Being one of those people that play the “Microsofts rat race game at signing up for the new updates before everyone else”, my review on the fall 2009 update is as followed. There really are only 4 obvious new updates to the dashboard since we’ve already received the larger update prior.

Facebook
The mother of bulkiness and redundant features. I know the whole social networking phase is still pretty popular and everyone is all over it but I do think that Microsoft spent too much time programming this section whereas they should have focused more on the Last.FM section, where it is strongly needed.

There is a new blade for each persons status, mimicing the NXE style, as you will see in the images to follow. This makes the section seem quite big. It would have been a better idea to make each blade belong to one person with their wall posts included, considering most people have 50+ friends on facebook to begin with. I assume our friends list on facebook will eventually grow since we’ll be able to find our xbox mates on there as well. Since they’ve programmed it this bulky blade way (which is aethetically, very nice), they’ve excluded one main feature; viewing a friends wall and making a wall post.

After using facebook for many years, we all know that there are many of our friends that never update their status but we still post on our wall. It seems a little ridiculous that this feature has been left out complete. We are able to view our friends profiles, their status and even their photos but no option to leave messages on their wall. I know the facebook module is a work in process but surely they could have cut down on some other section, simplified facebook a little, like they have done with twitter, and given us one of the core features.

Twitter
This has to be the addition I’m most happy with since it basically includes most of the same features you recieve when you login to twitter on your computer. I’ve loved twitter for a while and now that I’ve got it on my xbox, I couldn’t be happier! One nice addition would be to allow us to update our twitter account through the guide, instead of makin us go through the dashboard. Even if you don’t allow us to view our twitter feed, at least let us update through the guide! It’s a simple application that we could get a lot of use out of.

Last.FM
I started using Last.FM about 3 years ago and thought it was a great audio scobbler. I loved how it would record how many times I listen to certain bands/songs, especially since I’ve always been guilty of reformatting my computer a handful of times every year and itunes resets the song count. So that is all I’ve ever used it for. Nothing more.

When it comes to the suggestion of new bands/music, I most definately prefer Pandora (U.S.A based only) and their gnome system. Even though Pandora has transformed into a paid service a few months back, I still prefer it much more over Last.FM. My main reason for saying that is that their programming to recognize the bands I really enjoy through the songs I’ve favoured is a huge plus. This is what Last.fm is lacking. When I start a new station based on a band and I get to hear the actual band play only a couple of times over a period of a few hours, it makes me doubt the system. Even when I’ve favoured a few songs within the station, I still barely get to hear them and continue getting more different selections.

The next problem with the Last.FM addition is, I can’t play my set stations while I’m gaming! I don’t know what they were thinking when they didn’t program it so we could listening to music while doing other stuff on my xbox. Music is something we all have on IN THE BACKGROUND, what was Microsoft thinking when they thought we’d only be interested in listening to music throught the Last.FM screen? Though it is useful when I’m cleaning the house!

The last problem I’ve noticed is, they should give us the option to display what band & song we’re playing while other’s view our profile. They’ve included this for Netflix and we have it while we’re on our computer using MSN Messenger. It should be known that we expect this feature! And no, I have no problem letting people see that i’m listening to some more emo music!

The positive side to Last.FM is the quality of music is crisp and I’ve seldom noticed songs being jumpy. There is a small tool bar for the song being played which scrolls the band name as well. It’s a decent size and would be superb if they implemented that to be visible ontop of whatever game we choose to play, or include it within the guide.

Overall, this can turn out to be a gamers dream component if they make some more adjustments.

Zune
I’ve got the least experiance with the Zune’s full functions since I’m an iPod gal (though that’s all I’ll limit myself to purchase from Apple). Zune section has replaced the movie section completely but the best part of this is they finally have given us the option to search for movies/tv shows by typing the name, instead of making me search manually.

Even though we can download full movies for a wooping 1200 MSP (SD), I doubt I’d EVER pay that much for a movie when I’d prefer a hard copy of it on DVD and save the room on my HD for game and not add to clutter. I’m pretty sure most people will agree with me there, unless they can offer us a really good deal on downloading them instead of going to a retail store. Some movies cost 1200 MSP (SD) to rent while others you can buy for the same amount. Not sure if this is a glitch yet. There is also no option to download music in mp3 format at this time.

(Images courtesy of gearlive.com)

Yesterday, Daniel Benmergui released Today I Die. Today, I spent a few minutes (okay, maybe a few hours) swimming around in his simple yet beautiful little world, trying to find all of the hidden secrets.

At first glance, it’s a rather depressing scene, marked by an equally depressing poem. But much like the real world, Benmergui’s little ocean in Today I Die is changeable, and capable of finding beauty.

The game’s biggest strength is its simplistic design and curiosity-provoking interface. There isn’t too much going on at any given moment, but that’s a good thing, because you can play around with what’s in front of you, and learn how the funny little world works.

Today I Die also wins points for being beautiful, in that artsy, abstract sort of way. The game art is so simple that it’s undistracting (and, let’s be honest, I have a weak spot for pixelated art), and the piano soundtrack is just plain lovely.

It’s worth multiple playthroughs just to see how the ending changes, and once you’ve got the hang of things, the game only takes a few minutes to complete. Without spoiling too much, I’ll say that both endings (that I’ve found, at least…is there a third?) are very satisfying, albeit in completely different ways. The story is very dreamlike and fanciful, and watching how it evolves is a treat — especially because it’s up to the player to determine the progression of the poem.

Seems pretty fabulous, right? It is, but there’s one major feature that poses a gigantic roadblock for players with limited patience: there aren’t any directions. If you’re curious by nature, that’s not a problem, but a design like this has the potential to be incredibly frustrating. Frankly, if I weren’t so stubborn, I might have closed the window without getting past the first iteration of the poem, and that would have been sad.

There are also some definite timesinks, perhaps intentionally placed, that do not contribute at all to the story’s progression. I spent quite a lot of time feeding jellyfish to the piranhas before I realized that they would just keep spawning, and that I was focused on the wrong thing.

I haven’t decided whether this is truly a negative point, but it’s something that sticks out to me: I have not yet figured out how to “lose” the game. Despite the title, it appears that the girl does not ever actually die, and that lovely piano soundtrack will just keep looping until one figures out how to complete the game or gives up in frustration.

Moral of the story: art is sometimes confusing, and the world doesn’t always come with directions, but despite all of this, it’s an interesting ride.

Play Today I Die here. At the moment, it’s hosted ad-free, thanks to a generous donor (unusual individual, as the site claims).

On a recent trip up to Chicago, I attended an event called “A Girlfriend’s Guide to Gaming” — a sweet little cocktail soirée aimed at twentysomething women and introducing them to the Nintendo brand.

Champagne + snacks + Wii + DS sounds like a fabulous time for me, but many of the other ladies in attendance (1) weren’t familiar with the Nintendo brand and (2) weren’t interested in gaming. And some of them still weren’t at the end of the night.

Obviously, the disconnect between girls and gaming is something that marketing people have been studying for quite some time, but I wonder what’s so different between gamer girls and our non-gaming peers?

Let’s break things down into the fundamental reasons women might say they’re “just not that into” games. I snagged these basic categories from the marketing types at that event, although this list is by no means a complete profile of non-gamer girls. I’ll throw my initial responses in, but I’d love to see where this goes in the comments.

Don’t have time.
Gaming can be time-consuming. It’s extraordinarily easy to lose track of five or six hours while you level grind/build a franchise/work your way through a story. And who are we to tell anyone how to spend their time?

Okay, so maybe some of us spend more hours every week playing games than we do sleeping, but shopaholics spend tons of time in their favorite stores, and foodies devote many hours to tasty treats — people make time for things that are important to them.

It’s a given that gaming isn’t going to be a priority activity for everyone. But what about those minutes and hours when there’s nothing to do? Like train commutes, bus rides, long lines, waiting rooms? Perfect gaming opportunities. Handheld and mobile games are still real games, after all. Bonus: you can play video games on the train or in waiting rooms; you can’t shop or eat.

Aren’t familiar with gaming systems/games.
Shocking as it may be to those of us who grew up with a controller fused to our hands, there are plenty of women who do not have a clue what FPS and RPG stand for. They can’t tell the difference between a PSP and a DS (is that a portable DVD player?), and Halo is an accessory for angels.

Something drew us into gaming. I’m sure it was something different for all of us — maybe we grew up alongside the industry and had consoles during every generation, maybe we played pen and paper games and video games were a natural next step, maybe we had boyfriends who were really into World of Warcraft — but there was some thing that brought us into gaming culture, and there was a reason we stayed.

Guitar Hero, Wii Fit, and the like are definitely a great step towards bringing more women into the market. They truly invite participation in a way that many other console and PC games aren’t able to do. Casual games like Bejeweled and TextTwist are doing a great job of capturing women’s attention, even if they’re not as “hardcore” as most retail games. There’s still room for growth, but I think it’s key that women can find at least one game that resonates with them. After all, the girl who tries out Mario Kart might decide to check out Wii Sports. And after that? Maybe she’ll be picking up a copy of Madden.

Don’t think it’s fun.
Shooters, sports, and sci-fi/fantasy (and action/adventure, strategy, sim, etc.) really deliver on fun for hardcore gamers, but they’re not necessarily interesting or fun to girls who aren’t already into gaming. And besides that, there’s still a very present “nerd culture” that surrounds games.

Breaking the “fun” barrier is tough, because you really just can’t educate someone in regards to what they will or will not enjoy. It’s doubly difficult if they have preconceived ideas that something will not be fun. I think the solution here is similar to what I said above regarding casual games and music games. In order to dispel the “games are for nerds” idea, girls have to encounter a game that they enjoy. Maybe they have to play a game without realizing – per se – that they’re gaming, to break that stigma.

So, gamer girls: what are your thoughts on the disconnect? Non-gamer girls: is there something I’m missing, or do you have a different take on why you’re  just not that into games?

“Halo! Its divine wind will rush through the stars, propelling all who are worthy along the path to salvation!”

Ten years ago a relatively unknown game developer announced its next project, Halo, a real-time strategy game for the Apple Macintosh platform. Soon after this, the company was acquired by Microsoft and became part of the Microsoft Game Division under the name, Bungie Studios. 2001 saw the release of the Xbox and along with it the flagship game, Halo: Combat Evolved, one of history’s finest first-person action games which went on to be a critically acclaimed hit, earning its place in the FPS hall of fame and creating a truly fantastic franchise; one which we all know and love.

Now this is all well and good, but surely this wasn’t the RTS that Bungie had in mind when Halo was announced was it? That’s rights kids you’ve guessed it; Halo: Combat Evolved was not released as a RTS; instead it went through several iterations before finally arriving at the console first person shooter for which it is today recognised. Bungie felt that a RTS would be a waste of Halo’s intricate storyline and a FPS would be far more interactive for the player.

Okay, enough of the history lesson, fast forward to the present, the year is 2009, and expectations are high as we are about to embark on yet another euphoric journey into the Halo universe. This time in the originally intended format of an RTS, courtesy of the late Ensemble Studios, ladies and gentlemen I come tonight to bring you, Halo Wars.

Woah, woah hold on a second! ’A Halo game not developed by Bungie, I have a bad feeling about this.’ Indeed the concept is hard to grasp and although the boys at Bungie have helped Ensemble with getting a ‘general feel’ for the Halo Universe they have had very little significant involvement in the making of Halo Wars. During the long wait for the demo to download I began to grow sceptical, asking myself, ”Surely a lack of Bungie colouring will denote failure for a Halo game?” However after but a few minutes on Halo Wars all my doubts were quickly cast aside as I revelled in the greatness of the first true console RTS. Obviously Halo Wars is not the first RTS to be played on a console, as on the Xbox 36o alone we have had LOTR BFME II, C&C3 and Supreme Commander to name but a few. The only difference between these and Halo Wars is that the latter is as yet the only RTS to be developed solely for console gaming; all the others are formatted PC versions. Ensemble, best and only known for bringing us Age of Empires can be seen in my opinion as bit of a ‘One Trick Pony,’ however despite Ensemble’s over-experience on the PC, Halo Wars has shown me that this pony had a few more tricks up its sleeve.

I won’t bore you with the Halo storyline, but as far as game play goes this RTS is hard to fault and the graphics ain’t too bad either. Both the Covenant and the UNSC field full and diverse armies featuring all the familiar units from the trilogy and many more. From the Honour Guards of High Charity to the Marines of New Mombasa, the attention to detail and their overall resemblance to their original trilogy brothers is uncanny. The game features a UNSC Campaign and online multiplayer mode  fit for no less than 6 players at once, not to mention co-op capability in the campaign. Although there are only two playable factions, the choice of specific commander enables the player to utilize special abilities respective to their choice, so two Covenant armies could play off very different strengths. At first, I thought this abit lazy on Ensemble’s part, (especially the inability to play as the Flood) however the commander choice adds internal diversity never before seen by mine eyes.

To conclude, Halo Wars feels and plays right and is fairly balanced; obviously if you are neither a fan of Halo nor RTS then this game is clearly not for you. For everyone else this could be seen as a ‘must buy,’ but don’t take my word for it, instead download the demo and have a dabble. Halo Wars is actually released to the Britons on the 27th February, a furious four days before the American get it, HUZZAH! So from now untill then, enjoy the demo.

I’m a civilization/strategy game junkie. The kind that picked up the Settlers of Catan card game just to see if it was even close to the genius of the original board game. It’s quite possible that I have unlimited patience, because I will unblinkingly devote hours and hours to resource gathering and construction, even if I know I’ll never see the fruits of battle. So while I was waiting for the beta of Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War to download, I decided to give A Kingdom For Keflings a shot. I might have spent the next 6 hours on the game and forgotten about my download, but that’s not the point.

NinjaBee didn’t exactly make the game to end all games here, but it is good for a wee bit of fun (pun totally intended).

It’s an 800-point download on the XBOX Live Arcade. That means it’ll set you back 10 bucks — not too shabby.

Bonus throwback moment: it occurred to me that A Kingdom For Keflings is like a shiny new version of a game I played until the disc didn’t work anymore called Serf City: Life is Feudal. There’s just something very satisfying about lording over a village of wee, medieval-ish people who like to build stuff.

Remember that XBOX Live avatar you made when NXE debuted? You get to use it in this game, in Gulliver form. I’m a fan, because while I enjoy lording over my strategy-game minions as an unseen omnipotent force, it’s even cooler when it’s me lording over my minions. In a sundress and yellow heels.

Standard sim/civ protocol follows — collect resources, use resources to make buildings, get upgrades, lather, rinse, repeat. Oh yeah, and you can punt the Keflings.

Cutesy medieval strategy games have evolved since the days of Serf City, and the little Keflings are fairly advanced. Well, for minions, at least. Not only do they happily harvest wood, rocks, crystals, and wool, but they can be trained to transport it to the location of your choosing. In addition to gathering and transporting, the Keflings can be educated and trained to do a variety of jobs. One lucky dude gets to be the Mayor/Lord/King (appropriately enough, he gets the job before the school is built, so the Keflings’ representative leader is the least educated of the entire population).

Keflings themselves are the scarcest resource. Once you start to slot them into artisan jobs, you’ll notice that your supply of human capital is dwindling fast. In order to breed more peons, you need to find the elusive Love. How a propos.

Obviously, there are buildings. The game follows a pretty standard system of requiring certain basic structures before upgrades appear (I mean, really, would you invest that much time in a game where you could build the Big Important Castle at the beginning?). Resources are used to make these buildings, sometimes in simple raw form (logs, rocks, crystals, wool), and later in advanced (wood planks, cut stone, magic gems, cloth) and civilized (carved wood, brick, magic dust, silk) forms.

There’s a blueprint to unlock for every building in the game. Each building is comprised of several components, which may or may not be made in the same workshop (hint: keep your workshops easily accessible), and isn’t finished until all of the pieces are laid out according to the blueprint. Fair enough.

Whew! So there’s a lot going on for a simple, cartoony XLA game. Let’s break it down:

Obviously, I’m a fan of the integration of the XBOX Live avatar. The devs figured out how to make use of that thing without it being too cheesy. Plus, it’s kinda cute that the avatar is a giant.

The blueprint building system adds a second process beyond just gathering the right number of resources and clicking “go.” I like this, it keeps me interested and makes me pay attention instead of just mindlessly clicking. This is probably 75% of the reason I got sucked into the game.

Bonus for the architecturally-challenged: once you’ve laid down the first building tile, a little blue box shows up to tell you where the next piece goes.

Plus, there’s a little something for the world-creation geeks: the game actually encourages you to be creative with construction. Once you’ve played it once-through to unlock all of the blueprints (or given up before that, whatever), have a little fun with your kingdom layout. I’m a little bit in love with the game devs for suggesting things like making a maze for the Keflings or a football field.

The Keflings aren’t rocket scientists, they’re just minions, so if you don’t choose a location for resource drop-off or allocate the Keflings to new jobs, they’ll pull a Sorcerer’s Apprentice on you and just. keep. going. Check back later, and you’ll notice a pile of 300+ crystals in the middle of a field…great.

I haven’t run into any situations where I depleted any of the resources yet, but that’s just wasteful. I totally get that part of the strategy is to effectively manage the human (Kefling) capital, but I would love the ability to set limits on how much each Kefling mines.

Multiplayer gameplay is…kind of blah. There aren’t many built-in features to make this mode easier, and there just aren’t many multiplayer-specific features in general. One thing I was totally wishing for was a set of already-unlocked blueprints –  is it really necessary to rebuild an entire kingdom from scratch during a casual game? It’s also super easy for malicious players to enter games, vandalize a bunch of buildings, and disappear.

Not-so-bonus for the spatially-challenged: if you put important buildings (like workshops) in awkward places (like right near a sheep farm), you will have a world of trouble getting things done. In some games, city planning is not such a big deal, but in this one, it really is. Fortunately, you can demolish and relocate badly-placed structures, but it’s a terrible habit to get into.

Moral of the (admittedly, way long) story: It’s a light, cutesy game that still satisfies as a civilization/sim game. Absolutely worth the 10 bucks, and without a doubt my favorite of the XBOX Live Arcade offerings. And did I mention that you get an achievement for punting the Keflings?

A week ago a mate of mine told me I needed to check out that weeks XLA release called, The Maw. Even though I only saw a short clip about it in the the Dashboard (which I don’t think did the game any justice), I brought it without bothering with the demo (which I almost always do bother with. I tend to wait for the demo to tell me I could have unlocked an achievement, before I cave in).

In The Maw, you play as an alien character named Frank. Frank has a pet named The Maw which can attach to a plasma leash when Frank wants to control him. The Maw basically eats anything and everything in it’s way. As this little gluttonous blob continues eating, it grows in size. He does have numerous options to pertain some abilities from the animals or items he consumes.


The gameplay and cut-scenes are all in 3D. It was nice to be able to explore each stage in an innovative new way after the Maw evolves with some new trait.  The colour scheme was vibrant. Your tasks are straight forward and simple. You never die in the game, similar to the Lego games. The transformation reminded me a lot of Kameo.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, I strongly suggest you at least try the demo. It’s probably one of the best XLA games I’ve played in a long time. Make sure you let The Maw burn his mouth in the first stage and leave your controller idle for a few moments so he can give you evils.

The huge, and I mean HUGE downfall of this game is that the game is extremely short. I managed to finish it after playing for about 4 hours. When it was all over, I wanted MORE!!! I wasn’t bothered that it was a single player game, due to the length. On the plus side, we’ll soon have some new DLC that will cost 100 MS points per level.

Fallout 3,

I honestly do not know where to start with this letter. We have known each other for such a short time,  but it has felt like you have been a part of me for so much longer. You have shown me so many things in the last few months, things I had never thought possible and I am so very grateful to have you in my life. For once, I am finally able to be myself around someone and for that I can never thank you enough. Who else could I run around all day with killing Molerats with a plank of wood without being mocked? Even when I bludgeon helpless Wastelanders to death, you are there my love, watching their heads roll alongside me. We were meant to be Fallout 3!

In the 99 days that we have been together, we have been through so much. I cannot begin to describe the fear I felt when that Behemoth suddenly decided it wanted to tear us apart (literally), but you pulled out your Chinese Assault Rifle and you sure did own that son of a bitch! I jumped with joy when that beast fell to the ground as dead as my sex life will be once my partner realises how much of a nerd I am.

Do you remember that time we blew Megaton to smithereens? Oh how we laughed! And that young lady who kept flirting with you and asking you to help her with her silly little “research”? Well, I’m glad she isn’t much of a challenge for me now.

Oh Fallout 3, what ever would I do with out you? The many hours we have shared, stealing bottles of Nuka Cola, out running Deathclaws and trying to work out how to maim those little brats who insist in calling us “mungos”. I truly cannot remember what my days were spent doing before you burst onto the scene in a blaze of 1940s classics.

And how you have made everything so much more easier for me! Never in my 20yrs on this earth would I ever think of saying that all my problems could be solved with one simply system – V.A.T.S. What you have brought into my life is a button press away from pure bliss. I feel like the luckiest lady in the world Fallout 3, and my eyes twinkle with delight when I see your face getting covered in blood, eye balls and splinters of bone.

My life now holds new meaning with you in it and my heart leaps in my chest every time you whip your Pipboy out for me to play with. I know we had problems at first when I found it difficult to navigate properly, but you were very patient with me and slowly I grew to learn how to handle your Pipboy correctly and it only made our bond stronger!

I will hold you close to my heart Fallout 3, even when your DLC comes to me on the 27th of this month and we end our time together before your successor sweeps me from my feet. Your achievement points will be the sign of our perfect time together, I will never forget how you have changed my life.

All my love,
Elysium

I recently came across an updated list (12/08/2008) of the Top Offensive Games of 2007/2008 done by The Timothy Plan. While I applaud attempts by parents to raise their children right and be informed regarding which games to allow them to play, gamers and their games have a history of being publicly maligned and attacked by political and social groups with a great amount of misinformation involved (Case in point, the Fox News/Mass Effect debacle). This list is no different, it is almost an amusing read. The fallacies range from the downright ridiculous to the blatantly false. Here is a list of some of the things that caught my eye, but feel free to add your own!

STD’s in Fallout 3? I spent a heck of a lot of hours in this game, never came across this. Also, it is pointed out that you can wear a nightgown, one that, by the way, covers more of a girl than most sundresses or tank/shorts combos I see girls wearing just about every day in public.

Homosexual themes in Army of Two? Come on, this is certainly never overtly suggested, though anyone can “read” this kind of theme in just about anything, if they are paranoid and homophobic enough. That reminds me, they have homosexuality as a separate category from sexual references, which seems a bit overkill (I’d bring up homophobic as well, but that was already mentioned).

Sex used as a weapon in Crackdown? This just made me giggle. WHERE do they come up with this stuff? Will they never realize hyperbole gets them nowhere?

Name calling guys a “girl” in Bully? I’m sorry but kids have been doing this one since before video games were even invented.

Age of Conan is addictive? Bwahahahaha! Ahem *cough* sorry.

Mass Effect and Gears of War 2 are apparently FPS? I hate to be picky, but if THEY are going to be so ridiculous in their attempts to find each and every small point that might be even a teeny bit offensive to Christian extremists, then they should at least make an attempt to label the games right.

Hellgate: London features the word “hell.” OMG no way?!? These guys are really on the ball here!

A while back I made a post about an online animation service called GoAnimate. Recently one of my mates on xbox, AlmightySeraph, told me that he entered a contest on their site and came in first place. So I’d like to share the good news and the clip that won it for him.