Remember the good ol' days when you put a game in and it just played. Blow in that cartridge, slam it into your SNES, hit power and your playing. Things have come a long way since those days: graphics, sound, story, overall design, etc. Games are now bigger and better than ever and the consoles powering them have to be more flexible to accommodate these pixel-pushing, resource hogs. Updates and patches are as common as brushing your teeth these days. Most of these are small and only take a few minutes at the most to download. They are never really an issue with me because I fire up my consoles and play something on them every couple of days. What about the gamers whoare very passive? The ones who play maybe once a week or even less? I think they might see things in a different light.

Recently SOCOM: Confrontation came out. My launch, 60GB PS3 crapped out on me four days before it came out (great timing) so I could not play it. Me and a buddy of mine used to be crazy SOCOM II players, strats, gamebattles, clans, practices, all night "tryout" rooms, the whole deal. We used to rack up hundreds of hours on our profiles and know every intricacy of every map, it was awesome. As time goes on, we have less and less time to play but I thought since my PS3 is broken and his isn't, we should play some dam SOCOM. After I picked up the game and headed over to his place, we pop it in, waiting diligently for our first game. Wait, online is not hooked up, hasn't been for weeks, so we hook it up. FIRMWARE UPDATE, uh ok, this seems standard, about 20 minutes for this and we should be good to go. INSTALLING GAME, oh, I forgot about this. Okay, install the game to reduce load times and make the game run smoother, yadda, yadda, yadda. Another 20 minutes pass and it's game time... not quiet. GAME UPDATE, this is a juicy 400MB+ update that takes over 30 minutes to download, jeez. So after the firmware update, game install, and updating the game, we have enough time to play a couple games.

Now I'm all for keeping the PS3 up to date with the most current firmware and installing games to the HDD to make them run smoother and having updates come out to make online games run better but come on. From popping the game in to actually playing it took over an hour, that's fuckin' crazy. There doesn't seem to be an answer or work around to to this issue yet but something has got to change here. The days of popping in a game and just playing it right away seem to be slipping away and, in the words of my good friend, ". . .[that's] fuckin' bullshit". I totally agree.

Amon Amarth is a Viking Metal band with some of the juiciest drumming and synchronized head banging I've ever seen. I missed them last year so I just had to go this time. They played with a bunch of other Satanic Metal Bands from across the globe and each one was deadly. Bands like these have songs that last for 6+ minutes and dam are they awesome. The crowd was totally into each set and everyone had a good time. Nothing really to say about games other than I played Pure (it's ok) and the news from Tokyo Game Show about RE5, SFIV and The New Xbox Live Experience has me giddy. I know that some of these metal bands are an acquired taste but here's a video to help give you an idea of how awesome the concert was:





Now just add a crowd in front of that and everyone head banging along to the Epic Beats and your pretty much there.

First it started with a few lock-ups, system freezes. Then some games didn't want to work. I would come home to find the PS3 having a red blinking light where the warm, welcoming green light was. "Power surge or something" I thought, couldn't be my PS3. My launch day, 60GB, backwards compatible beauty, no way. Today I wanted to get in some time on the Home Beta. I turned it on, was checkin' out what new videos I downloaded from the store, then it happened. The PS3 turned off and started blinking red right before my eyes. In disbelief, I reset it, only to have it turn on for a second - flash yellow - and back to blinking red. Again and again, the same thing.

Well I did have an extended warranty, so I called Best Buy to get things sorted. I got the "Uhhhh.... well.... you see.... I'm not sure...." guy on the phone who after 5 minutes of uncertain conversing he took my number and said the manager would call me back. An hour goes by and I get worried, back on the phone. This time I get a different guy who says, "Uhhh yeah, the manager left." So I decide to bring it in. A young lad takes my finger smudged, scratched up PS3 and says, "So yeah, we're going to have to send it away. If it takes longer than 60 days, you get a new one." I describe to him that there are no more 60GB PS3's so he explained to me that I would get a PS3 closest to 60GB specs. He said that ordering the Motorstorm Bundle or the Metal Gear Solid 4 bundle, both apparently have backward compatibility, was an option. So I sit here now, typing away, counting the days until SOCOM: Confrontation comes out, only to have no PS3 to play it on. LAME!

The rumors and speculation are finally over and Duke-Nukem 3-D is official on Xbox Live Arcade right now, how awesome is that? The game is in it's original form with a few extra features thrown in like the new checkpoint system. Online can be a little laggy at times but who cares, it's freakin' Duke-Nukem 3-D. As you may have already guessed, I really love this game. It played a huge part in my gaming life, I first played it over at my buddies house on his PC and I was blown away. I didn't have a computer at the time so seeing this game in it's 2.5D glory was jaw dropping. The sweet guns, catchy one liners (for the time) and main badass character - this game had me hooked. Years have gone by and I have not really tried to play it since. I tried looking for it on the PS1 and tried installing it on the first computer I got a few years after it came out but neither method worked. So like DOOM before it, I am really looking forward to completing this classic.

Now having these old FPS games on XBLA isn't really following the Arcade theme that XBLArcade was originally shooting for but I guess that was thrown out the window when we started getting Sudoku and crossword puzzle games. So if XBLA is a free for all regarding classic games, get some more classic shooters in there Microsoft. Wolfenstein 3-D, Take No Prisoners, Fallout 1+2, Goldeneye (please God), Outlander, okay maybe not Outlander but I would buy it. You know where I'm going with this, don't flood XBLA with casual garbage and Pub Games. Fill it with all the shooter games of years past, we want to line your pockets with money Microsoft, so put some more great shooters on your platform so we can!

The Socom: Confrontation beta has arrived and I have been playing it as much as possible. As a huge fan of the Socom franchise, I am very impressed that Slant Six (the games developer) stayed so true to Socom II's feel. They have said all along that they are using SII as a template for what they want the final game to be and if the beta is any indication; they nailed it. Crossroads is the only map in the beta but that's ok, it's slightly refined but I can still find my way around from memory of the old layout. Firing your gun, the health system, character movement speed, it all just feels right but it's not just Socom II on PS3. There are now knife kills (Awesome!), weapon customization from Socom III is back and the all new armor system adds a bit more to the already strategic gameplay. Granted it's a beta, I still have to complain about the long load times, system lock-ups, unplayable lag and overall just how unstable it is. These things don't even bother me that much though, the load times are just like the later days of Socom II; uncomfortably long to sit through but perfectly long for sandwich making. Substitute the lag for cheaters and lock-ups for server errors and it feels more and more like Socom. The more things change, the more they stay the same I suppose.

Exclusive Reviews, we all see them popping up on varies sites and magazines. It's great, coverage that can only be located in one place; therefore, driving more traffic/sales. Win - Win, right? What about the motivation behind the publisher for offering this exclusive review? Under the table deals and bloated scores can result from these sketchy business propositions. The most recent incident that made the public more aware of this dirty underbelly would be the whole Jeff Gerstmann, Gamespot debacle. The man gets kicked from an 11 year career after "a certain game company" flooded the site with adds for their upcoming game and the game itself was not all that great. Jeff's review stated that and BOOM, he gets let go.

whattheyplay.com's John Davison was at the recent 1up yours PAX panel and was able to shed some light on this topic. When asked if people in the press get manipulated by the publishers, everyone chimed in and gave their two cents on the matter. Talking about the infamous Prey exclusive review and first hand dealings with these types of situations, John puts it simply, "Bottom line, exclusive reviews are bullshit."




X-Play's Adam Sessler was on the Panel as well and he adds, "Shame on the game industry to think that we're such tools that they can actually do that. It's really kind of embarrassing and there's times that I actually think that because we are the newest form of entertainment and that, you know. Look at us, we're not up here with suits and ties. There is a sense that we are more manipulable and that we can be pushed around and that's the part that really gets my iron."

I agree with these guys. Getting something from any game company as a "gift" or anything along those lines prior to a review or preview is just wrong. Pressuring you with wrong information about how other sites will give this game so and so score to make you somehow bend to the will of the PR is crap. Respectable publications like EGM and the whole 1up network refuse to accept any "gifts" from any game company and their editorial and add department are on separate floors. I guess what I'm trying to get across is, and this was mentioned on the PAX panel as well, know what your reading. Think for yourself when seeing the word "exclusive" plastered all over web sites and magazines - being exclusive might not be the only tactic that's being applied.

Digital Distribution, I love it. WiiWare, XBLA, PSN, Steam, I know I'm missing a bunch of others, etc. It seems like the wave of the future. That may be but EA thinks that digital distribution exclusivity is far off, 20+ years off. Dr Jens Uwe Intat, senior VP and general manager for European publishing in Europe at Electronic Arts cites size limits as the problem.

"I mean, we used to be below 1GB, but we're now building games that have 8, 9, 10GB - and if broadband distribution is going to allow 10GB to be distributed in half an hour, we'll have games that are 100GB. Because the graphical resolution increases,.."

"The content size of games, say Need for Speed, the size of the open world that you can use increases - so you just need more and more storage space, which is going to, again, make the pipeline a big bottleneck."

I guess I can see his point there, time from initiation to completed download may be a factor. Especially if that whole Net Neutrality thing goes down the gutter. The US doesn't even have 100% broadband access, never the rest of the world. Think of it from the other side and the point looses it's steam. Some people use Bittorrent. Some people use this to download files over 10GB. These people sometimes download files larger than 50GB, 100GB, 200GB, you name it. Sure, these same people let it cook for weeks to download but they still do it and if this turns into the majority, it might look like digital distribution will come sooner rather than later. Beside, who wants to be the loser carrying around a 500 Tera-Bit Green-Ray when we all have flying cars and food in pill form in 20 years.

Sony has always been big in Europe. Since the PS1 era, the Playstation brand has always dominated console gaming in that region. At Leipzig Games Convention 08, Sony announced the 160GB PS3, PSP3000 and a wireless keyboard attachment among other things. These are some pretty big announcements so why at Leipzig and not E3? The events are so close together, you can't really tell me that Sony didn't have these things ready for E3. I guess the only conspiracy theory inspired explanation is that Europe loves Sony and Leipzig is Europe's E3. It makes sense if you look at it from that perspective - I just feel a little ripped off. We get a boring ass speech about the life of the PS2 and Europe gets three hardware announcements, c'mon Sony, that Heavy Rain trailer would have been more exciting then that PS2 "sizzle" trailer.

Aside from Sony spoiling their favorite child, Europe, I have got back into Rock Band with a buddy of mine. I play Drums and right now I can play everything on Medium and some early gay songs on Hard. He plays Expert guitar on almost everything except a few Metal ones that look just insane. We were playing some Clouds Over California by Devil Driver *metal horns* and the game froze for a second. You know the optical illusion crap on the net where you stare at something and then you look away and you see the imprint or close your eyes and the design is still moving. Well that sort of happened to me when the game froze. I'm so used to seeing the notes fly by on screen and the flashy lights during the double-kicks that when the screen froze it looked like the whole image on the TV was floating slightly. I thought it looked pretty cool. By the way, play Too Human, don't listen to the haters - the game is fun.

A Casual Gamer - define it. What is the definition of a Casual Gamer anyway? I don't know. I guess it's the gamers that know nothing of the industry and play games very passively. If that's the case when does a Casual Gamer bleed into a Gamer or Hardcore Gamer. There's all these lines of gray and no definitive mark where a "gamer" gets to be labeled casual or core or whatever. David Thompson, VP of Scottish developer Slam Games, sheds some light on this, ""Saying somebody's a casual player is doing them a disservice, because there are people playing Bejewelled for twelve hours in a go - I wouldn't have ever played a game for more than a couple of hours in one go, so I think the terms are maybe mistaken somewhat. I think it's more the style of game - something you can sit down and play in chunks, rather than having to sit down for three hours to play the next chapter of the game, whatever that is." So there are some confusing descriptions here too. A person playing a gamed labelled as "casual" for extended periods of time. Does that push them into "core" or casual core? Whatever, I don't want to get lumped in to any of these groups. If someone plays games there just that, a person that plays games - like the rest of us.

I heard all the reviews and all the bad talk surrounding Haze but I didn't listen and I am playing through it right now. The game itself seems pretty solid but I am only about an hour into it. Voice acting is garbage but the view of super soldiers in the future - getting drugged up all the time and listening to rap music while they are in battle is pretty cool and a little ridiculous. I only have one big gripe about the game so far, the 20 minutes I had to wait before I started playing it. I boot it up and it installs, no problems here. There is an update with the game, so I get booted out to the cross media bar and an update has to take place there. Reboot the game with all the updates and installs and it has to stabilize the network before I can even start playing it. It's not that 20 minutes is too long, I would love it if it was just one install and I could go make a sandwich or something but you have to sit there and baby sit it. Press X to confirm, Are you sure you want to quit Haze? Install complete, Press X to restart system. After babysitting the numerous updates, I sort of didn't feel like playing Haze that much anymore. I'm not very far in but Haze is off the a rocky start, the only thing that can save it now is if I hear Korn's special Haze song soon.

GTAIV. We all know know about it's fun gameplay, great graphics, good story, awesome online play, etc. But did you know that it is solely responsible for a Taxi Cab Driver murder? Atleast that's what Thailand says. Earlier this week GTA IV was pulled from store shelves in Thailand due to a teenager "attempting to recreate a scene" from GTAIV. The young man murdered a taxi driver and robbed him to see if it was as easy as it is in GTAIV, allegedly. Ladda Thangsupachai, director of the ministry's Cultural Surveillance Centre had this to say, "This time-bomb has already exploded and the situation could get worse. Today it is a cab driver, but tomorrow it could be a video game shop owner." Next thing you know it could be the world if these dang kids get a hold of Red Alert 2 and learn how to command armies!! The horror!. This is just another case of "let's blame videogames" because it's easy to blame that disc in the 360 then the parents, you know - the people raising the kid for what happened. Thailand's not done informing us of the dangers of these videogames just yet. A few days later they released a list of the ten most dangerous videogames out there, they are:

1. GTA
2. Man Hunt
3. Scarface
4. 50 Cent - Bullet Proof
5. 300
6. The Godfather
7. Killer 7
8. Resident Evil 4
9. God of War
10. Hitman

So be sure to burn these games if you have them in your possession before your running a muck with G-Unit or fighting off a legion of undead mythological creatures with your blades of Chaos. Thanks a ton Thai Ministry of Health for this invaluable information.

Aside from the madness that went down in Thailand, I went to Warped Tour 08. They made a stop in Saskatoon and that's way too close to here for me to not go. A bunch of bands played but the ones that I was there for were: All That Remains and Protest The Hero. I got to meet ATR and I caught a bit of MC PeePants himself spittin' rhymes on stage too. It was an outdoor event and there was a lot of variety there. A bunch of different tents were set up for merch, there was a freestyle rap thing going on all day and even some de-bugg 360's sporting the not yet released Facebreaker along with Rock Band kiosks. A very interesting band was there performing right next to scream-o and emo stages, it was like trance/dance music or something. I forget the name of the band but it is two brothers, one is was wearing a black spandex suit with a gold cape - complete with a gold crown. The other had very tight jeans on with a black fishnet top and they were both dancing around on stage to pre-recorded beat samples from a keyboard. It's a little hard to explain but it was Tim and Eric caliber of funny/weird/awkwardness - I loved it.

I was checking my sites I noticed something funny up on Gamesindustry.biz. The headline reads "Game reviewers are lazy" so that peaked my attention. Turns out that the president of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Science (AIAS) thinks that game journalists are lazy when it comes to reviewing games. He goes off on a rant about how game reviewers are lazy and don't spend enough time with the games, here's a quote:"How can you review a game, how can you give a comment about a game like Grand Theft Auto IV, that has 40-plus hours or more of gameplay, if you've only spent 2 and a half to 3 hours playing it?" What? Who reviews GTAIV and only plays it for 3 hours max? Where is this getting his information? I think that this guy has a real disconnect dealing with this part of the industry. When someone is assigned to review a game, the general agreement that the game is completed and played to the point of which a review can be formed around it. From a 6 hour movie tie in to a never ending MMO, we are not lazy and we play the hell out of these games when reviewing them. Some game journalists review 20+ games in some months (thanks November) and that's anything but lazy! Maybe he saw this video and thought that's how all people review games, no, no they don't.



Nintendo has found great success with the Wii and DS. It seems that they are getting more and more rich with NPD numbers that rival the holiday season month in month out for both devices. This will eventually end and we all know that the next generation of consoles is imminent. Michael Pachter, everyones favorite Wedbush Morgan Securities analyst, thinks that Nintendo is readying their next console for release before the end of this year. Pachter credits this with support that the DS has been declining in sales in Japan (go Monster Hunter 2ndG go) and a new handheld will help boost them back to the top. The DS is still selling like nuts everywhere else in the world so I don't really think Micheal's got this one in the bag yet, where's that Wii II anyway? Aside from handhelds, the next wave of home consoles might be a ways off still. THQ's CEO Brian Farrell says new systems just aren't needed yet. Epic Games President Mike Capps seems to agree saying that no new consoles are expected until 2012 at the earliest and 2018 at the latest. I hope their right, it's way too soon to spend hundreds of dollars on the next home console incarnation anyway.

QuakeCon 08 is in full swing and industry Icon John Carmack was there promoting Rage along with the new installments in the Doom and Wolfenstien games. 1up got a chance to get a interview with the man himself and it's a no PR bullshit interview. John talks about the strengths and weaknesses with the Xbox360 and Playstation 3. Know more about each console then you ever wanted too, he also touches on his views on the direction of the next generation of consoles and memory constraints around them. It's a lengthy interview full of tech jibba jabba and industry insight, check it out at 1up.com along with all their up to date QuakeCon 08 coverage.

E3 2008 is over and the dust has settled. A few announcements her and there, some lame ass press conferences and no booth babes (again). Speaking of press conferences, I'm sure all you Nintendo fan boys were watching the Nintendo Press conference and scratching your heads in disgust. Big news: a noise maker, snowboarding and a Wii-mote add-on that should have been there since launch. I'm sure you all took off your promotional Twilight Princess T-shirts and put away your Metroid Slurp-ee cups in anger after the show. Well, Nintendo feels your pain, with only a "we're working on it" answer from Nintendo regarding Zelda and Mario - Satoru Iwata assures you that they have not forgotten about you hardcore fans. He basically said that these big, hardcore titles take long to make and since there is nothing really concrete created for either it would be smarter to just show nothing. I don't know about you but I would have loved to see 20 minutes of artwork from the new Zelda or Mario game then Miyamoto prancing on stage playing Wii-Music.

Guitar Hero or should I say the new hotness in videogames right now, this game is partially responsible for making the beat and rythm genre one of the most popular today. Now I know the far superior Rock Band hasn't left some of your disc trays since launch and all your Guitar Hero games are lovely costars or make shift mirrors now. There is still a huge Guitar Hero fan base though, the kids that post youtube videos of Dragonforce or hacked songs on the PS2 - listen up. Guitar Hero: Metal Edition is out and ready for you to hack into your PS2's everywhere! The game features over 60 tracks with some of the best metal around: In Flames, The Duskfall, Soilwork, Amon Amarth and Strapping Young Lad just to name my favorites. For the full list and details on the game check out: http://metalinjection.net/guitar-hero.

It seems that ever other PSN title out there likes to stimulate the psychedelic part of our brain. Everyday Shooter, Pixel Junk Eden, Flow, Flower, all of these titles are of the super relaxing and highly visually stimulating type. It seems that the developers of the anticipated Wipeout HD wanted to cater towards the Mushroom eating PS3 owning crowd. How so? Well, the game was on it's way to being released but they caught a snag along the way. Wipeout HD failed some test that could potentially increase the risk of Epilepsy in a certain percentage of people that played the game. So they have to tone it down a bit in the crazy-ness department. I know that the game will feature custom sound tracks and the environment will pulse to your desired music, I really can't wait for this game to come out now.

Nintendo and Sony had their annual E3 Press Conferences yesterday. Nintendo seemed to really lean towards the casual market and Sony's conference has a "Three Pillar" theme to it. Both companies strut their stuff onstage trying to capture the wallets of their consumers, with that said, both where quiet underwhelming.

Nintendo is all about the casual market. The only hint they gave of a new hardcore game was that the guys and gals who made Super Mario Galaxy and Twilight Princess are hard at work on something, Gee thanks. Instead the conference was centered around family friendly games and so much forced laughter that I cringed a few times during the show. Aside from the dry corporate Exec humor, the most interesting things at the show was the new Animal Crossing and the Wii-Mote add-on. The new Animal Crossing allows you to go to other peoples towns and chat with them using this group speak microphone bundled with the game. It's not a headset, it sits on top of your sensor bar and pics up whoever is speaking in the room. They better make that mic work the way it should or get ready to hear a lot of noisy florescent lights as well as washer and dryers. The Wii-Mote add-on allows for more precise movements with your wrist and comes bundled with another mini-game compilation that supports it. Sounds like something that should have come out day one for the console, better late than never. The add-ons and plastic peripherals are getting to be a bit much though, Nintendo, just don't get carried away with your add-ons - the 32x is still haunting us all.

The Sony press conference was wall to wall screens and "sizzle" trailers for PS3, PSN, PSP, and even PS2. The main theme of the event was the long life cycles that these platforms have. Drawing comparisons from software sales of the PSOne and PStwo compared to the PS3. Sony of course had charts and graphs showing their dominance in the market place with their own spin tied to it. The presentation of which was done using Little Big Planets level creator which shows just how flexible that game is. Home was talked about as well as movies on the PS3 which shows that Sony is really trying to match Xbox Live feature for feature. The big game of the show where God of War III and MAG from Zipper Interactive. God of War III was just a CG trailer with Kratos standing atop a rubbled building in a storm spewing mythic lore and it has me so pumped! The creative minds that brought us hits like SOCOM I and SOCOM II now have MAG: Massive Action Game. 256 players in massive online battles that look like their along the line of the Battlefield series style of play with Resistance 2's Squad system to keep things organized. All they showed was a CG trailer of an ongoing battle, it looks great but I'd love to see this game in actual motion.

So there you have it, Nintendo and Sony round out the end of the two day press conference extravaganza. More casual games for Wii and more of everything for Sony. No one really stepped up and surprised us like Microsoft did but a good showing of what to expect from these giants in the coming year.

The E3 08 Microsoft Press Conference was a solid line-up of hardcore games with some casual gimmicks sprinkled in. Long awaited rumours confirmed and one hell of a surprise ending, this years Microsoft Conference was a blast.

To kick it all off we are treated to some game demos. First up is a live demo of Fallout 3, first showing a half of a full trailer accompanied by some gameplay. The combat was shown off in real time and this slow motion feature that allows you to target any part of your enemy strategically. The combat looks a bit on the easy side if you abuse this feature. Resident Evil 5 was up next, showing off the online co-op feature that allows you and a friend to tackle the zombie onslaught together. The demo ended with a teasing battle of the two of you vs. a chainsaw wielding maniac but was cut short because of time constraints. The game looks very good and it has the same interface and core gameplay from Resident Evil 4 which is awesome.

Peter Molyneux graced the stage, announcing that Fable II is "done". Now Peter has been know to promise the world but I think he's not exaggerating for once. The live demo showed off some early gameplay where you are a male or female child and transitioned into co-op gameplay. The ability to join your friends game is now easier than ever. Just walk up to a glowing bubble in the world, invite him in and your playing co-op. Some more interactions with your family were shown off, socializing and doing things your family like seems to build relationships. This is easily shown by the very "The Sims" style of "+17" or "-8" bubbles that pop up over the NPC's head. Giving you feedback in real time as to what your doing and how it effects your partner or child.

Clifford "Don't call me Cliffy B" Bleszinski came on stage showing off a new trailer for Gears of War 2 as well as a demo of a never before seen level. The trailer is very Epic, showing Marcus charging into a group of various types of locust - trying to get to his pinned down buddies all the while holding a meat shield. The demo displayed showed a level where the environment was destroying all around you in glorious scripted Unreal Engine III graphics. The kind only Epic knows how to make, you even stay in a building while it falls down and the demo ends with Marcus suggesting to Dom to ride one of the Brumacks. An additional game type was revealed where you and friends online beat wave after wave of progressively harder locust.

A Microsoft rep then went on stage and touted that videogames are now the biggest form of entertainment in the world. The Xbox 360 is fueling this by great sales and great software. Putting the Microsoft spin on everything of course. "Winning" the console war in "North America" according to "NPD". Selling way more units then PS3 but only outselling the Wii by about 100,000, again, all this is North America not world wide stats. Quickly moving to the new Xbox 360 dashboard that will be released in the fall that offers a new look and some cool new features. The core look of it reminds me of my Windows Media Center program with the list of options scrolling in the top left and the stylized look. The much rumoured Mii rip offs, I mean avatars are confirmed and will be displayed in this new dashboards as well.

The avatars just look like hi-res Mii's and to prove that they are going to be used in games they also announced a new Uno game that will be coming out in the fall. It looks just like the old Uno but where there used to be Xbox Live Vision Camera's there is now your avatar wiggling around, woopie. One of the main creators in charge of the avatars seemed to drink the kool-aid and said, "Where else, beside Xbox Live, could you introduce the concept of an avatar and it immediately become a community of 10 million." Really? Think hard, what are avatars like? You can now see your friends avatars on the dashboard as well and invite them into a party (max of 8) where you can then launch any game or movie (more on that later) right from the menu. This all sounds good but it seems like someone at Microsoft might have been looking into Sony's Home for inspiration.

A new blade (I'm not sure if their Blades or just pages anymore) shows off only game show videogames. This PrimeTime section lets you play game shows like 1vs 100 online and compete for real prizes. Get ready to battle through weeks of ladder style tournaments for your Deal or No Deal keychain! Xbox Live Arcade was there in full force showing off Geometry Wars II, Galaga: Legions, Portal: Still Alive and a sneak peak at a South Park project. Most of these titles will be available this fall but my highly anticipated Duke-Nukem 3D is no where to be found, that sucks. Along with arcade games, Xbox Live Community games is launching this fall where you will be able to play games the community has created using the XNA tools provided by Microsoft.

Netflix and Xbox Live are now happy and together. The much rumoured joining goes back a few months and the mole who dug that one up deserves a carrot. So: if you live in the United States, have a XBL Gold subscription as well as a Netflix subscription, you will be able to watch any Netflix movie on your console AND you'll be able to share this viewing with your friends in your party. Sounds pretty cool but again, Home was all about showing movies in your virtual house to your friends first. With this much "borrowing" of features going on I wouldn't be surprised if gamerscore was now Gamer Trophies and the dashboard turns into the Cross-Media-Interface, prove me wrong Microsoft. Another Scene it game was also revealed as well as a new trailer for Banjo Kazooie which showed off gameplay on land, sea and air.

Your In the Movies is the latest in Microsoft "borrowing" ideas from Sony with this blatant EyeToy rip-off. This game allows you to play a series of mini-games that force you to pose, dance, run in one spot, swat bugs, etc. After a set amount of these games are completed, the footage of you looking like an idiot gets spliced into a cool looking move trailer. Guitar Hero World Tour was there, showing off drums with symbols, a new guitar and it's music making capabilities along with a ton of master tracks featuring: Van Halen, The Eagles, R.E.M. and Metallic just to name a few. Rock Band II shows up and totally schools Guitar Hero with over 100 master tracks at launch, everything backwards compatible and a very good variety of bands from Modest Mouse to Megadeth. To wrap things up a higher up from Square Enix comes on stage showing off a new trailer for The Last Remnant that looks a lot like Final Fantasy XII if you ask me.




O yeah, FFXIII is coming to Xbox 360 as well.

Another year, another Microsoft E3 conference in the bag. With Xbox being more aggressive towards the casual market with their avatars and casual games as well as going head to head with Sony's Home features. It seems that Microsoft is trying their hardest to appeal to everyone, nabbing the most popular options from the competition and spitting out system selling exclusives, their in great shape to have another solid year of hardware and software sales.

You know how sometimes, when the mood strikes you so, you want to go back and play that old game. I feel like that right now, I'm going to go back (not too far) and play some older games, see how they stack up. Each game is going to get 30 minutes to let me know how awesome or terrible they really are.

Dino Crisis

What I remember: When this game first came out, all I knew was that the dudes from Capcom made this and those dudes made Resident Evil so it's got to be awesome. The game looked and played fairly well with some annoying puzzles but I didn't care. Killing dinosaurs with machine guns and RE style item management was so cool.

What I played: Starting a new game, I was treated to a jaw-dropping PSOne caliber opening cut-scene. After the cut-scene ended, I saw the ugly face that was Dino Crisis. This game hasn't aged well, to say the least. Characters look grainy as hell and the voice acting is right up there with the original Resident Evil. I pretty much just ran around collecting items and killing a few dinos on the way. Nothing really big happened and I died a couple times. This game is remembered as great in my head but it's not all that today.

TimeSplitters 2

What I remember: Multiplayer was a total blast. The games story was wacky but not over the top and the gun play was great. I played this game all summer with a buddy of mine, good times.

What I played: Getting a quick refresh on the story, I'm chasing aliens throughout time to get crystals for some reason. I played the 1990 Siberia level, it was great. The guns still feel really good and they throw a lot at you. In this level alone I got a handgun, sniper rifle, shotgun, flamethrower and tactical shotgun. Fighting soldiers and zombie throughout this secluded military hideout was still spooky and fun. I would say that it looks like a low-res XBLA game, so much easier on the eyes then Dino Crisis over there. The game is still fun and I could easily see my self coming back for more.

Kill*Switch -Take Cover. Take Aim. Take Cover.

What I remember: This game has you stick to walls a lot and the guns felt jerky and awkward. Perhaps time has been kind to this rough around the edges shooter.

What I played: Time appears to be the enemy. This game doesn't look all that bad but it's jerky controls and just plain bad dialog make it a chore to play. The interface and weapons you use look and sound cool but that's about it. This game has recoil, a pretty new feature for the time and the pre-Gears of War stop-n'-pop gameplay is extremely rudimentary. It's going to be a long time before I throw this back into my PS3.

Well it seems that everything was a bust but TimeSplitters 2. That sucks, I was hoping to get a nice warm feeling inside from all of these but instead I get a decent FPS and two turds. I think games live on better through your mind then going back and playing them to make sure they are good. I don't want to go back anymore, I fear the older games I hold to such praise in my head might turn out to be crap after all.