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My Top Six Game List of 2005, Part Three

Well,everyone, here it is! My final installment in my series of my six favorite video games of 2005. What are the last two? Will I name a favorite? Read on.......

Sly 2: Band of Thieves for the PS2 is one of the best platformers, not to mention games, period that I've played for awhile. You play as Sly Cooper, the master thief, of the prestigious Cooper family, the latest in a long line of master thieves. Yes, I did say that Sly was a thief. A master thief, in fact, which means that he only steals from master criminals. Sort of a Robin Hood type character. Sly, as a young raccoon, was all set to inherit the Thievious Raccoonus, the Cooper family's journal of all their exploits and tecniques, but on the night, he was to inherit it, his family was attacked and brutally mudered by the Fiendish Five gang, who divided up the Thievius Raccoonus and went on their way to use the information in it to their own devious ends. Sly was the only survivor, as he hid in a closet and was not noticed. He grew up in an orphanage, and befriended two other critters who joined him in his exploits as they all grew up. There is Murray the hippo(?), who is the brawn of the gang, and does everything requiring strength over stealth, and Bentley the turtle, who is the scientific genius, and creates all sorts of gismos and gadgets to help Sly out.

In his first adventure, Sly battles the Fiendish Five and reclaims all of the parts of the Thievius Raccoonus. The final boss in that adventure is a giant owl named Clockwerk who was so consumed with his hatred for the Cooper family that he had all of his body parts replaced with mechanical ones so that he could live until he had defeated them. (perhaps borrowing a reversed page from Isaac Asimov's "The Bicentennial Man") However, Sly emerged victorious, and Clockwerk is defeated and his mechanical parts disassembled. In Sly 2, Sly discovers that someone, namely the Klaww Gang , has stolen Clockwerk's parts and are using them to their criminal ends- The production of illegal spice, printing counterfeit mony, etc. It is Sly's job to confront the five members and steal back the Clockwerk parts to save the world from the terrible possibility that Clockwerk would be reassembled.

This is a unique game that requires stealth and sneaking around instead of the usual action-packed running around and direct confrontation of enemies as in other platformers. It also has quite a few minigames thrown in that keep thing fresh and interesting. It is very well made, and kept me very enjoyably occupied for quite awhile. Thus it earns it's place on my list of favorite games of 2005.
Bentley, Sly, and Murray relax in their hideout.
Sly in action, sneaking around on a rooftop.

And, finally, the last, but certainly not the least, on my list, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes for the Gamecube. I think I would probably have to say that this was my favorite game that I played in 2005. I knew it would be a great game and would be well worth the money, so I saved up my video game allowance for something like three months to accumulate the $65 necessary to buy it and the Nintendo Power Strategy guide to go along with it as soon as it was released in November '04. It was well worth it, too. It is an epic first-person adventure game, with vast worlds to explore, beautiful graphics, unbelievable depth and detail, and epic boss battles. Your view is from inside the helmet of Samus Aran, an intergalactic bounty hunter, who is encased completely in a mechanical power suit, which enables her to survive in extremely inhospitable conditions and perform superhuman feats of strength and endurance. Yes, I said her. Samus Aran is a woman. That was one of the secrets of the original Metroid game for the NES. Only after you beat the game in an incredibly short time was the secret revealed. The Metroid games have always been focused on solving puzzles and exploration of HUGE worlds. In fact, the Super Metroid game for the SNES way back in 1994 was so huge that it took up 40 megs of storage space on the game cartridge! If my memory serves me correctly, that was a pretty respectable size for a computer hard drive back then.

This game certainly lives up to its heritage. It begins as Samus responds to a distress call from a Galactic Federation expedition to the planet Aether. She soon discovers that the planet has been inhabited by her old foes, the reptilian, violent, amoral space pirates. She also soon discovers that there are two dimensions of the planet, a dark and light dimension, and there are portals by which she can travel back and forth between the two dimensions. The dark side is inhabited by the Ing, a hostile race bent on taking over the planet. It is Samus' job to defeat the space pirates, restore order to the planet, and find out what happened to the GF expedition.

As I said, It is an epic game, both in graphics, bosses, and size. I recently went back and played the final boss battle in the game, which takes at LEAST 30 minutes, and was blown away again by the size and depth of this game. Which is why it has earned the coveted title of my favorite video game of 2005.
A view from inside Samus' helmet....
The much coveted (atleast by the space pirates) morph ball capability, which allows Samus to get into places she would otherwise be unable to fit.

Well, there you have it. My six favorite video games of 2005. What do you think?

Please pardon my two previous empty posts. They were errors in attempt to put a picture on my profile.

My Top Six Game List of 2005, Part Two

Hi again, everyone! It's time for the next installment in my favorite video games of 2005. Numbers 1-4 will not be in any particular order, but I'm considering naming one of them my favorite. Read on....

Ratchet & Clank: Up Your Arsenal for the PS2 is the third in the Ratchet & Clank series. The series has been a hit right from the get-go, because it was a 3-D platformer that got so much right, so little wrong, and was so entertaining and beautiful to look at at the same time. As with the previous games in the series, you assist in the galaxy-saving escapades of Ratchet (the yellow Lombax) and his robotic sidekick Clank, who rides on Ratchet's back and can be upgraded with all sorts of interesting items like a jet-pack and a helipack. Ratchet is a mechanic, and his main weapon/tool is his ever-presen Omniwrench 8000, which is the Swiss-Army knife of his home galaxy. The series is also known for Ratchet's arsenal of hilarious weapons, and this one is no exception. A couple would be the Quack-O-Ray, which turns enemies into ducks, and the Agents of Doom, which are knee-high little mechanical critters that have this fiendish little chuckle and chase down enemies, latch onto them, and explode! A great game, made by Insomniac Games, which also made the Spyro the Dragon series, one of which is also on my list.
Ratchet and Clank enjoy a quiet moment in Clank' apartment watching a holovid broadcast...
Ratchet explores a new planet, on his quest to find the elusive, long-disapeared intergalactic superhero (at least on the holovid broadcasts), Captain Quark!
Ratchet and Clank confront a large, robotic villain...

Next up- Spyro: The Year of the Dragon for the original Playstation. An earlier game by Insomniac Games, the original Playstation Spyro the Dragon series was one of the first 3-D platformers, and also one of the best. Spyro is a little purple dragon who just happens to be in the right place at the right time to be pressed into saving the day for whoever happens to be handy. In this case (Spyro's third adventure), the dragons are having a grand party, and it goes on until everyone falls asleep from exhaustion. While the dragons are sleeping, from a long-forgotten land on the other side of the dragon world, minions of the evil scorceress come and steal all of the dragon eggs! As Spyro is the only dragon small enough to fit through the tunnels that the scorceress's servants came through, he is sent to reclaim the dragon eggs and vanquish the scorceress. Spyro is a typical dragon, who can butt enemies with his head, and of course, breathe fire on them! He is accompanied by a few friends and his ever-present sidekick Sparx the dragonfly, all of which play an imortant role in helping Spyro out at different times as playable characters. It's a great game, and if you play both it and Ratchet & Clank, you can see definite similarities between the two. The great sense of humor, the excellent gameplay, and even some of the situations in the games are similar. Old, yes, but still great, Spyro is definitely one of the best! I actually played all three of the original Plastation Spyro games in 2005, but this was the one I picked to represent Spyro on my list.

Spyro turns up the heat on an unfortunate baddie who dares to challenge a dragon!

As always, all screenshots and boxshots courtesy of www.gamespot.com.

Stay tuned for my final installment and see if I really name my absolute favorite or just declare them all great!

My Top Six Game List of 2005, Part One

Well, everyone, here it is!!! My official top 6 video games of 2005! I was going to do a top 5 but couldn't decide which of the last 2 to bump from the list. I'm also doing this in 2 (or 3) installments, partly because dial-up is VERY slow when uploading pictures.

So, without further ado, here are numbers 5 and 6, in no particular order-

Lego Star Wars for the Playstation 2 is an incredibly cute, very entertaining game. The title says it all-an action/adventure game that plays through Star Wars Episodes 1-3, made entirely of Legos. It's not too terribly difficult, and not as long as I'd like, but still one of the best games I played in 2005. Check out the screenshot, courtesy of Gamespot.com.

Another game that was excellent was Dr Mario 64 for the Nintendo 64. It's a remake of an old 8-bit Nintendo (NES) game. It has the original Dr Mario game in it (starring Mario from the Super Mario series games), as well as a multiplayer mode, a story mode, and a couple of other additions. It's a puzzle game that's very similar to Tetris. However, instead of completing lines like you do in Tetris, you have a playing field (a medicine bottle in this case) with a number of viruses in it (the higher the level, the more viruses) for Mario to eradicate. To accomplish this, Mario throws vitamin pills into the jar, and it's up to you to manuever the to line up with the same color viruses. if you can line up four viruses or segments of a vitamin pill, or a combination of both, that line will be eradicated. The level ends when you have gotten rid all of the viruses in the jar. Very simple and very addictive! One of the best things about this game was that it was free! I found it in a car Daddy bought!

Well, stay tuned for the next installment (or two). I'm planning to do the remaining four games in one post, but if I don't have time, or my internet connection is slow enough, I might do three.

Fell free to comment on my favorites and offer thoughts and some of your favorite games!

An Exciting New Topic?

Hi again, everyone. (all 3 of you) Nothing extremely wild and wonderful is happening right now, aside from me sitting at the computer posting about my boring little life for the world to see. :-)I'm not sure who all has discovered this blog yet, and what all of you are interested in, but, since this is my blog, it's probably my duty to bore you to death with what interests me, right?

Maybe I'll try a post (or two) about the best video games I played in 2005. I'm too tired to actually do the post(s) tonight, but I'll lay the groundwork for them.

To begin with, I'll explain exactly what I mean by "games I played in 2005". I actually played a number of games last year, but I didn't really play that terribly many extensively.

It might help if you knew exactly how I buy video games. Instead of rushing out and spending $50 on the latest, greatest, new game, I try to keep an eye open for games that look appealing (and knowing two of my younger brothers, I get no shortage of advice). Then, I watch Ebay for the next 8 months until I find a copy for $5 to $10. Then, I buy it (provided I have enough money in my video game allowance), and add it to my stockpile.

This system has a couple of advantages. 1-It's much cheaper. It's amazing how cheap games can be if you don't have to have the latest, greatest stuff. 2-As long as it takes me to beat a game (partly because I don't have terribly much time to play them), I never have a shortage of new games to play. Therfore, if I finish one game, I'm also not compelled to go out and buy a new $50 one just so I have something to play.

Now I do occasionally save up my pennies and buy a new, expensive game. (Metroid Prime 2 is an excellent example) And occasionally Renee gets me a more expensive game for my birthday, Christmas, or something like that, but most of my games are bargain-bin used ones.

Also to add to my definition of games that I "played" in 2005, I will say that I tested each game when I got it, but, many of the ones I got came in the middle of my playing something else, so they didn't get played through right away. And since I have a number to choose from, some of them didn't get played through at all yet.

There, with all that out of the way, without further ado, my next post(s) will feature some of my favorite games of 2005! Stay Tuned!!!!!!!

I'm Finally Back!

Well, I have finally reappeared upon returning from PA, where we went for New Year's weekend. We hung out with my brother-in-law and his wife, who are also youth leaders, at the Millmont Youth New Year's party. We left early, though, to get off of the snowy and icy roads before all the drunks started coming out of the bars after their parties.

For the three of you that have discovered this blog so far, and are waiting on the edge of your seats wondering which guitar Debi took, it was the white Carvin. Quite a shame, really since the vote was almost unanimous for the BC Rich. :-)

Unfortunately, I have been pretty busy lately, and haven't had much time for any extra stuff at home or anywhere else. I did manage, however, to boldly defeat the Reznors in the Vanilla Fortress in Super Mario World. (the first I've played a video game in more than a week, I think. And I hadn't played anything except solitaire for awhile before that) Why am I playing an old Super Nintendo game when I could be playing a Gamecube, PS2, or XBOX game? Because it's such a great game. It's old, yes, but fun and very entertaining. Renee also got me a couple of new games for Christmas, so I might post about my grand escapades in the gaming world soon. We'll see.

I know it's a little late, but HAPPY NEW YEAR, everyone!