General Update 28: So Long And Thanks For All The 'Chievos!

It’s a sad day today, because I go back to work tomorrow after being off for nearly a week and a half. The reason for the time off was because I needed to burn off some holiday before my new allowance came into affect on the 1st. I didn’t go anywhere as I didn’t want to, instead it was to try and tackle my way through that list I posted in my last General Update.

I started the first weekend by finishing off Space-marine, as I said before, I enjoyed the story and I’m working on the review for it. I did have some trouble near the end and found a video to try and get some tips for playing. In the end I persevered and beat the final boss. Following that I then went onto to finish Timeshift. I had gotten stuck but again I looked up a video which gave me some Ideas which I was able to use for the rest of the game. After completing time shift I picked up Bayonetta as I was not even half way through it and I finished that as well. It will require another 2 playthrough’s at least, but not yet.

With 3 games complete I thought I should try and knock another title from the list. Seeing as i had completed and action game I started American McGee’s Alice. My first impression is that it hasn’t aged well. The control scheme does feel like a dated platformer, not that this is necessarily a bad thing. I also went back to try and put some more hours into a more lengthy game, but completing a few cases on L.A. Noire. I’ve completed 2 of the DLC cases and I’ve got one more Vice case before I move onto the last case desk so progress, despite being slow, is being made.

Oh yeah, before I started back in on Timeshift I went back and started something that I needed to do before March, play Mass Effect 2 as my fem-Shep. According to Raptr, an achievement tracking service, I’ve sunk 33 hours into that play through, and in my defence I did do ‘ALL OF THE THINGS!’. Everyone was loyal and survived, I explored every planet and did every side mission, including some that i hadn’t found before. I also completed the last DLC, Arrival, which I thought add some good narrative to the story but I did think it may have been a little on the short side.

Bioshock: Rapture is finished as well and seeing as, I’ve not made it to Assassin’s Creed Revelations yet, I thought I should pick up some new books. I made my way to Waterstone’s and picked up the 4th Mass Effect novel, Mass Effect: Deception, and Deus Ex: Icarus Effect. Obviously I’ve started Deception, and I’m really enjoying it. It’s interesting to see someone else’s take on the Mass Effect universe as the other 3 were written by Drew Karpyshyn who was a lead writer on the games.

One last thing to mention is that Inversion, the interesting third person shoorter, has been delayed. It was supposed to be released on Feb 10th, but it has been delayed until the vague date or early 2012. This means I’m not going to be buying a new game until march 9th when Mass Effect 3 is launched. Incidentally the demo for Mass Effect 3 is to be released on Feb 14th.

It is now time for bed as I’ve got to try and get used to having early nights and early starts. The rest of this week is going to be long!

General Update 26 : New Year, New Beginnings!

So it’s fairly safe to say that the end of last year saw me getting a little slack with the old blog. Naughty Praggers. However that doesn’t mean I was being lazy, far from it. December saw me being the busiest that I've been in probably for the entire year.

I had plenty to be getting on with gaming-wise and sacrifices were made. I was very tied up with Gears of War 3 and Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. As well as Batman: Arkham City, Deus Ex: Human Revolution and Lego Star Wars 3. That doesn’t include the games I've bought that are still in their cellophane wrapper, or those I've just not started; DeadSpace 2, Alice Madness Returns, Ninety-Nine Nights 2, Dead Rising 1 & 2, Wolfenstein, Battlefield 3 and the game of the year edition of Red Dead Redemption. That list also included Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, Lego Pirates of the Caribbean and Shadows of the Damned, the last two I got for Christmas, but I’ve started all 3 and finished the last 2 already.

My to start list!

There are a load of mammoth games on the horizon with Final Fantasy XIII-2, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, and culminating in Mass Effect 3 at the beginning of March. This is to go on top of Skyrim which still has loads of legs left is in it as does Gears of War 3, especially with all the latest DLC, and I still need to try and finish LA Noire and Rage.

|Gingerbread and Shortbread

The other thing that has been tying up my time before Christmas, is that I've started baking. I baked some Gingerbread, emphasis on the bread, some shortbread and then I went a bit crazy for brownies. It’s something I’ve going to carry on with this year as i do enjoy it and there is a sweet, or savory payout at the end. I have also thought about incorporating it into this blog, giving it a major overhaul and renaming it. We’ll see but in the mean time expect to see a few more baking related posts. I’ve got some ideas, so lets see if I can get them to fruition first. I suppose the first thing I should do is update the blog more often. *winking smiley*

Double Brownies

Just to make matters worse I went out today and picked up Sonic Generations and Halo Anniversary Edition with money I was lucky to receive for Christmas. Happy Gaming.

General Update 25: The Spark of Life?

Halloween may almost be upon us but, don’t be scared by this strange visitation! I know it’s been a while since my last post, I also know that I tend to say that beginning of most posts as well, but I’m still trying to work out a routine for making time for my writing. Unfortunately it’s looking more and more likely that it make have to be at the cost of some of my precious playing time. I’d like to say that the cause of my lack of writing is becuase I have been busy playing a host of this year’s big releases, but the stack of un-played games as well as the stack of games I’ve only started would say otherwise.

So a quick rundown of what I‘ve actually been playing in retail;

            Deus Ex: Human Revolution,

            X-Men: Destiny,

Warhammer 40k: Space Marines,        

Rage,

Batman: Arkham Asylum,

Gears of War 2 and 3,

And Briefly LA: Noire.

“What about on Xbox Live?” I hear silently you ask;

The Maw,

Hydrophobia,

Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale.

I’ve been having a little difficulty sticking to one game for any amount of time. Deus Ex and Xmen we completed to 1000g, Gears 3 I’ve mostly been playing Multiplayer which makes a change for me, Gears 2 I’m working through on insane and co-op-ing with my housemate. LA:Noire I wanted to go back and try and get a few more completed cases to 5 stars but I kept messing one up so I gave up. both Space marines and  Rage I’ve only had one sitting on and I’m enjoying both, Batman was in preparation of getting Arkham City, which arrived last night, and me trying to perfect my combat for the Combat Challenges. This isn’t working out so well, but I’m not giving up yet! It does mean that Arkham City will have to wait for a little while.

So what does the future hold? Well if I can find the time to write a couple of blog entries I’m hoping to put together a couple of Collector’s Edition un-boxing posts, for Gears 3, Arkham City and Fallout: New Vegas. I should also try and get a couple of reviews up, seeing as I do have a few things to say especially about X-Men: Destiny.

General Update 24: Reach for the Stars.

So it’s been a little while since I last wrote and not a whole lot has happened since I broke the 60k Gamerscore mark, but that’s mostly because of the fact that 3 of the games mentioned in my last post still haven’t come down in price, however Lego Star Wars 3 was on offer in Tesco so it was rude not. I’m going to rant about Game being Rubbish and then write up for this blog but it sort of leads into a big can of worms, and the other reason I've not done mush is because I had been playing Mass Effect again! This must be my 7^th play through? And it’s a massive game and I did all the side quests. After completing Mass Effect I completed Lego Star Wars 3, and then after hearing very good things, I picked up Deus Ex: Human Revolution, which I'm loving at the moment.

It’s that time of year again for the Summer of Arcade, I maybe a little late as this is the last week that it runs for. This year the games were Bastion, From Dust, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet, Fruit Ninja Kinect and Toy Soldiers: Cold War. I downloaded the trial version of Bastion and really enjoyed it so I bought the full game which I am still trying to work my way through. The other trial I tried was for Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet. I think there are some interesting mechanics in this game, and once I’ve managed to clear some of the back log from my arcade list then I’ll definitely look at getting the full game. I’ve still not invested in Kinect yet so Fruit Ninja Kinect isn’t feasible at the moment.  From Dust looks intriguing and I should look at getting the trial to see what all the fuss is about.

More Mass Effect 3 Videos

This week is Gamescom, in Cologne, Germany and there have been a couple of good trailers coming from it. So far I’ve see a Mass Effect 3 trailer that shows off some of the combat, but it looks a little too scripted to be game play, see above, and the other one I saw as for Assassin’s Creed: Revelations. This game is looking awesome especially from this trailer, see below. It’ll be good to see Altair again as I’m bored of Ezio, and after the ending of Brotherhood it’ll be very interesting to see how the Desmond story line progresses.

More Assassins Creed Revelations Videos

In other news there is a rumour that does appear to be building some steam, Diablo 3 may be coming to consoles, there has been two reports making mention to bringing the game to consoles and it’s this second post that really builds credibility for the rumour, however we’ll have to wait a little longer to see if it does become a reality. If you’ve been following me on twitter then you’ll know that I’m not the only one that is looking forward to this game. The other news is that Borderlands 2 has been announced to be released sometime between April 2012 and March 2013. I did enjoy Borderlands, you can read my review here, and although info on the sequel is slim on the ground at the moment there is some concept are that can be seen in this article, and the teaser trailer that is below.