Smash Bros Brawl!

It came out today - Super Smash Bros Brawl for the Wii!

Back with the N64, Nintendo released a game called Super Smash Bros. where iconic Nintendo characters battled it out in a fighter game. It was well received by gamers like me, and so they made another one for the Gamecube called Super Smash Bros. Melee, which included a lot more characters, a lot more stages, a couple more game modes, and a huge collection of trophies for the player to collect.

Now, the extremely anticipated Super Smash Bros Brawl finally made it out! I, like the dork that I am and am proud to be, reserved a copy, so I picked it up today and started playing. It is definitely the best version so far, and is pretty much endless.

There are 41 stages - not including stages you can build on your own

35 characters to play, including Sonic, Wario, Snake, among many other veteran fighters and newbies.

Hundreds of trophies and stickers to collect

An adventure mode that takes the better part of 10 hours to complete.

Just endless gaming.

So, anyone who wants to venture over and brawl with me, let me know! My Meta Knight will kick your Meta Knight's ass!


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It's Like Culture Shock, But From Games

I bought the system, along with The Orange Box and Bioshock, which came with a free copy of The Darkness. So being that The Orange Box has 5 games in it, I walked out of the store with 7 games for the price of 2. Sweetness! I then got home and realized that every last one of those 7 games were first person shooters. Funny thing, apart from a couple of James Bond games, I have never really owned any shooter games, mainly because they scare the shit out of me.

First, I played a little bit of Half-Life 2 (a game in The Orange Box). The graphics are amazing in this game! I'm in this city and there's this blue tower that goes up above the clouds, and I zoom in to see that panels of the tower are moving and there are birds flying around it... it looks like I'm watching a real life video of birds flying around a tower. I got a little freaked out by the monsters and so I decided to try another game in The Orange Box called Portal.

Portal is a very fun, puzzle-game. It's a shooter-styled game, but your only weapon creates harmless portals, and the only enemies are androids that sit in one stationary position, so it's not like you could turn around to some scary ass half-dead guy running at you with a knife. There was a funny computerized voice in the game that would tell you about the levels. The only creepy part of the game was towards the end when you were done with the tests and you were trying to escape the building... the computerized voice was eerie with the music. I beat Portal, and now have a goal to get all of the achievements.

That's another super cool thing about Xbox 360 - you create a profile and every game you play there are these things called "achievements" which are tiny goals that you get little badges for. For example, while playing Half-life there's one achievement that you get for obtaining the crowbar - it happens automatically in the story, but they're tiny goals like that, some of which are tedious like Portal's "destroy all 35 video cameras throughout all levels" or they can be fun challenges like Bioshock's "electrocute an enemy who's standing in water." Your profile tracks all of your achievements in one big list for all the games, they're fun side goals.

I started playing Bioshock today, and my god that's a creepy game, but it's very fun. I have only played it for about a half hour, and I already have 4 weapons. The graphics are also amazing in this game, along with a storyline that's extremely intersting - your plan crashes and you find a lighthouse in the middle of the ocean and inside there is a water craft that takes you to an underground city created by a man who wanted to experiment with science without all the hassles of laws, but things went wrong and now these scientific and altered freaks rebelled and you have to help the "good citizens" that remain. I'm sure there's more to it, but so far that's what I've uncovered, lol.

THis is probably a boring blog for most of you, but of all the systems I've owned - which include a lot of systems - I have never had so much fun and been so awed by the graphics in EVERY game within the first day as I have been with the Xbox 360 - I highly recommend it. I can't wait to get an rpg or a puzzle game for it.

Here's a video trailer for Bioshock depicting the city and one of the worst enemies in the game - The Little Sister and The Big Daddy, a small but evil child who is protected by a huge tank of a beast. It also shows how insanely imaginative the weapons are.

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Fast Forward to the Gaming!

Now that I'm living at home, and I don't have too many bills, I have the opportunity of making some nice purchases that I otherwise would have to take weeks saving up for. I got paid yesterday, and it was in my plan today to go out and by an Xbox 360. I'm a gaming guy, I grew up in a neighborhood with no other kids, and while playing house with my sister was fun, I pretty much entertained myself - mostly with video games.

Being more mature, I now have many hobbies such as writing and reading and practicing tap dance that I can do by myself, but I still get the gaming itch every now and then. So, I was going to get up this morning, clean my room, and go buy an Xbox 360 along with The Orange Box set and Bioshock; however, my mood changed a little as I cleaned my room.

I like to clean with background noise/music/movies -- today it was the movie Click which had just arrived yesterday by netflix. There I was thinking, this is the perfect movie to watch while cleaning - it's a happy go lucky comedy with the amazing talents of Christopher Walken, Jennifer Coolidge, The Hoff, among others... how can I go wrong!? Well, let me tell you - this movie is depressing. It has a wonderful moral and in the end you just want to hug every living thing and family member you have, but before you get there you're dragged through the mud on an adventure filled with fun feelings such as loneliness and hopelessness.

I haven't cried cleaning my room since I was seven and in protest of obeying my mother's orders to pick up my mess. These Saturday viewings that bring up unexpected emotions/vomit have to end!

Anyway, now that I've watched the film, I am torn. Do I go buy an Xbox 360 to get instant pleasure that will eventually and rather quickly become outdated by some new gaming system? Or do I put that money towards the future down payment that I'm saving up for? It would be a nice chunk in my savings account, but then again, why should I be in such a hurry to leave? It's one of the morals of the movie to appreciate family and not try to rush through things... I mean, I should at least buy my future plasma flat screen before I move out and have no extra money until I retire! It's only logical. I don't want to be stuck with a super old tv and no Xbox 360 forever!

I think this one is settled. I can buy the gaming system, and if I ever feel bad I just won't play it, and instead I'll spend very good quality time appreciating my family. That sounds like a good plan, Stan! Thank you blog and the movie Click for helping me sort out my priorities!

I found this clip of a casting shoot for an Xbox 360 ad, pun intended... (you can see the finished ad in the clip's menu - it ended up being banned from tv) makes sense... don't worry mom, I'm not going to have these tendencies after playing.


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