I've only been using Goozex for about three months or so, and I've already gotten some uber-awesome games (Jet Set Radio Future, Billy Hatcher), but nothing could've prepared me for what happened today! I've been sending in a lot of games lately while trying to clean out my collection. But unfortunately, I'm requesting semi-rare games that everyone else wants. For example, here's what my requests page has looked like for the last month. Every single game I want has a line of 15+ people in front of me!

Until today, one other semi-rare, classic game was sitting on that list too. And just like any other good Goozex user, I log in at least once a day to see if I have any trades open or games to send out. Last night I checked at about 2 AM (sleep is for the weak), and as always, none of my requests were even remotely close to being sent.

BUT THEN!



I check back in this afternoon, and BAM! I log in to see that under requests, I have "1 trade in progress"! My first thought was something along the lines of lolwut? Well, apparently a lot of people believe in that Team Ico HD remake rumor, because in a matter of 12 hours I jumped forward 17 places to the front of the line for Shadow of the Colossus. Some dude is sending the game to me in a couple days! No longer will I be left out of conversations about how amazing SotC was!

Moral of the story: sign up for Goozex! Probably soon. Or right now. And if you're a poor sheltered child like me who owns neither Shadow of the Colossus nor a PS3, hurry up and get in the queue for that game!

I came home from college today for a relaxing weekend at home. I recently went super retro and listened to the Final Fantasy 7 episode of Retroforce Go. I'm usually one of those guys who is bitter to the game thanks to all of the hype, but after hearing them reminisce I just couldn't resist the urge to play it again. So I've been anxiously waiting playing FF7 again for about a week or so. Shortly after I got home today, I went to my room to grab my copy of FF7 only to find...IT WASN'T @(#$ING THERE.

I grabbed FF8, and quickly realized my error (those roman numerals blend together!), so I put 8 back and scanned the shelf for 7, but to no avail. I'll tell you right now, I'm a pretty damn organized person. My room is always clean, my games organized in alphabetical order, etc...there's no way I could have misplaced it. I went all over the house searching every place I thought it might've been, but after not playing the game for 4-5 years, God knows where it is. I've looked for about an hour now, and only stopped to share my pain with people who might actually understand.

I was a latecomer to the Playstation, because at the time I was in elementary/middle school and had no money. I finally got one early in the PS2/GCN era, and started my collection with FFIX and Chrono Cross. It took a long time for me to get FF7 though, and when I finally did it cost me about $70 (new, Greatest Hits version off amazon). I was so damn proud to have that game (well not as proud as I am to own a black-label Xenogears, but I digress). So much for that.

My options are really running out at this point. I'll keep looking, but I still have no idea why it wasn't on the shelf where it should've been. I'm losing hope, and I really don't think it'd be worth it to get another new copy ($130 on Amazon). Of course, there's always PSN...but a digital copy of one of my favorite RPGs won't wipe away the tears. =(

Today, I went to the local Game Crazy (for the first time) to get in on the mega-awesome discounts. Unfortunately, I left empty handed - but not after digging through used games for at least half an hour. I'm really not sure how to explain this, since I don't know if a lot of you guys will relate or if I'm the only one. But I get this desperate feeling every time I go shopping for used games.

It's like the opposite of buyer's remorse. Or maybe the inverse. Or derivative, hell I don't know. But every single time I shop for used games, I just feel like somewhere in that mess of crap is an awesome game at an awesome price. After digging through dozens of dated sports games and licensed movie games, you'd think one would lose hope...but that's never the case. The more time I spend in the store, the more hope I get that I'll eventually find something awesome. Today, I was desperately scavenging for Okami, Katamari Damacy, or Blue Dragon, but I didn't see any of those titles. Maybe because somebody beat me to the punch, or because most people who bought those games (Okami/Katamari in particular) were satisfied, I dunno. But I swear, with every game case, I thought "here it is!"



On the bright side, leaving Game Crazy empty handed also meant that I left with a full wallet. The money I planned to spend on a cheap used game was instead spent on a 1600 Microsoft Points-Credits-Moon Dollars-Whatever you call them card.



Seriously though, am I just desperate? Or do you guys go through this stuff when you go to buy used games? Maybe next time I'll just shop online...

It's been a week since release, and I've pretty much played nothing but ODST. If you're on the fence about the game, maybe my impressions will help you decide if it's worth it! Here we go:

Campaign
The campaign is the main reason why I bought this game. For some reason, I think I enjoy playing Campaign more than I do playing online in matchmaking. Plus, what's more fun than 4-player co-op over Live? Anyway, back to ODST. I absolutely love the main missions. Each character has a "specialty" as an ODST (ex: Romeo is a sniper), and although you can use whatever weapons you want, you'll find that each level is basically designed for that character's specialty. There's a sniper, explosives expert, a guy who loves big guns, etc. You probably won't be using the same old BR/Shotty combo in every level like you could in Halo 3. Well...you definitely won't be using the BR/Shotty combo, since BR's aren't even in this game!

It's been said many times before, but playing as an ODST is very different from playing as Master Chief. You'll feel VERY vulnerable to everything around you. It's rare that you'll go through a stage (let alone a single minute) without some sort of frantic, high-tension, "holyshitomgi'mgoingtodie" situation. Also, ODST looks noticeably better than Halo 3...but the engine does sort-of show it's age. It's no Forza 3, but it still looks pretty good.

The story is decent; it at least made more sense than Halo 3's story did. There's still some pretty big holes that you'll have to read the books to fill. As always with Bungie, the dialog is sometimes mediocre but overall pretty good. My favorite line goes something along the lines of: "That... was a lot of people dying at once!" Story progress by searching around New Mombasa as The Rookie, finding clues, then having "flashbacks" to find out why the clue is there. It's a very clever method of giving the would-be jumpy story a strong sense of continuity. It's a lot more interesting than just playing as the same character mission to mission like every other FPS since the conception of the genre.



I'm still not sure if I enjoy playing as The Rookie or not. Exploring the city is kind of fun, but there really isn't enough variety in the design of New Mombasa to make it as entertaining as it is probably meant to be. Granted, it's supposed to be in ruination and darkness, but nearly every area looks the same. Of course, you'll be using VISR mode to see things in the dark. Although it's really useful having enemies outlined, I'd rather just be able to see them WITHOUT VISR mode. There's a sort of collectible in the game in the form of audio recordings, but they're pretty hard to find in the dark environment. I did laps around the city last night for an hour or so and I'm still missing about 10 of them...I have no idea where they are, and not much motivation to go and find them. I'd tell you how interesting the audio recordings are, but I haven't paid much attention to them. Fortunately, you don't HAVE to play as The Rookie very much at all if you don't want to.

Firefight
I've only played this mode once this week, but it's really fun. I'd played on Easy with one friend just to get a feel for it, and it was exactly that: EASY. It doesn't take a whole lot of effort to just survive, which is actually a plus. You can plan on spending two hours or so on Firefight and know that those two hours will be used up, unless you do something really stupid. It's all just crazy-awesome fun, particularly the bonus rounds. So far I'd have to say Firefight > Nazi Zombies. I'd like to talk more about it but I don't think I'll have a very good grasp on the game type until I do some 4 player Legendary action.

Halo 3 Multiplayer
I only had the Heroic Map Pack before ODST, because I bought Halo 3 so late...so I've had a shitload of fun trying out all the new maps. My favorite is definitely Longshore, one of the 3 new ODST-exclusive maps. The environment is a cloudy, port-like area along the water. If you haven't seen screens, I'd go check some out. Plus, it's a really well designed map. Heretic is a fan favorite too, being a remake of that one Halo 2 map that I don't know about because I haven't played Halo 2. Citadel is pretty fun too, not a bad map, but not a particularly exciting one either. Unfortunately, none of the new maps seem that practical for Forge mode. Longshore has some opportunities, but if you're big into custom maps, you probably won't find anything special with these new ones. But for the majority of us that just want some slayer/assault/CTF action, I can all but guarantee you won't be disappointed with them.



So that's what I think about ODST. $60 well spent? Hell yeah!