Intensive Gaming Diary

Blog about different aspects of retro and new video games.

Category: PC

About Sega Dreamcast

Posted on by Viljami

Sega Dreamcast was released 1998 in Japan and 1999 in North America and Europe. Its game library consists of about 600 games. This is considerably lower than all games that were released to PS2, a console of the same era and console generation, that had several thousands of games in its game library.

Some other gaming consoles of this generation were Nintendo GameCube, Microsoft Xbox and Sony PlayStation 2. So, Dreamcast was competing with these giants. This was an era in which we saw definitely more games released than we have in todays world of gaming. It has to said that the competition was tough. PS2 sold most consoles and had the most games in its library while Xbox and GameCube sold well but not as much as PS2. In 2001 Dreamcast was discontinued. It didn’t sell well.

Today Dreamcast is considered to be a definite gem as a retro gaming console. You can get the original console for about 200 euros. It is also possible to play it by emulating Dreamcast on a system like Recalbox that you can run on a Raspberry Pi 5 or PC. Raspberry Pi 5 has enough power to run Dreamcast emulation while some older Rasbperry Pi models might lack this power. We have to consider if this way of playing Dreamcast is actually legit or not. After all every Dreamcast game isn’t available.

I have solved this problem with buying this Dreamcast Collection for PC. I bought it a long time ago but it seems to be totally legal. This collection has four Dreamcast titles in it. While Sega quit manufacturing gaming consoles they still make video games for other systems. There are lots of good quality games still getting released by Sega. This tells something about their position as one of the most legendary game companies in the history of video games.

Sega’s history includes classic consoles like Mega Drive / Genesis, Master System and Saturn. However some of its products weren’t so successful. They did take a wrong direction with releasing 32X and Mega CD. They weren’t commercially successful which evidently lead to some financial problems that lead to discontinuation of Dreamcast.

What are some good games for Dreamcast? There are some role-playing-games like Skies of Arcadia and Grandia II, a boxing game, Ready 2 Rumble, many 2D fighting games, some 3D fighting games, like Virtua Fighter 3tb, Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure, Resident Evil – Code Veronica and many others. The game library is in its entirety a very solid and of good quality. I think that finding a bad game for Dreamcast is a difficult task to complete.

I do have some critic also about Dreamcast. The fact that the controller only has one analog stick makes playing first-person-shooters a bit clumsy. You have to map movement and aiming differently than you would with a better gamepad. Also when compared to some newer consoles Dreamcast lacks some power. But it has to be said that when considering it to be a retro console it handles its business very nicely.

It would be great to get something from Sega today that would be legit and also of good quality when it comes to retro gems like this one. There would definitely be many gamers that would like to buy a mini console, a remake or a completely new game from some of these classic titles. We have to see and wait for what the future holds for Sega fans.

Are You Waiting for GTA VI (or Not) ?

Posted on by Viljami

In this blog post we are talking a bit about the upcoming video game from a video game series that might be the biggest name in the game. I am talking about Grand Theft Auto and especially the sixth game in this series.

I still remember clearly how it felt like playing the first Grand Theft Auto. There were possibilities in this games. You could impact and interact with the world that was inside this two dimensional video game. Violence was present and you could just tear everything apart until there was more and tougher forces on the streets to calm you down.

Many times it was not so necessary to commit violence in the game. But also many times you killed, in the video game, someone for example by driving over a person or shooting someone. I remember what my father said when he realized that I had played a game like this. It could have also been one of the first two Fallout games, also, I don’t remember so clearly.

First two GTA games were golden or at least in my memories they are. I still own a copy of both of them for PS1. However, the third GTA was the game that made GTA series a historically very important. GTA III was released for PS2 and PC in 2001. GTA III had bright colors represented in three dimensional environments. It had many relatable characters.

We saw GTA IV in 2008. It was released for PS3, Xbox 360 and Windows. It was finally 2013 when GTA V was released. It made its way to many consoles going past even whole console generations. I mean that GTA V was first released when it was still the dominant era of PS3 and Xbox 360. When time went by we saw releases for PS4 and Xbox One. This game is also available for the latest and current console generation.

To tell you the truth I never was so excited about GTA IV or GTA V. I tried hard to advance in GTA III but after all failed to finish the game. I think GTA III is the most important game in the series. And the first two GTAs are just so much of a memory for me to dwell in as they bring me so much nostalgia that I prefer to play one of them before I would even start getting into a game like GTA V.

As you can probably tell from the attached image I still have a sealed copy of GTA V for PS4 literally in my hands. I think I bought it for 25 euros and this was already some years ago. You could say that this means I don’t have an interest to play the game. You are actually right with this one. I am not saying it is a bad game. I’m just saying that it isn’t interesting for me.

I could go on about GTA IV or GTA V and how especially the fifth game doesn’t interest me. But there is something happening soon that might take my concentration. What’s happening? There is going to be a new GTA game released. The game is the sixth in the series. This might be a hit. This might be a nice game. For all we know there are lots of expectations for this game to be a success. We can take it as a game for us gamers. We can deal it and review it as a piece of digital art and also a piece of gaming.

So, the final question is, are you expecting this new GTA game? Just ponder it a little while. Think about how you feel about this soon to be released video game right now. Is it going to fail and flop? Is it going to make some developer company some profit? Or would it be the case that it just brings something new to gaming? Whatever it will be we are going to see soon…

Download Half-Life 2 For Free (Until 18.11.2024)

Posted on by Viljami

It is now possible to get to download and play an old FPS game called Half-Life 2. You can get your copy now from Steam. It is available only until 18th of November 2024. It was released earlier today for free. Just search for it in Steam. Type “Half-Life 2” and you should see a link that gives you a permission to download and install the game. The game will stay in your library if you have activated it until 18th of November 2024.

I started to play this game as I decided that since it is now free I should at least give it a try. I have played this game earlier on original Xbox. It is very different to play it with a mouse and a keyboard. Half-Life 2 was released in 16th of November 2004. That means it was released exactly 20 years ago.

It is possible to play Half-Life 2 with a controller. I haven’t tried that yet but I think my Xbox Series S/X controller that I play my PC/Windows games with will function just fine. I had to fiddle a bit with the settings. I adjusted the movement level of the mouse and also checked for some controls. The graphics still look nice. I also had to find a way to take a screenshot from within Steam so that I could share you some more content from the game. You get to play also Episode One and Two with this free release.

My deeply rooted and deep relationship with Half-Life series’s games start right from the first game. I got to play it on a PC while it was also later ported to PS2. The first Half-Life was released in 1998. It had a true competitor that I got also into. The competitor was a game called Unreal. I remember buying a bundle of big box games that included at least the first game in Abe’s Oddysee series and Unreal. I actually right now don’t remember if it had any other games included. The box was partly yellow because it was a re-release, so, the box wouldn’t have been as valuable as the original one if I even had kept it even in a good condition.

A also bought Blue Shift and Gunman Chronicles. I still have the copy of Blue Shift in my gaming shelf. I am very sad to announce that I did sell my Gunman Chronicles big box game with manual included for about four euros a bit over ten years ago. Gunman Chronicles was a mod of the first Half-Life and Blue Shift was a sort of a spin off of Half-Life where you play as a regular security guard of Black Mesa facility. It was very popular to make a mod for Half-Life and there were many good ones available. I have to mention a mod called They Hunger.

I was in a bit of a hurry while writing this because the deal lasts for only about some days maybe two days or so. As you are in a hurry to get this game please don’t hurry while playing it. I think we have a very good game right here that can offer you a lot especially if you are into retro games for PC.

How to Rip Your PS1 Games

Posted on by Viljami

In this blog post we are going to go through about how to rip your PS1, PlayStation 1, games to rom files so that you can play with an emulator or a piece of hardware like Raspberry Pi 4/5. This way of copying your games for your personal use is completely legal. What is currently illegal is copying rom files of games that you don’t own and/or if you share some games that you have ripped to someone who doesn’t own that particular game. We are dealing with a sensitive legal issue right here and things can change, for better or worse, in the future. I don’t want to encourage you to break law in any way.

So you have your PlayStation 1 game. What else do you need? Here’s a list:

  • External DVD drive
  • A PC running, preferably, Windows 10 (this guide has been written using this OS)
  • Magic ISO Maker (the software that actually rips the disc and converts it to the rom file)

External DVD drives today cost something from 40 euros to maybe 60 euros. You don’t need a special DVD drive. You just need something that works. The DVD drive should be connected to your PC through USB. Many PCs today don’t have a DVD drive so you might need an external one. If you have internal DVD drive or something like that you can also use that.

The discs that PS1 uses are colored in black on the side that gets read in the DVD drive. That doesn’t stop the disc from being read. Note, also, that you can rip your PS2 games in this similar way if you are into emulating PS2 also.

You do need a special software. I am using currently Magic ISO Maker (trial version). However there are also some other alternatives. You might want to check them out also. Ripping the disc is pretty straightforward. You select “Tools” from the upper main menu. Then you select “Make ISO from CDRom”. There is a new window that pops up. Select your DVD drive that has the disc in it and make sure that you have connected the USB cable of the DVD drive to your PC.

Then you select your DVD drive from the drop-down menu. Now click the folder icon on the right side of the part that says “Output File” and choose the destination where you want to save the rom files and also give these files names. This doesn’t have to necessarily be the name of the game that is being ripped but that could make things somewhat easier. Then change the file format (“File Format”) to “BIN image file”. That way your game will be in a form of two files that are .bin and .cue. You need to copy both of them to your game library or the location that you are running your emulated games from.

Now make sure that there is Make CD Image selected from the radio buttons that is titled “Option”. Then just click “OK” button. Now the disc of your PS1 game gets ripped to a BIN-file and a CUE-file. You can rip multiple games and place them in some folder where you can have one game in one folder. That way you will find your games easily.

Looks Like I’ll Be Playing Gran Turismo 6 For a Long Time

Posted on by Viljami

How I got to playing Gran Turismo 6 all over again? It started when I was going through PS1 games and I got to play Gran Turismo 2. It is a very good racing game but the graphics just seem too outdated. This happened many weeks ago. I was thinking about how I stopped playing Gran Turismo 6 for PS3 and I wanted to finish it. It was in my opinion  a better game than GT 2 would be. So, I started getting back into playing Gran Turismo 6.

If we consider that almost all Gran Turismo games are very good I can, in a positivite manner, say that Gran Turismo 6 is definitely in the top three of all GT games. I am not saying that it is better than Gran Turismo 4 which is by the way a game that has such a legendary status in gamers and racing fans minds. It might compete with GT 7 that was a very good game but was maybe a short one. I didn’t actually complete, that is to play the game and achieve everything that the game has to offer, Gran Turismo 7. I did finish it although.

How Long To Beat website tells you that it takes 44 and a half hours to finish Gran Turismo 6. When I look at the statistics that the game kindly offers I find that I have completed maybe 43 percentage of the game and I have driven maybe 19 hours. This is the actual point of this blog post. I think I still have a lot to play if I wish to finish or even complete Gran Turismo 6.

Gran Turismo 6 isn’t a perfect game. Graphics are nice. They are not as nice as with GT 7. This must not be a surprise because GT 7 was released for PS4 and PS5. We didn’t see a release for Xbox as we didn’t see Forza Motorsport on PS. That has been the way since the war between PS and Xbox first became. Noways we do have some conversation about some these exclusive titles getting released for both Xbox and PS. This makes sense since a game like FFXVI is getting a release for PC and it might even be released for Xbox also.

I don’t clearly know if my controller is working fully. I checked if there would be any professional level game pads for PS3 available. This made me a bit disappointed. I only saw some Spartan Oplon controllers, which I do have a  one piece that is presented in this image next to this blog post and also there were some basic Dual Shock 3 controllers also available. I do have a racing wheel but I have to confess that I am not so into racing wheels. I just never got the hang of it and I have played with a controller since the end part of 1990s when I was getting first into these Gran Turismo games which then has lead to me to this day which I seem to be spending playing Gran Turismo 6.

Is Gran Turismo 6 a good racing game? Definitely. Should you spend almost 45 hours playing it? Well, if you do enjoy it, then go ahead. But if it feels like you have seen the whole game after 20 or so hours I advise to you to think about this decision again. I do have games that I have played hundreds of hours but these games are kind of a special cases, like NBA 2K games for me (:D). I had an idea of a blog post in which I would have discussed with you about how long would be the preferable time to spend on a video game but this current topic seemed more interesting to me. Anyways…happy Saturday to you, my reader. We’ll see each other when you read my next blog post. Take care!

PS3 Games Are Still Playable (But For How Long)?

Posted on by Viljami

This blog post is all about PS3 games and how you can play them today. PS3 has some thousands of game titles that were released through the history of the console that started its way into gamers hearths in 2007 in Europe. PS3 was released already in 2006 in North America and Japan. Its manufacturing stopped in 2015 to 2017 depending on where you happen to live.

Although the manufacturing of the console did eventually stop there are lots of used consoles still available in gaming stores world wide. Also there are lots of used games available. So, you could imagine that the console has a bright future ahead. Is this the case?

Xbox is well known of its backwards compatibility. Xbox 360, One and Series X are all partly backwards compatible. Sony made some decisions about this matter. One thing that affects the playability of PS3 games today is that PS4 never was compatible with any earlier PlayStation games. So, this includes PS1, PS2 and PS3. PS5 supports also PS4 games but not these PS3 games that were in large part released as physical copies.

PS3 games can be played on PS3 consoles. We have many different models with some models being partly backwards compatible with PS1 and PS2. I do have discovered that my PS3 has a lousy PS1 performance. It just has a terrible delay that makes playing PS1 games a nightmare.

PS3 is a very durable gaming console. How long will these used devices last in use? This might be a critical matter if we, the gamers, can’t have any newer consoles that could enable playing PS3 games. Shouls there be a sort of a mini console released of PS3? What would the gamers think about this?

As the performance of PCs gets better as time progresses we might see emulators taking over when it comes to playing PS3 games. There is already an emulator for PS3 games and the name of the application is RPCS3. It’s requires a PC with a fast CPU, GPU and 16 GB of RAM. SSD is also recommended.

So, to summarize we can say that there are many good games that are important for hobbyists world wide. It would be a damn shame if all these PS3 games would be unplayable in the near future. There are however many ways to avoid this situation. I have provided some ways and there might be something else we can do also to preserve these PS3 games so that they would be just games that we forget some day in the future.

All Original Xbox Games I Own That Are Playable On Series X

Posted on by Viljami

I have exactly only nine original Xbox games that are backwards compatible with my Xbox Series X. There are only 63 games in total out of every almost 1000 Xbox games that are backwards compatible. These games that I own are Black, Manhunt, Dead or Alive 3, Dead to Rights, Max Payne 1 and 2, Oddworld Munch’s Oddysee, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and Full Spectrum Warrior.

The fact that you can play these games with a modern hardware seems amazing to me. Owning a working original Xbox would be another way to get to play these games. The controller of modern Xbox just feels much better than the original Xbox’s controller. You don’t have to concern yourself with poor video output quality or a need to use an adapter to get an HDMI out of your gaming console. The poor quality of original Xbox’s can lead you to buy many Xbox consoles if you aren’t able to repair them by yourself. But what kind of a gaming console would last over twenty years and still work? After all the device would need some maintenance.

Now I have tens, maybe even over a hundred, original Xbox games. I have had to move some of them to storage as I have had issues with consoles getting to malfunction. I have a broken original Xbox and also a Xbox 360. The issue with my Xbox might have had something to do with a broken condenser. These things can start to leak and cause some internal damage. The symptoms were that the console wouldn’t turn off. I had to unplug the power cord just to shut down the console. Otherwise it worked fine. The problem I had with my Xbox 360 was that it didn’t read any game discs no more. This was caused by some dust that had gotten into the console. I tried to solve the issue with compressed air but didn’t eventually succeed.

Over twenty years old gaming console can have many different issues. These devices aren’t actually today made to last tens of years. I don’t think that software developers and manufacturers of electronics were really thinking in the future for such a long period. This is somewhat understandable. Today there is this scene of old games that can inspire you in many ways if you just find yourself spending some time with them. After all there are so many games and so many systems to explore. This richness should be truly acknowledged.

Xbox Series X supports many Xbox 360 games also. There are 632 games out of a total of 2155 games that are playable. What happens when we move always to more modern consoles? Are we forgetting our past? Although the original Xbox can be emulated it seems today to be a difficult task while we are already seeing emulators that you can play Xbox 360 games with on our PCs. My current PC system just isn’t powerful enough to operate an emulator of this kind. The emulators name is Xenia.

Building Your Own Steam Based PC Setup

Posted on by Viljami

This article is here to introduce to you an idea and also an alternative to something I have achieved here with my Raspberry Pi 5. I am talking about an alternative to Recalbox. This means a PC system, maybe a mini PC one, that is running also Steam. With this kind of setup it would be possible to run any game that you own through Steam. Lets begin!

What I did earlier was that I setup a Raspberry Pi 5 as a retro gaming device. I connected it to my 4K television. This system is good. Its biggest flaw in my mind is that it is not a legit device to play your retro games on. What would be a nice solution is a sort of personal computer that you have a Linux OS running in it and you could also play Steam games on it this way.

Raspberry Pi 5 is a powerful computer. However if you really want something powerful you could get yourself a mini PC that might have something like 32 GB of RAM, a proper CPU and maybe a GPU and also some disk space like for example 2 TB of SSD. As system like this can cost above 1000 or even 1500 euros. This would however be noticed as a totally legit device. It would enable you to play any PC game that you have bought through Steam.

One solution to which operating system you could use for a project like this would be Bazzite. It is a Fedora based Linux distro that can run Steam. Just search for Bazzite through your favorite search engine. I also watched a video on YouTube about this. The video was TechDweebs “This is a fun project!”. You can watch it for some more inspiration. Of course you can find it from YouTube.

If you have a Raspberry Pi 5 or some earlier one you can also try to install some other Linux distro and also play games through Steam. There are many distros available. Just remember that even Raspberry Pi 5 has limited power and doesn’t run the latest games. However it is possible to play many games that don’t have such demanding system requirements. You can also consider getting a real Steam Deck handheld console that is priced somewhere between 600 € to 840 euros. There are ways to hook up Steam Deck to your televsiion.

I wrote this blog post just to remind you of some ways that you can achieve a nice experience while playing your favorite video games. There are many alternatives to Recalbox. I think you will find the right way just for you. You might even want to buy some older game collections for your latest console or maybe you want the original retro hardware. The choice is always yours and there are lots of choices available!

Split Second – A Good Driving Game from 2010

Posted on by Viljami

I recently bought Split Second for my Xbox Series X as a digital copy. It was a cheap game (I bought it for about ten euros). I actually have played this game earlier but the platform was PC. I remembered having a great time with this game so I decided to grab it.

Split Second reminds me of Burnout 3 – Takedown. The gameplay has been adjusted. You don’t actually try to crash other vehicles. Instead you trigger some trap type of obstacles in your opponents way so that they will crash. You get power to trigger these traps by following close at your opponents tail or by drifting while you are driving in a corner.

I have to say that Split Second isn’t a perfect game. It has its flaws. Then again what game today wouldn’t have some disappointing features? The driving can’t be considered a simulation. It is actually very much like playing an arcade game. It is also already a bit outdated with its graphical presentation. This game was originally released for Xbox 360 and PC and surely also for PS3. So, I have played this video game for PC and Xbox 360.

This game reminds me of a somewhat better era for video gamers. Back in 2010 these games were easy to get into and also easier to complete finally. Every game released weren’t as ambitious commercially and in terms of how addicted gamers would become to the game that was in question. I kind of miss those days. We had way more games released. I think that every game can’t be a masterpiece. Every game cannot be a legendary one.

As there are fewer games being released and more money involved in the development process we are getting this clear picture of the state of this industry. Game developers might be aiming too high. At least thats how I feel. Well, maybe we will get some support in this matter from some indie developers.

One thing we can also have a debate about is how Nintendo has managed to get its console, Nintendo Switch, to be such a success. Switch is currently the most sold gaming console ever. It is soon passing PS2. I think its pricing and these good quality games that this platform seems to have have given this gaming device the success that it does currenlty have. Are you waiting for Switch 2? It is rumored that it will have a backwards compatibility with current Switch and also that it might not be such a powerful system when comes to pure technical performance.

As you can imagine I did play Split Second a bit over ten years ago with my PC. I have the game also as a physical copy. I have the frigging DVD disc! It is almost frightening to see these DVD boxes in my video game shelf. They are something that collectors do not wish to have. Do you have a DVD drive still in your PC? I do have, but actually I have disconnected the power supply from it. I did this partly accidentally as I had to change some parts to my desktop PC a while ago. I just haven’t had the time to try to connect the power again to the DVD drive. Actually I have also an external DVD drive that I can connect to my PC through USB. The main point of this paragraph must be that PC has been a digital platform for several years alreaady. What I mean is that if you buy a PC game you propably buy a digital copy of it.

There are plenty of good Xbox 360 and even some original Xbox games available in the digital store of Xbox. I actually bought three games just the other day for 21 euros. If you are into Xbox 360 gaming I highly recommend getting your hands on these games. It is a very good option for buying the physical game from a game store. And of course you might just have an only digital gaming console. Digital gaming seems to be more and more popular as the provess does progress.

What Are Some Reasons to Play Older Games?

Posted on by Viljami

First it has to be said that there are many reasons to play also older, or to use the right term, retro games. In this blog post I am going to explain and give some reasons that I and many others still play so to say old games. While there are many reasons to still play these games there are also reasons to play the newest games instead.

There are many things that have advanced in gaming technology. Happenings are processed more quickly since there is more memory to be used. Also, we have seen larger games. They contain more details. They have more complex scenery. These worlds offer even larger areas to be explored. The artificial intelligence of other characters than the main character has been improving.

This of course has a huge effect on what is actually happening while a player plays a video game. The game processes more data. The input of the player is analyzed more thoroughly. Some old games offer some nice game design solutions and today many game developers can make use of what was already designed in a game maybe even thirty or forty years ago. While technology has advanced also we have to remember some of these good solutions that old games had and still have.

One reason to go back to older games is of course the nostalgic feel that you get while playing a game that you have some memories with. You clearly remember the first time you started playing a game. You get the first reaction that you had and it reminds you of the feel that you had back then. The game hasn’t changed but your situation does have. The last time I had this kind of feeling was while I was playing Sonic Origins Plus. I got caught into nostalgic feel when I started playing the first Sonic The Hedgehog game. It was a huge game and also a huge character for Sega, The year that I first played this game was, I think, 1993. It brings back so many memories.

What about the way that we get to play retro games? It is a huge advantage to older game if it is easy to play it. I am talking of course about the importance of backwards compatibility. I have this way that I organize all my games. I keep these games in these two shelves that I am actually able to play with any console I have. I keep my other games in a storage. I do this because I think it is not so reasonable to keep games visible that I am not even able to play. Sometimes I like to demonstrate a game for someone visiting our home and sometimes a visitor picks up some game that he or she would like to play. And of course I myself can pick any game that I would like to play.

If you want to play retro games you have two different ways to do it. These ways are using original hardware or using an emulator. There has been a lot of conversation about emulation. I am not going to talk about so much of is emulating even legal or anything else like that. Lets just say that it is an option. Some think it is totally illegal and in a way it is. On the other hand preserving older games can be very valuable. After all we have to some way keep in touch with our video game history.

I have many gaming consoles in my setup. One part of my gaming setup has been already for some years these cool mini consoles. There have been mini consoles available for devices like PlayStation 1, NES, SNES and Mega Drive along with systems like C-64. You could of course just download an emulator for your PC and play these games but… Is it legit or legal? After all you are paying for something very interesting and valuable right here. The problem is that there just isn’t a mini console available made from all gaming systems. For example we are currently missing original Xbox and Sega Dreamcast mini console.

We talk on and on about what is the right way to play our retro games. I think the most important issue is that there has to be a connection between the old world of video games and the new world of video games. We have to somehow document our past. There are just so many games that game designers can take influences from. I think that it is a value for a game designer to know a lot about games. Of course if you know good games you can also design good games, right? You know the logic and what appeals to gamers.

Think about John Romero, one of makers of the classic FPS game, Doom. I mean, he started with playing old games in arcades. He played hundreds of hours of Pacman. He also had influences from Dungeons and Dragons, NES, SNES and Mega Drive games. And look what id Software did with Doom. It definitely revolutionized the way that we consume video games even today. Some games of this same era are Diablo and NHL 94.

So, it might not be possible to play every retro game. Do we have what it takes to document our video game history? Who has the power and responsibility to pass on these important lessons to our younger generation that doesn’t recognize all these older games? There can definitely be something to learn form them. While modern systems have the most power they also need the design. That’s where older games come into play.

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