We’ve been fans of the WipeOut series ever since, well, we bought a PlayStation, really. It has always had the right combination of thumping soundtracks, explosions and racing driver skill to make me squee. Frood likes it because he’s methodical and consistent so he quickly gets good. I like it because I process information really quickly and have fast reactions so I start off good and get better (although Frood usually catches up and overtakes because I’m more impetuous).

When we treated ourselves to a PS3 last year, of course we wanted to play WipeOut. Soon, promised the PlayStation Network. We will bring it to you soon and it shall be Glorious and it shall be Good and you shall fall to your knees and weep in gratitude for this Great Thing that we have provided for you.

‘Soon’ turned from months into seasons and Frood and I tried to slake our hunger by revisiting old games. It turned out that WipeOut Fusion, the most recent of the titles we own, is one of the very few games that will not play on the PS3. It’s buggy and eventually crashes. Luckily our PS2 is still part of our sexy black entertainment centre, so we just swapped a cable every time we wanted to play. We’ve been checking the PlayStation Store every so often hunting for the mythical WipeOut HD, our cynicism growing until it became habit rather than anything else. We’d go looking for Guitar Hero downloads and just quickly check, or see if there was anything new in the way of strange games like Echochrome (I shall review that diappointment later) and flick through the WipeOut HD teaser page while we were at it.

Friday nights Frood goes climbing. I fired up the PlayStation to give Echochrome a go (I lasted 5 minutes) and then went to the store, for the first time not even intending to check for WipeOut HD, so much faith had I lost. I was, get this, off to buy the downloadable version of N₂O because PS1 discs (we are loyal Playstation customers) won’t play very well in the PS3.

There it was. Right there. On the screen. OH. MY. GODS.

I DON’T CARE THAT I HAVEN’T BEEN PAID YET. GET THAT BITCH IN MY CART RIGHTTHISVERYMINUTE.

It’s a big game. It was still downloading when Frood got home. When I told him he was speechless. He didn’t believe me that it was really here.

But it is.

WipeOut HD is a totally different gaming experience from the other titles, at least at first. It is arranged differently. No more playing the League, which is a shame because I liked that. Now it’s a question of getting points over a range of different races and race modes in order to progress.

It’s fast. Dear gods it’s fast. The on-board computer has changed. Now it sounds like a female primary school teacher. The weapon system is also different. No more pit stops: now you can choose whether to deploy a weapon (although I have to say that weapon deployment appears fairly random as to whether it works or not) or absorb its energy. All the old favourites are there, except for black hole (shame). I don’t miss the flamethrower. The new proton cannon actually seems to have some meat to it.

The graphics are amazing. There is a real sense of acceleration from inside the cockpit when you hit one of the turbo pads. Yet they are also weirdly disappointing. They don’t have the jaw-dropping luscious near-reality of MotorStorm and the colours are very dark. If it turns out that all the tracks look like Katmoda 12 or Vohl Square I’m in trouble, because I’m slightly colour-blind in just the wrong part of the spectrum for those tracks to be clear.

As you can see, one of the new options is the photo mode — at any point in a race you can press pause and take a screenshot, including options for changing which ship you are viewing, from where in the ship you are viewing it, whether or not the HUD is in shot, plus contrast and exposure and other goodies.

Another new feature is the ability to create your own custom playlist. In the past we’ve nearly always resorted to turning the music volume down (even if the soundtrack is great at first, it gets a bit samey) and chucking some CDs in the stereo. Now you can make a playlist in the music section of your PS3 and import the playlist to the game. Wowzers. My only issue with that is that it’s impossible to skip to a preferred music track — maybe a feature for a future version. I’d like to think “Right, I need this race, so we’re going to have Hellsonic,” and choose that track.

It costs about twelve quid, which isn’t much when you consider how much Guitar Hero will set you back, although it’s quite a lot considering the usual price of downloadable games (Echochrome was £6.99). Worth it? Not sure yet. I think it depends on what the other tracks have to hold. I haven’t seen an equivalent of the glory that is Mandrashee, yet, and I’m not convinced by the colour scheme appearing to have come straight out of XG3 — never did get on with that.

Having said that, we were still up playing it 4 hours after it finished downloading, so maybe that tells you all you need to know.

• 10:30 @andygates Well, come up and play some more. I’m considering downloading it for the PS3 cos PS1 discs don’t play at all well in the PS3. #
• 10:34 @andygates That’s not Mars 3.0, is it? That’s Oppy. #
• 12:34 @andygates Ahhh. Right Error on page so tweets weren’t displaying properly. I was confuzzled. #
• 16:57 This is so *bad*. ♫ blip.fm/~a2zj #
• 23:46 I HAS WIPEOUT HD!!!!! WOOT WOOT AROOGA!!! #

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• 10:21 So very, very, VERY tired. #
• 17:34 @splinister I’m trying not to feel guilty about the carbon footprint. I’m not swimming to Galway! (waiting for @andygates to say HTFU…) #
• 18:05 Time for some MotorStorm. ♫ blip.fm/~9rxw #
• 20:38 @andygates I think it’s the first one after the training run. #

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• 17:14 is finally cracking on with the Chronicles and having mulled cider to stave off a threatening lurgy. #

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• 14:59 Feeling a strong desire to go home early. #

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• 11:59 Morning internet. ♫ blip.fm/~8i2d #
• 12:07 Inspired by @splinister . This woman has a fine set of lungs. ♫ blip.fm/~8i3d #
• 12:49 @andygates There’s nothing you could have done about it. Sucks, I know 🙁 #
• 12:49 @andygates I’m not sure it’s a look I want to emulate! #

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This morning I spent half an hour extracting something from my elbow. I noticed the lump a few days ago, right on the outside of the joint, and this morning it was a bit scabby and infected. THERE WAS SOMETHING INSIDE.

It was too icky to identify what it was (but it wasn’t wriggling, so it wasn’t a parasite). Either a bit of suture was left in there when they stitched me back together after I failed to nail the landing of the ninja flip on Shackleton (and it worked its way down to the point of the elbow), or at some point recently the alien abductions have started again and that was an implant that my over-hyped immune system quite rightly rejected.

Relax. I’m from Zeta Reticuli.

• 14:06 Stressed and depressed this morning. Night full of bad dreams. #
• 16:44 @kayucian All children are obsessed by war. Humans are territorial. They’re too young to understand the consequences. They’ll learn. #
• 17:00 Inspired by @mbf , the fellow Guitar Hero ♫ blip.fm/~8c0l #
• 19:13 @kayucian So did I! They wouldn’t let me though, cos I only have one eye. #

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• 08:39 Bah. Got up too late to do what I wanted to do, too early for what I have to do. #
• 08:45 The sun is shining! It’s a beautiful day! ♫ blip.fm/~7yob #
• 16:50 Friday! End of the week! And the inevitable bungee effect has already started. It’s only ten to five! ♫ blip.fm/~8295 #
• 17:19 My favourite Guitar Hero track. ♫ blip.fm/~82ib #
• 17:28 Inspired by @splinister ♫ blip.fm/~82lj #

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SYB does it again.

Why was this ‘built’ underground? Simple, it does not exist. It’s a big con.

It’s the same reason India/Pakistan allegedly conducted nuclear explosions underground simply because they never happened in the first place. Why? Because nuclear bombs don’t exist and they never have existed. FACT!

Hollywood and the people behind Hollywood (the rich elite race) came up with the propoganda to fool the ‘Sheople’. They’ll keep taking your money though to fund their lavish lifestyles.
Philip Coalman

Believe it or not, that’s not one of the comments from the sniggering readers. That’s one of the stupendously class (as in Kadaicha) Have Your Say posts regarding the LHC.

The SYB comments, as always, are hilarious; and if any of you out there were worried about what might happen when the LHC was switched on, not to worry, Outragedofbelmarsh has it all in hand:

I posted a box of crowbars to the scientists at CERN before the LHC was switched on….just in case.