cunzys top 10 computer game characters he like to get screenshots/photos of cos-players of, so that he can get hard, as nothing else does it now.

Top 5 Shit pokemon that are shit, but not quite as shit as the top 5 lamest pokemon that 1up posted:

TGAM's Top Ten "Oh Shit" moments in games

Ten reasons to buy a PS3 now.

Top ten things What we want to see in Biohazard: Degeneration or we will actually start to MDK people starting with whoever is the nearest. This is the definitive list any slight variation and it's curtains for everyone.

Top 40 things about our friend Randy McSporran

TGAM's Top Ten PC games.

Richie's Top Ten Hottest Video Game Characters

There are more Owen but this is enough for now.

A friend in need

Semi-retired Ram Raider have come back out of retirement again again to bring us this news about a game called Darkfall. The essence of the issue, for those too lazy to hit the link is that Eurogamer staffer Ed Zitron was unfairly treated by the company behind Darkfall Online, Aventurine. Including the not deleting of personal details put up on a forum. Or something.

This is unfair treatment and an issue that we are happy to bring more attention to, through the time honoured review of Darkfall Online Boxart.

Cunzy1 1: What? No boxart?

Richie: No due to the cutbacks we can't afford to google images anymore so we'll have to review the game title itself.

Cunzy1 1: Another world first from TGAM. Second greatest etc. etc.

Richie: Hmmm. Darkfall. Doesn't that game exist?

Cunzy1 1: No you are thinking of Darkwatch.

Richie: No. I was thinking of the Darkness.

Cunzy1 1: Isn't that a band? Also, I was thinking of Dark Stalkers.

Richie: Racist.

Cunzy1 1: Not racist. But by finding me racist you are a racist.

Richie:?

Cunzy1 1: Because I am so not racist I can't see colour. Everyone is colourless. There is no race. If you think there is, you are racist.

Richie: So all those people who thought Resident Evil 5 was racist?

Cunzy1 1: Yes. Racists. The racists.

Richie: So Darkfall Online. Sounds like a game where you play as a black Hitler from Downfall.

Cunzy1 1: Maybe it's a game about wells. Or big caves.

Richie: Or the onset of night.

Cunzy1 1: So the final score? This is a review after all. Shall we review it ONM styleee?

Richie: Lets. Is it a Nintendo game?

Cunzy1 1: No.

Richie: Is it a Wiimake of a gamecube game?

Cunzy1 1: No.

Richie: Is it a capcom game?

Cunzy1 1: No.

Richie: Is it De Blob?

Cunzy1 1: No.

Richie: Does it have a screenshot of a character with fire coming out of their arse or face so we can print it with a hilarious "Curry" joke?

Cunzy1 1: No.

Richie: Okay 2/10.

Cunzy1 1: Cool. I've been Ed Zitron....

Richie: And I've been Ed Zitron. Shit now we are going to get abuse on our myspace page from Darkfall Online fans.

Cunzy1 1: Do we have a Myspace page? Does Myspace even exist still?

Richie: Yeah we set it up in 2003 when Myspace launched. We also have a Twitter page which we've had since 2006. When Twitter launched.

Cunzy1 1: Wow so the Guardian might do a cutting edge report on something we wrote on there 3 years ago?

Richie: Any day now I'm expecting our thoughts from yesteryear to be front page news. Such is the cutting edge of the newspapers.

Cunzy1 1: 'Ediacaran spokesperson, "Predicted extinction of us"'

Richie: Palaeontology jokes. "Exclusive, Resident Evil for PlayStation review"

Cunzy1 1: Indeed. Actually they could just run that review every year because at anytime across the globe Capcom are remaking Resident Evil. It's a perma-review.

Richie: Not so my friend!

Cunzy1 1: Shit. We sold out? When? I wondered why the decor seemed different. So will this post attract any hits?

Richie: Only bad ones. Only bad ones.

Cunzy1 1: Damn. Always the bride, never the bridesmaid.

Richie: Ain't that the truth.

Breaking News from Gaylando

I skip town for a few days and all hell breaks loose. Reports of abuse, AXE MENTALISTS and the credit change crisis. Not to mention the weeds. GOD the weeds.

This seals it. I'm boycotting Nooks until all this blows over*


Economic crisis and or credit crunch hits virtual world. Would be the headline I would get the BBC intern to write using this screenshot. I'd put climate change in there too.


An AXE MENTALIST came to town too.


This is not how you talk to AXE MENTALISTS.


Nor this.


Expect lives to be lost.

*Well maybe next week. I have turnips I need to sell this week.

How many emails does it take to get a rise out of Kotaku?

Almost exactly a year ago, we started emailing tips to tips@kotaku.com for those of you who don't know, Kotaku is a gaming news site, probably the best one actually at least in terms of volume and frequency, not neccessarily consistency. Anyway the above email address is for Kotaku readers to email in tips or rumours so that Kotaku can copy and paste the post on their site with some insightful sentence of commentary from one of the editors, 80% of which are called Brian. From here the escapist and then EDGE copy and paste all their news.

So, for the last year we've been emailing in 'tips' sometimes once a day, other times once a month. But we did get a rise out of Brian Crecente once before they presumably blocked any email we send to them anymore. Question is can you guess after which one we got a response? Answer is on the reverse.

1. Hot Tip

If you look at the ground in Golden Eye on the N64 you run a tiny bit faster.

2. Another Hot Tip

In the videogame Halo, jumping around can make you harder to target by those who would "do you in".

3. An Even Hotter Tip

When playing Final Fantasy games, unlike real life, it is always prudent to talk to dogs and children. They may help with story progression.

4. An Even Hotter Tip

In Resident Evil 3: Nemesis on the PlayStation pressing square and down will make Jill Valentine (or Carlos) turn on the spot for a quick getaway!

5. Another flaming hot tiperoo

In the Wii game, Wario Ware: Smooth Moves, on the driving 'boss levels' both A and B buttons can be used to sound the horn and to get those pesky cows and baboons to get out of the way.

6. A Scorching tip today

Sorry for the lack of tips. Man's been ill for a couple a days. I'm making up for it with a scorching hot tip though!

In most videogames, just like in real life, characters cannot perform normal tasks whilst crouching. If you find your character isn't interacting with the environment, walking very slowly or not reloading weapons, check that they are not crouched down. If they are, try standing up and many of your ailments should dissappear.

7. A burning tip, burning. Flaming hot tip.

If you're gonna do a post about a video game drinking game, make it the original hardcore drinking game [prison rules version]http://www.thatguys.co.uk/2007/09/pokemon-drinking-game-prison-rules.html

8. Hotter than the surface of a hotplate tip today..

...just for you Kotaku slaves. Don't pass this tip on else everyone will be using it THUS NEGATING THE BENEFIT FOR YOU.

In Command and Conquer: Red Alert, you can tell you are about to be attacked because e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g l-a-g-s. Use this early warning system to bring back all your exposed whore trucks*.

*This is what all the cool kids call the ore trucks. Calling them whore trucks to other C&C Red Alert players instantly identifies you as "in the loop".

9. This is the hottest tip you ever received. Scorchio!

This is a tip for the fellas! Many women you come across may find your gaming "hobby" or worse, "lifestyle" a bit immature or sad. All that money wasted and you have nothing to show for it, except a bunch of save files! Don't fret though because many women like to spend extortionate amounts of money on shoes! Shoes! But there's more, it's not even shoes that enable walking, it's often shoes that cripple their feet, prevent them from walking over 1mph and cause them to whine after an evening out because their feet hurt! Now that's a waste of money, shoes that deliberately don't enable the very simple function of pain free walking. Mental.

10. Coming atcha like a volcano, truly the most burning tip yet

This one is for the ladies. In Dead Rising, when the yellow anorak cultists turn up, allow Frank to be "killed" by them (they should spit a powder in his face at which point he will black out). Instead of dying you'll awaken in a box in just your pants! Check out some schweet man ass and bulge for free!

Just don't tell anyone I told you!

11. Yesterday must have been cold without a hot tip so here's one that's been scorching a hole in my face

Don't bother with Second Life.

12.It's winter outside but here's a tip to warm you up

Shaking trees in Animal Crossing and Animal Crossing WIld World may reveal some furniture or better yet a bag of bells! Watch out for bees! If your quick enough you can catch the bees and sell them to Tom Nook for EVEN MORE BELLS!

13. The weekend looms, why not make it better with this tip!

In FPS (first person shooters) you should always strafe left to right. This makes you a harder target to shoot. You shouldn't strafe backwards and forwards because, although half the time you are becoming a smaller target, the other half you are becoming a larger target!

14. This tip comes for free but boy is it a hot one!

In the UK at least most gaming chain stores stock titles for little under a month before they are replaced with the new and shiny titles and piles of multiplatform releases like Catz or Cheggers' Quiz. Shopping online for games can be risky too because it's always disheartening to open up a second hand game you've received to find a scratch on the disc and jam all over the instruction booklet. Fear not though gamers because pawn shops often have a nice selection of games, in good nick and all the best titles aren't snapped up the minute they go one the shelves. This weekend I bought mint condition Code Veronica and Resident Evil Outbreak (I know! But I had to) for the PS2 for £6 ($12056US). Bargain!

15. I'm back from the centre of the earth, a journey that ook days to discover this hot tip!

Gamers, why not use valentine's day as an excuse to revisit Final Fantasy VII, Resident Evil 1 and three and Soul Calibur? Why? You might ask. Well to play as Jill, Vincent and Ivy Valentine! Yeah, yeah, put that in your stand up show, I'll let ya.

16. Just a tip but you might want to read this one.

If you get low on ammo in Resident Evil games, fear not because you can use the knife!

17. This tip is so hot men and women want it

In Resident Evil Outbreak press start to skip the cutscenes. For most other Capcom titles select works too!

18. England has had the Typhoid again so there hasn't been any tips for a while.....until now

In Crash Team Racing for the Sony PlayStation, make sure you always jump off of ramps and ledges. The higher you jump the bigger the boost you get upon landing!

19. I've been to the Congo, where I found this tip for you

In Brain Training for the Nintendo DS, holding select when you touch the Brain Training exercise lets you select the activities on which your brain age will be calculated so you can avoud the ones you find hard.

Blog that mofos, I'll be out tip hunting on your behalf.

20. Slow news day huh?

Well here's a fricking tip for you so post this so the readers don't die of not enough posts to devour! In the game Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles the RING OF FATES, make sure you "Add material" when making weapons and armour from a scroll. If you are not going to add material then the man next door will sell you the armour ready made for cheaper.

How did you like that tip kotaku? Because I tell you now. THERE'S PLENTY MORE WHERE THAT CAME FROM SON-SHINE

21. YET ANOTHER HOT TIP

How do I do it you ask? Well, that would be telling. Today's tip is for the game "Mashed".

If you aren't very good at mashed then always choose the red car. It's a little bit faster.

No, don't thank me, really. Just be glad to have the knowledge. It is power.

22. A new year and a new hot tip.

Wasn't dead guys just out, tip hunting.

Took me fourteen months of research and 10 years of work in the field. In that time I saw generations come and go. I saw the dawn of a new millenium but nothing would stay my hands and eyes looking for a tip in the event that you could do a post about it. Many times I wanted to give up on it all you know? Jack it all in. Live an easy tip-free life. But every time my heart drew me back in. I've seen things you can only dream about one of your friends dreaming about. I saw the face of god but I did not know madness. Very well, you may say but give up the tip. You can have the tip in a second but bear in mind the awful cost it took to get it. Use it wisely and it will guide you to a better place. Use it frivolously and life won't ever be the same again. Very well gentlemen, the tip:

If you get stuck on a wall in Mario Kart, reverse yourself until you can go forward and get off that wall or something.

No need to thank me but look into the eyes of your children tonight and know that you did best by god.

23. Here's another tip I trust you will take it?

In most Doom games you can pick up a weapon called a BFG. It is a very powerful weapon but do not use it at close range because you will kill yourself.

Just some L337 tech for ya to help you up your game, y'know?

24. A tip pure and simple, from me, to you

Hey guys another tip, free of charge for now. I'll put it on your tip tab yar?

Just drop the Day Note and Night Note yeah? No one likes it. Not even Crecente. And Bashcraft is like. "Dude me an my japanese wife who is japanese are in japan and we saw something that you only see in japan and we were in japan and my son who was in japan asked if japan is the same as America and I turned to my japanese wife and said in japanese no it isn't."
And Crecente is always like. "Great. I uh. Yeah. That must have been great". Then Bashcraft is back on the "SO WE WERE ALL IN JAPAN THE OTHER DAY AND WE WENT TO A JAPANESE PLACE AND AtE SOME JAPANESE FOOD AND IN JAPAN FOOD IS DIFFERENT THAN IN AMERICA AND IN JAPAN THEY HAVE DIFFERENT TRADITIONS AND STUFF. buy my book".

It's rarely about games at all. No one is particulalry interested and we all have friends who live in countries but who have made no attempt to ingratiate themselves. How about you change up the format? Like try and play some kind of videogame themed word game or six degrees of megaman. Anything else really. Give it a shot. Thank me later dudes.

It's a game for all the family! Cunzy1 1

Go here and read this

What a prick

TGAM top 50 ultimate TGAM top games best list of best games of all time ever: Number 46

Well we've had zombies, zombies, zombies and zombie dinosaurs in our hotly anticipated TGAM top 50 ultimate TGAM top games best list of best games of all time ever. What could possibly beat 50-47? Well something has to otherwise the list is pretty flawed no? Chortle!

Well today children in at number 46. We're going to get complaints that this one is so low I know it in my heart! Yes, yes it's only fucking RESIDENT EVIL GENESIS for the mobile phone!

Not the first, not the last retelling of Resident Evil 1 but surely the most 46th on the list! Yes indeed. I hear what you are saying. Is this really better than Dead Rising? Well check the list because Dead Rising is lower than this so DUR SPAZMOID of course it's better! Does Dead Rising have Barry Burton in it? No? I didn't think so.

Wow what an exciting week. Readers have been voting and commenting in the half dozens at least. What does next week's list bring? I'll give you a hint. "NOT METROID OR ZELDA". Yes. Can you guess what it is yet?

The fairest and most empirical list of greatness so far:

47: Dino Crisis 3
48: Dead Rising
49: Resident Evil Confidential Report File 1
50: Biohazard 4D Executer

This shit is real (probably)

Silly daily mail.

Although by googling "daily mail al qaeda" I fear I am now on some kind of to be watched list. See what I do for you reader?

All the cool kids are doing it......#2

Do you remember the post called All the cool kids are doing it.....? I don't. Anyway this is the second post with this title which, makes it another feature I guess. We have lots of features here at TGAM. It's why we are the second greatest videogame blog of all time scientifically proved don't cha know.

Anyway lots of the third rate games magazines (Official Nintendo Magazine, Official Playstation magazine etc.) have been including these little crazy look-alike features which they use to fill up column inches because they can't write enough good copy. So there will be a picture of some guy from Eastenders next to a photo of some guy from a game and they will label them with the names the wrong way round. HA hahahahahaha. Everyone laughs. Except! SPONTANEOUS PUBLIC SERVICE MESSAGE When people read games magazines they don't want to be reminded of the real world and their real life. There should be nothing but games from cover to cover. Adverts for other games, reviews of games, news about games and interviews with games people. Nothing else. As soon as you mention characters from TV, or worse, sport, or show an advert for aftershave or clothes people get depressed and think "I shouldn't be reading a games magazine. I'm not a child. I should do some real life things like the people off of telly or in't perfume ads". Even though their real life responsibilities get as exciting as do the laundry or taking the labels off of cans for the recycling, or go online and pay the council tax etc. It makes them put down the mag and depresses them. So keep it out of the games mags. Okay?

Anyway, here's TGAM lookalike. It's funny no?

Can you see the difference? I'll give you a clue, one is a really shitty Pokemon. Bug and flying pish. Go away.

In a similar but unrelated note doing this post reminded me of Jersey Devil. I miss you Jersey Devil. You never really had a chance to shine, you didn't stand out in the glut of other crappy platformers and now you are gone for good. :(

STOP FEMINISTS!!!

We all know that there is a 101 things you could probably say about this picture being overly sexist and chauvinistic. There is Princess Peach using her bum as a weapon. What undertones! and Overtones! We all know it's so wrong and so demeaning especially with the wink as well. It would be really serious and perhaps spark debates amongst feminists. However, she is a Princess of a Mushroom Kingdom and she is named after a piece of fruit. Kind of undermines the whole argument doesn't it?

Non-lazy feminist gamers might point out the merits of using the Princess as a character in Super Smash Brothers Melee, disspelling the rumour that she is a weak character if used by someone who knows her moves. They might even link to a Youtube video showing some of her greatest combos. They might go one step further and say that at least she gets to play golf and tennis competitively against the men and giant lizards of the Mushroom Kingdom which is more than real life athletes can.

Uber lazy feminist gamers might do a post about how Nintendo are as bad as Sony and how as part of this week's destroying chauvinism they will be protesting against the purchase of Beyonce and Shakira singles, albums and MP3s on their website because they promote the use of epileptic bum and belly shaking to sell music. They should also point out that the perspective of this screenshot shows a pokeball touching her hair and if that isn't some reference to sex, well, Disgusting.

Image from the wonderful Super Smash Brothers Dojo site. By wonderful I mean sexist and demeaning.

We're applying for a job at Joystiq

They put out a call to all bloggers as they are looking for some weekend staff. So we thought we would apply. Why not? Well because Joystiq is a bit of an in joke for all gamers. And as with all great humour, you should never have to explain your own joke. So we're going to explain our own joke:

Joystiq is a site that has ambitions. It so desperately wants to be Kotaku that it regularly steals posts from it except the posts are never as good. Also, they have stolen a site design from the early 1990s and I think you'll agree that it looks like one of those sites you get when you accidentally type http://www.hotmaik.com/ or if you type "bored at work" into a web browser.

So here's the application and before you start it does look like we are a bit ghey for Kotaku. That's not neccessarily the case but they are the best place for regularly updated gaming news.


Dear Nintendo Blogger at Gmail
This here email is an answer to the ‘call for bloggers’. We’ll get straight to the point, we really like Nintendo, except for the dark years when they abandoned us and the Gamecube and then more recently when they stopped making games for the Wii. However, the DS is still alive and kicking so we’ll go on about that.

Here are the three sample posts as required for the application:

1) We're applying for a job at Joystiq
Basically, we just added this post to our sample posts. I'm not typing out again in full as it will get complicated. This was mostly added though because the job application was tagged "meta". I didn't know that people still used that as a tag.

2) A new Resident Evil DS?

Yes, yes there is but it isn't Resident Evil Deadly Silence, it's Resident Evil Douche Simulator! We have insider information from someone currently testing the game. You'll be able to douche some of your favourite characters from the series racing against the clock to 'fresh that fem'.

It was revealed to us that there will (surprise surprise) be unlockable characters. One of which is Zombie Female 3 from Resident Evil 2. Capco said:

"she has green and bloody Douche-juice"

Of course she does Cacpom. Of course she does. Expect to see it hit shelves in August and probably stay there for two days before being replaced with Sponge Bob Squarepants meets Catz: Barbie Princess Army Men.

Labels: Apologies, DS woes, Jynx, Love, off-the-blob, Resident Evil

3) New Wii Lunch Title Announced!

Today Nintendo announced WWi: Childbirth. The game, aimed at the female market, comes with a foetal attachment. Players then insert the controller, (umbilical chord) nunchuck and foetal attachment into the appropriate body cavity and then have to give birth within a time limit. On screen is a vaginal tearometer as well as an oxygen gauge for the baby. If the oxygen gauge reaches critical, players then have to wave the foetal attachment to get the baby to "wake up" or press the A button (ABORT) on the controller. If the vaginal tearometer reaches critical then players can attempt to stitch it up with a Wi-Fi connection to a special version of Trauma Center: Under the Knife.

The Foetus attachment comes in a range of colours to match the range of colours for the controller. Whether or not a blue version has been considered is unknown at this point.

This revolutionary game will give women who haven't yet had children an excuse to actually experience how painful childbirth is, to then invoke it as "The most painful thing a human being has to endure" to all males nearby. Also men can play it but with obvious biologically incorrect implementation.

Labels: Best posts ever, Wii

Published Works
Everything at http://www.thatguys.co.uk/ except for the bits we just ripped from UK:R and the posts that were inspired by Kotaku but hey! You guys know all about that.
Everything at Cunzy11’s Dinosaurs in games
Omastar Comics

All of this

A short bio
Here is our short bio, with a section after framed within the ‘requirements’ section you set on the application.

We are two UK women, Cunzy1 1 and Richie and we have been gaming together for years and blogging about games together for just over a year and a half. We originally started blogging because we were concerned that women gamers were massively discriminated against online, in magazines and even offline. However, every man, women and dog had jumped on that bandwagon and it turns out that all women wanted to say is “I’m a woman”. After that they didn’t really have anything else to add. Have you checked Guilded Lilies recently or what about Hellbound Angels they used to be good? Snooze-a-rama. So we set out doing our own thing and speaking for the common gamer without any of the pretentiousness of EDGE, the childlike Americanism of\Gamespot or the bare-faced plagiarism of Joystiq. Soon after that Cunzy1 1’s dinosaurs in game site split off and lately we have had renowned success as the authors of Omastar Comics, the 2700th most popular gaming webcomic in the world. Last year we scientifically proved that we are the second greatest videogame blog in the world so you might want to check that too, go here. Anyway, you need us more than you need to change your page formatting so do give us a shout. We don’t have anything to do at the weekend save for earning those last few bits in Advance Wars War Room, oh and getting the UFO bits in AC:WW and walking the Nintendogs, Brain Training and berry picking on Pokemon so we estimate we could do as many posts as kotaku do. Which, we guess is the answer you want right?

A real enthusiasm for and knowledge of the Nintendo Wii and DS.
We have a real enthusiasm for and knowledge of the Nintendo Wii and DS. This can be highlighted by the number of posts we do at Thatguys.co.uk about the Wii and DS. To be honest, I don’t have too much of an enthusiasm for the Nintendo Wii because I don’t really like the Legend of Zelda and they haven’t released any other games yet. Still, I am sure that Super Smash Brothers Brawl is going to be good and Pokemon Battle Revolution should be fun for all of half an hour. As for the Nintendo DS I have every version of the Lite, including the Pikachu Yellow and the New Brain Training Cherry editions. The platform is really good and my enthusiasm is real.

A reliable connection to the internet (obviously!)
We have this but short of sending you a photo of our computer online you’ll just have to take our word for it.

Solid, speedy writing skills and the ability to self-edit.
I have solid speedy writing skills and the ability to self-edit and as such if I were writing the application form I probably wouldn’t have said “self-edit” and then italicised it.

A willingness to commit time and effort to DS and Wii Fanboy. It is quite possible to take this on in addition to a full-time job or schoolwork, but it is definitely a commitment of time and effort.
I have a willingness to commit both time and effort to DS and Wii fanboy. I work in games journalism as my real job so it really will be a seemless transition from writing real games news to writing for Joystiq.

Basic photo-editing skills.
I have more than basic photo editing skills as can be seen from this picture, which, I made in 3 minutes flat. That was with an extended tea break.

A willingness to follow instructions and an understanding of teamwork.
This is a poorly worded requirement. How are you going to test this in candidates. For example, we are willing to follow instructions and we understand teamwork. Is that good enough?

Lots of personality!
How generic. We have lots of personality but I’ll tell you now sonny-jim that you have to try harder to show personality that put an exclamation mark at the end of your sentence. It’s like laughing at your own joke so just don’t do it in future. Okay? Oh, also someone typed lulz on the application page. I assume you’ve had some work experience kids in recently and they’ve been tampering with your site. You may want to fix this as it look embarrassing, especially when you are asking for people to work for you.

Hilarious

This post was going to be a "how-to write a generic games are bad article for newspapers". You know the kind of article that is blindly ignorant of Jenkins' 8 Myths about videogames. I say this post was going to because dirty love rat laughing stock Mario Party "politician" Boris Johnson already did it for us here. We read it in the more cost-less content EDGE this month. We were thinking of making him the That Guy's maniac of the month but then the Telegraph might pick it up and put it on the front page. The Telegraph is allegedly one of only two UK newspapers that employs a person to google the name of the paper every two hours. Any results are then cut and pasted into the letters section to make it look like they have readers. We do that too. All the anonymous comments are secretely us except "I love the way all the comments are between themselves". That's one of Amber's flunkies. Anyway, the thing:

Here's a list of phrases and terms that BJ (Hah!) uses to describe the dirty habit of sneezing coke and fucking not-your-wife, sorry, I mean playing videogames.

"strobing colours"- I think he has games confused with raves from the 80s and early 90s, still, forgivable I guess....

"cross the room and just say no to Nintendo"- No one in the UK has a Nintendo console nor have they since the Gamecube died early 2005.

"It is time to garrotte the Game Boy and paralyse the PlayStation"- Maybe Boris, we should try to live in the 2000's. I know that since racism isn't allowed much anymore and the royals are a bit of a joke, that it is uncomfortable for you to live in this decade or even century. However, your ignorance and age is showing here. Perhaps you should suggest worrying about the wireless or trashing the talkies? How about we all go nigger baiting whilst drinking fizzy pop? That would be a jolly adventure!

"..that we admitted the catastrophic effect these blasted gizmos are having on the literacy and the prospects of young males"- Truly we are fortunate that a politician is thinking outside the box and not just blaming our shitty education system or the lack of jobs for graduates in anywhere but London. What about their health issues? Shouldn't we be giving the NHS a break?

"We demand that teachers provide our children with reading skills; we expect the schools to fill them with a love of books." Books like your autobiography: BJ How to waddle around like a twat and be successful? Fuck off BJ! Face it. Children of England are just fucking stupid, destined for jobs as guest presenters on TV shows or something in the periphery of politics. I doubt they could even put on a fucking condom some of them. They should be aborted! Oh, sorry Boris a bit insensitive.

"...are bleeping and zapping in speechless rapture"- There should be a variant of Godwin's Law for when lazy game-hate journalists write zapping or bleeping. Zapping! For fuck's sake, are we in a 1950's homo-erotic spaceman comic? Where's our rocket pack or our laser BJ?

"They become like blinking lizards, motionless, absorbed, only the twitching of their hands showing they are still conscious"- That's an accurate description of every office worker in the UK, except they are expected to do 50 hours of it a week. Surely this is good training?Next.

"I have just watched an 11-year-old play a game that looked fairly historical, on the packet. Your average guilt-ridden parent might assume that it taught the child something about the Vikings and medieval siege warfare. Phooey! The red soldiers robotically slaughtered the white soldiers"- Firstly, good sample set. It's nice to get a supporting anecdote in. Thank god the white soldiers didn't wipe out the brown or off-white soliders. That might be educational and topical. Did you engage with the boy whilst he was playing BJ or were you more preoccupied? What were you doing to this poor 11-year-old's mother Boris? Was Daddy around when you were "watching" this child. Why is the parent guilt ridden? No you'd never do that to a nice family unit would you?

"The more addictive these games are to the male mind, the more difficult it is to persuade boys to read books"- This is so true can you think of other leisure time activities that distract boys from reading? Here's some to start you off movies, television, sports.... There should be a study on why girls are immune. What about men and women or are we not including the largest group of people that play videogames? No they would distract from the point you are trying to make.

"Even at university, there are now terrifying numbers of students who cannot express themselves in the kind of clear, logical English required for an essay, and in many important respects if you can't write, you can't think" This work kind of relates to my real life work. BJ hits on a good point. University students of all age, gender and cultural groups can't express themselves clearly or logically. That includes the non-gamers too. Most of my gamer friends are fucking dumb as wll. Lets see, there is a government economist, a librarian, a museum curator, a concert violinist, store managers, artists, game testers, mechanics, a teacher and a university lecturer. Oh shit three of them are Doctors too. Oh man, we as a generation who grew up with games, are fucked.

"The Royal Literary Fund has, in the past few years, done a wonderful job of establishing Writing Fellows at our universities, offering therapy for those who can't put their thoughts on paper; and yet the fund admits that the scale of the problem is quite beyond its abilities"- You're right again BJ. University is the only route to success. We can fix all of societies problems with a good solid watered down entry requirement, overinclusive and expensive university education. God knows we need more arts graduates to work on the tube or work in PR. I heard a rumour the other day that once upon a time people didn't have to go to University. That's right! These people were £12000 richer than all of us straight off the bat!

"It's the software that's the problem. They have not been properly programmed, because they have not read enough." Clever word play BJ clever word play. Software. Programmed. You have clearly read a lot of books. But you know what they say about a man's library, the bigger the bookworm.....

Well that's it really. It's a nonsense article written by a nonsense man about a nonsense subject. The argument that computer games are responsible for poor literacy isn't water-tight. However, if BJ is right about the number of gamers and consoles in the UK isn't it time the government starts to treat gaming seriously? The DCMS, (that's the government department for culture, media and sport, which when it isn't haemorrhaging money into the Olympics that nobody wants, governs "media" and "culture". Both of which, are massively under funded, the Lottery, temporarily keeping some of these projects, inititatives and institutions afloat) website here, has contributed little to nothing towards videogames. A few studies into violence and videogames in which no link was found on a number of occassions and a few exploratory investigations. Until then as gamers we have to suffer from lazy articles blaming, lamenting and generally misunderstanding games and gamers.

Cunzy"I can't read books and play games"1 1 out.