Today is a day of delays.



On the one hand, the Metal Gear Online beta has been delayed. On another hand, warehouses are packed full of GTA IV ready for the playing. On the third, mutant hand, I am still anticipating the release of the new CoD 4 maps and Mass Effect for the PC. In this world of anxious anxiety, what is a video gamer to do to make the time pass? How do I sleep at night when my head is filled with next-gen blood-lust?

Okay, maybe it's obvious to you, but play your goddamn old games. Sift through your stacks of CDs and cartridges and find that game you forgot you put away. The one you used to talk to your friends about. The one that still gives you fond memories. The one that had the soundtrack you listen to on your MP3 player. The one you never beat. The one you never started a "New Game +" on. Yank that game out, give her a play, and be amazed as you slowly realize your need for Cops and Robbers in GTA 4, your need to climb upon a manapult in MGO, your need to explore space in Mass Effect is no longer a "need" but merely a slight thirst that you can patiently await quenching.

Go back to Pikmin 2 and pick up all the last items, go play the hardest difficulty mode in No More Heroes... while wearing the expensive pink frilly clothing, go collect those last skulls in Halo 3 using an FAQ, go rank up a bit in the Warhawk expansions, go try out The World Ends With You on the DS (they make drug jokes!), go finish up those extra missions in Crisis Core, maybe try out some UT or HL mods, but don't bother going back and collecting all the agility orbs in Crackdown, that just sucks...

Hopefully I've given the impatient crowd some ideas, even if it's usually your mom who says, "Why should I buy you a new game when you have so many old ones?" As naive as she is about your hobby, she still has a good point.