Yesterday, while wondering around the Trafford Centre, Manchester, I was lucky enough to run into the Namco Station, a nice little arcade with some not so recent games, and some pretty new ones as well.

Tucked near a wall, in the middle of the arcade, is sitting a brand new Tekken 6 cabinet.

Bear this in mind: I've never been a big Tekken fan. While I have really enjoyed the PSP iteration, I've never been a fan of the system and if I had to choose a Namco fighter, I'd go for Soul Calibur anyday.

That said, I had a bunch of fun with Tekken 6.

The most noticeable improvement is in the graphics. Not only do characters look much better, the ambient destruction (meaning that rings and lcoations are destroyable) is extremely better compared to Tekken 5, were there was never more than one destroyed item on screen at a given time.

I did not try any of the new characters (since, you know, 1 pound to play a couple of rounds with a character I have no idea how to play with is not a good idea). I did, however, buy one of those hefty game cards that allow you to store your character data.

In that regard, I have a gigantic complaint. The customization is less than stellar. In fact, each costume for each character only allows a handful of extras (like one new hairstyle, one pair of gloves etc) making it close to useless.

To add on to the pain, the very few items you can buy for your character are extremely expensive!

Just to make an example. Playing in your classic arcade mode will grant you 25G (the currency in the game) for each win (default is first to the 3 rounds wins). Playing against another human player, instead, will grant you 1000G if you win the 4 rounds necessary.

An average item, however, can cost upward of 85000G!

Now tell me, what am I supposed to do to put a stupid flower on Asuka's hair? Walk around the arcade asking people to play me (and lose) at Tekken? It's pretty insane. The whole thing was quite a bummer for me, since I'm obsessed about charracter customization.

The major difference in gameplay lies in the new "Rage mode", a special mdoe you enter when you life is on short. When clsoe to loss, in fact, your life bar will glow red and your attacks will deal more damage.

It makes for an interesting system and makes comebacks much more possible. In fact, in a 4 round match against another arcade player, I was leading 3 - 0. He then managed to win 2 games because, when entering rage mode, his combos where enough to damage me. I won 4-2 in the end, and I have to admit that Rage made every round much more interesting.

All this said, Tekken 6 is still Tekken. I'm no pro player, but I noticed close to no improvements in the physics or combat system, meaning that experts will probably transition fast into the new game.

So I've finally reached the dreaded 1000 points line... It's time to edit like there's no tommorow!

Passing by for a fast question here...

The rest of the internet has failed to advise, so I'm just gonna ask it here... I happen to be obsessed about videogame arcades (who isn't when he can find one these days), and I'm confident someone round the bomb can give me an answer.

I'm currently on vacation in the wonderful (???) city of Manchester, England. Does anyone one of you (possibly someone who lives here) know where I can find a GOOD arcade?

I've been searching wide and long and all I've found is a DDR inside a cinema and Third Strike cabin which is stupidly fit in the middle of a bunch of casino-like slot machines...

So... pretty please, where's my arcade at?

So yea... I might have came out as a complainer on my last blog posts and all, but that's not my point, that's not what I wanted to do...

I'm not gonna cut my wrists if I have to wait some time for pending submissions... It's patience, sure, but at this point it's not just that anymore.

I know that, overall, the site is still just a beta, and no one could ever expect the system to work flawlessly... But really, what am I supposed to say when someone uploads a buttload of screenshots to some game article and gets them approved after 20 minutes, when the main article I wrote on it 3 and a half days ago (that would be during day 1 of the sites launch...) is still pending?

Why is it that a random screenshot uploaded by some point-hog becomes the main picture when the boxshot I uploaded in the early hours of monday night is still pending?

It's not about patience, I've got it. If nothing was on that page, I'd be my patient little self and shut the fuck up... But as you can see, that page is not empty, and it's not even about that page, it's about alot of other stuff.

Don't ever get me wrong, this site is the bomb in so many ways and I'm having a shitload of fun. But since the most I can contribute to is to that one series, and I've been dedicating my unsleepful nights to submitting content about that one franchise, doing the best I can, why should I not feel bad when someone random just fucks me up on the way?

Once again, I have to say it for all the cretins that'll jump on the "I'll tell him to be patient so I can like some GiantBomb asses" wagon, no hatred or complaining involved... Just a subtle form of little sadness inside...

On another, happier note, during my tasty (not for the food) vacation in England, I've stumbled upon a pretty awesome game store that was having a cool "2 for 20" (that would be british pounds) event. I managed to get myself a copy of Mass Effect and Sonic (I know it sucks, but I had to, please don't ask why) for the light price tag!

I've yet to understand all the brits complaining about game prices... Those would have costed me about three times as much in italy! (Damn you expensive euro, damn you!)