• 25Oct 07

  The Xbox360 Elite Own3r :)

  From this day I'm the owner of an Xbox360 Elite. I had an opportunity to put my dirty hands on a really great package. It came with Forza 2 and Halo 3. And it came cheaper than a Premium edition (It was around 445$ (US) but Elite version costs 640$ here and games costs almost 90$ each. Dollar is so week nowadays.) Anyway it was the great opening day of a new Saturn Electronics market here in Budapest and this was their main attraction.

  300 people were waiting for it. I waited from 5:30AM till 8o'clock for the grand opening only to realize that they have like 20 units only!!! Needles to say that all unit gone in like... 90 seconds Or maybe less. Anyway I was lucky (and fast) and ran a 100 yards touchdown with 150 quarterbacks following me I managed to catch the very last unit.

  So here we are. If you are on my Gamespot friend list and have an Xbox live account, please feel free to add me to your friend list on XBL as well. We will have fun I hope

  
  

  • Posted Oct 25, 2007 11:44 am PT
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• 15Oct 07

  Forza 100% - Forza vs. Gran Turismo comparison review

  "Don't call it a comeback..."

  All right, after what it seems like a millennium I finished first Forza episode on Xbox. It didn't take me this long (from March to October) because it was extremely long (like GT4), or very difficult (like GTR or LFS). It took me so long because - for most of the time - it was simply too boring to play. But anyway now I reached 100% on everything so I kind of know this game. I also finished GT3 and GT4 to 100% so I think it's safe to say that I'm well informed and experienced on this topic. And as usual I'm far too opinioned for my own good. Therefore I could go on for pages comparing GT4 and Forza but I try to make life a bit simpler for you: GT4 is a better game than Forza. Even GT3 is a better game. And that's it.
  
  It's not like Forza is bad, actually it does a lot of things even better than any GT game up to date. The car categorization and race restrictions are a lot better. It's more tight, which is good. Motivating tools for playing it on more challenging settings are cool with aids turned off gaining more money and ideas like that. (Too bad money is not necessary that much to go on.) I have to admit I truly liked those ideas, especially in the beginning. But driving physics and overall playing experience was below what any GT game has to offer. Track selection is too small, got pretty old pretty fast. AI seems to be fair and challenging first but after a while it turns out to be a knock off contest on braking. AI drivers also drive like the player wasn't there at all. if I had a dollar every time they pushed me out... Godzilla-size annoying. And so on...
  
  But aside from these small differences Forza is nothing else but a copy of GT3. Take a look "Complex track" which is one of the most direct and huge rip offs of GT3. And the list is endless. It really feels like an American remake of a French movie (or Japanese in this case) that happens quite often. Like okay, this is good, but it's not American. Let's re-do it our way. And so they did...
  
  Bottom-line: Forza is a good game, but it's a copy. A good copy but still just a copy.
  
  My advice to all of you: If you have access to one platform only then it's easy to decide which one to pick. Both games definitely worth playing. If you have access to both PS2 and Xbox platforms and like the easier a touch more arcadeish racing sim then pick Forza. If you want to see the original and still the best, then please play Gran Turismo. It really worth it.
  
  Or if you are a racing maniac like me, then play both and decide for yourself which one did you enjoy the most.

  • Posted Oct 15, 2007 5:42 am PT
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• 21Feb 07

  AIM & LFS and then some

  A.I.M.
  It’s been a while since I last wrote a blog post. A lot has happened since. We did 2 A.I.M. races. First we got beaten badly, finished 9th out of 12 at Daytona. And we had another last weekend where we finished 7th out of 13 in Kottingbrun. It was physically the most challenging race so it felt great to get the best result so far. The best part however is that there were another Hungarian team last time. Few go-kart faces who believe they are the best in this country. Well some of them really are. They are the ones who beat us at the National league. So they decided to join us and make a team of their own. They truly believed and hoped they will win this whole shebang and they were very confident about beating us. Unfortunately they weren’t ready for 1 hour of driving. Every pilot of theirs passed out after the first hour. So in the end they started to change drivers during the 1 hour etaps, pulling the last etap with not 2 but 3 drivers. Hehe So they finished 12nd with 22 laps behind us! While we finished 2 laps behind No5. and No6. That's 1119 laps to 1121. That's 2 laps So we slowly getting better as a team. I really enjoy seeing that evolving.

  So after the 12 hours race on Saturday (from 1AM to 1PM that is!!!) we went home to Hungary, and participated in a 3 hours go-kart endurance race Sunday morning 9AM We just went there, no practicing what so ever, no info on which direction the race will take place at all. And we won the race (out of 8 teams).beat 2nd team with 6 laps. Everybody was looking at us like "Who the hell are these guys?!" It was like being the star band at Woodstock

  LFS
  Theoretically there was the last LFS race on Monday. But obviously I couldn't practice at all. I joined in after the qualification was over. Started the race from last position, but jumped to 5th place in the first lap I had a really good start But in the 2nd lap a guy pushed me off so bad my car crashed. I came back to the track, but then another guy crashed into me. I had enough of it in that minute, typed in few 4 letter words and logged out. That was Westhill LFS race for me

  What’ next?
  This week I’ll rest my poor body (did I mention I have a probably broken rib? Got it at AIM) and next week I’ll start my physical training for the AIM finals!! We do a 6 hours practice race on 3rd of March. Then a week later on 10th of March it's Finals time On 11th of March (Sunday) the Hungarian National Amateur Karting Championship opens. So that's going to be another packed weekend

  We plane to participate another team championship in Austria during the summer. There going to be 12 and 24 (!!!) hour races there It's called OTKS.
  

  Once in a forum I mentioned that I'd love GT4's 24 hour races, if some of us could do a championship out of it. Like 6 teams with 3-6 members each. And we could race each other on-line. That would be fun. Now I'll have that, but not in GT4 but in real world with 20.5HP go-karts on over 1km long racetracks And the opponenets, there won't be 6 teams, but 30-40 I think that is going to be fun!

  Here are some uninteresting websites.
  AIM and OTKS website (german).: www.kd2000.at
  Daytona track website (german): www.daytona.at
  Kottingbrun track website (german): www.kartcenter.at/kartcenter/
  Hungarian National Amateur Championship website (hungrian): www.amatorgokart.hu
  My page on that site: www.amatorgokart.hu/versenyzok/herman_t.htm

  Bye for now.

  • Posted Feb 21, 2007 7:51 am PT
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