As I near the finish of my week long series spotlighting my top five console games of all time, I’m struck by the realization that while my number one remains the end all, be all of the list, the other selections really jockey for position in terms of what number they fall on. Essentially, numbers five through two share two characteristics in common:

1. They’re beloved titles I could play and replay endlessly, and
2. They’re not number one.

With a shout out to Highlander, “There can be only one.”

( read more… )

Three down; two to go. Bear in mind, this list focused on my top five favorite console games. At some point, I’ll offer up my favorite PC-based entertainments.

But, at heart, I’m a console kid. I was reared on the Atari 2600, and the Nintendo Entertainment System helped melt four years of high school. It was on the NES that I began to witness this medium’s ability to tell a story. While so many titles followed the familiar “Save the Princess” narrative, some brave titles took stabs at displacing celluloid as the parchment for inking a good yarn. Of note, the Ninja Gaiden series and Bionic Commando made impressive use of their primitive tools.

That’s why it was incredibly rewarding to witness technology catch up to the demands of Hideo Kojima’s vision for the Metal Gear series.

Without further adieu, here’s number two:

( read more… )

Here we are at the series mid-point. So far, the titles I’ve selected have been fairly popular upon their release. No real surprises in the bunch. While I’m tempted to raid the vaults and come up with some obscure indie release to properly display my street cred, I find that in selecting my top five favorites, I have to be true to my heart. I discovered these games upon their initial release and fell hard for each one. While they all went on to enjoy varying degrees of success, their popularity doesn’t diminish their appeal. They got popular for a reason.

Today’s selection spotlights the first in a series that experienced the peaks and valleys of too much exposure. Here’s a title that blasted out of nowhere, gave gaming a new cover girl and eventually slid in disrepair. While we’re beginning to see a renaissance for this property, nothing can diminish the real pleasures provided by that initial title. Sure, it hasn’t aged well, but if we do the time warp back to 1996, this was as good as it got.

Without further adieu, I present number three:

( read more… )

Yesterday, I launched my week long feature focusing on my top five favorite console games of all time with my number five selection — Shadow of the Colossus for the PS2. With today’s selection, a theme is beginning to reveal itself: it appears I’m a sucker for exploration. I like being placed in an “alien” environ and then being tasked with making sense of how that unique world works.

Therefore, today’s selection isn’t much of a stretch from my number five choice. Once again, I’ve fallen in love with a game that dropped me in the midst of an organic environment and charged me with making it from Point A to Point B using equal parts brains and brawn.

Without further adieu, I present to you number four:

( read more… )

No matter how old I get, I can’t shake this gaming jones. Of course, as the calendar pages fly and the responsibilities mount, I find I have much less time for gaming than I once did. Still, I refuse to surrender it completely. So, like many people, I find time to insert my pastime into the crowded confines of my busy schedule. And I find that most days, when the house grows still and bedtime is close at hand, I’ll fire up a game versus mindless channel surfing to unwind. My wife finds that action incredibly ironic, as she feels her tension level rise when she plays, but I’m just the opposite. Saving the universe seems much less taxing than filing a TPS report or obtaining requisition authorization for a new frame relay.
( read more… )

I have a sore spot in my soul for Electronic Arts. Not because of money ill spent or lackluster titles, but because I remember Bullfrog Productions. Bullfrog was the British developer for such ground breaking titles as Populous, Dungeon Keeper, and Syndicate. Those of you who remember will smile as I do when I think back to hours spent sending floods against the worshipers of the opposing deity or of training and disciplining the creatures of my dungeon. The programmers at Bullfrog had a certain synthesis of programming expertise and designing savvy. A generation of gamers on both PC and consoles, whether they know it or not, were influenced by the design decisions of these clever folks.

( read more… )

For my inaugural Blog post, I thought I’d bring you all up to speed on who I am and what I’m about.

Let’s start here.

I’m a man of many identities. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m no Sybil. But over the course of my life, I’ve been on the receiving end of my fair share of nicknames.

( read more… )

Ryan’s Playstation 2 died this past week. The cause of death remains unknown pending an autopsy, but it’s speculated that internal failure caused by an accumulation of dust is the main factor of its untimely demise. It was seven years old. Ryan’s PS2 is survived by a collection of 32 titles, two sibling PS2′s and one significant other, an HDD. Ryan’s PS2 described his life partner as “always being a pain in his ass.”

I’m going to miss that big, black box of love. I was only 15-years-old when the PS2 launched in October of 2000, so as you can imagine, it was a little tough scrounging together almost 1,000 dollars to splurge on the launch.

( read more… )

Let me preface this blog by thanking MobyGames for all of their high quality screenshots of classic games. Without their hard work and their kind permission to repost the screenshots in question, this post would not have been possible. Thanks a million!

Regulars here at Avault will have recently seen my review of Crysis and the very specific warnings I related about the game’s stiff system requirements. While there’s no denying that trend in PC gaming is always toward programs that utilize more and more processing power, memory and storage space, Crysis bore special mention because its requirements are beyond even those of its contemporaries, in some cases significantly higher. For many hardcore gamers, whose systems easily exceed the minimum requirements for Crysis, I’m betting my warning was merely seen as a justification for their extremely high end systems and then ignored. In fact, I’d be disappointed if anyone with a top of the line Alienware system felt intimidated by my statements.

( read more… )

Let’s talk about God for a moment, shall we? Not an impossibly enormous bearded man resting on an opulent throne deciding the fates of countless galaxies and their inhabitants, but rather man’s mission to emulate God.

Populous, Sim City, Black & White – it’s all laid out in front of you. Build, destroy, cause a life-ending earthquake and then build a new baseball stadium to mend the wounds. These forefathers of the Simulated Holy Father allowed us to operate as lord of the land, but only within the confines of the earthbound plane.  When you compare that to what’s ahead, these classics barely scratched the paint when it comes to fabricated flexibility.

( read more… )

First, before the egg nog goes to my head, I’d like to congratulate our chief editor, David Laprad, on his upcoming wedding this month. And ask the question, who gets married over Christmas? He may think that he’s going to save on the gift giving, but as the only woman on staff, I must warn him and any of you that might consider it, you can’t count something as both a Christmas and an anniversary gift. She’ll smile, and “say” it’s okay, but she’ll never admit it to her mother.

( read more… )

I’ll be the first to admit I’m ignorant when it comes to storylines that deal with the sciences, resonance cascades (which I do know are fictional) or anything technical. My fortes are writing, sex and eating chicken, and as I’m sure you might be able to tell, I’m not too great at those things either. However, despite my disdain for all things involving critical thinking and intellect, I was deeply engrossed in the world of Half-Life 2. I’ll be bold and say it has one of the most gripping video game storylines of the new century. The reason I was so caught up in the goings-on of the HL2 world, despite some of the story’s deeper scientific hullabaloo, had to do with the fact you were always Gordon Freeman.

( read more… )

A few weeks ago, I started playing World of Warcraft. I’ve come up with a short list of aggravating things about the game:

The Horde: You guys are jerks. I’m minding my own business, killing hundreds of bears, when all of a sudden three guys come from out of nowhere and destroy me. The next several minutes is spent running to my body, reviving myself and then immediately getting killed again. It’s almost sad, because even though I know they’re hiding there, I still go to revive myself, thinking this time will be different. I’m sure that when I’m high enough to destroyhilate those much weaker than me, I’ll love it. For now, it sucks, and I hate you.

( read more… )

As those who have read my bio on Avault might have noticed, I claim to have very little skill in multiplayer. (If you haven’t noticed because you haven’t read my bio on the main blog page, just smile and nod.) While there are probably a thousand reasons why I’m not brilliant at multiplayer, what’s more interesting is that despite my obvious failings when facing humans in mortal combat, I actually do enjoy it. However, I don’t find myself playing against my human friends very often. Instead, we play co-op: two humans, battling together against the forces of [insert currently preferred antagonist here] and triumphing against carefully constructed and measured odds.
( read more… )

Unless you live in a cave (in which case you probably don’t have Internet and can’t read this anyway), you’ve heard by now that the WGA is on strike and your favorite television shows might run out of material by Christmas.  Now, I’m all for turning off the tube and talking to your family, but let’s be practical here.  The prime time television schedule is set up the way it is for a reason.
( read more… )