Just yesterday I received an email from Play-Asia announcing the availability of the Super Famicom Classic Controller. Today, it’s totally sold out. Gone. Kapish.

Talk about madness …

For the past few months I have gotten a few things but couldn’t have the chance to write reviews about them. Therefore on this post I have decided to write short reviews of each item to save time and avoid putting anyone who reads this to sleep.
Okay let’s get the ball rolling …

Hori Nintendo Wiimote Silicon Cover

If I were to compare this with Capdase’s Wiimote silicon cover, I have to say both have their pros and cons. The pros of Hori’s cover is definitely the design. It is made in such a way that you can easily unlock the back part of the cover to allow easy exchange of batteries. The cons? I feel that it is a bit thin and the grip feeling isn’t as good as Capdase’s, but hey that’s just me.

Conclusion : If you have delicate hands who itches for comfort, get Capdase. If you hate taking and putting off condoms each time when reloading, get Hori.

Click here to view other ranges of wiimote covers from Play-Asia

Nintendo Original Component AV Cables for Wii

There are plenty of component cables available for the Wii now as compared to the early days when Wii was just launched. To be honest I was having a hard time deciding whether to get 3rd party ones or just go for the original from Nintendo. Even after going through the usual “been there, done that” searches on the internet, the answers were still unclear. In the end I decided to go with Nintendo, despite the deep cut it will leave on my wallet. But heck at least I know that original cables will work without any problems (usually).

The difference in picture quality between component and composite cables are definitely noticeable. Fonts are sharper and the graphics looks less blurry. I don’t know if component cables make a difference on the old 4:3 tvs but on widescreens, it is good enough to put your old composite cables to eternal sleep. And if anyone is asking, Virtual Console games work without any problems for me. I tried Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Pokemon Snap.

Conclusion : Works great but a bit too pricey. Other alternatives can be considered.

Buy Official Nintendo Wii Component AV Cables (compatible with US Wii)
3rd Party Component Cables

Altec Lansing MX5020

Having used to listening musics, movies and games through 5.1 speakers, it can be a bit hard to reduce yourself back to the basics. I have that problem during the first few months but things gotten better after a while.

Anyway the MX5020 is a great 2.0 speakers in both price and sound quality. The bass and treble can be adjusted easily through a nice control panel on the bottom of the right speaker. I only face one problem tho and that is with the bass. Some songs sounded really good but there are few which causes an annoying “WOOOOOM” sound. To make things worse it doesn’t sync with the music. However I hooked them up on my Wii and Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess never sounded better. It is definitely a huge improvement over TV speakers. More review can be found here

Conclusion : Good price, slick design, great sound quality.

Wait I only bought 3 things? I thought I had more .. oh well

Christmas was a lot more fun than I thought. During the morning, me and Neko went for a few good rounds of Mario Strikers Charge on the Wii for the first time online. The battle was pretty intense where both of us keep hitting goals one after another to tie the match. However some of the matches were really pure ownage, where we own each other like crazy. During my ‘ownage’ I own my winnings on Neko’s low bat wiimote. During the final match he couldn’t move his players up and they ran downwards on their own. He then requested that we play “half-court” over Skype lol.

Mario Strikers Charged is definitely best played online

I do wonder if the proper team line-up (leaders and teammates) affects the overall performance. Both of us have experience a time where our players are literally avoiding the ball like a plague.

Before our online match, I was caught by a nice surprise. After booting up my Wii I received a new message indicator and opened up the message board. I saw two messages wrapped with ribbons and was puzzled. After I opened them up, I realized it’s a virtual console game gift from Neko. He gave me Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Pokemon Snap for my girlfriend. Thanks for the great gifts man. Who says virtual presents can’t be great?

A great classic Zelda game for the Nintendo 64

Snap all your favourite pokemons and send to friends!

I then spend the rest of the afternoon with my girlfriend. We cooked lunch and spend some time together. It was really great.

I know that things can’t be the same as they were few years back but I will try my best to look forward. Don’t think the future will always be that bad.

And it’s the anniversary of someone very special to me. It has been .. 8 long years?

(Be warned: This isn’t your typical review on the Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. This review is told from an entirely different perspective… You hath been warned!)

I’m the kind of guy who can never play a horror game or watch a horror movie on my own. Sure, I loved the Fatal Frame series and has played through the game several times, but the actual number of minutes I’ve held the controller in my hands the whole time can be counted on a single hand (minus the time required to solve puzzles).

Okay, I was exaggerating.

Two hands.

Best looking Link to date?

Storyline

If you’ve played any Legend of Zelda games, you already know the storyline. If you’ve never played Zelda before, here’s a one sentence summary for any Zelda games ever created quoted from Yahtzee from Zero Punctuations:

Pick any one of the ninety billion Zelda games there have been so far and odds are good that you’re always the same blardy guy saving the same blardy girl with the same blardy boomerang.”

Equipments

• Boomerang
• Bow & Arrow
• Clawshot
• Bombs
• Fishing rod

What more do you need?

Experience

My first true Zelda experience was Phantom Hourglass, where I affectionately calls Link sillyface. The Link from Twilight Princess, on the other hand, would be seriousface. The only real expression he ever shows on his face is through his eyes which is kinda disappointing.

Twilight Princesss is one of the creepiest game I’ve ever played. The dusky world along with the almost non-existent soundtrack and echoes of twilight realm never failed to give me the chills. It didn’t help that Midna’s eerie laughter came out of the Wii-mote and the first dozen times or so her laughter never failed to make me jump out of my chair. Actually it still makes the hair at the back of my neck to stand once in a while when I’m not expecting for Midna’s call.

The dungeons can be very dark when Link is in human form even when I’ve turned the brightness level of my TV up. But that didn’t really come as a surprise since the game already prompted you to make sure you’re at least able to see 4 different shades of darkness before you start the game. As you’ve probably guessed, I don’t really like being in the dark at all (which explains why I was never able to finish any Tomb Raider game I’ve bought).

Twilight Princess has plenty of places where you need to jump into holes on the ground and you’ll be falling through a long, dark shaft before you land in an underground cavern. I often dread these the most, since there are almost always enemies waiting to ambush you before you even get a good glimpse of your new surroundings. Did I mentioned I’m claustrophobic? Yes, it affects me even in-game, so I really, really, hate these shafts and caverns.

Speaking of ambushes after a drop, the best way to handle it is to do a 360 degrees spin attack. That usually takes care of any enemies trying to pounce on you, but the sound that is produced afterwards that signals the end of the delay time for the attack reminds me of the sound you make when you scratch your nails on a blackboard. Horrible.

Let’s not even get started with the Poe souls, which are basically ghosts but you’ll only see them as floating lanterns unless you turned on your senses as wolf Link. I almost shit in my pants the first time it appeared out of nowhere from behind me.

But I’m still playing…

Interestingly enough, I’m still playing on, albeit rather slowly. In fact, the biggest frustration I always face is the sometimes insanely impossible puzzles you need to solve when exploring dungeons in human form. Because the dungeons creeps me out, I never like to stay in one place for long and very reluctant to move back and forth, which unfortunately makes it harder for me to solve whatever needs solving.

The mini-games can be found all over the place and are always good fun. There are enough mini-games to keep you busy and entertained for a very long time. Which can be good or bad, since I’ve already played nearly 20 hours of gameplay and I believe I’m only around 1/4 done. This is one helluva long game.

Hyped?

Is it hyped? Actually, I really don’t know. The game came out quite long ago and at the time I wasn’t the least bit interested in it.

Honestly though, my expectations for the game was very different from what the actual game delivered. Maybe it’s because I got used to sillyface and the more lighthearted gameplay of Phantom Hourglass, especially when it comes to the soundtrack and mood of the game.

I had also expected more from the Wii-mote with control capabilities like that utilized in WarioWare, but at least they still made good use of it with most of the equipments. The controls are rather smooth, easy to pick up and you can really do quite a lot of tricks just by playing around.

But overall, the fact that I’m still playing it is proof that it’s a great game.

I present to you, the most overused screenshot for Twilight Princess…

Some images sourced from (it’s really obvious which images came from there): GameSpot.com

I might have played Mario games since I was in primary school and enjoyed most of them, but I’m by no means a big fan of the plumber bros. Even though the reviews had been nothing short of phenomenal for the game, I’ve always felt a little skeptic. After all, how great can a Mario game be? Surely it would be no match for Zelda, right? I mean, this is really a matter of preference, but RPG games are often at the top of my list compared to platform games.

It would be good to note that I’ve only recently bought my Wii and only own 3 games myself at the moment – Wii Sports, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and Super Mario Galaxy. Not the least impressive collection I’m sure, but I’ve also played a few other games at Dyna’s place – WarioWare: Smooth Moves, Mario Strikers Charged and a little bit of Wiisident Resident Evil 4.

Picking up the game

Even though I had some problems getting the hang of it at the beginning (read: keep dying) the learning curve becomes almost non-existent once you get the hang of the controls. It’s a really simple yet somewhat challenging game thats just highly addictive.

You might need a while to get used to the controls, especially the orientation when Mario is running all over a tiny planet, upside-down and downside-up due to each planet’s gravity. But that’s pretty much all you have to figure out and you’ll be ready to go. The gravitational forces also plays an important role in the gameplay as you would be jumping off from the surface of one planet and getting sucked into the gravitational force of another planet in order to proceed the level.

Gameplay

The gameplay is quite intuitive even when you gained Mario’s power-ups such as the Bee Mario (which is the only power-up I’ve really had played so far) that allows you to fly for a short period of time and to stick to honeycombs. I’ve also tried the rainbow star power-up that turns Mario invincible, just like in any other Mario games. That was pretty fun, too.

The worlds, as you’ve probably already read or heard a thousand times, are very impressive. Modeled in beautiful 3D environment that stays true to the roots of the franchise and plenty of familiar scenes and sounds will definitely bring back memories of Mario’s 2D days. There’s even one stage so far that brings you back to a 2D side scrolling style of gameplay, which is loads of fun.

Each galaxy and planet plays more like a collection of mini-games than a single Mario adventure, which makes it addictive and fun. It takes around 10-20 minutes to complete each galaxy, and it seems that most of them would have 3 stars for you to collect, which is really the equivalent of 3 different routes or stages for that planet. Because of that, you would almost never get bored of the scenery and there are plenty of replay value even this early in the game.

It also pays to revisit the same planet or path more than once to fully explore what options that path could offer to you. And they are simple enough that you would probably never get lost if you just keep moving around.

Experience so far…

The boss stages could be a little more daunting and frustrating, but patience and timing is the key. I’ve managed to complete the first observatory’s galaxies within 2-3 hours and fought a couple of bosses. Had to use up quite a few lives when fighting the bosses especially. But what I’ve discovered is that the easiest way for you to waste lives is to play the Ray surfing mini-game which reminds me of Mario Kart in a way, just instead of cars, you’re riding on a manta ray.

Hyped?

So, does Super Mario Galaxy lives up to the hype it has been getting? Probably close enough, although maybe not every single bit of it (i.e. Galaxy being the 2nd highest rated game of all times after Zelda’s Ocarina of Time). But its definitely a game that all gamers who loves to have fun on the Wii, which should be every Wii owner, since, you wouldn’t have a Wii if you didn’t want to have fun on it

To sum it all up in a single, easy to understand sentence: Super Mario Galaxy is an addictively fun game for all to enjoy, regardless of whether you’re a hardcore, casual or anywhere in between.

Images sourced from: GameSpot.com

Play-Asia still has Super Mario Galaxy in stock. Grab it while it’s still “hot”