interest renewed

The last few years has been relatively game-free for me. I used to buy pretty much every major title for the four game systems I owned, and freely admit I hardly ever played them. I’ve finished about 10% of the games I own, but wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the norm rather than the exception. I have all three of the “big” consoles, and have a decent gaming PC, too.

This year is a treat in the big-name game category.

Halo 2 is a lot of fun, and you have to remember to blink from time-to-time. Great story, great visuals, and not nearly as repetitive as the first iteration. Love the sword, I just wish it had the slice-and-dice visuals that Jedi Knight had. I’m about two-thirds through, and have yet to enjoy multi-player. Coop is already a level 5 mofo, so I am guessing he’s been taking in some melees.

Half-Life 2 is currently downloading from Steam, and a big thank you to ATI for including it with their Radeon XT products last year. I’m looking forward to taking it in, and I know I’ll be finishing it.

Unreal Tournament 2k4 is a tonne of fun, but I cannot admit I am as enamoured by DeathBall as Prii is. In a word, the Deathball crowd is rife with grade-A assholes, and he’s right, it makes the day-to-day nonsense of the old Coli clans look like civil discourse. I play the other mods, because they’re fun and you know all the twits are 14-year olds, which doesn’t appear to be the case with DB. Too bad, because it could be a lot of fun if the community was a little more sane.

Finally, X-Men Legends is the first level-up/beat-em-up that I’ve actually enjoyed. Good story line, good character development, and a lot of ass-kicking. Wolverine’s my fave character, but Jean Grey is a pretty cool character as well.

A big change, because I know I’ll finish all these games in the next month or so, which will be more games finished than in the last two years. That means I’m either falling back in love with gaming, or the dating scene really sucks.

Oh, and I’m building a MAME cabinet. Yay old skule!

Ok, I’ve re-read this whole post. I am a geek. It’s hopeless.