Sexy Bartolo Colon

Paid for another year of this URL, so...

Let's start using for what I initially used it for... All my stupid Photoshops.
Let this page serve as my anti-portfolio!

2014 Defeated Games List

January
Batman: Arkham Origins: Blackgate
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
Final Fantasy Tactics

February
The Walking Dead: Season 1 + 400 days DLC
The Stanley Parable

March
Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII (Technically twice...)
Strider (2014)
InFamous: Second Son (Good Karma)
Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes

April 
Gone Home
Tomb Raider (2013)
NHL 14 (2015 Season - Won Stanley Cup)
Bioshock: Burial at Sea

May
Titanfall
Final Fantasy X
Wolfenstein (2009)

June
Batman: Arkham Origins

July
Saints Row 4
The Bureau: XCOM Declassified

August Skyrim - beat Alduin
Metal Gear Solid

September
Metal Gear Solid 2 HD
Metal Gear Solid 3 HD
Destiny (campaign - L20)

October
Metal Gear Rising Revengeance
Strider 2
Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker
Metal Gear Solid Ground Zeroes
Nidhogg?

November 
Zone of the Enders
Zone of the Enders: 2nd Runner
Call of Duty: Black Ops II
Halo 4
Catherine

December 
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare
Battlefield 4
Injustice: Gods Among Us
Transistor

2013 Defeated Games List

FTL*
Assassin's Creed 3
Pokemon White 2 (full New Unova Dex)
Super Mario RPG
Fire Emblem: Awakening
Infamous 2 (Good)
Killzone 2 x2
Killzone 3 x2
DmC Devil may Cry
Saint's Row The Third
Megaman 3
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune*
Uncharted 3*
Brütal Legend
Guacamelee!
Bioshock Infinite
Spec Ops: The Line
The Last of Us
G-LOC Air Battle*
XCOM: Enemy Unknown*
Persona 4 Golden (True Ending)
Metal Slug XX*
Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon
Shin Megami Tensei 4
Final Fantasy VI
Final Fantasy IX
Grand Theft Auto 5
Beyond: Two Souls
Pokemon X (finished story)
NHL 14 (won the cup in Be A GM)
Batman: Arkham City Armoured Edition
               -Harley Quinn's Revenge
Metal Gear Solid 4*
Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
Killzone: Shadow Fall
Super Mario 3D World (Beat Bowser, saved the fairies)
Doom 2 RPG

 *Games I have finished at some point before.

Defeated Games lists!

Hey all, So in 2012, I had a hard time recalling what games I'd actually taken the time to finish. I could spend hours browsing through trophies on some platforms, but not all. I decided at the end of that year that I'd start building lists of all the games I finished in a year. I only count games I've played to story completion, since in adulthood I never play to 100% completion with all whatsits unlocked, all collectibles found, platinum trophy.

I've been building these yearly lists for 2 years now, and I've noticed my play style has changed. For one, I'm playing different kinds of games. I had already drifted away from fighting games when I moved in with Kyla, as I didn't have the time to play them on my own, and knew I'd not be able to play them with her or with her as an audience. Since I started making these lists, the time I've spent playing multiplayer shooters has plummeted. I'm more likely to play something with a defined beginning and ending.

 You can tell from these lists when I did and didn't have work, or when I was on a show deep into production or not. I think that's the most interesting thing about this list. I debated adding sections to say "I played a lot of Towerfall" to the list, but that feels against the spirit of it. If I didn't finish it, it shouldn't be listed. I got to the very end of Final Fantasy V and gave up from difficulty, so it's not on the list, even though I played that more than anything else in September 2014.

 I'm just happy to have a record of my accomplishments that I can share.

With the PS4 on the way, I've been thinking about what motivated me to buy the PS3. I didn't expect to buy all three consoles this generation, but I think it was around the 6th time my 360 died, just before GTAIV came out at the end of April, 2008, that I started to get fed up with the XBox. I played this shit out of GTA, but honestly don't blame it for the fact that 360 #6 had the shortest turnaround of any, dying less than a month later.

At the time, I was playing Halo 3 a lot, so I wanted some other multiplayer game while I waited for my broken XBox to return. Whenever my 360 was in the shop, I would go back to playing games on the PS2. Going back to San Andreas and Virtua Fighter 4 was like visiting old friends, but before the 360, my go-to online multiplayer game was Metal Gear Online. That game had since been shut down server-side. With Metal Gear Solid 4 on the way, 2 weeks away from #6's death, I decided to spend my first paycheck at my new job on a PS3.

My first memory of it wasn't a good one. I saved $100 getting a PS3 that couldn't play PS2 games, and still regret that decision. I bought it in the afternoon, went to work, got home late, and set it up, hoping to get right into playing. I spent an hour updating the system, only to wait another 15 minutes to update the game I'd just bought. I only ended up playing for 15 minutes before retiring to bed at 3am. If there's one thing I'm sore about regarding the PS3, it's the constant updates in their war against hackers. Playing on 2 different PS3s at the same time now, whenever there's a system update, it sucks, and we have to sit through it twice. PS Plus's auto download has fixed this, but it really shouldn't be a premium feature.

For the first 2 years of owning it, the 360 was still my main system. I had more games for the thing, and would choose to buy multiplatform games on it over the PS3. The fact that about 20 of the guys I was working with had PS3s meant that if I did choose to buy my games for that system, I'd be able to lend out games and have others lent to me. I'd arrange to buy, say, Batman: Arkham Asylum, with the expectation that someone else would swap Heavy Rain with me for a week. I got to play even more games that way.

When Modern Warfare 2 game out, those 20ish guys I worked with all got it at the same time. I followed. It was one of the best multiplayer experiences I'll ever have. We all worked the same terrible hours, so we all booted up our PS3s and joined custom games together after work every night. That's when I started favoring the PS3. The 360 became my RockBand box. I didn't realize I'd stopped buying games for it till I picked up Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood for PS3 despite having the others on the Xbox. Soon after that, I started dating Kyla, and spending more and more time at her place. She had a PS3, so buying a PS3 game meant I got to play it no matter where I was.

I was always wary of buying an XBox 360. I didn't want to support Microsoft, vowing to only buy used (I broke down soon after) and I knew about the red ring, but thought it'd never happen to me. I've only ever had to pay for my replacement twice, once refunded, but the next time it dies, I'd have to buy another, and I'm not sure I will. While Gears of War was once my favourite multiplayer game, the people I played that with never got into Gears 2 or 3. The people I played Halo 3 multiplayer with have since sold their XBoxes, or never bothered repairing them. I subscribed to XBox Live for 2 more years when Halo Reach came out, and only played on the service for about 3 months consistently. The service is so filled with ads now, it's a wonder that they still charge for the Live service, especially when PlayStation Plus lets me play so many games for less than the price of one per year. I really want to say I'll only get two of these Next Gen systems this time out, and I'm already leaning toward PlayStation. The PS3 may have had a slow start, but it's never let me down.

A week with the Wii U

Six years have passed since the Nintendo released the Wii. I bought one because I knew they were rare, and because an EB Games employee I knew pretty well let me know one was available at his store. I bought it and enjoyed it at first, but pretty much took a 3 year break from paying it any attention until the end of 2010. I hadn't been paying attention, and it was hard to notice, but the Wii got some of the best first party support from Nintendo since the days of the Super NES. With that in mind, I became extremely excited last summer when Nintendo unveiled their new Wii U. I had lost trust in Nintendo with the Wii, but late in the game, they earned it back.

The best feature of the Wii U is that it suits my living arrangement. This would not have been at all beneficial to me two years ago. Today, I share a television with two others. I've noticed that I'm playing games less because of this. Last winter, when Kyla was hard into playing Skyrim, racking up more than 300 hours played, I had my laptop out with my Wii piped into it playing Skyward Sword right beside her. This required me to have a mess of wires in the living room. It wasn't pretty, but it worked. Today, we have two PS3s in the house connected to different TVs in different rooms. We could play our separate games apart from each other. I imagine someone got her Lego Lord of the Rings for Christmas, and I'm hoping for Assassin's Creed 3, and if we had both those games, we could both play, but we'd be rooms apart.

This weekend, Kyla started watching television, and I was able to sit next to her playing Call of Duty. It didn't require a nasty hardware setup with a mess of wires like last year. I had my volume turned down to an inoffensive level, and we were able to talk and interact in the same room. We were doing separate things, but we were still spending time with each other. I also fared pretty well on the small screen. I'm certainly not the most skilled Call of Duty player, but my score was pretty impressive.

Another fair point to make about games like Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed is that Kyla hates watching me play them. For the last year, if I popped in Modern Warfare 2 to play some multiplayer, it was on a Sunday morning, quietly, before Kyla was out of bed. I could go play in the other room, but I'd rather be spending time with her. I played XCOM most when I was home alone, or when Kyla was taking a nap. While I'm sure we'll get the next PlayStation or XBox to complement our entertainment setup, as long as Nintendo keeps supporting this new machine, it'll have a place in our routine.

Another huge advantage this system has is that it can control the TV. I don't have to pause my game to lower the volume. If Kyla wants to do something else with the TV, I can set that up in an instant, without a word. She'll say she'd like to watch something on Netflix, and all of a sudden, the TV's input is set to Apple TV. I don't have to put the controlled down to relinquish control. I like being able to make that gesture.

The system interface resembles that of the 3DS. It's very smooth an beautiful looking, but, unfortunately, everything takes forever to load. The wait times between menus are unbearably long. It's unacceptable, considering we know the menus alone run on half the system's RAM. I really hope they patch that up soon.

The games I've tried are great. Kyla's been playing Scribblenauts Unlimited, and before I called in sick on Thursday and managed some game time between naps, she had used the system more than I had. Scribblenauts' visuals translate beautifully to an HD TV, and the game can be played completely from the GamePad, which is great, too. My only concern is that she's had it a week and is almost done with it. We have seen the credit roll. I can see making interactive greeting cards within this game, and that idea excites me.

We've barely scratched the surface of Nintendo Land. It's fun and cute. I loved the Balloon Trip game and found it very easy to control with the stylus. The F-Zero game left me pining for a new full-fledged F-Zero. Luigi's Ghost Mansion is the standout multiplayer game. We've only played 4 player so far, and had a blast with it. The Octopus Dance game was boring and stupid, and we'll probably never touch it again. Hopefully there are no secrets in this game that require us to do well in that. Everything in this game tugs at my nostalgia centre. The music is catchy, especially when it shifts to 8-Bit in certain menus. My big complaint is the way the GamePad is used to steer your Mii character around to different attractions. The picture on the television twists to match the way you're holding the gamepad, which is very disorienting.

Call of Duty is Call of Duty. It looks better than Black Ops did on my XBox, but I'm told this version doesn't look any better than the XBox 360 version, which is unfortunate. I only had one noticeable framerate drop while playing, and it was not during combat. The framerate seemed to drop during the story sequences between missions whenever there was a conversation with Woods that took place outside. Multiplayer suffers from not having the 500,000 players of the 360 community. Last weekend, there were about 500 players playing. That number has climbed over 1000. I've only once had trouble connecting to a game, but I've never seen anyone playing the party games, which are fun. It wasn't the best platform to buy this on, but as I said earlier, I can play this on the GamePad, and that offers a huge advantage, offering me more times during the day in which I can play this game.

New Super Mario Bros. U gets a bad rap for being the second New Super Mario game released this year. The level design is far smarter in this one that NSMB2 on the 3DS, and the world itself is reminiscent of Super Mario World. Last night I found a secret entrance in a level that took from a midway castle to the final castle of a world through a rear entrance that took me right to the boss. This is the coolest secret I've found in a videogame in a long time. The Miiverse integration is great. It allows you to caution when you're doing bad, or brag when you're doing well. I see games with Miiverse integration being a more social parallel to achievements and trophies. There are some real artists on Miiverse, and it's always cool to check what other people are doing and saying about the part of the game you're in. So far, I have only seen 1 penis.

I'm really excited for Miiverse to make it's jump to the web. In time, it'll be accessible on computers and smartphones. This is great because when you access Miiverse from inside a game, you can post a screenshot of the game you're playing. Being able to bring my screenshots to the computer to post on Facebook will be great. Unfortunately, Call of Duty doesn't let you access this from inside multiplayer. When I'm able, I'll be sharing a picture of a soldier in Black Ops 2 running around with an invisible gun that I posted to Miiverse this weekend.

The way they handled Wii backward compatibility is unfortunate. The Wii is fully emulated and broken off into it's own menu. This means all Virtual Console games and Wiiware exist only in this broken off space. If you want to launch a Wii disc, you'll have to load up this separate menu first.

I really expected I'd be able to play the Virtual Console games I bought on my Wii straight from the Wii U menu. Their solution of running those games in Wii mode is upsetting. Given the precedent they set with the 3DS and DSiware, it was a reasonable expectation.

I was a fan of the idea of the Virtual Console when the Wii launched, but it just took forever for the service to add the games I wanted. By the time it did, well... I found another way to run those games on the Wii that limited my access to the Shop Channel. Now that I've got a Wii U, I've got a list of future purchases I intend to make. Unfortunately, 3 of those games were removed last week; the Donkey Kong Country games are gone, with no reason given for removal. I want Nintendo to know I'm still interested in the Virtual Console.

I hope they're able to patch my existing games to run on the Wii U. I hope they don't expect me to buy Super Metroid again. I hope they don't split my Virtual Console library by games I can play from the Wii U's menu, and games that can only be booted in Wii mode. I also hope they can patch the 3DS's GameBoy Virtual Console to allow either Super GameBoy colouring or GameBoy Color colouring, because that's just lazy.

It's great that on day 1, we have 5 controllers that work with this new system. I still want one of the new Pro Controllers for guests, but it's nice to have a full assortment of accessories that don't need to be upgraded. That's always the big hidden cost of buying a new console. The PS2 let me use my old Dual Shock controller, and that was such a big deal. Since then, other than the Wii using GameCube controllers for some stuff, no one has really allowed you to use your old stuff. And even though the Wii allowed me to use those old controllers, I still had to go out and buy an extra controller, two nunchuks, and the classic controller to play the games I wanted to play. Later, we had to buy Wii Motion Plus attachments if we didn't want to replace our old Wii remotes. There was a high cost to setting up the Wii for 4 player sessions. I do really miss using the Gamecube controller, and playing those games. Most of my GameCube games are either Nintendo franchises that have been iterated on the Wii and are sure to find their way on the Wii U, as well as 8-16-32 bit game collections on disc. It would sure be nice to be able to play the latter on there. I suppose I understand why GameCube support has been cut, but it would still be nice. The Wavebird is still my preferred controller for Smash Bros. and Mario Kart.

Overall, I'm impressed with the games, but there's so much they need to fix about the user interface. I hope they care enough to try. I hope they let me download my Virtual Console games on from the Wii U eShop instead of the Wii's Shop Channel in Wii mode one day, but I'm not holding my breath. It's too bad. We'll see what happens. The firmware update that gave us access to the SD card for launching games changed the way I interacted with the Wii. Hopefully the Wii U sees some massive UI improvements as well.

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