Play:

Assassin's Creed: Odyssey (PS4) - more side stuff.

Stunt Car Racer (Amiga) - I've been playing around with Amiga
emulation lately, which has weirdly ended up being random command-line
stuff mostly, but I figured I ought to try out WHDLoad somewhen. I
liked SCR despite being rubbish at it on both the Speccy and PC, and
the same is true of this nicer version, despite the slightly odd
controls.

zcsoli (CP/M) - definitely not playing it with a CP/M emulator on an
Amiga emulator. Because that would be silly.

Want:

Nothing.

Bin:

Not getting an Amiga in, say, the 90s. Even just a basic one would
have been pretty useful as a second machine back then I think.

-Rus.

In article <ANGfI.369684$7Kb.240466@usenetxs.com>,
Russell Marks <zgedneil@spam^H^H^H^Hgmail.com> wrote:
>Play:
>

Hellpoint (Switch) - Lovely. The game does borrow one of the best
qualities of the first Dark Souls, in that the map all connects in
meaningful and useful ways. I just found all the paths around a particular
boss fight, which technically means that the boss is completely optional
since it's not blocking forward progress. It's nice to be able to do the
3D Metroidvania thing and explore, especially now that I've overlevelled
the GRENADE LAUNCHER to the point where I can comfortably take on larger
enemies from a safe distance. I just wish there were a better way to
charge up that stupid energy meter.

>Want:
>

I will address this section later when I'm not too tired to think.

>Bin:
>

Nothing gaming related. Normal service will resume next week.

-KKC, who would really like a nap now.
--
-- "People with happy families don't become spies. A bad | kendrick
childhood is the perfect background for covert ops. You | @
don't trust anyone. You're used to getting smacked around, | io-nyc
and you never get homesick." - Michael Westen, /Burn Notice/ | .com

On 20/04/2021 21:26, Russell Marks wrote:
> Play:
>
Tokyo Jungle (PS3)

I saw this while looking through my PS download list (actually looking
to install a PSP game, but Sony's utter incompetence means that
everything appears in one long list of 723 items, not filterable, often
not labelled which platform it's for. On the PSP and PSVita you can at
least tell if it's something that can be installed to those systems; on
the PS3 you can download anything at all because you can then transfer
it to the handhelds. So, when you want to download, say, Joe Danger to
the PS3, you invariable end up downloading a GB of data to find out that
you now have a nice tile enabling you to transfer it over to the Vita,
and not the PS3 version at all. I digress.)

I remember being really keen for this when it was first released, and
then not buying it because I still won't store payment details on Sony's
systems and so impulse buys don't happen. A couple of years later I saw
an advert that it was down to £4, but when I clicked on the advert it
turned out I'd missed the sale by a couple of days and it was back up to
£10. As a result I didn't buy it, and then in 2017 it was free with PS+.

I played it three times in 2018. Other things must have been more
interesting.

But I've tried it again, and it's a great game, with enough to explore
but not too much to be overwhelming. I've unlocked a few additional
animals, but prefer to play as the cats because, well, cats are best. I
feel like I'm still learning the game, becoming more adept with the
combat controls but forgetting to look which areas have enough food, or
getting lost in the sewers. Finding the story unlocks gives the game a
bit more purpose as well. All in all, fun to play and I shall continue.

PSP connection fun game (PSP)

Having found my PSP, and aware of the forthcoming closure of the store,
I thought it would be a good idea to get it working again and download
stuff I might want. I couldn't find the charging cable, of course, so
had to order a new one off Amazon for £2.16; plugging it in and leaving
it for five minutes gave the battery enough power to come back to life.

I have a lot of UMDs to try out at some point.

But back to the point. The PSP won't work on a WPA2 connection; pretty
much everything uses WPA2 now. In addition, my PSP was on a CFW based on
6.39 which meant that I couldn't connect to it through the PS3 either.
So, first job was to update to the latest firmware. Just download that
from Sony's site, then ... oh, no, of course they've taken those pages down.

https://revive.today/psp/firmware/ to the rescue - with links to where
those files are still stored on Sony's servers.

So, firmware downloaded, PSP connected to computer via USB cable, bish
bash bosh. All up to date and hunky dory.

Now, let's connect it to the PS3, and then transfer a few games I've
downloaded over. No can do; there's a error code which seems to imply
it can't authenticate. Some more reading and it's to do with 2FA
implementation - neither the PS3 nor the PSP can do 2FA, so you need to
generate device-specific passwords to sign in, but doing that means they
are no longer consistent between the PSP and PS3 so it ALL GOES WRONG.

To get over this, I had to disable 2FA on my Sony account, then wait
half an hour - presumably for the man to run to the other end of the
building to retype in my password - and then it transfers games over fine.

I'm not leaving my account unprotected though, given Sony's previous.
So, I then tried to find a way of connecting the PSP wirelessly directly
to PSN. Following Jaimie's recommendation, my iMac is now set up as an
access point with no security which I can turn on and off as needed.
And I can directly download games from the download list [see above] at
blistering speeds of about 1MB per day.

Wipeout (PS)

On both the PS3 and the PSP. One of the games that I had previously
bought, and I installed it as a test since it's pretty small. It's not
easy; my first race I failed to qualify in sixth place; my second race I
failed to qualify in fifth. It's made difficult on the PSP due to the
shoulder buttons not working properly as airbrakes. While it's
interesting from a historic point of view, the existence of Wipeouts
2048 and Omega Collection puts this a little in the shade.

Power Stone Collection (PSP)

It feels rough around the edges nowadays, but this is still good fun.
It always benefitted from multiplayer, though.

Mr Driller Drill Land (Switch)

Still not completed all the level 2 games. I was so close to the end of
the Indiana Jones tribute one, and then got killed by a spike I hadn't
noticed.

From Dust (PS3)

I recall playing the first level of this on the Xbox 360 many years ago,
thinking it was similar to Populous the Beginning in select ways, but
never continuing. Again, I saw this in my download list, installed it,
and have now completed the first seven levels. It's good in many ways,
but the pathfinding of some of the people is wonky and makes it pretty
frustrating to play. And it's just not as good as the best game ever made.

>
> Want:
>
The PSP store back again.

A new, online, Power Stone game.

> Bin:
>
Sony's lack of preservation.

Tim (tm)