Tip Off
Take your game play to the next level with these tips and tricks for four popular video games
The Sims 2
EA Games
PC
The Sims games are all about customization, so don't bother decorating your home with the game's built-in art.
Instead, make sure your Sim has a creativity level of five and can make a still-life painting. When your Sim starts painting, a frame will appear which you place over a vase or whatever you want to paint. Press pause and launch a graphics program to open "snapshot.bmp" in the folder C:\My Documents\EA\Sims2\Storytelling. Then save your own image over it, be it a digital drawing or a photo of your dog.
Go back to the game and your Sim will finish painting your custom artwork, which you can then hang on the wall.
Tales of the Abyss
Namco
PS2
After 10 years and eight games, the team behind the Tales of… series have added a new wrinkle to their formula with the "town link system."
Basically, shop prices and item availability now varies from town to town, depending on whether they produce their own goods or import them from other towns.
It's always cheapest to buy stuff like lemon gel or a sword from the place where they are primarily made and sell your extras in towns where that product is sold out. By completing side quests for shop owners, however, you can also reduce the cost of items and equipment.
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Blue Rescue Team
Chunsoft/Nintendo
Nintendo DS
Evolution has played such a major role in previous Pokémon games, you must be wondering why you can no longer morph your pocket monsters? Well, you can. But first you must complete the entire storyline, and after beating the final boss Rayquaza, you will be able to enter the Luminous Cave, north of Pokémon Square. Only bring along the Pokémon you want to evolve — and if it meets the requirements with experience points or special items (moon stone, sun stone, metal coat) — then you're off to the races.
Daxter
Naughty Dog/SCEA
PSP
It's great that Jak's little rodent sidekick Daxter got his own game, but what if you get bored staring at his little weasel-y face? Luckily, the designers hid masks behind breakable pictures that can change Daxter's face. The Jak mask is on the prison level, the human Daxter mask is on the hotel level and the Samos mask is on the lumber mill level. But there are also masks from rival games — the Sly Cooper mask is in the City Port area inside a crate behind the Emerald Isle warp gate, the Ratchet mask is on the Subway level and the Clank mask can be found in Tanker 1 up on a high ledge.