Chinatown Fair generally depresses me simply for the fact that the degree of competition, not to mention the overall morale of the common gamer isn't practically non-existant at times. Marvel vs. Capcom 2 will bring some of the missing gamers I used to see frequent the arcade, though I doubt I'll be among the players who will go ahead for the arcade experience. I think I'll pass and go at it on the Dreamcast version. Besides, being that the arcade operators here in the U.S. will not be using the actual Naomi arcade cabinets which host a port to use your VMU, I am going to feel cheated out of the entire function for the opportunity to upload my characters onto the actual pad and kick some serious butt (yeah, right). It'd be cool if one day, they'd make some sort of port that would allow you to use a control pad...can't tell you how many times I used to wish for my trusty pad and was forced to learn the arts of the joystick. Now, it's the cries of others who don't really frequent the arcade and admit: "I play much better at home."

So what happens at home?

This weekend had somewhat of an unexpected turn of events, since I was able to sit down and enjoy the Dead or Alive 2 demo I received from Tecmo. All the oohs and ahhs that you've heard through print, online and the word of mouth regarding this title is certainly well deserved and far from being exaggerated hype. I am going to write a brief first impressions this week in lieu of the game's release later this week. For now, I can say that you'll be very hard pressed to find anything missing from the game since it's arcade perfect in the graphics department...although Reno has been moaning endlessly on how the counter move function have been altered, thus causing him much upset (and an infinite level of toungue in cheek humor on how we wouldn't receive his evaluation copy) :)

Deep Fighter, a game I received from Ubi Soft to check out ended up being a dead end for me since, I don't own a system disc. You can imagine the level of excitement I had when I popped in the disc, believing that I was about to experience another fine title from Ubi Soft...only to recall that since I didn't own the disc to configure my DC to recognize the beta...it would divert to the back menu, along with my feelings of joy thrown to the floor. I joked about my disappointment with the PR rep, and along with a discussion of Chu Chu Rocket (which I'll get into shortly), we also came up with an excitement feature which you'll see here on TNL very soon, so be sure to check in daily for more info.

It's never a dull weekend if I am playing Street Fighter, and I was able to play this in abundance with some of the local friends at my crib. Ah, it's quite enjoyable to whip out Charlie and Chun especially, lock them up in the corner and crush a few hopes of victory. Okei, that's really evil, but when they start to get really bullish, I have to bring them back down to reality. One of my friends, Teddy wanted to show off his new skills with Ryu in SF III: W Impact while I opted to go with Elena, who I don't play highly competitive with, but just like to toy around. As he moved around the screen, I continued to stay one step ahead of him whenever possible, parrying here and there. I had to laugh at a few of the sessions we had because he kept trying to cross me up, but was unsucessful in each attempt that he just screamed out:

WHY CAN'T I CROSS HIM UP??!!?!?!???!!?!?!

Another of my friends that had came over gave him the comment that I was the King of the "Back Door" which was our term we created over a decade ago which stood for the cross up manuever. I also recall many of my other friends trying to do this against Chun Li back in my maiden Alpha 2 days...man, I really miss that game...now when I play it, I don't find as much enjoyment like I do with Alpha 3 or even the SF III series for that matter. Thankfully, I am not getting those high streaks like I used to get in the arcade...82 wins with Ibuki is not normal, especially when you're still learning the game yourself. :)

Since it's really late, I am going to save the rest of this pointless ranting for an evening edition that I'll feature for tomorrow night. I'll talk about the experience I had with Chu Chu Rocket online, with my friends offline, and even get into another game that I played on the Saturn, known as Death Tank. :)

··· Bahn