Edit: Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition (full version) is now $14.99 / 1200 MSP on Xbox Live.

So it seems there are a lot of misinformed (or ignorant, probably ignorant) people reacting extremely negatively to Ultra Street Fighter IV. Here is my argument for why this is unfounded.

Firstly, and perhaps most importantly: The only people who are angered by this don't even play the game. Yes, that's right. I seriously doubt anyone who plays this game is upset by a $15 piece of DLC. I'm still playing this game after 4 years (in its various incarnations) and it got me into fighting games again, I am so pumped for the new version.

Secondly, check out Patrick's article about how much these updates and new characters actually cost to develop. (Spoiler alert: It's a lot)

Now for a history lesson:

Street Fighter IV, 2009, $60, Retail

- 25 characters

- God-tier versions of Sagat and Akuma (Sagat specifically was a fucking monster in this version, easy as hell half-your-life-gone combos)

- LOOK AT THAT DAMAGE.

- One ultra per character

- Weak online modes, no lobbies, no replay feature

Super Street Fighter IV, 2010, $40, Retail

- 10 new characters, Dudley, Ibuki, Cody, Guy, Dee Jay, T.Hawk, Juri, Hakan, Adon, Makoto

- 5 new stages

- Added replays, team battles, lobbies to online mode

- Brand new ultras for every character (2 per character)

- New arcade endings, new trials/challenges (not that anyone really cared)

- Total re-balance

Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition, Dec 2010/January 2011, $15, DLC, Retail version replaces SSFIV

- 4 new characters, Yang, Yun, Evil Ryu, Oni

- Total re-balance

- Somewhat controversial as it made Yang, Yun and Fei Long very dominant

Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition: Version 2012, December 2011/February 2012 (PC), $0, DLC

- Easily the most balanced version of SFIV with very few 'bad' characters

- Total re-balance

- Big ass list of balance changes here

- It's free you guys

Ultra Street Fighter IV, 2014, $15, DLC, Retail ($40) replaces SSFIV AE retail copies and comes with all DLC costumes

- 5 'new' characters (admittedly 4 of them are data mined from SFxT, but work is still having to be done for their super and two ultra combos)

- 6 new stages (rumoured to be from SFxT)

- Total re-balance

- New modes (no idea what these are yet)

- You don't need SSFIV AE to upgrade if you only have Super Street Fighter IV from 2010

So yeah. I personally see no issue with this, is it really that bad that Capcom are updating the most popular fighting game in the world? I think not.

It would be nice if these updates were free, it really would, but frankly it's a rarity that DLC is free these days and this latest piece is still providing more value than 2 hours of Saints Row III gameplay.

I started testing Google Music this weekend, because I have a MacBook Air with a measily 128GB SSD, well that's not the only reason. Call it lazy if you like but because I already have to keep my MP3 player, yes, MP3 player in sync with my PC doing the same with my laptop was quite annoying. All music gets converted down to 320kbps MP3, well if it's higher than that, that is, which is fine for my laptop/phone use, I do have a lot of lossless music but that only makes sense to have when I'm at home because that's when I'm using my proper headphones and not my portables.

The web interface is really nice and quick, moving between your music is instantaneous and since it's Google you can bet the search feature is quick & accurate with useful suggestions too. There's a few quirks though, for some reason the service randomly changed some tracks to full caps or other info, such as the name of an artist. I'm not sure why but it only happened a few times. Album art was kept intact mostly, need to fix it some of it but that's just me being a dork. Also, HTML5 support can be enabled in the labs section! Only downside is no Last.fm support. (yet)

I don't use my phone for music because touchscreens are annoying to use in the rain and require too many steps to get to the point where you're browsing your music. (esp. if you use lockscreen security) I have a little Sansa Clip+ with 40GB of space and good old fashioned physical buttons, durable as hell and I don't have to worry about using it in the rain.

I did install the app for my phone though and it's pretty swish, I'll definitely use it if I'm without my MP3 player, it's just not gonna be my go-to place for music. Oh and Google Music is free, well, you get to upload 20,000 tracks for free at least. Unfortunately it seems there's no official iPad app out yet, so hopefully that happens eventually.

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After 24 hours it has almost finished uploading everything so I can start using it properly on my laptop then. I have a 60MB connection with a horrible upload speed. (only 3MB up) It's meant to be US only, or something, but you can easily get around that. (Google it!)

Edit: Only just realised Tested has its blogs back up and running. Oops.

I've been out of the fighting game scene for about 2 months now, still watching the streams of course but didn't think I had enough time to play, (went as far as removing all my friends on the games too) but hey circumstances change, so I bought another Qanba after selling my old one and went on a re-adding spree.

This is the "limited edition" (I have no idea if it's really a limited thing) ice blue Q4RAF. It's a beauty. I plan to change the artwork eventually but here it is in its stock glory:

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Mighty excited to dig into UMvC3 again (my favourite) and Skullgirls, have to go into town today and re-buy the former. They have one used copy left and I'm pretty confident it's the same one I traded in before. Ha! I think the game could be out of print as nowhere here, or online seem to have it new. (or maybe it's selling that well)

Edit: FYI my gamertag is Funkhouser MD, I own a PS3 but after SFIV (vanilla) I decided to stay away from that console for Capcom games, no idea if it's improved since then but I had a super poor online experience when it came to connecting to games. Feel free to add me, I should mention I am in the UK, so it's probably not going to be ideal to play against people in the US.

I have just written my first review in a long time, so I was wondering if anything is sticking out or grating you.

The review in question is this one, I would like to know if you feel that I used some sort of slang or other saying too much, or repeated words too often, such as using fantastic in two sentences directly after one another. Thanks!

I'm not trying to get into reviewing or anything but I do plan on writing one for Yakuza 4 in the near future, so all of this is just as a distraction. I should really get back to studying now. Isn't it funny I can decide to write up a review but have an aversion to my real work? Well no it isn't. I feel a little bad now. D'aww.

1. Will and Norm are not that well known, yes not having their faces on the logo is a little jarring but it makes sense. Jamie and Adam will bring in a lot of new fans to the site, meaning Will and Norm get new fans too.

1.5. Yes I do think they should be on the site logo or at least near it, but it's not a big deal. They didn't kill your dog and send it to South Korea.

2. Tested doesn't get that much traffic, it's lower than Anime Vice which was pretty much the ginger stepchild of Whiskey Media. I was personally worried about Tested a few months ago due to their statistics, this change takes that worry away.

3. They are fans of Mythbusters, this is like a wet dream for them. Can't you be happy for the staff behind these sites for a change?

4. If this goes well, maybe, just maybe Tested will get invited to more events.

5. Tested has for a long time been quite devoid of written content from Will and Norm. In the last 2 days Will has put up more stuff than he has in 3 months, if this continues it's going to be a far better site for all of us. Norm has also started putting up more articles recently too, I expect they'll be even more from now on.

6. Will and Norm getting access to a lot of new toys (not those types of toys) is a good thing. Expect some fine video content.

7. The Mythbusters themselves are quite entertaining, if they are contributing to the site then this means more content for you, and like I say, them guys are capable of fine content.

8. The other Tested contributors still seem to be around, so you're getting way more content on the same site.

9. The podcast stays the same.

10. This is actually only 9 reasons. Problem?

Put your pitchforks down, go and masturbate or something.

I should have posted this on Tested but the forums are all iffy at the moment so I'd rather sling it up here.

Thanks for reading.

I'm still making my way through a few of this years games, I have been playing Skyrim on and off so I'm not going to include that, and as for Saints Row: The Third I had to wait for my friend to get back from his girlfriends house so we could play co-op, so progress there has only just picked up again as of earlier tonight, alas, I did play and complete a few other video games this year. These are the ones that really leapt out at me.

1. The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

This game is as close to perfection as any video game has been in years. There's not one major complaint that can be lamented against it. The combat is engaging, challenging and rather importantly, fun. It has a likeable cast of characters each brought to life with fantastic voice acting, writing and models. As for the visual design, it scores a home run. The world of this game is jaw dropping, there's so much detail packed into every scene. Lighting is especially impressive and it manages to trump Battlefield 3 in several areas. You should play this game, I look forward to playing it again as it has true replay value; a lot of the game changes based on certain decisions you make. It's much more than a case of 'decision A = ending A'. The free 2.0 update is also now live changing a few gameplay elements for the better and adding new modes and items. If you do not have a PC to play it on then make sure you pick it up on 360, it will not disappoint you.
 

2. Catherine

Catherine was something different, and while the game did repeat the same formula of nightmare stage followed by social interaction over and over again it didn't feel repetitive; each stage was different and got progressively more punishing and difficult as the game went on. Vincent is a very likeable character and the experience is backed up by solid voice acting, a slick visual style, some funny dialogue and fantastic music. I really enjoyed my ~13 hours spent with the game and would buy a sequel. Bravo, Atlus.

Did I mention the game took the fighting game community by storm?

3. Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3

I was not a fan of Marvel vs. Capcom 2, I considered it a broken and very odd game. Despite that, I did get hit by the hype train for Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and picked it up as soon as it came out, my friend and I played this solid on launch day until 5am in the morning, it was some serious fun. As my time with the game progressed I was taking it more and more seriously. I wasn't new to fighting games, I had been playing Street Fighter IV since launch and of course Super Street Fighter IV that came after, heading to a few tournaments and offline events in my area. So what really is it about this game I like so much? Well, it feels so responsive and fluid, it's also fun, a lot of fun. There's so many different set ups you can explore, finding out which assists allow you to extend your combos with a character, which assists allow you to set up unblockables or extremely hard to block mix-ups, all of this contributes to the game being very deep. I've enjoyed watching many tournaments featuring the game too, there's been some fantastic moments. I look forward to watching and playing more of this superb fighter. The still new Ultimate edition only makes the game crazier, and that is a very good thing.

    

 
Anyway that was my list, the other 2011 released games I finished (and liked) are Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Dead Space 2, and while I enjoyed them they didn't make enough of an impact on me to make me want to write about them a little bit. Thanks for reading!
 

Here's a good one. I have recently been on the website OkCupid and now after being on there for some time again browsing and reading profiles as you do I have come up with the following. These assumptions are almost always correct.

If they have any of the following on their profiles:

Describe themselves as "bubbly."

Assumption: Loud, talkative or annoying. Usually all three.

Talk about how much of a “girl gamer” they are.

Assumption: Played Mario Kart a few times in the past. Possibly Wii Sports.

Claim they want to be treated like a “princess”.

Assumption: Doesn’t want to lift a finger in a relationship. Obsessed with Disney.

Talks about how “random” they are and how they have a “wicked” sense of humour.

Assumption: Not funny and will still find comments such as “full of win” relevant.

Loves Japan and is apparently learning Japanese.

Assumption: Watches Naruto, secretly loves Hentai of the tentacle kind and has Google Translate as their homepage.

Claims they are a bit of a “computer nerd”

Assumption: Knows how to download and install iTunes.

Couldn’t live without their iPhone.

Assumption: Could live without their iPhone as they never do anything requiring a smartphone. Possibly plays Angry Birds.

“Please don’t message me if you tlk lyk dis, you will just be wasting you’re time”

Assumption: Doesn’t like bad spelling but is apparently quite alright with bad grammar.

I think that just about covers it, I could have squeezed a few more out but these are the ones I see often enough and I didn’t want to just start clutching at straws, thanks for letting me express my cynical self guys! It was pretty funny writing this out.

I had the idea to track how many games I actually complete this year so I whipped up a simple database. 
 

I really enjoyed this playthrough, had more fun than I did playing it on PC. I love using a keyboard and mouse but for this I did just prefer using the pad. 
 
I did all the loyalty missions, Kasumi, Overlord and Shadow Broker DLC this run. Imported a character from Mass Effect too of course, romanced Miranda, went full renegade. Loads of fun, although playing it on this difficulty did get frustrating at times. 
  
One of the most frustrating things about the combat is getting stuck in an animation, such as a flamethrower knock back, or when a shockwave comes at you. This is the main reason I died throughout the game, just getting knocked out of cover then killed before the animations ended, I was basically immobilized and utterly helpless. Very annoying and rage inducing. 
 
Another thing that's combat related is the reload button. During the Shadow Broker confrontation I was hitting X to reload, however at times I hit X to reload just as the game decided to initiate a cutscene, this resulted in me accidentally skipping the cutscene 2-3 times, so I had to die and then i just had to hold off reloading to make sure I didn't accidentally skip it that time. They really should change the button for skipping cutscenes, very annoying. 
 
As for the difficulty...well I didn't find it hard at all to be honest, a bit frustrating at times but I only died 4 times on the collector ship, which is apparently the hardest part of the game that people have spent hours on trying to get past. It really wasn't *that* bad at all, I played Infiltrator and found it a lot of fun, not that difficult or frustrating at all, just had to be patient.  It definitely got easier as I leveled up though, at the start I was simply doing awful damage to the Krogan on Omega when on the way to Mordin. 
 
Loyalty ended up screwing me over too, I had to go back to a save several hours old - Tali kept dying purely because i sided with Legion and I didn't have enough points to end the conflict. I wish somebody had told me you could side with Tali and then speak to Legion afterwards and he would still remain loyal. I do hate the fact that loyalty can decide whether squad members die, I tried 2 times to keep Tali alive but she would either die in the vents or die later on. Lame, lame, lame. I fixed it all now by going back to an old save, siding with Tali then speaking with Legion after. 
 
The DLC was great, in order of preference it would be Shadow Broker, Kasumi and then Project Overlord. Shadow Broker was fantastic and felt really complete, the extras after you complete it were fun and some of them are hilarious. I really liked Kasumi and her mission, I wish they gave her an additional loyalty mission though but she was a complete addition to the game, I was glad she commented as you play throughout the game, I was worried she'd be a silent addition to the team. Lastly, Project Overlord was good, I liked the ending of it but I definitely preferred the Shadow Broker mission pack and the Kasumi mission. (even if the Kasumi mission was very short) 
 
Really it reminded me of how fantastic a game it is and how strong a universe the series has. For me I think the personalities of the alien races is the strongest point, Drell, Krogan and Turian are all badass in their own right. 
 
Clocked in at 34 hours this time, my first playthrough of the game on PC was around 26, although that was with no DLC and on the standard difficulty.

After a long time I finished Persona 4, I won't go on about how amazing that game is (read my review instead for that!) but now I'm 7 hours into Persona 3.
 
I have to admit it was kind of boring me but has picked up a bit now, I kept waiting for something to grip me but now some of the social links are kicking in and some plot points it's really starting to get me interested. I don't know why some people call the characters robotic and lifeless as I find them the opposite. Chihiro is a lovely character, Junpei is hilarious and Yukari is pretty cool too.
 
I sort of wish I kept my PSP so I could play it on that instead as it'd keep me occupied on the 9 hour flight next month but on the other hand I'd be missing out on playing through The Answer, so I guess it sort of balances out in the end. I'll just play Chrono Trigger or Devil Survivor on my DS instead.
 
In closing though, buying a PS2 was totally worth it. I'm gonna new game+ on Persona 4 soon enough but for now Persona 3 and Halo: Reach have my attention.