[Insert the sound of a clicking mouse here.] I always have Diablo 2 installed and ready to go at a moments notice. Like many others I have a strange love for it’s click-y loot-fest. The problem is the game hasn’t aged very well and I say that as a fan of retro games. It’s main problem is that it’s forced to run in one resolution. Sure, there are ways around that but, then you can’t play on Battle.net. Well, now Torchlight is here to take care of that Diablo itch and it does so perfectly. I’ve been slowly working my way down into the depths below Torchlight, steadily clicking on a never ending stream of monsters and picking up their multicolored loot. The story is a bit slim but, that’s not really what the release was about as far as I can tell. It seems to be more of a vehicle to get Runic Games and the IP out into the public. Oh, and if it sells well of course it helps raise funds for the online version. Which I can’t wait for, I miss Mythos, that was a good time. Word on the street is that it will be back playable soon thanks to it’s new owners. Wonder if it will still be any good.

Borderlands (PC)

The fun of Borderlands seems to be falling through geometry and getting stuck. Alright, well that’s not exactly true, playing with friends is the best part of, even if most the time I have been under leveled. That’s alright though, I’ll take my over powered weapons and self back into my game and wipe up all the people who get in my way. I haven’t exactly finished the game yet even though I’ve seen the credits roll. Great game, it could have been truly awesome too, hopefully the sequel will fix the few small things I consider issues, most of which are cosmetic and non-game breaking (so far). Maybe once I’ve finally made it all the way through the story I’ll come back as say some more.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 2 (PC)

I had a chance to try Modern Warfare 2 a few days after it came out and what should have been a quick session, ended about five hours later when the credits rolled. I can’t really tell you much about the game, just that it was almost always “on”. The amount of crazy stuff that was going down was mind boggling. I don’t remember the first one being quite so insane. I think what I need to do is going and actually pick up a copy instead of looting a friends, then play through both games back to back. Then maybe I’ll have the story gaps filled in. That and I’ll get to play some multi-player, I love Modern Warfare’s so I’m betting this will be just as good.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (360)

The day after I played through Modern Warfare 2 I decided it was time that I finally when back and actually finished playing Modern Warfare. As it turned out, I only had like 20 minutes of game play left. So, I wrapped that up and that’s all I have to say about that.

Rainbow Six Vegas 2 (360)

I had a $25 gift card for Best Buy so I picked up a copy. I’ve only played for a little while and probably won’t be finishing it any time soon.

Back in the beginning of September I had a chance to finally sit down and play some of the Aion open beta. I had been kind of following the development and wanted to get in and play. Once the open beta started I set aside a few hours to see what the buzz was about. Overall, I wasn’t super impressed. Sure, the game looked nice but, it didn’t really grab me. Honestly, I already knew I wasn’t going to be buying the game since I don’t play MMO’s with monthly fees. It just wouldn’t make any sense when I already seem to struggle to find the time to play. Anyway, I managed to work my character up to level 12 or 13. During my play session I mostly saw the same old MMO-ish stuff “kill x of y” and “fetch” quests. Another thing that kind of disappointed me was the large wall of text at the opening of some of the quests, most people probably won’t even read it, other quests had a brief cut scene that didn’t seem all that great to me. I did have a fun time playing it just wasn’t enough to convince me to pay for the game and then the monthly fee. Maybe I’ll give it another shot once it goes free to play.

Scribblenauts (DS)

Scribblenuats has done something no other DS game has managed to do so far – convince Kris to pick it up and turn it on. I showed her the game one night and the next day she’s wandered into my office asking where the DS is. For me the game got old really fast, I probably won’t ever pick it up again, and Kris has since moved on to Peggle DS. So is Scribblenauts her gateway to gaming? Probably not, I think it just shows what a good concept the game was too bad it’s so boring. Oh, and Kris just unlocked Peggle Nights.

Plants vs Zombies (PC)
A friend of mine has been playing Plants vs. Zombies for quite a while now. Well, not as much playing now as tending to his Zen Garden. For some reason I had resisted picking it up from Steam. I’m not sure why, I just never bought it. Browsing through my RSS feeds while on a conference call the other day I read that PopCap had released a Flash version of the game. It was then that I realized this is the perfect work companion so, I immediately bought it through Steam. I finished my first run through adventure mode a few minutes ago.

The Witcher (PC)
Seeing the leaked video of The Witcher 2 made me want to jump back in and continue working my way through the game. It’s such a good action RPG, I really need to finish it up. I spent a couple of hours working my way through a few quests I had open. I’ve still got a way to go in the game but I’m working on it.

Persona 3 FES (PS2/PC)
The day before picking up Plants vs Zombies I found myself with some downtime at work and really wanted to play some Persona. However, I didn’t feel like dragging out the spare TV and setting it up in the office. I knew I should have bought that TV tuner card. So, I made an ISO out of my Persona 3 FES disc and started playing with the latest build of PCSX2. I didn’t even play too far in since I really wanted to continue the game I have already started but still too lazy to drag the TV into the office. Now I’ve got too saves and still have 100+ hours of RPG to go through…

Dominion (Tabletop)

I’ve been hearing about Dominion and never really knew what to think about it after all, the descriptions I heard were pretty odd. Well, I finally had a chance to sit down and play a couple of games and it was pretty fun. Fun enough in fact that we may even play it again.

Fallout 3 (PC)

I’ve got two quests left in the main game, the last story line quest and the one known as Nuka-Cola Challenge. I haven’t played in since I reached that point, the benefit to playing the game so far after release is that I know that the end of the game is not that great something the Broken Steal download-able content tries to take care of. Not playing is taking it’s toll on me though, I really just want to jump back in and run through the wastes some more. Hopefully, the add-ons will be released one Steam once the Game of the Year edition comes out.

Dawn of War Gold (PC)

Once, I put Fallout on hold I switched over to some real time strategy. Having already beaten the single player campaign in Dawn of War 2 I figured now was a good time to go back and see the beginning. It’s a great game, I didn’t even mind the base build and tech trees. Graphics wise everything holds up pretty well, even though I had to manually set the resolution to 1680×1050 and it didn’t stretch. I almost wish I had kept a bit more track of how long it took me to play through, it felt like the first campaign flew right by. I quickly moved on to the second campaign and unfortunately it didn’t quite grab me the way the first did. I think it’s because I wasn’t really expecting it to introduce a new faction and force me to flip between playing that faction and one of the others. I’ve put it on hold for a little bit…

PAX (RL)

OK, so PAX isn’t actually taking place in August and neither is this post so… It’s coming up this weekend and I’ll be taking the short trip up with a couple friends to see what all the buzz is about. Just what I need a bunch of new games that I may not get to play for months.

I swore I would finish up a couple of game – I did. But, what happened instead? Fallout 3 went on sale on Steam a couple of weeks ago, and I couldn’t pass it up. Now, I’m 48 hours into that and the few titles I was hoping to finish before starting something else haven’t been touched since. To make matters worse I also picked up Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30 and it’s sequel Earned in Blood, when they were on sale, adding two more games to the pile. At this rate it’s looking like I’m never going to finish another game – ever – and as proof of this concept, I bought the Dawn of War: Platinum Edition pack this morning. Please, Steam/Valve stop making it so easy to buy games.

I loved Oblivion when it came out so it’s not too much of a surprise that I’m enjoying Fallout. It also helps that I’ve got a couple of friends playing at the same time, we’ve had a couple discussions which really highlight the many possible ways to play the game. Each of us have employed a different play style which has lead seeing the story progress differently. Ultimately, the main game story line leads to the same place (which is tweaked a bit with the addition of the Broken Steal add-on) but, it’s nice to see a few of the paths to get there.

I purchased the PC version of the game and just before starting it I looked around the internet hoping to find some sort of journal style add-on so I could have the game keep track of what was going on. The idea was to keep a log of sorts here on the site as I played through. I wasn’t able to find one unfortunately so, that never happened. Anyway, even as I’m closing in on the end of the main story line Bethesda has just released the fifth (and final?) add-on, Mothership Zeta. I really want to check that out but, I’m not really happy with having to buy the downloadable content from Games for Windows Live. It’s the “Microsoft Points” I just can’t stand the thought of using them. I’ve never even bought any add-ons from the 360 Live service. Hopefully, when the Game of the Year edition of Fallout 3 is released on Steam we’ll be giving access to the DLC either for free or through Steam itself at a discounted price. Of course, I’ve got a bunch of other games I should be playing before I even thing about starting on the DLC.

*update*

Forgot to mention, I also picked up Men of War last weekend.

Anyway, I had a chance to play through the ‘tutorial’ level during lunch. It started out very easy until, I had around 15 kills then the bot AI decided that to put up a fight. After that point, it was a hard fought game with the bot Crash closing the gap to 17-11. I also played a couple of short practice round on a few different maps. Practice rounds are easily setup with bots which will allow new comers to learn the map. Short games are nice too, ten minutes or ten frags – I could get used to that. I don’t think we’ll see too many short games during the beta but, we’ll see.

Replaying the tutorial level I found Crash remembered our previous battle and brought the fight right at the start of the match. After that all was left was to ruin my perfect standings in the game and join a live free for all match. It started off pretty going with my establishing a nice path around the map pretty quickly. At least that’s what I thought until some one who had obviously been playing Quake 3 since it was originally released. Going from zero to 15 in just a few minutes. Of course, part of his killing spree was hanging out sniping people with the rail gun – until I realized he was up there and ended that.

I’ve only seen one piece of advertising in the game so far and it’s an ad for a boxing match. I’m not sure it speaks to the demographic of the typical Quake player but, I’m no ad wizard so who knows.

Other then my time playing Space Invaders Extreme, I haven’t been gaming all that much.  While I have played to much I have picked up a couple of games on Steam.  With all the news of Beyond Good and Evil 2 from Ubidays I decided I should probably go back and finish the first one.  Since, I lost my copy for Xbox long ago Steam was the obvious place to get it.  Of course, I haven’t made it past the point Jade recieves the mission to take pictures yet.

I also picked up a copy of Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness, Episode One.  The longest video game name that I can think of is a pretty decent game.  It is a point and click adventure role playing game.  Which almost makes me wish there was a version on the DS as well, since I would love to play on the train.  I’m actually a bit glad I’m not just playing through in one sitting since, it seems to have fallen into the “kill x number of y” game play mechanic pretty early in the game – Steam reports that I’ve played for about 1.3 hours.  I have faith that it will break free of that as the time goes on – I hope.

Other games I’ve played for more then ten minutes include: Metal Gear Soild (ePSXe), Resident Evil 4 (Wii) and Shadow of the Colossus (PS2).

Rock Band (Xbox 360)

Mike and I finally sat down this past Friday (or was it Thursday?) and played through a bunch of Rock Band.  We hadn’t really played since St. Patrick’s day and I’m not sure you can really call that playing.  We had to start a new band because Mike, the drummer extraordinaire, managed to break one of the drum sticks.  We still have quite a way to go before finishing the Band World Tour so who knows if we’ll actually do it.  Don’t tell anyone from Activision but, Guitar Hero is terrible in comparison to Rock Band.  Especially, if Harmonix and MTV come through with the in-game music store.

Company of Heroes (PC)

I finally reinstalled CoH and started inching my way through the rest of the campaign mode.  Hopefully, by the time I finish it Opposing Fronts will be less then $29.95.  It’s a bit of a pain – only playing a few minutes at a time.  Although, I’m ending up with a ton of save games so if something goes wrong I’ve got a bunch of fall back points.

Prey (PC)

It was on sale for $4.95 through Steam last weekend and so far it’s a decent game.  The portals and gravity effects are pretty cool.  Nothing too special besides that though.

Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword (NDS)

Dragon Sword is without a doubt my favorite DS game ever!  The graphics are fantastic, the controls are perfect and the story is spot on.  I’m about four and a half hours into it and hopefully will get around to finishing it some time soon.  I pretty sure that beating it unlocks hard difficulties which, for once, I’m looking forward to.

Persona (PS1)

I haven’t made it nearly as far as I wanted to but, I have been playing a little bit here and there.

Library Link:

• Dreamfall: The Longest Journey