Parcelforce are *BLEEP*

Hi people!
That's yet another day passed by without getting the figure that i was supposed to get within 48 hours, a figure that was posted last Thursday!! I called parcelforce yesterday to ask where my parcel was and they told me that it only left their depot not long ago and that it would definately be with me today, well... it's still not here. It costs more than £9 for that service and it's utter SHIT! 
So in case anyone was thinking of using Parcelforce in the future.. Don't. It's a total ripoff and they don't even deliver when they say they are going to. 
It better be here tomorrow, because if it isn't that's at least a week from when it was sent for the princely sum of £9. If it had been sent first class recorded with Royal Mail it would have definately been here by Saturday, Monday latest and it probably wouldn't have cost much more than £3.65. What an utter joke. I've never been so annoyed at paying a high postage cost for such a shite service. Anyways... Nevermind. Rant over.

So you may have noticed a large change if you've visited this blog before, i've added every game that i'll be writing about (i may have missed one or two), i've only added a logo for most of them, this is because i'll need to get playing them before i write anything. I've found that i've more to write about if i'm playing the game at the time. 
I did add a small amount to Final Fantasy I, this is because i am playing it at the moment. You'll also find a tip for beating X-ATM092 for Final Fantasy VIII on the relevant tab.

Please feel to have a nosey around and if you keep an eye on my posts, i'll let you know if anything new has been added to a particular section. So you won't need to keep checking the page.

Again, please feel free to comment leave me feedback or anything like that. As of yet the only person to say anything about this blog is my own fiancé and she lives with me! So come and let me know that i'm not doing all this for nothing, it's getting depressing!

Thanks for reading (if you are)        

Tomorrow Tomorrow

Hi fans!

Yet another setback for me, once again the figure that i am waiting for in the post is late! It was meant to be here today for definite, but it turns out that i won't be getting it until tomorrow now. So those pictures i've been promising will yet again have to wait another day!

But in the meantime i managed to get some stuff done on the Final Fantasy VIII page at last, the Final Fantasy VII one is by no means finished yet either, but i thought i had better start adding different games. As it happens i am playing Final Fantasy VIII at the moment, so i'll be able to give fresh tips and tricks for the game, rather than just trying to remember them or googling them!

I've added a guide for defeating X-ATM092 on your first mission to Dollet, so be sure to give that one a try if you haven't before! It was a bit frustrating but i got there today! I kept trying to squeeze as many fights in as possible but i kept finding that if i tried 8 battles i wasn't left with enough time to get to the beach. So i had to settle for 7 battles and 350 AP for my Guardian Forces. 

I hope you are all well, please feel free to leave some comments and or some feedback about what you are all reading. I'll post some pictures of my latest addition when i have it myself!

Thanks for reading.     

The Latest

Sooo, i've not written anything for a little while, that's because i've been playing Final Fantasy VIII quite a lot and because the internet has been cutting out so much that if i tried to do anything it'd be near impossible, then i get angry and angry isn't good! haha

I did manage to start another blog ( a bit of fun really, but nobody has contributed yet) so head over and check it out, write out the next section, its just a bit of fun, something i did with some friends in school once and thought i'd be cool to replicate, it's called the Never Ending Story, click HERE to check it out! My fiancé and i came up with the idea the other night when we were talking crap, we kept adding sections to some imaginary story, something we totally made up there and then. It was really funny and thought it'd be funnier with even more people! So please head on over and check it out and tell your friends! It should be funny.

Anyway as i mentioned i'm playing Final Fantasy VIII at the moment, I'm only up to the communications tower in Dollet, but i'm preparing to kick X-ATM092's ass! I know farming xp and ap isn't supposed to matter too much in this one because the monster's levels scale, but i still definately feel like i have an edge when i've done it. Other than that, i've been collecting the Triple Triad Cards. That's been fun too, i've literally spent hours just farting about on it and barely any time bothering with the storyline. I've come across some ideas for tips and things already, so tomorrow i'll probably start on the Final Fantasy VIII tab. 

That reminds me, tomorrow i SHOULD be getting Bahamut Sin, that means a nice new shiny set of pictures to put on here under the Final Fantasy VII label. So keep an eye out tomorrow for my latest figure addition!

Before i finish though, i just wanted to warn anyone who buys or is thinking about buying any Final Fantasy figures from Ebay at the moment, a couple of weeks ago my fiancé ordered me the Master Creatures Bahamut figure from someone called gamestar21st, it took a week for him to send it and when i finally got it in last week i was very, very disappointed. He had advertised the figure as brand new and sealed, pristine condition, mint and all the rest of it, but when i got the figure in, the box was yellow, one of the ties that was supposed to be holding the figure in place was laying in the bottom of the box and the worst of all, the figure was actually broken. So not only had he lied about it never having been opened, he lied about the condition and he also lied to us about when he posted it. Well the worst of it is, we sent it back and got a full refund, only to find that he's re-listed the item saying that it's pristine and unopened! Now unfortunately someone else has purchased it from him and i couldn't find a way to tell them what's on the way to them! I reported him to ebay but they never took down the listing in time... (if they were going to at all), since then, we've noticed that he's had two more neutral feedback because figures he's sent other people had been opened and damaged. So please, please avoid gamestar21st on Ebay at all costs! He's a total liar and you'll regret buying anything from him!

Anyways i hope you are all having fun whatever you are doing (playing final fantasy games i hope) and enjoy the rest of your Sunday night! Feel free to comment etc...

Back in Action

Hi there people!

Right, I've had a short break as you will have noticed, from posting things on my blog, i wish i could say i spent that time playing lots of games, but instead i spent it setting up games!

Over the past couple of days i have been experimenting a bit with getting Final Fantasy VII and VIII to work on Windows 7 and trying to make sure they run full screen and at a slightly higher resolution.
I tried the latest version of Final Fantasy 7 for the PC (2012 version) but something just didn't seem right, probably the music to be honest.
Funnily enough the new version looks the same as the original pc version but with the fan-made Aali's graphics improvements. (Higher resolution etc)
I'm still trying to work out the best way to get the music the same as the original psx version, but for now i'm taking a break. 

I also got Final Fantasy VIII to work using he same graphic improvements, but i've not made any other changes, not yet at least.

Both games look great with this addition and can both be played fullscreen.

Now onto the blog , today and from now on i'll be working on the tabs, FF7 & FF8, i'll add the next figure that i get, as soon as i get it. But in the meantime, i'll be working on the static pages.
I'd like people to actually give me some feedback though. 
So far in 2 weeks i've had nearly 500 pageviews and nobody other than my fiancé has given me any feedback on here. I'd like to know if you like what you see, if you don't, i want suggestions as to what you'd like to see, if you have any content you think should be added, any news you want shared, anything at all. I'd just like some feedback after all the work i've put in so far.
So get involved, this isn't just me rattling on, i want the fans of the games to interact with me and each other here. 
There's a lot of great stories and experiences to be shared involving these games and it'd be great to hear them!

Later today i'll add some more to the tabs as i mentioned, i was wondering if anyone would like any simple-ish instructions on how to get a basic (slightly improved resolution) version of Final Fantasy VII and or VIII running on Windows 7 (i'm not sure if its the same for older operating systems), if anyone thinks it'll be worth adding, let me know!

Thanks for reading!

Bit of a Lazy Day

Heya Final Fantasy Fans!

Sorry for the lack of new content or interaction today, I've had a bit of a lazy day today and didn't really bother with anthing. As some of you may or may not know i was waiting for a Master Creatures Bahamut to arrive in the post. 
Well it arrived this morning and guess what!? It was broken. 
The seller described the item as mint condition and unopened, he also stated from a smoke and pet free home. Well the box was a yellowy discoloured looking thing, which i admit wasn't damaged, but it looks like it had been sat in smoke for a good few years. Then when i opened the box, which was stuck down at the sides by what looks like the smaller desktop sellotape sized tape, i could clearly see one of the ties for the statue sitting at the bottom of the box loose. I then took out the statue and where the megaflare meets the mouth it was snapped! It also looked like there was some dust on the shoulders that he couldn't get rid of or missed.
So after all the anticipation and waiting... It was a major disappointment! Not only that, but the actual statue was a LOT smaller than all the pictures i've seen of it, made it out to be.
So this afternoon i sent it back to the seller and should receive a full refund shortly.

However!

It may have been a stroke of luck, because in it's place i have found a Final Fantasy VII Advent Children Bahamut Sin figure, also by Play Arts. I'm not usually after the Advent Children figures because i prefer the game stuff. But this was too awesome looking to pass up! I've had a quick look online since and I've only seen some on Amazon.com for $300 and some more on Ebay.com for anywhere between $150 and $300. I'll let people guess what i paid for it, but i can safely say it's nowhere near that much!
The seller said they would send it to me Tomorrow or Thursday using a 48hr courier service. As soon as it's in and assuming there's nothing wrong with it, i'll be posting pictures of it on here to show all you lovely people!

In the meantime, i'll be adding more content to the Final Fantasy VII tab (tomorrow probably).

On another note, i played that Dust 514 beta today for the Playstation 3, which is linked to Eve online. I can't say i'm too sure about it yet. I love the idea but i'd say it needs a bit more work, for a start the interfaces and text were far too small to read properly half the time, and i've got a decent sized tv! The combat felt a tiny bit laggy but then it's an online game, but at the same time, so is CoD etc and that's smooth most of the time. I'd say give it a try, but don't expect greatness yet... It still needs some work.

Thanks for reading!

Apologies for Mistakes

I just went through and re-read the last post and subsequently had a quick scan of my older posts, i noticed quite a few mistakes in the last post and didn't spot any in the older ones (thankfully).
Today has been an epic fail in the technology department, the internet has been cutting out on me on and off for the entire day and has been messing with my writing flow.

You know when you're typing and you know whats coming next, well everytime my net cut out, that got interrupted. As well as my own errors, for some reason "it" (whatever it was) decided that when i put my links in the post, it would throw a few of them at the end of the appropriate paragraph instead of where it was intended to be. So i needed to go back and replace them.

Oh and the keyboard on my laptop is fail, it often doesn't pick up letters when i type them, sometimes i pretty much need to bash the key before it picks it up haha. 

So all that mixed in left me with a lot of proof reading and post production editing lol

Anyway that should all be corrected now, apologies for any inconvenience and crapness of that last post due to it. (Typical since that one is my favourite figure set)

Thanks for reading, comment and recommend to your pals etc!

Final Fantasy VII - Cloud Strife & Hardy Daytona Play Arts Vol.1 #0

Here is the pride and joy of my collection so far, the Cloud Strife & Hardy Daytona Play Arts figure. This was purchased from Ebay like the rest of my collection but the person selling it to me was getting rid of it for his son, he said it didn't look like the box had ever been opened. It had been opened but i only know that because the seal was broken, you wouldn't have known otherwise.

This set is pretty much mint condition and is absolutely fantastic.

The set consists of exactly the same Cloud Strife figure as the Vol.1 # 1 edition, he's around 8.5" tall and comes with spare hands and his infamous Buster Sword. The figure is based on the game version of
and not the Advent children version. The figure is highly detailed and has over 22 points of articulation, which allow you to pose him in various different ways. I've chosen one of his most iconic stances for the individual cloud and another one that should be VERY familiar for the one on the Daytona. It comes with the peg for the back that i mentioned in the Vol.1 #1 edition, this makes it a lot easier to keep the sword in place when you have him holding it over his shoulder. When not using the peg, there is a small plug that you can put into the hole, this is fairly discreet and unless you're looking for it, it doesn't look out of place.

Now onto the bike, this is a work of art! The bike measures in at around 13" in length and at it's tallest point (around the handles) it's about 6" high. It is quite a weight and is very well made. The wheels feel like they are made of rubber (quite hard but soft) and they obviously do turn, they aren't fixed. There is a kickstand (i think that's what it's called haha) underneath it to keep the bike upright and stable, but i didn't really use this when displaying it with Cloud, i'll tell you why shortly.
The attention to detail and everything about this bike is absolutely fantastic! It could almost be mistaken for a real one that had been somehow miniaturized! I mentioned earlier there is a good weight behind it and it's very sturdy. It's hard for me to explain but the weight and feel of the actual bike just adds to the appeal, it's so well made you can't help but love it!
When displaying the bike, i tried to make it so that Cloud had one foot on the ground and the bike was slightly tilted, this left Cloud's other leg bent at the other side of the bike, which looks cool in my opinion, Cloud is also holding out his Buster Sword as though he's ready for some Bike Fight action.
At first i wasn't sure if Cloud would get on the bike but his legs can be pulled further apart than you first realise, once this was done i could position him nicely on top of the bike and clip one of the handlebars into his hand. My major problem was trying to get the bike to not fall over in this position, i found that putting the kickstand down a bit and putting a bit of blu tack under Cloud's foot kept the bike in place, but i'd still be careful around it due to the weight of the bike. I would just use the kickstand and keep it stable, but then I'd lose the tilt and Clouds feet would both be off of the floor.

I haven't done this in the pictures because i didn't want blu tack on the table i was taking the pictures on, but i did try and get the figure as identical to how he's normally displayed as possible.

The packaging for the set is superb as always, the Vol.1 Packaging is very well designed and looks just as nice as what's inside most of the time. Once again it is a matt black colour with the silvered Play Arts lettering on the front at the bottom. The Final Fantasy VII logo is also on the front, along with the name and number of the set. The sides are fairly standard with a small image on one side and the name of the set on the other. The back of the packaging actually shows the image of how i had him displayed (the large image) along with a few other views of and the Daytona, it also displays the other figures that are included in the Vol.1 set. Other than that it's the usual smallprint in the corner. Underneath the box is the Square-Enix shop info.

I would definately recommend this set, it is my favourite of all the figures i have shown you so far and probably will remain the favourite or one of them, for a long time to come. It wasn't too cheap (not for me) but at the same time i think i got it at a decent price. I've seen this set selling on ebay for more than £100. The detail and care that has gone into making this set so accurate and amazing is fantastic! It's going to be fun re-running some of the bike minigames and storyline section with this in my peripheral vision! Buy it if you can find it!

Here are the pictures:

 

Final Fantasy VII Collectible Edition by Bandai

Thought I'd add another one of my additions to my figures, my most recent one, the by Bandai. This collection features four figures and two extras. In this set are Tifa, Barret, Cloud and Aeris along with a Frog and a Chocobo.
As with my other figures, this was purchased second hand from Ebay at a good price, i have seen it selling for more than double what i paid.
Unfortunately the packaging got a lot more battered than i expected in the post (the listing picture looked almost new) but the figures inside are mint.

These figures aren't nearly as well made as the figures, the arms fall out quite easily when posing them, they are slotted into the figure and can be removed at any time, this is the same for their heads.  However they do feel quite sturdy and probably wouldn't break. 
These figures are around 5" tall give or take and come with a small selection of weapons, some of which i'm not sure even belong with this set (the machine gun). Cloud's buster sword and a Staff for Aeris are included but these are both soft and can be easily bent out of shape.

The main attraction of this set for me were Barret Wallace and the Chocobo, this is because to my knowledge there has not been any other figure of Barret other than this one made by Bandai, he is sold separately but i think better value is in getting him with the set.

The packaging isn't bad but i wouldn't say it was very good either, it has images on the back, showing each of the different characters and on the front it's fairly standard too, the cardboard is also very flimsy (which is very apparent in the pictures).

If you can get this set at a decent price i would recommend it just so you can have a figure of Barret Wallace, which is otherwise impossible to find (as far as i know)

Here are the pictures: