Girls' Week 01 - Discs and Guns

Random thought for the post: when you put a lot of the word "week" together on one line, it looks really weird.

For those of you who are wondering how this is going to work, basically every Monday, I'll be recapping various goings-on in the gaming sprees of yours truly. Usually I won't have anything about my own personal life - there's a different category for that, and that can occur at random. Usually I'll talk a little bit about each of the games I've played, my plans for the coming week (not to be confused with posts in the DAY and END threads), as well as anything I feel like regarding games in general, though in a very general sense - that's why there's the categories for reviews and previews. I'll probably also cover purchases that I've made in the past week. This may or may not change, depending on how things work out, but I'm pretty sure this is the way things are going to stay. The only addition I can think of is actually having screenshots of things I'm talking about, which I can't do quite yet; I need to install more software in order to do that.

Purchases in the past week:
- Left 4 Dead 2 (Steam/PC) - $6.79
- AceKard 2 - $26.01

I was actually very tempted to buy a PSOne off of Amazon as well, since it was $23 including shipping, and it might actually help with some of my disc problems.

I've been playing a lot of Xenogears (Squaresoft, 1998) lately, mostly so I can get one of the longest RPGs in my collection (barring the Dragon Warrior games) out of the way, plus letting me understand half the reference they make in the Xenosaga series. After playing for over 24 hours straight, I finally made it to the infamous Disc 2. Let's just say I already don't like it. Why? Because it keeps crashing for no apparent reason. It might actually just be my PS2, which is more than possible, so once things get better, I'll be testing it out on my PS3. There's also the possibility of getting a PS1 or a PSOne (difference being the former is the big version, the latter is the small version) and see if that actually helps with the disc being read. I was able to make it through some parts of the disc, but after a while, it consistently crashed at one particular scene - again, I'd have a screenshot of the scene if I could provide it.

I'm hoping to be getting three games in the mail soon: Donkey Kong Country (Rare/Nintendo, 1994), Uniracers (DMA/Nintendo, 1994), and Tales of Destiny 2 (Namco, 2001). The copy of ToD2 I would be getting apparently has some troubles with Disc 2 as well, but I'm not sure if it's the PS2 of the person giving me the game or whether something is actually up with the disc. Only actually trying the game itself will tell. The good thing is that it's the last Tales game that was released in the United States that I have yet to own (Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology not withstanding, since I didn't really like it too much). The bad thing is that I don't have a XBox 360 with which to play Tales of Vesperia (Namco, 2008). I'm actually hoping to be able to save up the money to get a 360 by next summer, but in all honesty, I need to save that money for other things.

Games played this week:
Left 4 Dead 2
Played with a bunch of friends after the Steam sale. I don't remember who exactly I was the very first game I played (in which we finished the Dead Center campaign), but I was Rochelle for when we finished the Dark Carnival campaign, plus a friend from Puerto Rico and I played through two rounds of No Mercy (where I was Zoey both times, unf unf). Also played some Versus in Dark Carnival, but it was pretty one-sided since it was four people who are... all right at games versus two insanely good gamers with two AI characters. It also didn't help that the game crashed twice on me for no explainable reason.

Xenogears
As stated before, Disc 2 is being a douchecanoe.

Pokémon Diamond
Got to Eterna City. Having a little trouble actually leveling anything that's not my starter, since all I've got is it, a Zubat, and a Bidoof (HM Slave). I'll probably see if I can't go ahead and finish off the Gym, then take on the Galactic Building to help level up Zubat. If I'm lucky, I'll be able to make it a Golbat before I head off to the next town. The only move I'm kinda missing that I wish it'd learn faster is Wing Attack. It might actually gain some levels faster, since it'll be good against more types.

Final Fantasy VI Advance
I was trying to do a completion run, but I botched it in the South Figaro Underground. Well, really, you can go back from what I remember, but I'm sure it'll all be good. Only problem, though, is that in order to get the Green Beret from the fight in the Imperial Camp during Sabin's scenario, you have to have someone who can resist Berserk, and the only effective way to do that is with that Ribbon from the South Figaro Underground that I forgot to get. I can't exactly go back, since I saved outside the South Figaro Cave. I really open by opening the treasure chests in the cave I didn't miss out on anything. I'm pretty sure they're upgraded as far as they can be...

Plans for the week:
Considering my AceKard actually just shipped, I'm hoping it'll get here by Thursday so I can put Pokémon Bloody Platinum (which is a crazy Platinum romhack) and possibly the translation of Tales of Innocence (Namco, 2007) for my ride to the Marine Corp Museum on Friday. Might may or may not actually go and get some more stuff from home, or actually return my N64 in favor of my SNES so I can play Donkey Kong Country, though I've got quite a few unfinished games on my N64 that I still need to work on. I'm even tempted to just take my GameCube AND my N64 home, since I've got plenty to play on my PS2 and my PC (and there's only two or so months left of school for the semester).

We'll certainly see. Until next week, stay classy!