Hitting a Gaming Milestone

Holidays are over and were back to work! Last night I hit 10,000 Gamerscore. Woot for me! I've been playing Dynasty Warriors 5 with the wifey lately and it's really fun to see her get into it. Also played Fight Night Round 3. The graphics are very well done and the gameplay isn't lacking either, playing Manny Pacquiao(SP?) against Morales and Barrera really made me sit there for 3+ hours straight ( ok I lied make that 5 hours). Also I'm working on COD 3 on Veteran. Your teammates AI is sometimes retarded. One good example is sometimes they don't advance when you cross that "invisible" line that suppose to make them go forward or help you out. I don't know if it's me but some enemy AI are a little bit slow. There are occasional scenarios where I know that I would have been dead had that been in COD 2. Overall it's pain, I'm not really sure why I'm playing this game on Veteran anymore.

There are some non gaming related issues that are going on right now but that's for another post.

MMORPGs and Console game

Hmm.... I've been looking at these 2 games (COD4 and lego star wars) for quite awhile now and I want to get both of them but I won't(120 bucks!). I'm just thinking right now which one to rent first.

I took a break from MMORPGs after 2 years and got back on the console madness a month ago. Maybe I'll get back when friends starts playing again who knows or when a new shiny game comes out.

One thing I miss about MMORPGs is the social factor. I play with RL friends via xboxlive but other than that I usually go solo. I miss exploring, meeting people and making some good friends in the process, doing quest as a group, and sometimes just sit back and chat with guildies. I guess maybe thats why I stop playing, lots of friends quit online it isn't just the same anymore, andI don't think I had to the energy to invest my time again to find a guild and star over.

I do like my xbox360 though if only I can get more RL friends or get some of my WoW/LOTRo/Guild Wars to rock out with me in Guitar Hero 3 or just go wild and get on a Warthog and mow down some people.

Achievement Points and Me

I have just recently bought my Xbox 360 and I was introduced to these Xbox 360 Achievements. One poster at xbo360 site forum says it’s a new form of crack, maybe he’s right. Once you hear that sound that you have unlocked an achievement you get that feeling that you have accomplished something, that the game acknowledges it, and that it’s there for your friends to see and brag about.

One of the positive sides of achievement points is it expands your game play, encourages you to perform tasks that you normally wouldn’t do and the result is you experience more of the game that what you have expected. One good example is finding the skulls in Halo 3 and then playing thru the campaign again with the skulls on and same time get enough points in and finish it in a decent amount of time, I think that kicks it up a notch and takes the game to a new level.

The negative effects are playing mediocre games that you wouldn’t even touch if I wasn’t for achievement points and there is a good amount of them out there. Reading spoilers/sites that helps u get as much points in one run, which ends up you ruining a great game’s story for you. I have sometimes countered the latter by running thru a game w/o spoilers then come back again for the achievements that I missed. But sadly this is not always the case.

There is a competitive side of me that wants to join the ranks of the 1337 players who has their gamer score way up there. Play as many games regardless of quality and get as much achievements while enduring dull/grueling/unforgiving game experience on the process, although I’m sure there are a good amount of games that can be done in less than 8 hours, still that’s 8 hours.

And then there is the casual player in me that says points will come along. Just play the game for fun, don’t worry about the score that really doesn’t mean anything except boost your e-penis. But the thing is I’m not really your typical casual player; well at least right now. I’m in between the hardcore and casual players, I’m a hardcore/power gamer that has not enough time. I know that when my wife finally gets here my playtime will be reduced. And even then I’m still a competitive/power gamer who just plays casually.

My wife recently told me that I play games like there is no tomorrow and my usual response when she asked me to rest up abit is "can I just finish just this level/quest/match?" which leads to another one and another one. I’m really grateful that my wife understands and lets me be who I am.

After reflecting on my current dilemma, I know I’ll still play games with or w/o achievements because gaming is just imprinted on my genes. In the end my stance on this issue is, I want my gamer score to go up but without the feeling of being constrained by playing games that doesn't interest me plus I'm also a PC gamer(MMORPGs, FPS) so it's easier to let go of the 360 controller when games like WaR comes out for pc.

Madness?! It's Guitar Hero 3!

Last night one of my good friends ,we'll call him Razzle Dazzle, got suckered into buying the GH3. We had a blast last night playing with the whole crew with our overprice Guitar controllers. We definetely had a good time just look at these pics!