What You Did There; I See It.

First and foremost – coil over at day1patch showed me this game today, and I’m not quite sure what I think. It’s… disturbing, to say the least, but certainly powerful. What do you guys think?

Once in a while, I find myself in the uncanny situation of being just ahead of the curve on some type of breaking news or situation. The moment something happens, I’ll be right there, in the thick of it – “on the ground”, so to speak. Last week was just such a time.

Other times… well, other times, I find myself wondering how the hell I managed to go this long without seeing this movie/playing this game/eating a scorpion. Hell, sometimes it’s even stuff that I should have instinctively known about, like this game that has a gun that shoots sharks instead of bullets.

Hold on, hold on, I can explain. With Midnight Run, well, y’know, I just never got around to it. I mean, it’s in my netflix queue, that counts for something, right? Right? Please, stop hitting me. Ow, ow! And the scorpion, well he was in my tequila last night. Was I supposed to just let him get away with that? Hell no! I did what any badass would do – I ate the fucker. I have no excuse for not knowing about the Land Shark Gun game; I totally dropped the ball on that one. Dragon Age: Origins, on the other hand… well I blame that one on Microsoft. That’s right, I call foul on the achievement system.

Don’t get me wrong – I love achievements. I mean, I don’t live and die for them, but if I can do something that’ll only take me an extra hour or eight and it’ll net me another hundred or so on my gamerscore, am I gonna go for it? More than likely. It is for this reason and this reason alone I have several games that are better played on PC for the Xbox 360 (I’m looking at you, anything-FPS!). How could I resist buying Borderlands on the 360, when so many of my friends already had it, and playing it there would rack up my achievements on xbox live? I’m not some robot programmed to not care about friendly obsessive competition, you know.

So Dragon Age: Origins comes out and I’m totally going to buy it. But then I have many friends tell me “hey, it’s so much better on PC”. Freeze. I do some research, and the word sounds the same all around. That’s not to say that the 360 version isn’t good, just that it’s not really, well, the same game (controls, graphic limitations, etc. can really change a game experience). So I’m immediately torn. Obviously, I want to buy the game on the 360, rack up my gamerscore, and show off all my points to my friends. On the other hand, I really want to experience what is considered by many to be the “real” experience of the game (sprawling real-time tactical RPG on a controller doesn’t sound so awesome to me). So I stall, and stall, and stall. Days turn into weeks; weeks into months. Eventually, I just sort of write it off as one of those limbo games that I’m never going to buy (NOTE: do not confuse this with the game Limbo, which I plan to purchase the very MOMENT it is available – seriously, I demoed this game at PAX East and it was un-freakin-believable).

Then Steam (oh, Steam, how far you’ve come) goes and unleashes their “OMG THE OUTSIDE WORLD IS PLOTTING TO KILL YOU; HERE ARE ALL THE GAMES YOU EVER WANTED, ALL ON SALE; BUY THEM AND STAY INDOORS AND SAFE!” summer sale (definitely one of the best promotions I’ve seen in ages), and I pick up a boatload of new titles for rock bottom prices, Dragon Age: Origins included. Hooked immediately.

I’m maybe 30 hours in or so and I love it so far. I had intended on just playing it all last week until I beat it (stay-cation, remember), but then that whole “omg the Blizzard sky is falling” thing happened (remember that? those silly kids), so I got a little sidetracked. Even still, I’m loving every moment of it so far, and I can already foresee myself starting over once I’m done just to try it another way. Although, I suppose it would be good of me to finish the games I’ve started already before I got sidetracked (*cough*FFXIII*cough*Alan Wake*cough*), and then there’s that whole “guild” thing I run (not to mention, y’know, work), but hey – what’s a gamer to do? I’d rather have too many great games to play than too few.

Did you take advantage of the Steam Summer Sale? What games are you playing catch-up with at the moment? Most importantly, what do you think are some of the most underrated/unknown awesome games out there?

• (+) It’s Friday!
• (-) I am very, very tired.
• (+) I am currently doing what all real men do when they get home on Friday – drinking scotch.
• (-) We wiped on Yogg at 2% this week.
• (+) My GameFly games arrived in NetFlix-time; what an awesome service!
• (=) While I find the controls for Prototype a little tricky to grasp at first, they get easier the more you play/the more skills you acquire, plus the sheer carnage and mayhem make up for control issues.
• (+) I have discovered several new awesome sites this week, including TweetMeme and Translation Party. These make me happier and more entertained than I feel is reasonable, but I’ll take it.
• (+) Alice In Chains Pack 01 was released for Rock Band 2 DLC this week – I purchased it the second I got home on Friday.
• (-) I cannot, for the life of me, get through “Would?” on drums.

More good than bad makes for a good week. This weekend will most likely entail lots of watching TV/NetFlix, lots of playing Prototype, trying out Batman: Arkham Asylum, and much sleeping. I love my life.

Deborah Gibson, I had really missed you. I admit it, I completely dropped the ball when you were on Broadway, but gimme a break – I was in middle school. I had very little control over whether or not I was in New York City. Since stopping your mall tours and moving into adult contemporary, I admit my interest waned a bit – until now. Until seeing your performance in Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus. Truth be told, I don’t know if I can even really call it a performance, it seemed so true-to-life. Such talent and emotion brought to such a plausible script – I don’t know how you do it, but I salute you.

So seriously – the scene where the shark jumps out of the water and eats the plane? Priceless. I definitely feel that the octupus got the shaft a bit; we don’t really get to see his motivations very much, other than perhaps his deep desire to either sleep or get something out of his eye. Either way, worth the price of admission (in this case, free, streaming via netflix). I highly recommend intoxication.

Also – Gamefly? How have I possibly owned an xbox this long and not known about this site? Are there any other totally awesome services that elude me? Please, let me know!