I remember when Metropolis Street Racer was coming out for the Dreamcast, I was psyched. Good looking cars, drivers in cars, a points system for how well you drive… it (on paper) was everything I wanted in driving game. Needless to say it didn’t live up to expectations. When they changed the name to Project Gotham I thought I would give it another chance. WRONG! It in no way compared to Turismo, or even Sega GT. I wouldn’t even give the 2nd Project Gotham a chance. The game was dead to me, never to be taken seriously as a driving title.

When I bought my 360, I assure you that Project Gotham Racing 3 was not one of the games I picked up. A week later danzuke (aka NetPhantom) was done with the game, and I had nothing to play, so I asked to borrow it. I sat down, popped the game in the system and tried to convince myself that maybe they got it right this time.

To help me keep track of my progress I made up an Excel sheet. If you're interested you can download the sheet I made or simply view the chart after you continue the article. As I update the posts I'll be updating the sheet.

Being that it's only the second day of working out my brain with the program I think that results are pretty good. There was major improvement in a lot of areas and a few small declines in performance but most importantly my over all brain weight increased dramatically. We'll see how it goes on Day 3, which should go up on the site very soon.

The commercials just keep on coming!

Following the success of my previous "when commercials attack" features,

Part 1: Genesis does what Nintendon't - Ads from the late 80's
Part 2: Sony sells Playstation lifestyle - Strange Sony ads
Part 4: Japan Strikes Back! - Bizarre Japanese Ads 2nd Edition
Part 5: You had me at konichiwa (Japan ads 3rd edition),

I decided it was time to go overseas for part three. Japan offered up some choice classic and newer videogame commercials.

I realize it's easy to make fun of other cultures, and it's not exactly an "adult" thing to do, but funny is funny.

Make sure to stop back next week for a second edition of "Ads in the Land of the Rising Sun! The new link is here! Right there in the 1st paragraph, Japan Strikes Back!

Unfortunatly, I don't speak Japanese so translating commercials is not going to happen here. It's a chance to see some of the strange, bizarre and funny videogame commercials from the Land of the Rising Sun.

If you're looking for the best spot, it's at the bottom. I repeat, if you watch just one, make it the last one. But I promise you, they're all good.

The plot closely follows that of the movie, however it has changed enough to still have a few surprises in there. Many of the classic scenes are part of the plotline. Luca Brasi getting whacked, the horse head in the Woltz’s bed, and even Sonny getting assassinated at the tollbooth are all there. Many of the original actors even reprise their roles from the original. Al Pacino is the only one who is too good to lend his voice to the video game. Pacino wouldn’t even allow his likeness to be used as a basis for Michael Corleone (He’ll make a movie like S1m0ne, but can’t bring himself to be Michael one last time).

From the website:

"Press Start is a podcast about the world of video games--and the culture that surrounds them. Hosts Robert Holt, Ralph Cooper, and Kyle Orland discuss the art and craft of video games: what's new and what games they've been playing."

I think this is great news, both for NPR and for us gamers. This podcast takes videogames seriously, and will bring some much needed intelligent thought and debate to the issues surrounding our hobby.

Please check it out by click here.

The first show is off to a great start, the topic is "Videogames as Art"

(Guest writer Andarko plays the occasional casual game, and she's female. Suffice to say she offers quite a different perspective than the usual contributers, i.e. gamers and male. It's refreshing to see these topics from such a different angle. We hope you enjoy it and we look forward to more writing from her in the future -danzuke)

I am not a gamer. Never have been, though I’ve been around video games most of my life. When I was a kid, my dad bought an Atari, which he ended up playing more than I did, and then a Nintendo, which quickly became my brother’s domain. Currently a PS1 and an XBox reside in my house, along with my husband and my dog, but the PS1 was a gift and the XBox belongs to my husband, and it’s rare that I ever feel like playing either of them.

Occasionally a game will strike my fancy, though, and I’ll become addicted for a while. On the PS1, I totally got into Bust a Groove. Then I discovered Dance Dance Revolution, which was fun until I broke my foot and couldn’t jump all over the dance pad any more. I can also play the perennial classic Tetris just about any time on any system, including my cell phone.

Details are still sketchy, but it's said to contain multiple-choice problem-solving challenges and trivia. Like Brain Age and Big Brain Academy, this game also has a strange way of scoring you. So far we can determine how old and how heavy our brains are, now we can see our chances of "avoiding embarrassment in the future."

I'm sure it'll be as scientifically as the other two "Brain" games (i.e. not at all) but whatever the science, each day I use the games I'm doing some math, and that can't be bad for me.

What do I think should be included in the questions?

1. Your girlfriend asks, "Do I look fat in these pants?" What do you say?

• A. It's alright, I've put on some weight myself
• B. It's nothing a few days at the gym won't fix
• C. say nothing. say absolutely nothing

2. You stop at a drive-thru for a morning cup of coffee, do you put the scaldng hot coffee:

• A. balanced on the dashboard
• B. between your legs
• C. in a cup-holder

3. Your 8 year old son wants you to buy him Grand Theft Auto, do you:

• A. buy it, to prove you love him, and let him play all by himself
• B. ignore parenting duties and just take your kids word for it
• C. tell him he's to young (you know, be his parent)

If Common Sense for Adults is anywhere near as fun as Brain Age and Big Brain Academy I'll be first in line to pick it up in October.

A man selling old books had a dusty old Turbo-grafx 16 and 5 games sitting on top of some random magazines. the conversation went down like so...

"How much for the games?" I said

"2 bucks a piece." he said

(so far so good, I like what I hear. I press on)

"How much for the system?"

"5 bucks." he replies

(I decide to push further)

"Will you take 10 for everything?"

"Sure, I just want to get rid of it"

SCORE!

I was looking for one on eBay and I promise I'm not beating a system, controller, and 5 games for 10 bucks (plus 2 nes controllers he threw into the bag as he was grabbing at cords).

Earth shattering? no. But in the bizzare spectale that is my life I find I need to take pleasure in the little victories.

Hardly newsworthy, to be sure, but pleasing nonetheless. At least to me.

Suffice to say these finds aren't even listed in the rumor mill of the price guides. It'll re-write the books.

Quite simpy, this is a dream-come-true, once-in-a-lifetime find. Congrats whoever you are.

I've seen this pop up on digg and a bunch of other sites, so I don't know who broke the story, but you can get a pretty good write-up about everything found at GameSetWatch

The guy is running a bunch of ebay auctions (of course), click here

What was your best garage sale/flea market find?

If you're online, come challenge me or harpua over the 'ol live service.

Our gamercards are over there somewhere ---->

We're all very happy about the response so far, and we'll be adding new stuff over the next week or two. Possibly maybe including a contest!

Please subscribe to our RSS feed! We update the site every day. Links to the feed can be found on the sidebar.

These are the stories we're working on for next week!

Stories:

-A View on the Wii, from someone who doesn't play games

-Ads in the land of the rising sun! (when commercials attack pt.3)

-Me, My Rage, and My Playstation (frustration spills over and our controllers suffer for it)

-Harpua's quest for a heavier brain continues! (Big Brain Academy Training)

Reviews:

-One of us draws the short straw and reviews "The Legend of Zelda: the complete animated series"

-EA makes us an offer we can't refuse: our Review of Godfather: The Game for the Xbox

-Ball Buster: hands-on with Magnetica for the Nintendo DS

-Greshkov can't stop playing driving games: does Project Gotham 3 earn his kudos?