Here's a selection of first person shooters, one's that I for one consider to be underrated! While I could probably rant on about more games than what you have here, these are the one's that I want to talk about.

FINAL DOOM. Alright, alright, I'm a die-hard Doom fanboy, so my opinion was going to be quite obvious with this one. I know Final Doom was never actually developed by id Software and contained no new features to the already aging series whatsoever, but honestly, some of the levels within this game are actually very respectable and certainly some of the most interesting out of any game from the classic Doom series. Obviously, with the sixty-four levels spread over two different Doom stories (Evilution and Plutonia Experiment), there were bound to be a few duff one's in there. However, huge, sprawling, craftily-designed levels such as 'Metal', 'Prison', 'Hunted' and the cheekily-titled 'Impossible Mission' proved to be some of the most challenging and well designed levels yet. Final Doom is a fantastic game, sadly only the fans will understand that.

BROTHERS IN ARMS: HELL'S HIGHWAY is a game that comes to mind. While I don't think the Brothers in Arms series as a whole is underrated or obscure in any way, I do think Hell's Highway deserved a bit more attention amongst the general public. Anyone who considers themselves to be a World War II game fanatic shouldn't pass up on Hell's Highway, which is, in my opinion, the best game in the series along with the best World War II game since 2008. While I loved Road to Hill 30 and Earned in Blood, Hell's Highway just improves almost every great aspect of the first two games, from the brutal combat (with the new cover system), superb AI and squad leading tactics, to the excellent movie-like cinematic presentation, voice acting and story line. Not quite a masterpiece, but close.

Speaking of World War II games, MEDAL OF HONOR AIRBORNE is some of the most fun I've had with the genre. Seriously, Airborne is the most FUN MOH game to date. Unlike Brothers In Arms, which tends to focus on realism (to an extent), tactics and dramatic story sequences, Airborne stays with the staple MOH ingredients of crazy heroism, big battles (and explosions) and straight-forward shooting – in other words, it doesn't stay true to realism! But this is irrelevant. Airborne is a traditional MOH gun-fest with non-linear gameplay thanks to the freedom of jumping out of an airplane, landing anywhere in the level and completing objectives in whichever order you want. EA struck gold if you ask me. It's just a shame it was over before you knew it, because this is one of the last FPS's that truly felt like it was developed for pure, unprecedented fun – and that it is!

VIETCONG is an oldie, but is still the best representation of Vietnam combat in video-game form to date if you ask me. It's one of those rare games where you never feel safe, and you should never underestimate your enemy. Obviously the game is dated by today's standards, but in terms of enemy AI I think it's fair to say that it's aged well. They know the jungle, and you don't meaning that numerous, unpredictable ambushes are imminent. You have to rely on your pointman and your own wits to find and disarm deadly traps littered around in foliage along with fox holes leading to huge, underground tunnel networks. Intimidating is the best way to describe Vietcong, probably the first game to not only feel authentic in terms of the Vietnam War, but also the first game that really made jungle warfare in video games work in my opinion.

Another game that comes to mind is PREY. Although a bit on the short side, and not exactly the most difficult game ever made, I loved it's presentation and story as well as some of it's unique gameplay features for the time. Ever wanted to play as a Cherokee/native American mechanic names Tommy who gets abducted by gruesome aliens, whilst Blue Oyster Cult plays on jukebox in the background? Alright, maybe you didn't, but you can in Prey! Forced to battle your way through an alien spaceship in order to save your girlfriend, there's a lot of crazy action to be had here. The whole zero-gravity business that goes on is awesome - walking on the ceiling or the walls whilst blowing away aliens with their own insane weaponry was always a good thing, and using native American supernatural powers, such as the ability to leave your own body and play as your own spirit was, let's face it, original. Graphically and artistically, Prey is still a great looking game too; it runs on a modified Doom 3 engine (idTech 5). This is a game that's definitely worth a shot if you never played or heard of it.

Way back in 1996, a small game developer known as Lobotomy Software created a game for the Sega Saturn and later PC and PlayStation known as EXHUMED (or PowerSlave in the US). As far as old-school shooters go, this is by far one of my favourites. It has some of the best level design in any game of it's time if you ask me. It also makes excellent use of the whole Ancient Egyptian vibe in terms of it's enemies, power-ups, items and visuals. Exhumed will always be a forgotten gem, and I highly recommend that anyone who respects the history of first person shooters to go out and find a copy.

Other honourable mentions include Far Cry Instincts: Evolution, Call of Juarez, Hexen II, Men of Valor, XIII and the original ArmA.

Bought Rage (Anarchy Edition) the other day as it was on offer and even though I'm enjoying it a fair bit, I still don't think it's that great, especially by id Software's standards. id Software have been my favourite developer ever since I first layed hands on Doom and Quake, but Rage just doesn't feel like an id game for one reason or the other, and it's certainly nowhere near the standards of Doom 3 (the last game they released...and that was way back in 2004...).

The problems I have is that id seemed to have focussed more on plot and character development as well as variety in gameplay instead of what they do best - total carnage and action. Fair enough if they wanted to go for something different, but thing is, I just don't care for the plot or the characters because they just aren't that interesting. While the gameplay is actually pretty good for the most part, I think the driving sections are alright, but there's just way too much of them, i.e. they play too big of a role than they need to.

The id Tech 5 engine is a let down too. It is nowhere near as groundbreaking and impressive as, well, all of id's previous game engines. The biggest problem is that the textures are just inconsistent - some look fantastic while others actually look less impressive than the one's found in an id Tech 4-powered game (Doom 3's engine). On the plus side, I've experienced barely any technical issues and bugs that the game had on launch, probably because they've mostly been fixed by now (and because I have an NVidia card). In general, the game is actually great visually, but at the same time not as great as you'd think.

Maybe it's just me, but I also think the violence is positively tame by id's standards. Still, gunplay is actually well done here, and the weapons feel quite nice to shoot, as well as being varied. Also, I do think the game exceeds from an artistic point of view - the overall visual design of the whole wasteland side of the game is very well done.

Seeing as id Software are my favourite game developer, I definitely expected a whole lot more than this, and when I heard John Carmack basically said Rage wasn't geared towards the PC market, this let me down even more. I mean, this is id. Still, like I said, I am enjoying the game, and I've only played it for a few hours or so at this point in time, I just expected more that's all. I'll probably review the game at some point...

So Battlefield 3 is installing as I'm typing this. I've been waiting a long, long time to play it. As long as I enjoy it as much as I enjoyed BF2, I'm happy.

Due to being mostly absent on GS for for a long time, I haven't really done a 'proper' blog post in over two years, so here's a (hopefully) interesting one.

Here's a bunch of games that have had the biggest impact on me personally - not necessarily my favourites, but the ones that changed the way I looked at games, and ones that changed the way I perceived certain aspects in gaming.

Well the first and most obvious one is DOOM. Doom is an always will be my favourite gaming franchise, and I personally regard Doom II to be the greatest First Person Shooter of all time. But it's the original that left me wanting more, seeing as it was the first in the series I played. Everything about it just defines what the core of an FPS is and what it's all about. Doom is all-out carnage; super-fast paced, blood and guts with a slight hint of humour. Not only that, but it's a beautifully crafted game: the iconic weapons are perfectly balanced and every single one of them proves to have at least some use against one enemy or the other. Everything about Doom just feels right, from the simple movement of the Doom Guy to the atmosphere and level design. This all adds up to one of the most entertaining games of all time. Sometimes simplicity is best - Doom represents the FPS in it's purest form; it's all about the gameplay and fun factor, not realism, visuals or story telling, and that's why I love it so much.

COMMAND & CONQUER definitely deserves some credit. Bar Doom, the original C&C must have been the first game I was actually addicted to. As far as Real Time Strategy goes, C&C is the only one that perfected the gameplay for me. I've played numerous competitors - from Age of Empires, Starcraft and more recently Dawn of War and Company of Heroes. All of these games are great in their own right, but for me C&C just had 'it'. The gameplay is fast-paced and challenging, but also relatively simple and easy to master. Every time you completed a mission, you wanted more. Everything was just right about it. I'd also like to point out that this game (along with a majority of others in the series) is amazing from an artistic point of view. Both armies, GDI and the Brotherhood of Nod have wonderfully-designed units and structures. The cut scenes were unforgettable. The atmosphere Westwood created is insane. It's untouchable. All the characters are genuinely interesting (especially Kane!) and make for an intriguing story that all comes together very well. The in-game music was also top-notch. The entire formula was essentially kept the same throughout the series until C&C Generals came out, which was when I stopped playing any new C&C title full stop. It's not the same anymore...

It may surprise you that I feel METAL GEAR SOLID 2: SONS OF LIBERTY should be in this list. The reason is because it was the first game that really felt like a cinematic experience – the story telling throughout is insane and the cut scenes are expertly crafted. The same could be said for the first game, but MGS2 was the first game in the series I played, and to me it was ahead of it's time. The plot had so much depth along with the characters and setting it was simply a breath of fresh air to play. The overall art design of the game doesn't stray too far from the original (in my opinion), but if it ain't broke don't fix it. A wonderful game that not only had it's incredible story telling and voice acting, but also offered great stealth gameplay.

Perhaps an obvious one is GRAND THEFT AUTO III, but playing it back in 2001 was absolutely awesome. Free roaming around a city and causing chaos wasn't exactly anything new to the gaming world, but it certainly was new in the way that GTAIII presented it. I think we were all waiting for the game that let us steal cars and shoot at pedestrians in a 3D perspective! GTAIII perfected this, and the number of clones that have followed is through the roof. Just about every single free roaming game is compared to GTA, and for all the right reasons. The following games in the series expanded on the gameplay and added new features, but at heart, the gameplay has always been kept the same since GTAIII simply because it doesn't need altering.

Realism in games is not that important. I basically already explained that when I spoke about Doom. But sometimes it is refreshing. Only one game comes to mind...OPERATION FLASHPOINT: COLD WAR CRISIS. To me, Flashpoint set the benchmark for all realistic, tactical, military-based shooters. Oh sure, Tom Clancy had his Rainbow Six series out before then but Flashpoint pushed the boundaries in my opinion. This was hardcore PC gaming. Any vehicle can be driven, any weapon can be fired, everywhere you see in the huge environments can be explored. Firefights take place over several hundred metres, not five feet away. You have no superhuman advantage, just you're brain; you are just as vulnerable as the enemy. Flashpoint tested me, and for that reason alone it deserves a place on this blog. Sure, it had it's flaws and with Bohemia's ArmA II on the market, it's been long updated, but for years Flashpoint was the king of military PC games.

The last game is HALF-LIFE 2. You may be surprised that it's HL2 and not the original game on this list, but I didn't play the first game until several years after it's release. HL2, for me, was like a game from the future. The physics created from the Source Engine back in 2004 were simply mind-blowing. Top-notch story telling, visuals, functional combat and the best character animations I had ever seen at the time all added up to make a masterpiece of a game. To this day I still compare new FPS's to HL2. It was ahead of it's time.

There's a whole bunch of other influential games I would really like to include, such as Deus Ex and Quake, but I didn't play them until long after their release, so it's difficult to include them.

After my previous, ageing PC broke down about a month ago, I finally gave up with it and ordered a much needed new PC a couple of days ago, and hopefully i'll have it by Monday as it was dispatched yesterday. The specs are as follows:

• CPU: AMD Phenom II x6 core, 2.8GHz
• RAM: 4GB DDR3
• Graphics Card: nVidia GTX 550 1GB
• Hard Drive: 500GB

...and to anyone who says I could do better than that, computers and gaming aren't exactly at the top of my priority list, and they never have been. Sure, I do enjoy gaming, but I have too many other hobbies and obvious life essentials that my wages go towards. I didn't get a new monitor with it, although I do plan on getting one over the next few months. In the meantime, my old monitor will have to do. The hard drive is a bit on the small side by todays stands i'll admit, but for me it's more than enough space seeing as I have an external hard drive as well.

Having said all that though, i'm obviously going to be investing in a few odd games for it over the next few months, namely Battlefield 3 and Skyrim, and possibly Rage. I'm going to get Grand Theft Auto IV and Episodes from Liberty City next week too! The first games i'll be testing are Crysis for obvious reasons, Far Cry 2, Brothers In Arms: Hells Highway and Half-Life 2: Episode 2.

A couple of weeks ago I bought an original Xbox, crystal edition, second-hand with 1 official Controller S. Best £15 i've spent in a long, long time. For that price I couldn't say no! Anyhow, for an extra £15 I got Fable, Doom 3, Unreal Championship, The Suffering, Halo 1 and 2. A couple of friends also donated me 2 extra controllers (unofficial), Return To Castle Wolfenstein: Tides Of War, Enclave, Burnout 3 and Sonic Mega Collection. And seeing as Xbox games are so cheap these days, I also got Half-Life 2, Doom 3 Resurrection Of Evil, Serious Sam and both Far Cry Instincts and it's expansion Evolution.

Needless to say i've been having a lot of fun with it. Oh sure, I own a majority of those games on PC, but I think i've spent maybe £40 max on everything, and that's a bargain if you ask me!

Which is my favourite game out of all these? Well I could say Half-life 2 purely for the fact that it's Half-Life 2, which is my favourite FPS of the 21st century, but the Xbox port isn't perfect, though you still have to give Valve credit for even bothering to port the game to the Xbox. Nah, i'd say my favourites are Doom 3, which is an absolutely fantastic port that I recently reviewed and Far Cry Instincts, which I may even like more than the original PC game though I haven't made my mind up yet. Oh, and Halo 1 and 2 for their great multiplayer!

A couple of years back I reviewed the original ArmA. I've recently deleted that review and wrote another one, andhaving played the game over a long period of time, my opinion of it has changed to a slight extent. Oh, and it's also my first review in a very long time.

ArmA review

Very late I know but a few days ago I bought the Orange Box. Picked it up since it was cheap (already own HL2 and Episode1 that's one reason why I didnt buy it for a long time). First game ive bought in ages.

Half-Life 2 Episode 2 is probably my favourite game excluding the original HL2, what an improvement it is over Episode 1! Even though it only took me around 5 hours to complete, it was a hell of a lot better than the predecessor, though I still like the first HL2 most. Bring on Episode 3!

Portal is cool but i'd already played some of this beforeso I knew some of the puzzles. Either way it is like no other game ive played and actually makes you think.

Team Fortress 2 is the weakest but has still entertained me. Didnt really like the first TF but this is definitely better. I shoulda picked up Orange Box ages ago. Thats all I can say!

Not quite sure why I havent been on here for so long. Guess i've just been busy. Actually, I definitely have been busy. Last month I saw Judas Priest, Megadeth and Testament on the Priest Feast tour. GREAT show. The other week I went to airsoft (kinda like paintballing but more realistic and with bb replica guns). That was also GREAT. Been training for American football and helping out at senior matches, college work etc. Oh, I also dislocated my finger and snapped it back into place yesterday :?.

Played quite a lot of games (at some mates houses of course!) like RE5, Gears Of War 2, Far Cry 2, COD World At War, Killzone 2 etc but havent actually bought anything for ages. Well thats all I can think of saying for now.

OK ive written a review on Counter-Strike Source (which you've probably all played or know). It's the first review ive written in ages.

Read review

In fact, this is the first blog post in ages. I've been busy as heck at college and i've even joined and American football team (which is difficult to get into in the UK). Anyway enjoy the review.