When I was a wee lil gamer, my mom bought our family their very first home gaming system. On Christmas morning we tore into a brand new NES complete with Mario, Power Pad, and Zelda. We weren't allowed to play Zelda until mom finished it first. And in those days, before online walkthroughs and strats, mom made her own maps complete with secret locations and codes for every level using a only pencil and graph paper. Mom still plays video games more than most of my friends. So in honor of our family's original gamer, I present a review of one of mom's favorite games, the classic Final Fantasy 10.
Final Fantasy 10 was the start of a new era for the Final Fantasy franchise and for it's publisher, what we now know as Square Enix. The series was previously full of ugly pixelation. The tenth installment on the Playstation 2 would definitely be its best looking game up to that point. FF10 even looks better than some of today's releases. Number ten also brought in the use of voice actors for the first time, and decent ones at that. People instantly fell in love with the characters of Yuna and Tidus.
Speaking of the main characters, this game stayed on course with the series's tradition of strong stories. Final Fantasy 10 has everything. There is romance, a son trying to understand his father, and the impending destruction of the world. The characters are compelling and the ending has some respectable twists. Definitely worth a play through.
FF10 was the first game in the series that either of us played, and its a great place to begin. The conditional turn-based battle system is extremely user friendly as is the sphere grid. The game has a lot of worlds, maps, and exploring to do. And newer players can find their niche in melee, ranged, or magical attacks. So there really is a style for almost everyone. This game is a great introduction to the series.
With all that said, you should dig out and dust off your PS2. Final Fantasy 10 is a classic game that will easily enhance your gamer credibility. Plus, if you don't play it, you are going to get shut down by by a 59 year old woman. So do what mother says; "wash your hands and play your video games". Happy Mother's Day !!!
For the first time, we decided to cut off all the cable in my apartment. As I am getting older, I have way less time to watch television. Between that and all the online streaming services, I don't really need to pay $80 every month. Thanks to Netflix and Hulu, I don't even crouch over my laptop, rather sit back and enjoy on my television. But is Hulu Plus worth the money ?
I have been using the Hulu.com website for about a year. Its super useful for someone like me who never seems to be home when the shows I love actually air. They began as a basic service. There is no charge and you don't even have to register if you don't want to. The site carries shows from broadcast networks and some other channels like USA, Comedy Central, and more. For each series the site hosts, they usually keep a back log of around 5 of the most recent episodes so there is plenty of time to catch up.
While this free portion of the service is still available, there is now an additional, paid service called Hulu Plus. With this, there are more shows and they keep huge back logs, sometimes the entire series. Hulu Plus is also really cheap. The newly extended service is only $7.99 per month. And unlike Netflix, when a new episode airs on tv, there isn't a wait time. The newest shows are usually available the very next morning.
So why are we covering this on our gaming blog ? Hulu Plus is now available on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 ! I was pretty psyched when the Plus service launched on consoles. It seems like such a natural fit, just how Netflix was such an obviously good choice for the same release.
But the Hulu Plus service has some noticeable hiccups with its appearance on the gaming systems. There are a significant number of popular shows that are only viewable on their website. I absolutely love the show Fringe, but it is "web-only". So that was a huge disappointment. And even though the service is paid, there are still regular commercials. The amount of commercials are not as long as those on regular, live television, but its still annoying.
So it's up to you if this service is worth it. I would much rather pay the $8/month and suffer through some commercials than pay literally ten times that amount for cable. And I extra love that I can access this through my gaming console. The question I have is, "What next?" I would love to see CNN or MSNBC come to these platforms. What new services would like see ?
