Thursday Update

Let's see... what have I been up to?

On Saturday, I brought my lovely white box over to the home of DaftApeth and introduced him to the ways of Guitar Hero II. It was love at first twang. Hopefully it won't be much longer before he joins the family of happy 360 owners.

We played for hours, me on lead and he on bass. And it was good. We unlocked several co-op achievements.

Yesterday was a banner day. It was another double-header XBLA Wednesday, with Eets: Chowdown and Pinball FX released.

First impressions: Eets was... OK. Had it been a little cheaper or if I had liked it a bit more, I may have gotten it. But I passed. However, I did pick up Pinball FX. Not because it's a terribly great game, but it's the only pinball available on the 360 and the physics engine is really not bad at all. I've spent a few hours here and there on the Windows Pinball game (Space Cadet), and Pinball FX offers 3 tables with the promise of more, and a rather high level of graphical detail.

It wasn't too late, so I picked up the axe and tried for that elusive Full Combo (100%) on a Guitar Hero song. And you know, I finally hit it. It was on Easy, but still. I'm no Rock God.

I've also Twitter-enabled my XBox, so if you care to follow my goings-on, pick up my Twitter Feed and you'll be notified of my current state.

Board Games on the 360

My current hobbies include 360 gaming, Warcraft, and board games.

When I say "board games", I'm talking about the good stuff. Power Grid, Die Macher, BattleLore, Puerto Rico, Railroad Tycoon, Acquire. I'll pass on Monopoly and Clue, thank you very much.

The reason this is relevant is the plans to bring board games to the 360. On the horizon are Carcassonne, The Settlers of Catan, Alhambra, and Talisman.

This is nothing but good news, and gives me all the more reason to keep the 360 fired up.

A Laptop Worth Loving

Last year, Engadget created a nice XBox 360 laptop, well worth fawning over.

Now it's 2007, and the XBox 360 laptop Mk. 2 is complete and ready to take over the world. Or at least my dreams.

Excuse me while I clean up my drool.

Maybe when my XBox 360 is out of warranty I'll be able to do this mod myself.

Guitar Hero II Pwned

I finished up the first two stages of pwnership of Guitar Hero II last night. Five stars on every song in the Easy career and completion of the Medium career. Whew, those Face-melter songs were beasts, but fun at the same time.

I also tried Surrender on Hard mode, and failed pretty quickly. On a scale of 1-10, I would say that Easy is a 2, Medium is a 4, Hard is a 9, and Expert is an 11. The jump from Medium to Hard is quite pronounced.

Since I'm obviously not up to the task of Hard (without practice), I think my next mission will be getting five stars on every Medium song before progressing.

****

In a bold move, XLBA released two titles yesterday. The old-school Gyruss was the expected release, but I was surprised to get 3D Ultra Minigolf Adventures as well. I gave them both a spin and passed for different reasons.

Gyruss played like a clunky version of Galaga. Minigolf was not too bad, but it was pretty simplistic, and with only four characters to choose from (as well as the $10 price tag), it just wasn't quite enough value for the money in my book. If it had been $5, I may have taken the plunge. Also, the trial version was horribly short - only three playable holes.

****

In surprising news, Katamari Damacy will be coming, and I look forward to trying it out.

Break is OVER!!!

My taxes are finally finished and mailed, my overseas trip is completed, so it's time to get back into it!

First things first... I completed the Old Spice Challenge, earning my gamer badge (as shown on the left), a rank increase, and the XBLA game Contra. Huzzah!

On to other news. I've stagnated a bit on Worms. I like the old-school game quite a bit, but it's not holding up as well as it used to. I did buy Luxor 2 and enjoy it quite a bit. I'm mostly done with the Easy adventure, which I'll finish up before moving on to Medium.

I passed on Boom Boom Rocket. I quite enjoy rhythm games, but this one didn't quite do it for me. I think it's the way the arrows are scattered around the screen without reason that makes it a bit too distracting for me.

What's really blowing my socks off this week is Guitar Hero II. I never played any previous incarnation of this game, but I'm enjoying the hell out of it on the 360. Easy career mode is a bit too easy, but since I want to ease my way into it, that's where I started. I finished that mode quickly enough and moved on to Medium career mode. I'm currently alternating between that and getting 5 stars on every song on the Easy tour. Almost done with both, and I haven't had the game for a week yet.

I must be in the minority opinion with regard to the cost of the GH2 DLC (Downloadable Content). Everyone seems to be up in arms about the price (about $6.25 for 3 songs). When I think about the effort and licensing that must go into each track, I don't think it's too expensive at all. I've bought all of the DLC available for GH2 and I have no doubt that I'll get more when it is released.