Grand Theft Auto V Official Gameplay Video!

It's out! It's huge! It's GTA V!

All the usual GTA stuff are in there. Crazy side characters! Hilarious One-Liners! Los Santos! Explosions! Typical Stereo-typical jokes! Customization! Holy Crap! (Yes that's in the game too!)

You will also get a first-look at how the swapping among the 3 characters will be like. Clothes and Vehicles customization. Chopper-flying and Underwater swimming.. and also a quick glance at the multiplayer branded as "Grand Theft Auto Online" and.. wait why am I telling you all this? You are probably watching this video over and over again, and I'm sure you don't need me to tell you what's in there..

Just finished The Last of Us

Wow.. is all I have to say..

Ok..more than that actually, it's a really awesome game. The plot just sucks you in. The chemistry between Joel and Ellie was fantastic. Not sure if being a dad myself had to do with it, but the whole "father-daughter" thing was really emotional. The story was probably one of the best I have seen in a game. (Still think Red Dead Redemption is the best, though the open-world exploration could have dampened it for some people).

"Oh-so-wonderful" relationship they have...

It's hard to explain really.. you have to play this game for you to feel what I'm feeling after playing through the entire game. I'm not going to post spoilers so not to worry. The ending was very ideal, it leaves it open for a sequel but at the same time, can be a conclusion, leaving what happens next, open for discussion. I would definitely, not say no to another if Naughty Dog can give us a sequel which is just as good.

The survival horror mechanic was very nicely done. I played the game on normal difficulty. (It's probably noobish to you but I'm fine with that). The game does a very good job of making me feel "on-the-edge" at all times. Each time I encounter those infected or humans, I was nervous about completing that stage. I just had that "oh-crap" feeling in me every time I see the infected..

You do get better weapons as you progress through the game but at no point of the game, I thought that "I could do this". I would always rather sneak past them than try to take them on. Many games have that "Survive or get killed" tag but they give you an abundance of weapons, armor and health that would be enough to take out a horde of zombies. Of course, their game-play and idea may be different but I have to take my hats off to Naughty Dog for making it a true "survival horror" game... 

Source: Last of Us Wikia

Those bloaters freak me out..

But... there is always a but.. I felt the checkpoints made it a little too easy. Die and you re-spawn just a minute or two before. There isn't much "punishment" for dying where you had to start all over again. A larger distance between checkpoints would have made it harder but at the same time, frustrating. Had to compromise between one or the other I guess, but could have balanced it out better.

Some really brutal and tense moments were added to keep memories about this game for a long time. That part in the burning restaurant was really intense..

I definitely would recommend this to everyone who loves a good story and a memorable game. Everyone who has a PS3 should try this some day. Glad I got this as I pre-ordered it just 2-3 days before it's release after much consideration. Definitely no regrets! I truly enjoyed this game and it's still in my mind even after starting on a new game. (More on the new game in another post soon..) The Last of Us will definitely be a contender for the Game of the Year but I just have to say.. Grand Theft Auto V isn't out yet..

Shit happens.. to me..

This happened the other day..

I was watching an auction.. started off at $0.99 with a Buy It Now price.. Didn't want to BIN so I bid early. However, I got outbid with a few hours left.. No worries, I'll snipe it manually later I thought.. 

So with 20 mins left to the auction, I got ready to snipe. It was about 1.40am. Auction ends at about 2.00am. I was sitting on the bed..

1.45am: Ok man, I'm ready..
1.50am: Alright this is it, this auction is mine!
1.52am: Here it goes.. this thing is going down!
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.
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2.25am: Oh crap! I dozed off!!!!!! 

To make matters worse, nobody else bid on that auction and it went for a super low price at $3+. Really crappy man. Been looking for those for quite a while and at that price, I really felt like kicking myself.

What a whole load of Bull Crap Shit!

It's been a year!

It's been just over a year since I started up this blog. My very first post seems like ages ago now..

It's been real fun blogging about my favourite hobby and I'm glad to have "met" several other gamers and collectors all over the world. It's been fantastic seeing some of your collections and a relief to know I'm not the only crazy one out there. Some of your collections are really phenomenal!

Just a hi to some of you I hear from regularly.. Alexander, Vhal, Celine, Sam Smith, Abhinandhan, Rishi, Mark Leo.. and everyone else! Sorry if I missed anyone! But it's nice to see you guys post or email me. It's really wonderful. So keep posting you guys!

I have mentioned before that the purpose of this blog was to share my thoughts as well as get to know more people with the same passion so it's been definitely nice to know and hear from you guys.

I also haven't had the chance to play online with most of you so I hope that will change in the coming year.. Especially with GTA V coming out in a few months, hope to roll with you guys in the crazy world of Los Santos.

Thanks for reading and have fun! Chiku Chiku Enjoy!

A GTA VCS Napkin!

Traded one of my GTA San Andreas Match boxes for this little napkin..

This one was a promo for the Vice City Stories game. I was under the impression that the napkin was for the Vice City game prior to getting this. Is there a different one? If someone out there has any info, please let me know in the comments. 

Anyway, very glad to see the napkin packed very nicely in a plastic sheet. As much as it is a napkin, this one isn't going to wipe anything.. Thanks Mosavon for this!

Finally found that Last of Us Umbrella

Remember that Last of Us Umbrella that was given out as a pre-order bonus in certain Asian countries?

I finally got one!

Wasn't an easy hunt for this but finally got it!

Here's how it looks, fully opened..

Closer look at the "The Last of Us" trademark..

The PS3 Logo

and our good friend, Mr Clicker aka Mushroom-Head

On the underside of the umbrella, there is a Naughty Dog tag..

The umbrella comes with a sling cover so you can err.. sling it over your shoulder!

Nice stuff, not really my idea of a collectible as it has no relevance to the game, but still cool to have since it is a pretty rare pre-order item. 

Edit: Thinking of selling this away as I got other expenses coming up.. Throw me an offer at jveron004@gmail.com. I can ship internationally.

My favourite games from E3 2013!

E3 2013 has come and gone.. so what are the games that I'm looking forward to?

Unsurprisingly, the big ones like Assassin's Creed IV, Watch Dogs and Infamous: Second Son are my favourites.

The Assassin's Creed series keeps getting bigger each year and Assassin's Creed IV seems to be following the trend. With Naval Battles a much bigger focus this time, I'm definitely looking forward to it.. And who doesn't like Pirates? Ubisoft is clever enough to know that if they don't bring in new themes into the Assassin-Templar setting, the series will start to suffer. Glad that they chose a Pirate theme for this one..

Watch Dogs looks cool, I did see this at E3 2012 and was impressed by the trailer back then but wasn't sure about the game. It sort of looks like a modern-day Assassin's Creed game (They are both from Ubisoft afterall), but it does looks fun. If the actual game lives up to the "hack-anything" hype, this could be one hell-of-a-game.

This is my first-look at Infamous: Second Son as I have been avoiding it till now. I haven't played Infamous 2 yet so didn't want to spoil it for me, but I just couldn't resist it in the end. Really impressed by the graphics and game-play from the E3 demos. The game looks more fun than the previous games but the protagonist doesn't seem that likeable at the moment. We will see about that soon enough. Need to get on Infamous 2 in the meantime..

These are the 3 games that I'm definitely getting on release day but there might be more depending..

PayDay 2 looks real fun. I haven't played the first as I can't get enough friends to play together. Would really like to play that before getting onto the 2nd game. Bank Heists, Guys in Joker Masks.. what's there not to like? I have always had a thing for Joker/Jester/Evil Clown stuff and I have even hunted down the the PayDay 1 and 2 promo items, they should be posted out from the U.S very soon. Anyone wanna play the first with me?

Thief has gone in and out of my "Interest Radar" over the past few weeks. The setting and theme of the game looks really cool but gameplay hasn't gotten me really excited. Will have to see more before I can decide...

Batman Arkham Origins continues, what is a great series of Batman games. Wish more comic-based games are up to this standard. More bad guys, more Batman, more action and of course more Joker! What else can I ask for?

The Crew is another game from one of my favourite publishers, Ubisoft, so this had me interested. It's sort of a co-op racing game and it does look cool and the concept looks real fun. Somehow, I don't seem to have the time for racing games. Got Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit last year but never got around to playing it much. Will be tracking this one for the moment. 

Another game from Ubisoft, The Division looks visually stunning. While watching the trailer for the first time, I thought.. here we go, yet another Zombie game but they surprised me with the whole disease/infection thing. This whole "disease" epidemic is so real in life that it does freak me out. Forget wars, floods, meteors, aliens... a widespread epidemic could wipe out the human population. In the Last of Us, the game shows us how infection can change the entire world. 

The trailer also talks about how infection can pass through dollar notes.. and it was a nice touch of dropping "infected" notes onto the show floor to exchange for memorabilia. The Division was probably E3 2013's best game. A really cool game and if it plays half as good as it looks, I'll be in for this.

Among all the games that were revealed at E3 itself, the game that excited me most was Killer Instinct. This fighting game might be unknown to many but this was pretty famous many years back. I have never played nor heard of this but it looks really cool. In the demo, the developers talked about how they will have training features in the game to help beginners pick up the different moves. That would really help someone like me who just suck at fighting games. Really disappointed to know that this will be a X-Box exclusive. Would have been a must-buy for me.

Of course, there was no GTA V on show at E3. Rockstar has a habit of not attending E3 so wasn't expecting to see that or else this whole post would be about GTA V!

I was also very disappointed about no news of a new Prince of Persia game. Realistically speaking, I wasn't expecting any news from this franchise, but I was secretly hoping that it would be one of the games to be revealed at E3. Sadly nothing... but..... Just 2 days ago, the official Prince of Persia Facebook page posted this.. "Get ready for some news about Prince of Persia, starting next week...". I wonder what the news is..

Anyway, this has been a very exciting E3 with all the next-gen updates and cool games. I'm definitely looking forward to many of these games mentioned above. What about you guys? What games are you most interested in from this year's E3?