I went to PAX this year. It was pretty sweet. I babble on for 40 minutes about it. Part One, Part Two, Part Three, and Part Four are all available on YouTube.

Hope you guys enjoy it.

I'm sorry, GS users who read my stuff. I noticed that I haven't really written much here. Again, I'm sorry. Would you take these flowers? How about these cookies?

Anyway, I've been playing games as usual. I beat Far Cry 2, which had a somewhat disappointing ending. Hell, the whole ending portion was drastically different than the two parts prior, where it's all linear-based except how you get there is up to you (a dedication to the first game, perhaps?). Really the problem I had with it was that while it had some really good atmosphere in its environment and locale, the gameplay wrapped around that location is repetitive and boring. Go here and kill this guy/destroy this object/steal this item. There are a few twist missions where you must threaten somebody to do something, but it only happens 2-3 times in the course of the game.

Oh, and I finally welcome my new guitar hero overlords:

I got this at $10. The Guitar Controller was free with purchase (GH:A was one of the few games that was under that offer). I just beat the game on Easy. I almost got 100% in Dream Police on Medium. But then I got fumbled in a middle segment.

I'm kinda disappointed at the Aerosmith track selection. Where's Dude Looks Like a Lady? Where's Jaded? Where's Janie's Got a Gun? Where's I Don't Want to Miss a Thing, arguably one of their most popular songs? Ah well, it's got Dream On and Rag Doll, so it's not a total loss.

Now I should invest in GH2 or RB or one of those other games so I can be fully assimilated into the music rhythm genre.

So recently I completed Crackdown. I felt a little underwhelmed when I finished. It was the same as the first two parts when I killed the last remaining gang members. I got a "You saved this portion of the city" message, then the big spoiler comes up (The Agency pretty much created the gangs in question to give Pacific City some degree of chaos, and it's all the equivalent of some training exercise). Not even a cut to the credits, or something real special. Just... ends like that. At least in other free-roaming action games like GTA it gives a satisfying conclusion and a credit roll. Crackdown just ends with a pop and a whimper.

The biggest problem I have is that it's very, very repetitious. Basically you had to knock down every leader of a gang, then head straight to the head honcho, and repeat for the next two areas. There are no variant missions outside of the rooftop and road races that permeate the world, and the hidden/agility orb hunt, which is like GTA's hidden packages but amplified a pinch. But it's the same way from when you start, to when you finish. There's not even a chance to friend certain factions and do missions for them, a la Mercenaries.

The upgrade mechanic is a nice touch, even though you'll upgrade your agility faster than everything else, making driving something you only do to keep your stats consistent. I like how as I progressed, my character was slow, very inaccurate with weapons, and had to make a few roundhouse kicks before they could kill someone. By the end, my only problem was swarms of gangs and the gang member with larger HP than the others. Oh, and having to climb my ass all the way up through Wang's tower, only to die and have to re-climb the area three times. Thankfully that was only a Time Trial. But either way.

I know people will hound me for saying this, but this needed a more broader story than "There's gangs polluting the city, go kill them." It needed reason, explanation for my actions, further consequences outside of just sending me uberpowerful grunts if I killed enough of a certain faction.

I will say that doing crazy flips and acrobatic stunts were the greatest thing about Crackdown. Had those not been in there, the game would've been excessively dull and I never would've finished it. I'm done with the game, but I could always go back and try to do a few things like catch all 500 Agility Orbs (about 420 and counting), or finish all rooftop and road races I didn't go through the first time round. Or maybe get into some co-op action. I don't want to put the game down just yet. I feel that there's unfinished things to take care of.

Also, lower the damn "Gettin Busy content pack" price already. Two years later, it's still $10. You want me to pay about 80% of what I paid for the game for this content, of which half I can't use because you need to be in co-op to do it? No, Microsoft, I will not accept your offer.