Upgrade Complete

Upgrade Complete is a fantastic little time waster, a must-play for those people who get a kick out of the upgrade mechanic in games. It's better to just let you experience it, rather than trying to describe it.

Thanks to Adam "The Fly" LaMosca over at Gamers with Jobs for pointing me in the right direction.

Gamers with Jobs post can be found here.

Weekend Movie Reviews (short version)

Made of Honor - Fairly entertaining, wouldn't have watched it if I wasn't married.

Next - Absolutely abysmal, stopped watching it around 40 minutes in. Lamenting the fact that I can't ever get those 40 minutes back.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian - Pretty decent, but I didn't appreciate the added plot just for the sake of the movie. Would have been better if it were 30-45 minutes shorter.

As you can see, having kids delays movie watching by 6-8 months, minimum.

I Love this Story

I just can't get enough of the story. Being an avid fan of sports, I love to see when human decency crosses onto the field and 'the right thing' happens. My hat is off to everyone involved.

Trine

Just gave the Trine demo a shot, from Steam. The art style and atmosphere of the game are top notch, and I think I could really get into this game. The only problem I had, from a 30 minute run in the demo, were the mouse and keyboard controls really didn't do it for me. I would have loved to have a controller in my hand while playing it, but otherwise I thought it was a well worth my time. The physics in the game appeared to be quite good, and the amount of manipulation of objects in the environment was substantial. I also liked the fact that there were multiple approaches to take to solve each puzzle situation, allowing for unique replays later.

Still making my way through Fable II as well. This game has captured my attention more than any other since Fallout 3, which reminds me I still need to complete the Broken Steel expansion. I'm not as excited about going back to this since it causes my PC to crash every time I exit out of the game.

Fable II

Been playing a fair amount of Fable II the past week or so, having just gotten a new XBox 360 (I gave my original 360 to my brother when my twins were born). I'm really enjoying the game as a whole, with the writing and humor being highlights for me. The social interactions are interesting, but obviously a system that could use tweaking to become more realistic. As an example, whenever I fast-travel to Bowerstone Market, I appear on the screen and there are immediately 6-10 townspeople who are in love with me, to the point where all I'd have to do is give them rings. One would figure that with so many suitors, both female and male (my hero being a male), there would be some animosity between all of these people. Wouldn't it be great if a random brawl could break out in the mosh pit of adoration, possibly represented in a whirlwind of dust, limbs and randoms symbols hanging over the entire scene, like the cartoons I watched as a kid? :)

Just a thought...