Trauma Center: Under The Knife

I've recently received Trauma Center: Under The Knife for the Nintendo DS. Great game. Truely magnificant in the sense that it does a pretty accurate replication of real surgery.

This game, like all others, has it's ups and downs. One of the good points this game has is that it puts you in a surgeon's shoes. You have to carefully and accurately perform operations on your patient, going through all the steps requried. While the first few missions seem kinda boring and redundant (you're basically doing the same operation, just with some slight alterations), the game will suddenly pick up real quick.

You will need to act fast in order to take care of multiple problems arising in certain situations. Where I'm currently at in the game, you've got to take care of multiple aneurisms in a patient. It seems like a simple job at first, after you quickly take care of the first aneurism. Then another one pops up. Then a few more. And more. I don't have the reflexes to take care of them all fast enough (I've played my DS so much that I've worn my touchscreen down to the point where it's not as accurate as it used to be, which makes gameplay harder). I tell you, it certainly gets crazy.

My only gripe with this game is the storyline. So far, nothing's really happening that seems to have any significance. To be perfectly honest, I'd, personally, prefer that the story be removed from the game, and it was more of an "everyday life" (in a surgeon' shoes, of course) sort of thing. But that's just me. I'm sure that there are some people that love the story. Then again, I've no clue how far into the game I really am, so maybe the story hasn't had time to progress yet.

The graphics in this game are pretty much up to par with what I'd expect on the DS. Since the DS is about as powerful as a Nintendo 64, the graphics seem to be as good as you can get. Looks like they didn't leave anything behind. Though, while the game might not seem 3D at all, it is, slightly. It's hard to tell, unless you're zooming in on an area to operate on, you can see organs fly past you with depth perception. But when you're not zooming in, and you're slicing away at a tumor, it seems rather 2D. But, it works out just fine. I'd rather not be seeing distracting 3D stuff flying around while I'm working on a dying patient.

The sound department, however, is rather lacking, in my opinion. Nothing really stands out. There's not much music in the background or anything (which may be a good thing. Wouldn't want to be headbanging with a scalpel two centimeters from the heart or anything like that). It seems rather dull while you're operating. With a game like this, though, there's really not a lot of room for oustanding music. Though something a little ambiant would've been nice, if you ask me.

One more thing I'd like to mention. This is one of the few games that relies entirely on the touchscreen and stylus. There are other games which use only the buttons, or the buttons in tandem with the touchscreen, but this game is entirely stylus. This is very nice, to me, because there's no need to switch around in options and fumble around while you've got a limited amount of time to save a patient.



All in all, I'd give this game an 7/10. It's a great game, but it could be better.


-D14BL0

Amazon ripped me off.

Out of nowhere, Amazon.com decides to delete my account. I've enetered in my email address and password that I've used to log in plenty of times, and yet I can't log in, nor can I retrieve my password. Yet, my wishlist and Amazon profile are still available to be viewed. So my account must still be there. The only question is... Where?

I can't log in or retrieve my password. But I still exist. My only guess is that maybe there's a problem with their servers or something. I'll try again in a couple days (though I did mean to order something today) and see what happens. Hopefully this is nothing serious. I hate having to re-register for stuff because somebody screwed up. The way I see it, it's just common decency to fix the problem without making the user have to start fresh.

But oh well. I don't rule this world, so I won't pretend to.

Plugging some websites.

Shameless, I know.




For those who don't know, I'm an avid video gamer. I love playing video games, and I could go on for a while about them.

But I'll spare you that.

What I will do, though, is provide the world a link to one of my favorite websites, YVGS (Your Video Games Suck). It's where we take video games and write negative reviews about them. All in good fun, of course.

Why, exactly, am I putting a link to YVSG on my blog? To show off some of my works, of course. I've written most of the reviews on the site (too lazy to count them at the moment, but I'd say about half).

• Advance Wars: Dual Strike
• Billy Hatcher And The Giant Egg
• Custom Robo
• Diablo II
• Diablo II Expansion Set: Lord Of Destruction
• Dragonball Z: Budokai
• Fire Emblem: Path Of Radiance
• Gunbound
• Kirby Canvas Curse
• Mario Kart: Double Dash
• Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes
• Metroid Prime
• Metroid Prime 2: Echoes
• Metroid Prime Pinball
• Phantasy Star Online: Episode I And II
• Red Faction II
• Resident Evil 4
• Sonic Adventure 2: Battle
• Sonic Heroes
• Soul Calibur II
• Starfox Adventures
• Super Smash Brothers: Melee
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time
  

A full list (which is updated every time I write another article) can be found on my YVGS user page.

Warning, though. Most (if not all) articles on the wiki contain dreaded "curse words". So be sure that you're not letting your child read it, if you're one of those over-protective parents. There's never going to be offensive images on the site, though, as that would go against our guidelines, so, essentially, it's work-safe.

If anybody is to read any of the articles I've put together for YVGS, let me know what you think. Remember, it's entirely in good fun, no matter how much it might seem that I hate the game. I'd just like to hear opinions on my works. Constructive criticism is also appreciated, as well.

Just don't mention anything I've misspelled on the site. Half of the articles I've published I've been too lazy to spell check, so I know some stuff isn't spelled correctly. If you happen to notice any of that, please feel free to register and edit the article, correcting any typos or grammar errors you've noticed. If you do so, just follow the rules located on the FAQ page.



Another site I'd like to direct your attention to is [Boxed Thoughts], which was created by a friend of mine. Rather simple idea, and it got some media attention, too (it was mentioned on TWIT and G4's Attack Of The Show. It's a site where you can anonymously publish 10-second thoughts into a 10x10 px squre every few hours. While I've become a bit inactive on the site, I still check it from time to time, just to see what everybody's thinking about.

That's all I have for today. Until next time, good bye.

-D14BL0

Among the "elite"?

Yes, I finally made myself a blog on Blogger. I've had my own blogs on various other sites, yet Blogger has always evaded my interest. I never hear anything about the Blogger "community", if there even is a real community.

Which is why I've always stuck to LiveJouranl and MySpace, even though I tend not to use the latter.


So, what will I do with this new blog of mine? Not a clue. Mayhap I'll post my opinions on current events. I might put up reviews of movies or video games or the like.

Maybe it'll just be random ramblings. Only time will tell.