Well the year is drawing to a close and I thought I'd have a rant on my blog about what's happened in my gaming year..

At the begining of the yeat the household had a PS2 and 2 PSP's, you'd think one would be enough buy apparently my wife tells me the Pink one is a "must have". Games wise we've played through Daxter, Ratchet and of course GTA on the PSP's but I have to say that the limited resolution and grating controls with games like Ratchet. Enjoyed Daxter more which was interesting..

PS2 was pretty much relegated to gathering dust and whilst I'd promised to myself that I would not buy a PS3 until Xmas 2007 I jumped the gun and bought one in April. TO be honest this is exactly what I'd done with the PS1 and the PS2.. So it was no great surprise that like in previous console purchases I was an early adopter and there wasn't much quality/choice games wise.

However the PS3 did prompt me to upgrade my TV to a 1080p HDTV beastie and the with the PS2 and the DVD player gone from under the TV the PS3 took pride of place in our living room. I've been running mythtv for 3-4 years and suddenly it was relegated as the PS3 could do a much smoother job of playing music and photo slideshows where a joy. Soon after came a Mythtv upgrade that meant that I could playback all of the recordings (I've three DVB tunners in a Linux box) and the quality was better than that of our very good quality setup box.

Games wise I'd discovered Oblivion which I'm still playing on and off after over 300+ hours of gameplay, still we looked forwards to our old favoraites Ratchet and Clank and SingStar. The later was delayed and slipped so many times we'd given up hope of every receiving it from Amazon. However we where not disapointed with Ratchet and Clank.. True its formula my wife and eye soon demolished it and when into Chalenge mode great game.. Wish they'd do a Jak and Daxter as well!!. (Hint Hint).

SingStar is not in residence and is a very smooth enjopyable game.. I just wished we could have had it 6 months ago.

Most happy with my PS3 and am looking forwards to playing Assasins Creed, The latest installment of Obivion (Elder Scrolls IV) and GTA in April.

Onto the compitition.. I was never tempted by the Xbox.. Although I suspect I would have been swung round if it had supported Linux, Microsoft is always funny about its "rights" in this area so I hope they choke on them. Very noisy box doesn't really help.. Sort of thing I might have in my home based offer along side my incredibly nosy Desktop system. As you may have gathered I'm not a MS fan and certainly not about to buy a 360.

The Wii on the otherhand was intreging.. New controlers, simple games.. Low spec and thus low cost console.. I was glad Nintendo has some not only the strength to continue but to come up with such a successful console. However having played with it I'm not sure it survives the hype.. I mean beyond Wii sports its all a little soft core.. Still I guess that's the point.. Its safe family fun.. Its not aimed at an adult market its aimed at familes and kids.. Oddly enough I think it hits that nail hard on its head.

Which got me to thinking about the PS3 and the 360.. It occurs to me that the 360 is a very PC oriented box (Hard core games or death and destruction) whereas the PS3 has a lot more "Party games" (Buzz, SingStar, etc.) plus its really a lot more at home under the telly. I get the implression the 360 would be best connected to a computer monitor .

So in conclusion I think 2007 was a very slow year for myself and the PS3.. but now with the first xmas out of the way I see great things ahead and I'm espcialy looking forwards to PlayTV. Could thius finaly mean the end to my MythTV?. I certainly hope so I'm fed up tweaking it..

Hope you had a great year and remember the futures bright..