Amplitude offline, NBA Live 07 online and Crackdown.
Sunday, February 25th, 2007
Today was the second attempt to get 1,000 people together online for the NBA Live 07 achievement worth 100 gamerscore points. Basically, if there are 1,000 people online playing NBA Live 07 while you are playing, you get 100 gamerscore points for minimal effort. It was really cool to take part in something like this, not only because I got a cool C-note worth of points, but because I helped others do the same. While I hope this is the last of these type of achievements, I will say I had a good time doing it.
I played Crackdown a ton this weekend, and this game just continues to be fun. The play mechanics are literally begging the player to goof off with a friend online and try to uncover weird and wacky stuff. The only limit to this game is the player’s imagination. The initial pitch meeting was something like “You have super-powers in a huge city, and so does your friend. Now, do whatever you want.” It really is a lot of fun, and for some reason the fun isn’t wearing off as some other games sometimes do. Maybe it is because you are constantly leveling up your character, even when goofing around. Regardless, if you haven’t checked out this game yet you really should.
Lastly, the company that made the Guitar Hero franchise also made Amplitude and Frequency for the PS2. These games were great fun back in the day and they still hold up fairly well. I had read that the online servers for Amplitude were going offline tomorrow, so I decided to go online and download all the user-submitted remixed tracks to play whenever I desired. Well, unfortunately for me, the tracks were pulled about a year ago and the only portion that was left online was the leaderboards, the chat, and online multiplayer. I chatted with a couple people for a bit, but then logged out to play the offline single player game. The game is still as fun as it ever was, but at the end of the day the biggest thing I was feeling was anticipation for the Xbox 360 version of Guitar Hero II. I have it pre-ordered from Red Octane, as it comes with a free 2-guitar gig bag for the controllers. I can’t wait, but I must.
So I was very busy for a time there, but now I’m back and better than ever (or at least as good as before). I’m not going to spend a lot of time recapping what I have played since I was posting regularly. The good news is 
I worked late again and didn’t have a chance to play anything tonight. I did, however, catalog some games for the pile of shame. Yes, I realize this site is supposed to be about me playing the games I already had and not getting more games, but I have a problem. This site has become more of a “this is why Master has more games than he plays” type of site. Maybe I will find the time to play the games I already have. That would be nice. Anyway, without further ado, here are the Playstation 2 games that I have in my pile that are sealed.
I am still sick as a dog. I am feeling a little better today, but not by much. I started playing some more Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 today and eventually got tired and had to take a nap. That is a running theme, my playing some games for a little bit, and then needing to take a nap like I’m 90 years old. Being sick sucks, especially when you are all alone (my girlfriend is visiting family in Boston). Anyway, my Mazda RX-7 is pretty tricked out in TXR3, but I’m starting to think I should buy a new car and smoke everybody. Here is the North Amercan boxart for TXR3 as I didn’t post it yesterday.
After my short nap I played some Doom 3 Coop with my buddy Ryan. He has been on me forever to play this game co-op over Live and we decided today was the day. He couldn’t find his copy for a short time, which I thought was hilarious, but eventually he found it and I hosted a game. This game looks fantastic through Xbox 360 backwards compatibility and plays really well to boot. This game plays completely differently when playing in cooperative mode, and has a much faster pace. We got through the entire coop game and I was way too tired to get up, and that of course meant…
Xbox Live Arcade games! First I played Galaga and got the last pesky achievement I had been unable to get. I had been trying to time my shots on the bonus levels to try to earn the perfect achievement, little did I realize that if you get double ship and position yourself in the middle, holding rapid fire will award you the achievement every time. Silly me. Well, I have it now and finally all the achievements in Galaga are mine.
Then I played some Crystal Quest. There is one achievement I have left to get buy never seem to be able to get it. To get the last achievement I have to kill 20 enemies at once with a bomb, but never have I seen 20 enemies at once on the screen. Should I be playing on hard, on easy? Any help on this is appreciated. I would look it up from the many available sources but it is time again for another senior citizen nap. 
I’m pretty much dying. Well, maybe not dying, but I feel pretty bad. My whole body aches and even sitting up hurts for no reason at all. I haven’t really gotten a chance to play much of anything, though I did spend an hour or so tooling around with Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 for Playstation 2. Ever since playing Shutokou Battle X on my friend’s borrowed Japanese Xbox 360, I have had a hankering to play. It will be added to my pile of shame when I through and list the PS2 games, maybe I can even get through enough of it to where I can list it and then immediately cross it off the list. Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 is known as Shutokou Battle 01 (zero one) in Japan and was developed by Genki. I think the Japanese box art is just a bit cooler than the domestic, so that is why there is no cover art for TX3.