If you're a PC gamer, chances are that getting stuff from Steam is a big part of your procurement process. I haven't bought a physical PC game in years. The vast majority of the stuff I buy digitally comes from Steam. There are a couple of exceptions - Stardock for Gal Civ II, Blizzard stuff and some things from other stores because they were cheap.

When EA were on Steam, they had a chance of getting some business from me. Now, on the PC, they may as well not exist. Now I'm not saying that I don't like EA's games. It's just that I'd rather play most on console. Steam's all about the impulse buy, so that's gone - and do I really want to install another store on my computer?

The answer is no, but I'll probably end up doing it anyway. See, EA are publishing Star Wars : The Old Republic soon. Battlefield 3 too. Games that you either cannot play on a console or historically, haven't travelled well on consoles ( compare Battlefield 2 : Modern Combat with its bigger PC brother and you'll know what I mean ). So yeah, EA might lose a few impulse sales from me, but ultimately, that store will be on my PC - and EA won't be paying a dime to Valve when I make my inevitable purchases. Another positive is that in a time when people are accusing the PC of being moribund, you've got a major publisher investing in its own digital distribution platform for a platform supposedly on the operating table.

Long-term, while having to install different stores for different games is going to be a chore for PC gamers, the only way that a publisher can get you to install that thing is by giving you a good damn gaming reason to do so. This may end up being a good thing for PC gaming overall. So, gross miscalculation that'll cost EA impulse sales or cunning plan to cut out the middleman? Time will tell. It really depends on whether EA can deliver the goods with their most anticipated games.

As kids, we'd chew the fat with suggestions for the world's most boring videogames.  Having experienced enough of life to know what boring meant, we dreamt up concepts to drive men to tears.  Text-based adventures without exits, where the parser treated every combination of verb and noun as the consequence of a squirrel clambering over a keyboard.   One waterbound suggestion that always floated to the top was fishing.  How could that ever be fun in a videogame?
 
I know that fishing can be fun.  We've all seen affluent anglers reeling marlin onto million dollar boats.  We're not talkiing about that sort of fishing.  We're talking about  sitting alongside a dismal body of water where nothing happens for eight hours climaxing with a going home empty credit sequence.  Eight hours your life that were totally pointless and you'd never get back.
 
Last night, I spent an hour fishing for Glacial Salmon in the Grizzly Hills of Northrend.  How times have changed.
 
To be fair, games based on mundane activities are not new - but they normally add something fantastic to the mix to spice things up.  The aim of  BurgerTime  is to make burgers, but each sandwich is six feet in diameter and the staff get harrassed by six-foot hot dogs.  Likewise, Jet Set Willy was nominally about clearing your house of detritus after a party - but the house was replete with rotating razor-blades of death, vicious vicars and trident-wielding demons. In the first five screens.   Must have been quite the party.
 
Perhaps the first attempt to make a truly boring game was Advanced Lawnmower Simulator, for the Sinclair Spectrum.  This game's obstacles were rocks, coat-hangers and duck ponds.  Despite the intentional mundanity, the game gave some reward to the gamer.  Equipment upgrades available to skilled mowers, providing some sense of progression for lawnmower enthusiasts everywhere.
 
Desert Bus is a mini-game featured in Penn and Teller's Smoke and Mirrors.  The player has to drive a bus from Tucson to Las Vegas in real time. It's a 360 mile run which can be driven at a maximum speed of 45mph. The road is perfectly straight, but the bus pulls to the right, meaning a player has to yank the controls left every couple of seconds to keep the bus on the road.  The game cannot be paused, so players must spend eight continuous hours to drive the complete length of the trip.  If you do veer off the road, the bus is towed back to Tucson, also in real time.    A video of the gameplay is here.   Desert Bus for Hope are a group of well-meaning maniacs who do Desert Bus endurance runs for the Child's Play charity.  Compared to what they go through, fishing in WoW  doesn't seem so bad.
 
Desert Bus is undoubtedly the king of mind-numbingly tedious video-games.  It is intentionally and deliberately humdrum, purpose built to bore the living shit out of you.  Those little tykes that dreamt of boredom would be proud.

We British have a strange relationship with the weather.  While we're typically free of the extremes of say, Tornado Alley, our climate is variable enough to permeate most aspects of our existence.  The news bulletins spit out a report every hour, with increasingly impressive graphics showing the sun over Southampton, showers over Somerset and the proverbial cats and dogs pissing all over Manchester.  
 
As a gamer, I love bad weather.  It justifies the hermit-like existence I have grown to love.  Clement August days?  I can do without them.  All it means is that the sun is streaming through the windows of my domicile while an inner voice guilt trips me about not spending more time outside.  Winter I can handle.  There's little more satisfying than exploring every nook of a fantastically realised virtual world while the real one is being battered by the elements.  The season happens to coincide with a massive influx of new and exciting titles, so all should be cool.  Except it's not.  Fallout New Vegas was released last week, and it has been gorgeous outside. 
 
I haven't had a great deal of time to spend in Obsidian's return to the Fallout universe.  Fallout 3 happened to coincide with an extended period of working away from home - which provided the perfect excuse to run riot in the Capital Wasteland.  This time out, I'm back as leader of the family clan, have massive time commitments inside and out of work.  I've barely reached Primm on a saved game I'm satisfied with.  I'm sure I can concoct some excuses to vacate the family so I can travel further afield, but it'll be difficult to explain the pristine state of the house when they return home and discover that it wasn't really on fire. 
 
On the portable front, I've been playing Game Dev Story for the iPhone OS.  At the time of writing, there's no real Retina display support, meaning everything looks a bit blurry.  It's definitely compelling while it lasts, but having finished the game, I feel like I've seen and done everything it has to offer.  Still, for £2.39, it's pretty good value.  I'll offer the following advice for anyone embarking on their own Game Dev Story. 
 

• Don't be afraid to restart.  Trial and error is your friend.
• Hire and fire until you get the right people.  There are some game-breaking stat-monsters out there.  Seek them out and use them.
• Always bang out a couple of contracts after every game release.  Not only does it make you money, but you'll also score research points - essential for levelling up your staff.