Wow, what a year for gaming. I ended up having a crazy schedule this year, I didn't get to go out much or do much with friends because of my work schedule, but every night from midnight until around 4am or 5am I had all to myself for gaming goodness. (And not too much else to do!)

And there was alot of goodness! My prediction that this year would be a good one was spot on. And when the year came to a close, when I was looking at some leftover holiday money and wondering what to do with it, I found I had pretty much all the greatness I could have gotten! I'm still holding off on a PS3 until much later this year, so I don't have any games from that platform represented, but the Wii/PS2/360/DS camp covered the majority of the excellence this year anyhows. I also completed a record number of games I started, some of them even getting multiple full playthroughs like Mass Effect.

This year should be another very interesting one. Not the gold standard year we just had, but it should be good. The world economy has really woken up to video games, and the massive success of games like Halo 3, WoW and Mario Galaxies means that there are more people playing than ever. There is bound to be some real stinkers this year as games are pushed out to cash in or just don't meet the expectations of thier developers, which is normal for any year but this year I think there will be alot more of it. More people playing means more people making and there is an evolution to these things. With a year like 2007 behind us, 2008 is bound to be alot more hit and miss, but what games end up really shinning through will be something trully special.

2008 holds a new job and a new schedule for me. I should be able to catch most of the Gamespot live shows before they end, so it's nice to see a few familiar people in the chat rooms from a year ago. I still have time to game, but this year I'll be sharing this time with other normal-evening type activities. I won't be able to play super-obsessively for 4+ hours every night, but I'll still be playing every day and I'm sure I'll still get a ton of gaming in before I fall asleep at night. Plus, weekends actually have a meaning for me this year, so those are opportunities to really dive into titles like MassEffect and other games that seems to be better when you can devote large chunks of time to them.

This looks like a good year coming up all around. Wishing everyone the best for 2008!