Let me just say that Nintendo is not much of a contender anymore in the system race. What is keeping this company back you say? It is the lack of adult oriented games on the platform. Sure, most of the games on the Gamecube are for all ages, but I think the system needs more games that specifically target older audiences, even if only teenagers. If you look at the library, the best games for the system are along the lines of Resident Evil 4, Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, and the Metroid Prime series. What is different from these titles than most others? They are all skewed towards more adult audiences. Nintendo needs to realize this, and create more games that focus on the young adults who want to experience at least a drop of blood and who don't care for jumping on the heads of goombas.

People often ask the question, "was this year really the best year for gaming ever?" People go to sites and argue about why certain games in the past year were not as good as those of previous years. And I have only this to say. Every new year is the best year for gaming. People say that the years when games like Ocarina of Time or Mario 64 came out were the best years for gaming, but think how they would stack up if they came out this year. The fact of the matter is that the bar for game perfection is being raised every single day. So mediocre games of this year would have received excellent scores one or two years ago. So in the answer to anybody's pointless question, EVERY YEAR IS THE BEST YEAR FOR GAMING!

In playing games, I often find it necessary to yell at the ideas the developers incorporated into their games. I think it is high time that people finally stood up for what they believed in and payed visits to the Man. Just imagine telling Shigeru Myamoto that multiplayer in Pikmin should actually have substance and be fun or telling Hideo Kojima that you wanted to play Metal Gear Solid 3, not watch a lot of it. I think it is time that we started a revolution. Because developers don't listen to new consumer ideas, they often don't get their ideas right. I mean, fixing the problems in certain games is nice, but adding new ideas without any substance or creativity is murder. People wanted Pikmin to be playable for two people. I assure you, they didn't want battle mode, they wanted co-op single player. People didn't like the convoluted storyline of Metal Gear Solid 2, so instead they got a much more deep, yet long story. It is good, don't get me wrong, but I want to play the game I just shelled out fifty clams to get.

People hear me in this time of need, and tell developers exactly what you are looking for. I guarantee that they will listen.

In case you were wondering what the title means, it is a story that only I can explain. My friends and I do some pretty weird things. Some are most definitely sad, but not as sad as what I am about to tell you. That's right, if you want to remain perfectly sane, I recommend not viewing the following entry in my series of unfortunate events.

I was online at my friend's house when we decided to visit the best online video game site ever created in the entirety of the world (You guessed it, GameSpot!). It was there that we discovered Dance Dance Revolution. Inclined to do something that was not completely boring, we boiled down to watching gameplay footage.

Approximately five seconds later, we had pushed the chairs out of the way and were dancing on a rug to the beat of the game. Thats right, without any dance pads to accompany us in our mindless ways. We played the same footage thirty times before giving up. Not because we were sick of it, but because we passed out amidst the music. Needless to say I am getting the new edition and some dance pads this holiday season.

I remember this day well, for it was not long ago that the incident occurred. After waiting to get my hands on Jak 3 for just over a year, I finally nabbed my copy. Around the halfway point in the game, I was asked to retrieve a batch of artifacts from the wasteland before a sandstorm came in and ripped the flesh from my bones. So I took off down the wasteland, running into the artifacts at top speed (apparently, newly uncovered artifacts float in the air and get discovered by giant beacons of light from the heavens). Please keep in mind, that the mission seems to last more than ten minutes, and checkpoints are nowhere to be found...

Right at the end of the mission, I was heading back to the city with all of the artifacts retrieved. There were thirty seconds on the clock and I could see the large, stone gates in the distance. So I slammed on the boost and took off a jump. Whoops!!!! I slammed headfirst into a marauder (there are approximately twenty of these vehicles on your ass at any given point of the desert).

So there I was. Stuck to the vehicle as the time slowly ticked away. I hopped out of my vehicle and manually blew apart the horribly glitched car. I hopped back in with ten seconds left and boosted towards the gate. This is the part that makes me want to kill someone right now...

In an attempt to load the city I was about to enter, the gates opened slower than ever. I was going to fast for the damn gates to open. That's right, I slammed right into the gate as it was opening (thanks for the glitch Naughty Dog, you guys truly are naughty). The yellow beam was right in front of my face, and the time ran out on me. I had to do the entire mission over again...