Archive for the ‘Import’ Category
Making PSN Accounts in Other Regions
We so very often recommend our listeners/viewers/readers get a foreign PSN because it’s so “easy”, but I figured with this morning’s news of Shadow Tower coming to the US PSN later today and the massive amount of games I purchase on the various PSN stores that it was high time to make it easy for you. Creating a PSN is not a difficult task, however it can be a challenge without knowing the language, written or otherwise, of the territory you seek and also knowing what you will and won’t gain from each. With the average Playstation 3 being able to tether up to 5 PSN accounts, I have chosen to dedicate one to my home base PSN, three to outside territories, and the final one to guests in my house. The best benefit of a PSN account on multiple consoles is that all accounts on that console can share installed games, so I purchase a game on my Japanese PSN only to use it on my American account for the sake of trophies and keeping my friends informed as to what I’m playing. Perhaps you don’t know how to create a PSN for another country or perhaps you don’t know the benefits, well this little article will assist you in making the proper decision.
Podcast: Snatcher and Policenauts Game Club
Hideo Kojima, best known for the quirky stealth series Metal Gear and Metal Gear Solid has also delved into the world of visual novels and point-and-click adventure games. If you aren’t aware of them, it’s probably because Snatcher released on the Sega CD only and didn’t clear 10,000 units sold in the US and Policenauts has never released outside of Japan. Thanks to Fred’s lucky ownership of a super rare game and emulation/fan translations for all other instances, the GH101 crew delves deeply into a nearly 3 hour podcast on Kojima’s futuristic adventures with some of the worst shooting sequences in all of gaming.
Partial Longplay: Policenauts (English Translation on PS1)
No one likes to release something that is half finished. It’s even more embarrassing when you know there’s no way to complete something you started. This is one of the hardest lessons I’ve had to learn with the world of hacked consoles, fan translations, and promising things before you’ve completed them here on Gaming History 101. With a perfectly working copy of Policenauts, the English fan translation that released for PS1, I set out to do a longplay for tonight’s game club just as I had with Snatcher. Unfortunately the game seems to break in several parts of disc 2’s translation despite disc 1 working perfectly (more than half the game as well) and the same disc 2 that broke on my PS1 and PS2 doesn’t have problems playing on my PC through the ePSXe emulator. While I have no idea why this is happening – I can’t seem to find anyone who played on console and the other YouTube videos are clearly from emulation – it rendered my longplay unable to be finished. Rest assured I beat Policenauts on Sunday night and am ready to discuss it in full for tonight’s game club, but I only have the first 2 acts captured on video before the game began to break in Act 3. I used various save data to load parts of Acts 4 and 5, which loaded fine and played fine until certain moments of scripted events that occur within 15-30 minutes of loading a save (same place, has nothing to do with the save point, load point, or amount of time played). Fortunately out of the 12 hours of length that is Policenauts, 7 or so of those hours is Acts 1 & 2, leaving the other 5 hours for Acts 3-7 and the epilogue, oh Kojima. With all that said, I was debating on whether or not to release the videos, but I haven’t released much video content in the last two weeks and I’ve been cranking out videos so I figured you should see where half of this hard work went. Here is the official playlist of the first six videos of my longplay in full upscaled 720p HD with commentary. You won’t get to see me complete the game, but you can get a great feel for what the game as a whole was like. Additionally this playlist is available openly on YouTube, but I’ve put it as “unlisted”, which means it will only be accessed by direct link or searches, not on the main channel page proper. Be sure to listen to our game club for complete coverage on this never released in the US title. We also will have reviews going live on Thursday. Below is the first video of the series, enjoy!
Just Because: Die Hard Arcade (Dynamite Deka) PS2 Complete Playthrough
Recently Fred played Die Hard Arcade on the Sega Saturn to show off one of the oddest directions licensed franchises have gone in games. Well the game was known as Dynamite Deka (Dynamite Cop) in Japan, but retained all the Die Hard similarities, and was re-made in arcade perfect form on the PS2 (only in Japan as part of the Sega Ages 2500 series). When Fred noticed it on the Japanese PSN for the PS3 – and at only ¥400 on sale, ¥823 normally – he had to pick it up and play through it. Feel free to grab it for yourself if interested, but without further ado we present the complete playthrough of Dynamite Deka.
Retro Game Night: New Ghostbusters II, DecapAttack, and Kid Dracula
This week’s late Retro Game Night features the Famicom title New Ghostbusters II by HAL Laboratories (they made Kirby and Lolo), DecapAttack for the Genesis, and finally the Famicom version of Kid Dracula.
Retro Game Night: Sega Master System Brawl, Streets of Rage 2 hack, and Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic!
This week we’re covering a lot of ground in a little bit of time. Not to be outdone by the upcoming Wii U Smash Bros, Sega fans made a Genesis/Mega Drive homebrew of classic Master System characters and levels duking it out entitled Sega Master System Brawl and we check it out. Then we move on to a color enhancing hack on Streets of Rage 2 that is said to bring it closer to SNES quality (and we put the original’s gameplay in the corner for comparison). Finally we play the Famicom Disk System (FDS) title Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic! which you all probably know better as it released in the US as Super Mario Bros 2 on the NES. Like Streets of Rage, we put the original gameplay in the corner for comparison. This was played on original hardware with either original games or a flash cart for homebrew/hacks, no emulation.
Podcast: Extra Credit – MicroSoft eXtended (MSX)
For this extra credit Fred goes solo to discuss Japan’s only semi-exclusive microcomputer, the MSX. Created by Microsoft as a computing platform, the MSX is responsible for many cart-based titles that found mass success on the NES and even today. It’s an impressive library on one of the most niche worldwide consoles/computers of all time.
Opening Song: Main Theme – Nightmare on the MSX
Sequence 1 break: Intro/Main Theme – Metal Gear on the MSX
Closing Song: Main Theme – Salamander on the MSX
Let’s Play Michigan: Report from Hell
Here’s our complete Let’s Play of the PS2 Japan/Europe exclusive by Grasshopper Manufacture and Suda51, Michigan: Report from Hell.
Retro Game Night: RE Gun Survivor 2 and Michigan
For this week’s video and Retro Game Night we are playing requested titles Biohazard (Resident Evil) Gun Survivor 2 (Japanese Version) and Michigan: Report from Hell (European English Version). Both titles only released in Japan and Europe so here they are in all your viewing glory. Michigan is a complete let’s play series. Due to language and violence both of the games and the commentary, viewer discretion is advised.
Podcast: Are You One of Us?
This week Fred flies solo to discuss the short live but highly coveted niche console the Turbografx-16. With an 8-bit processor and a 16-bit graphics card this Japan-centric console by NEC only hung around for 4-5 years but has a cult following almost as intense as Sega. This episode covers its release, different versions, Japanese counterpart the PC Engine, and of course the expensive CD expansion and games.
Gaming History 101 