Sorry for the drama but as you may gather my 360 caught the infamous red ring of death last night. It's an extremely annoying thing when a console dies on you but at Christmas, when you have a billion games to play - that just makes it 100 times worse.

To be honest, it isn't as bad for me. I didn't actually get any 360 games for Christmas. My brother on the other hand got 3. He got Gears of War 2, Fable 2 (which I was kind enough to buy for him ;)), and Call of Duty 5. As you can imagine, it is very frustrating to not be able to play those great games especially since he just got to start them before mr. red ring of death made a stop at our house. I did buy Mirror's Edge on the 360 for a friend but she's away so I wanted to try it out before she came back. I guess I won't be able to now. Oh well, I guess I can just borrow it off them at a later date.

We're planning just to buy a new core xbox as our harddrive is fine. We want to get it quick and repairing it will take forever. Hopefully since it's after Christmas, we'll find a cheap one somewhere. I know I'm being very dramatic but that's for the sake of the blog. As annoying as this is, there are worse things that can happen to you.

On an unrelated note, I haven't signed in since Christmas Eve. I just watched the GOTY video and I'm very happy to see Metal Gear Solid 4 won. It truly is a fantastic game and as Gamespot said, there are so many memorable moments in the game that you will remember it for a long time to come. If you have a PS3, you really should buy it.

Anyway, before I press the submit button just want to say what i got Christmas. I got the full set of Guitar Hero: World Tour for the Wii and Prince of Persia for the PS3, and my brother bought me Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations (what a long-winded title). I am having a lot of fun with these games. Especially Guitar Hero when I have 3 other people over. Also, I got Batman Begins and The Dark Knight on DVD. Seriously, I must be the only person in the world not to have seen those movies yet. I hope everyone else here had a great holiday. See you online!

If you read my last blog, you will know that I recently purchased a PS3 with MGS4 and Drake's Fortune. They are both excellent games but as a Metal Gear Solid fan, I just have to say, wow. I'm so amazed at how amazing this game is. Ofcourse, I expected it to be, but still I'm blown away by it.

Now, I haven't actually played it yet. I'm just watching my brother play it. It's the story and the settings and I find so amazing. I'm sure once I start the game and get to feel the gameplay I'll be even more in love with this game. My brother has just got to the 4th act, which is quite a nice surprise to us. If you have gotten to this act, I'm sure you know why it's a nice surprise. I don't want to ruin the story just incase someone reads this who hasn't played this game yet but it's brilliant. They take storylines from each MGS game and continue them and I presume will finish them towards the end of the game. It's great for nostalgia if you've played all the MGS games which is why I love it so much. Me and my brother really don't want to finish it because it's so good.

That's about it, short blog. Just had to say how great the game is. See you online.

So, after almost two since the release I got myself a PS3. To be honest, when it was released I never planned on buying it but over time, more and more reasons to buy it came up so I bought it, today.

I now have all the 3 current gen consoles and I guess you're thinking that I'm spoilt. In all fairness, my brother bought the 360 with all hiss money, and I bought the Wii with all my money and almost two years after that we split the money for a PS3. Quite a bit of saving went on before we could afford it though. Anyway, the games we bought are Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (quite a long-winded title) and Uncharted: Drakes Fortune.

Haven't played too much of them, but what I have seen so far is great. I'm only watching my brother play MGS4, and then I'll start my own game once he's done. May sound a bit strange but I did it for all the other Metal Gear Solid games so I may as well continue the tradition for the last MGS game...well by Hideo Kojima anyway. I really look forward to getting further...welll watching my brother get further into it as we have loved the series since we started gaming. MGS1 was our first game. I was 7, and yes my parents thought I was mature enough to watch and ofcourse than play a 15 rating game. I haven't become violent now.:roll:

I was playing Uncharted for a good while there. I have to say, it's a very fun game. At the moment I would have given it more than the 8 Gamespot gave it, but I haven't been playing it too long. I guess I should finish it before I make my mind up.

That's about it. I think the PS3 is a great console and I'm glad we bought one. Since the 360 is more my brother's, it's great that I have part ownership of a console to play great looking games that don't come out on the Wii. Don't get me wrong though, I'll still play the Wii.

I noticed I haven't blogged in ages. I saw that my last blog was about my 15 birthday and my 16 birthday is in a few weeks. Oh well!

See you online.

It just went past midnight here in Ireland so it's officially my birthday. The big 15. Now I can get into 15 movies, well probably not since I'm pretty small but still I'm sure I can get ID. :P. Anyway since it's so early in the day, I can't say if it was a good day but it's a Sunday so it can't be too bad. So now down to the presents. I got them a bit early this year. I got 3 games from my parents and a DVD boxset, and my brother bought me game, and I got money from different money, which I appreciate them all for. Well I got:

Stuntman Ignition for the 360

I loved the first one and this is one is way better. I'm really enjoying it. I've done a good few missions and I've got a tauros nomination and 5 stars in every mission so I'm doing well so far. I'm sure it will get way harder. I'd understand why someone wouldn't like this series but I love the orignality of these games and how you play the game. I just think it's great.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Justice For All

Again, I loved the first one so I wanted this one. It isn't as good as the first Phoenix Wright but it's still a great game. I'm near the end of the second case, so I'm not that far into it. There are only 4 cases but the next cases will probably get longer like the first one. Another orignal series I love that I would understand why someone wouldn't like but I love it.

God of War 2

Again...again, I loved the first one, and I think God of War 2 is better. I'll play through this one and decide which I think is better after. Anyway, this is a brilliant game and I'm really enjoying it. It's just so much fun and I love the bosses in it which there is way more of than in the first God of War. I'm at The Temple of Euryale. I hope this isn't too far into the game. I'm enjoying it so much I don't want to finish it quickly.It's awesome!

Prison Break Season 2 boxset

I borrowed the first season boxset of somebody and I loved it but it was too late to catch season 2 on TV, and I didn't want to watch it on the internet so I wanted to get this. I'm really enjoying it. Not as good as the first season so far but it's awesome. I'm only on episode 7 and there's been so much happening in the series. The third season is going to be starting at the end of this month over here but if I haven't seen all the episode I can always tape it. I don't want to rush through it so I may have to tape some epsiodes.

And my brother bought me:

Big Brain Academy for Wii

This is the only present I got where I hadn't played or watched the one that came before it. It's pretty fun and since it is supposed to make you smarter it's good. My best score so far is 1405 which is the average for people who have had it for a week so I'm doing well.

And that's all my presents. They're all great and I'm enjoying them all. I got quite a lot this year and I appreciate it all. Well that's pretty much it. See you online!

Well, the end of summer is drawing near which means, back to school for us kids. School starts tomorrow for me. I shouldn't moan about it too much because there's a lot of people on Gamespot who had a lot shorter summer holidays than I had. I had 12 weeks off where some people had 6 weeks so I should be grateful. Although, it's sort of harder to get back to normal. Anyway, school means less time for gaming and less time for Gamespot but atleast it means more time for friends.

This is an important year for me. It's the Junior Cert year, it's not my final test but it will organise all the honours and pass subjects for the Leaving Cert (which is the big one). I'm not looking forward to this year but atleast there are things I am looking forward to throughout the year like my birthday, Halloween holidays, Christmas, more mid-terms, Easter (which I've heard you can't enjoy when you are doing the Junior Cert), and the summer holidays again.

Not much other news. I've started playing Metroid which I found out my brother had borrowed for two years and I never knew. I want to play it because I'm going to get the third one when it comes out for the Wii which is around 2 months in Europe. I'm also looking forward to getting Stuntman Ignition which comes out in a few days and Phantom Hourglass which comes out October 19 (but maybe I'll buy online and get it a few weeks earlier from America). I'm also going to buy Phoenix Wright 2 and God of War 2, and a Wii game if I can find another good one soon enough.

That's about it. See you online!

After finishing 3 games recently, I needed another game to play. I picked a game from my brothers collection (we share a collection but I haven't played all the ones my brother has bought) which was Gears of War.

I thought that I had to play this since it got 9.6 and was Game of the Year on Gamespot. Well I started it and obviously I finished it. My thoughts on it. It is an excellent game and very fun. I would recommend this game to anyone who has a 360 and likes shooters. It doesn't actually bring anything new to the genre but it still is a really fun game. Putting a chainsaw at the end of a gun is genious and as Jeff Gertsman said, using it never gets old. I would have liked to see some back story to the soldiers but other than that I'm very happy with this game. The game wasn't that hard on hardcore once you get used to the game (I'm sure it is on insane mode) except every now and then there was some hard part that took me a good few tries to get past. But again, I really enjoyed this game. Although, I still think Oblivion deserved GOTY but this isn't a bad choice.

Anyway, now I'm stuck with what to play. School is starting in a few days so I won't have that much time to play games. I'll be getting some games soon anyway, and I need some Wii game recommendations. I already have The Godfather and Resident Evil 4 on other consoles and I don't want to buy them again even if they were awesome games. I was thinking about Super Paper Mario but I'm not a big Mario fan so I'm not sure. I'm going to get Metroid Prime 3 but it's not out till the end of October in Europe so I'm stuck with what games to buy. Anyone have any recommendations?

See you online!

So, in the last 2 days, I spent a lot of time playing games. I wanted to finish up some games before I go back to school in about 2 weeks. I did spend a lot of time on them on the last 2 days. My friends thought I was dead. I don't plan on doing that again. :lol: Anyway, onto the games I finished.

The first one I finished was: The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures.
I've had this game for over 2 years at this stage, maybe even 3 and I could never get into it. I really want to finish all or atleast most Zelda games (not including remakes unless I don't play the original and play the remake and defintely noy playing those terrible cd-i stuff), and I just felt I had to finish this one. So a few days ago I just started playing it from where I left off a few years ago and kept playing. Eventually, I finished it. It was pretty good but wouldn't be my favourite Zelda. That's 8 Zelda games completed. It's probably my 7th or 6th favourite. All Zelda games are great so that isn't bad. I'm trying to find the GBA version of A Link To The Past, because I don't want to get it on Virtual Console even if it is cheaper. I'm sure it's on eBay.

The second game I finished in just over an hour after completing Four Swords Adventures, is Splinter Cell: Double Agent for the Xbox 360.
I already finished it on the Playstation 2 a year ago but I bought it again on the 360 since it is almost a different game to the Playstation 2 version. Anyway, I really enjoyed this game. It is probably my favourite Splinter Cell game because I really enjoyed the trust feature of the game. It was also really fun to balance missions between the NSA and JBA and I also loved the choice missions even if there weren't much of them in the game. I can't wait for Conspiracy to come out now.

And finally the third game I finished is: Saint's Row.
This is a excellent game. It's not as good as the GTA games but it still really is brilliant. My favourite part of this game is the insurance fraud missions. If you watched the newest episode of Button Mashing, that was the game that was played. I have done a lot of it and I could have put up a good fight against Matt Rorie myself but Matt got a lot of money really quickly. I probably wouldn't have got far in that episode of Button Mashing though. Anyway, I actually completed all the final missions of each gang today as well as completing the game. I lost track of time.

[spoiler] About the ending of Saint's Row. They actually killed the main character by blowing him up in a boat. That was a surprise. Well it was when I heard about it a few months ago but still. I've heard thatyou are supposed to hear someone swimming and breathing at the credits to tell you that you got off the boat in time but I didn't hear it. If he survived or not, he probably won't be in the sequel anyway. He'll probably be atleast mentioned. I look forward to it anyway. [/spoiler]

Anyway that's about it. That's the first time a in a while I played so much games at one time. See you online!

Just below this blog, you'll see that I was playing Canis Canem Edit and could not find one rubber band. Well, I eventually found in a place I was sure I checked. Well, I got it anyway and continued on in the game, taking over the nerds, and the jocks and so on and so forth. Well, as you probably know, from looking at the title of this blog, I did all the story and collected all the collectibles and then went on to complete the game 100%. Every time I finish a game 100%, I immediately like the game more, but even before that I did love that game and I would reccomend it to anyone who is into the action adventure genre or anyone looking for a good game (although ofcourse anyone looking for a game would want a good one; why would you want a bad one?:?) I actually finished it 100% ages ago but I forgot to make a blog about it.

At the moment I'm still playing Oblivion. I haven't gone anywhere into the story. I'm still doing faction missions and side quests. I am getting a lot out of this game and it is so much fun and anyone with a 360, PS3 or PC should get this game. Doing around a quarter of side quests, I've been playing it for 50 hours. It's just so addictive. I am now leader of the Theives Guild and the Dark Brotherhood, and I have done all of the Arena missions. I'm going to do some Mages Guild missions and Fighters Guild missions as well as do some main mission quests.

Well, that's about it for now. Just an update on my progression through the games I talked about in my last blog. See you online!

I noticed I have not written a blog in a while and I feel I should keep you up to dates with what I've been playing since it's a gaming website.

I bought Canis Canem Edit (or Bully) a few weeks ago on eBay.

I was expecting it too be good but I was surprised with how good it was. It's just so fun doing the missions and collecting all the random things that you can pick up. It really is like Grand Theft Auto Schoolyard except without the guns and the car robbing. The game even makes going to class fun. I just finished all the classes two days ago. English was hard but I finally did it. I have a problem collecting the rubber bands. I should have 63 for where I am but I have 62 and I can't find that one. I don't want to move on till I find that rubber band. It might take a while.

I'm also playing The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion on the Xbox 360 after my brother having it for ages.

This game is great, no doubt about it and it has so many great features, it's hard to keep count. I'm only really doing faction missions and sidequests but it's great. I'm level 10 and I haven't closed any Oblivion gate yet, not even the Kvatch one. That might make it harder for me. I've always loved the Thieves Guild from Morrowing but the Dark Brotherhood is brilliant as well. I'm still playing Morrowind but not as much after I started Oblivion.

Also if you watched this week's episode of On The Spot, you would have heard that Rich Gallup is leaving Gamespot. I'm sad to hear that and I'm sure a lot of Gamespot users are. Rich Gallup, I know you won't read this blog, but I wish you luck in your future and On The Spot and lot's of Gamespot features won't be the same without you. What will happen to Button Mashing? Gamespot in general won't be the same without you.

Image by Sarkahn from cj_hope33's profile:

Again, you'll be missed Rich Gallup and good luck in your future!

As the title of this blog suggests, I am back from Portugal, and now I have 8 weeks of my school holidays. The holiday was pretty good. I finished Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. It was a very good game and I'm still trying to recruit unique characters. I'm trying to recruit Sokolov at the moment but I'm having some trouble finding a soldier to interrogate to find out about some codec number to open a door. I also started playing The Godfather which is a game my brother had for a while but I never played. He brought it to Portugal and I gave it a go and it is a very addictive game and I am enjoying it. I've finished all the main missions and now I still have plenty of side missions to do. I didn't really play much of Spartan: Total Warrior after borrowing it off my friend. I also have continued Brain Training, continuing to train my brain in minutes a day. That game is surprisingly addictive!

I want to try do a tribute video to a game. My favourite games are Zelda, Prince of Persia, Metal Gear Solid, Hitman and Splinter Cell so if anyone has any ideas for a tribute video with those games that would be good for me to do, please tell me.

That's it for now. Another short blog but I haven't much to say.

See you online!