Hello!

Bought Shivering Isles the day it came out here in Europe, and damn!!!, it made me realise what a great game Oblivion is and forever will. It's one of those games that'll live beyond its time, it'll be remembered for a long, long time.

Shivering Isles, IMO, is even better that the main game, per se. Loading times improved, deep surrealistic plot with a landscape that stays loyal to the main game and fits the new universe like no other... Check my review if you like.

After completing Shivering (including a lot of side quests - my char. is lvl 46, wich I think is fairly good), I finally started playing Icon. It's an ok game, well above average. Again, check my minimalistic review.

Started playing (lightly) Saint's Row again. I have these three friends from UK who are nice, funny guys. Trustworthy, wich is almost priceless these days => Gamer; Senior and Agent.

On a personal field: Girlfriend went to NY to work at the UN. Allthough I'm quite proud, it'll be some lonely 9 months, and a major change in my life, as I was/am used to have her near. I talk to her almost every day, and she allready rented an apartment on the Spanish Harlem (??!)... I have no idea what that means, but she seemed happy with it, so it's cool, I guess...

I asked her to send me Virtua Tennis 3 (VT3), as there aren't many region-free games, and I think VT3 is nice. I also want to take advantage of her stay in the States to buy one of two things, a 360 Elite or a Zune. What would you guys prefer ? I sometimes think I decided for one, but then I start thinking about the other... Decisions.., decisions!!!

Well got to go... say something..., and thanks for reading.

360 Rocks!!!!

Miguel

...Def Jam: Icon !

Yes, Crackdown arrived on time, as usually Amazon UK provides a trustworthy service, at a reasonalble price. Well, actually, compared to Portugal, there's an huge difference on video-games prices. That's mainly due, IMO, to VAT wich is 21% here, plus, and unfortunatly, in Portugal you can still see a lotta piracy, and therefor, legits (as myself, and a few more - kudos to them) have to pay for their titles and for the pirated ones, I think. I wish MS banned 360 pirated-software users from Live, that would tech them.... But no..., I still can see some of them, I know them, they brag about it. They have every single game, and they play none. They're no gamers, they get their kicks out of pirating and bragging about it. How sad...

So, what about Crackdown ? Is it worth it ?

Hell, yeah! Check out my review below. Not much of a regular review, it's more like a conceptual comment on a piece of software that excels mainly in its aesthetics, rather than in gameplay.

The game, as everybody knows by now (well, not really by now, since it went on development, more like it), it's a GTA-like game, but with quite a few differences. For instance, it almost skips a plot, allthough not entirely. Even in this field, where I thought I could somewhat feel a bit disapointing, I didn't. It manages to "throw" us a few bossed with a very distinct mini-movie introducing them, almost like a TV-series. Quite well made, it works! It works also in an aspect, that makes the game, apparantly, easy expandable. They can put more bosses, using the same format, as a downloadable content (and I think they'll do it, as there's only 900gs so far).

As I mentioned in my review, the game's a true sandbox game, the sense of freedom gained another level, with the protagonist super-powers, and his ability to climb to almost every roof top. A true 3d sandbox, go anywhere, and everywhere!

Other aspect quite nice of Crackdown, is its Achievements. It captures the essence of the system, by awarding players for ridicule action stunts, that otherwise few would remind of doing. This is what it's all about! As I noticed from my friends, and some foruns, it even lead for people to push it further, and doing even more out of place weird stuff, like trying to put a car on top of the Agency..., wicked!

And the greatest part of the game, for me: its aesthetics! Pure brilliance. The very first playable comic book!

Ok, enough about Crackdown...

My current pre-order is Def-Jam Icon. I loved FFNY, and even knowing that the latest installment has few things in common, I usually reward devs and publishers with my money when they improve my free-time quality. The benefit of doubt.

I have a meeting now with my boss , got to go.

Thanks for reading.

Later.

Been a while since I post something in here. Well, since World Cup...

What's going on in my side of the Planet:

- I'm still dazzled with the 360, whata great system! Countless hours of quality ludic time.

Been playin: Saint's Row (multiplayer); Bionicle Heroes (bought it, mainly 'cos it was on 'nice price', very easy game, did all the Achievements!); Amped 3 (late aquisition, but it's actually a great game! Huge mountains, great sense of freedom, no draw distance problems, very nice Achievements, currently going for "Supreme Snow God", and I will get it!).

Bought a new car! Sold my Clio 1.2 75HP, and bought a new VW TSI 140HP!, amazing power! (well I wasn't used to this amount of "horses"..., so plz uderstand some over-reation.

Pre-ordered Crackdown, but just for the sake of it, not for the Halo 3 "thing" - I don't dig demos.

My GamerScore stands at 22040, and I currently have 88% of game completion. I also hate gamesavers with passion, I wish MS ban them, but we, true gamers, allready disrespect them (read: spit on their gamertags, /spits/), so it's cool. I have some fun episodes with a guy with a huge gamerscore that got raped by me and every friend of mine (legit gamers), in every single game he had 100% completion on. On many of them he didn't even know the controls. It was embarassing... . In the end nobody wanted to keep him as a friend - disrespected!

I'm also thinking of giving PSP another opurtunity, I have it since launch day in  Portugal, and haven't played it for about 1/2 year now. Tried to sell it but lost contact with the guy who was iterrested in. I'm looking for Tales of Eternia here in Lisbon but can't find it. Does somebody know if this game is worth it ?

Anyway, really, really looking forward Crackdown, but until then I'll be tryin to do some Achievements from some games such as Amped 3(allready mentioned it); Kameo and PDZ.

When Crackdown arrive, I'll post again to say if it stood up to the expectations.

C ya.