Online Shenanigans

*Presses Start*

First off, Megan's on a roll, isn't she? Give her a hand! *claps*

Now to the good stuff.

Nowadays PSN and Xbox Live are a gamers second home. It makes you feel welcome. Accepted. Quaint. Playing online with millions of people across the world, making them all eat whatever you can dish out, it's a phenomenal experience that people around the world lose sleep over.

I can't stand it.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not a hermit, nor would I like my online systems disabled by any means. There are certain aspects of being online that I'm thankful for. I have friends everywhere that playing online is the only means of playing. However, I usually only play with friends. Not because I love my friends. Not because I love the netcode of the games.

It's because, by nature, human beings are assholes.

Playing online almost ruined my MVC3 playing because of the way people play (And still do) and it would get so frustrating and so ridiculous that the game that I waited to play for 10 years, I dropped in 2 months. It took a lot of convincing from friends to get back on the wagon and actually start playing, but now, I've limited it to just friends. I know we've all had that situation. Playing a game online just to run into that one person who needs to hit that instant win button. They make the game generally unendurable and maybe it's just my luck, but from Marvel to Madden to Modern Warfare, There's always that one.

On top of the online douchebaggery, The world wide web has never been the greatest place for competitive gaming. Some gamers will still get on with their dial up internet creating some of the slowest games ever. Lag is a terrible problem. It doesn't help the concentration when your game play looks like a slideshow. On top of all this, there are people to exploit this. Lag Switches are devices that temporarily disconnects you from the internet, and quickly connects you back. When happens, the person on the other end sees everything either in slow motion or catches the action in quick bursts, allowing the lag switcher to outmaneuver and do whatever is it to do to you to get the upper hand. It's a cheap way to get the win.

There's a ton more to talk about, like boosting, rapidfire, disconnecting, hacking, aimbots, exploits, etc, but then I'd be here all day. The main point that I'd like to bring up is there's nothing like having friends getting together and playing. Sure, I could play them online, but there's a certain feeling that you get when you've got your friends there. One of the best experiences I've had is getting friends together to play "X-Men Legends" when it dropped years ago. We were up all night, and then some. So much gaming. Same thing with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. Multiplayer madness. Does anyone else remember Gauntlet? Get some friends and play some couch co-op! Go outside, make a friend so you can go back inside and be hermits. Besides, can you picture playing Mario Party 8 with a lag switcher? Geez.

Also, as a final note, back in May (or June?) , I made a post talking about Hollywood staying out of my video game movies. The post was sparked at the realization that they were making a Phoenix Wright movie. I blew it off, saying it was going to be dumb. The trailer was leaked on YouTube. I was wrong. It actually looks damn good. Go check it out. There's not many times I'm wrong about game movies. Hopefully, This will be enough to make me eat crow.

Continue?

Another TCPS Special

We are going to live stream a first impressions! Today! Yes tonight, the 14th of November, (for real this time.) We're going to live stream gameplay and FI of Ultimate Marvel VS Capcom 3! (Obtained through legal means of course,) with a live Q & A! Catch all the action Here (@ http://www.twitch.tv/tcpspodcast) tonight starting roughly around 2:30 pm EST (11:30 am PST and 7:30 pm GMT). It's gonna be great!

A TCPS Special!

We are going to live stream a first impressions! Tonight! Yes tonight, the 12th of November. We're going to live stream gameplay and FI of Ultimate Marvel VS Capcom 3! (Obtained through legal means of course.) Catch all the action Here (@ http://www.twitch.tv/tcpspodcast) tonight starting roughly around 11:30 pm EST (8:30 pm PST and 4:30 am GMT). It's gonna be great!

November Upcomings!

Halloween is coming, and after that is November. With November comes the beginning of some of the most anticipated titles. The Holiday gaming releases are upon us, folks. So what does that mean for TCPS? Well, you can expect more first impression podcasts of games coming out, and games that have recently come out. More podcasts of us playing classics in honor of new releases. Sonic, (the hedgehog, not the fast food chain,) is celebrating a milestone and a new game, and we're doing something special for him.

There might be a tiny celebration of both of our hosts working in the Video Game industry, in some fashion, (this means that Megan got a job. Really, it's a means for celebration.) And after Megan sells her video game inspired handmade creations, she'll be able to shoot more zombies with Antonio in a Legend of Zelda Left 4 Dead add-on. We'll record it, we promise it'll contain some classic moments.

Stay tuned for a regular release of podcasts, blog posts, and more. Antonio will be participating in a Iron Man of Gaming event this November and we'll bring you updates on that also. He's brushing up on his MvC3 as we speak. And don't forget to check us out on the Twitter-sphere @TCPSpodcast and on Facebook here.

Updates abound! Stay tuned!

Extra Life for the kids!

Starting tomorrow, October 15th at 9am EST (6am PST, 2pm GMT) Megan and Tony will be playing video games for 24 hours! Why? To raise money for the Children's Miracle Network. They'll be streaming almost all of it, and taking turns when they aren't playing together. All donations are IRS tax deductible (at least in the US), and you get to see two people who love to play games make it through 24 hours, if they can! What could be more fun than watching them start to crash? Makes things more interesting.

If you want to donate they have a team page on the Extra Life site. Here it is: To Continue Press Start. Now what kind of games can you expect to see them play? Okamiden, The World Ends With You, Minecraft, Sonic the Hedgehog, The Legend of Zelda (various ones), Retro Game Challenge, Chrono Trigger, the Jak and Daxter series, Ninja Gaiden series, Catherine, Marvel vs Capcom 3 and Many many more! Megan and Tony will go head to head in Super Smash Bros Brawl.

You can check out the Official TCPS Ustream here: TCPS/Megara Stream
Megan will be streaming here also.
Check out Antonio's stream here: TCPS/Antonio Stream

What could be more fun than playing games for 24 hours? Very few things, my friends.

Animus, TCPS Style! Part One: Looking Back

So, we're going to hop in our Animus and look back at the First 6 months of gaming and tell you what was awesome, what sucked, and what was surprisingly good. Let's not kill anyone on the way. I'm looking at you, Desmond. And just because I look at Desmond, it doesn't exclude you, Megan.
(I have No idea what he's talking about. I would never *stabs passerby* anyone. Damn! I missed my target! *runs)

JANUARY:

TOP:

Mass Effect 2 - Finally, PS3 owners got their hands on the sci-fi epic that rocked the socks of 360 owners almost a year before. Touting the DLC content and the Mass Effect 3 engine, this game easily peaked up there as one of my favorite games of the month.

Dead Space 2 - A follow up to the horror sleeper hit by EA, this game brought even more scares and more blood and gore then forty score of the civil war. Amazing gameplay leaves me hankering for a DS3.

LOW:

MindJack- I'm sure you've heard me rant about this game, and upon looking back on it, I can't say it was a horrible game. It's a terrible game with mildly cool parts. It was very clunky and the touted multiplayer game was terribly done. Big disappointment.

Two Worlds II : I can safely say that it was better then the first one. That's not saying too much at all.

SURPRISE!

Lord Of Arcana - This Monster Hunter/Phantasy Star rehash turned actually turned out pretty cool. Lots of customizable options. Not a GOTY title, but great title.

FEBRUARY:

TOP:

KillZone 3 - One of Sony's strongest titles went strong in February with plenty of sideswipes and action sequences that makes any FPS fan question the better shooter. Damn good.

Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 - Fighting Game quips aside, this was a very strong titles matching the heroes and villains of the gaming and comic book world together in this fast and frenzied fighting game that was easy to learn but hard to master. Solid game from Capcom.

BOTTOM:

Hyperdimention Neptuna - This RPG published by NIS America had a really cool concept. RPG based off the current console war and playing as female versions of the current game systems? How could that fail? Well, subpar graphics, slow story, and uninteresting characters. Oh, and DLC Characters that I can meet in game but can't use until I buy them? Get out.

Knights Contract: This GOW rip off had the potential to be really really cool. But the story ripped from Dante's Inferno and the gameplay that we've seen all too often leads it to not be as great as it should. Don't get me wrong. I have zero problems with games being practically the same gameplay. If you're going to go down that route, however, make the story creative and do something that others haven't done.

Surprise!

Bulletstorm: This EA/People Can Fly/Epic Games mash up that looked like Gears Of War surprised everyone, including me. A story that's totally different from the get go, and the addition of a scorpion style whip and a point system lead to a TON of fun. One of the best games of this month.

MARCH: (Note - March was a HUGE month. It was hard to keep it limited to 2 per section.)

TOP:

Crysis 2: I know in the Ides of March, I said that this was a game that should have gotten a full review, and I still stand by it. One of the best FPS that I've played in a very long time. Special abilities combined with a pretty awesome story and a increasingly difficult campaign leads to a must buy for anyone who likes shooters.

Dragon Age 2: This is a pretty weird post. Some people dislike Dragon Age 2 and some people love it. While I don't think it was as epic as the first one, I thought that DA2 was a great game in its own right and sets up for what could be on the same level as Bioware's other hit, Mass Effect. It's a quicker, faster, more streamlined game, and for that, It was a pretty enjoyable experience.

Bottom:

Homefront: THQ's jump into the foray with Homefront places the war on american soil. Apparently, people didn't take too well to that. Bad graphics and a 3-4 hour campaign left gamers and myself with a very very sour taste in our mouths.

Final Fantasy XIV: This is a potshot, mostly because it's a MMO, but Square Enix really dropped the ball with XIV to the point that the game (to my knowledge) is STILL free to play until Square can fix the numerous problems that plague the game.

Surprise!

The 3rd Birthday: For a lot of us, this was the awaited end of the Parasite Eve trilogy that many of us begged for. Square Enix gave it to us, and did not disappoint, despite the many changes to the game and the doubt of a title that can supply a enjoyable experience.

Part 2 coming up soon where we finish up the list, I point out the greatest games so far and we take a look at the future!

To Continue Press Start 1! The First podcast!

So here it is, the maiden podcast of To Continue Press Start, (which was almost changed to Pity Health earlier today. Long Story.) During this audio podcast we talk about Marvel vs Capcom 3, or we had planned to. Also, challenge to myself, Megan, is posed, we talk about fighting games in general, some classic games, Let's Play! Power Rangers edition, and even some Kingdom Hearts, and much much more.

Check it out Here (or hopefully up in the iTunes store soon!)

Opening Remarks and Acceptance

*presses start*

Welcome, one and all, to the fantasy zone.

Megan randomly asked if I wanted to do a podcast on which I jumped on immediately. The problem was that we actually couldn't just randomly make a podcast. There was a lot of technical mumbo jumbo that had to be jumped so that we could actually do this, but we jumped with ease. The hardest part actually came for a name for this blog/podcast. It took longer to come up with a name that didn't suck then to actually make the site. After some intense deliberation, we're here now.

I've been a gamer as far back as I can remember, all the way from my family owning a NES to owning a Genesis to owning every next-gen system possible. To question my gamer-ness is to question my manhood. I'm a gamer a heart and I'm pretty sure I'll game until I run out of extra lives and game over becomes more then a cue to start over.

I've been playing the fuck out of Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 recently. It's a game that fans have been waiting to drop for over 10 years and it's finally made it. The game is fun and fluid. The graphics are beautiful. The MT Framework works wonderfully for this game.

And deep in my heart of hearts, I know people are going to hate this game with a inhumane passion. For No. Reason. At. All.

That's generally how it goes with gamers. We're passionate about our games and anyone who doesn't follow our opinion of games might as well be dead to us. If you play fighting games, you're a elitist. If you play Call of Duty, odds are you don't like anything else that isn't "Real life". If you play sports games, you're a jock who's so close minded, he hates everything else. RPG players are nothing but nerds who sit in their basement and play D&D all day. If you play the platformers, you enjoy the kiddie games. It goes on and on and on with no end in sight. It's almost kind of sickening how close minded the gamer central is. It brings your personal likeness of virtual games and tossed on the outside world and ridicules you for it. I've seen people stop talking because one is a sports fan and the other likes puzzle games. It's the ridiculous shit like that. Megan (as I'm sure she'll tell you on one of her posts) plays the hell out of Minecraft. While it's not my cup of tea by a long shot and I pick on her constantly about it, I'll never tell her that she sucks as a human because of her gaming habits. That's crossing the line.

And even if you can agree on certain genres, that's not even the end of it. There's sub-genres as well that could very well be your Mason-Dixon line. "u liek Final Fantasy? WTF, Disegea 4 life n00b, gtfo". It's these retarded habits that make real gamers not associate with other games. For the record, There's at least something of every genre that I've taken a liking to. From Madden 11 to Ico, I can say there's something out there for everyone, and one game doesn't necessarily define the genre. So, I challenge all of you. Go play something out of your genre. You an RPG guy? Try a sports game. FIFA soccer your choice of game? Play some Trauma Team or some Phoenix Wright. You like FPS's? Hit up some Street Fighter and then let's talk. Find something to play and who knows? Maybe you'll come out with a new love of a certain game and at very least, you can come back here and say that you tried. Acceptance, ladies and gentlemen. That's all I ask for. Tolerate that everyone likes something different.

Except those Minecraft people. They're fucking weridos.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go back to Amaterasu. Spider-Man has been talking shit and I plan on shoving one of my divine instruments where the web don't spin.

Until next time,

Continue?