Quick hit reviews

"Mass Effect"
I just recently beat Mass Effect and despite it's physics flaws and chugging frame rate, I felt a need to finish this game.
"Mass Effect" does a lot of things that were refreshing during my play-through. Namely, "Mass Effect" had a story that was engaging and created a bond between my characters and me. The choices were very basic and binary at the beginning, which led me to believe that I was going to have to trudge through "Mass Effect" making choices that had no real consequences or bearing on what would happen later in the game. Yet, late in the game there is a choice that really affected me. I was totally blindsided and wasn't ready for the ramifications of the choice I was going to have to make. Everything considered, I finished "Mass Effect" which says a lot about what the game does as I normally can't be bothered to finish a game.

"Mass Effect 2"
Finishing "Mass Effect" I felt the need for more, and I was blessed that BioWare was going to release "Mass Effect 2" the day after I have finished. "Mass Effect 2" is one of the most beautiful games of this generation. BioWare polished out the frame rate issues of the first "Mass Effect" was plagued with. Importing saved games from the first allows for continuation of the narrative and allows for even more connection to even the most minor characters from the first. I have not finished my first play-through but thus far the story seems to be every bit as driving as the first.

My reimmersion into gaming

Alright well it finally happened. I am back into the gaming community full force... What did it take to wake me from my gaming slumber? Borderlands and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

Let's start with Borderlands as it was the game that first pulled me back in. I had been hearing a lot about Borderlands and have been interested in it since they changed the art style a while back.
Borderlands is essentially first-person shooter Diablo. I will admit that I am a loot whore and I love games that have that aspect in it. Borderlands exploits my love for collecting loot to the full effect. Although there are a couple of items that are recognizable in the game, there are no, as far as I can tell, Stone of Jordans or Tal Roshas Armor or anything like that.
The art style is a stylized cell shading that just works really well. Here is the box art, and basically what the game looks like.


The game had enough side missions to keep me playing for a good 25-30 hours. The main story line could probably be finished in about 8 or 9 hours. The game offers a new game+ feature that ups the difficulty of the enemies.
Basically what my love for this game boils down to is the fact that the stylized art and shooting and rpg-elements all blend well together.
The cons...this game has awful, and I mean awful netcode for PC. If I wasn't against all caps when describing something I would say it's AWFUL...oh wait I just did.
All that aside, it's real fun when you can connect to someone and even better if you can hook up with a friend. With a surprising amount of sales I would say that we can be expecting more Borderlands in the future and I am not ashamed to say that I will buy that one too.

Modern Warfare 2
Really, what do I need to say about Modern Warfare 2. It's fun, it's multiplayer is amazing and it even appeals to people who aren't good at it by having a fast rank up system.
I am now level 24 on Modern Warfare 2 and I haven't even touched the campaign. Now I know that 24 is not a very high rank, but I have other games I want to try while I am still on my streak of wanting to play games.
With the controversy about the PC version still (sarcasm) raging (/sarcasm) not having dedicated server support I am surprised to see how many people are still logging on to Steam to play. As I play on my Xbox I am always pleased with my experience online...as long as I am playing in a party. Even though party chat has been disabled I find that playing in a party is much smoother in this iteration.
Infinity Ward has earned my money on this one and while I may not run out and buy everything that they will produce in the future I will say that Modern Warfare and Modern Warfare 2 certainly have not hurt their reputation in my eyes.

Well, as much as I would love to stay around and blog more for you games are calling my name...it feels good to be back.

Why I no longer finish games

I have discovered that as of just recently I do not finish, nor do I intend to finish some of the games I buy or rent. I will take a more specific approach and say that I will probably never again finish a J-RPG or almost any other RPG for that matter. I bought Fallout and I borrowed Oblivion and both games got only a couple hours out of me before I lost interest. I played the first disc of Lost Odyssey before sending it back to gamefly.
I have been wondering what it is about this particular genre of games that has kept me away. I thought it might be the length only to realize that that was only a part of the problem. I also realized that I am no longer able to sit and grind out levels until I can beat a boss. I find it to be an archaic formula for games. That is not to say that I want to be able to breeze through a game, but I find that spending countless hours trying to bust a couple levels just to beat a boss is a stupid way of doing things...J-RPGs are the biggest offender in this category.
Oh western RPGs aren't far off. I am tired of being the biggest baddest dude and people not responding accordingly. In J-RPGs at least they never really make any aesthetic changes to your character. When you get the best armor and a sword that spews all types of elements from the very bowels of hell I expect people to run for their lives not greet me and tell me to get their dogs out of trees.
Then we have games with awesome mechanics that are poorly executed. EA's "Mirrors Edge" is a perfect example. I really liked what was going on in that game and the story and ALMOST everything...The controls and the ambiguous way points made for an awful experience that I chose to stop after getting halfway through.
I almost like going back to formulaic gameplay...ie Koei's Samurai and Dynasty Warriors games. There is some comfort in those games, perhaps due to my nostalgia I have associated with those games.
I guess what I am trying to say in my very long winded way is that what game developers should be looking at is to try and make a well balanced game...."Well duh Nigel don't you think they think that...?"
And my answer to you is no...I don't think they are thinking that, at least not at all times of the creation processes. I mean we can take a look at "Mirrors Edge" again. It feels as though the developers were constantly pushing having a game that looks fantastic and a game where the concept of free running really felt like you were free running...however, they seemed to forget that this was not a free running sim, but a game that had more aspects to it, and somewhere along the way the combat got messed up and the way point system never got finished. If the developers get another chance to make this game, which I feel they should, I suggest rounding out the game to have something more than just the BEST of one thing... and this goes to the rest of the developers.
Whatever take this for what you will but let's try and focusing on making our games well rounded and not just the best in one category.