Hello again! Can you believe June is nearly over and we’ve still got rubbish weather?! It’s been raining every day down here, although it was a lovely 28°C on Thursday! Anyway, you’re not hear to listen to me rant about the weather, so here’s this weeks Community Round-Up.
The second round of racing, smashing and bashing is finished in the DiRT Showdown Tournament, and we have a second extensive video commentary of proceedings from Death_in_Flamez. The groups are finished, and the top four guys progress to head-to-head quarter finals now. Good luck to everyone that’s made it through!
Starting off with the Meets, let’s take a look at what we’ve got shall we?
Tonight, Bodachi hosts the usual Uncharted 3 meet beginning at 7pm, while at 9pm sanmartinez hosts the Bioshock 2 Meet. Tomorrow, R1MJAW hosts the DiRT Showdown meet at the usual time of 6pm.
Monday night’s Gran Turismo 5 Meet starts at 7pm hosted by Jambo, featuring the Spa Francorchamps DLC track. [I also made a little teaser trailer for it – Tef] Also on Monday, Youles gets dirty with the DiRT 3 meet at 8pm. And then at 9pm quinkill hosts the Max Payne 3 meet.
Later on in the week, Element666 hosts an Assassins Creed Revelations meet at 8pm on Thursday.
Keep an eye out for Youles’s usual WipEout Vita meet on Friday at 9pm, as well as Forrest’s Friday Night Battlefield Meet, and if you feel like it, you can create your own Meet provided you have 250 TSA Points.
Once again, we’ve only got two reviews for you this week I’m afraid, but the first one is Dan’s 9/10 review of the impressive, but sandy, Spec Ops: The Line. Blair gave a robust 7/10 to the 3DS title Heroes of Ruin. Lastly, Tuffcub gave a 6/10 to Lollipop Chainsaw, the game featuring a cheerleader and a chainsaw – what more could you want?
We have a few more previews, beginning with Stefan venturing beyond the E3 demo of Black Ops 2. In fact, Stefan’s been a busy boy, going hands on with The Amazing Spiderman, Skylanders: Giants and lastly Transformers: Fall of Cybertron.
Despite a tough week, Peter’s managed to put together a completely outstanding article explaining the true historical context of Assassin’s Creed 3, and why you maybe shouldn’t be quite so outraged at the nationalities of the antagonists, nor the protagonists in the game series. If this excited you, you’ll be pleased to know there’s more to come.
Al has been writing so much stuff this week. He lends his thoughts on what it was that made WipEout 3 so great, (It extends beyond the self-referential title screen) the way PS plus benefits the industry, why LBP Vita is the best thing on the PS Vita, the real problems for PS minis and finally why he’s found himself stop playing MotorStorm RC. Rounding us out is Kris, looking at what the point is of SimCity Social.
And now, let’s move onto the community articles and regular features. First up, it’s results day for those of you that took the Meet the Reader Exam. Congratulations to those of you that passed, for those that didn’t; retakes take place next week! We also have the WeView Verdict for inFamous 2, before asking you about the equally PS+’d Space Marine. Borderlands featured in Gareth’s Cheap PC Gaming this week, but not to be missed are last Sunday’s Sunday Thoughts looking at second screens, the 67th Episode of the TSA Podcast and lastly What We Played #59 from Greg.
It’s great to see the Forums this week are brimming with activity, let’s take a look at what we’ve got:
- After countless years of retakes, Elder Mike has finally completed his degree! He was only a nipper when he started!
- Ignoring the fact I’m half Welsh, OrigamiKiller demonstrates why Welsh people shouldn’t be allowed behind the wheel with some of his F1 2012 footage.
- A Inferior Race asks you to name your top 5 games for a little forum game he’s planning.
- Sympozium asks about Minecraft, and if you’ve got any cool creations, why not show them off?
- And lastly, CrazyDel, or more specifically, CrazyDel’s sister needs help winning a t-shirt design competition.
I think last week saw the closest battle yet, but eventually Sephiroth was declared winner with 8 votes to 7 against Solid Snake, so Sephiroth enters the hallowed Hall of Fame. Now that we are almost 6 months into the showdown, and with 4 contestants in the hall of fame, I decided it’s about time we put them head to head.
So, in the first week of ‘Saturday Morning Showdown’s Head to Head Fight of the Champions’ (catchy, heh?) we are going to see Optimus Prime from Transformers take on Ratchet from the Ratchet and Clank Series.
Ratchet
Pros
- Ratchet is a Lombax, a sort-of feline creature and looks kinda cute!
- Has a vast armoury of futuristic weaponry.
- Also has other equipment such as Hoverboots at his disposal.
Cons
- His sidekick, Clank, seems pretty useless for 95% of the time.
- Those long ears can probably get caught in machinery quite often, and attract strange fetishists.
- Being the last of his race must make his love life a bit complicated. Oh, and the whole looming extinction thingy too, I guess.
Optimus Prime
Pros
- Leader of the Autobots, the most badass assembly of robots. Ever.
- Drives round with an armoured weapons platform, just in case something goes down.
- Will never surrender to the Decepticons.
Cons
- Attempts to surreptitiously conceal himself as a massive red and blue truck, because you see loads of those everyday, right?
- Often trusts those he should not, ‘seeing the good in everyone’.
- Goes through loads of WD-40.
Well that’s it for yet another week. Leave your votes below, and I’ll see you all next week! Bye!
Death_In_Flamez
Firstly, it’s either the top four from each group or the top eight driver for Showdown…. :P
Secondly I’d go for Ratchet on this one. Reckon he’s got the size and gadgets to defeat Optimus
Origami Killer
I dont like to be petty but it’s F1 2011 footage not 2012, thats not even out yet :P
Optimus no doubt, he gets my vote.
Alex C
Two reviews? ;)
Death_In_Flamez
Whether it was Gazza or Tef who wrote this, someone hasn’t been getting their sleep ;)
gazzagb
I’d missed out Blair’s review by mistake, but Tef noticed itand added it in, but didn’t change the two to three!
And I didn’t notice it because I didn’t see it under the ‘reviews’ tab, so it’s his fault for not tagging it correctly! :P And I’ve no idea why TC’s EA’s Subscription Service news comes under reviews either!
Stefan L
What Gazza said. It weren’t our fault, Guv, honest!
The Lone Steven
You want me to unleash the giant spider on Gaz for that mistake Tef?
MadJunkBoy
bought R&C trilogy today so the vote must go to ratchet!
Crazy_Del
My wee sis says thanks for the mention and was surprised to see it on the front page =D
Thank you so much
Now back to me I really need to check out the Assassins Creed by Colossalblue.
Optimus Prime for the win!
Wee sis says Ratchet
MadJunkBoy
GO DELS SISTER!
ratchet FTW! ;)
gazzagb
Optimus get’s my fault, he’s big and awesome!
Aquastyle
Transformers is just sooooo lame. So my vote goes to Ratchet this time, the cat-thing.
freezebug2
Looking forward to the GT5 GTR race at SPA on Monday, love races that involve strategy with realtime live planning :)
If Ratchet had early access to the R.Y.N.O. weapon, then he’d be at a bit of an advantage, It’s like an RPG that fires around 8 homing missiles in one shot. Toast!!
The Lone Steven
And down here in the south, tis been sunny every day. I’m starting to get a little scared of what the big ball of fire may do if it continues to hang around. *loads up on supplies and grabs shotgun* :p
Anyway, Elder Mike has been walking around TSA towers wearing a leather jacket and quoting action movie lines. I keep telling him that i won’t give him the title of the Forum Badarse but he keeps telling me to yippa ka baby. I think he’s gotten the quotes crossed.
Origami Killer was found on the roof, sunbathing when he was supposed to be working and was given a wedgie off the top of said roof. Also, a Xeno’s head was put in his bed. Not a real one as it would kill him and Adam is threatening to take my tea away if i don’t stop accidentally killing members. He should tell them to stop making so much mess and giving me reasons to torment them! Tef was busy being a hippy and organised a massive BBQ but the bar steward banned me from attending as apparently, i was needed to clean up his office. Oh and i got mini sharks with freaking laser beams on their heads as the office fish as well as being promoted to head of ensuring Gazzagb is never late with the Community Roundup. *strokes his giant spider*
Sane Version:Erm…………
Ratchet would beat Prime as he’s taken on hundreds of robots before and every single one of his weapons are very powerful when fully upgraded.
Origami Killer
I wondered why my bed has melted due to acid damage.
element666
Its a tough one but I think I got to choose optimus prime!