Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars: missing a sword

I'm astounded by this game. The amount they've managed to pack onto the DS cart is amazing; the game runs smoothly through huge cities, and there's so much to do. The city can at times feel slightly sparse, but not to the extent that GTA Advance or even the original GTA did. There's so much detail in the streets though, with buildings looking distinctive - there are even some with scaffolding on, and builder's bucket pipes down the side.

The game does just about everything right. You can lose the cops who are chasing you by getting them to crash (complete with comedy dying siren sound). The rampages are well thought out and fun; and the way you throw molotov cocktails is an excellent use of the touch screen. The PDA on the lower screen works well too, especially with the use of email to drive the story forwards.

I've worked out you can put the GPS directions on the main game screen, which makes navigating much easier. Having said that, I've found that actually I'm having difficulty navigating normally - I'm not learning the cities like I did with previous GTA games.

The missions are based around a really stong story, and almost every one has a twist to it, making it run not how you'd have expected from the introduction. The people that you're acting for are a varied bunch too - I've acted for three potential leaders of the Triads so far, but I've now heard from an undercover cop. If anything I'm finding the missions too easy, because of the aiming system meaning it's easy to dispatch enemies given a decent gun. That may well change soon.

Mario Kart Wii: on to 150cc

I hadn't played this since the last time I blogged about it - November last year. I've no idea why - limited time in the country can't have helped, and there have been various other things tempting me away. After watching my brother playing it on Saturday, I decided to go back and try to get a gold on all the remaining 100cc grands prix - and did so. Once again, Rainbow Road almost proved to be my undoing, but luckily in the previous race I'd taken out my main opponent on the second-to-last corner with a blue shell, so they had to get seven points more than me in order to win. My slow-but-steady sixth place on Rainbow Road was enough to clinch it.

The 150cc races are hard.

I also played around a bit on the online time trials. There are some rather good players out there.

My Xbox 360 is broken

After around 5 minutes, the screen locks up and I get artefacts all over it. I wanted to play Half-Life 2 as well.

Loco Roco: Completed!

A new PSP battery which means I can actually play games again ... and it turns out I had only a couple of levels left to complete. I've not 100% completed every level - as in, there are still some muimuis I've not found, and there are many levels which were completed without 20 loco rocos, but I've explored a lot and I'm more eager to get onto the sequel, with new levels rathe than going over the old ones. My tastes in gaming have evidently changed; it's all about the thrill of the new at the moment.

The last few levels weren't that difficult, but trying to keep the loco roco number up on the last stage (and boss battle) was tricky - there were sections where the big loco roco was bobbing up and down in wind, and barriers with spikes were rising and falling, and you had to time tilting the level with the loco roco bobbing down while the barrier was raised. I went from 15 to 9 strength because of that.

Completed, but the songs are still in my head. Any pointers to where I can download them from would be great!

Mr Driller Drill Sprits: to the moon and back

Despite completing 1500m, I can't get down to 1000m on the two 2000m stages, in New York and on the moon. The moon stage is clever, as it introduces items, such as extending the maximum air, filling the air gauge (which can be very handy indeed), providing a shield, speeding Mr Driller up, or slowing the descent of blocks. At times this can be useful, but I find myself trying to get to the items even when it'd be best not to. I need to get better at evaluating when there are too many obstacles in the way - and when I'm likely to kill myself by burrowing under unstable blocks.

Super Monkey Ball Lite: wibbly wobbly

It's impressive for a phone game, sure, but the controls just feel a little too imprecise. There'd be no completion of Expert 7 on this. Not that there was often completion of Expert 7 on the GameCube, but still. It's not a bad game by any means, but it's not convinced me - yet - to go and buy the full game. Maybe one long train journey ...

Sprung: Completed!

I was right, I was close to the end of the game. It was frustrating; it was clichéd; it did rely on trial and error in order to work out the correct response since there was normally no indication of what to aim for. I finally got Becky and Brett together (again, playing from Becky's side), and ended with 72% completion on the item collection. Whoopdie-doo. I don't think I'll go for 100%, I might find myself accidentally throwing the DS down the loo.

Ico: take my hand

After the Singstar party, my PS2 was all set up and ready to go. My PS2 game collection is rather poor though, and nothing appealed - until I noticed the special editions of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus sitting on the shelf above. I've played Ico very little, and Shadow not at all. I decided that today should be the day.

Ico starts off slowly, with a long cutscene. You get thrown into a murky world and have to work out the controls. The world's not actually murky, but playing it on my HD TV certainly made it look so. I worked my way through the castle, until I found the girl in white. I knocked the cage down the tower, and rescued her from the shadow monsters. I then couldn't find a way out of the room. Huh.

Never mind, I thought, I'll come back to that later. I'd been playing for 40 minutes or so. I turned the console off, and then thought ... hmm, I wonder if the game does save at checkpoints?

Evidently not.

We're spoilt now, with autosaves and save-anywhere mechanics. The reason it didn't occur to me that the game might not have saved is that when I paused it, there was no way of manually saving. Oh no, it appears that to manually save you've got to sit down on a bench, which at that point I hadn't found. It forces you to play a certain amount at a time. This is a problem for me - gaming tends to be half an hour here and there, and I can't leave the PS2 on all night to pick it up again in the morning, like I used to do with games on the Mega Drive.

After all, I'm paying for the electricity now.

So, at some point I've got to play the entirety of the start of the game again. I hope it's worth it.

Singstar: under the sea

As in, that is where I wish my head could be this morning. Why does Singstar necessitate a vast quantity of alcohol? Why do I wake up the next morning able to talk in a mere whisper, having flashbacks of genius, repulsion and amusement?

Sharon's rendition of Under the Sea from The Little Mermaid will be remembered forever. Partially because I filmed it. Ken and I sang A Little Time by The Beautiful South. Justine videoed that, which is good in a way since I never would have believed just what I did.

The evening brought forwards talents unknown. Justine tied with Helen; the latter part of a choir. Sharon can't rap. An really does feel for Sharon, you could see it in her eyes as she sang Babe. She was Sonny.

But I shall say no more. What happens in Singstar stays in Singstar.

There was one important thing that happened: I thrashed Ken at Wii Tennis. And then refused his fiver which he bet me all those months ago. I am smug.

Until I see the videos again.

Loco Roco: bum dum de daaaaa dum dee diddly dum bum bum

I love the way they sing. I love the way they bounce and slide and coo. I love the expressions on their faces.

I hate the way the battery dies after five minutes.