X-COM: UFO Defence AKA UFO: Enemy Unknown Games Room Review

This is a review I have wanted to do for a very long time, but it took me awhile to get round to it mostly because I wanted to record my own footage for the review and for some unknown reason every time I would try to record it something would go wrong making the footage unsuitable, but here it is complete and finished, for those who prefer to read reviews instead of watching them the written version is below the video.

X-COM: UFO Defence known as UFO: Enemy Unknown in Europe is a science fiction strategy video game developed by Mythos Games and published by MicroProse in 1994. It came out on PC, the Amiga the CD32 console, and the PlayStation. My first experience of it was on the Playstation. I loved it from my very first go, it was quiet simply unlike anything I had ever played before and I found myself constantly returning to it just because it was so different to everything else in my collection, it was also one of those rare games which a lot of my friends also seemed to get into. Every so often there would be a game which my whole friend group would seem to buy and this was one of these games, we would all play it separately but kind of come together to talk about our in-game adventures and our tactics it kind of made the game exist beyond the confines of the screen.

Ok so to explain X-COM UFO Defence as a game to anyone who has not played it or heard of it before well it’s a game which basically mixes a real-time management simulation game with a turn-based tactics game. The player takes on the role of commander of X-COM – an organisation which is an international paramilitary organization which exists to defend the Earth from aliens.

So, when you play the strategic part of the game you are in charge of the research and development of new technology, you’re in charge of building and expanding your home base, with the choice of also building additional bases, you’re in charge of the organization's finances and personnel, and alongside growing your organisation your also in control of monitoring and adequately responding to UFO activity.

When you respond to UFO activity by sending your men to a crashed or landed UFO then you enter the tactical section of the game, as soon as your craft lands you are tasked with issuing orders to your individual X-COM troops, you tell them where to go and what to do. You can only see enemies on the map when they are in view of one of your units. At the start of the game your men will have conventional weapons, pistols, rifles and grenades and you will be fighting with Aliens who have Plasma based technology. This is where the two game types connect, if you want to have better equipment in the field then you need to research it and develop it, if you can either kill all of the enemies on a map or pick up a defeated enemy’s weapon and then retreat then you will be able to take their weapons and equipment back to your base and start the process of researching this otherworldly technology.  Obviously having a working team of researchers and other staff requires money, and how do you get money well you answer to a council made up of members from the various nations, if you help to keep their airspace clear and to eliminate aliens who land on there soil or conduct terror attacks on there cities then they will fund you, keep failing them though and they will withdraw their support which will lower your funding.

The game received strong reviews and was commercially successful, acquiring a cult following among strategy fans; several publications have listed X-COM: UFO Defence as one of the best video games ever made, including IGN ranking it as the best PC game of all time in 2007, the game has directly inspired several similar games, including UFO: Alien Invasion, and UFO: Extraterrestrials. The game had many sequels its first sequel was very similar to this game but was set under the sea, but after that for my taste at least the games strayed too far away from this formula the third game was overly complex and none of them captured the spirit or the fun level of the first two games.

IN 2012 there was a remake of the game called Xcom: Enemy Unknown created by Firaxis Games and published by 2K Games. While this remake is a fantastic game that I would heartily recommend I wanted to show the original game and review it as I don’t think the original should be replaced both of them are brilliant games which deserve to both stand tall.

By today’s standards X-COM: UFO Defence has incredibly basic graphics and sound but the core gameplay is still incredible, it’s a great example of a deep tactical game which can literally eat away days and days of your life, if you get into it the game all of the basic graphics just cease to be an issue. Sure, the remake is fantastic in its own right but I would argue that this version is possibly a deeper tactical game, there are things you can do in this game that you can’t do in the original, for example you can shoot walls to destroy them, you also take far more men out in to the field which I think gives the game a slightly bigger feel. I am not putting down the more modern remake both of these games are very rare cases of games which I would score with a solid 10 out of 10.

My Retro Game Purchases for July 2019

So neither my blogging or my YouTubing have got off the ground yet again nor have I been taking photos of things either so once again there are going to be no pictures and in total honesty its not been that thrilling a month purchase wise. I am proberbly going to go a little more in to the real life stories of how I found the stuff I found mostly because people seem to find it strange that I actually find old games that are not like a bizzilion pounds but mostly because I just think that it will make this a more intresting read.

On July the 2nd I went in to a charty shop not to far from my house and I Paid £8 in total for a bunch of complete PS1 games. These games were Toca world touring cars, Toca 2, driver, driver 2 , smackdown, tomb raider the last revelation, die hard trilogy, syphon filter , syphon filter 2, and syphon filter 3 (platinum version). I had actually seen these games in this shop about a week ago but they were £4.99 each which I thought was a lot more than I wanted to pay especially for the Toca games. This day when I went in though I was buying some cheap dvd's to watch and the manager who knows im into old games mentioned that he thought the person who had put out the PS1 stuff had put it a bit high and it wasnt shifting, I said if it was less id have brought them already, next thing I know he tells me to bring them up and he would figure out a price he wanted for them and £8 was what he first said and I thought it was such a low amount he was asking for that it would be distastful to haggle any further.

Around the 6th I visited a small indy game shop and in a glass cabinet I noticed three 3rd party Dreamcast memory cards for £1 each one is a joytech 1mb, ones a joytech 4mb and the others an unnamed 4mb one. I figured this was a cheap asking price and so snapped them all up.

I didnt grab anything else then until the 25th, when I went in a charity shop near to my girlfriends house where there was a bunch of dirty looking copies of Fifa and stuff for one pound each but amongst them I saw a sealed copy of Tokyo Road Race for the PS2 for £1, not the most intresting retro purchase but one of not that many this month.

 

On the 27th I went on a overnight trip to Cottingham near Hull , which is about 90 miles away from me. I was there because my girlfriend was having an operation on her leg by a specialist surgeon. I went to visit her and as I wanted to see her more than one day I stayed over night in a shithole hotel about 5 miles from the hospital in what looked like a demilitarized zone. The hospital wouldn't let visitors in till 2 and I woke up at 9 and didnt want to spend one second more in the hotel than absolutly necesery so I spent like half a day busing and walking looking for charity shops to occupy myself and keep mind busy. I went in about 8 diffrent charity shops two in one area and 6 about another two miles closer to the hospital. It was in one of these that I found Spiderman for GameCube complete with a 3rd party memory card included in the box for £1, Dragonball z budokai boxed but missing manual for £1, Eighteen Wheeler boxed but missing manual for £1, and Rugrats Totally Angelica complete for PS1 for £3. 

 

 So all in all I only spent £18 this month on retro games which is pretty much an all time low for me. I am not dissapointed though I think that I got some decent stuff for my money and id rather spend a little and get decent stuff than over pay buying stuff just to be able to say that I have purchased something. Will I buy more in August who knows, it wouldnt be hard to spend more but then again I know that I am currently quiet busy so dont have quiet as much time to go looking for games, still lets see what the fates bring.

 

 

 

 

My Retro Purchases in Febuary 2019

Well this month has been an incredibly slow month for retro game purchases. It hasnt been a total waste though, in fact I think I would argue that its a successful month because I didnt get much but I am happy with what I did get. I havent sorted out any pictures again this month, so I hope this doesnt dissapoint anyone too much.

My first purchases were on the 7th which in my oppinion was a pretty good day for the old retro gaming. I went in a charity shop like 5 minutes from my house on the way home from work and I got Windsurfers Paradise for the original Playstation sealed for 95pence, Ronin Blade for the original Playstation sealed for 95pence, Shadowman for the original Playstation sealed for 95pence, Who wants to be a Millionaire for the original playstation complete for 50pence, Harry Potter and the philosophers stone for the original playstation complete for 50pence, Freestyle Scooter for the original playstation complete for 50pence, Crash Bandicoot (Platinum version) for the original playstation complete for 50pence, Syphon Filter 2 (Platinum Version)for the original playstation complete for 50pence, and Crash Team Racing disc and manaul in empty case for 50pence. It was a really crazy amount of stuff picked up in one go for a really low price and it really made me happy.

 

On the 13th I grabbed Elebits for the DS boxed but missing manual from cash convertors (American) for 99pence , I have wanted this game for blooming ages having been a massive fan of the Wii Elebits game which is a lot more common to find out in the wild.

My last purchaes of the month happended on the 18th when I grabbed a few snes carts, I grabbed  3 of them for £6 in total they were Striker, NBA live 95 and Super Wrestlemania all loose and pal. from an indy games shop.

 

I only actually spent £12.84 this month proberbly making it the least I have spent on retro games during a month for several years. Will I spend more next month? I have no idea. My favourate purchase of the month would have to be the DS Elebits.

 

More about the PlayStation Classic full title list including the diffrences between the Western and Japanese Version. Including my oppinion on Three of the Japanese exclusives

In my previous post I posted the full list of games on the Western PlayStation classic and then went on to talk about two of the games and what I thought about them being on the machine. Something I didn't mention was the difference between the Western and Japanese versions. Well 12 of the games are the same on both regions systems however our Japanese gaming friends will not be getting Cool Boarders 2, Destruction Derby, Grand Theft Auto, Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee, Rayman, Syphon Filter, Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six or Twisted Metal. I guess there will be good reasons for this maybe these games were not very popular over there or are not as well remembered by them. The Japanese however do have the following games on there version of the PlayStation Classic.

Japanese PlayStation Classic Exclusives:
Arc the Lad
Arc the Lad 2
Armored Core
G Darius
Gradius Gaiden
SaGa Frontier
Parasite Eve
XI [sái] (Devil Dice)

I already discussed Cool Borders 2 and whether it really deserved a place on the PlayStation Classic or  not but I instantly have to admit that there are a lot of games on the above Japanese Exclusive list that I would very happily swap Cool Borders 2 for.

The Arc the Lad games are basically games which consist of tactical battles and basic RPG elements, as far as I know they didn't ever come out over here but I do remember one of my best friends having a Japanese import of the first game, and the games have certainly been downloadable in English on the PSN store. I actually quiet like these games and I would have enjoyed seeing one of them on the Western PlayStation Classic and to the best of my knowledge they both actually reviewed quiet well. It is also interesting to note that the inclusion of the first two Arc the Lad games on the Japanese system means that the Japanese version actually has two games in the same series something the Western version cant brag.

Armored Core is a third-person shooter mecha video game developed by FromSoftware who are probably best known now for being the developers of the Dark Souls games. and released in 1997. The game is the first in the Armored Core series a series which not only made a name for itself but has also gone on to include around 20 games. Given how much love Dark Souls gets I think it would have been cool to have this game feature on the Western version of the PlayStation Classic

I don't want to get into the other games right now I will save those for a latter post but personally I think I would have possibly preferred if we had gotten the same titles as the Japanese but I guess a lot of that is down purely to my own possible preferences.

My Retro Purchases September 2018

My monthly retro purchasing started on the 3rd of the Month when I spent £22 on a small bundle of games from an indy place. This bundle consisted of Lemmings for the Philips CDI complete, lego harry potter years 1-4 complete for the wii, trauma center second opinion complete for the wii, prince of persia the forgotten sands complete for the wii, blazing angels complete for the wii, trauma center second oppinion complete for the wii, pokemon stadium n64 cart only, Banjo kazooie for n64 cart only, snowboard kids for the n64 cart only and DiddyKong racing for the n64 cart only.  I kind of consider the CDI game as the jewel here in a way not because of worth but because of the fact its not that often that I actually come across games for this system.

On the 5th I managed to grab Vandal Hearts for PS1 for £15 complete. I don't often like to pay much for PS1 games but its a game I have wanted to own for a long time. I remember playing it when younger I am pretty sure I never owned it and that I had simply rented it or lent it from someone. The funny thing is that despite now seeing this as a very good Fire Emblem clone I had actually played this long before I even knew what Fire Emblem was. The simple truth is that I had dived on this now because I got the feeling that if I didn't jump on it now it might have ended up becoming one of those games you remember but can simply never get your hands on again without paying an absolute ransom.

On the 9th of September just after work I grabbed The Cyber Shinobi, Strider, Bank Panic, Alien Storm and Arcade Smash Hits all for the Master System all cart only for £8 which I was pretty darn happy Alien Storm particularly is a personal favorite of mine.

On the 27th I got a few N64 games just loose carts. I spent £6.50 and got 1080 snowboarding, Forsaken and Wrestlemania 2000 which Is pretty good going as far as I am concerned.

On Friday the  28th I managed to grab 007 From Russia With Love for the GameCube Complete for £3.50, Mario and Sonic Olympics for Wii complete for 95pence, and Mario Strikers charged for wii complete for 95pence with the added bonus of also having a Wii Mario Kart disc in the box of the later. All in all I wouldnt consider this a bad little haul at all.

 I ended my month of retro purchases by buying Spiderman 2 complete for the GameCube for 50pence from a charity shop on the way to my fiancee's place, which in fairness as its an excellent game and a good price is a pretty good way to end the month.

If my mathematics skills are correct then I spent £57.40 this month on retro games which although quiet a calm month by my standards it is also quiet a lot more than I spent last month. In general it is a month I am pretty happy with. I guess I would have to call the star buy of the month Vandal Hearts partly because I think it was a great deal and partly because its one of the things I purchased with the most personal meaning behind it. What will I get next month? Well I guess time will tell.

My Retro Purchases June 2018

I started my months purchases on the 6th of June with Thunder Birds Japanese cart only for the SNES arriving in the post, it cost me £3, postage was free so I think this was a pretty good pick up. I also went in a semi local retro shop on the way home from work and grabbed Sonic 2 for game gear cart only for £1.

On the 8th I went to an Indy store and I grabbed Gauntlet 2 cart and manual for NES for £5 and Hook for NES for £5 , in my opinion anytime you can get a NES game for £5 and its not a sports title then you just kind of have to jump on it.

On the 10th on the way home from work I grabbed Asterix and the Great Rescue for megadrive cart only for £. I have to admit to having been a huge Asterix fan as a kid. 

Things were quiet on the retro purchasing front then until the 17th when I spent £1 on a complete copy of Grand Turismo 4 for the PS2 which also happend to have a memory card in the case and the disc for Project Silpheed the lost planet in the case tucked into the manual. Not bad for £1 at all really.

On the 21st I grabbed two loose NES carts, RoboCop for £6 and StarWars for £7.

On the 21st I went to a charity shop, a charity shop which usually wants £3.99 for any game you could possibly call retro whatever format its on and even if it is just an old ps2 copy of FIFA. Well surprisingly this time they had a sign up saying they had too much stock and any product with a red dot on it was only 25pence and so I got the following games all complete all for 25pence each Brave: The Search For Spirit Dancer for PS2, The Jungle book grove party for ps2, Singstar Anthems for ps2, Medal of honor European assault for xbox, Sensible soccor 2006 for xbox, James bond everything or nothing for xbox, Splinter Cell for Xbox, and Mashed for xbox

On the 22nd I once again found myself in a charity shop and I grabbed The Lost World: Jurassic Park complete for PS1 for £1.50.

My last purchase of the month happened on June the  26th when I went into a charity shop and  I grabbed Tony hawk's underground complete for Xbox for £1, Halo (classics edition) complete for Xbox for £1 and Project Gotham racing 2 (classics edition) complete for £1. I might have ignored them if it wasn't for the fact that they were in amazing condition with totally scratch free discs.

So in June I spent £38.50 on retro games which is actually a pretty low amount for me, as for star pick ups I would argue that it wasn't much of an eventful month and I don't think I really have a favorite purchase, so lets see what next month brings.

Retro Game purchases: April 2018

So its the fourth month of the year and once again as always I have been tracking how much I have been spending on retro games. The first month was an expensive one, with the second not being too bad, the third being average and well as for the 4th? Well if you want to know that then I guess your going to have to read this post.

Well on the 5th of the month I got my first purchase and it was a Japanese N64 which cost me £15, it was just the system no pads or wires as I planed to take those from a spare European machine I had. On the same day I also got a boxed complete Japanese copy of G.A.S.P which I paid £5 for and an American N64 cart of Rogue Squadron which I spent a further £5 on. The first thing I did was to go inside the Japanse N64 and alter the insides of the cartridge slot so that it would play Japanese and American games.

I went on to order a few more Japanese carts these were Choro Q, Mario Kart, Blast Dozer and a boxed copy of Human Grand Prix which cost me £20 in total which had all arrived by about the 18th of the month. A few days later on the 20th I would spend £3.40 on a Japanese cart only copy of 1080 snowboarding and then on the 23rd I would get an orange memory cover for the N64 which I had ordered, basically I got this so I would know my Japanese system from my regular pal ones instantly on first glance, it cost me £1.50. So this means I spent £49.90 on getting into Import N64 gaming this month. I already owned carts of Kirby and Flying Dragon Japanese which I had previously used with an import convertor so I guess I know have myself a nice little 9 cart import N64 collection.

On the 22nd I made my first none N64 Retro purchase of the month when I grabbed 4 complete PS2 games for 50p each today Shrek superslam, Super Monkeyball Deluxe, Monsters inc scare island and IronMan. 

 

On the 26th I did a little shopping at some retro indy stores after work and managed to grab Grandia (Unisoft exclusive edition) complete for PS1 for £15 and Captain America and the Avengers (American Genesis version) complete for megadrive £20. In honesty I think these two were my joint favorite purchases of the month.

So this month I spent £86.90 but this doesn't seem much really when there was a retro console purchase in the mix. I have been getting rid of a lot of none game related stuff I no longer need as I acknowledge the fact that what I buy takes up room and I kind of have plans to buy less, but I guess we will need to see how this goes, only time will tell.

If they made a Playstation One Mini Classic

So in my last post I talked about the SNES mini classic and at the end I said my following post would be about the idea of a Playstation One mini and why I think Sony should and could do this.I know that basically the Playstation One was a smaller sleeker version of the original playstation hardware and therefore some might say it should just be called the Playstation Mini, but with the fact there has been a Playstation 2, 3 and 4 I think you need a word like One or Original to make it clear we are talking about the original hardware and the games from that machine.

So why do I think a mini playstation console would be a good idea? Well why was the NES mini so desired well its because of nostalgia and I happen to think that there is a heck of a lot of nostalgia around the original playstation. I know some people will say that with the games being on Disc and so much larger this is not feasable but I dont think thats the case at all and I think its a tottally workable idea. If you think about the playstation TV console which was a small box which was basically a playstation vita redesigned as a simple home console then in a way there you pretty much had a Playstation Mini Classic. Let me explain the Vita was capable of playing PS1 games that you could purchase and download through the sony store, the Playstation TV being basically a Vita was capable of this to, all you did was buy the games, download them, hook the Playstation TV up to a TV and use a PS3 pad. If this existed then why wasnt everyone doing it you might ask? Well I would say that it was mostly due to the fact a lot of people didnt realise it was possible and this was because it wasnt marketed in the right way.

Imagine a PS TV now instead of it being black imagine it recieving a redesign, imagine it in classic playstation grey, imagine it looking like a shrunken original playstation complete with original logos and everytghing but with A hdmi port and all the modern trimmings. Now think about what it would be like if instead of giving it all kinds of settings options and download channels and such you replaced all of this with a user friendly game selection screen and a choice of around 15 classic playstation one games and you marketed the heck out of it just before christmas appealing heavily to those of us who lived through the original playstation years.

Game size is actually a lot smaller issue than you would think you see for example the original Rayman was around 500MB on disc but the version on the Playstation store is compressed and comes down to about 95MB. If you think about trying to offer up about 15 games and save room for them all plus a little room for the menu's and such you could proberbly swing it with around 2gigs of memory or heck with 4 you could go to town and push the boat out and either offer larger games or go for a number closer to 20.

So when starting to think about the games I would put on a Playstation mini classic I thought what kind of thing do you want, I wanted to try not to pick any massive sized multi disc game if I could help it and I also wanted to try and make it somehow represent the entire catalog in some way or another. I thought I would start by looking at the begining and when the playstation originally released It came out the gate with a few awesome games including Tekken, Battle Arena Toshinden, Warhawk, Air Combat, , Ridge Racer and Rayman and quiet honestly I would kind of be inclined to include all of these in a way but then when you think about it some of them do have sequels which have just that snippet of extra polish so maybe I would go for Tekken 2, Battle Arena Toshinden 2, Ridge Racer Revolution, WarHawk, Air Combat and Rayman (yes I am aware Air Combat had sequels but the first is better in my oppinion). So if we are going for 15 thats 6 down and 9 to go. The next 2 games I would say are very much based on my memory of them and they would be Krazy Ivan which for those that havent played it is a mech game and Loaded. I also can not even consider a Playstation one classic without throwing on CastleVania Symphony of the night as in my humble oppinion its one of the greatest games of all time. I would also feel the need to drop Parapa the Rapper on there because I think the game offers something diffrent. I would also add the first Gran Turismo and the first Twisted Metal due to them being the start of great franchises. Ok so this leaves me with 3 spots to fill, so I think I need to stop and think about what I am lacking here.

For the last 3 spaces I would go for Vandal Hearts a great Fire Emblem style tactical game, and then I would throw in Suikoden which is an extremly good RPG and finally Wild Arms another RPG which is a little bit diffrent for having a sort of western theme. You might like my selection of games or you might not but I am sure it has got you thinking about what you would put on a machine like this if you were in charge and thats ultimatly what is so fascinating about this we proberbly all have our own list of the ideal catalog for a mini machine be it either what we feel are the best games or the games that best represent the machine or simply what would sell best and make the highest profits.

So there are a lot of reasons I would like to see this being done, one of them is because I think that a system like this could be a lot of fun for people and introduce them to both the games of there youth but also stuff they missed out on but also because I would like for Sony to show Nintendo how it is done. I am not saying Sony or there games are better than Nintendo but I do firmly believe that if Sony saw people desperate to pay them for something they had made, if they saw it was going to draw a big profit they would push the boat out to ensure that there was good availability, that new units kept hitting the market not long after the last batch had sold out, and that they would make sure they kept on making money out of the situation rather than allowing scalpers to be the ones to benefit the most. The thing is basically I believe very strongly in the need for good competition and I think that in order for Nintendo to do there best they need to feel under threat, and not just them I think this is true of any company, while Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft all fight for our cash and attention and put out the best products they can to do this then it is us the consumers who are ultimatly winning.

PSN store versus Nintendo's Virtual console which is better?

So as I sit here eating chips left over from yesterday which I have microwaved back to a sort of edible state, I think it is safe to say that I am a man who doesn't like to waste money. This might sound strange to some as they would argue that video games, horror movies and comic books are a waste of money but to me they are not they are in some cases an investment and in other cases they are things to occupy me. Quiet often in terms of time spent with them compared to there cost I find video games to be one of the cheapest ways to occupy myself. I have a funny old formula that I will have maybe mentioned in the past most likely its a formula for how much I am willing to spend on a game. This formula is that I want at least one hour of enjoyment for every pound I spend but I am always happiest when I can get the ratio of fun per pound as high as possible.

I prefer to have physical copies of games to digital for lots of reasons but mostly for two reasons. One is that with physical games you have an object you can actually collect, an object which in the case of retro games or games released in a limited capacity will usually increase in value over time, this means that either the game is going to get rarer and rarer and owning it will be more of a pleasure or that if you are ever in desperate need of cash and forced to sell it then your at least likely to see a return on your investment. The other reason is that usually with physical games there is more chance of finding a deal, you can search for old games in pawn stores, on car-boots, sale sites, trade spares with other collectors, you can shop around for the best offer, in comparison digital games usually have a set price if they are available on a consoles virtual console/shop programme.

Sometimes though if a physical release is so rare that its average price is sky high online console shop services can provide a much cheaper way to experience these games and in this case they can actually be in a lot of ways the best way to go. Everyone of the console manufacturers has there own online games buying service (there are also lots of these for PC but I am not going to go into that right now) Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo and on them you will find a mix of full triple A titles, indie developed titles and classic/retro games from older formats. Its the retro stuff I will be focusing on in this case and in particular the retro games available on Nintendo and Sony hardware.

Obviously having been in the race the longest Nintendo's titles stretch back the furthest in time, they also on there latest console the Wii U give you the ability to look for games on a system by system basis so if you want to see what NES or SNES games they have for example then there are icons in the shop to click so that this is what you get. I do think that Nintendo could be described as a little bit greedy on the retro front though as they charge £3.49 per 8bit NES title and this is mostly regardless of what the game is. So while £3.50 might not seem like much for an all time classic like Super Mario 3 it seems like a fortune for stuff like Donkey Kong Jr Maths or Volleyball. Then there is Earthbound Beginnings a famicom (Japanese NES) title which as it had never been seen on these shores before and required translation Nintendo want £6.29 for. This is not the first time Nintendo have decided that never released on your shores before means mark up the price.  The price of the average SNES game on the Nintendo Wii U virtual console is £5.49 but when Earthbound a game previously not released in Europe was brought to us Nintendo wanted £6.99 for the pleasure, I cant say that its not worth it as a loose cartridge of this game would cost you absolutely loads. N64 games are £8.99, with Wii games being 17.99, GameBoy Advanced games being 6.29 and DS games ranging from £6.29 to £8.99. So really the strength of Nintendo's service is the wide variety of formats represented but the area where they let themselves down is price. Not only are they in my oppinion quiet expensive but there is also most of the time no cross buy, meaning if a game is available on both the Wii U virtual console and the 3DS Virtual console and you want to play it on both your machines then your going to end up paying twice.

I just spent £20 on PSN the playstations online games store. Obviously the playstation brand doesnt have as long a history of games and machines as Nintendo. The original Playstation was released in the same console generation as Nintendo's N64, meaning that you wont find any 8bit or 16bit offerings on Sonys Store well at least not at present (A SNES title is actually going to be released on the PS4 soon, Super Starwars, which may be the start of something new or a one off, this remains to be seen). Ok so the earliest Retro games you can get (ignoring some arcade classics which have appeard in store) are original PlayStation games (or as some people call them PlayStation one or PS1 games). So the first question would be, how much are PS1 Games? Well a few of them such as G Police and Driver start for as little as £1.99 so less than a 8 Bit NES game, the vast majority of them seem to be £3.99 including long RPG's like Suikoden and Suikoden 2, Tekken,Tekken 2, Crash Bandicoot, Crash Banicoot 3 etcetera. Some PS1 games are £7.99 including titles like the PS1 Final Fantasy games and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Now this makes even the most expensive PS1 downloadbale game cheaper than what Nintendo charge for N64 games, but which are better N64 or PS1 games? Well that depends on the game doesn't it, size wise though PS1 games are generally bigger after all discs can carry a lot more information than carts can and some of these games were spread across more than one disc, so if anything it should cost Sony more to keep these games up online as downloadables.  Nintendo do have sales in there store but usually these are just sales on either Triple A or indie titles apart from when the Wii U was released and Nintendo ran a early adopters offer of one certain retro game for 30pence a week for about 6 weeks I have never seen any NES, SNES or N64 titles on sale (Wii games have also been half price for the first week of there release when they first started doing them). Sony however involve PS1 titles on sale quiet frequently.

This gets back to the £20 I spent earlier, so what did I buy? Well I paid £2 for Wild Arms a PS1 RPG which would usually be £3.99 but is on sale. I spent £2 on Twisted Metal a vehicle combat game again usually £3.99. I got Grandia another RPG for £3.25 its usual price being £6.50. I spent £2 on Klona Door to Phantomile which would usually be £4. I wont list everything I got but the thing I think is most worthy of mentioning is that I got Arc The Lad 2, Arc The Lad 3 and Gaia Seed all games which to my knowledge were never released in the UK/Europe and how much did these games cost me £1.85, £2 and £2 and even if they hadn't been in the sale they still would have only cost £3.69, £3.99 and £3.99. What is more all of these games can be played on my PSP, my PS-Vita, My PS3 and a PS-TV if I happend to own one. My only complaint is that as of yet you cant play them on the PS4 which I hope is one day considerd but still one price to be able to play the games on multiple formats is pretty darn impressive, especially when in most cases the games are cheaper in the first place.

Is it just PS1 games though? No there are actually some PS2 games available to download for your PS3 including Virtua Fighter 4, Suikoden 4, GodHand, Capcom Vs SNK 2, Maximo, Red Faction, Sonic Heroes, are all usually £7.99 Some PS2 games are as little as £5.79 though including Conflict Desert storm 2 and Conflict Vietnam not surprisingly these are only playable on the PS3 though and not any of the handhelds. Now its hard to compare these titles to Nintendo's offerings as the PS2's counterpart the Gamecube has so far been ignored by Nintendo but still these are cheaper than Nintendo charges for N64 titles.

I wont mention the PSP titles available on the Sony Store as unfortunately they are only available to play on either a PSP or a PS Vita and I didnt talk about the games that can be gotten on the 3DS.

So which is better? Again it depends exactly what you want and how much you are willing to pay. I feel that both online stores have things they really should do to better themselves.Well lets take this on a brand by brand basis as both companies have there strengths and there weaknesses.

Sony needs to start involving the PS4 in the whole retro downloads arena, its got enough power that with a little work it should be able to play all of these old games the PS3 manages without even using a quarter of its power, also there is no reason why they couldn't make the PS3 and PS4 play PSP games, there are no touch based controls or anything to stand in the way and not everyone likes handheld machines but they would still enjoy some of the great games the PSP had to offer if they were available on the big screen (I know this is answered to some degree by the PS-TV but it could very easily be done by the PS4). Also it should be made far easier to find PS1 and PS2 games, you should easily be able to look at all of the titles available from a certain format with just a click or two like it is on Nintendo's store. I am hopping that with the fact Super StarWars is due to appear on the PS4 this will open the flood gates and sony will look at approaching other companies who released games on older 16 and perhaps 8bit formats to offer something to fans of this period of gaming. Yet I have to admit I have to take my hat of to them when it comes to both the prices and the idea that if you buy a PS1 game you can play it on most of your devices, I also think they handle sales really well, involving the retro games in these is a great idea as it helps draw attention to them.

Now Nintendo have the wide variety of formats on offer but I do think that there is some real greed there, sure there games are good and you could very easily make an argument for the prices being worth it but I do think when compared to others there prices seem greedy especially when they expect you to buy the game twice if you would like to play it on both your Wii U and 3DS. I think cross-buy is definetly an area they should look into. Yes you'd get less money by letting the person pay once and play on multiple devices but it would encourage people that having a hand held and home console made by your company so you could benefit like this would be the thing to do. Also involve your retro titles in more sales.

This Months Video Game purchases: August 2015

Ok so it is that time of the month again, the time when one month is almost over and a new one is about to begin so it is time once again to look at the retro purchases I have made. I may also at the end this by talking about some of the more modern games I have picked up along the way just to let you all know that I am not stuck completely in the past.

So I started off on the first of the month by buying a Playstation 2 for £10 with its pad and all its wires. I think price wise this is a pretty good purchase but I guess the main reason I did it is because the one in my collection is missing the guard from its CD tray.

It was only a few days after this on the fourth of the month that my daughter called me to let me know that they were selling off some games in a semi local charity store. Cant split the cost of these on an item by item basis as they told me if I just grabbed everything I wanted and made them an offer they wouldn't bother pricing them up individually. I spent £20 on the games below.

Dynasty Warriors 2, Sonic Mega Collection Plus, Jak 3 (Platinum), Tak The great Juju Challange. Winx Club, Malice, Sonic Gems collection, Yu-Gi-Oh - The Duellists Of The Roses, Tokobot Plus, Stitch Experiment 626, Peter Pan - The Legend Of Neverland, Animaniacs - The Great Edgar Hunt, Super Monkey Ball Adventure, Mystic Heroes, Teenage Mutant Ninja: Mutant Melee For the PS2 all complete, Astonishia Story and Daxter for the PSP complete and New super Mario Bros and Fossil League for DS complete.

I was quiet surprised to find that of these games Winx Club was the one with the highest supposed worth selling for around £15 online complete on its own. I looked up the approximate amount the above would tend to sell for and it was around £80 which made me quiet happy overall.

A day latter I got Sclaer, Bionicle heroes, Disnyes Piglets big game, Garfield 2, Casper and the ghostly trio, robots and Stuart little 3 big photo adventure (A Reviewers copy) all for PS2 complete and Nintendogs Labrador and friends complete for DS for £10.

Over the next week or so from there I ordered a cartridge only copy of Ringside Angels for £6 including postage, Race Driving cart only for the snes for £3.50 including postage and TOYS, Complete for the snes, it was advertised as being an NTSC American copy but turned up and was Pal, it was £4 including postage.

Towards the end of the month I have found myself picking up CID The Dummy, M.A.C.H: Modified Air Combat Heroes, and Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep for £8 only downside is Kingdom hearts doesn't have the manual. I also grabbed a copy of Super RC PRO-AM cart for gameboy for £1 a complete copy of everybody's golf for psp for 25p. I got the following for £1 each on Playstation 1 Syphon filter 2, Quake 2 and Ape Escape (platinum) and Resident Evil code veronica X, Grand Theft auto 3 and Grand theft auto vice city all for Playstation 2 all complete at £2.50 for the lot.

I would say in general that this was a much better month for grabbing Retro games than last month, I probably wouldn't have brought the few bits and pieces I did from ebay and would have just relied on what I found but I ended up buying the Japanese wrestling game because I owned it as a kid and someone reminded me of it, I saw a copy cart only for the cheapest price I had seen it in a long time and decided it might be a now or never moment. If not for this conversation I would probably have given it a miss. The Snes games I also mostly brought so that I could review them, neither of them were things I had fond memories of or a real desire to try but I thought they would help me make decent reviews.

As you might have been able to guess from some of my reviews and opinion pieces at the beginning of the month I brought Rare Replay, largely just because it was a way to play a whole bunch of my favourite old games in one place. I cant remember exactly what I paid for it but it was like £17 or £18 pounds which I considered great value for money. I have also brought one other game new and that was Scream Ride from Argos mostly because it was only £13.50 and was something a little bit different to a lot of the games I already own for the machine. I grabbed a second hand copy of Diablo 3 for the Xbox One from a pawn store for £15 and then ordered Dying light from game during a promotion where I paid £21 for dying light and got a pre-owned copy of Assassins creed unity for £1.

I imagine that next month will be a lot less exciting when it comes to game purchases, for one it is my fiancées birthday month so need to hold something back to treat her right, I also think I might have ran out my retro luck for awhile but I guess we will just have tot wait and see. 

This Months Video Game purchases

So I have to admit first that I am stealing this idea wholesale from my friend at The Game Over Yeah blog but its a good idea and I like it. I noticed that he did posts based on what he had finished recently and the recent purchases he had made. So here I am doing a this is the stuff I have recently gotten video game wise. I know this is a horror site as well so you might wonder why I am only going to mention games but its simple. With horror I tend to just watch it on various online services or litterally pick from my local pawn stores pound section, they don't tend to have the same collect-ability as games and there's not as much wheeling and dealing and hunting involved. Also I will from time to time buy digital games if there is a sale on but I much prefer owning these physically, this might be strange to some but its just the way I roll.

The main reason I collect video games is for the thrill of the chase, if they were stupidly easy to get for nothing all the time like horror DVD's usually are then I probably wouldn't bother. I tend to fluctuate with my game buying, I will buy lots and lots of retro games on the cheap and then I will sort of cool my jets and decided its time to go back to the modern, I have to admit this rhythm has been a little disturbed by the invention of Amiibo.

I would have waited for the end of the month to do this but in all honesty with knowing what I am up to I doubt I will buy anything else. For the purpose of clarification when I shop for retro I tend to count anything not this current generation as retro, I see it as cherry picking before it gets that rare collectable glaze that people just suddenly see when something is old.

The most recent item I have purchased was a cartridge only copy of Kevin Keegan's Player Manager for the Super Nintendo for 99pence in a pawn store a day or two ago. It was in good condition but yeah I know its an old sports title so not too impressive.

On the 21st I grabbed a few cheap PS2 games 5 for 2.50 almost didn't bother but I looked at all the discs inside the cases and they looked like they'd never been played... Dragon Rage, Eternal Ring, Ghost Hunter, Legion the legend of Excalibur, Alone in the dark the new nightmare. Yeah none of them are going to set the world on fire and even if I had gone looking for these titles specifically I probably wouldn't have paid more than 10 pounds but sometimes if its in front of you then you just grab them for the sake of it.

On Thursday the 16th I grabbed the following from a charity shop all of them complete boxed with manuals and in good condition.  Die hard trilogy, Future cop L.A.P.D., Wild 9, Medal of honour Underground and Excalibur all for ps1. I also grabbed Time Crisis 3 for PS2. Now the real cherry here seems to be Future Cop L.A.P.D as it sells for between 12 to 25pounds on line depending on condition but not only that it seems to have a good cult following and some good reviews under its belt. In honesty buying it I didn't know anything about its worth, I knew I could remember hearing it was good but I also knew that I would buy pretty much any PS1 game boxed with manual for that kind of price.

Really compared to last Month its been a slow month, after all last month I got a boxed Gamcube with a pile of games for 40quid but to be honest I needed a slow games buying month just to afford the Amiibo figures I ended up with. 

(Edit added 31/07/2015) 

Despite saying I knew I would get nothing else by the end of the month I did grab a few things

I picked these up all for the PS1 over the last day or two, Magic Carpet 50pence complete, MDK 50pence complete, Eliminator  50pence complete, RE-LOADED 50pence complete and Heart of Darkness  1quid complete. None of them are worth a fortune but most of them are things I have played before and enjoyed.