7-24-06  It was my wife’s birthday and we decided to try the new micro-brewery that they just finished by our house.  Now recently I had given my 6 year old son a bag of his own to keep his gba, charger and games in.   A nice little bag that says Nintendo on the outside and has little spots to stick your cartridges into on the inside.  So we were drinking and talking and my son got bored so my wife went out to the car to get his Nintendo bag and we kept drinking and he started gaming…well after several of the wheat beers with slices of lemon we were ready to go and feeling pretty tipsy and, of course we walked off and left his bag there.  Luckily he grabbed the gba sp itself but he had a coupla hundred dollars worth of cartridges and his charger in the bag that we left behind.  Needless to say, about a week later we wanted to play some gba and we couldn’t find the bag anywhere.  We called the bar and they had one cartridge that they had found.  After looking in the trunk of the car and all over the house we called the bar again and they said now that they had two cartridges…of course the two they found are the ones that we could do without.  My son was crying and pretty upset and I was pretty angry cuz they are really all mine and I just let him borrow them…but lego star wars and sonic are the ones that we will miss the most, and Zelda too…and the charger!!!  So, my collection of gba games has just about been cut in half.  Luckily I keep all of the more desirable titles (Doom, MOH Infiltrator, Ecks vs Sever etc…) in a separate bag with my micro gba.  My son is like, “well you can let me borrow yours.”  And I’m like, “No way…I buy things to collect them and not lose at the bar.”  And plus all of the ones I have left are really not appropriate for little people to play…So that’s my story and I had to get it off my chest.  Well this could be my excuse to finally buy a nintendo ds.

Okay...now you know you want one...that elusive PSP...well after a long wait i finally dropped enough hints to get my wife to buy me one for my b-day present on 4-15-06...my son picked out Star wars Battlefront II for me and he likes to play it too...now when I stuck the disc into the machine I thought the graphics looked a lot more like a PS1 than a PS2...but I later found that it does look better with some different games (infected and Grand Theft Auto)...after staring at the unit for a while I noticed that I did get one with a constantly lit pixel...now I have infected and the graphics and game play for that game are awesome...also Grand Theft Auto...in the long run though the high techery of the PSP makes it not very kid friendly (which is fine by me cuz then I can play it when i want to instead of waiting for my son to put it down).  Something about the simplicity of the Nintendo line and the friendlier price that makes it way more portable-friendly.  The light on the gameboy lets you know when battery is low, on the other hand the PSP has the battery power only if you are in the home screen.  So while you're playing a game the battery could get low and you wouldn't know.  And when the battery dies on the PSP there's no warning, the machine just turns off right while you're in the middle of some exciting action.  I just mail ordered the media manager and a 2gb card for the PSP so I can put some MP3s on it.  I'm sure everyone complains about how much the accessories cost so I won't go on about that.  The power button is just in the wrong spot...every time I am in some intense zombie fight in Infected my right hand slips and turns the power either off or on hold...when you grasp the machine you really can't help but slide that power switch up and down...i've also noticed that the plastic area around the joy stick is already scuffed or scratched from the friction of the joy stick against the face plate...and this unit is less than a month old...I've been playing my Gameboy a few years and it doesn't have any scuffs on it. After using the analog stick for a while the user realizes that this doesn't really have the feel of the PS controllers.  The stick on the PSP is flat and doesn't have that ball in the controller that gives the player a 3 dimensional feel like the PS dual shock controllers.  Every time my son grabs the PSP, its size and controls make me afraid he's gonna drop it (and the price).  So if you are a parent, stick to the Nintendo units for the kids.  They are much more rugged and user friendly (and a lot more bang for your buck)...if you're a game snob like me you know you want one of these.  I was never really into the GTA franchise, (although I did like III and own all of the PS2 titles) but the GTA for the PSP is really an excellent game...graphics are good and it fits the machine really well.  I just mail ordered a 2GB memory card and the media manager for the PSP and will let you know about the MP3 abilities of the PSP as soon as I  get the new memory card and software.

may 9, 2006 OK...before my new memory card arrived the screen on the PSP started blinking on and off...not to completely black but kinda flickering to a darker version of the game i was playing...so fortunately the thing was still refundable with the reciept...so i took it back to the place of purchase and they exchanged it...i got it home was happy to find that this one does not have any constantly lit pixels, but i haven't played it much...the photos and MP3s are so easy to put on with the PSP media manager and the feeds option is really cool...i left it hooked up all night just downloading all kindsa cool audio and video.  I am so happy I took it back and got one without any messed up pixels...I mean come on if you pay 250 dollars for the thing it should work well no matter what sony's excuse is for the bad batch of screens.  The music actually sounds good from the speakers that are built into the PSP...a little bit tinny but overall pretty good.  Game saves and everything is so easy to back up with the media manager software...it makes it much more than just a gaming machine...i'm really enjoying it...

5-19-06 i found a great web site for downloading free video in PSP format:  www.guba.com  there's tons of cartoons, music vids and full length features there to download and transfer to your PSP...check it out!!!