If you're wondering why I haven't posted a new gamer diary in a while it's because of 3 reasons.

1. I've been busy. Between updating two comics, having 3 classes and an internship I just wasn't finding the time

2. The old DVD player I was using to port out my PS2, VHS, and working DVD player conked out on me, and it is really inconvenient to switch out the cords all the time (as my tv only has 1 aux thing and it's at the back)

3. My dog Sergeant died. Sergeant had sort of a weird relationship with my video games. Despite the fact I'd never harmed him when playing, and yelled at him even without playing, he became terrified to be around me whenever I played a game. So whenever I flipped on my DS or my pS2 he would always run out of the room. Me playing a game without him running away was something I wasn't ready for.

But it's kind of appropriate that the game I come back to after losing him is from the series that got me into gaming in the first place.

Follow up:

Before the age of 11 I actually hated video games. I found them all frustrating and boring, because the only games I had ever seen in my life were sidescrollers. And I *HATE* sidescrollers. But one day I was sick at a babysitter's house and picked up the gameboy to play Pokemon Blue. And it was totally fun. Shortly after I begged for a Pokemon game and I was initiated into the wonderful world of gaming.

I had actually been a little reluctant to get Platinum. After the brilliance of Gold/Silver/Crystal I was desperately disappointed by Ruby/Sapphire. Sure, the graphics were great, but the 3rd generation designs were awful, the gameplay was lackluster, and most of the best 1st and 2nd generation pokemon couldn't even be ported into the game because there was no backwards compatibility! After that and seeing some of the 4th gen pokemon, I was less than enthused to invest in buying a DS and a new Pokemon game. But after getting a DS for KH 358/2 and finding a cheap copy of Platinum on Amazon, I figured, what the hell, right?

So have I been disappointed?

Actually, so far, so good.

I haven't made it to the first gym yet, but I can't say I'm hating the game. The graphics are great, the DS controls are nicely intuitive and the brilliant people at Nintendo finally had the sense to keep some backwards compatibility in mind. There are a few things that bug me, however.

First is the tutorials. Even in the original, very first incarnation of the game, most of the tutorials were optional. You didn't need a tour of the towns, you didn't have to see how pokemon were caught, you didn't need to be shown every, tiny, little, detail. Not only are there tutorials for EVERYTHING, there is no way to avoid them. *Headdesk* So for someone who has played every generation of the game since Red/Blue that was verging on painful.

The start of the story is a little odd too. The idea of two rivals is kinda cool, but Rowan puts way too much of a philosophical motive behind being a trainer. In Red/Gold/Ruby it was always, you're 10 years old, go out there and fill this Pokedex. Also, that blonde haired kid is too much of a spaz.

What will I make of the rest of it? Well, we'll see.