Everyone has been very busy this last month as the fiscal year comes to an end, as such we’re all stressed out and a good gaming session is exactly what the doctor ordered.  Here’s what we’ve been relieving the tension with.

ArchangelUK

The Orange Box (X360)
I finally spent money on the game and have already worked my way through it pretty convincingly, sorting out the majority of the achievements.  Yes, even finding all the lambda caches! Achievements are kind of my thing at the moment it has to be said as I try and catch up my senior team members with their massive gamerscores.  Now if only I had broadband so I could get the online ones!  HL2 Episode 1 has irked me a little, as the bridges in the Citadel core broke and didn’t move when they should have, leaving me stranded and screwing up my “One Bullet” run.  I’ve just spent £50 on items from the valve store, so while I sip water from my Aperture Science mug and listen to the soundtrack I can think of the joys of Portal and how I am SO not getting the Neighbourhood Watch achievement on Episode Two.

Mario & Sonic At The Olympic Games (DS)
Well it IS my game after all, so with all the demoing and sorting out of things I was bound to have played it more than once or twice.  Hopefully my DS will appear soon so I can go back to reducing my 100m time.

SD! Vs Raw 2008 (X360)
It came with the console deal, and hey I like wrestling - its like a soap opera without the misery and people asking telling their daughters to eat up their chips.  SD! Vs Raw 08 is a hideously flawed game in places (Do you want to relinquish your title? No. You have relinquished your title!) but again its rather good on the achievement points.

SEGA Superstars Tennis (Wii)
Its an early build the version I have alas, but I’ve been enjoying it far too much to care.

Forza Motorsport 2 (X360)
Another bundled title. my driving may be awful but I’m racking up the wins at least.

Mark OC

I have spent most of my time recently travelling around Europe and playing Viking: Battle For Asgard (out on 28th March!). I have also found a little time to play Super Mario Sunshine, Guitar Hero 3, Mario & Sonic at the Olympics (DS), Call of Duty 4 and also revisited an old favourite - Crackdown.

El Magnifico

Football Manager Live has been my main vehicle of play this past month, purely through commitment to work and for research purposes, of course. It remains my ultimate life goal to leave Dynamo Dave FC in a state of financial ruin and see Electronic Hearts as the dominant club at SEGA. Other than that, I’ve been keeping my consoles warm with the following:

Outrun 2 SP
Still awesome at capturing a sense of serious speed, and the drift is enormously satisfying. A killer soundtrack, too.

Ghost Squad
The thinking man’s mindless shooting game.

Professor Leyton and the Curious Village
This is my way of salvaging grey matter after bringing out my savage side on Ghost Squad. A very satisfying puzzler. 

Dave K

I went all retro this month digging out my old Atari ST and sampling some Football Management classic. The original Football Manager got an hour of my time, before I bored of this and moved onto the challenge of guiding England to glory on Tracksuit Manager.

As ever, Football Manager Live & Pro Evo made up my staple gaming diet for February. But, I did manage to squeeze in a little Mario & Sonic on the Wii.

The Big Cheese

Trying to improve my team’s ranking in Football Manager Live BETA, I’ve got a warchest of £2M for the start of the new season and I’m trying to pick up a bargain from my shortlist.
 
Other than that, PS2 Katamari has been revisited, not only for the fantastic gameplay but also for the funky songs. I’ve collected further stars on Super Mario Galaxy, been shooting like a loon on the PS3 version of The Club and been building an empire on Civ 4.
 
Final Fantasy Tactics on the PSP is making those long train journey’s whizz by, Cooking Mama 2 and Mario and Sonic DS are also complimenting the handheld fun.

So I’ve had Jetix email me and now the Guinness Book of Records! Guinness World Record’s Gamer’s Edition will be attempting the ‘Largest gathering of Games characters’ on March 18, 10.30 for 11am at the Millenium Bridge, London and are looking for all cos players and gamers to come down and make Guinness World Record history!

SEGA are teaming up with Guinness to support the event, with Sonic himself in attendance to wow the crowds as well as one of his other fellow SEGA Superstars NiGHTS. 

So if you think you could maybe make a good Dr. Eggman, Knuckles, Amy Rose or even be someone non-SEGA like the King of All Cosmos (Katamari Damacy), Master Chief (Halo) Dante (Devil May Cry) or Gabe Logan (Syphon Filter) then we want to see you there so we can bust that record! To register please e-mail gamesgathering@guinnessworldrecords.com

All characters will appear in the Guinness World Record Gamers Edition 2009 plus on the website as well as receiving a gift for their efforts!

The record attempt celebrates the inaugral Guinness World Record Gamer’s Edition that is on sale now and is bursting with new records, high score statistics and fascinating facts.

In addition Guinness World Records are also searching for the next new gaming record breaker to join the hallowed ranks of the book. Applicants are being encouraged to upload their scores on the Gamer’s Edition website, http://gamers.guinnessworldrecords.com  to enter the challenge. 

Being the boss of this rabble is a tough life; I have to sit here waving my silver cane shouting at them to play more games, while I try to fathom out what delicacy to eat at lunchtime.

Well, it’s going to get harder as we now have another new person to look after. Welcome to David Hanson, who’ll be given the massive responsibility of playing Football Manager LIVE all day. Check out David’s blog here soon.

Another important part of the day is deciding who makes the tea/coffee. Because of the gravity of this task, a few months ago we incorporated a serious method of brew creation management. It’s Tee for Tea!!

A quick dash over the road to Argos, purveyors of cheap sporting goods, allowed us to unlock the “putting green acquired” achievement. A slower dash back from Argos (the road was busier) was followed by a frenzy of cardboard ripping and sellotape picking. We now owned our very own Belfry.

Rules are simple, Tee off from the carpet near the printer, get on to the green and then putt uphill into the hole for glory. Glory is basically taking fewer goes than anyone else, the unlucky or “rubbish” golfer who takes the most putts is sent to the kitchen to make hot warming drinks for the winners (or a glass of water for ArchangelUK who likes cold things).

We’ve also been tracking the stats on whose been the tea maker fool the most (come on we all play FM, how could we not make a league table) and here they are:

Martin The Fat Ninja - 26
Dave - 11
The Big Cheese - 9
ArchangelUK - 6

As you can see from the picture below, Martin the fat ninja hasn’t quite grasped the concept of golf.

Keep any eye out for more office updates, thanks for reading!

I know you lot are a creative bunch so I thought I’d kick off a little competition; recreate your favourite SEGA moment using nothing but MS Paint (or other freeware paint program for Mac users).

We’ll publish our favourite ones here and there’s a prize for the best one.

Simply upload your pictures to somewhere like Flickr and include a link to your image in a response. We’ll then check your work and display it if we think it’s worthy or just funny.

To give you an idea as to the sort of thing we’re after, I created my favourite moment; me beating someone at Virtua Fighter on the SEGA Saturn without looking at the screen.

If you’ve been reading my blog about my trip to the NiGHTS community leaders in Edinburgh you’ll have noted I showed you a picture of the delightful TRiPPY in her fantastic NiGHTS costume. 

Now I know there are a lot of cosplayers out there.   You may also remember waaaaay back last year I bemoaned the lack of SEGA cosplaying people at VGL in London on my review blog of that event. Grim Fandango? No thanks. Master Chief? Pff.

So now here’s your opportunity to show your colours - we want to see pictures of you cosplaying as SEGA characters, now it has to be you okay? I’m sure there are hundreds of photos online of Asian babes dressed up as Ulala (we’ll probably do some research later on to find out the exact total).  This has to be you dressed as a SEGA character.

Send them to our blogs email (blogs@sega-europe.com) and as long as they aren’t dodgy we’ll put them on our Flickr page for the world to see and also feature them on the blog. There might even be prizes on offer for truly outstanding examples.

So pass this around and let people know!

It’s that time of year again, when New Year thoughts turn to getting a little bit fitter, and with lots of football fans in the office we decided that our get-fit campaign should come in the form of a five-a-side football team.

So, we found a league, we entered, and yesterday we played our first match; and guess what? We won!!!

Unfortunately a couple of our team (myself included) were unable to make the game due to meetings, so we had a little help from a couple of chaps from the Sports Interactive Test Room. And, despite falling a goal behind early on, goals from our web developer Kai and a couple from the SI boys put us 3-1 up in an ill-tempered affair.

Muze, our opponents, grabbed a goal back late on to set-up a nervy finale, but SEGA Online FC managed to hang on for their first ever victory, thanks in no small part to Jim, our goalkeeper, who I’m told pulled off a string of great saves that even Peter Schmeichel would have been proud of.

We’re off to a winning start, so visit the blog next week to find out how we get on against Bunny Army; and also check out our official team photo for the season ahead!

When we’re not at work playing games, talking about games, writing about games, thinking about games and making tea, we like nothing more than spending some quality free time with our loved ones and squeezing in some more game playing. But what games have been taking up our time in the past month (much to the annoyance of some of our partners)?

Well, this past month I have mostly been playing…
- Guitar Hero 3 – A fantastic game and the wireless controller allows me to jump off the sofa like an idiot. I’ve now progressed to medium woohoo!!

- Call of Duty 4 – Simply one of the best multiplayer games on the market, and I will probably still be playing this next month.

- Ghost Squad - a brilliant arcade shooter, mindless fun

- Wii Sports – The best pack-in game there has ever been. Played this with family and friends over Christmas and had such a great time with it. I even managed to complete a game of bowling with nothing but strikes and spares.

- S.W.O.S – What a waste of money that was. I’ve tried time and time again to get a game online but the damn thing keeps locking up. Also, I’m annoyed you can’t take your custom team online.

Oh and I’ve just received my 5-disc Blade Runner: The Final Cut Blu-ray from the US so will be spending some time watching that and the extras when I can.

The Big Cheese says:
My hours of gaming have been divided up between the following digital delights:
- Football Manager Live Beta - Best game in the world, just superb.

- Super Mario Galaxy - Just pure joy, takes me back to the fun I had on Mario 64

- LEGO Star Wars Complete Saga - Another trip to a Galaxy far far away with red bricks and unlockable characters.

- Crackdown - I was so surprised that I loved this so much, I now dream of collecting ability orbs

- Call of Duty 4 - Multiplayer mayhem of the first degree.

- Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games - Is this making me fitter?

- Assassin’s Creed - I know it’s a little dull, but it is ever so pretty!

ArchangelUK says:
There has been some expenditure in the AAUK household, which means new entries on my gameplay timetable.
- Guitar Hero 3 – Despite complaints about the “twanging” noise of strumming the guitar controller.

- Billy Hatcher & The Giant Egg – I want a sequel. I want one now. COCK-A-DOODLE DOO!

- SONIC The Hedgehog – I’ve now got 45% less hair.

- NiGHTS: Journey Of Dreams – Out Friday in the UK, I’m looking forward to demoing it to the main NiGHTS fanbase on Thursday.

- Crazy Taxi – My Crazy Taxi announcer impression gets even worse, but my driving gets better.

Dave says:
A normal gaming month from me I’m afraid, I don’t like change!
- Football Manager Live Beta – I’ve never been so emotionally attached to a football team, real or fictional. Dynamo Dave FC are by FAR the greatest team, Gameworld 3 has ever seen!

- Pro Evo 2008 – Spanked my brother and his mates on Sunday, and am regularly ruining the lunch breaks of Naz, one of our designers

- Arkanoid II – Internet broke on Saturday for a bit, back to some old-school Atari block-busting!

Mark O’Connell says:
- Call of Duty 4 - I’m still spending far too much time playing Call of Duty 4 online. While I frequently attempt to play other games, it isn’t long before a friend’s game invite lures me back in the trenches!

- Warhawk – I downloaded this over the weekend for Playstation 3 and am getting quite into it.

- Guitar Hero 3 – Having completed it on easy and medium, I am currently attempting to rock on Hard difficulty. I find the key to successfully doing this is to ignore my natural blinking reflex for 3 minute stretches.

- SingStar – Another PS3 title and the only one that my wife volunteers to play! If only I could actually sing…

- Super Mario Galaxy – I haven’t played this as much as I’d like to, but I’m looking forwards to spending more time with the moustached plumber soon!

- Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games – We spent a little bit too much time playing this on Saturday evening, and woke up the following morning unable to move my arms or shoulders. Good times!

- Worms Mobile - Many a journey has been shortened thanks to this portable game of Worms!

The Guinness Book of Records have launched a sneak peak of their 2008 Gamer’s edition which rather nattily (and unsurprisingly frankly) contains many SEGA related records.

The 24 page preview of the book contains various sections devoted to individual game series, platforms and types. Unfortunately they seemed to miss “most obscure ninja” for Martin, but we now know the following SEGA related records:

• 1999’s arcade version of Virtua Tennis was the first tennis game to use 3D graphics.
• Virtua Tennis 3 has more playable real life players than any other tennis game.
• The highest score achieved on the Dreamcast’s Virtua Tennis in exhibition mode is 44,000 by Jan Erik-Spangberg of Sweden.
• Sonic 2 is the best selling game on any SEGA console.
• Sonic Mega Collection is the world’s best selling retro games collection.
• The highest recorded total scored on Sonic 2 is 433,640 by a Heather Corocan of Arizona (under Twin Galaxies rules).
• Sonic is officially the fasted video game character in the world.
• Sonic Heroes featured more playable characters in a platform game (12) than any other game.
• Sonic The Comic is the longest running comic on a video game character, clocking in at over 14 years!

You can check out the preview here.

Continuing with our posts that probably reveal more about ourselves than is necessary, we present to you our top ten most played songs on our iPods (or other generic MP3 player). Just what do we listen to when we’re knee-deep in work? You may be surprised…

The Big Cheese:
1. Pacific State - 808 State.
2. Hard2beat - Hard-Fi
3. Slave to the Rhythm - Grace Jones
4. Imperial March- John Williams
5. Voodoo Ray- Voodoo Ray
6. Eple - Royksopp
7. To Cut a Long Story Short (12inch)- Spandau Ballet
8. Return of Forever- High Contrast
9. Anakin Vs Obi Wan- John Williams.
10. Love Can’t Turn Around -Farley Jackmaster Funk

Martin – the fat ninja:
1. Kingdom – Dave Gahan
2. Carnival of Rust – Poets of the Fall
3. Dirty Little Rockstar – The Cult
4. Chapter XIII (+44)
5. Always the Sun – The Stranglers
6. Enjoy the Silence – Depeche Mode
7. Extreme Ways – Moby
8. Holy Mountain – The Cult
9. Vision Thing – The Sisters of Mercy
10. The Nobodies – Marilyn Manson

So, what are you guys n gals listening to?

Sitting here with our tea and biscuits, we often debate the important issues of the day. Issues such as: whose turn it is to buy the sugar?, what to have for tea?, is it justifiable to buy a movie in HD when you’ve already got it on DVD?, and which biscuit is best for dunking? But one question remains unanswered; a question that has caused more disagreements and raised voices than a Labour Party Conference. Just what is the best videogame in the world ever?

With a combined gaming age of over 100, the five of us have played more than our fair share of gems (and rubbish) over the years. And as we can’t agree on the best game in the world ever, we’ve compiled our individual top 20 favourite games of all time.

Some of them may not be the most technical or re-playable games in the world, but they mean something to us in some way or another. Some of them created a genre; some took it to a whole new level; while others are just good old fashioned fun. Some of these you will no doubt agree on, others will probably leave you shaking your head in disbelief.

In no particular order (after about number 5), mine are:
1. Saturn Bomberman – SEGA Saturn (without doubt, the best multiplayer game EVER!!)
2. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion – Xbox 360 (the best single-player game ever)
3. Alternate Reality – Atari 800xl version
4. Mario 64 – N64
5. Silent Hill 2 – PlayStation 2
6. GoldenEye – N64
7. Super Puyo Puyo - SNES
8. Tempest 2000 – Atari Jaguar
9. Magical Flying Hat Turbo Adventure, AKA Decapattack – SEGA Mega Drive
10. Street Fighter 2 – PC Engine
11. Splatter House – PC Engine
12. Resident Evil – PlayStation
13. Galaga 88 – PC Engine version
14. Super Mario Bros. 3 NES
15. ChoroQ – PlayStation
16. Legend of Zelda – Ocarina of Time – N64
17. Tomb Raider - SEGA Saturn
18. GTA: Vice City Stories (PSP)
19. Super Mario World - SNES
20. Wii Sports - Wii

Dave:
OK, here goes. There were so many that could and possibly should have been on this list. And I’m sure I’ve overlooked some crackers:

1. Super Mario Kart – This game has taken up months of my life
2. Football Manager Series – This one is possibly touching years of lifetime consumption.
3. Sensible World of Soccer – In short, the most in-depth action footie game of it’s time.
4. Virtua Tennis 3 – I’ve had some amazing multiplayer duals on this bad-boy, it’s still my game of choice in the online office.
5. Football Manager Live – THE most addictive game I’ve played ever.
6. GTA 3 – My life was taken over by this game for a month. I even started talking in an Italian accent and everything!
7. Worms – The ultimate war game, Noggin, Smidge and the gang – I salute you!
8. Arkanoid II – Simple game, hugely addictive, massively frustrating.
9. Wizball – I was enchanted by the originality of this Atari ST classic.
10. Formula One 97 – Myself and a friend got very good at this game and had some Prost / Senna like battles.
11. Chuckie Egg – Delicious!
12. Super Grand Prix – An Amiga classic, race as an F1 car, a tank, a motorbike or even a dragster – classic racing!
13. Kick Off 2 – Oh the fun myself and my brothers had playing this footie sim. It was the game of choice until SWOS came along.
14. Starquake – I got lost on this wonderfully large world of caverns and caves many a time. Avoid the evil crosses!
15. Tetris – The only game that allowed me and my mum to compete on a level playing field.
16. Brian Clough’s Football Fortunes – It’s a computer game, and a board game; and it was the only management game where you could lose two of your star players in a car-crash – what more does a football fan need.
17. Grand Theft Auto – We’ve got a ten thirteen at South Miramar
18. Ikari Warriors – Multiplayer Rambo style brilliance.
19. Ski Challenge – Classic simple skiing action.
20. Super Mario Bros. 3 – Lovin’ that racoon suit.

The ‘so close’ contenders were…
Sim City
Striker
Pro-Cycling Manager
Super Bomber Man
New Star Soccer 3

ArchangelUK:
1. Turrican 2 (Atari ST)
2. Sonic Adventure 2: Battle (GC)
3. Tales Of Symphonia (GC)
4. The Legend Of Zelda: Link To The Past (SNES)
5. Llamatron (Atari ST)
6. Sonic Triple Trouble (GG)
7. Sid Meier’s Colonization (PC)
8. Super Smash Bros. Melee (GC)
9. Star Goose (Atari ST)
10. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (PC)
11. Star Wars: Original (Arcade)
12. Time Crisis II (Arcade)
13. Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker (GC)
14. Soul Calibur II (GC)
15. Mario & Sonic At The Olympic Games (Wii)
16. Double Dragon
17. Sonic 2 (MD)
18. Shadow The Hedgehog (GC)
19. Bomb Jack (Atari ST)
20. Unreal Tournament (PC)

Juuuust missing out:
Billy Hatcher & The Giant Egg (GC)
Crazy Taxi
Halcyon: The Fringe (PC)
Half Life 2 (PC)
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
Need For Speed Underground 2 (PC)
Offroad Thunder (Arcade)

The Big Cheese:
1. Civilisation (Amiga)
2. Total War: Rome (PC)
3. X-Wing (PC)
4. Football Manager 07 (PC)
5. UFO Enemy Unknown (PC)
6. Super Return of the Jedi (SNES)
7. Sensible World of Soccer (Amiga)
8. Star Wars Lego the Complete Saga. (Xbox 360)
9. Mario 64 (N64)
10. Kick Off 2 (Atari ST)
11. Pro Evolution Soccer 5 (PS2)
12. Grand Theft Auto- Vice City (PS2)
13. Midwinter II Flames of Freedom (Amiga)
14. Grand Theft Auto- San Andreas (PS2)
15. Elite (ZX Spectrum)
16. Arnhem (ZX Spectrum)
17. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (SEGA Megadrive)
18. NHL 2004 (PS2)
19. Tracksuit Manager World Cup Edition (C64)
20. Half Life 2. (PC)

Mark O:
Compiling a list of my top 20 games is tricky because it means excluding the hundreds of others that I have enjoyed over the years. I obviously also love the Total War series, but I have left them of this list to give you an idea of what else I play.

1. Crackdown – Xbox 360
A hugely entertaining game that is fun in both single and multiplayer. With all of the bosses now defeated, my hunt for green and blue orbs continues!

2. Final Fantasy VII – PSOne
This was my first real introduction to RPG’s and remains a firm favourite 10 years later. I proudly dedicated 81 hours of my life to exploring this epic world and racing my prized Chocobo!

3. WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw - Playstation 2
Having played all 9 titles in the series, I am so fond of the games that I even moved to Los Angeles at one point to work on two of them!

4. Bioshock – Xbox 360
One of the greatest single player FPS games of all time. If only it had a multiplayer mode it’d be perfect!

5. Grand Theft Auto 3 – Playstation 2
The leap into 3D corrupted my fragile little mind!

6. Call of Duty 4 – Xbox 360
I’m a huge fan of the COD series, and the latest entry is the best yet. I have recently become quite partial to the Domination mode on Xbox Live.

7. Knights of the Old Republic – Xbox
The best Star Wars game. Ever.

8. Worms – PC
I still cannot resist the charm of throwing a sheep or banana bomb at the enemy to hear them retaliate in a high-pitched voice “You’ll regret that!”

9. Fight Night Round 3 – Xbox 360
This 360 launch title has still yet to be assigned to my “gathering dust” pile, and I currently have a 20 match undefeated streak on Xbox live!

10. Crimson Skies – Xbox
Crimson Skies was a very pleasant surprise, and is definitely worth checking out.

11. Super Mario Galaxy – Nintendo Wii
While all Mario games probably deserve a place in this list (well, except SMB2), his latest adventure is a current favourite.

12. Metal Gear Solid – PSOne
Fantastic espionage action with unique boss battles. A bit text heavy though!

13. Guitar Hero 3 – Xbox 360
Who’d have thought a brightly coloured plastic guitar could provide so much fun!

14. Ape Escape – PSOne
With a unique analog control system, Ape Escape was one of the best platformers on PSOne.

15. Tomb Raider – PSOne
The T Rex scene on level 3 was an iconic moment in gaming. As was jumping off the waterfall and purposely missing the water! :o)

16. Crash Bandicoot: Warped - PSOne
The third in the series was packed with humour and had gorgeous visuals.

17. Timesplitters 2 – Playstation 2
There is something indescribably brilliant about being able to run around as a duck and throw bricks at the gingerbread man in a supermarket.

18. City of Villains - PC
Superheroes are more fun than goblins – fact!

19. Super Monkey Ball – Gamecube
Monkey boxing rules!

20. Dancing Stage: Euro Mix – Arcade
The best pre-Wii Sports exercise around, and for some reason I’m actually quite good at it.