It’s that time once again, time to realize that maybe I do play too many games, as my game library continues to swell and my free time continues to shrink. This month I added a few more games from Steam, picking up Psychonauts, the Freedom Force: Freedom Pack and the Eidos Collector Pack (which added 14 or so titles including Batman: Arkham Asylum, Tomb Raider: Underworld and fan favorite Kane and Lynch: Dead Men). Seventeen games for around $52 dollars, that’s not a bad deal at all. Thanks Steam!

Batman: Arkham Asylum (PC)

I’ve only spent about two hours with the Batman so far. Since, I’ve already played through the game once on the 360 I decided that this run through would be on the hardest difficulty. It’s very strange playing the game without a controller but, I’m getting used to it. It’s not a terribly long game so I’m hoping to actually get through it in a reasonable amount of time.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Beta/Demo (PC/360)

This past week EA released a PC beta and a 360 demo of “BFBC2″. Both versions are basically the same thing, having a single multi-player map and game mode. That hasn’t stopped me from sinking in a handful of hours with each and having a good bit of fun. I’ve never really followed the Battlefield series very closely, only playing a little of Battlefield 1942 quite a while ago. Anyway, I’ve been enjoying myself enough that I’m actually considering picking up the first game as well as pre-ordering from Steam. Playing on the 360 is fun and all but it just can’t match the quality of my PC.

Team Fortress 2 (PC)

I know two people that combined have about 700 hours of Team Fortress 2 play time. 700 hours! Hard to believe that I’ve only played just over 25 hours. I’ve been spending much more time with it lately, trying to unlock some of the Soldiers weapons. It took a bit of time but I did finally unlocked the Direct Hit, the rocket launcher with a faster firing rate but smaller splash damage. Why did I want it? That comes from my desire for a faster firing rocket, I’ve always been a fan of the Quake games so that may be where that comes from. Now, I just need to spend some time getting used to the new way of playing.

Anyway, that’s really it for this month, still working my way through some old games and not working my way through new ones.

Here we are at the list Now Playing for the year, maybe I’ll get it posted on time. It’s all going to sound pretty familiar since I’m still playing most of the same games. It’ll be nice and short this time around – have to go get some dinner before ringing in the New Year.

Torchlight (PC)

I’m still slowly grinding my way through the gound below Torchlight. I had a bit of a setback when they released the Steamworks update since I needed to start over to get the new achievements.

Street Fighter IV (PC)

Just picked up Street Fighter today as part of the Steam holiday sale. $9.99 is just too good to pass up. Now I just need to get my PS3 controller working.

inFAMOUS (PS3)

I’ve managed to squeeze in a bit of inFAMOUS here and there. I’m not sure how far I am through the game though. Still enjoying it – it’s the only PS3 game I have at the moment so that’s good.

Happy New Year.

*Twenty Ten Update* The PC port is so good it’s just as cheap when you get to Seth as the 360 version.

Now that Mirror’s Edge is down to a reasonable $19.99 on Steam, I’ve been really thinking about picking up a copy. However, when discussing this the other day with a friend, I got called out for playing (and not finishing) too many games. He’s right I’ve started more games then I can count, and the Now Playing posts don’t always cover games that I’ve started and never really gone back to.

According to Steam I currently own 76 games. Out of those games there are 22 titles that have a clear start and an end, which I have yet to finish. There are a couple I do want to get back to like, Beyond Good and Evil, Indigo Prophecy and definitely The Witcher. The others I want to finish at some point I’m just not in a rush to get back to them. On the PS2 side of things I really need to finish up ICO and Shadow of the Colossus, as well as Killzone. Then there are games I doubt I’ll ever actually finish, like Persona 3 (not to mention FES), Persona 4 and Devil Summoner 2. I just don’t have the time to give Atlus titles what they deserve. I feel a bit better about not working on Persona 4 that much more since I’ve caught a few random episodes of Giant Bomb’s Endurance Run.

I need to check out the Xbox 360 back catalog and see if there are some console exclusives that I want to go back and play. I say console exclusives because lately due to Steam, and buying a new computer, I’ve finally swung back around to being more of a PC gamer. Not that I ever stopped playing games on the PC it’s just that I find myself turning on my 360 less and less. Also, I have to figure by the time I pick up a PS3 it will probably have a OK library of exclusives as well. I’m thinking maybe I’ll do a full catalog of games I haven’t finished and start forcing my way through.

Oh, and I did pick up Mirror’s Edge… so the Steam game count is up to 77.

The next few weeks are full of what look to be great game releases, unfortunately, I can’t buy them all.  In fact, there is only one game coming out soon that rates as a “must buy” for me and that’s Left 4 Dead.  The only problem with this is – which system should I buy it for?  Right now, I’m leaning toward getting the PC version, after all, I bought The Orange Box for 360 when it came out and then bought it again when I realized I wanted to play Team Fortress 2 on PC (alright, I admit it, I wanted access to all the games on PC).  Even though Left 4 Dead will probably sell very well and Valve has said they will be using dedicated servers for multiplayer (something TF2 could have used) I don’t want to repeat past mistakes.  Also, it’s just nicer to play multiplayer games in a PC setting.  I’ve spent far too much time playing the Halo’s and Call of Duty’s on Xbox Live and sometimes it’s just not very pleasant.  That and I’ve become a Steam junkie, so, as long as the demo runs OK on my PC (and there is no reason it shouldn’t) – I’ll be buying it on PC.

Don’t get me wrong I’m not turning my back on my 360 – after all, I need some place to play Gears of War 2 and Fable 2.  Everything else that’s coming out (Dead Space, Call of Duty: World at War, Fallout 3, Mirror’s Edge, Saints Row 2) is multi-platform so, I can grab it on either PC or 360.  I’m not sure which of those I’ll be picking up when (I’ve got some mid-terms coming up – one of which I will probably post about).  I am seriously thinking about joining GameFly finally, but, that would only work if I can get find a few minutes to play.  It would at least let me get through the game season flood without spending an arm and a leg.