What title could I give a blog post as worthless as this? I thought about it for five minutes and came up with nothing...

Hello to whoever’s out there, I’m back. It’s been about a month since the last entry and yes, that’s way too long for a guy who said he wanted to start a blog. Can I give you a reason? Nothing substantial or worthwhile to report I’m afraid. I took a vacation, I’m doing some other writing, its winter time, Britney Spears; Bullshit excuses one and all, I mean why would you waste your time, right?

On the game front I went through Mass Effect, taking around fifty hours to do so which means I saw a good portion of the game but not everything. As I said before the pacing can get slow but overall this is a worthwhile waste of time. The story and combat outweigh the performance issues and repetition. The game is good throughout and bloody brilliant at the end. It’s truly a great sci-fi epic that promises more in the future. I played as a really nice guy and when the new downloadable content hits the streets later this year I’ll have another go playing as a cruel bitch. The game is coming to PC this year and there it will shine the brightest as the technical issues and load times will be vastly reduced. Do yourself the favour if you are so inclined.

I also finished Devil May Cry 4, a game I was long waiting for, and unfortunately I have mixed feelings. On the good side it looks excellent and plays like a dream. This action fighter is highly polished and all the new mechanics are a great addition to the franchise. On the bad side they really got real cheap on actual content. You visit most of the game’s environments twice; once going forward and then in reverse. You fight the same boss monsters two and even three times. The amount of recycling going on was absolutely galling.

I have a theory for why they resort to this vile practice. The title was multiplatform; it came out on both the PS3 and the X-Box 360. In order for this highly demanding game to fit on a standard DVD disk and therefore work on the 360 they had to re-use levels and bosses. We might see more of this as time goes by what with the data storage differences between Blu-Ray and DVD. The unfortunate part about the recycling is that after going through it once there is no desire to play it again; I’ve seen the levels twice and some of the bosses three times! This is probably the best rental game out there today though, do so or if you know me borrow mine. I’m bound to take this one back for store credit.

Rock Band is still demanding most of our time when my gamer wife Mike and I hang out on Tuesdays. I play Anna Stesia; lead guitarist for Itchy Clitchy, our acid-punk-new-jack-rock band. I don’t enjoy rhythm games enough for them to take up floor space in my living room but I have to admit that Rock Band is a very well made and highly polished game. It’s a pleasure to interact with and navigate through. Mike has been downloading songs-a-plenty off the Playstation Network so now his library is quite daunting. You can play for hours without hearing a repeat. This new genre of game is going to be huge, you can see it. Not only will casual gamers flock to this stuff but these games have the added benefit of helping you really appreciate music of all genres. When you have to learn a song you discover what’s great about it, why it has the fans it does. Interactivity is GOOD for the art of music. I see Rock Band as pretty well the ultimate family game out right now.

I’m going to give my hot wife some props here. She finished Halo 3 and is starting to shoot the shit out of stuff in Unreal Tournament 3. Eat your heart out! This little woman started gaming with photography simulators and cute cartoon character cat burglars. Now every time I say “FLACK MASTER” or “ROCKET SCIENTIST” she makes this metal-as-fuck face and proceeds to rock out with her cock out. Corruption is mine sayeth the Dyno.

In the name of posterity and filling up the internet with superfluous information I’m going to list the release dates of all the games I’m interested for the first half of the year. Looking at the list I see my tastes have really streamlined. I used to play a wider variety of games but these days if fun and frolic does not entail shooting someone’s virtual son or daughter in the face then I’m not interested. If I get to bash them in with a sword or axe then I guess that will do on occasion - and in that way I’m something of a homicidal renaissance man - but really the running and the gunning is where I’m at.

ARMY OF TWO March 6th

CONDEMNED 2 - BLOODSHOT March 14th

DARK SECTOR March 29th

GRAND THEFT AUTO 4 April 29th

HAZE May ???

TOO HUMAN May ???

METAL GEAR SOLID 4 – GUNS OF THE PATRIOTS June 12

BATTLEFIELD – BAD COMPANY June ???

That’s uhh… That’s a lot of games. This list is sure to get pruned once reviews and impressions start rolling in. To that end I’m waiting patiently for F.E.A.R. FILES, JERICHO, TUROK, FRONTLINES: FUEL OF WAR and BLACK SITE: AREA 51 to hit the cheap aisle as word on the street says they’re worth checking out but not at full price. As you know I always listen to the streets, I am the streets!

I’ll try to touch on news stuff later on.