Need For Speed: Carbon

So that was easy.  In my last post, I mentioned about the shocking price differences between UK supermarkets on this game (between £17 & £40!). 

Anywho, the game turned up, and I had great pleasure in playing it for all of 3 days before completing the actual story-line.  I was a bit unimpressed with the fact that I could complete the main storyline within 3 days, and only being caught by the cops once and having to purchase 3 cars for the whole game.

But yeah, it was a good game. Pretty similar to Need for Speed: Most Wanted, but not nearly as much fun!  The drifting part of the game was really fun!  But the other parts of the game, like speed trap & circuit were near identical to NFS:MW which made me feel like instead of releasing a whole new game, EA could of just released a new map-pack!

The graphics were good though, and the choice of motors wasn't bad.   Handling was alright, and obviously different with each car.  The only gripe i had with the handling was when you put the brakes on, the car seemed to jolt, and the frame rate seemed to shake.  I'm not sure if this was intentional, or just my xbox screwing up but this really put me off.  It wasn't smooth!  Speaking of handling though, I thought it'd be easier to drift during normal races.  And as hard as i tried, i really couldn't get it down.  I managed to get the Drift King acheivement though so that's all good :)

The other part of the game is the challenges, which im currenlty working through now.  Well, i say working through, i've done them all except one or two, and they were pretty easy too!

There is one gripe I have with this game though, and that's your crew.  As you progress through the game, you get to recruit other racers into your crew to help you progress, but they really are more of a hinderance than anything!  And what's even more annoying is that they tend to get in your way, or cross the finish line for you!  Now i can't remember where i read it (probably metacritic) but to me, the computer shouldn't win the game for you.  A game doesn't seem fun when the computer is winning for you!  You might as well watch a demo!

It also has a photo mode built in, but this is definatly not a patch on PGR3 which has a fantastic photo mode and EA should of looked to PGR3 for proper implementation of photo mode!

It's not a bad game, but it's not a fantastic game either.  I much enjoyed NFS:MW faar more than this!  I'd still be playing that if my disc wasn't cracked :(

Overall though, this gets a 7/10 from me!  It's good. It has it's great bits, but it also has some poor bits.  The game is generally quite easy but you do have the odd difficult race which adds a bit of a challenge to the game!

Shocking price difference!

The other day, i had an evening to myself, H had gone to her dad's for his birthday. I couldn't get the time off work so i was home alone. 

I decided to watch The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift, as i hadn't seen it before, and it was something to watch.  It wasn't that great, but watching it reminded me sooo much of 'Need for Speed: Carbon'.

So the next day, i went hunting for NFS:Carbon.  I didn't want to pay more than £20. I could get it second hand for that.  Most places offered it for £35-£45 though.  Ebay had a few for £25 but still a tad expensive.

Then i remembered an email i had got from Asda (part of the wal*mart family) saying that they had xbox360 games from £13!  So i checked it out, and they had NFS:Carbon for £17!  Wicked!

However, it so happened that that night, we were visiting Tesco (a rival) so i thought i'd check their website for the price.  £25.  hmmm.  I thought that whilst i was in there, i might as well get it for £25. Save P+P, get it sooner etc.  However, when i got in-store, it was marked up as £40!.. Woah!

So between the 2 stores, they was a price difference of £23!  That's no good.  So i went home and ordered it!  It turned up the other day, but not had a chance to play it yet! 

Soooon. :)

All stickered up!

I made a post 2 weeks ago (here) saying that i'd been given a www.sunrunrally.com window sticker to put in my car window, but the sticker was actually too long.

I wasn't too sure whether to reduce the kerning manually, but placing the letters closer to each other, and risk putting them on bent, or to just drop the www. from the sticker.

I decided to drop the www. bit, and i put the sticker on the window.  It looks pretty pretty good!

Thoughts?

Jellybass volume one

I thought I'd let you know about Jellybass volume one.  A fantastic mix of electronic beats & basslines.  Think Mr Scruff.

Visit jellybass.co.uk to grab the free 30 minute MP3 download! 

I Must say, i really really enjoyed listening to this mix yesterday, and will definatly listen to it again and again!

One year on...

This time last year, i was going through a strong time testing my willpower, and it was probably one of the most daunting things i've ever done.

You see, I'll be 26 this year.  I started smoking when i was 16, and had been smoking roughly 20 a day for 9 years.  I didn't particularly like smoking, but it was a nice social tool.  It helped when I was at college, it helped when I was at work, and it helped when I was with friends, but it stunk, and generally, i'd wake up with a mouth that felt so dry, it'd resemble the bottom of a bird cage!

I am also rather built.  Not through muscle you understand, but fat.  I weight about 16st, and am generally overweight.  Not quite obese, but getting there, however, noone ever thinks i weigh as much as i do!  Anywho, another reason i wanted to give up smoking was for my health.  I was already putting strain on my heart and stuff through being over-weight, but smoking was just adding to the problems!

And the final problem was the cost.  When i gave up smoking, i was paying £4.35 for a pack of 20 fags, and they were the cheaper 'sovereign' variety.  But smoking 20 a day at £4.35 would equal about £30 a week, or £120 a month, and obviously, over a year, that'd be £1,587.75!  That shocked me! 

If i gave up smoking, within a year, the money i would of saved on smoking would of paid off my credit card! 

So i mentioned to Helena (my girflriend) that I was thinking of giving up smoking.  She said 'Good for you, but you'll never do it'.  And being the competitive man I am, I set out to prove her wrong.  I said "Right.  May 16th is the day i'll give up".

And i did.  I remember that May 16th 2006 was a Monday, so the Sunday before was the last day i would be smoking.  I remember driving back from Eastbourne with 2 fags left in my box.  I had one whilst driving, and then had my final cigerette on my balcony when i got home.

After a week, i felt so proud of myself, and so was Helena. She then said "you'll never keep it up!  I bet your smoking within a month".

Again, being the competitive man I am, i thought 'I'll show her!'

A month went by, and again, i gloated at the fact that i'd proven Helena wrong again.  So she turned to me and said "I bet you wont keep it up for a year!".

And here we are.  One year on, and i've not had a cigarette since I gave up!  And thanks to my 'Quitomzilla' extension on Firefox, i can reveal several stats about my giving up, which are:

• If i had been smoking, i would of smoked roughly 7,300 cigarettes in the past year.
• I've saved £1,590, however this isn't accurate, as the price of cigarettes have since gone up several times, so i've saved more!
• I've been smoke free for 1 Year, 13 hours & 50 minutes.

I'm so proud of myself for doing it.  I used nicorette gum to help me through the withdrawel symptoms, but after a week or so, i no longer needed the gum!

Looking back on it, when Helena was telling me she didn't think i could give up, i felt a bit bad because i thought she thought i couldn't do it because i wasn't strong enough.  However, i know realise that Helena knew about my competitive streak, and the fact that i like proving people wrong, so she was just saying those things to encourage me to give up!

So thank you Helena & everyone for the support!

If you smoke, i'd urge you to give up!  It's great!  Oh, and it's true what they say, the ex-smokers are the worst for moaning about smokers lol!

Finally finished Gears o' War

As i mentioned yesterday, I got my 360 back.  And a lot sooner than expected after reading stories on xbox.com about people waiting months! 

Upon opening the box, my console was all neatly wrapped up along with a letter saying that the motherboard was faulty and had been replaced.  There was also another sheet of paper telling me i'd have to re-sync my controllers, and also a customer service survey which i'll be filling out tonight!  Also, to my surprise, was a one month voucher for Xbox Live 'Gold'.  Wooo!  So I'll register that soon and maybe have a bit of multi-player Gears!

Speaking of which, for the last 3 months, i've not played Gears purely because i was stuck at the end.  I Just couldn't defeat General Raam.  I tried and tried... and then gave up!

So after reading on the net about how you kill him, I tried some more... and still failed.

So I waited for Helena's brother, Colcoo to visit.  Last time he visited, he brought his Wii, so we didn't have a chance to co-op on Gears, but he's been down for the last couple o' days, so last night, we fired up the 360 and to my surprise, we defeated him on our second attempt!

Now obviously i couldn't do this on my own!  I had trouble staying alive for more than a minute, however, in co-op mode, player 2 can revive your health when your dying which definatly helped last night!  And obviously a few well placed sniper shots from Colcoo and a machine gun to the head by myself, and we'd finished the game... 5 months after i got it.

The problem is though, we finished it on... umm... casual.  Easiest of the easy.  D'oh!

So for a laugh, we started another co-op game on 'insane' and that wasn't as hard as i had expected.  We managed the first act before switching games!

But yeah, man, the 360 rocks, and co-op play is. just. awesome!

360 is home... sort of!

At last, my 360 has just arrived back, via UPS, from Microsoft after i had to send it back for a repair!  However, it's not quite home yet. It's sitting here next to me at the office.  So it's not quite home, nestled under the TV, but it will be tonight!  I Promise!

Shame it didn't turn up yesterday though, as i was home alone last night and would of had some serious fun, but it's here now, and that's the main thing!

I would get in a couple of hours gaming tonight, catch up and all, but we're going out for H's dads birthday!  Shall be fun :)  However, colcoo should be with us tonight after the meal, so fingers crossed we can squeeze in a bit of co-op Gears of War!

Time to get a new game i suspect, a welcome home present if you will!