*Sobs.*

Three people? Oh, how the mighty have fallen. But seriously, if I wanted a ton of people following me and commenting on my stuff, I would totally be hurt. Honestly, there could have been tears. Anyway, it's about time I throw some awful formatting at you guys, because I've never done an answers blog before, and I don't know how to format anything anyway. Enjoy!

TristanH12: "How did you spend your holidays?"

Well, I did a little something called being lazy beyond belief. It's a sort of meditation they came up with in the '70s or so, when sitcoms got really popular.I don't knowif there's any correlation there. You should ask a sociologist.

I went to Pittsburgh to visit with some friends. That was a little awkward at times, but I had fun. Then, I came home after a week of that, and I had to do Christmas shopping on Christmas Eve, because I'm always late to the party. Mostly movies and such, but most people in the family knew what they were getting anyway. I got mostly movies, myself, and a couple video games, and a Penny Arcade "FF Caught in the Act" t-shirt... look it up. I was hoping for a Wii Remote, so I could play New Super Mario Bros Wii with someone in the family, but no such luck.

johnsteed7: "Where does your name come from?"

I have a better question: Where do I even start with that one? I guess it's story time. I was sitting around one day, staring at my stupid AIM screen name I blatantly took from a freaking Sonic the Hedgehog game--I know--when I suddenly realized it was a horrible idea and I needed to make a change.

"Golly!" I said. "I sure do think the word 'scion' sounds cool. But I can't think of another word I like the sound of."

I spent the next few minutes thinking of words I liked, and most of them came up nonsensical or wouldn't fit into AIM's 16-character limit anyway (although "Scion of Defenestration" would have been sweet). Eventually, I came up with "entropy" and it just so happened that it formed a vaguely coherent idea and name, however arguably depressing. Since then, I've used it for most everything. If you see a ScionofEntropy on another board, it's probably me... or someone jacking my rad name.

VGobbsesser: Current thoughts on gaming? What are your favorite games?

Darn it! And here I was hoping to avoid complex questions. Ah well...

My current thoughts on gaming? Well, first, let's look at the Big Three. We'll start with Microsoft.

Microsoft

I honestly have no idea how the Xbox succeeded, mean as it sounds. The original console was, in my opinion, awful. Granted, Microsoft absolutely nailed online gaming with Xbox Live, which was absolutely a huge part of the console's success, and their integration of multimedia functions was another brilliant move. However, the console itself was an ugly behemoth, and Halo aside, I saw very few compelling exclusives. And even Halo, I wasn't and am not all that enamored with--I just don't get the appeal. Still, the Xbox managed to succeed, solidly trouncing the GameCube, much to my dismay, and trailing the PlayStation 2 for years to come.

Then the 360 came out, and I still wasn't impressed--until I saw just how meaningful that year lead over Nintendo and Sony was. Microsoft had all but clinched that first year for home consoles, while Nintendo made up for lost ground in portables and Sony's PSP was still finding its footing. They had room to breathe while Microsoft reaped the benefits of their quick thinking, and for a while it seemed as though the 360 would remain king. Arguably, it has.

However, I would question the viability of Microsoft's Project Natal, and their skewing toward the "family" demographic with avatars. And with integration of Facebook and Twitter (among others), this brings to mind the question of "How much is too much?" I think that answers itself, personally. Facebook and Twitter? But I'll back off that.

My point is, Microsoft's audience is and always will be this so-called hardcore audience. Casual or family games on the 360 will remain a niche thing, regardless of how many fancy controllers--or lack thereof--you dress it up with. Long story short, Microsoft, I believe, should have stuck to what they were doing, because they were doing it well.

Nintendo

Nintendo, I love you, but what are you doing?

I love Nintendo. Honestly. I have for almost two decades now. It's that bad. But it hurts to see them getting mocked so horribly by so much of gaming, and it hurts more to see them seemingly taking it lying down.

Don't get me wrong. Whomever it appeals to, the Wii is a massive hit. And this talk of a slowdown in sales? I don't buy it. And the DS? Well, that speaks for itself. But let's go back a few years. The GameCube, much as I loved it, was a failure. And that's a big shame, because it had a ton of fantastic exclusives, and some of the multiplatform titles were the best on GameCube. But after past failures, third parties were reluctant to support it and the dedicated gaming machine fell behind the colossal Xbox and the odd-shaped PS2. Lack of multimedia features to blame? Possibly. Failure to take advantage of the online market in any successful way? Very probably. Even so, it was one of my favorites and it's a shame it fell so flat in the end.

With the Wii, we know Nintendo took another route, and here we are. Some of these peripherals... Vitality Sensor? I'll withhold judgment for now, but it seems like that's only going to be used for fitness games or something (Wii Fit 3 will have it integrated, almost definitely). I'd love to see it used for survival horror, like what they did in Eternal Darkness--except you're doing it with your pulse if you get nervous.

Anyway. The Wii. The lack of HD was a huge mistake, and it drove away the core audience. Going solely motion control for a lot of other games was hit and miss, and some games (RE4, No More Heroes, MadWorld, Rabbids Go Home, Okami) have benefitted hugely from it, while others have only used it as a gimmick (The Force Unleashed). Wii Motion Plus has begun to fix some of that, and hope remains that the "true" motion control will make 2010 a great year for the Wii.

Honestly, I really hope Nintendo can turn it around for the "core" audience within these next two years and bring out some more titles that show they still have it in them to be king. With Other M, Galaxy 2, Reginleiv(sp?) and Zelda coming within the next two years, at least we know Nintendo hasn't abandoned their veteran franchises for another Wii Music or Wii Play. And it remains to be seen what Retro is doing. ...But what about Pikmin 3?

Sony

The PS2 was a huge success, though it's finally slowed down, which I would argue is a good thing. This should show Sony they should start focusing on both the PS3 and PSP--namely getting more compelling exclusives out on PS3 and making a better version of the PSPgo, or just forsaking the thing altogether. Not much to say about their past. They've done well for themselves in the past.

Sony started off this generation in a miserable state, but they've managed to turn the game around, largely due to the Slim and its reduced costs. But it helps that 2009 had a slew of great exclusives and 2010 looks to bring even more. Over the 2009 holiday, Sony was arguably the winner, shattering their previous sales records for the PS3.

I obviously have the least to say about Sony right now, and there's a good reason for that. Mainly, I haven't seen their potential realized yet this generation. Don't get me wrong, though. Sony won the format war with Blu-ray, a technically superior format to Microsoft's HD-DVD, and a lot of the 360's former exclusives have now gone over to PS3, so they've gained momentum. I'd like to see how these next two years play out for them. Maybe they'll catch up to Microsoft? Maybe they'll get ahead? It remains to be seen.

Favorite Games

I'm not doing the "best" games here, because I don't know how to qualify that, and there's definitely no way to do it objectively. I'm going to do a top 15 of the last decade blog sometime to explain these (and others, as I'm doing this off the top of my head), and they're in no particular order:

The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Shadow of the Colossus, No More Heroes, Metroid Prime: Trilogy, BioShock, Jak 3, Final Fantasy XII, Paper Mario, Super Mario Galaxy, Beyond Good & Evil, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Hotel Dusk: Room 215