Gaming

Gaming is something that has been mentioned on the homepage since the inception of this site, but I'd never actually had a page for. Let's change that!
Part of the inspiration to change this has been finding this absolutely amazing haul tucked away at the back of the family garage:

I couldn't withhold my disbelief! This collection had been hidden away for over 20 years, I didn't know we had a NES, let alone two! And the super best thing? After a clean up and some contact cleaner, all of these consoles work! Mildly disappointing for my electronics side, as it's always fun to try have a reason to open up these classics and repair them, but so amazing to be able to play them! So I've been absolutely getting back into gaming of recent, playing the original Mario especially. Also helps that the new Super Mario Galaxy movie is in theatres too.

And well, with getting into a Mario mood I couldn't help but play some Super Mario Galaxy on the Wii too! I finally got all 120 stars and can play as Luigi! Here's some pictures from towards the end of that playthrough:

I've modified the PlayStation in the picture for a PSIO unit, and have been setting up my own stash of consoles!

Yes, that's right, there's a PS5 plugged into a CRT. They call my crazy.

Wii Modding

We have two Wii's in our family, and for a long time the disc drive in the first one we owned has been broken. After finishing the game of Super Mario Galaxy on the other Wii, I realised I should get this up and running with homebrew! I used the str2hax method:

As always, backup the NAND! But now the homebrew channel is installed!

It was time to set up my dumped games for USB Loader GX, with some help from TinyWiiBackupManager 🙂.

And what better way to test than a bit of Sonic Adventure 2? I still need to get all A ranks, but I'm well on my way!

Favourites

Here's a very haphazard list of some of my favourite games:

• Nearly every mainline Sonic game
• LEGO Batman, Star Wars I and Star Wars II
• The Batman Arkham Games
• Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec
• Project Gotham Racing 3
• Spyro (OG Trilogy, A Hero's Tail, I even liked the "Legend Of" games)
• Ratchet & Clank
• PS2 era Need For Speed Games (Underground 2, Carbon)
• Zone Of The Enders
• GTA V
• Super Mario Galaxy
• Insomniac Spider-Man Games
• The Last Of Us I and II
• Tank Racer