Guns Not Included

Love them or hate them there is no denying that downloadable content (DLC) is here to stay in the gaming scene. What kind of content constituted as being okay to be released as DLC and what content is absolutely necessary to the core experience that should not be released separately as DLC? For a game like Dead Rising 2, i can certainly live without the additional costumes and raised attributes as the game is already filled with enough costumes and apparel in the basic game.

Prologue/epilogue episodes like in Dead Rising 2, LA noire, RE5 or Lords of Shadow? Again nice to have but like an issue 0 to a comic book series not absolutely necessary to experience the core story. A trio of guns from a shooter game ? Now that's a big no-no especially when it's a tough shooter like Vanquish. Three weapons in Vanquish were pulled from the game and released as a Pre-order bonus from selected stores during the game initial release. Playing the game without them is like playing handicap though you can certainly finish the game, removing these guns significantly alters the difficulty of the game. I had no choice but to begrudgedly purchase this from the PSN store recently but it wasn't like Dead Rising 2 where I enjoyed the game so much to the point I didn't mind spending an extra dollar on the game's DLC.

What's your reluctant DLC buy?

Terror is Real

I was pretty content with playing the story mode of Dead Rising 2 since I didn't have anyone to coop with yet and frankly I would like to see the whole story through before inviting someone into the game. I was at the beginning of Day 3 last weekend when I had to rescue a couple of survivors caught up in a poker game inside the casino. Of course they wouldn't budge from their game unless I beat them in a poker game but I didn't have enough cash to even buy into the game. I didn't want to give up these survivors so the only way I could think of raking up money without letting the game clock tick away is to earn some from the Terror is Reality game show.

As soon as I entered the tournament I was impressed by how the whole thing was set up with TK making announcements in between searching for opponents. It really helps with the loading time and the live commentary also make things a lot less awkward since you would be mostly competing with strangers. I tried out the ranked matches as I was expecting the servers to pair me up with other newcomers based on my understanding. It's certainly not the case as those combatants were clearly experienced while I was just learning how the game is played. Needless to say I end up at last spot but I still didn't have enough money to advance through the rescue mission. I thought the next match was going to be my last as it would be enough to earn my entry into the poker game but to my surprise I won the next episode with ease, beating out the competition in every match. Winning can be addictive so all week long I was thinking about getting back into the TIR circuit to win the remaining five other matches for the TK favorite trophy.

It turns out my last victory was probably a fluke as each other time since then I have been fighting hard not to end up last! The competition is pretty tough as some of these matches which I thought I would excel at are not that easy especially the shooting ones. There are plenty of incentives to keep playing on and hopefully get better at it but frustration is beginning to set in so I'm planning to focus back on the story mode which was the sole reason I got into the TIR matches at the first place. Hopefully I can find a balance between playing both modes so I don't ultimately get frustrated with the whole game.

Midnight Attack

Since I don't live in the US, it's hard to tell when exactly a product will be made available on Playstation Network even if i know the release date. Obviously i can't be logging on when the clock strikes midnight upon the day of release as we are roughly ahead by 12 hours. That's why it's important for me to log on today as soon as i can to see if the Heavy Rain demo is available for download, after all this is the last week of PSN updates before the re5 dlc is release on PSN next week.

Come next week i will still be away from work on the 18th so hopefully this will get me better prepared as to what time to log on to PSN to purchase those dlc.

Disc is No Good

In the wake of Rockstars' announcement of their previously Microsoft exclusive DLC content coming to the ps3, it seems like everyone is cashing in on DLC these days. A while back i made the decision to purchase the RE5 DLC on Playstation Network instead of the disc version. My reasoning was the timing of the release as the DLC was debuting on the PSN roughly a month before the retail disc version would be available in stores.

What i failed to realised then was this was all referring to the US release dates as the Japanese will be getting their retail disc version, Alternative Edition in stores the same day as the DLC debut in the US Playstation Network. The only problem was the DLC content will be spread out over the course of two weeks, with the second episode debuting two weeks after the first. I initially thought that this would be a great idea as i can devote all my attention on one episode before moving on to the next but this presents a problem when i'm planning to play with my friends who are getting the Asia or Japanese disc version. Being the impatient gamer that i am, waiting for my RE5 Collector's Edition to arrive last year was one painful experience. Story of my life, looks like it's all set to repeat itself with the release of RE5 Alternative Edition this year.

Don't Panic

One of the first things i did when i got the calender for the new year was marked down the dates when the RE5 DLC would be released. Then taking into account how long my last order from Play-asia took to finally reached me, i estimated what's the latest date i have to place an order for the Playstation Network Card should it indeed take another 3 weeks to reach me again. At that point, the PSN card looks readily available at Play-asia so i didn't have to take into account any additional time for PA to stock and ship the item to me. Next thing i know, PA finished their supply of PSN cards and needed 2 to 4 weeks to ship it, causing me to panic and placed my order much sooner than originally expected. After all, if PA does take the maximum 4 weeks to ship it out and local postal service does experience its usual holiday season delay then the PSN card will not get to me in time.

Turns out all that panic was for nothing as PA probably still have some cards in stock and promptly shipped out my order the very next day. So here i am with my PSN card of $20 value in hand and the DLC is still roughly a month's away from release. Do i key-in and activate the code now or should i wait until it's close to the DLC release date? Does these thing have an expiry date or worst, a time limit i have to spent everything after i activate it?

What's The Deal with Qore?

One of the dumbest thing i did when i got my playstation3 bundle was not claim my free PSN game bundled inside. You see there was a coupon inserted inside the blu-ray demo disc for complimentary download of the PSN game, Pain. A couple of the thing held me back from doing so during that time, the worry of storage capacity and the concern of a long download time. Eventually when i finally decide on claiming it, the coupon had already expired sometime at the end of last year.

So when i got a couple of back dated game magazine today and discovered one of them contained codes for free download of QORE Episode 8, i was determined not to let this opportunity slipped by me again. Never mind that the said issue with the code is already five months, it doesn't hurt to give it a try and sure enough, the code still works! Being a bit of an old school gamer, i rarely ever take my playstation3 online so i'm not terribly familiar with either QORE or Pulse, gaming programs produced by Sony aiming to bring you the latest in the world of Playstation. My friends download Pulse religiously which i believed is because it's free and also partly because it's got some asian chick hosting it. QORE on the hand, requires subscription fee which i initially thought is because it's a high definition gaming program and thus requires more work than Pulse but then i found out that Pulse is also available in high definition too. So why is Sony charging for one show and not the other? The file size is pretty big at 1.5GB so it would probably be a while before i finish downloading the entire episode and see what the fuss is all about.