Learn to put up with X or accept Y. That seems to be the general vibe at the wrap-up of the video above. However it can't help but get me to thinking. They've forgotten the inevitable third option. "Just quit playing games". Which is sadly the path I've mostly had to take. I'm not a person for whom impulse control is an easy choice. It's my greatest failing and I'm aware of it and I try to control it. Sadly, the predatory nonsense shoved into nearly every game I was planning to play in 2017 just meant I played the least amount of new games of any year in my 40+ years of gaming.

Loot boxes are poisonous to me, because I know I'll keep hitting that button. Having an addictive personality means my choices were "be exploited" or "leave". It's like with cigarettes. I was a smoker for years. Once I quit finally (no easy task), I know I can't just buy and enjoy a cigar. Because I won't just have one cigar. I'll enjoy it, want more, and get more. Smash cut to two weeks later and I'm back at 2 packs of Camels per day. And I know that's on me, but it's also on me to moderate my bad behavior and do what I can to avert it. And sadly, that means looking at other hobbies now. Big game companies have chosen to see me as a money pinata they can keep whacking away at and I had to cut the string.

For the record, I had no problem with tiered releases (standard edition gets you the game, Gold and Silver editions get you the game plus baubles). More often than not, I was happy to fork over the extra cash for a bigger experience. Sometimes it'd need to be a proven brand, but often just looking fun or a decent demo would be enough to hook me. And if paying an extra $10 or so per game meant that I'd have kept getting a full experience rather than a piecemeal chopped up version that I had to reassemble later through DLC and Season Passes, it'd have been a far better option, but not a choice the gaming community was given.

DLC, I feel, didn't fail to sell because it was or wasn't released at a certain time but because the quality was dubious and more regularly than many would like to admit the offerings did not represent good value for money. Map packs for shooters were fine and most folks didn't have problem forking over cash for them. Story segments are great when they're done well, but I can count on one hand the number of games that have truly set a high bar with their post launch DLC for single player gamers. GTA4's Lost and Damned and Gay Tony expansions were great, Fallout 3 ended up with more good story DLC than bad, and... maybe Skyrim? Maybe Mario Kart 8? I dunno, each person will have their own suggestions

Anyway, sorry for rambling. I'm just frustrated and fed up with gaming as a whole. From the shoving of gambling style dopamine hits into the play structure to things like Destiny gating off content* and other games where you have meaningful story bits left out and sold separately, it's been a drag to be a gamer for the last few years. I've been gaming literally since the hobby began in the 70's so it's tough to think of myself as a person who may leave the hobby in the past. But at this rate, unless something changes, that's what will most likely happen. For the record I did have a few great game experiences in 2017. XCOM 2's expansion was really good as an example. And INJUSTICE 2 was a lot of fun as well, among others.

*Just for the record, I skipped Destiny 2 and the gating of content didn't personally affect me, but I am a long time Bungie fan who hates to see the company pulling those kinds of crap moves on their dedicated fan base.

The Year of the Loot Box was the one that finally got me to set aside gaming as my main hobby. So gold-star to you, Games Industry. You managed to turn away a gamer who's been a fan since the 70's! Kudos!

The few games I did play were pretty good, I will admit. Mostly stuff bought for my new Switch console which I picked up about 4 months ago. Here's my truncated & mostly Loot Box free list of games I played and enjoyed in 2017 in no particular order!

• Injustice 2- This one did have a loot box style, but thankfully the monetization was mostly not too intrusive. Consider this one my last straw for that nonsense.
• XCOM 2: War of the Chosen- Always love the XCOM games. I put about 600 or so hours into this one this year alone. A definite A+
• Cuphead- Finally we got Cuphead this year and it was pretty great. Now if only I wasn't so crap at playing it!
• Halo Wars 2- That was this year, right? I played a bit of this, but the real gem was putting Halo Wars Definitive Edition in the package and letting me play it on PC. Worth playing if you haven't before, especially now that it's on Steam.
• Super Mario Odyssey- I don't know if it's the best Mario game in the last 20 years, but it's probably the one I've enjoyed the most since 64. Great game!
• The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild- The Zelda game that got me back into Zelda games. Not that any of them were bad or anything, but I hadn't really played much Zelda since Twilight Princess.
• Splatoon 2- More of the same? Yes, please!
• Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle- This one probably goes on a bit too long for it's own good, but it was REALLY fun for a while.
• Mario Kart 8: Deluxe (Switch)- It's mostly just the same fun game I already played on the WiiU, but it's Mario Kart and the formula still works for me.
• Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp- This one is really reaching, I know. And I can't say I love this half-measure version of AC. But I played it a bunch, so it makes the list I guess.
• EDIT: Overland- This small but ambitious game can be played on the Itch.io app(app?, "service"? whatever). It's a surprisingly difficult, quite engaging randomly generated monster outbreak scenario game. You move from camp to camp scavenging gas, helping (or leaving) survivors as your car's size permits, upgrading your car (or losing it if it's damaged), look there's just a lot going on with this game despite it's simple premise and gameplay loop. I highly recommend it! Here's a playlist I put up on YouTube where I got to the end (at the time, it's early access still in the vid).

With all the time and money I didn't spend on video games this year though, I did manage to rekindle my dormant but ever-present love of comic books. In the wake of the great Loot Boxing of the games industry I started making my way into the Local Comic Shop on Wednesdays and picking up a few issues here and there. Here's a few titles I'd recommend to anyone looking to read some good comics:

• Batman: White Knight- In this out of continuity "elseworld" style story, we see a Joker who manages to cure himself and a Batman with just a bit less self-control. Prone to violent outbursts to accomplish his goals, the world is just askew enough to make for a very entertaining and interesting look at well worn characters
• Mister Miracle- I'm as surprised as can be just how interesting this new version of the classic Jack Kirby character feels. It's compelling, heart warming, scary in places. Worth a look, even if you never cared for Kirby's "New Gods" stories.
• BUG! The adventures of Forager- This is what Mike Allred is working on right now. I don't love BUG! as a character, but damn do I love that guys art.
• DC Metal- The cure for "event fatigue". DC's Metal series has been silly, it's mostly something you'd expect to see on an album cover... and it's pretty great too. Worth checking out. It might be a bit difficult to jump in at this point if you haven't already, but TPB or HC collections will be out in a matter of months. Come learn about the dark Multiverse and the evil god Barbatos.
• Batman: Creature of the Night- This is a very different kind of Batman story. A bit melancholic at points, but the tale it tells is heart-breaking and satisfying.
• Gotham City Garage- Batman plus Mad Max with Supergirl as the audience POV character. Another out-of-continuity story doing fun things with characters you know and love already. A fun take on the DC universe.
• Bane: Conquest- The breaker of the Bat gets his own book and it's quite spectacular! Good art, fun story, and Bane is a character who gets more and more interesting the more time you spend with him.
• Mother Russia- This is a title from a little known company called Alternacomics. It's a zombie series (limited series) set in Russia. These guys print their books on newsprint paper and sell them for $1.50. Even if you hate the story (which I don't think you will), it's worth giving a chance. The art is really good and it's a fun read.
• The Chair- Another Alterna title, this is a horror series. I don't want to spoil anything, but it's being made into a film. Worth a look!

Full Size version can be found on my Deviant Art page here: http://zzombiexiii.deviantart.com/art/Disney-s-MST3K-677440420

In the new season of MST3K on Netflix, Kinga Forrester longs to sell-out the show to Disney. Which got me to wondering, what would that look like? Clearly, I had no choice but to draw it.

• Kinga is modeled after Belle
• Jonah is modeled after Lefou
• Crow T Robot is modeled after Pluto the dog
• Tom Servo is modeled after Donald Duck
• Cynthia the clone is modeled after the Fairy Godmother
• Max is modeled after Percy the Dog from Pocahantas, but he already looked so much like Patton Oswalt that I barely had to change anything
• Gypsy is modeled (very loosely) on the snake from Jungle Book. And morphed into Princess Gypsy (because Disney).

UPDATE:

I really wanted to draw The Satellite of Love, so I updated these and turned them into two separate pieces, the S.O.L. version and the Moon Base 13 version. Added Cambot who's based on The Brave Little Toaster and added some Boneheads from the Skeleton Crew.

Just as before, full size versions are available on my DeviantArt page. You can follow the same link above to find them there if you like. Free Downloads since this is Fan Art and while it's my art these are not my characters. I'd feel skeevy trying to sell prints so, go nuts just don't repost it somewhere without giving me credit and we're cool! :)

I've always been a Star Wars fan. Literally. As in, I do not recall a time before I loved the movies. Of course, I'm 45 years old. I saw the first film when I was 5 years old in 1977, so my experience may be a bit different than many of you who grew up watching them on home video, but if you're a fan you know what it means to have gone through the good times (Original Trilogy era), the dark times (prequels), and the modern era.

When I first watched the original animated Clone Wars series (the first one with traditional animation), I loved it. Of course it was less a series and more of a proof of concept, but we didn't know that at the time. Back then it was just the thing that made the otherwise abysmal Attack of the Clones film a bit more palatable.

Fast Forward to the CGI animated The Clone Wars and I honestly didn't even bother at first. I tried to watch the movie that kicked off the series, but it was not a good start. I had a host of issues with it. I didn't care for the art style, they had never made Anakin a likable character in the films so the thought of an entire series set around him and a heretofore unmentioned padawan made little sense, and then the mission upon which the characters were tasked with looking for Jabba's never before mentioned son... what the actual biblical Hell were they thinking? But chief among my issues with it was the Ahsoka Tano character. Every time the character would smugly refer to Anakin Skywalker as "Sky Guy" I'd secretly wish for the ability for Force choke myself to death.

By all accounts, I expected this would follow a safe, "child friendly" style. I expected it would be nothing more than what we used to call "Saturday morning cartoon" fare and I assumed I would not like it. Star Wars seemed to be in it's death throws anyway at that time what with the Revenge of the Sith being better than it's predecessors, but still the same kind of logic leaping and ultimately poor quality film I'd gotten with Phantom Menace and then Attack of the Clones. While there are great moments in the prequels, I still don't care for them and I doubt I ever will. I know there are some who have come to like them, and I honestly wish I could like them as well, but I just can't. Those issues combined with Lucas seemingly trying to make fans hate him with constant edits to the Original, the swearing that the actual Original trilogy didn't exist and could never exist again, and all the other baffling things he said in public it seemed Star Wars was well and truly over for a while there. At least from my perspective.

So we fast forward again to the Disney era that we are currently going through. I'd heard that the canon had been drastically cut back by the purging of the former EU (now Legends) line and while I did enjoy many of those books and comics over the years, I thought it was likely a good plan. But I also started hearing people say that they were genuinely sad at the announcement that The Clone Wars would be ending and be replaced by something else. "Really?" I thought to myself. I found myself reading up on what fans thought and there seemed to be a genuine love of the series among many die-hards.

During the lead up to Episode 7, I was really in the mood for some Star Wars so I decided to give it a try. It was free to watch the entire series with my Netflix sub and I was eager for some Star Wars goodness anyway, so why not, right? While it takes it's sweet time, not really getting objectively good until well into the second season, I started to let the show stand on it's own merits. And I started to like it quite a bit. It humanized the Clone army in unexpected ways. It showed many of the Jedi we didn't get a chance to know well in the films or even the games. And most importantly, it had started to do the one thing the prequels had never managed to accomplish (or had they even bothered to try?). The Clone Wars let me like Anakin. The films showed him as annoying brat, bratty teen who talked back to the one character I already liked (Obi-Wan), and finally bratty grown-up but willing tool of his own demise by falling to the Emperor's obvious lies. But I digress, by the time I had gotten through the second season of TCW I was fully on board, but I was still not liking Ahsoka as a character.

I'm not stupid. I know how these things work. They add a young character to be the P.O.V. insert for the young audience they hope to court. It's not an ineffective move either. From a storytelling perspective it allows exposition to come across as almost fatherly lessons (something I can relate being a father) and it gives the kids a perspective they can call their own. But it's precisely because of this almost cynical approach that I found myself just never able to gel with the character. Or rather, not able to gel with her at first.

The reason I titled this blog "The Curious Case of Ahsoka Tano" is because of the way I went from truly not enjoying a characters presence in the least to feeling that she was essential. And by the time I got around to catching up on the new Rebels show, I loved it when she showed up having aged and grown since our last TCW encounter with her and the pre Original Trilogy timeline of the show. Once I got to the end of the second season of Rebels and the huge confrontation she has with Darth Vader, and her realization of who he is under the mask, I was almost in tears for her. I realized in that moment that she had become one of my favorite Jedi characters without my even noticing.

Like I said earlier, curious indeed.

I know I played plenty of games this year, but it feels like I missed more than I got to actually play. Still, there were some real stand-outs this year, some real let-downs this year, and there's a bunch of games I still need to get around to trying in the coming months. So here is my (diminutive) list of games that stood out this year.

• Steep- As a long time fan of video games that emulate "extreme" sports like Skateboarding or Snowboarding, I was eager to try this one. And I'm glad to say, it does not disappoint. As it was my Christmas gift this year, I can't say I've played a ton of it so far, but I've played enough to know I want to play it a lot more. And since I love the sense of speed and exhilaration of these kinds of games, I decided I'd let it be on my list
• Gears of War 4- Really surprised I liked this one as much as I did. I thought I was done with the Gears games after 3. Our game glitched out and lost all my progress right near the end so I never finished 3 and skipped Judgement. So I didn't expect to like this one as much as I ultimately did in the end.
• Mafia III- This one could have been higher on the list were it not such a technical failure. The story is good, the characters are good, the world is good, but they were all let down by a lack of polish that permeated every facet. I actually fell through the world in Mafia 3, a bug I haven't seen happen in a few years. Shame really, because the art of the game was great, if only the technical side had matched the artistic vision this one could have been the number one.
• Doom- Jeez, DOOM is great. It was great when it started, it's still great today. And since Halo has been a shit-show ever since Bungie left it behind I really was looking for a shooter to fill the void. This one lived up to the hype.
• Hitman- I was so surprised by just how much I enjoyed this game. Not only enjoyed playing it, but enjoyed watching others play it. It's a rare treat when a game can so capture its vision and Hitman is one such game. It all works so well. The mechanics were near perfect, the fact that they keep the story beats light and on the periphery (where they belong with this kind of game) and the wonderfully well designed maps, it all comes together to make a satisfying game that I kept wanting to revisit. Really happy with this one.
• XCOM 2- For me, this is the one that kept my attention held the longest. It's far from perfect, and I'm not even sure it's better than the 2012 reboot, but I've put over 300 hours into it and I still want to play it some more. So this one is my Game of the Year for 2016!

And sometimes a game hits you right in the gut. A game is so bad, so far afield of what you had hoped for or expected it completely lets you down. For me, my disappointment of the year is:

• Dead Rising 4- I've already written a pretty harsh review for this one so I won't go into specifics. You can look it up HERE if you want to know more. But Dead Rising has been my favorite video game franchise since 2006. I've loved every entry up until this one. This one I cannot abide. And I wish bad things for the people who made it. Not anything severe, I don't want them to suffer or die or anything like that. But if some cosmic entity devoted to justice could give them all, like, a week of reeeeally bad constipation I'd be okay with it.

Dead Rising is my favorite series, so I'll buy the game regardless. I must say though, I'm apprehensive. It truly seems like they've stripped out all the things I've loved about DR in the past. And since they released the old games on the X1 and PS4, I've just recently replayed the best games (to me) in Dead Rising & Dead Rising 2.

One thing for which Capcom Game Studios Vancouver (or Blue Castle or whatever they're called this week) deserved to be praised was their willingness to have a new protagonist with each game. Using Frank West over and over seems like the easy route since he's a fan favorite. So when they introduced Chuck Greene I thought it was a ballsy move. When they repeatedly defied expectations in Dead Rising 3 with Nick Ramos, I also thought it was the right way to go. Another story, another hero; without relying on fan attachment to the former champion. Here though, it seems like they are literally whoring out Frank. We'll give you this beloved character (sort of) but everything else has to go and also he looks and sounds almost completely different (I guess he got a nose job when his voice broke?). I can almost understand everything else, but the reason for leaving out T.J. Rotolo make no sense. He's an actor, pretty sure he can adjust to give them the older "grizzled" thing they were going for and fans would have loved to see him return. I know I would have anyway. This reminds me a bit of the original reveal of inFamous 2. Wherein they changed so much about the character he just wasn't "Cole MacGrath" anymore. But whatever, it's too late to fix it now even if Capcom agreed with the fans and they clearly do not.

It's concerning, but as I said they've already got my money so it's hard to have much credibility as I sit here complaining while also existing in a state of "being their pawn". That may make me part of the problem and if so I'll own up to it. I'm kinda the pinnacle of impotent rage if I keep whining so I guess I'll end this diatribe here. One last point though: I do hope whatever Dead Rising 4 is, that it turns out to be good. I can handle changes that work, I just hope they've retained the spirit of Dead Rising and I think folks who are worried that its changed too much are justified (heh, call back to DR1), but try to keep an open mind. What we all want is good games and if it's good, I'll be happy to say this worry was for nothing.

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I spent a while writing a forum post about DR4, and then decided not to post it. It was sounding more angry than I wanted it to and I didn't want to put that anger out there. But I also put a bit of work into and wanted to keep it so I'm adding it to the bottom of this blog as an edit.

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This is a _Dead Rising_ game that more people can like, but I can't imagine anyone loving it. I can still sit down with DR1 and enjoy trying to get my "perfect run". Meanwhile _DR4_ thinks I'm so stupid I can't manage save files on my own so I have to wait for it to give me a checkpoint. It thinks I'm too stupid to manage my own inventory, so I get slots for each kind of toy and there's a gun every three feet (they should have set this one in Texas). And for this, people cheer? Man, why does every game have to be "for everyone". I'm not averse to change when it adds, but all DR4 has done is take away.

And before anyone says "The timers were stupid and we're better off without them" or something, here is the list of things that made Dead Rising a game I enjoyed and elements that have been removed only to be replaced with... nothing:

* Multiple endings (unless you count the DLC pitch at the end as "multiple")

* Saving survivors and leading them to safety (you know, BEING A HERO)

* Limited resources making you manage your inventory wisely

* Special moves learned through leveling. No more "Disemboweler" or even "Zombie Walk"

* Boss Fights with interesting characters

* Cut scenes for those interesting characters to help establish their motivations

* The ability to restart as I see fit and start over with my leveled character

Dead Rising 4 asks nothing of you. It expects nothing of you. And it's gameplay loop is about as deep as your average smartphone game. If you dig it, then you dig it. Good for you. Of course if you do dig it there were already a dozen zombie games that do the exact same thing elsewhere. I don't know why I had to give up my favorite franchise so people who hated _Dead Rising_ can now have a _Dead Rising_ that they might like, but whatever. Seems like we could have gone the way of 3 where there were options, nightmare mode for those who want the challenge and the regular mode for those who don't.

The one good thing that came from this is that I was a bit short of cash on the day I bought Dead Rising 4 so I decided to skip the DLC pass until later. Thank God for that because otherwise I would have wasted even more money on this stinker. Ah well, one more log for the fire that is my waning interest in the current state of gaming. _C'est La Vie_ I suppose.

The point is, for those of us who loved what Dead Rising was and don't care for this new direction, is that this game has removed choice. And while you may have hated the timers or leading the survivors to the safe house, many (most) of those things were never required of you in the old games, they were choices. And now choice has been taken away. I just don't see how that's a good thing and I never will. In purely pragmatic terms, you're paying the same money for much less game! Plus it's not a very good looking game. It's ugly and feels like there are less zombies than DR3, but I could be wrong on that one.

Batman gets his groove back.

I'll be honest, I only really played about 4 games this year. I mean I played more than that, but a cursory run through and an actual play through are two different things. I technically played Bloodborne, but I didn't play enough of it to know if it's really great or whatever. I wasn't a Souls vet so the game didn't have a pedigree with me personally. I like it. I liked the look of it and I enjoyed the small amount of time I spent there, but I couldn't adequately gauge it's worthiness in a year end wrap-up. I bought and played Forza 6, technically. But I didn't take the deep dive that I did with Horizon 2 or Forza 5 so while I can assume it's more of the solid racing goodness I actually don't really know.

So instead of a Top 10 list, I'm just going to point to the 4 games that I actually spent enough time playing to say that I liked them (or didn't).

FALLOUT 4

This was kind of the big one for me this year. I know many of you will likley have enjoyed Witcher or Metal Gear more, but I never got around to those games (yet). I'm a huge nerd for Fallout though and from the announcement to the release, speculation and hope were pretty much all consuming activities. Happily, I can say that I enjoyed it greatly. Or rather, I AM enjoying it greatly as I have played nothing else since Novermber 10th.

I know the game has been criticized for being too similar to Fallout 3, but for me that is pretty much exactly what I wanted it to be. More of that thing I loved so much 6 or 7 years ago. And darn it all, it works for me. I'm not the biggest fan of Elder Scrolls, I've never played a Witcher game, but Fallout is the open-world game that just gets me. I like the dark sense of humor, I like the setting, I like the alternate version of history they've built over the years. I. Like. Fallout.

So this one is my best of the year easily and hands down. I've put over 200 hours into it already and I am not even near finished with my first playthrough. Heck, the first week it was out one could have been forgiven for assuming I played it just as a base-management sim. Settlements have occupied way too much of my time over the past month but it's all been a joy.

Batman: Arkham Knight

I bought Arkham Knight and played it for a good amount of time. I finished its story (97%, never did get those last 120 Riddler trophies) and I guess I enjoyed it. But it wasn't a lot of fun. It certainly wasn't the end of an era game I was hoping it would be.

ROCKSTEADY has made two games that I adored (Asylum and City), but Knight did not grab me. I still love Batman in comics, films, whatever. But the game constantly forcing me into that Batmobile over and over to keep blasting away at endless Drone tanks just didn't sit well with me. I wrote a review you can read if you really want to know more. LINK

Bottom line; Liked it, didn't love it. Good, not great. And since Asylum and City were great, it felt like more of a misstep than a finale. Too bad. I hope whatever ROCKSTEADY works on next is fun both for fans and for them. Eager to see what they do next.

Mortal Kombat X

In my younger days, I was a fighting game enthusiast in every way. Big fan of Street Fighter 2 in the arcade scene of the day, big fan of MK, of SNK, KI, even Tekken and Virtua Fighter to a degree. Though the 2D fighter will always be my favorite.

MKX felt great to play, it was fun and it had an entertaining story. I can't say it had a good story but it was bad in that way that all MK stories have been "bad". Like a bad B movie that you just love to watch over and over. I loved it.

This one ended up being fun for me on mutliple levels as well. Not only was it fun to play both as a single player game and a mutliplayer game, but I ended up using it as fodder for silly YouTube music videos. They're dumb, but I enjoyed making them anyway. I doubt anyone would want to see them, but if you do, here is a link to the playlist: LINK

And MKX gave me something I've wanted since I was 11 years old, I got to play as Jason Voorhees in a video game. Game, set, match. This one was a winner.

Fallout Shelter

It feels strange putting a phone/tablet game on my list. I normally wouldn't have done that. But I did play a lot of Fallout Shelter this year. More than a lot of other games that I could have. As I said up above, I love Fallout. And this game was fun enough. It isn't great even for a mobile game. But it's simple comforting busy work kinda engagement and I kept wanting to see my vault grow.

But the main reason I kept playing this one was that my girlfriend started playing it with me. She's not a gamer. She's a nurse and her career is her main focus. But it's also a stressful job and I've suggested that a fun game to relieve the stress and take her mind off of things for a bit, might be beneficial. And Fallout Shelter ended up being that game. I still help her with it more often than not. But we both check in on our vaults and dwellers together and have a good time with it. Surprisingly, it ended up being one of the games I played the most this year.

Honorable Mentions

Mario Maker and Splatoon. Both good games that I enjoyed, but didn't play enough to really give them a spot on the list. I actually had more fun watching Mario Maker stuff than actually playing it. From Dan and Patricks throw-down challenge to watching my daughter get consumed by Splatooning, it was a good year for Nintendo even if the controller wasn't technically in my hands for much of it.

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And here's a few games that I plan to get around to playing if I can ever stop playing Fallout 4

• I definitely want to give the Witcher games a try. I'm thinking I'll probably start with 3 rather than starting at the beginning. It looked great and all my friends have played it so I'll definitely give this one a whirl. Probably when I can grab a copy on Steam somewhere in the new year.
• I know many people have been praising Rocket League. I never played it but it looked fun. I am normally not much for multiplayer games, but I may give this one a spin just to see what all the hype is about. The Quick Look made it seem fun so I need to get around to trying this one.
• Until Dawn looks great. I borrowed a copy from my daughter's girlfriend and I'm going to try it out soon. Love horror games so this should be a no brainer.
• Bloodborne. I did play a bit of this, but I want to go back and give it the attention it deserves. I was distracted when I played it and couldn't really commit to it and it seems like a game that needs you to commit. I'll revisit this one in 2016.

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Post Christmas UPDATE

Well I guess I'll get to Witcher 3 sooner rather than later. I received Witcher 3, Just Cause 3, Mad Max as well as the next gen version of GTA V as Christmas gifts from my family.

Geez, 4 open world games at once. It's an embarrassment of riches! Although now I have the difficult albeit fun task of deciding which to tackle first. It's a good problem to have!

This one may take some 'splaining.

A week or so back in the community Spotlight, they featured a game by @havochq. I thought it was really neat, so I did some fan art for it. You can see the whole thing here: LINK

I then noticed that she'd also made a game called "Commander Ryckert". This, coupled with the Bombcast having some Star Trek talk in recent episodes, made me want to do a mash up of TNG and our beloved Giant Bomb crew. Sadly, I'm not the best at drawing caricatures (or anything really), but this is my best attempt and I hope you like it. :)

I had to make a couple of major edits to the TNG crew since Giant Bomb has almost no women. I cheated with Mary Kish, but she was around from time to time. With Troi and Guinan, I just had to go with the gender swap. I thought about giving Vinny Troi's low cut outfits, but we'll save that for "season 2" perhaps. :)

A friend of mine is a big fan of the Captain Toad video game. And he's hoping that Cap Toad makes his way into Mario Kart 8 as a DLC at some point.

While I haven't played Captain Toad's Treasure Hunt game yet, talking about the whole thing led me to make this: