Though it wasn't quite the three-day points bender I went on last weekend, my 360 was still plenty warm from constant use this weekend. In an effort to both clear out my back catalog of 360 games and to revisit games I didn't really play in HD the first time 'round, I started in on PGR3 on Friday night, and even though that session was cut short by a midnight showing of probably the most haggard print of The Princess Bride in current circulation (much love to The Clay, but damn, you guys should've mentioned the quality of your print in the newsletter!), I was still quickly reminded of how beautiful that game looks and how great it plays.

The lion's share of Saturday was spent eating dim sum and looking at art, but by Saturday I had still prodigiously finished the career mode in PGR3 on Silver. I'm still enjoying the online play, and I really like how it's integrated into the overall career mode, though once I snag the Celebrity achievement for appearing on Gotham TV, I'll probably be done with it.

I put up a big fight during our GOTY 2005 meetings over the soundtrack in PGR3, and I would like to rescind everything I said. That soundtrack absolutely sings, and the choices made in each genre it covers consistently appeal to my sensibilities. Like everyone else, I was thoroughly frustrated by how quietly the music plays, and I eventually had to plug my iPod into the 360 just to get some loud background music. I was pleasantly surprised when the game continued popping up song and artist information, even though it was playing off my iPod. More 360 games should do that.

After a few hours of PGR3 online Sunday morning, I switched over to Condemned, partially because I knew it was about four hours long and had some easy points, but mostly because I wanted to get it out of my GameFly queue. I actually put off playing Condemned for a while because I finished the first two chapters around launch, and the game just totally freaked my bean. I'm a bit of a pansy in that way--Resident Evil 4 is a game I can only play during daylight hours. I really wanted to like Condemned, but I had already gotten my fill of Monolith's spooky tricks playing F.E.A.R., and at about the halfway point I just got bored of the whole "grimy room plus crazy hobo" dynamic. Of course I did both endings, but wtfffffff is the point of having alternate endings if they aren't actually alternate?

With Condemned behind me, Sunday night saw me staring down copies of DOA4 and Full Auto, not really wanting to play either, when I finally did the inevitable and put Oblivion into my 360. I actually bought Oblivion the weekend it came out and played through the tutorial snap-quick, but stopped shortly after that, knowing full well it would consume me once it really got rolling.

There's already a serious amount of editorial out there about how rude this game is, so I'm not even going to mess with it, because you should already know what's up by now. It's reminding me why I fell in love with WoW the first time through, but with really fleshed-out, interesting characters instead of some jack-ass from Skokie, IL pretending to be some mythical chick. That's right. I totally just called out Skokie. What's up?

Which puts my current points tally at 11,803. Thanks to GRAW for that goofy-ass 3 points on the end.