I am pretty proud of myself for the progress I have been able to make. First off, I just completed Lego Indiana Jones. Short and easy, but a very cool and fun game. I liked it just as much as Lego Star Wars.

The first big accomplishment was finally finishing Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core a few nights ago. I had stepped away from it for a long time thanks to GTA4, Burnout, and a couple other games, but I was extremely satisfied with the game and ending. Simply awesome. I didn’t expect the ending to have as much of an effect on me as it did. Anybody who has played through the original FF7 should know how the story ends so I was expecting it, but the way it was presented with the gameplay, music, and of course, the FMV sequences was just beautiful. Very powerful. I am glad I returned to it. The gameplay left a bit much to be desired (too much button mashing) and the DMW was weird, but once you got used to it and accepted it, the game was a lot of fun. I can appreciate the innovation and it was totally worth putting up with the button mashing to have the wonderful experience of returning to Midgar and all its characters.

My other huge accomplishment was finishing Metal Gear Solid 4. Like GTA, I had never got more than a few hours into the previous MGS games and had never even touched MGS3 (or the NES and PSP chapters for that matter). However, due to the almost legendary status of the series, characters, and story, I had a base knowledge that, coupled with a perusing of the MGS Database that is available on PSN, provided me with enough of a background to make me feel ready to enjoy the game fully. While there can be some gripes about this being more of an interactive movie than a game (the last act in particular has you watching more than playing it seemed to me), I thought it was simply outstanding presentation. This would be a much bigger complaint if the characters and story were not so interesting. I was impressed every step of the way with the gameplay, story, presentation, and graphics. A game like MGS really forces you to play differently than most other games. I won’t go into spoiler territory and discuss everything that was so awesome about the game, but I will say that I just listened to the