Results tagged “Picross DS”

So you're the type of gamer who likes to sit down with your DS and do a Sudoku every now and then.  Perhaps you wish that you didn't always have to take your system around, or your copy of Brain Age has already run out of Sudoku puzzles and you want more.  There's a selection of Sudoku software you can purchase that will offer you hundreds of hours of fun.  But what if you can't find any at your local brick and mortar game store, and you don't want to wait for a shipment from Amazon?  What then?  And what do you do when you're on the road and your DS's battery is flat and you need your Sudoku fix, but you've left your charger at home?

You're in luck, for a solution exists on most newsstands.  But you already knew that, right?  What you might not know is that the same solution exists for other kinds of puzzles you may enjoy.  For instance, if you're a fan of Picross DS, but you've unlocked everything and you've redone all the puzzles so much that you've memorized them, just look for one of Penny Press's logic problem magazines.  For the past few years, they've added some Picross puzzles at the back of most issues of Original Logic Problems (both the original and British editions).  It's known as "Logic Art" in the original American issues, and "Japanese Puzzle" in the British editions.  Occasionally, issues of Master's Variety Puzzles and Master's Tournament Variety Puzzles will include a couple pages of Logic Art as well.

For Kakuro puzzles, look for any of Penny Press's variety puzzle magazines, which will include Kakuro puzzles under the name "Sum Totals".  On the Dell side, they're known as "Cross Sums".  Ideally, if you can find the Dell-published magazine Math Puzzles & Logic Problems, it usually includes at least 20 Cross Sums in each issue.  For a little while, Dell was publishing Kakuro Cross Sums Collection, but sadly the magazine ceased publishing after only a few issues.

These are but a few of the puzzles and games each magazine offers.  Both companies also offer Crossword and Word Search magazines, of course, as well as volumes of their more popular puzzles for mail order on their web site.  If you're a fan of cryptograms, for instance, there are many volumes of them available from both Penny Press and Dell.  Their variety puzzles don't depend upon knowledge of pop culture, for the most part.  You might come across one that makes references to, say, popular music.  It's alright if you have to skip that one, I sometimes do the same for ones referencing celebrities.  But for how much each issue costs, it's still worth it even if you don't do each and every puzzle contained within.

I will close this off with a word of advice: despite the urge you might have to buy a lot at once, don't.  89 magazines tend to be pretty heavy.  27.5 pounds, according to the postal worker who handled my parcel.

Video of the Week:

I lit a match, then let it catch
To light up the room
And then you yelled as we beheld:


Currently Playing: Glory of Heracles (DS)

For something based on mythology of Olympic proportions, it's not very Olympic yet.  But I'm only just getting started with it.  It's certainly more exciting than the 2010 Olympics.  (Oh no, I just insulted the Olympic games!  Bell Canada's going to be pissed!  VANOC will be after me!)  And unlike games like Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood, the touch screen activities that activate during battle are actually fun.  Not that they aren't in Sonic Chronicles, but I like them better in Glory.  One of them depends on your knowledge of Roman numerals, but other than that, they all work well enough.

Looking Forward To: Dust: An Elysian Tail (Xbox LIVE Network)

This game won Dream.Build.Play '09, and is already garnering attention from the gaming press.  Whenever I watch the trailer, I can't help but like the character of Fidget.  The music in the trailer reminds me of one part Fox Amoore, one part Breath of Fire III, one part Protopop (especially Protopop's Nimian Flyer game).  It'll be interesting to see how the game incorporates so many different styles of music, especially since it was all composed by a single composer.

Dust is one entry in a planned series of games, movies, and more set in the world of Falana, and although production on everything is slow, it looks like a worthwhile project so far.  Plus, by the time the game is released on Xbox LIVE (which I'm guessing it will be), I'll probably have an Xbox 360 by then.  I'm looking forward to it.

This week, the Geek News Roundup is being posted earlier, for I have something I need to post.  Skip ahead to the last four paragraphs if you're impatient.  But first, the news.

There is a fourth state of matter beyond that which is known to most men.  It is a state of matter as vast as space and as timeless as infinity.  It... okay, it just falls apart the further I get.  But anyway, plasma is being used to disinfect human skin and kill germs.  Personally, I feel cleaner if I use actual soap and water, but if this kind of thing takes off into personal use, then maybe it'll help stem the spread of stuff like the Swine Flu.  The Swine Flu is now the Swine Few.  There are a few distinct variations in the flu, and that is causing some people a great deal of worry.  Hey, if I get the piggy flu, I'll just stay in bed for a week with my video games.  And while scientists are having trouble with the flu, other scientists are making progress in fighting certain kinds of cancer.

In space this week, more evidence of life on Mars has been discovered, and it's looking more and more like a certain red planet was once full of life.  Small, microscopic life, but it still counts.  Also, if you're planning a trip to Saturn any time soon, you might be in time to see a spectacular light show.  What is called the aurora borealis to those living in Alaska can also be seen on everyone's favourite ringed planet.

Microsoft sucks this week.  It looks like they don't want anyone drinking the COFEE anymore, they've issued takedown notices to many sites hosting the software.  Silly Microsoft, people will find other ways to distribute it.  Sarah Palin sucks this week.  She claims that her family used to play Scrabble a lot.  Yeah... no.  Take it from a Scrabble fanatic: I don't know how you play Scrabble in Alaska, but in the rest of the English speaking world, you don't want to hoard the Q, you want to get rid of it and hoard the Ss.  RPGs suck this week, according to Pixel Poppers.  Apparently, as an RPG gamer, I automatically suck at hard puzzles.  Hey Angela, thanks for helping me acquire a copy of Picross for the DS.  I've been enjoying it quite a bit, especially the level 10 (hardest) puzzles.

How's this for interesting?  A book called "The CIA Manual Of Trickery And Deception" is available on Amazon.com.  But wait a minute, one of these authors has already written quite a bit about the CIA, and all of a sudden, he comes across an old spy manual and decides to sell it?  It's not like it just fell into his lap, he had to go digging for it.  But anyway, as for my own writing, Adventures in Canadian Gaming will resume in December, after the end of NaNoWriMo (I am currently at 48455 words, which means I have 1545 words left to go), provided I am still alive.

In an earlier column, I mentioned Canada's Worst Driver, and made flippant, almost self-mocking comments about my own death by motorist.  It was totally and completely a joke to me.  I even mentioned the corner I figured it would happen on.  Well, at approximately 5:13pm on November 5th, five days after I posted that entry, a motorist driving a dark truck didn't even look in my direction when he was stopped at a stop sign on the corner of Campbell and 1st in my home town of Revelstoke, Canada, exactly one block away from my predicted scene of death.  I was on foot, and I hesitated because not only did I not know what he was going to do and didn't have eye contact, but he also had stopped in the middle of the crosswalk.  I didn't have to stop for him.  It was my right of way to continue walking.  If I had, he would've plowed ahead and mowed me down.  I would most likely have died on the scene or on the way to the hospital.  I hope the extra five seconds he saved driving to the bar was worth it.

On last Monday's episode of Canada's Worst Driver (rerun Fridays, when I watch it), one of the bad driver nominees who was going through the driver rehab course got a phone call.  Crystal Farao's brother-in-law, Thomas Stagno, was killed when a bad driver failed to yield for him.  The driver, Tom Marion, was charged.  Failure to yield carries a $150 fine in Canada.  It might've been worse for the driver who almost struck me, but for Thomas Stagno, that's all his life was worth.  $150.

I had someone's life in my wallet earlier today.  Could've been mine.

In playing through Dissidia, I can't help but wonder something.  In the game, it's suggested that many warriors were present in the world of Dissidia when the conflict began, but now only ten are left.  So it begs the question: who were these other warriors who have fallen, and why isn't there any real effort being made to avenge these characters?  I have to assume they are characters from other worlds, since the characters that are left aren't talking about their fallen comrades or about taking revenge for the deaths of loved ones.

But suppose these other characters were also taken from Final Fantasy games.  Heroes who fought alongside each other in their original games, now fighting alongside each other in the world of Dissidia.  I find it hard to believe that only ten of them remain.  There are plenty of characters who should still be around to fight the forces of Chaos.

First of all, the Warrior of Light, the Onion Knight, Bartz, and Firion were all from games where each character pretty much shared everything with each other and their skills were interchangeable.  If they're the only ones left from each of their games, then it's probably due to sheer luck.  They'll be the next ones to die, in this case.  A possible exception would be Galuf, since he was the only character to ever survive being reduced to 0 HP in battle without requiring a special status effect to keep him alive.

In Final Fantasy IV, Cecil is not the only character who could deal heavy damage and hold his own in battle.  Kain was a pretty decent fighter in battle... when he was on your side.  I suppose anyone who could easily be controlled by the enemy would be unreliable as an ally.  Quick to die would be the old and feeble FuSoYa and Tellah.  The spoony bard who mourned for his lost love in the twilight, Edward, would also die easily, unless he uses Hide a lot.  Then again, he would still die in areas where there are no hiding places.  On the other hand, Cid would be hard to kill.  Anyone who can survive blowing himself up could easily survive an onslaught of Chaos's minions.

In Final Fantasy VI, there were far too many characters for Square to pick just one, and the only reason Terra was present in Dissidia is because she has the most history with Kefka.  But there are a few characters who would easily hold their own even better than Terra could.  Gau grew up in the wild, and was one of the fiercest characters you could take with you on your journey.  Nature toughened him up during his years on his own.  The thief Locke also comes to mind.  He was so good a thief, he could walk away with the clothes on your back.  Shadow, Sabin, Celes... there were easily quite a few characters who would go the distance in a Dissidia setting.

You could pretty much list most of the cast of Final Fantasy VII on a list such as this.  Aeris would probably be easy to kill (sorry fans, but I'm surprised it took Sephiroth that long to take her out), and maybe Cait Sith as well, although there would be more of him built and ready to go if one of him does die, so considering him a liability would be just as much a mistake as would be considering him a good character.  Vincent and his transformations would be hard to kill, as would Tifa and Barret.  And Nanaki?  He would fight like the beast he is and take down Sephiroth himself before he would ever die.  He might even outlast Cloud.

Final Fantasy VIII had a mixture of good and bad characters.  Seifer was a bully, but he could easily hold his own against the forces of Chaos, as long as he doesn't suddenly join the sorceress.  But at least he had free will.  Rinoa has access to a bunch of sorceress powers... except, she would be a liability as well, given how easily Ultimecia could possess her.  Other than Squall, about the only ones I could see doing any kind of damage against an enemy would be Zell, with his up-close, street brawl style of combat, and Irvine, who could snipe most enemies dead (but would probably die if confronted by a party of enemies at close range).

Similarly, many characters in Final Fantasy IX would be dead before long in a world like Dissidia.  I would probably expect Freya to be the only character who could hold her own from the cast, other than Zidane.  Unfortunately, all three magic users would fall quickly (although Eiko might last a little while longer than the others), and Steiner is too much of a submissive coward to hold his own in a fight.  Freya, meanwhile, can stay in the air and rain spears down on the enemy when she goes into Trance mode, which is a pretty effective attack, probably just as effective as the Onion Knight's oh so cheap Meteor attack.

And from Final Fantasy X, I would expect Auron to survive against Chaos, as well as Kimahri.  Maybe the other characters, if they're lucky, but it depends on how quickly they can level up.  However, if Tidus, a mere dream of the Fayth can survive, then the rest of the cast should have little trouble surviving as well.

A vast number of characters have the potential to aid in the fight against Chaos, but I suppose programming them all into the game would've taken forever, so we're stuck with only one from each game.  Still, these characters showed what they could accomplish when they all teamed up in battle.  Dissidia splits up the original teams and forces each character to join forces with strangers from other lands.  Ah well, at least the battle system's awesome.

Watch for the Dissidia review to be posted soon!

Video of the Week

With all the talk about the track and field athlete from South Africa, Caster Semenya, and questions about whether she is a man or a woman, we here at Damage Control think we have the answer.

Background: apparently, if you run as fast as a Kenyan, you get deported to Kenya.  When you run faster than Kenyans, your own gender tries to disown you.

Our theory is thus: she is the long lost sister of Lady Gaga.  And to explain Lady Gaga's weirdness, look no further than this week's video of the week:

Currently Playing: Picross DS (DS)  Yes, I'm still playing it.

You know a game is good and addictive when you play it often.  I keep unlocking more stuff, so it's hard to say when it'll end.  Plus, you can go back and improve your time on puzzles you've already completed.  Some people have their Final Fantasy games.  Some people have their Soul Calibur games.  I have Picross.

And since I linked to the Wikipedia page for Picross DS last column, I'm linking to a web Picross game this time.  Enjoy!

Looking Forward To: Numb3rs, season 6

The new season starts next week, and as I do every year, I anticipate it eagerly.  Last season's Big Question will be resolved (tune in tomorrow if you live in the US or Canada to see the season finale if you missed it the first time, so you'll know what I'm talking about), thank goodness.  I've been waiting all summer to find out what the answer will be.  It sure beats last year's hastily rushed cliffhanger where Charlie lost his security clearance in a last minute rush to fit all of the relevant plot into the shortened season.  It really helps when writers don't go on strike.

Alternate title: Flipping My Lid

I used to think that the reason Amazon wasn't allowed to send certain games to Canada was because of a lack of French on the covers of the games they had in stock, and a lack of availability of a Canadian edition.  But when I got Dissidia: Final Fantasy in the mail last week, I was surprised (and downright pleased) to see absolutely no French cluttering the packaging, and upon opening the case, I found a reasonably-sized manual inside, rather than a 150 page epic, half of which would've been in a language I cannot read.  It might as well be in Japanese or Egyptian.

Interestingly, when I received the rest of my shipment the following week, most of the rest of the games were also in English only, so I would love to hear Amazon's reasons for denying me access to most of their game library.

So Dissidia (and the pre-order bonus CD) came from Amazon, and I knew I would get hours and hours of enjoyment out of the game, based on the demo I downloaded from the PlayStation Store.  And it turned out that I had a lot of fun micro-managing things between battles.  Every time I mastered a skill, I went back into the menu system, looking things over, seeing what other skills I might want to add.  Every time I finished a story, I was in the PP Catalog, eager to spend my hard-earned points.  As I spent more and more time playing, I quickly realized that only about one tenth of my time was actually spent in battles.  (A lot of it was spent waiting for stuff to load, but still.)

And then, about three hours into the game, my PSP broke.

Naturally, I was angry and frustrated at that point, but I resisted slamming the PSP against the table, which would've made the problem worse and potentially irreversible.  It is, of course, not a Nintendo product, and not indestructible.  But if I ignored it, the problem wouldn't fix itself, and the PSP's function as a game player would be severely hampered.  What happened was, the lid that keeps the UMD in place came off one of its hinges, so the first thing I tried to do was snap it back into place.  I quickly found out that, the way the hinge was designed, it should've been physically impossible to have come loose in the first place, even when the force of my knee was applied to it.  So I wiggled it this way and that, tried brute force a couple more times, and then tried unhinging the other side to see if it would come loose, and if so, try to gain some kind of insight as to how to put it back together.

At this point, I was ready to declare Hammer Time, but I didn't want to bust up my PSP further, so I resisted the urge.  It was bad enough that one entire side of the lid had come off, and the door was swinging loose.  Rather than continue to apply brute force and possibly break the lid further, I decided to look up a tutorial or two on-line and figure out how to take the device apart.  Turned out, most of the tutorials were for the 1000 series, and mine is a 2000 series.  It took some digging to find a tutorial that even mentioned the 2000 series, but I eventually found one that mentioned both the 2000 and 3000 series PSPs, both of which have more screws than the 1000 series.  So I started with step one and took out three of the screws in the back, then stared hard at the sticker that said that if I tampered with it in any way, the warranty would be voided.  I sighed, figured my problem could only be solved in this one way, and peeled enough of the sticker away to reach the fourth screw.  Once it was out, I turned to the screws on the top and bottom of the device.

They wouldn't budge.  I suppose I had the wrong screwdriver.  I mean, I guess it's possible to have one screwdriver for each kind of screw in existence, but only if you're so obsessed with tools that you improve things in your own home all the time and build hot rods and have a low rated home improvement show on cable, but between visits to the emergency room, and all the projects for personal and work-related use you'd be involved with, there wouldn't be time to play video games and write about them.  So I made do with what I had, and the screwdriver would've worked, if the screws hadn't been so tight.  I suppose, from playing the PSP for one and a half years, that all the sweat that had accumulated must've somehow rusted the screws in place without visibly showing any of that rust.

After two hours of struggling with the screws, and with numb thumbs, I gave up.  I tried to press the lid back in place once more and almost growled in frustration.  Getting it back into place was as physically impossible as jarring it loose in the first place, and yet it was loose, so it should've been possible to fix it again without even opening my PSP.  Yet the simple act of taking the screws out had defeated me.  So I sighed again, this time in frustration and anger, and put back in place the four screws I'd successfully removed, put the battery back in (two of the screws, including the one that voids the warranty, are behind the battery), put the battery lid back on, futilely tried to press the UMD lid back in place, and then flopped down in my chair in front of the computer.  As I was reviewing the website I'd found earlier, I absently applied just a little pressure on my PSP as if it would help to snap the lid back in place, when brute force hadn't done it.

That's when I realized that I had just snapped the lid back in place.

Video of the Week

Memo to Square's casting department: you dropped the ball with Kefka's voice.  He just doesn't sound demented enough to be the clown prince of the Gestahl Empire.  If you want to hear the voice of the person you should've hired for Dissidia, here you go:



In your next game that features characters from Final Fantasy VI, I hope you fix this unfortunate oversight.

Currently Playing: Dissidia: Final Fantasy (PSP; see above)

I just wish the game was more epic, like past Final Fantasy games.  What's really captured my attention though, is:

Currently Playing: Picross DS (DS.  Duh)

At the rate I've been playing this game, I'll end up finished in about a week or two.  Those puzzles are so damn addicting!  And yet Canadians aren't allowed to buy this game from Amazon.com unless they went through a special section of their site.  What, are Canadians going to use a game where you draw pictures with numbers to burn down the White House again?  Hell, we didn't need the help of such a device the first time, why would we need it the second time?

Looking Forward To: Ōkamiden: Chisaki Taiyou (DS)

This is a game I'm taking a lot of interest in.  I don't know if it's going to make it over to North America.  Then again, I didn't think the original game would either, but Capcom surprised me, twice.  Please, Capcom, if you're never going to make another Breath of Fire, at the very least bring Ōkamiden over so we can play it!

I am a little wary, though, since the game is starring a small, cute wolf called "Chibiterasu".  Chibi, for crying out loud.  They'd better not ruin this for me!  Can't deny it, though, she (I'm assuming it's a she?) is cute.

Bottom line: Ōkami sequel + DS = it's about damn time, doubled.  I'm looking forward to a game controlled by the touch screen that doesn't suck, and where the shapes actually mean something.  I'm sorry, Lost Magic, but you did kinda suck.  And the control scheme for the DS seems perfect for Ōkami.  I really, really, really hope this makes the trip over the Pacific.  Maybe I should learn Japanese, just to be on the safe side.

Note: next Adventures In Canadian Gaming, if current scheduling plans work out, will be posted September 17, then return to its regular once-a-week schedule.

I could lie and say that my pile of unfinished games is the reason why I was suddenly absent from the blog for a few months, but I won't.  I haven't even touched The Chronicles of Spellborn since writing about it.

There can be disadvantages to procrastination, and that is that your opinions tend to become outdated rather quickly.  I'll see if I can recycle stuff from a column I wrote (and then didn't post) about a month or so ago, and post that next week.  I guess I didn't care enough about how out of touch Nintendo can be with the used items market to make my opinions known in a timely manner.

But if there's something I do care about, it's the acquisition of certain games that I've been looking forward to for months (and in some cases, years).  True, some of these games can turn out to be outright disasters, but for the most part, I'm usually pretty good at sniffing out quality.  If anyone wants to look for a copy of Brave Story: New Traveler for the PSP, you won't be disappointed when you do buy it.

But be careful of who you buy it from, or you may not be allowed to purchase it.  Especially if you live in Canada.  The unfortunate thing in the gaming industry is that there are less options for purchasing games that are available to you as time goes on.  As gaming retailers merge and/or buy out one another, the consumer gradually finds themselves having to buy from the same company, no matter where they go.  I was dismayed to find that if I want to buy games from EB Games here in Canada, I have to deal with GameStop in the US.  It doesn't matter that you're going through a Canadian site that says EB Games on it, these days it feels like it's just a mask; if you approached someone with a horse mask on, it doesn't make them a horse.

Also, giant gaming retailers can be as cruel to the customer as they want, since they all know they're pretty much the only game in town anymore.  When you swear one off because of a bad customer service experience, it's like deciding you won't eat at a restaurant with the letter E in its name (and yes, that includes places who use the word "restaurant" in their name).  You are left with hardly any choices afterward.  But now that I've mentioned it, EB Games (and GameStop, since you own EB now and have for quite a long time), tell me this: if the country my credit card was issued from has to match the country I want the game shipped to in order to get you to not cancel my pre-orders, how then does "CANADA" not match "CANADA"?

So after I found out the hard way that EB Games GameStop didn't want my money last November, presumably because I'm Canadian, I've been left with few other options to purchase the kinds of games I want.  Some publishers have set up their own on-line stores to help with the demand for their titles, and they're to be commended, especially since publishers see no problem with shipping their product across the 49th parallel.  But when it came time to find someone willing to sell me the new Black Sigil: Blade of the Exiled game for the DS, I ran into a few rather annoying problems.  First of all, the game was developed independently, and therefore is too far under the radar for certain gaming markets to bring in.  Second of all, they had to take the time after it was released to print French instruction manuals for their game, so they could sell it in Canada.  Instead of waiting a few weeks for the Canadian market to finally acquire it (I put the blame entirely on the whiny French), I naturally took the plunge and tried out what Wikipedia calls America's largest on-line retailer, Amazon.com.

I've already purchased from them before; when my mother received a gift certificate for the site, she purchased an item and I added a few as well, so that we could save on shipping costs.  It was my credit card we were using in the first place, to cover the difference in the item that mom was purchasing, so it wasn't a problem that I wanted to buy a few things as well.  The transaction went smoothly, and at the time I had no idea that the only reason I didn't have a problem was that I was buying books and music, two items that can usually pass unrestricted across the Canada/US border.

While Amazon.com has shown that they're pretty reliable when it comes to printed and musical materials, electronics are another matter.  I admit that I don't quite understand the law as it pertains to electronics and electronic media, but it seems like there's a few things here that doesn't make sense.  Bear with me as I ramble.

As I've stated in the past, I work in an electronics retail store, a store that also happens to sell video games and music.  We're a small store, so we don't have access to as large a library of games as an EB Games or a GameStop.  Still, we seem to have access to whatever title our suppliers can get their hands on, and they're only restricted by whatever titles they're willing to risk carrying.  Games like Super Mario Galaxy and Final Fantasy XII obviously seem like sure hits, and they can afford to buy many lots of them (I don't know how many games are in a lot, I assume each lot is equal to 500 or 1000 or some other high amount of games that's easy to track by the publisher).  Games like the aforementioned Black Sigil are more risky, and so they may only choose to buy one lot, or even no lots at all.  Also, near the end of the life of a console, a supplier might choose to discontinue carrying games for that console, even if there are more games still on the way.  At least one of our suppliers has already discontinued their support of the PS2, despite the long list of upcoming PS2 games, but that's a story (and a rant) for another time.

Usually, I don't mind waiting for a game to arrive locally, but I was unwilling to wait a few weeks to see if I could get the game through my usual sources, especially since there was a chance that I couldn't.  With EB GameStop already out of the picture, I turned to the Amazon to see if they had the game.  And they did!  Naturally, I was happy to give them my business and go on my merry way.

But there's a certain wisdom you acquire when you live in a small city, and that is, if you're going to bring something in from out of town, you might as well bring a lot of that something in and save on shipping.  It's a true enough adage.  Most retail stores in town will only order from certain suppliers once or twice a year in order to lower the overall cost of bringing their merchandise in.  I found that out the hard way when I tried to order a shirt I liked through a local clothing store many years ago (this was before I had a credit card, and was therefore unable to buy from most on-line retailers).  And so after finding Black Sigil on Amazon's website, I browsed their site for other games they might have.

This is where I began to run into problems.  Apparently, not all video games are available to be purchased if you just happen to live outside of the United States, and the site can be very tight-lipped about which games can and can't be imported, especially when you're a first time buyer.  What does this mean for Canadians?  Well, there's always the Amazon.ca site.

Or not.  Valhalla Knights, for example, is available for purchase directly from the US site, as long as you live in the US, but on the Canadian site, there are only third-party copies available, and a limited quantity of them.

But that's alright, I can deal with that, since I can't afford to buy all the games I want, not yet.  So I selected a few that claimed they were available to me and went to check out.  That's when Amazon decided to change its mind on what it could and couldn't sell me.

It doesn't help that some of their shipping policies are vague and improperly explained.  Oh, I understand the pages that say "Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses." quite clearly.  But there are certain pages that say "This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.".  Okay, which countries?  Their help section gives the list as "Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Portugal, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom"  I note that the fourth name on the list is Canada.

Apparently, not everything that can be shipped internationally is allowed to be shipped internationally.  Case in point: Picross DS.  Notice a lack of sign posts saying Canadian Dogs Not Allowed on the page.  But when I went to the check-out page, I came across an error trying to get it, and all the other games sent to my post office box.  It's rare that a company is unwilling to accept a post office box as a mailing address, but so be it.  I added my home address even though I would probably be at work when the package arrives.  No dice for Picross: although three of my six games were suddenly allowed, this time a more succinct No Game For You message appeared beneath the other three.  The help section offered no advice for me, and short of shipping to one of my American friends and expecting them to forward the package to me, I was stuck with no other option than to cancel three of the six games in my order.  I'm not about to start treating my friends as middlemen in all my on-line transactions, just so that I can add to my unfinished games pile.

As it turned out later, there is something called Amazon Global, which claims it "takes the guesswork and heavy lifting out of international shipping."  There is also a category you can search called Video Games Available for International Shipping.  And quel suprise, Picross DS is available.  I feel like I've been given a separate water fountain to drink at, because of who I am and where I was born.  It makes no sense that you have to go to a separate page in order to purchase a game, and it does nothing but discourage me from doing business with them.

Oh, and to top it all off, now that I'm registered with them and they have my address on record, there is a handy little message that comes up and says "We are not able to ship this item to your default shipping address." when I go back to the first Picross page.  I would've liked to have had that notice before, thank you very much.  And what of the Canadian version of Amazon?  It's pretty piss poor.

The story doesn't end there, with the placement of my order.  It usually takes a couple days to process it and get it sent.  If you pay them even more money, they'll put your order to the head of the line and process it within a day or two.  Never mind the fact that they're pretty fast about shipping anyway, so you're wasting money if you want it any faster.  Also, if you don't mind receiving your order later, you can select free shipping (although France seems to hate such a policy, and calls it anti-competitive, and even fined Amazon.com a thousand euros a day over such a policy... overkill, if you ask me).

About a day after I placed the order, they randomly shipped me three of the books, but none of the games or music I ordered.  After a week of waiting for the rest of the shipment to be sent, I investigated and found on one of the items I ordered, there was another message they hadn't shown me before, and only shows up if you're already registered with them: "Shipping this item to your default address may require an additional 1 to 3 weeks to process."  So I canceled the item and they shipped the rest of my order the very next day.  Such a message probably would've been seen if I'd have already been registered, but there's no way a first time buyer will see it unless they register first before they know whether or not they'll want to use Amazon's services.  It's almost like Amazon is discouraging first time customers from even trying their service, especially if they don't live in the US.

After all that, I have to conclude that with the random way they jerked me around regarding their merchandise, Amazon.com doesn't want my money any more than GameStop does.  And with the United States government encouraging a Buy American policy, it discourages me from buying anything from an American company ever again.  A Buy Canadian policy suddenly looks like a good idea, except as I've found out on many such occasions, it's very difficult to Buy Canadian when something just isn't available in Canada, and it's not like video games are a Canadian product anyway.  Well, other than the rubbish that Ubisoft spews forth, but I've already said enough about them.


Currently Playing: Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars & Shining in the Darkness (Wii Virtual Console)

Unlike Amazon.com, the Shop Channel on the Wii is easy to use, and if a game is available to the United States, it's available to Canada as well.  Plus, it only takes a few minutes to download a game, so by the time it's released, you can practically already play it.  No shipping, no "one to three extra weeks to process" crap, etc.  Once you download it, it's ready to go.

Actually, I finished Super Mario RPG this morning.  That's how good the game is.  It felt like a longer game, despite being only about twenty hours (I beat it in twenty two), and in the end, I was satisfied.  Remember when games didn't have to stretch for fifty, sixty hours?  Yeah, this was one of them that didn't.  I'll try to have a review up soon, but no promises.  It is a rather old game, so it's not high on my list of priorities.

I originally intended to use Super Mario RPG to tide me over until the second part of Final Fantasy IV: The After Years was made available, but finished it in about a week, so I might as well give other games a try in the meantime.

While acquiring games via download has its own risks (will the download service be around forever?  Will the medium you've used to store it last forever?  Can the company suddenly decide that you no longer have the right to play it?), it is a convenient and fast way to buy and receive games you might want to only play once.  Myself, I prefer to own a physical copy of a game, but I'd be willing to go digital if given the right incentive.  It helps that it's a lot faster to download a game than it is to purchase a physical copy.

For instance, I timed how long it would take me to walk away from the computer, turn on my Wii, add Points to my account, and download Shining in the Darkness.  I was playing the game after just ten minutes.  You don't even need a Points card, you can just use a credit card to add Points to your account.  For those who prefer an instant gaming fix, downloadable content is definitely the way to go.


Looking Forward To: Lunar: Harmony of the Silver Star (PSP)

When this was first announced, I was talking to Angela about it and I stated that if anyone but Ubisoft was going to localize it, I would buy it in an instant, but if it was Ubisoft, I might skip over this game.  My rationale was that other companies had done much better jobs of games that Working Designs might've worked on if they were still around.  Square-Enix were the ones who picked up the Grandia series, for example.  NIS America could've used it to turn their reputation back around, since lately it's been slipping.  And Atlas has been localizing games like there's no tomorrow.  I totally didn't expect to hear about XSEED picking it up, and I'm kind of excited about it.  They're the ones who brought Brave Story: New Traveler over, and for that, they've earned a high spot on my list of publishers I pay attention to.

Given that I don't own a single copy of the game in its past incarnations, this is a release that I'm closely following.  I may or may not go through Amazon again, depending on if they'll randomly decide that Canadians are allowed to play the game or not.  If not, I may have to look for other means of acquiring the game.  Somewhere out there is someone who is willing to take my money.