So I'm in a gaming slump. Microsoft wants me to shell out $100 to fix the peice of crap hardware that they sold me, and my Ipod Touch is good for quick sessions of Puzzle Quest but I want something more. I have around $200 coming my way soon, and I'm just going to red ring my Xbox myself so Microsoft will fix it, so I'm considering buying a new PSP. My last one was ruined while out playing an airsoft game on a rainy day. It was supposedly in a "water proof" bag but when I come back to the bag I find a puddle of water in the bottom along with my PSP and cell phone floating along comfortably in the bottom. That was nearly a year ago but now I'm considering buying another one, because I believe that Sony can pull the PSP situation around.
 
I was never one of those people that thought the PSP had no games. I always had something to play like Final Fantasy Tactics, Patapon, Puzzle Quest, Harvest Moon, or SOCOM and I kinda miss those long nights of grinding through a PSP game, because I never fell asleep doing that, but for some reason whenever I try to play a 360 game at night I end up falling asleep. But anyways, I feel Sony is bringing this around with games like Resistance Retribution, Patapon 2, and Motorstorm, and all the other recently announced 3rd party PSP games like Rock Band Unplugged. The Playstation Store is also bringing it hard with Sony adding tons of full downloadable games all the time, including my favorite PSP shooter ever, Killzone Liberation and other original PSN titles like Everyday Shooter.
 
Although with all the rumors of a PSP 2 being announced at E3 this year, I may just hold off on buying a PSP-3000, but I'm seriously intrested in picking up one of these babys again and you should too. DS just cant compare anymore now that the DSi is going to be costing just about the same as a PSP-3000. For a few bucks more you get gorgeous 3D graphics, decent multimedia capabilities, far better online play than a DS, and tons of other stuff if you want to run custom firmware and stuff. Its just a all around much better package and really to all those people who say there are no games, their are tons to play, especially if you havent owned a PSP before and want to dip into its back catalog a bit for some older stuff for real cheap. I still can't believe Sony is only charging $20 for the original Patapon and Patapon 2. In my opinion, Patapon is the best and most original game on the system, and a must have if your just buying a PSP.

And oh yeah. Baseball. If you love baseball as much as I do and dont own a PS3, and hate 2Ks crappy MLB games then a PSP is the way to go. I absolutely love Sonys MLB: The Show games, and portable is a great way to play them just a inning or two at a time on a bus ride

Happy gaming, don't count the PSP out yet,

Nails

• 10 days after getting my 360 my hard drive became corrupted, and had to wait nearly a month to get a new one since MS didn't have spares to give out because of the holiday sales rush. (Dec. 07)
• The system ran fine for awhile, but I lost a COD4 disc and two copies of Forza Motorsport 2 because of disc scratching by the console
• RROD in July 08 and got a new system in late August
• One red light and error E74 (March 09)

So yeah, not fun times over here. If my warranty gets fixed, and I send the box back in, ill probaly be sticking to my Itouch and free PC games for my gaming needs. I was hoping to get into the Battlefield Heroes beta, but I doubt thats happening, so I may try out Quake Live, and report back on that later. Other reccomendations for free PC games would be appreciated :)

Nails

• Castle Crashers- This game just blew my mind. I used to love the brawler genre so much, and the combination of great art, traditional brawler gameplay, and some light RPG elements make this probaly my favorite brawler of all time. Definitely worth the price.
• Midnight Club: LA- Wow, just wow. If you can finish a four minute race through the heavy traffic of LA without wreck once then congrats! You have what it takes to succeed in Midnight Club: LA. That sounded pretty negative, but I enjoy the game quite alot. The car selection is nice and varied, cosmetic customization of the cars is very deep, even though the performance upgrading system is rather generic, and the city of LA just looks amazing, but the insane difficult that even the most dedicated drivers will have trouble winning and the fact that cars don't just handle differently enough (I should be able to tell the difference between how a Lancer Evo and a Mustang GT handle, right?) are what made me abit lukewarm towards this release. Still, its worth a look for hardcore racing fans.
• Far Cry 2- So I bought this on release day and have maybe sunk around 12 hours into it or so, and I'm not even 30% done with the game. I really don't have much to say since I don't feel I have spent enough time with it yet, but if you like great, visceral shooters with some very cool ideas thrown in and don't mind driving for several hours to get to objectives than this game should intrest you.
• DOOM- Yeah, I bought this when I had 400 MS points and 2 hours to kill. I played it once and haven't gone back since. Its definitely a DOOM port. Like you haven't played 50 of those already. I know I have, but this is the definitive port from the 2 hours I spent with it.
• Gears of War 2- I went into this October/November not caring about Gears 2, but around November 5, I had my 'Oh crap! they are totally making another Gears of War game" moment and decided to go buy it on launch day. The single player is a huge improvement over the original, which I felt was very short, and occasionally downright bad. Its a much longer experience, the scripted sequences are far superior to the originals, and they used colors of than gray and brown this time! Multiplayer is a collosal improvement from Gears 1 as well. Maybe its just because I got into Gears 1 online very late, and by then everyone else was way too good for me, but this just feels more streamlined and balanced since weapons other than the shotgun and chainsaw do damage.
• I bought COD: World at War a few days ago. I'm going to write something more in-depth about that after I've spent more time with it, but I'm having loads of fun with it so far.