Good god this game could not have been any worse than it is. Ok, maybe it could have been worse. They could have had only 1 map and tried to add even more useless classes to the game. Or, they could have put horses in as a ridable vehicle. That surely would have knocked it down a peg. But at least they would have been interesting.

I tossed up a review if you are interested.

From the crappy weapons, to the crappy controls, and the equally crappy maps and mountain of glitches. This game has a ton of fail in every direction you look.

Avoid it at all costs. Do NOT be fooled by the $15 price tag. It's not even worth a third of that.

1) I tossed 3 packs of exploding onto a tank as it rolled up on my flag. I back up quite a bit, and as I did this the driver popped out right next to his tank. I hit the switch and KABOOM! The tank goes up in flames, and so do I... but not the driver that was standing next to his tank.

2) I'm running toward an enemy, who just captured my flag right behind me, and pull out my pistol. I shoot him 5 times, a few of them which had to be in his head because that is where my reticle was. He finishes reloading just in time to shoot once and kill me. Five shots vs. one shot and I loose?

3) A tank is coming up a hill and I have a good position. I shoot it with the anti-tank rocket. No pop. I shoot it with another. Still no pop. And a third. Nope, no pop. He turns his turret toward me and as it is sweeping by he instantly kills me with his machine gun. Keep in mind, I could see the tank the entire time and no one was repairing it.

4) I'm in a tank and I roll up on a base with 4 guys pointing away from me trying to snipe. I level my machine gun and open fire sweeping back and fourth. NONE of them die. One turns around and runs for me and before I can hit the gas the tank blows up with me in it. None of them die.

This game has problems. A mountain of them. And I can't even get my money back because it's stupid DLC. Screw digital distribution.

So far.. massive dissapointment. I played a TON of 1942 back in the day, and 1943 is basically a stripped down version of it. Somehow, EA managed to revive an old game and make it feel even older.

I'm going to give it a bit more time before throwing in the towel, but so far I can say that it has done nothing to fix many of the worst problems that were in 1942. Infact, it's managed to magnify all of them. The class balance issues are definitely a big concern. Weapons that feel like Nerf guns have got to go. Grenades with splash damage of about 1 foot are irratating. Tanks that take a full 5 seconds of machine gun fire to kill infantry, can barely kill infantry with the heavy gun, and pop almost instantly when driving into enemy territory. Not too mention the most awkward control scheme in the history of ever for a console FPS.

Even for a cheap $15 game I still feel like I got robbed. Somehow it's ok to release crap if you are going to sell it for a crap price.

If you don't know what Aion is, check it out here or here. My friend called my up on Friday morning (had the day off) and insisted that we go put down pre-orders for it so we could get into the beta that was open all weekend. I was a bit skeptical when I first got my hands on the pre-order packaging, as the artwork on it screamed "Asian MMO full of emo frohawks and goth angels!", which is not something I am interested in beyond a random pop-culture joke or two. But, I went ahead and paid my $5 for the pre-order and figured I could just cancel it for my money back if I hated it.

I had no luck getting it installed that night. It was a huge 6gig download at around 100k a sec. I tried fileplanet, but they suck and managed to deliver a corrupted 6gig file not once, but twice. And they had the audacity to ask me to become a paying member. Yeah, no thanks.

So, about Aion. This games is ridiculously polished for a beta. I've played a lot of betas over the years. NEVER have I played even a launch MMO that ran this smoothly and bug free. I encounted only a few little quirks here and there, but for the most part it was rock solid. The only major gripe would be the servers coming down 3 times over the entire weekend and being brought back up within 30 minutes or so. Everything else was just shinning from all the polish that has been poured into this game. They could launch today and no one would know it was in beta yesterday.

The look and feel of the game was at first a downer. It looks and feels a lot like a Final Fantasy game, which isn't to say it sucks, it's just kind of goofy. Mostly this is because of the character animations and spell effects. Lots and lots of light orbs and glowy everythings. Take a look at a number of screenshots and you will see what I mean. To top that off the music is just strange. Every time you go into combat a rocking guitar riff kicks on that sounds a lot like typical 80's hairband guitar wailing. This got old real fast, and thankfully it can be turned off. Hopefully they change it up a bit by release and maybe add a dozen or so different songs that could kick in. Having just the one results in an almost required Options > Sound > Remove Checkbox. This initial poor opinion of the game quickly faded once I got going (and made a few other options adjustments).

There are 2 factions, and each faction only has the 4 same clas.ses to pick from. They read something like an old RPG game: The Warrior, The Scout, The Mage and The Priest. Not a lot of options right? Well fortunately they archetype out into 2 clas.ses each once you hit level 10. I picked The Priest, and then at level 10 got to choose between a Cleric (pure healer) and a Chanter (heavily armored buffer). I chose a Chanter. If you've played WoW at all, you will probably instantly compare them to Paladins. They have great armor and buff, but can also heal really well. The way the buffs work is interesting. I have a total of 5. One is self only, and two are called Mantras that have no time limit and affect everyone in the group. And, they stack. They can all be active at the same time and grant the full effects. Pretty damn nifty! This easily makes the Chanter worth having around in groups, although I never got far enough to group with more than 2 other people.

Crafting is also implemented quite well in the game. There are a handful of available crafting skills, and players can learn all of them on a single character. This creates a massive hill to climb for those folks that love having all their crafting skills maxed. It also grants everyone the ability to get it themselves if they like playing their MMO's solo a lot. I thought this was a pretty cool decision and I fully expect this aspect to suck up a lot of my game time when this thing launches.

Combat is very slick in the game. All clas.ses get "chain" abilities. These are abilities that can only be used for a short period after a prior ability successfully landed. I only managed to get up to a tier 2 chain ability, but once you pick your archetype the abilities menu maps out what your future chains are. The longest for the Chanter is 4 abilities in a row, and they are pretty impressive toward the end of the chain. I really like this design choice. It will add all kinds of depth with needing to know what clas.ses gain what kinds of benefits for particular chains etc. They branch too!

The big hook with Aion? Flying. Everyone can fly once level 10 is reached. Each character gets a set of wings that can be used to fly around in certain places, or glide in any location. This is especially awesome for jumping off ledges and getting there a bit quicker. It adds quite the interesting flash to the game when you flip out some massive wings after jumping off a high ledge. There appear to be all kinds of upgrades available too. It will be very interesting to see how this aspect pans out later on in the game. I hope they try to incorporate the flight ability as much as possible with later progression.

The questing system is also really well done. There are Campaign quests, and other quests. The Campaign quests are very clearly the centerpieces for the story progression. LOTS of high quality in-game cutscenes. I counted roughly a dozen by the time I hit level 8 or so. No more reading quest windows to get the lore in there, you get to experience it first hand a lot.

In addition to this there is a title system. Titles can be unlocked by completing specific quests, usually the more difficult ones, and then you can choose which one of your earned titles to use. These will appear in front of your name to let everyone know what you've done. In addition, titles grant specific bonuses. The bonuses aren't huge, but they are a good a nice little touch that makes selecting your title more than just a vanity decision.

I could go on for quite a bit longer about all the little "Oh and also.." things that come to mind, but I need to end thus blog post now, before it turns into a multi-pager. Long story short, keep this game on your radar if you are into MMO's even remotely. Or, if you are not into MMO's but want to give one a whirl. The amount of well done components for this game makes me think it's a fantastic place to start.

A weekend of Liberty? What the heck? Yes, it was the 4th of July. No, I didn't do anything even remotely patriotic other than spend some money and drink a beer or two.

EDIT: And, I do realize that Michael Jackson is in my banner, and it is slightly distasteful to have him up there with his hair on fire since he just died. I am working on getting that fixed. Hopefully I will have something a bit more fancy soon.

I shop for games at a lot of different stores. Target being one of them. Mostly because they always have ridiculous prices on clearance items. I've often picked up games there for $10 that are still going for $30 elsewhere. One of the nice things about Target's PC gaming section is the super cheap games section. You know the area... games that are packed in CD size boxes? Usually really old games that are no more than $10? Well lately I've been cruising through there and finding that I am actually interested in several of the games I'm seeing. One game in particular has been nagging me to buy it for the last 2 months at the low low price of $9.99. Disciples II Gold. Despite the low price I've still managed to avoid picking it up. Well, today I wandered through that section, with a $10 copy of Star Ocean: Second Evolution already clutched in one hand, and saw that the price on Disciples II had dropped to an astoundingly low $2.48. That's cheaper than a cheeseburger!

Yes, I bought it. I almost bought my brother a copy too, but I'm pretty dang cheap and his wife would kill me if I bought him a new PC game.

I managed to fix my 360 today. I watched a few videos on Youtube about it and decided to take a crack at it before throwing down more money for a new one. Why pay MS to do it when I can do it myself for super cheap?

It did take me the better part of the day. The hardest part was getting the old cooling goo off the chips. I replaced it with Arctic Silver 5 and the 360 fired up just fine as soon as I got all the working parts back together. That didn't last long though. The RROd came back after a few reboots. So I followed the instructions for unplugging the cooling fans and turning it on so it gets real hot, then letting it sit for 20 minutes.

I then proceeded to play Fallout 3 for a few hours with no problems. And all it cost me was a few washers from Home Depot and a new $10 screwdriver set for the Torx nuts I had to remove. For now my 360 is sitting open in front of my TV laying down flat. I'll finish putting it back together tomorrow and see how it runs standing up like normal. If that causes any problems then it may just spend the rest of it's days horizontal.

Good times.

Yup.. my 360 RROD'd again last night. My fiance woke me up and asked "Is the RROD 3 red lights or all 4?" Not a cool way to get woken from a deep slumber. Not cool at all.

I called support this morning, and had to reregister my Xbox, and in a surprise to no one, my warranty is kaput. Even though this unit is a 2 year old unit that was the replacement for the first one I had RROd almost exactly 2 years ago. Apparently it doesn't matter if they send out units that will last a long time as long as they last long enough to surpass the original unit's warranty. Fantastic!

So I can pay them $100 to fix this one, which also gets me a new 1 year warranty. Which makes me laugh that it's only 1 year because that suggest they know the fixed units will only last.... ONE YEAR! Or, I can buy a new unit for $300 at my local Fry's and get a full 3 years of use out of it. Either way it goes, it'll be about $100 a year in costs to me. But with a new unit I'd most likely not have to deal with it as often. Tough decisions.

So now I am checking out all the fix-it-yerself videos and instructions that I can find. I have a hunch I can crack this sucker open and getting it working. No worries about destroying that shiny little Microsoft sticker since this sucker will never get worked on by MS.

Also, I'm looking at what to do about getting a new one. Yes, I will get a new one despite being burned. I love my 360. I don't love MS. I want a white one, but I also want a Falcon. I'd like to get a 120gig HDD too. So.. I might buy a new Pro, and the 120gig HDD for $450 total. Then, try to sell off the extras and recoup some of my money. It looks like I can get at least $50 for the 60 gig HDD itself. Then maybe another $20 for various cables etc. Still, that means I'm coughing up roughly $380 for the privilege of 3 more years of 360 goodness.. hopefully a lot longer, but doubtful.

ARGH! At least my PS3 is running strong with zero problems what-so-ever.

Holy crud this game put me to sleep in 5 minutes. No joke. Then I figured it was a good time to hit the sack so I stumbled to bed and I couldn't get to sleep for at least an hour...

Ah.. the magic of dull games.

The last few months have been pretty lean on gaming around my house. I've been thoroughly entrenched in watching basketball this season, and just haven't found a lot of time to play games. When I do find time, I spend most of it playing Warhammer. My consoles have been getting neglected quite a bit, even though I've continued to buy most of the big release games that have come out during this time. I've got a huge stack of big release games that haven't even been opened yet. With the weather improving this time of year, I suspect I may end up spending my free time outside a lot more too, creating a bigger dent in my gaming time.

This feels somewhat familiar. It seems that every time a big game comes out, I avoid actually playing it until the popularity dies down. It took me over a year to get into Oblivion, and when I did I ended up putting 120 hours into it. The same thing seems to be happening this time around with Fallout 3.

The last week has seen more action though. I finally started Resident Evil 4 on the Wii (after getting a replacement disk sent to me). I did play the game on the Gamecube waaaay back in 2005, but didn't get very far after getting frustrated with the controls. The Wii edition is definitely a lot friendlier in this regard. I'm roughly 20% done so far.

I'm also still plugging my way through GTAIV. I told myself I won't buy the DLC expansion until I finish the original campaign. I suspect I may end up not getting far into the DLC once I actually do get it. I'm also mentally tieing this into my desire to go pick up a 120gig HDD, which I am stalling on until the price drops. I doubt it ever will, but I keep hoping so. So yes, somehow I've managed to make a connection between finishing GTAIV's campaign and protesting Microsoft's peripheral pricing strategy. Odd yes. OCD maybe...

My DS has been seeing more action lately too. Out of all the systems I buy the most games for on regular basis, my DS gets the most love. I recently picked up GTA:CW and have been having a blast. The look of the game was a turn-off at first, but I've come to appreciate it and understand why they took this direction. The GTA games on the PSP were really dull. Mostly because I think the tried too hard at making them feel like the PS2 GTA games. Portable games require a portable angle, and not one that simply involves removing features and making minor adjustments to the controls. GTA:CW is a prime example of how this can work.

I also managed to start playing God of War on my PSP again...

Maybe I need to start being more picky about what games I buy. The collector side of me seems to be drowning the gamer side of me in too many games.

Just whipped up an Advance Wars: Dual Strike review. Finished the game last night, and have to say "terrific stuff". If you haven't play an Advance Wars game, and you own either a GBA or a DS, then you are a fool. The first Advance Wars game on the GBA was the reason I bought that system, and I didn't regret it for a second. This game is no different. If you don't own either, then picking up a DS just for this game, that was released over 3 years ago, is still completely worth it.

Next up on the DS? I'm thinking either Lock's Quest or Rondo of Swords. Tough call.