I apologise for not keeping up with all the blogs or posting in the forums and unions recently, it is rude of me and I'm sorry. Hope you have all been well?

So what have I been doing? Playing Valkyria Chronicles, on chapter 17, but it is a game I need have an afternoon free and need to be in a good mood for. It is an awesome game and glad there will be a sequel, not so happy with it being on PSP, I do hope they make it for the PS3 as well. When time is more constrained, a good blast of Saints Row 2 is my current game of choice. I have been reading a lot of books (hope to put up a lot of reviews tomorrow after finishing my current one) and watched the Euro 21 and U19 championships over the summer, two enjoyable tournaments where two good England sides fell at the final hurdle. I have been working on two fanfiction stories, lesson learnt so far is I am a very very slow writer at the best of times but I hope to be on far more often now.

Serious Spoiler Warning for Enchanted Arms and Indigo Prophecy, slight one for MGS2 and Fear Effect 2 I'm afraid.

When I consider what games I wish to buy, I go online and look at certain sites like gamespot for their reviews, over time I have found a set of sites I trust more then others. I have learnt that discussions in forums are worth finding, from there I would have discovered GTA4 was not like the Second Coming amd, thanks to the many posters who backed the game, I was persuaded to try Enchanted Arms. So I ordered it and while waiting for it to arrive, I looked for other reliable game sites to add to my list for checking reviews for games I want. It was during this search that I came across one or two reviews accusing Enchanted Arms of being homophobic or negative stereotyping of gays which surprised me. Was this something the others had missed or an overreaction to certain things within the game? With the need to be seen as PC, overreaction was possible but something that might cause outrage if involving a Black character could slip by if it involved a gay person instead.

Having already paid for the game anyway and with so few complaints, I decided to play it and see. I would turn it off if it did get homophobic, write something blasting Ubisoft and the game itself then feel sad about the world if it was true. Within five seconds, I had a good guess at what the accusations were based on, a character by the name of Makoto who it quickly emerges is indeed gay Now even if he was straight and seen kissing five separate ladies during the game, some would consider him gay anyway due to way he was dressed, talked and seemingly wore makeup. It is a sadly regular occurrence in certain Dynasty Warrior sites that once in awhile, somebody will complain koei made Zhang He gay despite the fact koei's Zhang He shows no romantic interest in any man, simply because Zhang He dresses and acts flamboyantly. I don't know why dressing and acting in such a way makes one gay but it has become something of an image some people stick to. I don't think Makoto's love of cooking, his catty personality or his bright clothing would have helped stop people deciding he was gay even if he had been straight.

It certainly didn't help Ubisoft when Makoto's efforts to win his love interest early on come across as immature, a little creepy and slightly fanboyish. Yet speak to the other students, mostly female, who fancy the same man and they are exactly the same, so if anyone should be insulted by the handling of love at that early point, it is University students. As for the stereotype, quite simply every main or side character is based on a stereotype, the strong vigilant warrior, the fiery girl, the moron of a main character, the pampered ruler and so on, I can think of possibly two characters that are not stereotypes. While the game does superbly to make most of them interesting, Makoto is only one of a stereotype, he is also an entertaining character who helps liven up the tutorial and could be quite funny, few could deny his bravery when it mattered.

There were one or two moments far later on when Raigar, the stoic knight of the group, is teased as being gay due to his not being seen eyeing up the ladies. At the end of it they always reassure Raigar that if was gay they would accept it which could be read as someone who knows they said something wrong and then gone "some of my friends are..." or "only kidding". However given there is a huge moral message running through the game, this does seem to be a misconceived attempt to deliver a "we should all accept homosexuals" message then any desperate covering up of something horrible.

Were the reviewers wrong? I think they were slightly overcautious but I admire them for warning it's readers about such a possibility, one of the sites I now often read their reviews as I know they will warn of any such issues. Said site was also one of the few I found to discuss the fascism allegations in their review for Resident Evil 5 and whether said allegations were fair or not. I understand why reviewers, when they decide it isn't racist in the final play-through don't bring back such controversy, Capcom may well be happier for allegations to be forgotten rather forcibly disproved.

Ubisoft did leave themselves open to accusations with their handling of Makoto and to an extent, the jokes about Raigar yet I would rather praise them for at least trying. They went for a gay character, made him entertaining and a fairly important part of the story, he wasn't a token homosexual to fill a quota, they also tried to make a positive message about homosexuality. Yes it would be nice to see a non flamboyant gay character I suppose, so it wouldn't be accused of stereotype, Tommy in Indigo Prophecy comes to mind, but at least Ubisoft did something. Aside from Tommy and Makoto, how many non straight characters can anyone think of? The bisexual Vamp on MGS2 which is more a passing reference then a plot twist and according to gamespot's excellent Great Loves feature awhile back, Fear Effect 2's Hana and Rain. A quick search for gay game characters tended to provide me with "possibly gay ones like Tidus of Final Fantsy X (no, I don't get out one either) or Voldo of Soul Caliber which is rather sad indictment of what some people count as gay In RPG's I have played, I have never had a chance to kiss or date one of my character own gender which seems an odd, surely games about creating your own characters should allow for a character to be anything other then straight?

I'm not going to sit here and demand game companies include more homosexuals or bisexuals, the writers should be allowed freedom and to write what they are comfortable with. Forcing a character the writers don't want or forcing a token character isn't helpful to the game, I would rather they became more comfortable with writing in homosexual relations and indeed wanted to because they felt could make something great out of it. It may take awhile before new writers coming in willing and able to write about different kinds of relationships. Even then, companies will have an eye on the games selling, which will require gamers to be accepting and comfortable with playing a main character who happens to be gap. In England things are more accepting then they were, at least openly, but still you can here homophobic chants at football grounds (and no football player in England has claimed to be gay for some time), while anti gay jokes still are allowed when racist or xenophobic ones would be banned, there is certainly work to be done. There is also visible minority online who have issues with those different then themselves, it isn't just Zhang He whose sexuality has been questioned, anyone odd like Voldo or unpopular (Tidus, Raiden) will end up being called gay if I was considering making a gay game, I would be rather concerned by all this. Hopefully time will heal most of those issues and our children won't be reading discussions about lack of black or gay characters but I just wish to say well done to those who have taken the plunge and made characters who will upset the bigots.

I enjoyed Rise of the Argonauts as you can be read by my review here , an ok but short rpg with some decent but not great characters. One of the things often highlighted by reviewers as a good aspect of the game is the fighting. Three separate weapons, good (well mostly good) boss fights that required something different each time, a nice way to improve by dedicating deeds to one of the four gods and thus unlocking new powers or improvements. It was enjoyable yet it was not an excellent system like Call of Duty/Uncharted/Metal Gear Solid, it was simply good, not a system I feel that would have been enjoyable if the game had been mostly fighting. By limiting the amount of time the player spent fighting, to the unhappiness of some, it kept the fighting system fresh and enjoyable rather then allow it to get boring due to overuse.

After I had finished that game, I got to thinking about Dynasty Warriors, a series which has got heavily criticised over the years. DW2 was one of the first games I ever played, back then the fighting system was very good, the stages were large but few and it was something I could play with my sister (Omega Force still not got round to managing to balance the cooperative mode), DW3 was also an enjoyable game, adding voices. It was thanks to these games I read the book Romance of the Three Kingdoms that the game is based off, a very long, enjoyable propaganda tale written in another time of war that has had quite an impact on Chinese culture. Eventually I was able to find out about the history, some of the SGZ compiled by Shu/Jin historian Chen Shou has been translated into English so thanks to Dynasty Warriors, I would discover one of my favorite hobbies, discussing the three kingdoms.

I am grateful for Koei and Omega force for that but I am not blind to it's decline, while I may not agree with the critics on everything, I agree with the general gist of their complaints. Most of the wounds are self inflicted, the fighting system has only been slightly altered over D3XL, DW4, DW4 XL, DW4 Empires, DW5, DW5 Empires, plus the two Orochi games where DW's meets SW (Samurai Warriors) before the series came onto PS3. That is a lot of games and some were unnecessary, perhaps making one Empires game to see how it went down, perhaps one Orochi as fanservice but Empires and XL should have been stuff either already included in main game or added to the next rather then games in themselves. It made the series seem, as it may well be, as a cash cow for the company and when you have been playing the same system, with minor improvements ten times on the PS2, people are going to get annoyed. Koei has been able to innovate with a long running game series, doing so for eleven Romance of the Three Kingdom strategy games, not always successfully but it has never sunk as low with the critics as Dynasty Warriors. All three Kessen games were markedly different from each other while Bladestorm contained fresh new idea's that didn't quite work but has enough promise for the future if they fix a couple of issues. Omega may not be the most innovative but Koei are clearly able to make very good games while Omega's original Samurai Warriors showed a path DW could have gone down, Alternate paths leading to different endings, good rather then erratic story-lines, each character's role in a battle completely different from another so even if your playing the same battle, it feels different. Yet even after making two Samurai Warrior games, Dynasty Warriors has failed to copy the good idea's in SW which would have greatly improved DW.

DW6, on the PS3, could have been a revival and though they finally stopped the vanishing soldiers problem, altered their looks and weapons and invented a new system, the critics were not impressed, not giving much credit to a new battle or skill system as they felt it was too similar. I doubt their opinions will be changed by a new Empires game being made either but even worse for Koei, they upset the fans. In an attempt to make those changes and release it, they made cuts. Out went several stages, only seventeen characters would get Musou (story) modes, several had movesets that were the same as another rather then each one being unique as before. All this was going to cause some unhappiness but the biggest blow was removing seven characters, removing new comers like Pang De, Xing Cai and Zuo Ci wasn't too bad but the uproar when old favorites like Jiang Wei, Da Qiao and the Nanman couple, Meng Huo and Zhu Rong. A fair few lost their favorite character, didn't have a story mode or found they fought the same as another character in the game, gaining Koei a lot of criticism. Under the circumstances, they may look to bring back the characters (seems next Empires will bring back Meng Huo) and declone the others, give everyone a story mode but this will take time that could be used to try to improve the game in other ways.

I feel Koei went the right way by cutting the characters and limiting which ones had a story mode but that if they are to win the critics over and make a great game, they must gamble on losing their fan base by going even further. Even if they never add or return another character, that is forty-one stories to create and even if all of them restricted to usual five stages in story rather then some of them having more, that is 205 battles (240 if the deleted characters return). Those battles will often be on stages that by the tenth character, the player will have covered several times with the difference between playing the Yellow Turban stage (for example) as Cao Cao or Dian Wei often being simply the spot the character starts of with. Any system is simply going to come across as repetitive with that many battles, the stages themselves will become boring after the umpteenth play-through and the additional games like Empires will only hurt Koei's image while adding to the feeling of repetitiveness.

If Dynasty Warriors is simply a safe cash making game and they using the cash to make games not guaranteed to sell well, the Kessens, the Bladestorms of the world, to be created then I understand that. If they want however to make DW into a great game then I do not see how they can keep all their characters at once but having a game with the exact same characters each and every sequel could become quite boring very quickly so why not rotate them? One game have Dian Wei, Wei Yan and Huang Gai, the next drop them for Xu Huang, Ma Chao and Ling Tong instead as examples, the game after that have a different set. How many characters to have each game I will not guess at, too low and it will be over too quickly but too high and same old problems. With less characters, they could concentrate on better graphics, trying to make then keep the fighting system innovative, improve the AI, improve the stages, all the things that have not always got done in the past, so that such a basic as climbing ladders (without it being of great use in DW6) isn't embarrassingly being used as a lure to gamers to play it anymore. If they ever have the time to add back a character creation mode or an empire mode then either add it as a cheap download or include it as part of the main game, not a full price new game.

In terms of characters, I would hope they could make each musou mode longer, with alternate endings, each battle different for each character in the same way as the first SW, improved story and character development, if not immediately then a game after they rebuild the DW series successfully. Ok, as an action game a story is perhaps not the biggest thing on their mind but Call of Duty 4 managed it and Koei seem to have put a lot of effort originally into most characters to make them unique and to stand out. Longer musou modes may partly defeat the point of cutting the characters but with a small enough group of characters, it would allow time to create each a story for each that would pull at the heart strings and help drive people on to see what happens next but I am someone who simply loves good stories in games. I would like to see it possible for your character to die at the end, they did it in SW's before and in previous DW's your allies could be killed in cutscenes. In DW6, it seemed rare for anybody to die and never your on character yet this was a time of war, endings were not always happy and people died, the majority of officers and rulers never saw the land united. I know Koei are rightly never going to show anything near the full horror of the time, that they want the player to succeed rather then feel their efforts were all for nothing but no sad endings feels a bit of a white wash, at least with alternate endings people could get the happy ending if they chose. I wouldn't complain for new characters to be introduced among the rotation either, Liu Shan (or Chan), Jia Xu, Yu Jin, Cai Yan and Lady Wu are among several whose characters and stories would be interesting to see in the game and it would help keep things fresh, while I wouldn't object to certain characters never making a return but Omega must always ensure they don't have too many characters in one game again.

I have reviewed three games since my last update, playing Assassin's Creed again to pick up some of the story I missed last time, the humorous Overlord and the short but fun Tom Clancy's End War. I thought I would have Bioshock done as well but my pattern of Oblivion on weekday's and Bioshock on weekend has been thrown by the addictive gameplay of Enchanted Arms. The way it randomises starting positions on grip means each battle is different and helps keep it fun, just under half way through at the moment.

Henry VIII's Last Victim by Jessie Childs just wasn't my thing, I prefer Henry Howard's cunning father Thomas Howard over the arrogant poet, though I found the information on the court during Henry VIII's decline interesting. but those more interested in Tudor poetry and sonnets might enjoy it more then I did. I did greatly enjoy Marie Antoniette: The Journey by Antonia Fraser though I would advise never reading the latter chapters at night, the brutality of the mob gave me a few nightmares. While Fraser's handling of the characters was fair and neutral, criticizing and praising both royalists and rebels, she also deals with the allegations against the Queen. The book's humour suffers when Abbe Vermond fades from the scene but it did leave a sad impression on me about mob mentality, very uncomfortable near the end. Charles I: The Personal Monarch (Second Edition) by Charles Carlton had a few spelling error's (not that I'm very good on that front), maybe a tad more information on the battles of the Civil War and an epilogue would have been nice. Carlton manages to give a good overview over Charles government and show how attitudes by the people towards their King slowly changed, it was a wonderful portray of an insecure and ineffective King whose failings helped plunge England into Civil War and a Republic. Eleanor: April Queen of Aquitaine by Douglas Boyd did not absorb me in the same way Fraser and Carlton managed but it was an impressive work, Boyd having learnt the local language of Occitan. I didn't get much of an impression of the Queen's personality but the book was very informative about the several King's and people she knew, from her husbands, her disloyal sons to bards and monks. It was a wonderful window into France and England during that time rather then a window into the Queen. Worth getting from a library simply for the songs by the troubadours (and the female equivalent), they were very witty and could be heart-rendering, the appendix at the end with two pages on troubadours was a delightful surprise.

My next set of books seem to have a Napoleonic connection. A book discussing the three Commanders at Waterloo, another on Empress Josephine, then one on Napoleon and Wellington. Two more royalist books, one of the love-life of Louis XIV and another about some more dubious practises, like magic and poison, under the same King. The last book is about King Harold, the last Saxon King, defeated by William I. Going to try and split up the Napoleonic books and those of Louis XIV, might help avoid boredom or repetition.

So far I have reviewed two rather old games, Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom which I gave a poor review and the first Heroes of Might and Magic which did rather better. I hope to soon add Assassin's Creed, replaying it and enjoying some new aspects and Overlord reviews. Recently got Enchanted Arms for £13 but that will take awhile before I finish it I hope. With any luck, will get something from the rental scheme as well, ideally Valkyria Chronicles before it finished in a few weeks.

Recently went into the next town's library since our small town one is closed for expansion and got biographies on Henry Howard, Lieutenant General for Henry VIII at the age of only 28, Charles I, the King of England till he was deposed by Parliament, Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Regent of England for some time, Marie Antoinette the Queen of France during the revolution and Felice della Rovere a outspoken daughter of Pope Julius II.I hope at least one matches the interest I had in the Good Soldier by Gary Mead that offered a fairly neutral biography of Douglas Haig, teaching me of a lot of the important reforms he did. Add in the history book Millenmuim by Tom Holland and the borrowed books will have a hard time matching up to recent enjoyment but we will see.

Yesterday I was searching through youtube for "Goodbye to love" by the Carpenters, an old duo I recently found thanks to their song "Close to you." I made an error and typed in goodbye my love which took me to a list of other songs. I was about to make the correction to my search when I spotted one of them had Tidus, of FFX, on the front. The song with it was an interesting choice, Chemical Romance's Cancer, a very good and depressing song but it also brought back memories. So I found it on gamespot and found the lovely feature on game romance, which included FFX's story between Yuna and Tidus.

Final Fantasy X was my first, considering my failure to complete the latest version, my only final fantasy, it was also my introduction to the genre. The beautiful opening before you even start the game, teasing at how good the graphic were, giving glimpses of the places you would see, from that game I learnt not to press start but to just wait for the start menu to appear after the scene. The start was slow but the graphics were impressive as we briefly saw Tidus in his job, and it was good way of learning the fighting system and introducing the characters. First Tidus, the arrogant but soon lost blitzball player whose story you follow, then Auron the grizzled and calm (if slightly impatient with Tidus) man, Wakka the slightly annoying but cheerful shooter, LuLu a quiet but caring sorceress, Yuna the trusting summoner and eventually Rikku, the opinionated but surprisingly happy thief. There was the ever blue Kimahri but but his personality, story and indeed his fighting style made seem an after thought, a rare blot on the FFX landscape.

All the others had their uses in combat but it was the story that caught me hook line and sinker. Every character other then Kimahr were given a fair chance to stamp their influence on the story and took it, evolving as time passed, Wakka and Lulu getting past the death of Waka's brother, Wakka overcoming his hatred of Rikku's people, Auron's youthful impetuousness show, Tidus becoming less self centered and concerned about returning home. There was love interests, religious conflict that even affected the group, loss of loved ones, for a long time there was huge debate within the group over what Yuna should do. The characters had bad sides, Wakka's religious intolerance being perhaps the major one but it made them well rounded rather then off putting. Yuna at one point nearly cracks from the strain, unsure if to push ahead to certain death or live on with her friends, no self righteous determination there but a young lady, scared, in need of support when her friends are bickering and divided, she had lost her father and bared a heavy weight on her shoulders, later to learn everything she had learned was a lie. It was a Tidus who became her rock, a stranger to the land, a once arrogant youth struggling under the legacy of his father in his homeland and even in Spira, ignorant even that Auron is a famous figure. At first trying to find a way home but changing somewhere into a spoilt but lost brat into a determined, loyal young man determined to end Spira's suffering and save Yuna.

Their romance was confirmed in a beautiful forest, the butterflies helping illuminate the forest in a soft glow. Yuna, betrayed by her faith, unsure what to do was standing a river when Tidus turned up. Uncertain, shaken, facing death for a people who hated her, at first lifted by idea of abandoning the pilgrimage but then breaking down. Amidst the glistening forest on a beautiful night, she cried, the animation beautiful as anything I had seen, the two kissing, floating together as a beautiful song was playing. The image of the two lovers floating as little light streamed past still appears in my mind every so often and is an image I often recall of FFX. That same music would be played in the credits after the sad ending, either a fortunate or brilliant choice, recalling to mind the kiss the two lovers had shared in the waters.

In the end, they manage to find a way to save Spira forever, without sending summoners to their deaths but it came at a cost as Yuna began the final summon. A brave choice by the creators, not just to sacrifice one but to sacrifice two of their characters, they they had created and worked on so hard. With Auron, it was hard enough but as he said to Yuna "It is your world now", he had fulfilled the promise and could rejoin his friends in the spirit world, in many ways it was perhaps a relief to him to depart the world. Yet to wrench Tidus, the man whose eyes we saw the story from, the love interest of Yuna away from the world? Watching his body fade, Yuna's tears and protests matched by a mature acceptance from Tidus of what must be, Spira's salvation had come at an emotional cost for the group and for myself. True at the end, Tidus got his father's acceptance and seems to reappear, swimming upwards (a tease for the X-2 game perhaps) but Yuna's whistles were sad to see, as was our reminder to remember the ones they had lost, she had lost a link with her father in Auron, her rock and her beloved in Tidus, I had lost two beloved characters and wondering how Yuna would cope.

I would watch X-2 over my father's shoulder, in many ways it was closure as we saw Wakka/Lulu's child, see Rikku was doing well but also two (and a half) very good endings. There was a poignant one where she visits Tidus, telling him they would always be connected but also saying goodbye, it was the best ending in terms of storyline though left me wanting to know what happened next to Yuna and hoping they met up on her death. The alternate to that one is she doesn't visit him as he is in his own world now, not quite so poignant but still with the same questions and feelings. The perfect ending, where they were reunited was not so poignant or great story telling but it made me happy, seeing the two of them together. I lacked the time to play X-2 myself so hasn't had the same effect on me but the joys/sadness from the endings was none the less a great one and I am grateful they made X-2 to put a finishing touch to the great story.

When I finished FFX and expressed my enjoyment, more experienced gamers told me FFV7 or 8 were better, that Tidus was whiny or a variety of other complaints. Perhaps 7 and 8, I have never played them so cannot comment, were superior, perhaps not but I personally grew to cherish Tidus. FF may produce superior games in future but X, as my first and one of the great gaming stories I have ever enjoyed will always have a place in my heart.

There are other games that will provoke nostalgia in me for storyline/character reasons, Neverwinter Nights (Fenthick's death), MGS2 (my first, the death of Hal's sister and the invincible lady), MGS3(ending) will probably always provoke nostalgia in me, I suspect Call of Duty 4 and MGS4 will do likewise in time. Others like Deus Ex, an enjoyable game with decent story will provoke a smile when I hear a sequel of it or the name mentioned (as I did of Deus Ex 3 on same day as FF nostalgia hit). What are yours and why?

Multiplayer has a lot going for it, while I prefer single-player as a general rule, playing excellent games like Time Splitters or a sports game along or against someone can make for a fantastic afternoon. Far better playing as Chester, or another lowly club, alongside a friend and trying to storm them up the table or trying to defeat a close friend. All great fun but were I really am thankful for multiplayer is with old, cheap and the not very good games that allow you to play alongside another.

Sometimes it is simply a once decent game that is past it's prime, as the Simpson's PS3 game was, sometimes it is a good game that just doesn't suit my tastes as Resistance was or a very flawed game like Untold Legends. Two of the games were cheap and Resistance came free with the PS3 so I can't complain, I would not have enjoyed any of the three greatly if just single player. However playing the campaign modes alongside my sister, put on some good music and suddenly it was a real joy. The frustrations that come from bad games vanished as we laughed along, everything turning into little joy. Suddenly it isn't so repetitive, that bad camera angle is just a minor irritant, I'm having fun. A real saving grace is cooperative campaign mode for mediocre or bad games and sometimes the games are worth getting just for that.

I was looking forward to Resistance 2 but I hear that, unlike the 1st game, you can not play the campaign alongside someone and for me, that is a great disappointment. True, Dynasty Warriors has taught me the need for games to learn how to balance cooperative which DW failed that, but that wasn't a problem for the first Resistance. With their ability, why change from that and take away a chance for friends or family to play it through as a team? Like to see more genuine cooperative campaign modes in the future.

December tends to be interesting time of year, doing things we perhaps do more regularly like spending time with family and the once a year things like going around the streets to look at the Christmas Lights. In gaming terms, it means looking back and voting on games of the past year (MGS4 for me, might not quite be on MGS3 level but not played anything to match it this year. Excellent end to a heartrending series) while looking forward to the year and games ahead. It was looking for somewhere that held a list of games coming out next year, or a schedule that I found this site. Got a couple of games, like Heavy Rain and Overlord 2 that I dearly will hope to do well but there are more then enough games for me to play now.

On the PC, I recently decided to go from the beginning of the excellent Heroes of Might and Magic series, having played a bit of all of them in the past. I chose Lord Ironfist, otherwise known as the Knight faction but the level difficult in that is wild. First level is easy, build up for a week then attack gateway, second is the ideal of formidable, punishes you for silly errors but not stupidly hard and you should be able to win it given time. The individual ones were you face Slayer (Barbarian), then the two magic types (sorceress and warlock) one at a time are the right level of difficulty. The 4th level and the last level though are excruciatingly hard, any mistake and your main army gets wiped out, no time to build, the enemy always stronger, needs to be toned down. Heroes of Might and Magic 2 has a far more engaging story, a longer campaign mode, more choice of forces and though early, the difficulty level is right. Still got Neverwinter Nights 2 to play and catch up with my sister and father but that can wait.

On the PS3, I plan to play more of the Untold Legends with my sister, an awful game saved by the enjoyment I get playing with her. I take the wizard, she takes the rogue and we batter our way through, laughing as we go but single-player wise I plan to finish the evil attempt with the very funny Overlord. My current hold up is that I wish to fill my helmet which takes a 1,000 minions sacrifice, I probably have about 700 minions overall and reluctant to go short on them. With the helmet boost, I can go into the abyss area's before the final section.Eventually I will play it as a "good" character, felt guilty over dumping that mistress. Need something shorter, I'll pick up Fifa 09 and manage Chester City (with custom keeper), spent money on fitness and tightening up the backline, lack of goals or conventional wide players though are a problem.

I'm also reading a book on the WWI commander Earl Haig and Cadfael books after recently finishing Tom Holland's excellent book, Millennium. Never read one of his books before but it is both informative and entertaining look on when our ancestors truly believed Christ would come to earth, to end the world, and the clash between Kings and Popes. I enjoy history books about war or rather commanders in them, further back then WWI or more modern wars usually, figures of some controversy or ladies who did more then conventional society would have expected like Lady Marsh (granted, relatives more fascinating then her) and Lady Hamilton. Novels I tend to read are in the Dragonlance mold, fantasy and magic, I tend to find myself liking the villains or morally less then pure then I do the saintly ones or the warriors but so few new (good) ones around it would seem and was disappointed by the Acaia book. Though in truth, I will just borrow from the library any book that I hear is interesting and appeals to my taste so not picky. Any suggestions on book would be most welcome, else I just keep a list of books that catches my eye when the Times reviews them?

On boxing day, I'll be settling down with my father and a beer to watch Villa vs Arsenal, a game Arsenal need to win to draw level with Villa. Soccer has never been in the family but some reason I have become a fan of Arsenal, and England. Sometimes so it is a joy when England youth matches are on, or an international youth tournament. I feel relaxed, young players have a long way to go and it is interesting to see which nations might suddenly emerge strongly or young players might make it. Such games can give a vital reminder that soccer is just a game so I don't get so worked up with Arsenal's current struggles, the board room infighting concerns me more then current form. Disappointed with Liverpool game last Sunday, we needed a win, took the lead and proceeded to throw it away, conceding a sloppy goal, making mistakes and losing our heads, both when Cesc came off injured at half time and when Ade was sent off. My boxing day prediction is a Villa victory, we will miss Ade badly but we are capable of great things on our day so who knows.

Most of all though during this Christmas week, I'll be enjoying time with family. I hope that, whoever you are with or if you are alone, whatever you are doing, you have a happy last few weeks of the year and a have a wonderful New Year.

Magic Hat