Number 4

2 in a row. Im impressed

Number 4. Crash Bandicoot (PSX)
Oh Crash Bandicoot. 32 bit graphics, fruit frenzied marsupials and the most demonic math teacher villain of all time ( I wish my math teacher's name was Dr. Cortex). How we love thee. Once someone tried to convince me of Crash's insignificance because of inferior graphic capability and basic gameplay, but I am convinced to this day that he never actually played the game. The point of crash bandicoot was not to overstep the bounds of modern hardware or break down the walls of innovative story, but to make the most fun game of all time. All. Time.
The first game on the PSX (in this series at least) was the most fulfilling Video Game I have ever experienced. I was 7 years old, which may have contributed to my fanboyism, but I was thoughourly ensconsed in its glory. The first level where you made it through the linearly plotted jungle, over the death pits, and away from the crazy-ass spider-mask enemies, and then had to play the level in reverse to run away from A FUCKING BOULDER! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
-Joe Schmaling, 1999

Thats why Crash Bandicoot is awesome.
Straight up.

Joe

Again, I return.

It feels nice to be the only one who thinks about this thing. Like I'm the only one who still plays PC games.

I think its cause I am.

I never finished my list of games. I really feeel like completing it this week. So here goes, numbers 5 and 4.

Number 5. Starcraft
Starcraft. Starcraft. Starcraft. One may have gotten all the points I'm about to point out from those words. Starcraft is in a league of its own. There is nothing quite like it, nor will there ever be anything as great as your first Zergling rush. No innovative graphics, even for the time, or fancy game mechanics, just an RTS that is so solid most precious stones shit their britches upon its insertion into a CD Drive. Blizzard captured its player with Starcraft and has held them like a vice grip on a scandalous senators scrotum. The intimacy of every detail of the game, including the remarkably cool "new" interactive menus and the tiny blood-splosions on screen when a firebat died, hooked anyone who played it even once. Everquest had nothing on this game. It took a certain type of person to delve deep into the otaku world of everquest. But Starcraft had an allure to not only the hardcore who had been preoccupied with their RA2 rivals and Westwood online scores, but the little'uns like me, at the age of 9, who played this game once at a friends house and now had further reason to force his parents to buy a computer. I played Starcraft more than any game since my debut as a gamer, and this is not time I'll spent by any means.
Starcraft was a gateway game, similar in nature to alcohol or marijuana. It led me to play through the Command and Conquer series, tossed me into Doom, and opened up the doors to every game I've ever played.
Except World of Warcraft. That was just a straight up bad idea.

The Next Generation

So ya. Here goes the next few games in my epic countdown to ultimate electronic epiphany.

Number 6. Battlefield 2 (PC)(PS2 Modern Combat Licks more balls than a Korean working off his immigration Loan)

This game is great, and I don't know why. It has no innovative game aspects. No Fantastic graphics engine. Not even a gravity reversing device (to be announced on LifePatch 1.4.1). But the few things it did do, it worked seamlessly. The experience and unlock system was harsh, but not to the point of frustration and quittingness. It made you strive for it. And enjoy it. And the unlocks that you got. They were the coolest. The first time I went from the M4 to the SCAR-L was the first time I realized that MilSim games could be good (damn you CounterStrike......damn you all to hell). Being Commander was so cool the first time, but got monotonous and boring after the first time. Thats why this game didn't make top 3. All in all, this game is awesome, but not awesome enough to make this veteran critic (hahahaha....you laughed, I know you did) place it with the best.

It has been brought to my attention by one of my cohorts that I am a total retard. I need to re-examine my life. Fuck

HOLY SHIT!! AN UPDATE!!!

YO! THIS BLOG IS MINE BITCH!!!
Seeing as its been somewhere in the range of 6 months since an update, I thought I might pitch in.

Recently, I've been playing a lot of games. Cod2, Bf2 and assorted expansions, some Quake, and various other games (Not all FPS's, those are just the ones I play the most).
This brought me to a thought. I want to compile my top 10 games ever.
So after racking my brain over and over, looking for scraps of long since buried brainwaves, I think Ive done it. Ive played alot of videogames all the way through, including some that my brothers in arms may have never heard of. Surprised at the fact that I could recall 10 games I've played, and order them, I was forced to put the DDR games into an all encompassing entity. They all rock.

So here it is. The story of my Life, in 0's and 1's.

10. Gunstar Heroes (Sega Genesis)
This game is what started getting me up at 5 in the morning so my parents wouldnt know I was on the "Brain-Melting-Apparatus". My brother and I spent more time on this game than we did learning to speak, and subsequently speaking. It was like Contra with a bad attitude. The first few levels where the little 2d 16 bit terror fighting machines boarded the Zeppelin and wreaked havoc on thousands of unsuspecting lackeys in brightly colored armor has stayed with me ever since. I have dreams about them to this day.

9. Doom (PC)
"Joe, what are you doing"
"I'm clearing level 2. With a chainsaw."
Doom was my first PC game, playing it on my best friend Spencer's half-top laptop in 4th grade till 3 in the morning. The epic quest through Mars City with little more than a few meager weapons and a brush clearing device threw my parents for the proverbial loop once they saw their 7 year old impressionable son dismembering a unintelligible aliens on one of those fancy computers. Ever since I've been addicted to FPS's, laying the foundation for my formidable fancy for fragging (+rep Alliteration). I didn't know it at the time, but Doom was the game that made me play James Bond in the backyard in summer, think of escape routes and secret passages to powerups when I was supposed to be taking notes, and insisting that my 5th grade teacher was a martian.

8. Half Life1
Ah....what list can go without Valves single masterpiece that stunned and awed us with the PII power to run such a game. I remember playing HL1 back in 2001 when I met a friend of mine and the Goldsrc engine was still cool. The pants-wetting, sperm killing, gut busting moment when you chose "No" at the end still gets me everytime I go on a nostalgic trip (on someone elses steam account. Why buy it?) back to the world of Black Mesa. I, to this day, continue to create conspiracy theories about the origins of the G Man, if we really were on Xen or just an orbital moon, and things that only the criminally insane or sex-starved brilliant could create.

7. Half Life2
I know no one liked it better. I did. The introduction of a sudden Nazi-esque force about which you knew absolutely nothing other than their child hood-bullyish obsession with ominous fear (Pick up that can) and fetish for microsoft error sounds eminating from one hell of an architectural masterpiece made the game every bit as good as its 32 bit prequel. The graphics became a key part of the gameplay, which is what jerked me into Next-gen gaming and set my psyche up for a head first dive into the technological future of video games.

Thats it for tonight, More on this later.
Does that make this the longest post? +pity No Life

Oh no, It's a start-up D&D blog so that I don't have to waste space here.

Yup.
That's right.
Masterwork Gaming, Inc. FTW.
-Xanth out

Quake Wars. Sadly no, not that one.

As a deathmatch fanatic it has come to my attention that Quake 4 SUCKED! It was like taking Quake 3 (best deathmatch game/tied with UT) and shoving the Doom 3 engine up its asshole. Then adding a bunch of unnecessary crap that destroyed the game's sweet "Bare-bones" fragfest feel. Plus I think renaming the Plasma Gun the "Hyper Blaster" was really kinda dumb.

Anyone else smell pancakes?

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Not Trying to exclude/jepordize any non-local, non-d&d fanbase

How's This Friday For you all?
2:30 at the earliest?
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