Thomas Was Alone tells a heartfelt tale of friendship. Developed by Mike Bithell (the PlayStation ports handled by Curve Studios), it follows a group of sentient artificial intelligences in the form of quadrilaterals as they attempt to escape or rather, emerge from their confines. It begins with Thomas, a newly formed AI longing for camaraderie, and a dozen other characters searching for purpose in their newfound lives, all working together to discover it.

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Chinese knock-offs span every category of product, so it's probably not going to shock you that games are not exempt from its scope. However, what's really shocking is what kind of bizarre, crappy, and sometimes even cool games you can find on the Chinese knock-off market. The first in this series of spotlights is a fun little platformer called Pikachu Y2K:

Pikachu Y2K is, in all essence, a classic Mario-styIe platformer starring the titular electric pocket monster mouse thing. Going by the aforementioned description, you'd think that this all would be a fun, neat little game that, in essence, would give you a generic experience. HA, joke's on you: this game is nuttier than squirrel feces.

First off, Pikachu Y2K doesn't immediately drop you into the action. To start off with, you're given a short cutscene in which a mad scientist and his pet cat phone Pikachu at his home because they want a magic purse back. Oh, by the way: did I mention that the text says that Pikachu's real name is Felix?

So, er, I guess Pikachu will now be referred to as "Felix?"

After promptly hanging up and using the force to reel in his magical purse, Felixchu sets out on an adventure to...erm...not try to let the mad scientist guy get the bag from him? Honestly, he could have just stayed home and called the cops on him, leading to an arrest and avoiding all the ensuing nonsense but hey, I'm talking about a Chinese knock-off 8-bit platformer so why should I be caring so much?

Anywho, Pikachu Y2K's gameplay is pretty standard platforming fare, ridiculous premise aside. Sadly, it's a little sub-par for a side-scrolling platformer since its rules aren't very in line with Mario, as you can die from jumping on enemies. With stomping on their heads out of the equation, how can Felix-the-Pikachu deter people from snatching his purse?

The purse, of course!

Yes, instead of jumping on enemies, PikaFelix disposes of his foes via a Tom and Jerry-styIe boxing glove that pops out from his bag of wonders.

The animation doesn't include the bag, though...

 Given all this, the game seems pretty disappointing, right? Well, what makes Pikachu Y2K a little bit cooler is the ability to collect power-ups that transform the bag into various weapons such as singing, driving a car, riding an air balloon, and even driving a freaking tank.

Also, it shoots bombs with faces.

Take a moment to soak all this in: there's Felixchu in that image up there driving a tank in a happy pixelated 8-bit world. Yes, there exists a game where you can actually play as Pikachu driving a tank. Why hasn't anyone thought of this before? Seriously, the war game market is virtually untapped for the entire Pokemon franchise and here you have the Chinese knock-off market taking the initiative while Nintendo sits on their duffs, scratches their heads, and puts out a Gamecube game consisting entirely of watching fake television shows with Pikachu all day. Y'know, because we really need something like THAT on the market, while the idea of Tankemon goes completely over their heads. In a way, this instantly makes Pikachu Y2K better than a good deal of the franchise's official games from recent years.

Aside from the brilliant idea of putting Pikachu in a freaking tank, the rest of the game, like I said before, is pretty generic. The regular enemies aren't even other Pokemon, just some stupid little bird sprites and regular fishes...though there are a few walking trees here and there for no real reason. Ents aside, there isn't really that much to talk about in terms of enemy design and, on that note, there isn't much to say about the level layout. Really, the only thing on showcase here is how bizarre the overall premise of the game is and, beyond that, it's a sub-par platformer.

One last thing, though: the Game Over screen kind of bugs me:

...What's in that garbage can to the left? Seriously, can anyone give me an idea? I don't have one.

VERDICT:

Graphics: 8 - Pretty decent representation of Pikachu. Besides, the entire thing's running on an NES, so I'm not that picky.

Sound: 6 - There's a fun little tune in the first level, then it repeats in the second, the third, fourth....yeah.

Gameplay: 6 - It's functional, but there's no pizzazz beyond the power-ups.

Story: 10 - PIKACHU IN A FREAKING MAGIC PURSE TANK!

Overall: 7 - It's worth checking out for about an hour, but not farther beyond that.

So that's all for Pikachu Y2K! Be sure to stay tuned for more showcased Chinese knock-off games!

(also, please someone tell me what's in that garbage can)

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That experience helped tremendously when I became the DM of my AD&D group in the early-to-mid 90's, but I learned some hard lessons from my players: you HAVE to control the player. If you give a player a wide-open world to adventure around in, he'll do just that, and whatever story arc you may have laid out becomes a forgotten piece of advice from a bartender in...some town or another a while back.

I've been thinking about my DM days a lot here lately, having just taken the plunge into RPG-development land. RPGMaker VX Ace is my first attempt beyond some FPS maps at making anything resembling a computer game, and I find myself thinking less about my days with Dragon Warrior or Final Fantasy I/II (US versions) than I do recalling the hard lessons of DMing a group of rowdy players who wanted nothing more than to put the sword (or dagger, or fireball) to the beast.

And so I've found myself in lands of my own making, with lore and characters whose beginnings reach all the way back to my elementary school days a few decades back. Unlike those days behind the DM screen, staring out across eager faces I knew so well, I have no idea who will take up the sword in this world of mine and explore whatever fantasy lands I manage to create. Warrior or mage? Male or female? Expert or nascent gamer?

Arder Island, the place that isn't that other place.

As I learn the subtleties of the program I find myself thinking less about HOW to do something, and more about whether or not I should. It easy to throw everything at the player at once, show him all you've got and make him think "wow, that's interesting."

It's something else entirely to make the player want to keep playing.

We've all had those games that, as much as we wanted to enjoy them, just didn't draw us in. They became a chore to finish, if we ever even finished them. They were a task to get out of the way rather than a work of fiction to be enjoyed from one cover to the other.

DMing for a group of friends had the advantage of immediate feedback. Are people starting to doze off and lose interest? An unsuspected attack or a magic spell gone wrong could always bring everyone back to their feet, ready to join the fray and fight over the booty. In between the die-rolling and stat-checking, I could be behind my screen tweaking and adjusting the overall arc to be a bit more lively from that point forward, the players never suspecting that I had dropped the ball.

So here I find myself, a DM to players unseen and known, and I have to keep them interested.

I have to control them in the sense that I need them to want to do the things I've laid out before them. This isn't a Bethesda game, you don't get to make your own story, you get to play mine. But, as with any good RPG, I want it to become your story, as well.

Ancient temples always mean a badass boss at the end, right?

It's not just about interesting locations and characters, lots of weapons and enemies to stick those weapons into, but rather its about anticipating what the player expects and wants. And, despite that, you can't just give it to them. One must, at times, defy the players expectations or desires. Show him what he wants and then take it away. Lead him on that chase, through temples and mines and towns and places he has no other business being in. Give it to him in pieces, and let him think that the ultimate goal is just out of reach.

That box of swag back there would be a nice start.

The truth is, the mechanics of gamemaking isn't taking up as much of my time as I thought it would. The lore, characters and locations have long existed in my mind. It's the player that's the dynamic variable that I've got to pin down and hold on to; the one thing that makes the world run is the one thing that's so easy to lose.

So as the player begins his journey on Arder Island and starts hearing tales of the mainland, I have to consider "how do I make him want to do whatever it takes to get off this island and explore the rest of the world without the island feeling like an obstacle in the path to greater freedom?"

And then, once on the mainland, that question will evolve again to "now that the player is here, how do I get him to want to go elsewhere, instead?"

I'm in the very beginnings of my ultimate DM campaign. Many months from now I hope to invite you all on an adventure I've lived many times in my own mind, but first, I have to make sure all the strings go to the right limbs and that if you look up, you can't see me.

Ignore the man behind the curtain; this means nothing.

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Here's to being Mr. X hopefully for a bit!!

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Long story short: Add me on PSN, you goons! My PSN name is also megagene.

Just leave me a little note letting me know you're from Gamespot.

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The Atheism Union has previously been a useful antidote to religious commentary on Gamespot. It still contains much good information about secularism and religious intolerance. Active use of the union has declined with the rest of the site forums in the past, but now they seem to be on-the-up again, I propose the AU still has it's uses:

www.gamespot.com/unions/17275/forums.html

The Atheism Union, going forward, should be a place where all-comers can express and discuss their views about religion. It is also a useful repository of information on religious ideas, the secular responses to them and about the philosophies of humanism. I have tried to contact the esteemed union leader Domatron23, but unfortunately have had no response as yet. This a great shame, because Dom's knowledge of Greek thinking and logic was deep, relevant and profoundly interesting. He also made a fair and courteous leader in the union and promoted it well while he was active here.

Women are welcome there too!

I would like the union to grow once again, so that it can be a place where people of all beliefs (and none) can discuss their views in a more considered environment than places like OT. Off-Topic can be a difficult place to express views now, due to the fast movement of the religious threads and seeming disregard of etiquette in discussion. It still does not seem to stop the increasing numbers of religiously inspired threads there though. This shows that deeply-felt emotions are still valid regarding religion, especially as we test our own tolerance of others' intolerance.

I hope you share my view of the desire for an active Atheism Union. You don't have to be a member to post there, or even to include the above link in your sigs (to advertise the existence of union in your posts). I wonder if you have any ideas on how the union can grow again, or if the desire for active participation there is not relevant now. Of course, joining the Atheism Union is free, easy and painless, if you'd like to express your beliefs through the unions you affiliate with.

Personally, I have learned that it is far better not to alienate fellow union members and shall be showing a more conciliatory tone in my arguments against religion and some atheist ideas there myself. I do worry that my recent string of post creation in the AU is starting to make it look like the defunct "Christian Witness Union" and "Bible believers' Union" that ended their usefulness as one-man rants with no responses. Can you help?

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SHEEP JUICE! Use wool as flavoring! WOOOOOOLLLLL!!!

Mmmm...nice pulpy juice, made from only the freshest of sheeps.

*Whistles.*

Anyway, apparently Catherine has rotted my brain. My parents put on TSO's Night Enchanted to see if the speakers worked and, well, I screamed out, "It's Catherine all over again! D:" And my parents gave me this weird look like I had drugs or something. I told her it was similar to a theme in Catherine, but she didn't believe me.

(The theme I'm talking about is William Tell Overture Part 2 and Part 3. You get tired of hearing it after you die a bunch of times.)

I finished Catherine up. I gave it a 7.5 and I have a review somewhere. I just can't remember where I saved it, so it's not quite up yet.

And probably won't be up if I can't find it. ;D

Finishing up Fable III. I already beat it, pretty much. I've also been rather disappointed with it. It's so glitchy and it's just not like Fable II. I like some of the changes in the game, but other changes could really do without. Plus for whatever reason, Jasper stopped talking to me half way through and I have no way of getting him talk again. But then again, he was pretty annoying to begin with, anyway. So, I guess whatever.

Now it's just finishing up Tales of Vesperia, Magna Carta 2, and Muramasa. :3

I've also been working on Japanese. I can tell time, the date, how I feel, ask how someone's feeling, etc. Just little things right now. I've always wanted to learn the language since 6th or 7th grade, and I had no idea what anime was until a year or two later.

I guess that's it. Nothing too exciting.

SHEEP JUICE!

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So a while ago my friend rented Burlesque on Blu-ray, a provocative musical staring Christina A and Cher. However you're probably asking yourself "why is he bringing this up now if he saw this 'a while ago'?" Well, there's that song by Flo Rida that has a snippet track that uses "I've got a good feeling", a lyric used from Etta James - Somethings Gotta Hold On Me. I heard it on the radio and it made me remember Christina's opening song in the movie of the same song.

I kept thinking to myself that song, and how it sounds coming out of Christina's mouth, and I can't help but notice how predictable her voice is. I mean she is talented, she can sing. However the originality in her ad-libs and runs are flat out the same in ever song she sing. The songs she starts off with is usually a loud long note, add a little rasperyness to it and copy & paste it in her song where ever you like.

Take for example this song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcxvFraCaKA&feature=related. It's "tough love" performed by Christina A after her performance was deliberately sabotaged by a drunk jealous actress who lost her place to Christina. Don't believe me of that plot? Look it up! She was drunk, snobby and completely jealous...typical, I know.

But back to Christina's video. You'll notice at 2:48 of the video she does a ad-lib/run on a single note, and you can compare it to 1:01, you'll start to hear the simularities of what she does. You hear it all throughout the movie, and after that I cannot unlearn what I've learned. What has been heard cannot be un-heard.

Now we can compare her to other artists like, let's say, Rihanna and Beyonce. One of the two biggest artists out there, but why compare them to Christina instead of her biggest competition for comparison, Britney Spears. Oh, come on! We gotta fair and realistic too. Britney Spears is definitely a hot "artist", but I use the word artist very loosely. She has looks, the moves and she sings. But is she taken as a real singer though? My opinion, no. Because as far as originality and quality of voice goes, it's not carried very far without marketing the visuals of what Britney Spears sells. Be honest Brit Fans, she has a smoking hot body, but if it wasn't for the body her vocal talents would have been totally fallen on deaf ears.

Typically it's easier to compare two objects alike because of simularities, for example computers. The age all comparison is Mac vs PC, they are so the same in hardware, but software is night and day in terms of how the code is written and executed. The obvious comparisons between Christina A. and Britney S. are:

• Blonde Hair
• Slender sexy bodies
• Was on the Mickey Mouse Club show
• They are singers
• Music falls close to similar ****
• Looks, visual identifications
• Vaginas
• Been in movies
• Bewbs
• Both taken weird life detours
• Bewbs
• They're white

You can call me racist all you want, but it's the truth. A lot of people will be hesitant to compare black people to white people, it's just built in emotions. People don't want to be named racist, they just wish to show their tollerance in society. But if we take out that element, we are left with the voice. The quality of voice is very different. We have one artist who plays it safe on a basic chord structure, that can be used with most upbeat songs and some ballads. Where as the second voice actually tries different things with volume, adlibs and runs There's not negativity between them, it's just what they can offer in their range.

So why compare Christina to Rihanna and Beyonce? I personally think that Rihanna's singing talent has gone down hill, but do I really think she had much talent to begin with? Mmm, I'm on the fence. I've heard some of her ballads and they are memorable. I've heard some of her upbeat songs, and they're enjoyable, but it doesn't push any bars to a new standard. I mean she has more hair ****changes then Jocelyn Wildenstein's face.

Beyonce definitely has a aggresive strong hold in the music industry. She totally has different ranges if given different material, but a lot of her fast songs are sort of the same. I personally enjoy her ballads more, it really gives her a chance to express the singing with more detail. Now Christina has done some power ballads that I believe are pretty darn good, but looking back at the youtube video you hear a lot of the same thing. Same single note runs, adlibs and overall ****

You like her or hate her. Compare her to your standard artists, and you will identify a lof of things that you wont like. My personal standard is actually the old Whitney Houston, but nobody can really match the standard she set at that time.

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Thank you guys for sticking with me.

Later guys.

You can still follow me on my YouTube account:

www.youtube.com/OneManBoxOffice

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I haven't updated this journal in quite some time. How is everyone? How are things?

I'm doing all right. A bit under the weather today. I had to pop in though and add Assassin's Creed: Revelations to my following list! Oh man, I can't wait to get it!

Hope all are well!

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I have nothing else to say.

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