Some Other Castle » batman

Some Other Podcast, Episode 40: Midget Zombie Clowns

Leah — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 01:23:21 +0000

We hope everyone has had/is having a perfectly wonderful holiday season! We know we are; after all, thanks to this week’s special guests, Dan and Joe, we finally get to gorge ourselves upon the long-awaited Fudgie the Whale! What better way to celebrate the coming of the new year than with chocolate crunchies and talk about (what else?) VIDEO GAMES? Rather than our usual setup, we have a chat about the games that stood out for us in the year 2009. Do you agree? Let us know!

Link the halls with boughs of holly…. (in no particular order and probably missing a few… gimme a break, I was drinking…)

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

Forza 3

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks

New Super Mario Bros. Wii

Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box

Pokemon Platinum

Resident Evil 5

Wii Sports Resort

Chronicles of Riddick

Mario and Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story

Shadow Complex

Star Ocean: The Last Hope

Punch-Out!

Katamari Forever

Gyromancer

Puzzle Quest: Galactrix

Guitar Hero: Van Halen

Some Other Podcast, Episode 33: DO YOU HAVE STAIRS IN YOUR HOUSE?

Leah — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 03:19:12 +0000

We’re getting all nostalgic up in here as we recall basically every internet meme known to man. News is actually starting to get interesting again, and we’ve been playing a ridiculously wide span of games between the two of us, so there’s plenty to keep you entertained! Listen up as we chat about clothes made of hair, lawyers who apparently can’t read, and Borderlands! Lots about Borderlands…

Links, yo.

Batman: Arkham Asylum

Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box

Bayonetta gets a 1/8 release date

Borderlands patch fixes a bunch of stuff that was broken

God of War III gets an Ultimate Edition with lots of cool stuff

Patches incoming for King of Fighters XII and Tekken 6

Modded 360s being banned from Live

PSP Go hasn’t sold all that well in Japan

Eric Neustadter of Microsoft badmouths Facebook on DS, looks like an ass

No Doubt suing Activision because they can’t read contracts

SMT Strange Journey getting a US release Spring 2010

Gran Turismo 5 costing 60 million dollars to make

Infinity Ward pulls CoD MW2 video campaigning for “Fighting Against Grenade Spam”… come on, guys…

Confessions of a Backlogged Gamer, Weeks 38-39: It’s All In The Timing

Leah — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:54:27 +0000

This may not seem like a new or surprising assertion to anyone else, but *I* think it’s interesting, and this is my column, damn it: I actually play a lot more games than my backlog numbers may seem to suggest. It’s just that so many of the ones I compile are RPGs falling somewhere within the forty- to ninety-hour range that the time I put in seems a bit paltry by comparison. When I play games of an actual “reasonable” length, however…. well, they actually get finished. Who knew?

With so many new shiny games staring me in the face right about now, you’d think that I would sit down with one of them. Instead, I decided to power through Batman: Arkham Asylum, which I’ve been ignoring for far too long. I picked it up right after it was released on the strength of the demo, but then it sort of got pushed aside until now. I know a lot of people really got into the challenges and solving all of the Riddler’s clues, but the only ones I really did were the ones that I found along the path of the main story. Arkham is a very cool setting, but I just didn’t find it compelling enough to wander around with all of the bad guys gone. Without going much out of my way, I finished the game at around 65% completion, meaning that there’s plenty more to do for anyone who finds themself wanting to continue, but at 8-10 hours, I felt like I got what I wanted out of it. I really enjoyed thrashing ridiculous numbers of enemies at once, although a few of the “armed dude” rooms were a bit frustrating (I’ll never get tired of stringing up baddies from gargoyles, though). My one real complaint with the game was the points, particularly near the end of the game, where the travel seemed to be artificially lengthening the gameplay. I understand that in some parts, it’s necessary to the storyline to have you travel through the same areas more than once, but I think the addition of some kind of (even limited) quick travel routes would have been nice. Overall, I had a really good time with this, however, and I’d recommend it without hesitation, particularly if you’re a Batman fan to begin with (or if you watched the 90’s cartoon, from which several of the voice actors are used).

In a second sitting, and with the help of my trusty comrades Elaine and Dan, plus Chris “Lefty” Brown of The Married Gamers, I finished ODST this week as well. On Heroic! I have achievements and everything! As you can tell, this is sort of a big deal for me, having only experienced my Haloz on the easiest setting thus far. I’m still not very good at shooters, but that’s why co-op gaming is so great; I get to play with my friends, and I don’t have to be very good at the game, just good enough that I don’t get everyone killed (and maybe shoot some manz myself every once in a while). With SOME PEOPLE setting OTHER PERFECTLY INNOCENT PEOPLE on fire with flamethrowers, I don’t think I was the most dangerous player on the field anyway. In a sort of related vein, I started playing Borderlands last night with another group of friends, and even though things were moving a bit fast for me due to the fact that they’d all played before, I still had a lot of fun. Honestly, I’m not so sure I’d like Borderlands if I tried it single-player, but co-op is making it ridiculously awesome.

Yet another game that I finished this week (I know, right??) is Uncharted; let me get this out of the way and say that yes, I did think that the “twist” I’ve heard so much about is pretty fucking dumb. If I wanted to be playing Resident Evil, I would be playing Resident Evil. I didn’t hate it so much that it ruined the game for me, but I really would have had a more favorable impression overall if the gameplay had stayed more consistent and not gone off to Crazytown just when I’d finally gotten the hang of things. As soon as I can pry the second installment away from one of my friends, I’ll be playing it, and if what I’ve heard is true and it really is better than the first, I really can’t wait. I know it sounds trite to say that it’s like playing a movie, but that’s really what it was; the story is fantastic, the characters are relatable, and the whole thing is beautiful to watch. I’m glad I let myself be badgered into this one.

When frustration finally drove me to put down Scribblenauts (probably for good), I picked up Professor Layton and the Sack of Oranges…. er, sorry, the Diabolical Box… instead. It’s…. well, it’s more Professor Layton. Different setting, different puzzles, same annoying little fucker of a sidekick that I sort of want to punt over the side of the train. Anyway, my addiction to the first round of Layton’s adventures is pretty well documented, and even though I’ve only put about two hours into this one so far, I can already feel the sickness seeping back in. I welcome it, actually.

Current backlog total: 100

Now playing: Borderlands (360); Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box (DS); Shin Megami Tensei: Persona (PSP)

New games added: Borderlands (360); Ratchet and Clank: A Crack In Time (PS3); Cooking Mama 3: Shop & Chop (DS); Nostalgia (DS); A Witch’s Tale (DS)

Games completed: Halo 3: ODST (360); Batman: Arkham Asylum (PS3); Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune (PS3)

Some Other Castle, Episode 32: IRPS

Leah — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 02:27:44 +0000

Welcome to our internet radio podcast show! We’ve been waiting for you. Have a cookie! Oh, and you should probably be prepared for some video game chat; this week it’s discussion on upsizing handheld systems, Netflix on the PS3, and the wrath of PC shooter aficionados.

Link? Link! LIIIIIIIIINK!

Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune

Batman: Arkham Asylum

iPhone has fastest hardware growth in consumer tech history according to Morgan Stanley analyst; beats out Wii, DS, and PSP

Uncharted 2 DLC to be released by end of year

PS3 getting Netflix

Excite Bike World Rally coming to WiiWare 11/9

Modern Warfare 2 featuring 3rd person mode for certain playlists

Brutal Legend DLC 11/3 will be free on PS3 for the first two weeks, paid on XBox Live from the beginning

DSi LL coming to Japan 11/21, US and Europe Q1 2010; features 4 inch screen and larger stylus, retailing for the equivalent of $221 US; also, is dumb as hell

Fairytale Fights has free DLC if you purchase game in first 90 days

Listener mail makes us smile! If you want to make us smile, send some to podcast@someothercastle.com.

Some Other Podcast, Episode 22: Unperfect Ninja

Elaine — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 01:00:33 +0000

Their Personas and Pokemanz, they will show you them. This week the ladies return to discuss their ever increasing addictions which apparently now include both Persona and Pokemon. Elaine also discussing embarking on the epic journey that is the Earthbound Funktastic Gameplay 2009. In addition the girls get uppity about ads in Wipeout HD, ponder the future of the current PS3 hardware, and contemplate posting inappropriate pictures to Facebook using a DSi!

Zombies need Liiiinnnnkkkkksss!

Assassin’s Creed 2 Special Edition

Left 4 Dead Content (yes for the original)

Batman Arkham Asylum Demo

Braid to PSN

Fat Princess is busted and getting a patch

Wipeout HD makes you watch ads

PS3 Slim a real thing?

PS3 manufacturing costs down 70%

Id responds to concerns about RAGE on Twitter

WET releasing on September 12

DSi 1.4 update including Facebook now available in North America

Turtles in Time Reshelled now $10 instead of $15. Yay!

Want to send Leah and Elaine email? You can send them to podcast@someothercastle.com. We read them all (even the spam sometimes).

Collector’s Editions: What is wrong with us??

Elaine — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:51:11 +0000

A few days ago images for the Collector’s Edition of Batman: Arkham Asylum detailing what is in the box surfaced. The package includes a nifty 12 inch Batarang, a slew of behind the scenes material, a map, and a spiffy case to hold everything in. The images make the whole package look very sexy. So what’s the problem you ask? This Collector’s set will set you back a cool $100! I find myself coveting it and that forced me to ask myself why.

I don’t know why shiny Collector’s Editions are so tempting for me. In general the promise a lot and contain nothing more than cheap crap that serves to be nothing more than some geek badge of honor. Most of the time we get figures or posters or some other junk. Other times we get nothing more than behind the scenes DVDs or the occasional extra DLC content. So why do people buy these things? Is it to support a game we truly love or perhaps having all of this crap on our desk is some sign of how dedicated we are to our hobby.

Personally I buy them for one simple reason, I like shiny things. For whatever ridiculous reason I can’t help myself. I have no trouble buying CEs of games I really love that include something more than just extra DVDs. I am struggling with the rising price points of these things though. Around $70 I can cope with but $100 might just be a little too rich for my blood. So wonderful readers, do you buy Collector’s Editions? If so why do you do it and how much is too much to pay for one of these things?