I am the most inconsistent Gamespotter ever. I come and then I go. I post a blog and then I stop. I say I'm back and then I leave. I want to keep making friends on this site and continue to remain in contact with the ones I'm following and vice-versa and I continue to just leave.

I'm going to rephrase the way I say this: My goal is to remain on this site and develop the friendships that I have here. As I've matured and have gotten married, I realize that friendships are important--even online. Yes, there's no facial contact but we all look for relationships in life and there's nothing wrong with online relationships. There's nothing wrong with developing relationships beyond just games. Life is truly better with people in it.

I've gone to GameInformer's website and have made friends there and now I'm back to my "home" gaming website and I want to come back to my original group of friends that I've met through commenting, the forums and just plain browsing.

Yes, you guys matter to me here and I want to take the thing that I enjoy and use it to stay in steady contact. Thankfully, it's been made a little bit easier with GS FUSE and it's a website where we all get together anyway.

All in all to say, I am back--to stay. I'll just come on as much as I can.

Yesterday my church held a picnic at the park. My pastor and I brought his grill, he brought all the meat and everyone else brought whatever they wanted. We had it a nice wide park but there was one problem--no bathrooms. Thankfully we handled it well as no one needed to go in the four hour stint but it was definitely something that was not aware of at the time of choosing the park.

I was stuffed after the whole thing and my fiancee was ready to go to sleep. Burgers, hot links, potato salad, chips--all kinds of chips, 6 layer dip, hummis and a whole bunch more. After that, the pastor had a message for us and then we ate some more, packed up and went our merry way. Still got wonderful hot links left over.

Story

The story is becoming a little muddled at this point. I understand that I'm going from city to city and finding different men to assassinate but the quest itself doesn't seem as interesting anymore. The information provided only sparks my interest for a moment but it doesn't make it last and it doesn't make me ponder about what is really going on. It really feels like a fetch quest right now and while those are okay, they become very tiresome. And I'm very tired. Perhaps it's because I'm hungry. That probably plays a part of it.

Gameplay

Climbing walls and jumping across roofs still has not gotten old. I also found that you can kick and punch people on ladders too! A satisfying addition to the exploration aspect. The AI has increased in difficulty as it should but it feels like the AI is a little too overpowered in combat but then again, with patience, it's not that difficult either. Guards are less patient it seems like when they're watching you but this is a inconsistent observation.

Fighting templars is insanely difficult. They can do everything you do and you can barely do what you do to them--counters are near impossible, attack counters are useless, etc. Seems like the only effective way to kill a Templar is by assassination which isn't bad gameplay element, I'd just like to beat them in combat.

The traveling is rough. The cities are very spread apart and there are guards everywhere thoughtout "The Kingdom" as it's called in the game. That means, if you're riding on horseback at high-speeds, you'll set everyone on alert. However, my roommate said you can outrun them. It makes sense since they're all on foot but if you get caught up on a cliff or make a wrong turn, it's going to be a difficult task to fight off close to eight guards depending where you're at.

Combat is a little stale at times. Seeing the same counter animations gets a little boring and that the animation doesn't go for the OHKO doesn't make sense. Some guards he'll slash his sword through, others he'll counter and then punch their stomach. It may be a AI thing but whatever it is, it makes battles longer than I would like them to be.

Controls

The controls work fine. There have been only a few times where the controls did not do exactly what I wanted it to do but that's because it was in a high intense situation. You may think that's when it matters the most, and that's true, but I do know that if I would've been calm, I would've been alright. Directing Altair on the walls is easy although sometimes he'll take a longer to climb a wall when holding up simply because the control doesn't register in the game. It doesn't happen too often and it doesn't slow the flow too bad.

Music

Unfortunately, music is still pretty obsolete. The only time I really ever here the music and it's not ambient is when I'm in danger or if the city is on high alert on me. Other than that, nothing is sticking out to me.

Sitting in my 360 game collection was Assassin's Creed II and I played through it a little bit but it kept getting taken over by games I can play and put down quickly like fighting games or racing games--maybe some RPG's with the ability to save anywhere. I don't have a ton of time on my hands anymore. I decided to whip it out and play it again since some time has opened up for me and I forgot how good the game was. After playing it, I thought to myself, I need to get the first one. I knew that wasn't going to happen until I got some money or the price went waaaay down.

Well, God sure did send Gamestop solutions my way because the next morning in my e-mail, I saw that Assassin's Creed was $5! I quickly put on my clothes, ran my errands, talked to some friends and then went to Gamestop and bought Assassin's Creed. I went home. I ejected Assassin's Creed II. I popped open Assassin's Creed and took out the disc. I slid it on up in my 360. I sat on my couch and craked out on it for about 5 hours straight. Now, in most gamers' minds, 5 hours isn't a lot. In the world of a gamer who's got a fiancee and is wedding planning, that's a TON of time.

Overall, I like the game a lot. The wall climbing and jumping across roofs never gets old. I love looking at the environments as it really feels like I'm walking through a city. The atmosphere the game gives out feels pretty authentic and the dialogue isn't half bad. Altair could use some better dialogue but I suppose for his personality, it suits him. I would like to comment on the music but most of the time I can barely here it because they're ambient tracks. It's not bad it's just very little rhytmical melodies going on. Whenever I do here rhythmical melodies though, it sounds good and is very fitting.

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*****
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Work is about to pile up on me. It's a little hard to explain the "backstory" on my duties at work since I haven't delved into here before but basically, I work at a child treatment facility with behaviorally challenging kids.

During school, I'm doing work on the unit while the kids are at school. I do things such as correct daily progress notes for the kids, check their rooms for contraband, organize money, etc. This week, I haven't been able to do my normal duties because I've been having to take kids to the doctor, help move furniture back into an old unit (that's a story in and of itself) and tomorrow, I have to sit in a teacher's schooloom (eyes always have to be on the kids) because the teachers' instructional aid is out and my co-worker, who was in for the instructional aid, is out. That only leaves me to do the job. Which means, the rest of the job isn't going to get done until next week. It's not my fault. It's just annoying because I have a feeling someone is going to complain to me about it. And I have a greater feeling it's going to be the people that told me to do it.

I asked my fiancee if she wanted to play Sonic last night and she was eyeing my Call of Duty 2 game and then said, "Let's play Call of Duty." I chuckled to myself because I couldn't take her seriously. I thought she was joking when she said that. She actually wanted to play something as hardcore as Call of Duty? Naw. A part of me hoped she did though. She looked at me like I was crazy and said, "What? You think I'm playing? Let's play!" Now I'm just smiling and I reply, "Are you serious?" She says, "Yeah. Let's play. What? You don't think I can play?" I shake my head laughing and in shock at what I was hearing. I said, "No. If you want to play, then we'll play." CoD 2 did not have co-op so I pulled out Modern Warfare 2.

At the Speical Ops screen, I told her all the necessary controls that she needed in order to have any type of survival. The entire time was a coaching/tutorial fest. All we did was do the first mission of Special Ops because apparently, I had to tell her that in order to turn her body, she had to use the right stick. Old-school gamer, indeed.

She was having trouble with the coordination between her left thumb and right thumb. It was like she was trying to play Metroid Prime. At first, we were completing the mission in about 2:40 because I would let her go through it and I'd just pick up kills if she needed to reload. In order to help her get the coordination, I'd have her walk around one of the wooden boxes and then have her stand in one place and shoot the cardboard enemies. Eventually, she brought the time down to 1:13 which was really impressive. She even sprinted toward the end. She never got the coordination though. And she wanted to try to go to the next mission; just to try it.

We tried that next mission where you stand on top of a building and snipe people as they come swarm around your location and you have to complete the certain amount of waves. That was an utter disaster. I told her what was going to happen and I'm shooting at people and she asks, "Where are all the people?" I respond, "Baby, you have to look over the rail of the building to see the people." She laughs hard because she knows I'm thinking "WTF?" I tell her to stay on top of the building. A few minutes later, she's bleeding out on the ground. I say, "What are you doing!? I told you to stay on the ground!" I revive her and she somehow manages to get to the top again without dying. After more, "WTF" moments, I get bombarded and I start bleeding out and she doesn't know how to get to me because she can't use the right stick and she gets killed. Game over.

Would I do it again? Yeah. But that was traumatic.

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Marvel vs. Capcom 3 however, she got. If you don't know, this game has a normal mode, where you execute everything yourself and then a simple mode where at the press of button, you can do crazy specials and combos. I told her about simple mode and told her she should use it.

I shouldn't have told her about simple mode.

I thought I'd be able to cream her anyway but the battles were epically close and she even got me extremely frustrated. She was button mashing like crazy but that's what simple mode is supposed to let happen. She was destroying me by the end of the session. I told her I couldn't play anymore because I hate losing to button mashing. She says, "I know that's code for 'I suck'." I say, "No. It's just I know you don't know what you're doing." Then she has the audacity to say, "How do you know?" Okay.

I'm gettting frustrated just thinking about it. It was fun though.

I'm always baffled by my own inconsistency with blogging on this website. I start and have a good run for a few weeks, maybe a month, then I fizzle out and start posting on other blogs that I have. Whatever the reason, the new site design is the perfect segway for me to post something on this blog, like I used to.

My first impressions of the new design are good.I like it mostly because navigation is easier. I don't understand why people are having trouble navigating the site. Everything is right there at the top or you have to scroll down a few pixels to get to the rest of the headlines. It's simple.

I haven't taken a fine-toothed comb over the homepage yet but the only two immediate suggestions thatI could that would be better would be more customization on the Latest & Greatest section. Instead of having a dropdown box with the option to only select one headline option to view, it could be a dropdown box with radio buttons to check what you want to see coming down the list so it wouldn't be just previews or just news. For someone who doesn't view the site often, the 'just news' option works, for example. But for someone who views it pretty frequently, it's more beneficial to be able to see everythingI want to see. If it stays, it won't be too much of a hassle but I think it's just that much more less clicking that has to be done because we all have lazy wrists and index fingers.

I played through one mission of Perfect Dark and beat the second to the last blacklist racer in Need for Speed: Most Wanted. Hopefully if I can get some more work done I can finish further along. I tried to finish all the minimum cop races for Razor, the #1 on the blacklist but the races are long and it was late so I let my roommate play some more Assassin's Creed 2--looks like a really good game from what I've seen.

I'm working on some image buttons for a website I'm a part of called Raging Nerds. We just went to E3, got some interviews and made some videos and covered a game or two. Since it was our first E3 and our first major press event, we learned a lot and but also didn't get a lot. I wasn't one of the ones that went to E3 but I did watch them online and write about them. That's the best I could do for them. Other than that, I'm the community manager for their website. I haven't been doing much trying to get my priorities in line (which reminds me I still have to practice on the drums) but now that they're getting better, I think I can dedicate more time to it. I'm hoping to get someone to help me for those days I don't have time to look at the forums or write up the weekly updates. We'll see how that goes.

Here is my title that I created for my friend's, buddies music video: watch

My former co-worker from SDSU came by my house today seeking some help to make a title animation for a music video he made for one of his friends who is putting out an album. Not a mainstream guy at all--just a local San Diego rapper. Tomorrow I will have the video up on youtube since I'm going to put it up on my portfolio anyway. I think it turned out pretty nice.

The song is a swagger filled love song but it's also has a cute sort of feel to it also. He wanted me to bring in the words "L.O.V.E" with some flare. It took me about an hour and a half to make it and most of it was spent trying to think of what to put in it to add some flare to it. Hopefully, the guy will like it. If not, I guess I'll make another one.

I went to the San Diego Center for Children to find out my hiring status. Then, I went to depsoit an unemployment check and get some laundry money but nooooo. It had to be more than that. Gamestop wants to have a big red sign outside their store declaring "Power Save Sale!" Any store with that sort of declaration must have a decent sale going on. They got me.

50% off any used games while other new games were on sale. I wanted to get Modern Warfare 2 since someone stole mine but it was still $50 and I wasn't willing to spend that much. However, Gears of War was $5 and Assassin's Creed 2 was $20. Overall? $27.17. I couldn't resist. The Gamestop bandits got me good.

My girlfriend just happened to call me during my purchase at which I did not pick up but I eventually told her what I did. She couldn't blame me for resisting a sale that I saved close to $35 on. Actually $25 now that I think about it but two good games for a little over $25 is a nice deal to me. Still, these will be my last game purchases for a while. I have to finish my other games. I will say I am tempted to see what they have at other Gamestop's by my house but that's going overboard. I don't feel completely bad because my roommate was very excited over AC2 so that made me feel better since I did buy that game partially because he wanted to play it so bad also.

If you're trying not to buy any games, avoid Gamestop right now.

My job at San Diego State is no more since I've been laid off and now I will be working at the San Diego Center for Children. This has nothing to do with anything I've done in the past as far as salary related jobs but my friend said he could get me the job if I just gave him my resume and so after thinking and praying about it, it's the best option for me right now. Why not get a job that basically has its doors flung open for me? I may not have that much experience with kids but I do like them; even if the'yre special needs kids.

These are kids who have a hard time coping with their emotions whether it's because they've been traumatized, have brain issues, etc. Something has gone wrong in their development as a person and as a Child Development Counselor, we help them try to live normal lives and let them know that they can live a normal life. It's a little daunting because, like I said, I don't have much experience with kids. Being a kid is one thing, taking care of one, with special needs is a whole 'nother ball game.

I'm not exactly sure when I start but I'll be doing on call since the full time schedule they gave me interferes with some of my Sunday obligations. With this on call though, I choose all the days I'm going to work if there are people who aren't working. So if there's a lot of people not working a week, I can fill in for them. If there's enough work, I can still make 40 hours a week--maybe more if I wanted to. It all works out. If not, I'm still going to be looking for some kind of work if the hours aren't enough. Gotta pay the bills and feed myself so gotta put in the work.