Game Diary, catch up edition.

short catch up edition. First the streak lives on and we are currently sitting at 353 straight days. I have been playing a little more Red Faction, and have grown tired of it. So tired, I refuse to return it blockbuster. Fallout 3 has been consuming the majority of my time. Some new DLC was released and should hold me for the long haul. I will play Fallout3 until the year streak is obtained. I will sprinkle in some NBA2K9 and Tiger Woods 09 for some variety.
The diary should be back in full force tomorrow.

Thanks for reading

Game Diary, Tuesday's game play

Quick one tonight. I played some more of this Red Faction. Starting to grow tired of the game already. It is basically Saints Row on Mars. I am disappointed. Sure the destruction thing is a cool new tweak, but it can't carry the whole game. Same old song and dance, drive to yellow marker, complete mission, jack car, drive to new yellow marker. Yawn.

So I fell back on a classic. Yup, played more Fallout3. A new DLC was released today, so you know I had to get it. Not quite ready to play it though. Looks really good. Creepy, dark, and a mysterious stranger with an Ax????

NBA2K9 got a spin as well. Still trying to get the Bulls the championship. The games knows they are not suppose to have it.

The streak lives on.

Thanks for reading.

Red Faction : Guerrilla

In place of the game diary, you get this post.

Want to know the best game you missed so far this year? Read on suckers. While you busy re-hashing old 80's movie into a semi playable video game, the good people over at THQ and Volition bring you a great re-make of a 90's video game. Originally released on the Ps2 Red Faction pops on the 360. But what is it? I was thinking the same thing until I read about 15 different blogs and magazine articles on how everyone was going to over look this game. I got tired of reading it, so I rented it.

At first glance of the cover, your thinking a Russian game. Wrong. Your probably thinking FPS, wrong again. RFG maroons you on Mars. That is where the Red comes in......you team up with you brother to fight the government within a small Faction. I have yet to see how guerrilla's tie in. Mars is presented to you in a open world, highly destructible, environment. What I was first surprised at was the vehicles. They are awesome. Some fun is to be had, by blazing wildly across Mars, and jump a huge crater to land your mining 6-wheeler squarely in a government building. Total destruction, for the building at least.

With Volition at the developing helm, you get a good taste of Saints Row in this game. These open world games are starting to get repetitive. Get in car. Drive to mission. Play mission. Drive to something else. While RFG does have this aspect, the destructible environment over shadows any similarities you will find in other sandbox type games. Oh, and you will find similarities. This should not scare you away.

A wide array of weapons, vehicles, and NPC's keep the action flowing. That bad ass sledge hammer you see in the title plays a pretty big part in the game. It is fun smashing down a huge building, then turning around and smashing someone's head in. Good times. I played about 2 hours of the main campaign and liked what I saw. If I had to compare this game to some others, I would lump it into a category of the following : Bully, Saints Row, GTA, Assassins Creed. I hope the missions do not get repetitive. The first "level" had me destroy a few key government buildings, rescue a few hostages, and 3 mission type scenarios. All very fun, but could get old very quickly. Time will tell. I usually do not like to post any comments until logging some serious hours, but tonight's game play was really fun, and I needed a break from the diary. If your concerned the streak lives on at 345 straight days.

So the blogs and magazines are about 65% right on this one. Definatley a great game to rent, but not something you will be kicking yourself over missing. Keep in mind, I have not played any of the online modes, but those are usually not deal breakers for me. The G's have been trickling out at 10 per level. It would appear you can achieve 500 G's from the single player and 500 G's for completely ridiculous online play. Seriously? When will they just give up on the online G's?

Thanks for reading

Game Diary, Thursday's game play

Streak lives on. Thursday's game play was almost identical to Wednesday's. I caught some more crab while playing Alaskan Storm. I also scored another 20 G's by making some considerable progress on Fallout3. DLC The Pitt is awesome. Just stunning graphics, and a wild story that will have you making a very big moral choice about half way through. No 1 vs 100 tonight, I was tempted, but passed.

Thanks for reading

Game Diary, Wednesday's game play

With the return of Live service, I found myself in yet another 1 vs 100 beta. I finally cracked a million points with my career score. That has got to get me some attention and possibly a seat in the mob? I hope so. I got some first hand comments about the new Ghostbusters game. Sounds frustratlingly fun. Sounds like it is shaping up to be a rental.

I pulled in a few hundred pods of crab in Deadliest Catch as well. That game is fun in small doses.

I finished up the night with some Fallout3. I located all 100 steel ingots for 20 G's!! It took about a hour, and yes I used a walk through.

341 straight. This is getting interesting.

Thanks for reading.

Game Diary, Tuesday's game play

With the Xbox Live service being down Tuesday, it was a free streak day on 360Voice.com. So did I take the day off as well? Heck no, I played some Arkadian Warriors. I was able to level my Character up to a 13. Darth Slagus and myself have been co-oping through the main campaign together. It has been very enjoyable for a Arcade game. In the past I usually would throw in a reference to Gauntlet here, but instead I am going to start comparing this game to Castle Crashers. It really is more of a hack and slash game than a RPG.

No 1 vs. 100 tonight and with Live service out, I actually flipped on the TV. I caught a few minutes of a Discovery channel program featuring crab fishermen. I thought to myself, can't I play this instead? Sure enough I popped in Alaskan Storm, Deadliest Catch. I am right at the point in this game that the controls become second nature. No more awkward button pushes just to see what they do. I know what they do, crab beware. I finished up the first fishing season, and scored 15 G's. To bad they don't count towards a challenge. They do count towards my "Great Outdoors" and "Tv Games" badges.

Overall a good night for no live service. At time of this writing (11:00pm) service was still not back. 340 straight. We are under a month.

Thanks for reading.

Game Diary, Monday's game play

The weekend came and went way too fast. The streak was preserved and we now sit at 338 straight days. This post will focus on Monday's game play. I was able to sneak in some Fallout3. Enjoying a waste ridden Pittsburgh, collecting some billets, and hack some raiders to pieces with my new axe. It was great. I also got sucked into yet another beta session of 1 vs. 100.

More importantly I was finally able to finish up Wolverine : Origins. This wolverine game is a solid game. I would rate it a high 7 or low 8 if I would officially review the game. The single player campaign was ton of fun to play through. The controls were awesome. A few wolverine moves really stood out. A few stand out moments really make this movie game stand out. I can confidently say that this one of the best comic book character, Hollywood movie, tie in games out there right now. I highly suggest giving this game a spin. I have not played the DLC that was recently released, not sure if is worth it or not. There was some "bonus" stages that consisted of 1 on 1 match up against another AI wolverine. Not sure what the purpose really was of these arena stages. They were boring. Games at least worth a rental.

Check back tomorrow as I push farther into The Pitt.

Thanks for reading.

$5 Xbox 360 Arcade Games

According to Major Nelson, the following games are $5 or less. Achievement Unlocked found many errors and omissions during Major's 1 minute rundown. This is the most comprehensive list on the web. Please let us know if anything is left out.

Aegis Wing - FREE
Altered Beast
Assault Heroes
Asteroids & Deluxe
Battlezone
Blazing Birds
Bliss Island
Centipede & Millipede
Comix Zone
Contra
CrazyMouse
Crystal Quest
Cyberball 2072
Dash of Destruction - FREE
Defender
DIG DUG
Discs Of Tron
DOOM
Double Dragon – NOT AVAILABLE
Ecco the Dolphin
Fatal Fury Special
Feeding Frenzy
Frogger
GALAGA
Gauntlet
Geometry Wars Evolved
Gin Rummy
Golden Axe
Gunstar Heroes
Gyruss
Hardwood Backgammon
Hardwood Hearts
Hardwood Spades
Hexic HD - FREE
Jetpac Refuelled
Joust
Marble Blast Ultra
Minesweeper Flags
Missile Command
MS. PAC-MAN
NEW RALLY-X
PAC-MAN
Paperboy
Phantasy Star II
Robotron: 2084
Root Beer Tapper
Rush’n Attack
Scramble
Shinobi
Small Arms
Smash TV
Sonic The Hedgehog
Sonic The Hedgehog 2
Sonic The Hedgehog 3
Space Giraffe
Spyglass Board Games
Streets of Rage 2
Super Contra
Tempest
Tetris Splash – THIS IS $10
Time Pilot
TMNT 1989 Arcade
TotemBall - FREE (Vision Camera Required)
Track and Field
TRON
Ultimate MK3
Uno
Warlords
Wolfenstein 3D
Worms
XEVIOUS
Yie AR Kung-Fu
Zuma
1 vs 100 - FREE

Game Diary, Thursday's game play

I stayed up way too late playing Fallout 3. Finally got my character to level 30 while maintaining a "good" status. 30 G's Yooooo!!! Now I just need to get him evil and score another 30 G's. I finished the first DLC. I played it before so nothing new to me. Just some more shooting.

Side note, have you examined the selection of video game magazines at your local bookstore lately? I discovered this horrible magazine tonight while browsing. It was basically a review of the summer games based on movies? What a specific, stereotypically sub par, genre to focus your periodical on. Especially when over 90% of what is in the magazine could be found on the Internet. Worse of all, right on the cover plastered big and bright, "Brought to you by the editors of The Official Xbox Magazine." Like that was suppose to add some credibility to it? Ugh. I did pick up a sweet little UK publication called Games TM. I picked it up mostly for the Bioshock 2 story and a awesome interview with the developers of Fallout 3.

Thanks for reading

Game Diary, Wednesday's game play

Short and sweet today. Not much gaming, just some Fallout3. I also got sucked in to yet another 1 VS 100 beta. Why can't I stay away from those?
Keeps the streak alive!!

Thanks for reading.

Game Diary, catch up edition.

Sorry for the diary outage, I was on another vacation. This time I stayed home and played video games, lots of them. So the streak is safe and on going at 332 straight.
I rented a few new titles Wolverine : Origins, and Terminator : Salvation. Both titles play off the Hollywood movie releases. One succeeded the other failed, as a video game at least. Play Wolverine if you get the chance, pass on Terminator not worth the 5 hours it takes to complete the game.

I made a ton of progress with Fallout3 and started the first of the 3 DLC's tonight. I am inching ever so closer to the new stuff. With the new DLC already installed I keep stumbling upon new places and faces. I just can't get enough of this game.

The usual suspects also found their way into my console. I played some NBA2k9, Pacman, Ms. Pacman, Madden, RockBand2, Forza2, and Arkadian Warriors. Darth Slagus and myself got to co-op Arkadian Warriors and the game just loses something online. The camera angle is a little limited, I guess that must be it. Still worth the few bucks for the download. I should mention that I also participated in a few more Beta rounds of 1 vs. 100. It is a great idea, and pretty fun. A great chance to relax and play with a party of friends. I will probably play one or two more rounds but really wait for the series to go live. I want some prizes for my efforts!!!

Check back tomorrow as I finish up Wolverine, and push deeper into Fallout3.

Thanks for reading.

Terminator Salvation Review

This blog wouldn't be a service to the gamer world if it did not spread the word on Terminator Salvation. I recently had the chance to play this game, and thankfully it was only a rental. 4 hours people, I repeat 4 hours people, is all it took to play this game all the way through on medium difficulty. Don't get me wrong the 820 G's were a nice welcome, but the experience was not worth them. Lets get into this review.

First the highlight. Singular. The controls, a basic duck and cover system is the key element here. With some elements of Gears of War 2 blended with a flank system reminiscence of Ghost Recon the robots never know what hit them. Spoiler: most robots weak points are their backs. Funny, they figured out time travel, heat seeking rockets, and laser weapons, but not how to put a piece of sheet metal over their battery packs. A simple fire sequence and limited weapon choice round out the average display.

Graphics, here is what I didn't understand. The game is about robots...not the background. So even though the setting is pretty, the robots look second rate. I just felt more time was needed to make the futuristic atmosphere pop. Not horrible, but not excellent either. Just blah.

Story, I guess it follows the movie, I haven't seen the movie. Pretty straight forward, best part it is over quick. Nothing exciting, or worth remembering.

You won't be seeing cool robots like him in this game.

Replay value : NONE. The split screen mulitplay is not even worth mentioning.

Random complaints. The game has a horrible health system. I simple red meter is slowly depleted until it starts flashing, then you die. No way to refill this meter, no health packs, and no recharges. After battle encounters the meter just fills up. That is another complaint I will get to. The health scenario wouldn't be that bad if you could save. No save option at all. Hell, you can't even tell when the game auto saves. There is no way to end the game and be confidant you just saved. I found a few times replaying a section or two because I thought the game auto saved.

Ahh the battle sequences. Basically this game boils down to this. Each stage will have about 5 to 6 robot battle sequence. You will run to each sequence, figure out where to duck and cover, flank the robots. Win battle, then run to next sequence. This would be fun if there was any variation. You get 8-9 gun variations, but nothing worth noting. A few handguns, machine guns, and rocket launchers cover the basic requirement. Sure you get the obligatory ride on the back of a car and shoot a turret stage, and those weren't really exciting either.

What really pisses me off is the $60 price tag. Checking tonight bestbuy.com still has this title listed at $59.99. I would be really upset if I had blown $60 bucks on this title. Games like this do more damage than good for the industry. A new gamer on the scene, who enjoyed the movie, could accidentally buy this and be completely discouraged from the genre. There are perfectly good movie video game cross overs, check out Wolverine : Origins.

At the end of the day Terminator Salvation is a rental if you have a rent one get one free coupon. The 4 hours of your life you won't get back, the hour of enjoyment you do get will not be worth it.

Thanks for reading.

Game Diary, Wednesday's game play

The streak lives on. Short post today. Fallout3 and Arkadian Warriors were the flavor of choice for today. Expect a review of Arkadian Warriors shortly. 327 straight days and counting.

Game Diary, Tuesday's game play.

Well Tuesday was another big announcement day from the E3 conference. With Nintendo and Sony headlining the podiums today, a lot was announced and you can find all the latest information on the usual places like Kotaku, GameLife, and the offical website. I found myself watching too much of Steve Wiebe's attempt at reclaiming the Donkey Kong world record. Spoiler...he failed. Such a sad story.

Back to the 360. The streak continues, as I log heavy hours of Fallout3. I am on the verge of getting some more G's. Those will have to wait until tomorrow, as I have a new challenge over at 360voice kicking off. I am working hard at trying to reach that DLC by this weekend. I have a wide open weekend with no plans what so ever. That should allow for some big G's and a effortless attempt at continuing the streak.

Unfortunately Fallout3 was all I got to tonight. Look for a little wider variety tomorrow as I start squeezing G's from my existing library of games. Big question should I rent a few games for this weekend? There is another 1 vs. 100 beta I would like to play.

Thanks for reading.

Game Diary, Monday's game play

Back again with the game diary. Tuesday was an exciting day in the world of Xbox360. With E3 kicking off, there was a ton of big reveals at the Microsoft conference. One of them was the new Beta testing happening tonight of a new XBLA game called 1 vs. 100.

I had to rush home and set a reminder? for the game. I got in some Guitar Hero : Aerosmith and Fallout3 before the Beta kicked off. It was kind of neat. A group of 4 of us were private chatting and just kind of hanging in the dashboard, when 1 by 1 we all got an invite to play. The first game kept our party together, but we got separated for the remainder of the night. Not sure if that was on purpose or a technical glitch. Either way the game was a ton of fun. The "live" host did an adequate job. No complaints. Super simple controls and pretty detailed stat tracking will keep players coming back. Another beta test this Saturday. Then we sit and wait for go live. Should be soon as the game appeared polished. Pretty slick how they force fed us commercials during "break" time.

I will definitely play again once they actually start handing out prizes or G's at least. Short one today....it's late!!!

Stay tuned for details on E3, especially news of L4D2 due out in November.

Thanks for reading.

Game Diary, Weekend Edition

Well, well, well....after a few emails exchanges my streak has been restored. The powers that be over at 360voice.com have decided to re-instate my streak. So we are currently resting at 324 straight days of gaming. 41 more days for a year straight. So with that being said what did I play over the weekend?

No new games to report. I finally completed CSI. Got the full 1000 G's. Probably never play that game again. Do not take that the wrong way. If you can find this game for $19.99 or cheaper it is totally worth it. There is no other game on the market like it. Basically it is a computer game on the Xbox 360. It would work better with a mouse, but the controller gets you through the game. If you do pick it up, I suggest playing at least the first 3 cases. After that you will be hooked. Plus there are only 2 more cases to complete after that anyway.

Friday night was reserved for band practice. Rock band 2 was heavily used, but still no G's. Very stubborn game. That got me in the mood for Guitar Hero : Aerosmith. I failed "Walk this Way" 10 times so that got me 10 G's. Almost finished the hard level for Aerosmith. Only 3 more songs to go.

Spent some time in DC as well. Nearing a point where I feel comfortable playing the DLC. My character is now a level 10 and well stocked for any fight. By next weekend I should be seeing the Pitt.

Keeping it short, just really excited to be back on the streak wagon. I promise no more hiccups here on out. I see no obstacles in the next upcoming month. Fingers crossed.

Thanks for reading.