The Year in Review

Wow, I've been pretty lax about updating this the last 6 weeks. Too many games to play. Since all the major releases are out now it seems to be a good enough time to go over the highlights of the year. I won't be doing Game of the Year and what-not, I'll save that for another post. What I really want to do is write about some of the games that have been taking up all my time the last few weeks.

The Simpsons Game (XBox 360): This game is a lot of fun. My wife and I have been playing it co-op and having a blast. As a game, it isn't great but certainly isn't awful, just kind of average. Fortunately the writing and humor save the game in a big way making it an awesome amount of fun for a Simpsons fan.

Fire Pro Wrestling Returns (PS2): This is a port of a Japanese game from like 2 years ago. It is also the most in-depth wrestling game to hit the US. The Create-A-Wrestler mode is so deep it is scary. I mean, I spent a good couple hours configuring my guys in the Smackdown series (not looks, I'm talking moves) so I have genuine and legitimate fear that this game take over my life if I let it. The gameplay is all timing based, so button mashing won't help you at all. All that having been said, it is the most fun you'll have with a wrestling game since No Mercy on the N64.

Orange Box (XBox 360): I've only played Portal on this, but damn was that game awesome. I wish I'd played some Half Life 2 since I've never played it before, but stupid me let a friend borrow it since I was planning on playing some other games first.

Super Mario Galaxy (Wii): To be honest, I'm not drooling over this game like so many other people are. That may be due to the fact I haven't spent a lot of time with it, though. I'm glad to finally have another good game for the Wii, which went through some serious dry spells over the last year. But really, if you love Mario 64 (which I do), then you'll love this game.

Rock Band (XBox 360): I got the stand-alone version of this since I wanted to wait for the Stratocaster to be wireless before I got one. I like the song selection on this better than Guitar Hero 3, though GH3 is also fun. But whereas GH3 seemed kind of "off" to me, Rock Band really delivered. I've only done guitar and singing, but I've had a blast with both. The guitar sections seem easier overall than GH2. I can say this because I've cleared like 4 or 5 tiers on expert in Rock Band and only been able to beat one expert song in GH2. I'm still waiting on my slack friends to come over to try some multiplayer since my wife won't touch this one.

Mass Effect (XBox 360): This game and Rock Band have been fighting it out for control of the XBox on any given night. I'm about 8 hours into it and still haven't even scratched the main story line. The combat is fun, much moreso than a standard RPG. I like the conversation system, even if it isn't as amazing as advertised. Pretty much everything in this game is just spot-on awesome. It felt to me from the beginning like I was playing some kind of 80's sci-fi movie. There's even a filter to add film grain you can turn on and off. The music is even perfect, making full use of synthesizers just like the 80's. It sounds like a movie off MST3K, which is a compliment.

You may have noticed I didn't talk about any PS3 games. I did play Fire Pro on the PS3 but I don't think that really counts. Part of the problem is that if a game is multi-console I'm going to get it on the XBox due to achivements. But have no fear, PS3 fans. My Xmas list is chock full of PS3 goodness, including Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Rachet and Clank, and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, so I'll be reporting on at least one of those after the 25th. I'm also wanting to try Assassin's Creed, but again, that will probably be on the 360. Also, I've got Lair coming, but I've got pretty low expectations for that. Luckily I didn't pay a dime for it, nor did anyone I know.

An Overload of Options

I never thought I'd say it, but I wish there weren't so many video games coming out. The only saving grace is that there is still nothing of note coming up for the PS3, so I'm safe on that front. But look at this list of games I'll be too weak to resist buying.

Phoenix Wright 3 - 10/23 - Nintendo DS
Guitar Hero 3 - 10/28 - XBox 360
The Simpsons Game - 10/30 - XBox 360
Super Mario Galaxy - 11/12 - Nintendo Wii
Fire Pro Wrestling Returns - 11/13 - PS2
Smackdown vs Raw 2008 - 11/13 - XBox 360
Mass Effect - 11/20 - XBox 360
Rock Band - 11/23 - XBox 360

And that's just through November! Yes, I'm well aware that some of those games will also be out for the PS3, but unless there's a damn fine reason for getting the PS3 version, like extra levels or something, I'll get the XBox 360 version. Why? Because I'm a bit of an achievements whore. Plus, my friends all have 360s, so I can do multiplayer with them. Only 2 of my friends have PS3s, and of those two, one has a 360 also.

The worst part isn't even how my wallet is getting raped without any lube. No, the worst part is how I don't have enough hours in the day to play this. I suppose my weekends will be opening up in November, which is nice, but between these games, the games I already own and haven't played enough of (Hi, Halo 3!) and the few tv shows I watch, there just aren't enough hours in the day.

Adding insult to injury, I'm picking up Beautiful Katamari today and I'm going to try to have the strength not to grab Orange Box at the same time. The only good news is that Katamari won't suck up too much time since I can grab it and play for a short time. I'm also really glad now that Heavenly Sword is only like 5 hours long. I may actually beat it! Of course, I have to actually start it first.

The only other thing of note to happen is that the wife and I got Eternal Sonata a couple weeks ago and started to play it the other night. Well, to be truthful, we started to watch all the damn cinematics at the beginning of the game. It took like 20 minutes before I was actually playing anything. Hopefully I'll be able to add a second character to my party pretty quickly, since we want to play the game co-op. I haven't really gotten far in the game since our work schedules have conflicted since we decided to play it. I'm not really a big JRPG fan, that's my wife's job (though she insists she doesn't like them, she really does) but I play them on occassion. Because of this passing familiarity with JRPGs I can't be sure if Eternal Sonata is more emo than the average JRPG or if it is just way, way emo. All I know is there's a whole lot of whiny "woe is me" type dialog in the beginning movie. Maybe its just me getting older, but damn is it annoying.

The PS3 - First Console Designed by Trained Monkeys!

Alright, I've spent some more time with the PS3 and I'm still pretty happy with the purchase. Come to think of it, the PS3 hasn't actually been turned off since I bought it, I've left it running Folding @ Home the whole time. I have to admit I wouldn't have the confidence in my XBox 360 to leave it running like that.

The wife and I have spent a lot of time playing We Heart Katamari this week, getting ready for the release of Beautiful Katamari in a couple weeks. I kind of like the irony in playing a game on the PS3 to get myself geared up for an XBox 360 release.

I spent a bit of time at a PS3 forum yesterday, trying to really get into the role of a new PlayStation 3 owner. I check out 360 Arcadians daily, so I figured I should balance that out with some PS3 love, too. Man alive, nothing could have prepared me for the fanboys at the PS3 site. The Arcadians, while an XBox 360-centric site, still gives plenty of love to other consoles, because at its heart it is a gaming site/forum. Over at the PS3 forum, you'd think Bill Gates and Major Nelson had gangbanged these people's dogs and forced them to watch.

The big complaint was the Microsoft was paying developers to delay their PS3 releases. Um, yeah. That's called a timed exclusive. There were also many cries about how Microsoft is paying for exclusive games for the 360. I'm still failing to see the problem. Microsoft is doing everything they can to make the 360 the leader of this console generation. There's nothing wrong with that. Of course, some of these folks are so paranoid, they think Sony took money from MS to delay Home. Yes, you read that right. In fact, I'll have to quote the post, because you'll never believe me otherwise.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Insanehead
You think MS also paid Sony to delay HOME?you never know. i
don't think its a case where ms blatantly gave sony money but microsoft probably
knew 360 would be dead along with live as soon as home came out so they probably
made some sort of deal like you delay home for 6 months and afterwards we'll
give up this and this exclusives cause they knew ps3 would kill them anyway. and
by getting sony to delay home for 6 months, it means they could launch halo 3
and other games successfully without sony killing them with home so early, and
sony gets back some of the exclusives in the deal. probably haze was the first
game on the ps3 side from the deal.

That's user Nariko Rulz, who has unforunately been banned since yesterday. That's a shame, because I really enjoyed his paranoid fantasies.

Look, I know it is just plain stupid to suggest that Sony is trying to fail with the PS3, so I'm not going to do that. What I will say is that I have to seriously wonder about whomever is making their decisions. From the beginning, Sony has displayed a level of hubris not seen since Nintendo's heyday back in the 80's. First, the release a console at the $500/$600 price point a full year after the XBox 360 launched, so they knew what MS's price was. Sony just felt that since the PS2 sold so well, people would buy the PS3, too.

There's also the problem of the game library. Right now, there are very few AAA titles for the PS3. That list narrows much further if you try looking for PS3 exclusives. There's Warhawk, Heavenly Sword, Lair, and Resistance. Some people would include Ninja Gaiden Sigma in the list, but that's just the third rehash of a title for the original XBox. I was being nice in adding Lair to the list since it was really supposed to be this awesome game. I figure someone that never reads reviews could be tricked into buying it, so it'll go on the list.

But really, just 4-5 "must have" games after a year? People like to say that the Xbox 360 was in the same boat its first year, but I'm not buying it. In the first year, the 360 had PGR3, Dead Rising, Saint's Row, and DoA (3, 4? I hate fighting games, cause I suck). Plus they had Fight Night: Round 3, Oblivion, and other awesome games that weren't exclusive, but they weren't available on other next-gen consoles at the time. Add in XBox Live Arcade, which is far superior in every way to the PlayStation Store, and the games were looking pretty good in the early days of the 360. You'll also notice I left out Gears of War, since it snuck in just after the console had been out a year.

And now Sony is goofing on rumble. Yes, they've finally settled their lawsuit so they can put the rumble back in their controllers. But they seem to be in no rush to do that. Japan is getting it by the end of the year and then North America gets it sometime next year? You would think Sony would be rushing to get that to the US before the holidays. Rumble doesn't sell systems, but some people will wait to buy a console if they know a new model is coming out soon.

Look at Mike Tyson. Way back when, Tyson (Sony) had a fight against a young up and comer named Buster Douglas (Microsoft). Douglas has pretty much a no name in boxing circles and it seemed like Iron Mike was going to steamroll another opponent. So, Tyson was lazy coming into this fight. He didn't take it seriously and didn't prepare properly. Douglas, on the other hand, made the most of this shot. He trained, studied, and generally prepared to kick some ass. Tyson was caught off guard and next thing you know, there's a new World's champion. I'm not saying Sony is going to try and bite the ears off Nintendo, but they'd certainly do well to try and get in the damn fight.

PS3: First Impressions

This is kind of a supplemental post to the buying the PS3 story.

I've had an XBox 360 since April 2006, so I'm pretty used to it and how it works. During that time, the XBox 360 controller has also become my all-time favorite video game controller, a spot that was previously held by the DualShock controller. Actually, the WaveBird is probably the best controller ever, hampered only by the screwy button placement Nintendo decided on for the GameCube and the lack of rumble. But I digress.

The Good:

• I liked the fact that I was able to use my old PS2 component cables with the PS3. I've got an HDTV, but it is old enough to only have a DVI input, no HDMI.
• Going back to the SIXAXIS is like riding a bike. I haven't actually turned my PS2 on in over a year, but picking up the SIXAXIS was like I never stopped playing it.
• I like the opening music when you turn on the PS3. A minor thing, but I enjoy it.
• Folding @ Home. Its for a good cause and it looks pretty.
• The wireless internet was simple to set up and offered no problems at all.
• I heart the Emotion Engine chip. No software emulation backwards compatibility for me!
• The PS3 is certainly an impressive looking piece of electronics.

The Bad:

• It is impressive looking because it is HUGE. Like it dwarves all my other systems. It is currently sitting where my original XBox sat and is way bigger.
• I really like the XBox 360's UI better. I like the blades and the way things are organized, it makes sense to me. The PS3's interface, on the other hand, is functional but ugly.
• When I first turned it on, I had to download a rather large update. It took forever. I've been told that it is faster to use my PC to download the update, then apply it using a flash drive or memory card.
• The PlayStation Store. I understand why they made it like they did. Having it be a webpage means they can quickly and easily change it whenever they want. I mean, a total conversion kind of change, too. But it looks ugly. The icons are ugly. And I hate using the controller to move my "mouse" cursor around. It is slow and very easy to overshoot your target. This was especially annoying when I was trying to buy something on the store and kept missing the scroll down bar for the credit card expiration date.
• To go along with the previous two complaints, when I bought a couple items from the store (flOw and Super Stardust HD), they took forever to download. Same thing with the demos I got. I actually started downloading the Heavenly Sword demo, put in 300 and watched it, and when I was done, the HS demo was only 83% done. There's no excuse for that. I've got 10mbs cable internet, so it isn't a speed issue on my end.

The Unknown:

• I haven't tried out the unit to play non-DVD movies yet, so I'm looking forward to that.
• Same thing for music and pictures.
• I'm also looking forward to trying some multiplayer in Resistance. I've got a couple friends coming over tonight so I'll try that. I'll also try some online play soon.
• Warbirds. That game looks so awesome and I really want to get both it and Ninja Gaiden Sigma, but I know with Halo 3, I won't actually play either of them for a while.

So that's my intial review of the PS3. I know it looked pretty heavy on the critical side, but I'm really pretty happy with my purchase. I'm anxious to get a game that can really show what it can do, though.

Halo 3 and the PS3

As usual, my timing is great. I'm probably the only guy dumb enough to pick up a PS3 four days before Halo 3 hits the shelves. But, I had the money in hand and just had to buy it. That's the good news. The bad news is now that Halo 3 is out, I won't be touching it. I guess I'll have to let Folding @ Home keep it busy for me.

The actual purchasing trip wasn't as uneventful as it should have been. I really wanted to just buy the PS3, some games, a Blu Ray movie and leave. Unfortunately, it couldn't be that easy. Last week, Toys R Us was running a "Buy 2 Get 1 Free" video game sale. I decided to try and price match at the store I was buying the PS3 at to save a trip. The problem started when the customer service person told me they don't price match from Toys R Us. I asked for a manager and things went downhill from there.

Just so I'm clear, if they would have said they don't price match Buy X Get Y deals, I would have accepted it and made the trip to Toys R Us. But the manager's reason for not doing it was that he didn't want to. I pointed to the price matching policy about 3 feet to my left in giant letters on the wall, but he said that he made the policy and wasn't going to be price matching that day. The best part came when he said he wouldn't match it because on the Toys R Us website, it says the sale is for "select" games. I told him that wasn't relevant since the store in question doesn't price match website prices, only actual retail locations. He didn't like that. But the deal in the Toys R Us stores isn't on "select" games, it is on any game. So I asked him to call the Toys R Us to verify, as this store normally would do. He refused. I again asked him and told him that this didn't need to be such a pain in the ass, and that's all she wrote.

Ok, so maybe using the term "pain in the ass" wasn't appropriate, I'm not really sure. Since I wasn't calling the manager a pain in the ass, but rather was talking about this whole situation being a pain in the ass, I don't think I crossed any kind of line. But, whatever. I went to a different store who was more than happy to take my money. Plus, they matched the Toys R Us sale, so I picked up Resistance: Fall of Man, Eternal Sonata, and Overlord along with 300 on Blu Ray and the 60GB PS3. Yeah, yeah, I got two XBox 360 games and only one PlayStation 3 game. But really, the only other game I was interested in at the time for the PS3 was Heavenly Sword and once I heard it only lasts 5-6 hours I decided spending $60 for it wasn't the smartest idea. I'll pick it up on the cheap later.

Once I got home and set everything up, I tried the demo for Ninja Gaiden, which is awesome. I never played the XBox versions for some reason, so I was blown away. Had I known the game was this cool, I would have picked it up instead of Overlord.

But now Halo 3 is out, so it looks like my PS3's days of love are going to be delayed.

This Is The End

It seems like just yesterday I was commenting on how quickly the goal was approaching. Actually, it was two days ago. How time flies.

This morning I checked my accounts and with the marketing sale that went through while I was sleeping, I've reached the goal. Yes, I have now managed to acquire the funds for a PlayStation 3 using only online sources. I'm at $523.14 earned, which is enough to go make the purchase. And it only took 52 days.

I'm still waiting on a couple of checks to come in, but at this point I'm sure I could convince the wife to let me go get the machine and reimburse the checking account as the checks arrive. I'm really not sure what I'll do. The sad truth of the matter is that I'm in a rush to get a PS3 only because I want to be sure to get a 60GB version with the Emotion Engine chip inside. There aren't any PS3 exclusive games I'm dying to play and I don't own any Blu Ray movies (yet).

I am, however, looking forward to playing some of my PS2 games upconverted. I especially am anxious to play some God of War and Kingdom Hearts on it. I'm also wanting to play Stranglehold, but I'm not sure if I want to play it on the XBox 360 or the PS3. I do like the achievements on the 360, but if I can get the limited edition PS3 version, I'll probably grab that one instead.

I'm also thinking seriously about getting the PS3 from Amazon. I've got an affiliate account, so I'll get like 4% back, which is still better than nothing. On top of that, they're running a promotion where I'll get 2 free Blu Ray movies with the PS3, in addition to the 5 movies you get just from buying the system. If I go that route, I'll probably get the first two Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Those should look pretty nice in HD.

But I guess the real question is, where do I go from here. I've got the foundations of my internet marketing business up and running. The revenue is still rolling in from it and I really enjoy tending to the sites to make it all happen. I really think that learning these new skills was way more exciting than getting the PS3.

I'll keep this blog going, because I've had a lot of fun talking about video games. But I will be changing its purpose. Or, at least half of its purpose. With the PS3 purchase imminent, I think I'll shift my sights a bit higher. I've been wanting to get an iMac to do some music recording (GarageBand is pretty damn cool), so I think my next goal will be to get one of those nice 24" screen iMacs. Just like I did with the PS3, I'll keep the running total going to the right.

The End is Near

Wow, this is pretty crazy. Its only been 50 days since I started this and now I'm just $60 away from the goal. I really didn't expect to get that much money that quickly. Of course, when I started I was figuring I'd be doing surveys for money and writing for Associated Content to raise it all.

Of course, since then I discovered that there are far better, more fund and much more efficient ways of making money online. I suppose I've been lax in talking about them, since that is half the stated purpose of this blog. I spent nearly all of my posts talking about video games, because I figured that what people found the most interesting.

So, to explain it very simply, I've got a few sites set up that have some articles about different topics. Kind of like blogs, but not updated nearly so often, if at all. I make sure to write something I think is interesting to the person who found the site and I also make sure that the articles I write have something of value in them. What I don't want is for someone to find my site and think it is there just for selling something, because I hate that when it happens to me. If I'm searching for information and a site claims to have that information, I'm not amused if they'll only give me the info after I pay them.

That having been said, the sites are most certainly set up to sell something. But more in a "Hey, I hope that article helped you out, and if it did then you might want to check out this book, too." kind of way. Like I said, I make sure to address the reason the reader came to my site in the first place.

I've never really been the type to click on a lot of ads or buy things online. I'm more of an instant gratification guy. But it turns out, lots of people do click ads, and a lot of those people buy stuff after they click. So by following the concept of writing informative articles and then directing people to products they're already interested in, you can make pretty decent cash. So far it doesn't look like I'll be retiring on this, but it has paid for more than half of a PS3 in less than a month's time, so that's not too shabby.

Secret Shame - My Massive Backlog

Time for another confession. I've mentioned my gaming ADHD, so it should come as no surprise that I've got a massive, massive backlog. I'm talking about a backlog so massive I honestly don't see any way that it will ever be beaten down. At this point I'm probably better off just admitting that I'll never actually play the games and be done with it. I sometimes like to think that I'm a collector of video games and that makes my problem better. I know that's not really true, but I it doesn help the pain just a little

Here's just a partial list of the games I have that I want to actually beat. They're not listed by system or any particular order.

• Halo 2 - Never actually beaten the single play campaign. Started running through it in co-op mode, but didn't finish it befored I moved.
• Paper Mario 2: The 1000 Year Door
• Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes
• Metal Gear Solid 2
• Metal Gear Solid 3
• Eternal Darkness
• Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
• Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess
• Marvel Ultimate Alliance
• Viva Pinata
• God of War
• Kingdom Hearts
• Kingdom Hearts 2
• Guitar Hero 2 (Need to beat Expert mode)
• Crackdown
• Just Cause
• GTA: SA
• Pokemon Diamond
• Phoenix Wright: Trials & Tribulations

And these are just the games that are at the top of the backlog. I've still got tons more games that I haven't beaten. Hell, in same cases I haven't even played them. And there's still BioShock to finish up. Then Halo 3 comes out, Mass Effect, Metroid Prime 3, and the list just goes on and on.

The Perfect Time For Zombie Genocide

For nearly the last week, I've been sick as a dog. Like, the only movement I've made is from my bed to my couch and back again. I was even too sick to want to play any games, which means I was pretty damn sick. If I would have thought about it, I probably would have been trying for the zombie genocide achievement in Dead Rising, but the it didn't occur to me. But really, driving around in circles in the mall basement is really about all I could have handled this week.

Right before I got sick, I did get around to playing the skate. demo, which was a lot of fun. I've mentioned before I never really cared for the Tony Hawk games, but this one was alright. I doubt that I'll actually buy it unless it drops down to $20 or $30. But if a friends gets it, I'll probably end up borrowing it for a few days.

I also play the new Medal of Honor demo, which was fun but not really outstanding. I think it is very probable that I burned myself out on WWII games a few years ago. Actually, since I beat Allied Assault and then went right into Battlefield 1942, I haven't been that into WWII games. I barely even touched the Call of Duty series.

What I'm really in the mood to play is some Beautiful Katamari, but I've still got a month and a half for it to come out. I kind of wish they'd held the demo just a little so there wouldn't be such a long wait. I suppose that at least gives me time to get in some more BioShock.

Slacking

Well, it certainly appears that I've been slacking this week, judging by the non-existent posts I've been making.

But that's simply not so. No, as the mission statement for the sites claims, I've been busy earning money for my PS3. I've spent the last couple weeks learning how to do some internet marketing. No spam crap, but basically how to make money off of web sites. Not that this site will ever make me rich. (Click the ads. You know you want to.)

In fact, in the last 48 hours I've made about $50 towards the old PS3, which is awesome. The best part about it is that this is pretty much an automated process, so now that it is up and running, I don't have to overly worry about it. So, that's going on, and while it is pretty much taking care of itself now, it was pretty time consuming to get up.

I also just got the first check from the fine folks at CashCrate. I'll get a picture of it up soon.

In with all that, I've been trying to squeeze in some BioShock time, which just keeps getting more and more awesome. I've also downloaded the demos for the new Medal of Honor game and Skate or whatever it is called.

I'm really looking forward to trying the Medal of Honor demo. I loved Allied Assault, but haven't played any of the MoHs since, but I do have high hopes. I'll play the skateboarding game, but I'm pretty apathetic about it. I've never really cared for skateboarding games. I've got Tony Hawk 2 or 3 (I really don't remember which and can't be bothered to check), but I only own it because a friend gave it to me.

So, that's been my week. I'll get that check picture up shortly and then I'll work on getting back to my more regular updating schedule.

Free Bioshock Soundtrack Download

Just a real quick note. 2kGames has put the orchestral soundtrack for Bioshock online and made it available for free download, which is awesome. I'd heard some complaints that the limited edition of the game didn't come with a soundtrack, and I guess this is the reason why.

Big thumbs up to 2KGames for going above and beyond on this. Despite any issues (real or imagined) with the widescreen or the PC version, this is pretty cool.

You can download the soundtrack here.

Console Gaming vs PC Gaming

I realized today just how little I used my PC for gaming anymore. I mean, I obviously have to use it for MMORPGs, but beyond that, the last thing I think I played on it was Oblivion. And I honestly can't recall the last upgrade I did. Probably switching up to a Radeon 9800 Pro a couple years ago. In a shocking turn of events, to me at least, I do way more of my video gaming on a console.

To put things in perspective, I've been playing console games since I got an Atari 2600 in 1980. Since then I've had a NES, Super Nintendo, Genesis, Nintendo 64, PlayStation, XBox, Gamecube, PlayStation 2, XBox 360, and a Wii. That's not even counting the handhelds I've owned.

I've also been playing games on a computer for a long time. I started with an Apple IIc back in the mid 80s, got a Commodore 128 just to play games on, and have had some form of PC since my first 386.

During all that time, the best games always came out on the computer. The console games were fun, but lacked the depth and scope of a computer game, for obvious reasons. Of course, there were exceptions, like how fighting games and platformers were always better on the console (except the original Prince of Persia), but the best games were on the PC. But now, consoles are pretty much little computers optimized for gaming. And the depth of PC games is no longer an issue with consoles.

Try Oblivion on the PC and then on the XBox 360 or even Playstation 3. Other than the fact that you can't download mods on a console, the games play the same. In fact, you could make a case for them playing better on a console. You need a pretty beefy PC to make Oblivion look great (not good, but great) and have to download several mods to optimize the experience for the PC. With the console, just put the CD in the tray and you're set.

Which brings me to the fact that I don't have to worry about drivers or patches for my console. Well, I guess there are patches, but those are auto-downloaded and have yet to cause more problems than they solve. Can't always say that for the PC.

Plus, I never have to upgrade my console. Sure, I may have to buy a new system every 4-5 years, but even still that's just the cost of a high-end video card for my PC.

The saddest thing to me, at least from a nostalgic point of view, is that I don't see the PC regaining its crown as king of gaming. The bright side is that the games are stellar all around, no matter the platform. The king is dead, long live the king.

Bioshock - Welcome to Rapture, Wish You Were Here

Bioshock - Helooooo Nurse!

I played a ton of Bioshock last night and it really is as good as I'd hoped. I also regret not having hooked up my two rear surround sound speakers when I moved. I'll have to fix that little issue tonight. I've been very careful to avoid saying anything that could be a spoiler when I talk to people, so I won't say too much about this game just yet.

What I can say is that the telekinesis power is way too much fun. And no, that's not a spoiler. Even if you haven't read any reviews (which just about all mention the various powers), this particular plasmid is advertised within the first 10 minutes of the game. I mean that literally, you see a poster about it on a wall.

When I first got the power, I ran into a splicer and used it to steal the hat right off her head, then throw it back at her.

By the way, Bioshock should win some kind of prize just for break Guitar Hero's deathgrip on my XBox 360. I've got a friend coming over tonight for some multiplayer Guitar Hero, but I really want to play more Bioshock. I'm thinking I might just turn off the lights, lock the door, and pretend I'm not home.

Anticipation - Bioshock Part 2

My brand new and still shiny copy of Bioshock is sitting on my desk, tempting me.

"Come on, Rob. Just opening the manual won't hurt anything," it says.

"Why don't you watch some gameplay videos to see how awesome I'll be?" it asks.

But no, I'm standing resolute. But just barely.

Perhaps I could take a dive down the stairs so I have to go early.

Bioshock - Somewhere Under the Sea

Man, that's a bucket load of awesome.

I played the Bioshock demo yesterday for the first time. I guess I'm a bit behind the curve on that, especially since I've had it downloaded for a few days.

I'm really impressed by everything I've seen so far. The graphics are outstanding, the game is immersive, the story seems really cool. And it is pretty scary. I tend to really get into games like this, so I can scare fairly easily. If you're old enough to remember the PC game "The 7th Guest", that one did a number on me. More recently, the Call of Cthulu: Dark Corners of the Earth is another one that I both loved and hated to play alone at night.

Not too much else to say on this topic just now. I didn't get to play too much, since I had to go to work, but Bioshock is going to be a day one purchase for me. So expect a much better review in a couple of days.

What I Should Have Been Playing This Week

The weekend if finally here, so I'm looking at logging some actual time into some games. During the week, I've just been too busy after work to actually play anything except for a bit of Guitar Hero II and the Beautiful Katamari demo.


Guitar Hero II - Man alive, this game is way better than I would have guessed. I didn't play either Guitar Hero on the PlayStation 2, but finally broke down and bought the XBox 360 version a few weeks ago. Since then, it has been just about the only thing I've played, except for a little bit of Pokemon before bed. This game is an absolute blast, the music is great and the time flies when you're rocking out. Also, "Woman" on hard difficulty can go screw itself. Seriously.


Beautiful Katamari - I've played the PlayStation 2 versions and loved them, so I was pretty excited when this was announced. When I found out the demo was ready to download, I couldn't wait to try it out. The HD graphics look fantastic and the gameplay is as good as ever. The demo is really short, which is unfortunate, but this game is a definate buy for me. People have complained about the $40 price tag, but that seems completely fair to me. Wasn't We Heart Katamari eitehr $30 or $40?


Twilight Princess - So, this game had the misfortune of being purchased as I was trying to finally beat Oblivion (I'm still a couple quests from finishing it). I have't got very far into the game, shortly after meeting Zelda for the first time, if memory serves. I really want to go back and make the time to play this some more, because my Wii is seriously being underappreciated at the moment.


Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes - Kind of a random choice, but I started this game about a year ago, and quickly put it aside for something else. Gaming ADD, remember? I've got all three MGS games, but haven't beat a single one. I keep planning to knuckle down and bust through them (as much as you can bust through an MSG at any rate), but haven't made myself do it yet.


Lord of the Rings Online - So, I quit World of Warcraft to play this one. I still stand by that choice. Haven't had time to play in nearly a month at this point, though. I do really like the quest system and how you level largely from quest exp. The graphics look nice, the world is plenty detailed, but I just don't have the time to enjoy it. It also doesn't help that the friends I started playing with became totally lame and dropped out, too.


The Sims 2 - I can be a kind god or an angry god. I'm just kidding, I'm always an angry god.

Which PlayStation 3 To Buy?

Much to my disbelief, the amount of money I've earned for the PlayStation 3 goes up just about every day. I'm already to $163.70 after just over two weeks worth of work. Not bad at all. If I can keep up this pace, I'll be playing Resistance: Fall of Man by the end of September.

Of course, that's because I've decided to get the 60GB version of the PS3 over the 80GB one. Why did I do that? Believe it or not, the reason isn't the price. If I can make $500 plus tax online, I can surely come up with the other $100 I'd need. The real reason is because I want a PlayStation 3 that comes with the Emotion Engine chip.

What's the big deal with this chip? The EE chip is what allows hardware based backwards compatibility. With the 80GB PS3s, Sony removed the chip and implemented software based emulation for backwards compatibility. But still, what's the big deal? Simply put, with the EE chip, every PS2 game I want to play with play just fine (in theory). Without it, I have to hope that the software emulator that has been built for this particular game is a decent one.

Basically, the XBox 360 uses software based backwards compatibility. They really didn't have any choice since they switch processors types (Intel vs. Power PC) and graphics manufacturers (NVidia vs ATI). I haven't had many problems with this on my XBox 360, but all of my old XBox games still don't play on the 360. That's why hardware based compatibility is so cool.

Secret Shame - Pokemon

I'm a 31 year old married man and two weeks ago I started playing Pokemon. I'd never touched one of the games before, but was looking for a game for my DS and some people on some forums suggested it. I was skeptical, but figured I didn't have anything to lose.

It turns out I was wrong about that. What I lost was all of my free time, and I'm pretty sure I lost a bit of dignity, too. I play the stupid game all the time now. I even stay up way past the point I should be asleep because I'm in bed playing Pokemon.

For being a "kid" game, Pokemon is surprisingly deep and full of strategy. For example, Pokemon are of a certain type, like a fire pokemon. Each type is strong against another type and weak against some other type. This plays out a lot like Rock-Paper-Scissors, except there are more than three type of pokemon. This is information I was unaware of going into this. So when I first faced off against a rock pokemon, my fire monkey didn't do any good for the first time. After much searching, I found that I needed a plant pokemon, which I had to go find, then level up until he was around the level of the rest of my party.

And then the pokemon learn new moves, which can be attacks or defensive in nature. But the thing is, each pokemon can only know four moves at the same time. That means if your pokemon already knows four moves, but levels up and has access to a new move, you have to decide whether to forget an existing move or never learn the new one.

Of course, there's the famous need to "catch 'em all". I don't even want to know how much time I've spent wandering the same patch of wilderness trying to get a different pokemon to appear. In the past, I've played Magic the Gathering, HeroClix, and other games of that nature, so I'm a collector at my core. That means this game is going to eat my soul and leave me an empty shell unless I can find each and every pokemon.

So there it is. I've publicly admitted that I'm playing Pokemon, a fact that I (unsuccessfully) tried to hide from my wife for two weeks. If ever there were a secret gaming shame, this would be it.

Fusion Cash

A few days ago, I signed up with another GPT site, Fusion Cash. As you can see from my August earnings in the box to your right, after only a couple of days, I've made $78.40 there. Actually, just take a look at the nifty little banner Fusion Cash generates that shows how much I've made and how many offers I had to complete to get there.

That's not bad at all for next to no work at all. Actually, the Fusion Cash banner is fantastic because that means I don't have to keep updating the article with new totals, the banner does it automatically.

As with all GPT sites, Fusion Cash pays money for completing offers. These can range from completing surveys to joining free trials of websites. And again, if you join the free trial and you aren't interested in staying a member of the site, make sure to cancel it as soon as the membership is confirmed so you don't get charged any money. Remember, this whole experiment is about making money online, not spending money to join websites.

What really sets Fusion Cash apart from other GPT sites is that they pay the most per offer of any GPT site I've come across. For example, out of the 23 offers I've completed to date, none of them have been for less than $1.00 and most for significantly more than that.

The cashout process is very simple with Fusion Cash. You must have $25 in your account to cashout, but with such high amounts per offer, that isn't tough to get at all. Especially when you figure in the $5 sign up bonus they offer. They offer three different payment methods: Check, Direct Deposit, or PayPal, which is pretty nice. Once you select to cashout, you'll recieve the money around the 20th of the next month. So, if you cashout in August, you'll get payment around September 20th.

You probably won't hear as much about Fusion Cash online as you will CashCrate for a very simple reason: their referral system isn't as good. Now, CashCrate is a fine system, the payout is good and it is a very simple way to make some extra money. As I've stated before, with CashCrate, you'll get a $3 bonus when your referral makes their first $10, and you'll get 20% matched earnings of everything they make, plus 10% matched earnings of whatever their referrals make, which is a fantastic referral system, probably the best in the GPT business.

The Fusion Cash referral system isn't nearly as spectacular, though it is still pretty decent. You get $1 when someone confirms their email, $2 when they complete their first offer, and $2 when they cash out. Since you don't earn a percentage of what your referrals make, I don't expect you'll see a ton of websites promoting this offer, when they could be getting a large passive income with something like CashCrate instead. But, I wanted to talk about it, because I've made a ton money with Fusion Cash in a very short amount of time and one of the things this site does is talk about all the offers I try.

So, if you want to try Fusion Cash, please do. I've had an excellent experience with it so far, and will of course post a pic of my payout when I get it next month. And, as always, if you have any questions, please post it in the comments and I'll be happy to answer it.

Back Up and Running

Note to Self: Don't try to change the template ever again.

The problem started Wednesday night when I (foolishly) figured I could easily change the template to give a look more consistent with the PS3/Video Game theme of the writing. I browsed and searched until I found a pretty spiffy PS3 theme (which you are now enjoying). I made sure to make a backup of the old layout before I altered anything, then proceeded to upload the new template. It informed me I would lose my widgets (the little boxes to the side telling you how much I have left to earn for the PS3 and what-not), but I copied down the information in them and told it to go ahead. The save looked successful, so I clicked the button to view the blog, and nothing came up. Nothing.

Well, not completely nothing. I got a nice page giving me a 404 error saying the site couldn't be found. Hmm, looks like the new template hosed the site. No worries, I made a backup. Upload the backup, click view. Same 404 error. I ran through about an hour of trying anything and everything I could think of, nothing could shake that 404 error. It pursued me as doggedly as the Aztecs in Civ 2. As an aside, I hated the Aztecs in Civ 2, those war-mongering bastards.

I made a post on the Blogger help forum, but after 24 hours there was still no resolution. That leads me to this morning. Being frustrated, I kept plugging away, and since you're reading this now, you can safely assume I fixed the problem. How did I do it? As you may have noticed, I have a custom domain name here, http://www.myps3quest.com/. I rolled the name back to http://myPS3Quest.blogspot.com and the site loaded. After that, I had to switch back to the custom name, go to my domain host's site, redirect the information (again, since I did it once already) and now the site is here for all and sundry to see.

So that's the story of the mystery disappearance, in case anyone even noticed. I'll try to make it up with something exciting tomorrow.

The Game I Really Want To Play

There was an interesting thread on the forums at Penny Arcade about what game you wanted to play that would probably never be made. That question was so easy, I didn't even have to think about it. I want to play a Zorro game on the Wii.

If you think about it, Zorro is the perfect franchise for the Wii. Tell me it wouldn't be awesome to play a game controlling a character that uses a whip, is a master swordsman, and rides a horse. Alright, maybe the horse part isn't a big deal, but there's no way the rest of the game wouldn't be the best thing since sliced toast.

So yeah, that's what I want, a Zorro game on the Wii. I don't care what it takes, someone just needs to make this happen. Alas, it will never happen. Mere mortals like us are not ready for such pure, unadulterated joy.

Things I Hate About My XBox 360

In the interest of equal time, today I'll explain a few of things that I really don't like about the XBox 360.

• Red Ring of Doom - This is the most common complaint you'll hear about and it is the one that bugs me the most. You've heard all the arguments before about how a console costing this much shouldn't break this often. Though, I really think that regardless of the price it should break so often. I'm on my third 360 right now. First one got the RROD, second one got very loud and sounds like a jet engine. Then two days ago, I come home and get the dreaded RROD again. I power-cycled the XBox and it has been working fine, but I know it is only a matter of time.
• Microsoft Points - It isn't that I mind paying for downloadable content, because I don't. What I do mind is the fact that Microsoft thought they could get all cute and make 79 points cost $1.00. On the Wii, 100 points = $1.00 and that's math that makes sense. The XBox route is just to make it look like you're getting a better deal when you buy an XBLA game or something.
• 20 GB Hard Drive - Yes, I know the solution to this is to get an Elite, but I've got an older HDTV that has a DVI input, not HDMI so the Elite has nothing I want except the bigger hard drive. As I've mentioned, I've got more than an entire season's worth of South Park downloaded. That and a couple of demos and my hard drive is full. I'd gladly buy a bigger drive, but $200 for 120GB? Forget that.

Why I Love My XBox 360

Some titles just scream "FANBOY" and this is one of them. But, I can't very well write about how much I love my PS3 if I don't own one yet. Yes, I am psyched about getting a Playstation 3 and you'll be able to read all about that later this week. But for now, I'm damned happy to have the 360. So, what do I love about the 360?

• XBox Live Arcade - Geometry Wars is a blast, but most people are aware of this. But I really do love the entire concept of smaller, cheaper games. In fact, these work perfectly with my Gaming ADD since they can typically be played in shorter bursts and don't take nearly as long to finish. Plus, XBLA gives my the chance to replay games I loved as a kid, like the TMNT arcade game.
• Achievements - When I first heard about these, I didn't see the point. Who the hell cares how many points I earned in a given game? It turns out that I care, and I care a lot. I've actually found myself playing a game well past the point I normally would have quit just to get one more achievement. On top of that, I now have numeric evidence that I'm better at a particular game than one of my friends.
• XBox Live - Not the arcade this time, now I'm talking about the whole system. Smooth matchmaking, downloadable demos, the video content, I love it all. Against what I used to consider my better judgement, I've bought an entire season of South Park over XBox Live. I didn't fall for digital purchases from iTunes, so how the hell did Microsoft get my money from me?
• Dead Rising - Yeah, I really wasn't going to list games in this list because they should probably be separate. But dammit, Dead Rising is killing zombies in a mall. People can bitch about the save feature, but it is still killing zombies in a mall. If you don't love this you've got no heart, no soul, and no brain. But to be fair, that's because the zombies ate it.
• Streaming media - It is nice to be able to stream media from my PC to my big screen tv in the other room. Very nice. I don't think there's too much more to even say about it. If you can't see the benefit of being able to access all your MP3s over your surround system without having to involve an additional computer, there's simply no helping you.

So there it is, a list of things I love about the XBox 360. Please, no cries of foul against the PS3. I can't be biased against it, otherwise why would I make a web site detailing my mission to buy one? Is it really written anywhere that I can have room in my heart for only one console? No, that's silly. Just like women, I'm allowed to love as many consoles as I've got room on my AV switch for.

A Brief Note for the Readers

Much to my surprise, the site stats say I've been getting people coming to the page and reading. Not a whole ton, but a few, and new ones each day. So, if you're one of these readers (and if you're seeing this then you must be) please leave a comment and let me know how you found the site and what it was you were looking for that lead you here.

Payment from Associated Content

As promised, here's a screenshot of my payment from Associated Content. Hey, it isn't a ton of money, but at least it is something. And really, the work was pretty minimal since I already knew plenty about the subject. And again, if you want to check out my Content Producer page, please feel free.

Here's the payment picture. Click it for a larger version.

Secret Shame - Gaming ADD

I don't think I'm alone with this problem, but it is still a secret shame. You see, I seem to be almost totally unable to play a game to completion. I want to beat the stupid game, I enjoy playing it, but within a couple of hours the siren song of another game is too much for me to resist.

It starts like this: I find a new game that looks pretty cool, so I buy it. I take it home and pop it in the console. I'll play through the tutorial and maybe an additional level or two and that's it. I'll plan to play it the next day, but I don't. So it goes on the shelf next to the other games that have suffered the same fate. On the off chance I actually do finish a game, it is only because I came back to it after a year. The perfect example of this is Oblivion. This is one of the very few games I played the hell out of right when I got it, then put it on the shelf after a couple of weeks. Then a year later, I pull it down and finish off all the missions.


Why do I do this? When I was a kid, I didn't have this problem. I think there are a few reasons. First, when I was younger, the games weren't a long. Final Fantasy 1 and the Legend of Zelda were the longest games I can remember. Now it takes 40+ hours to beat many games.

There are also a lot more games coming out now than there were when I was a kid. Back then you only had two systems at any given time instead of three and there were just fewer games coming out. In addition, I didn't have access to places like Best Buy and GameStop, so my selection was much more limited.

Another part of the problem is I have more money to buy games now than I used to. There was a time when Christmas and my birthday were the only reliable times to get games for me. That, and whenever I could whine and beg enough to get one. But now that I've got a job and plenty of money, I can buy all the games I want. Combine that with much less time now than I used to have (I really miss summer break) and I think the cause becomes more apparent.

What I think is happening is since I have more games but less time to play them in, a game has to really grab me pretty quickly before it gets bumped off to the side. Now, I don't want to grind levels in an RPG, I just want to see the story, dammit, and get on to the next game.

The obvious solution is to just buy fewer games, but I'm not sure that I'm capable of that. I do try to get the games when they're on sale, but as I've said I'm a consumer whore and I want to have the newest, hottest game right when it comes out.

So, until I get more time, I guess I'll have to be happy with only playing until Medusa on God of War and accept the fact that if I play Pokemon, I'll never actually catch them all. But I'll be damned if it isn't a bitter pill to swallow.

Associated Content

My second stop on the way to the PS3 was Associated Content. (Full disclosure: That's a referral link. After extensive searching on the AC web site, it appears their referral program has been discontinued, but I'll leave the link in case they decide to bring it back.)

Associated Content is a large community of writers that pays for articles. The articles can be on any topic of your choice, but it has to be at least 400 words long. However, just because you submitted an article doesn't necessarily mean they're going to pay you for it. They do require proper spelling and grammar. The pay ranges from $3-20 per article, though I've heard they also have a special $50 bonus for certain Content Producers (what AC calls their writers) if the article is especially good.

My first (and so far only) published article on Associated Content got a whopping $4.03. Obviously this isn't an outstanding offer, but I was pleased for my first attempt. After reading the forums, I found that the offers tend to go up if you get a lot of page views and/or subscribers.

That leads me to the Associated Content Performance Bonus. You get $0.0015 cents per page view, payable once the total reaches $1.50. That's 1000 page views for those of you suffering from arithmophobia.

Everyone and their mother has ideas for increasing page views over at Associated Content, but the most common topic is keywords. Basically, when you're planning your article you want to try and think about what someone would search on Google to get to your article. Then, you need to word the headline to include that phrase as well as include as often as possible in the article. Actually, as often as possible is a bit too much. What you want, is a keyword density of between 2%-5%.

This means that you want that word or phrase to show up about 20 times per 400 words article at most. It seems to me that can lead to some awkwardly written articles, but I suppose practice makes perfect.

The other key is to write about both things that get searched for a lot and things that there aren't a lot of articles on Associated Content about. I would also suggest articles that aren't either too narrow or too broad in scope. Something about insects of the world would be too general, while an article on the Mexican Staring Frog of southern Sri Lanka probably wouldn't get a lot of searches, either. Also you should aim for articles that won't get dated too quickly. For example, an article on this week's Senate debate will be interested for about a week (if you're lucky), an article on immigration will be relevant for quite a while.

I also need to mention that I've read exclusive stories get higher offers than non-exclusive. The difference is that with exclusive you're giving the copyright to Associated Content. My story was submitted as exclusive because I have no plan to ever do anything with it ever again.

But enough of that, I know you didn't come here looking for a course on how to write for Associated Content. You want to know about making money. Obviously the first step is writing and submitting the story. Approval can take up to two weeks, though for the one story I've submitted thus far, I got an offer the next day. Once that's done, they send you the money via PayPal. The payments are sent on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. So, I'm expecting my payment tomorrow, hopefully. Once it goes up, I'll post a picture of it here.

Finally, if anyone just can't get enough of my writing here, you can check out my Content Producer page.

Cashcrate

I recently joined CashCrate and wanted to give people some information about it. The idea with CashCrate is that after you sign up, you complete surveys or other offers and get credited some money. The average amount seems to be around $0.50, but some of the offers I've completed on CashCrate went up to a couple bucks. Then, at the end of the month, if your completed offers total more than $10, they send you a check. I took a couple of hours on CashCrate and completed several of the offers and now have a check for $19.05 coming. I've got an additional $8.40 that hadn't been approved by the deadline and since then, only $1.00 more has cleared. I think it is also important to mention the only offers I completed on CashCrate were the 100% free ones, meaning no credit card was required and I wasn't out anything except the few minutes it took to complete the offer. CashCrate does have some "100% free" deals that do cost money, however. Deals like the Vonage trial gets you $44, but you have to remember to cancel the account and send back any equipment. The S&H charge on the equipment is around $10. That's a net $34 for those of you keeping score at home, but it seems like a lot of hassle. CashCrate also has daily surveys you can take, each of which offers $0.80. You can take up to two of these a day. I haven't actually qualified for any of them yet, though. I suppose I could go through several times and answer the qualifying questions differently until I do qualify, but that's too much effort for me. After a couple minutes with a calculator and scanning through the offers that didn't require any sort of commitment, it looks like I could get around $350 or so from CashCrate, which isn't bad. Of course, your mileage may vary depending on what offers CashCrate are are offering when you sign up. Also, these offers are for the US. Other countries have offers, but not nearly as many from what I've read. If you're interested in signing up for CashCrate, please click my link to do it. To be upfront and honest, I'll get a $3.00 bonus if you get to the $10 cash-out minimum, as well as 20% of the amount you earn and 10% of the amount of anyone that you sign up. Just to clarify, however, this is not money out of your totals or anything. It is an extra payment to me from CashCrate. I was referred by someone on a message board and kept track of my offers and anything that he got from my time did not come out of my money. I would also suggest if you are going to sign up at CashCrate to not spent too much time at first. I was (and still am) skeptical, so I just spent a couple lunch hours doing it. Once I get an actual check from them, I'll post a pic here as proof, but I feel it is better to be cautious. And really, if you're not 100% sure about CashCrate, don't sign up for anything that requires money and/or commitment. If you get the checks from them, you're free to do what you want, but make sure you get the checks first!

Start at the beginning

I suppose the first question many people will have about this is what is the point exactly? That's a fair question to be sure, but to answer it, I need to go back to before the beginning, which just made the title of the post a complete lie.

The simple answer is that I'm a consumer whore. I love new gadgets, though I've been known to quickly get bored of them and move on to something new. But if that were the sole reason, I'd just go out and buy the damn thing already.

So, another part of the answer is that I already own an XBox 360 and a Wii, so if I just went out and bought the PS3, my wife would, in all probability, kill me. And most likely she'd do it slowly.

But, I reasoned, if I bought it with money that otherwise wouldn't exist she wouldn't care. As it turns out, that line of thought was right on the money. I'll leave it up to you to decide if the pun was intended. In fact, when I mentioned the idea to my wife, she laughed in my face. I was not phased, being used to this sort of reaction.

I've got a lot of free time, most of which is spent aimlessly surfing the internet. Pretty often, I'll see websites offering money for various things. Surely, these sites aren't for real? But maybe they are, and it could be fun finding out what's real and what's not. And don't call me Shirley.

So that's how I started my quest. I will purchase a PS3 using only money earned online. Ebay doesn't count. I'll document the sites and methods I'm using and let you know what works and what doesn't. More importantly, I'll let you know who pays and who doesn't. Most importantly, I'll let you know how much they pay. And maybe I'll get some time to talk about video games, too.