Mario Kart DS

Just a quick go online (mainly to see if I really did appear in the “whos online” bit of www.nintendowifi.co.uk – I didn’t), and played a Rivals game. I don’t know how it calculates the “rival-ity” of the people you play, but all three had 170+ wins, and less than 10 losses each. Rubbish. As in, I was. Scraped joint second, somehow, but only through luck in getting the right weapons at the right times. Pah.

Sonic Advance 3: ADVANCED!

I feel like a quadraplegic or something when I can’t complete a ‘simple’ Sonic game without having to resort to $hlmun attempts at killing the end of game boss. In fact, the boss wasn’t actually all that difficult, it was the fact that every time you die, you had to kill the pre-boss boss, then the boss. Then, if you lose all your lives, you have to go back and do the boss from the previous level, then the pre-boss …

Tony Hawk’s Underground: GROUNDED!

SUPARBEST! The main levels were actually very easy. Alarmingly easy, especially as I’m sure I found it frustratingly hard when I played it last year. There were a few difficult goals to get, such as the get-all-the-cameras one in Moscow, and a skitching one in San Diego, but on the whole they were pretty easy. Moscow was a bit odd though, what with the Skate Theft Auto girl-collection car bit, and the Tony Hawk’s Splinter Cell goal, which was totally …

Tony Hawk’s Underground

Well, after completing the DS game earlier, I decided to go back to this, which I’d previously stopped playing after reaching Tampa some 15 months ago. And it was alarmingly easy to just drop back into after all this time. Finished off Tampa, and made a start on San Diego after it, mainly just bumping up stats as I’d just been made an “Am”.

Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land: COMPLETAGE!

After managing some of the previously impossible goals, I had The Warehouse unlocked, and completed some of the goals in there. That’s all the levels unlocked now, so… Went back to Story Mode. And ripped through all of the rest of it! Bought all the bits for the Warehouse, earned a stack of money, and made the skate video. And won the game! Hurrah!

Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land

I moved onto the next few levels instead of struggling with the few remaining goals at Vans. The next level was pretty hard too, and there’s no way in hell I can get the COMBO letters, nor any of the higher scores. And I can’t even see the Secret Tape, let alone collect it. There’s another goal where I have to do tricks through some signs. Two of the signs say “GRIND”, so I grind through and get them, no …

Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land

I can’t understand why I’m crap at this game. I used to be pretty good at Pro Skater on other formats, but I just can’t get high scores in this one. As well my inability to revert-manual, I find you lose momentum on the manuals far too quickly, meaning you can’t string more than a couple of verts together in a combo. Or at least, not one after another. Anyway, I completed a few more goals, but am stuck in …

Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land

Played a fair bit of Story Mode this evening, and worked my way past the first two levels. It seems a lot easier than Classic Mode so far. Also tried to bump up my rankings a bit, but in the end only managed to lengthen my Lip Trick time (to 31 seconds). Did boost my stats a bit though too, but Air and Ollie are woefully low. I can’t do the “8 grab tricks in one combo” type requirements, as …

Tony Hawk’s American Sk8land

High score rackage! Almost! I’ve been trying to bump up my scores and stats to improve my standings in my Skate Crew’s scoretables. I’ve only been trying on Hollywood, but I’m now 5th for the Run Score, and 1st for the longest grind of 33 seconds. That even puts me 52nd in the Global Grind Scores for that level too, which is pretty good going.

Mario Kart DS

Although I’d previously finished the game, I managed to unlock the rest of the Retro Cups in Mirror Mode today, and then win those too. Got an A rank and a Star rank for the Leaf and Lightning Cups respectively. I can now choose any kart for any character. Not really sure what advantage that gives me, but anyway.

Sonic Advance 3

Finally managed to complete Chaos Angel Zone, which wasn’t actually as hard as it has first appeared. The boss at the end was a bit of a pain, though, and I lost tens of lives to him before getting past. And now it’s onto Altar Emerald. The strange Metal Sonic/Ristar hybrid thingie that keeps cropping up as a “mid boss”, as well as part of the main bosses, was here, and then a giant Eggman-controlled Eggman robot was after that. …