Welcome one and all (probably emphasis on that "one," eh, you lone reader, you?) to the revamped, revitalized, reinvigorated, and reincarnated Sparky's Update. Yep, I'm bringing back an age-old boring format where I blather on about games I've played and my thoughts on the industry as a whole. You read a thousand of these a week, but guess what? I don't care! I like writing, I like the sound of my own voice, and damn it, I love games. I'm probably going to start up a similar but much shorter version of this for Screened, where you can read about what I'm watching (and I don't mean my peepin' Tom exploits either, you pervs). Damn, it's good to be back. Let's giddyup now, little pardners! Yeeehaw and such!

I STILL HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO MAKE HEADERS

What? Stop judging me, Judgy McJudgenut.

I BEAT HOW MANY GAMES THIS WEEK?!?

I've talked before on the forums about my "rainy day" game collection, but for the uninitiated, here's the scoop, the skinny, the rundown, the lowdown, the facts. For the last few years, around Black Friday or so when games are at a huge discount, I pick up oodles (yep, oodles) of games that I'm interested in. These are the games I'm unsure I'll like, or for which I can't justify paying full price. Purchases like Arkham Asylum (see below), Enslaved (also see below), Deadly Premonition, Ratchet and Clank Future, and Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts are prime examples of games I've picked up during those deep discount sale days. I then play each game briefly to see if anything really pops out at me, and then store the games in a specific order in which I want to complete them, usually alternating between great looking titles, ones I'm not sure about, and mediocre looking games, in order to keep a steady variation on game quality and hopefully stave off gaming doldrums. I usually put major releases or games I'm genuinely excited about before these game titles, thus saving them for a "rainy day" when I don't have a shiny new game of the month to play. You get the idea. This stack of games also includes games I just haven't gotten around to completing yet for one reason or another, but those are the rarity. I don't claim to finish every game I've begun, but I justify that with a simple "hours of entertainment to price" ratio. If I'm not interested in playing a game to completion (e.g., Final Fantasy XIII, Last Remnant, Wild Arms 3), then I try my damnedest to play those games to the point where I feel like I got my money's worth. I collect games and never trade them in, so a system like that makes sense to me.

I wrote that big wall o' text to give you some idea as to why I was playing Arkham Asylum, Enslaved, and Fable 3 this week. Given that there aren't any major releases I'm interested in until the release of Forza 4, I've got some time on my hands and games to complete. I spent the bulk of the week's worth of gaming playing Tiger Woods 12 (thanks Claude for helping me fix that) and various Steam purchases made through their recent sale. Finding myself craving some action and story oriented games, I reshuffled my rainy day games a bit and came up with Enslaved and Arkham Asylum. I'd enjoyed what very little I'd played of both (about an hour's worth of both) back in the tail end of last year, but I had yet to hit them in my rainy day games list (it's been a spectacular year for my gaming tastes, so I've been really busy with a handful of games released since then as well as others in my stack).

I can't believe I didn't play either one to completion earlier. Enslaved's absolutely incredible character interactions and great, basic story make it a clear-cut contender for one of the best games I've played all year, and that's not even touching on the fun combat, surprisingly colorful visual asthetic, or the enchanting world the game's designers have created. I played it in one sitting, with the only breaks being for the bathroom and some ice water. It was an experience the likes of which I haven't had since playing through the entirety of Halo in my sophomore year of college with a roommate. I've had several gaming marathons even lengthier than the one I've had with Enslaved (all usually with games from a developer that rhymes with Shmefezda), but not to their entirety since that misspent day of my college youth. "But Sparky," you ask, "didn't you just say you played the game for an hour or so last winter?" "Yep," I respond, tapping the ashes of my smoldering cigar into a filthy coffee cup, "but I restarted the game. Duh."

Batman: Arkham Asylum had me a bit less enthralled, but as I've stated on my profile, it's not any fault of the game. No, in fact, the game is terrific. Other than some minor trouble with a bad little camera angle (you're naughty, you vent cam, you), it was shockingly proficient in every area. But my detachment came from the DC universe itself. I'm just not a huge fan of DC's villains. Save for the Joker and possibly Lex Luthor, they've never had quite the same punch or draw for me as Marvel's villains so frequently do. If this had been a Marvel game, you'd probably see my drool come up classified as a new lake by land management agencies. But as it is, I just didn't find myself drawn into the story or really get absorbed with what was happening. Is it a great game fully worthy of five star reviews? Absolutely. Is it going to be on my list of favorite games of all time? Probably not. But it should be.

And then there's Fable 3. Sigh. The Game That Should Have Been. I had played the game damn near to completion late last year, and then just gave up on it, only an hour or so from finishing it off. I finally pulled the trigger on that last hour or so this week. I'm disappointed with Fable 3 in many ways, but none so much as the feeling that this one is Molyneaux having to phone it in. I say "having to" because there's gotta be an enormous amount of pressure on Lionhead to develop quantity over quality. I hope that's the case, anyways, and that Molyneaux hasn't become the latest developer to run out of steam. I don't know though - with those latest videos of that new "not on rails but it's on rails" Fable game, I'm not entirely sure what to think of Lionhead anymore. Fable 4, if and when it happens, needs to take the reverse approach to "dumbing it down," and get rid of the paltry fart and kid jokes, the controls meant for drooling morons, the convoluted and disappointing visual menu system, and the general story of the game. They need to create a bigger world I actually want to explore, rebuild the engine for a new generation, and tell a complete, non-rushed story that just doesn't suddenly end. Do this, and I'll gladly put Fable 4 on the same level as its venerable predecessor Fable 2, which was and is one of my favorite games of all time.

WHAT I'LL BE PLAYING THIS NEXT WEEK OR SO, OR "LET'S GUESS HOW MUCH MY PREDICTIONS WILL SUCK"

With those three games out of the way, this next week is going to hopefully see me finally finish Persona 3 Portable, which I've been playing off and on since I bought my PSP a few months ago. It's a great game, but I am ready to move on to other games on the PSP.

I'll also keep chipping away at Lord of the Rings Online. I want to make it to level 50, see how much I like the Moria and legendary weapon content, and then see if I want to continue subsribing to the game. If not, bye-bye MMORPGs for a good, long time.

I'll be playing through a few other PC games, namely Defense Grid (which is great fun in short bursts, which is exactly how it should be played), possibly Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Father, and Hector: Badge of Courage.

On the console front, I'm aiming to wrap up the last of Super Street Fighter IV's character endings, as well as play the new New Vegas (wow, that's redundant) DLC due out this week. If it's not going to crash my 360, that is. Hmmm, on second thought, maybe I'd best wait on that DLC. I'll also try to get a good chunk of White Knight Chonicles finished, which I'll label as this weeks, "Shyeah, Right" prediction. Man, I just cannot get interested in that game.

WHAT YOU SHOULD BE READING INSTEAD OF THIS

SonicFire is writing up a great look at playing and achievement whoring some old Xbox 360 games. His thoughts are fairly random and often hilarious. It's well worth a read. Also, be sure to give user and former intern EpicSteve a pat on the back as he prepares to deploy to some not-so-pleasant areas of the world. Oh, and his blogs are pretty damn good, too.

THAT'S A WRAP. MMMM... WRAPS... AND YOUR QUESTION OF THE WEEK!

As with my older blogs, always feel free to hit me up with comments. If you've been reading some great user blogs or reviews that I'm not pointing out, give me a holler. I'll feature what I think is great, but I do like to plug the "little guys" of the site as well, so if you read some obscure blogs that need a quick pimpin', let me know.

Your question of the week is... what game character duo's interactions do you like the most?

I won't be attaching these to the forums often, as this one's just a shameless plug to try to get myself a few readers. Hope you enjoy and partake in future blogs.