So here's me, Rachel, a 21 year old nurse who likes to game. It helps me wind down and relax and escape to another world that's not full of the sick. I am a female gamer and proud. This post was inspired by one idiot who commented on my last blog, let's just say something that had no relation to the topic but what he wanted me to do to him. I have been a user of Gamespot for about 4 years now but it took me a while to actually create a user account but I felt like I was missing out on the social side of gaming and finding others like me who enjoy it and are passionate about it. I love going on the forums, even the off topic discussions and meeting new people, reading their opinions and it angers me that there are some people in the world who want to take this from me. Gaming is my little haven from the world and some idiot tried to ruin that. I've always been a tom boy, having more guy friends then girls and friends of mine say that it's 'cool' having a friend that games who's a girl. I don't come on Gamespot to meet people to date. If I wanted to, I'd use a dating site. To coin a phrase used by my guy friends, though gaming websites can be a 'sausage fest' it doesn't mean because I am a woman, I want that sort of attention. I don't game for attention, I do it because I enjoy it.

After saying for years I'm a thoroughbred Sony gal, I'm now debating getting an Xbox. The main reason for my back-stabbing to Sony? The Kinect. I want to play Just Dance and Dance Central to get fit and unlike buying a treadmill for the house and then using it to hang clothes on when I tire of it at least I can use the Xbox for other things like Fable and Alan Wake. So now I've explained myself. But I still refuse to pay for the online account as I wouldn't use it and paying for the service is one of my big complaints about the Xbox. Well that and the ridiculously cumbersome controller. So ha Microsoft, you haven't really won, one point to me (regardless of the fact I will be buying something off you).

So I was watching the Gamspot bluffers guide to Final Fantasyand was firstly pleased to see that Danny, like myself hasn't actually played any of them. For me this was because I was actually not even born when the series started. I can remember being about 8 when 9 was released (I'm 21 now) and seeing it in the shops but when it was a toss up between buying that at a slightly lower price (having not played anything like that before) and Crash Team Racing, which was just out and loved the other Crash games, so to my young self the choice was obvious. I was thinking about old games and today after watching that I might actually dig out my PS1 games and have a go. There are some I never did actually complete due my exceptionally short attention span which was even worse when I was younger. I mean Crash 2:Cortex Strikes Back was a great game of the time if not slightly ridiculous in general with the mask that everyone I knew who played it refer to as 'UGA BUGA', you know that one And the concept of apples for health, I mean, that's just genius! Well eating 100 apples gave you an extra life, imagine if that worked in real life! I also miss the old skateboarding games. I'm not going as far back now but Tony Hawks American Wasteland on PS2 was immense. I loved that game and spent hours getting ridiculous combos on the extra scoring modes but again I don't think I ever completed all of it. WELL THAT CHANGES TODAY. I'm going back in time people, wish me luck.

Well, this year is certainly going to be expensive on the game front, and what better excuse to go all out than the end of the world! Syndicate- I like the look of this and yes, I did also like the trailer. At least it got us all talking about it and the music gets your heart racing with excitement. I haven't played the original however but maybe it's a good thing as when games get remade they're like films and we end up telling ourselves that they're never as good as the original. Syndicate to me looks like it's going to be a better version of Deus Ex, by which I mean more fun. In Deus Ex, although you could go out in the open and shoot people it worked better in the game if you were stealthy. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't like stealth, on the contrary I love spending hours on Assassins Creed making sure I can fully sync by not being spotted. But, I digress, the fighting mechanism looks interesting and also, so much gore it may be banned in Autralia if they don't change it- awesome! Resident Evil 6 - Yes, it's going to be different to the others. Do I hope it's more like the originals with less action and more horror? Hmm I don't know. RE5 was fun. My best friend used to come round with a crate and we used to just drink and play this for hours and it was great fun. When I used to play the second my PS2, I don't know if it was the poor frame rate and bad graphics that added to the horror factor or the fact I was young and naive and yeah the fact you had less weapon pickups than you did in 4/5, but 4 was still a tad scary the first time I played it. Yes you won't hear many people admit it but the regenerators really freaked me out! Again I'm going off track. I don't think I care which characters they put in the game (bar Ashley as she's ****ing anoying). I would like co op but when you play on your own have the option to choose to have the AI tag along with you or go at it alone, mainly as when I needed healing once, Sheva shot me in the face with a rocket launcher, which obviously helped loads. As for the walk/run whilst shooting that people have mentioned, I'm not really bothered about this and it does make the game harder that you can't do both currently. Mass Effect 3- I actually won the copy of Mass Effect 2 of a competition on Gamespot UK itself. I hadn't played the first being a Playstation gamer and owner all my life but just entered thinking it looked good and won, so I had a play. I love RPG's, they bring out my truely nerdy side and this was an brilliant game. The story was fantastic and you genuinely felt that what you were doing had an effect on your world around you. The characters were diverse and designed with a full background and culture and I found myself just wanting to sit and watch the interactions between different species. I can't wait for this game and I hope that it isn't the last in the series they do, but then cutting it off whilst it is on a high point is sometimes for the best. I didn't have many problems with the last game either, mainly the having to run at a wall so you can crouch behind it and sometimes then jumping over it in to open gunfire was a tad annoying but it's nothing major. The variety and diversity of missions was also a high point for the game and made me continue to play until I eventually got twitchy eye which is not recommended and very annoying. So main reason I'm looking forward to this is just because of the general awesomness of the last game and to see what happens in the story because lets face it, it's always more fun shooting things when you have a good reason such as saving humanity and saving commander Shepard's pretty little face. Oh, and your team mates.