Video Games Have Taken Over My Life

Video Games are my new movies.

Okay, so that isn’t very accurate, considering I’m still watching a lot of movies (although I’m catching up on a lot television these days) but video games are finding a new renaissance with me. I posted about that a could of months ago, but it’s even more true now. I’m back to my old ways, of playing through 3 or 4 games at a time instead of concentrating on just one.

Back in the Gamecube/Xbox days, when my interest waned for the first time since picking up a NES, I would buy the big, big games and play through them, only to shelve the system for another 4 or 5 months. What I didn’t realize was that I was missing out on a lot of gaming greatness. 2006 recaptured my youth and with the help of Laura on the RPG’s, we managed to conquer the following games:

Dragon Quest 8
Final Fantasy 12
X-Men Legends 2
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance
Justice League Heroes
Kingdom Hearts 2 (well, most of it)

It’s not that impressive of a list, but considering that the only game I played and beat in 2005 was Katamari Damancy, which took about 2 hours, this is a pretty impressive list. And that’s not including the games we just played, like Wii Sports, Excite Truck, Guitar Hero 1 & 2, Kareoke Revolution and much, much more. Yup, gaming is back.

Right now I’m still finishing up Zelda (at the Sky Temple), while I’ve just delved into Phantasy Star 4 from the Sega Genesis Years. The Sega Classic Collection is quite possible the coolest damn thing to come out last year and I’m enjoying playing all the games I never tackled, being a SNES kid.

And let’s not forget that Laura’s brother has a Xbox 360, which we’ve spent time playing on-line Gears of Wars (the people on there are a bunch of losers) and games like Dead Rising. …

On the movie front, I’ve been keeping busy so I’ve got a few movies to report on –

Music & Lyrics – For my money, the best movie of 2007 so far. Hugh Grant as charming as always and the 80s pop music and dance moves were hilarious. Drew Barrymore had great chemistry with Grant and the movie was pretty damn funny. The Cora character, who was a mix of Britney, Christina, Shakira and all those other crappy pop chicks was on the money. Great flick that you should definitely check out.

Epic Movie – Was such a pile of crap, I can’t believe anybody went to see it. Shame on me, I know.

Catch and Release – Great to see Kevin Smith actually acting in a movie. He’s underrated and could be a great supporting comic character in any movie of this sort. Jennifer Garner is great to watch on screen but the flick was a bit on the slow side for what it was trying to do.

Night at the Museum – Laura and I caught this right at the end of
December as she didn’t feel like watching Rocky Balboa in the theatre. I must say, we were both pleasantly surprised and actually shocked at all the negative reviews. Night at the Museum is a popcorn comedy that doesn’t try to do anything special and doesn’t have to. The display’s coming to life sell the movie in itself and Ben Stiller is terrific in the title role. Check it out on DVD when it lands later this year.