On Black Friday, my husband and I purchased a second Xbox One. We weren’t initially going to do that, but we had reached a tipping point between the cost analysis (it’s expensive and we’re just two people) versus the games that we wanted to play together, namely Halo 5 and, in 2016, the new Crackdown. Our discussions were long. We ended up making lists of games that could be played co-op and on...
There are some years where I feel like I have missed out, that I have spent too much time in the clutches of one game, only to realize as Christmas passes that I really, REALLY, should have picked up some other titles. At the start of this year, I wouldn’t have pictured myself in that situation. When my husband would turn to me and ask, “What’s next?” I would shrug my shoulders and go “I dunno,...
As a stalwart lover of all things Diablo, today is a weird day. It seems like the news coming out of Activision Blizzard as we near Blizzcon 2015, which runs from November 6th through November 7th, has become a deluge. Just yesterday, Austin wrote an article about Activision Blizzard acquiring King, the developers of the devilishly addictive and mind-numbingly successful mobile game, Candy Crus...
I am a sucker for loot driven games. Ever since I first installed the original Diablo, I’ve been trying to find new and fun ways to accumulate new and better gear. In Western RPGS like Oblivion or Skyrim, I end up spending hours upon hours searching every shelf and chest in every house and cave for unique weapons and armor. If it has a special name and skin, I desperately want it. It doesn’t ma...
These past few weeks have been rough. People are tired, frustrated and emotions are raw. That’s all I will say about that. This piece isn’t about what is bad or frustrating about games, but instead about what is so very good. It’s about the ways we find friends and keep them, how memories are formed and treasured when we play games, and how our lives can become so much richer when we play. When...
Sometimes when I play a game, I don’t end up thinking about the game when I am done. I end up dwelling on things I’ve read or seen before. A game, or more accurately a demo, that was very effective in doing just that recently was P.T. Unless you’ve been living in a cave with no internet connection, you’ve probably already heard about this”playable teaser” and how it’s just a very clever and fri...
Diablo III is a game that has become one of my favorite ways to waste time. Along with Marvel Heroes, a similar entry into the ARPG category, I find myself going back frequently to kill more monsters and accrue newer and better loot. While Marvel Heroes pushes me to try new characters, I tend to stick with my best character in Diablo III. She is a Demon Hunter named Erin, and she is one awesome...
Mass Effect 3 was an awesome game. We can all debate the merits of the ending, but when I played the final minutes, I thought it was a successful finale to a great series. Characters that we had grown to love were given satisfying arcs and Commander Shepard saved the galaxy from the Reaper threat. All in all, it went pretty much as I had expected it would, and I was content. Thank you for summi...
“What’s your favorite game?” That question, whether asked in a face-to-face encounter, or online in a forum thread, is a constant in the lives of people who play video games. We judge each other based on what games we say we love. We praise people we agree with and ignore or admonish those who don’t share our opinion. Sometimes we even get into the really interesting bits, the reasons why peopl...
Yesterday I tried out Microsoft Game Room. I fooled around in my arcade, decorated a few rooms, and then I went straight into demoing about a third of the games offered. Out of all the games I tried, I only found one that I would spend my space bucks on, and that game was Crystal Castles. I really enjoyed how fast the game was without being completely incomprehensible or utterly cheap. I actual...