Brett's Gaming Blog

So I have some words to say about an announcement that was made recently. And you guessed it because I already said it (aka the subject). 3DS XL! So many thoughts on this. This is not the first time I have ranted about the 3DS. If you didn't catch my first rant because it was on  facebook , I rambled on about how I regretted buying a 3DS because of the price drop and lack of games in the first year of release.  " I think Nintendo pulled the curtain over my eyes for awhile there, but now I see clearly, $250 was way too much to spend on something that I have gotten little value from." Last week Nintendo announced a 3DS XL to release this August in the states. In my head I have given much though on what to do when it comes to the 3DS. At first I wasn't even going to get one because I didn't want any of the launch games. I ended up buying one on launch day because off all the exciting capabilities it had, and 3D was at the bottom ...

Hey all! Some of you might have noticed no posts in about a week. Oops! That one was my fault. I started a few posts but as time went on my excitement to finish them waned and now they sit in the limbo that is my unfinished projects folder. In like a year I should just post a bunch of unfinished pieces, see how that turns out. But back to my main point, I have not been writing! It has been for a couple of reasons (excuses!). I have been gearing up for a big project in July. So get amped. I teased my July project on Twitter. If you want to stay super current with what I'm doing, it's going to show up on there. @Caulif . That is a bit easier to put quick updates on, rather than a long blog post. The other reason is that I have been trying to go multimedia for you all. I have been working on getting a weekly YouTube video going, and possibly a weekly podcast as well. So far the quality coming out of these projects has been awful, but hey so was my blog ...

On the verge of starting a new segment called What I'm Playing! I decided to spin it off before it started, into What I'm Watching! The playing segment is going to come soon, but for now I wanted to give you a tid bit on what I'm watching. If you have not heard to up roar from the indie scene, a little movie came out last week called Indie Game: The Movie. I proceeded to buy my digital copy for the fair price of ten bucks and watched it promptly. The movie looks at the lives of the three indie devs behind the games Braid, Super Meat Boy, and Fez. I have bought and play all of these games, so all the more reason I was interested. The reason these games were picked is because they each fell about a year apart from one another, and all at different times in the indie scene. During the filming process Braid had already debuted, Super Meat Boy was on the brink of coming out, and Fez was missing it's release window but still a work in progress. Enjoy the trailer below if yo...

Am I allowed the preface this by saying this is my first review? Boom shakalaka I just did. In the time line of things I know I said this review would come out Friday and today would be more E3 things, but I finished the game and got the review done, so I thought I'd post it in a timely manner. More E3 stuff tomorrow. This being my first review, I'd love critical feedback. As I mentioned in the past, and as it says over by my picture, I want to be a freelance videogame journalist, so I'm always looking to improve my writing. I hope you all like it, and I have done you proud. If you take one look at Lollipop Chainsaw you will have a pretty good idea of what the game is about. If you were thinking the answer was killing zombies and rainbows you would be correct. Lollipop Chainsaw is a Grasshopper/Suda 51 joint (No More Heroes, Killer 7) and it is very easy to tell that Suda's flair comes off in the game. It's zany, it's loud, and it's in your face. All of...

As you might have summed up, Microsoft was what I had my eyes glued on during E3. They showed Halo and premiered Splinter Cell, but what really got my attention was Tomb Raider. Swimming past all the BS about Lara's moaning sounds and objectifying women, I loved the trailer they showed at E3. I have kept a safe distance away from Tomb Raider since it's announcement, and mostly because I have never played a Tomb Raider game. I have also not been huge into action adventure. If it was not a turn-based rpg or shooter I never really dove very deep. Now in my old age I'm regretting missing all these great games. I have been dying to play Sly Cooper ever since that trilogy was released on PS3, and I might snap if another person tells me that Uncharted is god-like before I get around to playing it. None the less, I have never played Tomb Raider or had any sort of affinity towards it. This all changed last week. Microsoft brought out a few guys from Crystal Dynamics on to their...

More E3 junk! Doesn't this guy know that ended last week. Yes, yes I do. Thanks for the hate mail, haters. That's completely false, no one has mailed in any mail, hate or otherwise. But you totally should. Not the hate part, that shit gets moved to spam. But the other mail, the happy mail. I'd love to get some E-mails that I could answer, so send your questions in. I'm going to be tweaking the looks and hopefully interactivity of the blog here this week, so I'll try and add in an "E-mail me" button for you all. If I do you better damn well press it, it will probably take a lot of work to add that button. But back on point, because I know that catchy headline drew in your attention. I thought while I worked on that juicy Lollipop Chainsaw review, I'd wet your appetite with some more E3 impressions. There were a few games there that really got me wanting a time machine to travel to the future in. So i'll talk about the top three in the next few day...

Not much gaming going on at the moment (I mean have you seen the weather), but I wanted to post up that gaming was coming. I'm planning on writing a review for Lollipop Chainsaw, so stay tuned for that later this week. And here comes the real reason I wanted to post today. I got back on the internet today! As some of you might have seen, from my last post , I wrote a little piece to contribute to a community event on IGN Xbox over the weekend. The piece went up this morning and my writing showed up on it. I was so stoked I jumped from my computer chair and could not control my excitement. It pretty much made my day, week, month, year. Alright maybe not year, but I was pretty freaking jazzed. So here is the link if you want to check it out. I wrote the part that says Brett Marden, but you already knew that. I appreciate all the kudos I have gotten so far and I'll be back later in the week with more gaming goodness. Cheers!

This piece is intended not only entertainment, but also for a community event with IGN put on by Mitch Dyer. Hopefully Mitch likes what we sees and everybody can read this Monday on IGN.com. Edit: I ended up making the cut, the article can be read here ! I was looking forward to the Microsoft press event more than anything else at the show. Things have been pretty dead in the water with them since the Xbox started flying off shelves and they focused on Kinect. At the show, Microsoft really surprised me with the direction they are going in this next year. While there wasn't one stand-out reason to go buy a Kinect, all the dynamic features together sell the product really well. The voice recognition in Splinter Cell was genius, and Wreckateer looks like a lot of fun. The Tomb Raider and Halo 4 gameplay they showed sold me on both games. I had been leaning away from these games, but now I must have them in my collection. All of the sports stuff was the low point for me. Al...

Has this E3 been the year of the bow or what. It seems like a lot of games are going the jungle route. Which in turn mean that the main character wields a bow. Tomb Raider did it at the Microsoft conference, Crysis 3 did it at the EA conference, and then Far Cry 3 did it at the Ubisoft conference. Assassins Creed 3 also showed bows at every conference it was at. Guess it's the year of the 3's again too. It's just something that I have noticed through watching all the press events. Nothing has really wow'ed me yet, and I doubt anything will since most of the announcements are over with now it's just getting the press overage done with. Been trying to keep on it as much as possible, but there really is a lot coming out of LA right now. Send me any questions you want answered  and I can post them up next week or if you just want to chat leave a comment and I'll get back at you.

Anyone who is anyone I'm sure is knee deep in E3 information that is spewing out of LA at every moment this week. Me in my humble blog could not keep up with everything that is going on so I'm not going to try, I'm just going to enjoy watching what comes out of the event. I just watched the Nintendo press conference, which is the last of the big three. I caught up with the Microsoft one this morning and caught some of the Sony one live last night. Well worth watching if your a fan of any of the platforms. I'm not a Sony fan but the games they showed off looked amazing. Beyond: Two Souls , Quantic Dreams new game, looks incredibly beautiful. The Nintendo press conference was all about Wii U and they are having a separate event tomorrow for 3DS. Everything made me want to buy a Wii U. My Wii was incredibly under used, and I'm sure a Wii U would be as well, but I want to have one to play around with. Just looks incredibly fun. Micrsoft was lack luster as anticipate...

'It's the most wonderful time of the year!' Well maybe the second most, as gamers we sort of like when all the games come out during the holidays. But this is the time of the year when all the games are announced. Well for the most part... A few weeks ago I started an E3 predictions post. That got wrapped up in a cluster of posts I started and didn't finish. I got around to posting them all but just not the E3 one. Just ran out of time. But E3 is here so I guess there is no need for predictions. Sadly I will not be around today to watch the Microsoft press conference, but will be able to see the other big two. Just to give you a short time line of them, Microsoft presents today at Noon EST, Sony is at 9pm EST, and Nintendo is tomorrow at Noon EST. There are many other press events such as an EA one and Ubisoft as well. And if your really itching already, Nintendo had a Nintendo Direct last night unveiling some Wii U features, if that's your thing. Can't wait ...

If I had to stick my gaming interests down to one dial on the spectrum, I'd have to go with mainstream indie games. Now this sounds backwards in all sorts of ways, but let me explain. Why didn't he say FPS or RPG? I love those games but I can't get over the artistic and simplistic nature of indie games. What the hell does he mean by mainstream indie games? The indie scene is huge, and I dare not call myself and expert in the category. I'm always being surprised by what is out there, that has been there for years, but I don't know about until it comes up in conversation. So what I mean by mainstream indie games are those that get into the public eye. It could be by remarkable game play and is getting talked about by the press and by gamers, or games that are getting promoted and marketed in a way that the message reaches a mass audience (like summer of arcade games on XBLA). XBLA is by far in a way my favorite gaming source. I eat up games like Cas...