Personally I prefer to play on original hardware rather than emulation (it's a bit like the old CD vs vinyl debate!) That's not to say emulation isn't great in a lot of circumstances, but I tend to prefer the real hardware. Timing is one thing I often notice is inaccurate or erratic in emulated games, my favourite example being Samus' wall kick in Super Metroid, which I often use as a quick acid test of a SNES emulator.

I've put together a collection of various JAMMA games that are favourites of mine and use a Supergun to play them. While it's a bit of a pain swapping delicate boards (the encased boards of the CPS1 Q-sound era onwards are a godsend), it's great to be able to play the original hardware. Obviously certain early non-JAMMA games need extra wiring to work, but it can be worth the effort if you're into this sort of hobby. :)

Yeah I've found the decals on VAIOs rub off just by looking at them. I think within 6 weeks my last VAIO had lost all the labels for the ports on the sides, and all I'd done with the laptop was pick it up from one place and put it down in another. Several of the keys had lost parts of the letters too. The wrist guards also tend to show rub marks and wear after about 12 months too.

VAIOs look lovely on display in the Sony Centre, but give it a few months and they start to look quite ratty. For the price premium I would expect something that is designed to withstand normal usage a bit more robustly. Although I'm sure people wouldn't buy replacements as often if their old laptop still looked pristine!

Don't forget all the Lotto scratch cards! ;)

I don't see why the chavs need this anyway. All the ones that live near me have already have PCs, mobile phones, cars, PS3s, Sky Sports subscriptions, etc all thanks to their generous benefits payouts.

I thought we were supposed to be cutting back on government spending, I'd like to know how much the dedicated helpline they're promising will cost for starters...

I agree, Reach seems to be missing the more colourful and bright look of the previous main instalments. As well as the texture and frame rate issues you mentioned I noticed quite frequent AI bugs, with characters getting stuck and not moving, just popping out of existence and on one occasion Kat just teleported into the passenger seat of the Warthog after I left her behind. I often see the AI in Halo games used as the gold standard, but I wasn't that impressed with this one. Makes me wonder if maybe the game was a bit rushed to hit the launch date MS set for it...

Are you using the classic rectangular block controller or the "dog-bone" controller of the NES2? I'd never used the dog-bone prior to last year when I bought an AV Famicom and I was absolutely blown away at how comfortable and easy to use the controller is. It's probably the third best controller Nintendo have ever made after the Super Famicom and N64 pads.

Before that the NES had never been a particular favourite of mine, even though it was responsible for my life long addiction to videogames. I was quite shocked at the difference a controller could make, and I'm regularly turning the system on for a bit of Kirby's Adventure or Duck Tales 2. I can even finish games I never had a chance of finishing as a child, like Super C and the Turtles Arcade Game. Although to be fair my Super C cart is a pirate that lets you always have the spread gun. ;)

For its time, the NES controller was the best thing I'd ever used, prior to that I'd been using great big joysticks on my C64 and Atari ST that were never very easy to use. In hindsight the concave buttons and sharp corners weren't the best ideas, but they were better than anything else on the market!

I play games on mine! :) My current netbook plays stuff like GTA Vice City and Aliens vs Predator (1999) really well.

I'm about to replace it with an Alienware M11x so I can play modern stuff like Mass Effect 2 on the go. Basically it's a portable Xbox 360 for me. It should have the horsepower for most emulators too.

I hate this too. I'm still upset Shenmue II ended on a massive cliffhanger with Sega clearly not intending to finish the story.

More recently Ubisoft have been doing it in a lot of their games, and in the case of the Prince of Persia reboot, they've already abandoned it for a Sands of Time sequel to cash-in on the film coming out this summer.

The article talks about rating online games based on their demographics and moderation systems, but I believe even that is pointless. Just look at Nintendo, I lost count of the number of hairy dicks people had drawn on the front of their karts in Mario Kart DS, and that game has no text or voice chat and no webcam features. No matter how many people you ban for inappropriate behaviour, there will always be someone new on the game ready to mis-behave.

The ESRB can't rate online interactions and they're right not to try to do so. The only thing they should be doing is educating parents about the risks of playing games online and recommending that parents monitor who their kids are talking to in those games.

It's the same reason why Final Fantasy XIV is "exclusive" to PS3 initially, because Sony allow you game alongside players from other platforms, which in this case is the PC version. Microsoft policy is not to allow this, although there have been exceptions like Final Fantasy XI and Shadowrun.

Besides, do you really want 13 year old Xbox and PS3 owners with headsets in the same game together? It would instantly set a world record for the most times the word "gay" was said in a single minute.