It seems the fellow over at BBC news are having a look back at hand helds:

Technology experts say the PS Vita, which was released on Wednesday, could be the last dedicated hand-held games console. Newsbeat takes a look back at how they have evolved over the years.

via BBC – Newsbeat – Hand-held games consoles: from Pac Man to PS Vita.

It’s old school time!

Well that’s what I thought to myself when I went and got myself an old NES off of eBay. Bought myself a few of the classic games, warmed up the red wine and sat down ready to play a few minutes before saying “hmm, not what I remember”. But it was not to be…

Last night I went along to Nintendo’s celebratory concert for Zelda’s 25th Birthday.

Was it good? No. It was better than that.

Anyone of you that has played a Zelda game knows that the music is one of the key things that sticks in your mind and makes you remember the good time you had playing the game. Be it ocarina of time, link to the past, Majora’s Mask or any other the theme and background music stick with you.

The chance to see a one time performance of some of this music by the London Philharmonic orchestra then is not a thing to be missed. And thankfully I didn’t.

The whole event was drowned in Zelda memories. The upper circle before you went in to the auditorium had kiosks playing the latest title “Skyward Sword” on the wii. Can’t wait to get my hands on that come November! Then around the sides were green lit glass cases containing each zelda game and it’s corresponding console. Lovely touch.

The whole place was littered in huge banners – some depicting each era of zelda, some just a massive logo.

As we entered the auditorium we saw the setup for the orchestra with a large screen behind it displaying one of the iconic Hylian glyphs from the Zelda series. As the show began The Producer of the Zelda series (Eiji Aonuma) came on stage to introduce the show- and also to ask us nicely not to film the symphony as he felt that you needed to be there to experience it. Sweet. As he left- the music began.

Dear lord it was good. And the only way you’ll hear it now is on your CD player when they release the soundtrack with Zelda Skyward Sword. Trust me, it will not do it justice. I’ve never heard anything like it.

We got these cool little souvenir programmes too- free I might add. Thats right, Nintendo doing something for FREE.

By far the most exciting part of the night for me was when all was done, and you thought it was over- they roll on out Koji Kondo himself to play a solo piano piece from the Wind Waker. Just stunning.

So to close, it was every Zelda fan’s wet dream- the epic-ness of seeing your favourite moments from the games up on the big screen with a full orchestra and choir belting the tunes out at a volume that Bats would ask you to turn down. So was it a big marketing stunt for Zelda Skyward Sword? Probably, but honestly I couldn’t give two tosses if it was. I was going to buy it when I went in, Im still going to buy it now. And who can argue with an orchestral version of the “Milk Bar” theme from Majora’s Mask?

..Fucking Milk Bar!!

I’m here! It’s 6:15 ish and we are lined up to go in and take our seats. Come back tomorrow for a full report on one of video games finest musical concerts!

The atmosphere here is buzzing with some kind of film crew going around and getting groups of the line to sing the song of time. The huge banners here outside the hammersmith Apollo give a buzz to everyone waiting for the show.

I bought along my 3DS for an experiment to see how many street passes I could get. I got up to 43 before I got tired of pressing the button to skip through them. Considering in the 3 months I’ve had it so far I’d managed to wrack up a massive “4″ passes before tonight I’d say that’s pretty good going.

More after the show!

It’s been a long time, bond.

The year was 1997, films were in 2D and games came in a rich variety of polygons. At this time the playstation and N64 were in fierce competition with Sega about to admit defeat from the console race. Each had their key games but the N64 was about to get a surprise hit from a genre that NEVER does any good- the movie tie in game.

The game was Goldeneye 007…and the rest is history.

This weekend I went to visit Mr. Coldicott in his homestead. He had just recently dug out his N64 from under his bed. It had been there going on a good 7 years so the hope that it would actually work was slim. However after a bit of messing around on his TV he finally got it and on span that familiar metallic nintendo logo that we had both seen so much in our time. So let’s get the graphics question done with- it looks dreadful! Remember though that the TVs we were playing on at that time were still SD and probably no bigger than 20″. We were playing sat about three foot away from a 40″ HD TV which didn’t really do the old 240p resolution any favors. There were certain notable issues like enemy’s being consumed by the Walls and bullet holes floating in mid air, but I prefer to look more on that as charm rather than glitches.

We dove right into the Dam level on 00 agent (no messing around here). Granted probably not the wisest move having not played the game for some time but I made a fair stab at it! Got mullered in the basement getting to the data backup by some sod hiding behind a wall. I can tell you though that even now the gameplay makes your adrenalin rush. There’s something about not being guided around to your objectives like some crap technical safari that really emerges you in the game. There’s no “new objective- it’s over here, about 400 meters” markers popping up every second. Nope, it’s just a list. Find them, do them.

It was Lee’s turn then to have a go at the missile solo level (also at 00). You only get 8 minuets for this one as after that the whole place explodes (was there ever a better incentive?).  He blazed his way through corridor after corridor of identical octuplet guard groups, making it all the way to the bullet proof Ourumov at the end of the level. At this point he had 5 seconds left to dash for the lift- and dash he did, making it with barely a second to spare. With a whoop and some old school backslapping we celebrated the achievement. But wait… Objective C, FAILED?! Goddamn it! Back we go! You see most games these days wouldn’t be so bold as to let you finish the mission without completing the objectives- but Goldeneye just glares at you for such a mistake, and makes you start again. I guess there’s something to be said for discipline in games after all as the sense of satisfaction when completing a Goldeneye level is far greater than that of any game I’ve played in recent years.

Some retro games age like milk where others age like your grandparents: with a quet dignity. This is the latter. Re-playing Goldeneye all these years on it’s amazing to see the influence it had on the modern shooter. It’s difficult to comprehend that before Goldeneye, shooters on consoles either weren’t done or were just plain bad. Now it’s difficult to find any other kind of games on them! The gratifying experience if figuring out and completing your objectives is just something that is lacking from today’s games. It’s all waypoints and instructions. When we were thrown into the first level if Goldeneye (the Dam) my friend Steve rightly said “you know, if they made this now- there would be a five Minuit training corse on how to use that sniper rifle”.  Am I looking at Goldeneye through Rose tinted glasses? Sure, but they are massive Rose tinted glasses with pictures of girls etched in them and the bond theme playing out of tiny speakers on them…and I would happily stay behind them forever.

Rose Tinted Rating:

Graphics:     4/10

Sound:    9/10

Gameplay  9/10

Overall:   8/10 (Still Brilliant)