halfameatball

Take out proximity grenades and take away the ability to knock players over with smokes. Seriously, it is too much and though a good player can beat those threats they are seriously annoying. Also what happened to creative map design? Jacinto and Pavillion are pretty much the same maps. Stasis, River and Ruins are pretty much the same maps. And the rest of the maps feel like similar copy and paste jobs as well sharing elements between them. After being a fan of the MP in the first Gears, Gears 2 feels like overkill. Epic added too much junk to MP and the maps lack the style of the original's as well. SP is great, but you can't just keep adding more and more crap to MP, it feels like a mess to me.

It was a toss up for me, a three way one at that. I couldn't pick between Fallout 3, Fable 2, and MGS4. However, since this was Snake's final mission I had to give it to the old fart. An amazing franchise wrapped up beautifully. GTA IV was great, but parts of the game dragged for me. Left 4 Dead is also fantastic but not enough content (if there were say three more maps it could've easily been my GOTY). Three months ago I had no doubt that Gears 2  would be the best game of 2008 but Epic really screwed up what use to be a balanced multiplayer game and added ridiculous smoke grenades so that you spend the first minute of every match on your back. The MP maps in that game lack the creative design the first Gears had also.

I see myself getting this tomorrow....playing with it for an hour....then going to play Left 4 Dead

I'd join up. I really would like to get into TF2 but none of my friends play it so i stick to Half Life and Portal. I'm decent, but would like to work at getting great at the game and know that I could if I had a group of friends to play with. My gamertag is filipjfrenchfry (FILIPJFRENCHFRY just in case lower case was hard to read). Add me and let me know when you want to play.

Far too many. I have Gears 2, Mass Effect, Fable 2, Fallout 3, GTA IV, The Orange Box, Bioshock, Dead Space, Prince of Persia, Far Cry 2, Left 4 Dead, Banjo, Oblivion, and I even did Halo 3 just because it was really jarring to hear my 360 actually running at full capacity now. Each game loads better (except for that one exception, which is hardly noticeable thus far) and I've noticed smoother frame rates on games with larger open worlds (Oblivion, Mass Effect, Fable, Fallout 3, GTA IV). Best feature of the NXE.

I think big games like Bioshock 2, Mass Effect 2, Splinter Cell (Conviction?), A.P.B., and probably a couple others are going to be announced shortly. We know all these games are in production. How far along they are and when they are coming is anyone's guess, but I wouldn't be surprised if these all hit late next year. Put those titles with the games already mentioned in this thread then add RE5, Borderlands, Riddick, and other multiplatform games, then add Halo 3, Gears 2, Fallout 3, GTA IV and other downloadable content to that list and 2009 sounds like the best year yet for the 360. The only problem is that this is all speculation, but I feel it is reasonable.

Guess we'll have to wait and see, but I completely agree with SmugDarkLoser...2008 didn't look that amazing in 2007 and look what it turned into. I don't doubt that will be the case with 2009 as well.

Anybody else having problems with the guide interface? Mine seems to freeze and stall quite a bit. Other than when I hit the guide button I think the new dashboard is great. Netflix, avatars, installs, etc. it is all gravy. I really wish it moved as fast as the blades though.

That would be nice, I really enjoyed the original Crackdown. Though this is only a rumor I can not help but get excited when I hear "New" and "Crackdown" in the same title.

I do not quite understand the appeal of the God of War franchise, nor do I see what others find so captivating about it. Never has the God of War series been as satisfying as Ninja Gaiden from a gameplay perspective for me (though it undoubtedly has a better camera). I'll probably buy God of  War 3, but I am neither bursting with excitement or counting on the next installment to blow me away  with anything outside of its technical prowess. I will also admit that this genre does little for me personally.

Two piecing has definitely been balanced out by stopping power. You should never have someone that close to you and not expect to die anyway. The chainsaw on the other hand has become frustrating. People can just run through shotgun shell after shotgun shell and still end up getting you. The lancer's chainsaw  is not lowered and delayed enough when shot at and it is a little ridiculous sometimes.