Games this week:

• Playstation 3 - Infamous, Dragon Age: Origins
  
• Playstation 2 - Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII
  
• Xbox 360      - The Darkness
  
• Nintendo Wii  - Fragile Dreams: Farewell Ruins of the Moon

So, let's start with The Darkness, shall we?  I finished that game up today and I think it's pretty good.  The combat's completely jacked until you unlock a few Darkness powers and types of Darklings.  At which point you can hide behind a corner and not actually engage in a lot of combat.  Okay, that's not true, you'll pop around the corners to drop a black hole on enemies or blast them with your ostensibly infinite ammo Darkness cannon, but, not for long because after three or four hits you're dead, while you're enemies can take a full clip and still be standing.  So, you'll constantly be retreating to let your health fill back up, rinse, and repeat.  But, other than that, the game is great.  The story is interesting and there's a bunch of little things that make it endearing.  But I discussed those last week.  So, moving on!

Infamous is the same as its been. I beat the game with Evil karma, which was way more fun than playing on the good side.  And looks way cooler when you get the black lightning. SO AWESOME.  And just ganking civilians instead of trying not to zap them when they're running in front of you while you're fighting a bad guy.  I also liked to kick them when they were rolling around on the ground.  What can I say?  I embraced the dark side.  But, same lack of polish issues, of course.  And I would really like to collect all of the Trophies, but, I can't FIND three guys on a roof to blast off, so... yeah, not happening.  I don't want to play a whole new game a third time just for that one stunt.  I'll see if I can get it while collecting everything else, but, if it comes down to being my only missing Trophy, I'll just stop.

Dragon Age: Origins is... really difficult.  I keep butting up against a wall with these side quests.  But the whole reason I'm doing side quests is because the last story mission took me forever to get through and was very frustrating, so, I wanted to do some leveling.  Oh well, let's hope the next story mission isn't any harder than the last, otherwise I'll just be done and shelve it in favor of something I can actually play.

Speaking of shelving, I actually played some more of Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII.  I know, what?  I thought I was close to the end, but, three hours later and no end.  Looked it up, just a couple more chapters.  How much longer could it take, right?  It's just super boring.  The story isn't interesting and a lot of the voice acting is poor.  Though I will say I love Vincent Valentine's voice.  Well done.  Anyway, I don't know if a big fan of Final Fantasy VII would be happy with this just because it's more story in that universe, but, I can say that it doesn't hold up for someone who has no particular love for the universe, like me.  But I hate leaving games unfinished, so, I'll press on.

And last but not least, although played the least technically, Fragile Dreams: Farewell Ruins of the Moon!  I was following this game up to its release because it sounded great.  I remember it getting mediocre reviews, but, I wanted to try it myself.  But I only started last night and I'm not even an hour in yet, so, too early to tell.  I can tell that the camera control, pointing to the edges of the screen to turn, is an unfortunate design decision.  I just hope it's not too damning.  But, it does let me play it with the original Japanese audio, so, that's a huge plus in my book!  You'll know more as I play more.

See you next week, where I'll probably talk about F.E.A.R. 3! I'll be starting that up tonight and playing a bunch tomorrow.

 Just reading the name Dirge of Cerberus sends chills up my spine, that game was terrible.

It is definitely not a lot of fun.  I'll finish it, though.  Just to be done with it.