Only a week since my last blog. Not much has happened, except Gears of War 3 being released. I also got paid for the first time. As is tradition, first paycheck means a stupid purchase which I will be getting in to shortly.

Happy Birthday Dave!

It is Dave's Birthday today, and as a creepy tribute people are wearing hardcore dave as their avatar for the weekend. Get involved!

You can also have Hardcore Dave emblazoned upon your chest by purchasing the Duder T-Shirt from the Whiskey Media store. Shameless plug over.

Bastion Soundtrack

Roughly 6 weeks ago SuperGiantGames released the Bastion Soundtrack for digital download and physical album, including a signed version. Despite never using CDs beyond ripping them for my iPhone, I ordered a signed copy of the physical album and you will be pleased to know you get an immediate download of the digital version. Considering it took 6 weeks to arrive, that was a good idea as I have listened to it for hours in that time.

I have quite a few pieces of gaming memorabilia, and it's good having one of the best gaming soundtracks among my collection. I love Jen#s artwork too, so seeing the cover makes me happy.

Rock of Ages

A quick note, since I bought and completed Rock of Ages. An incredible, silly, funny, unique game. It is, however, incredibly short with little replay value and a tiny almost non-existent multiplayer community. As long as you go in to this expecting to be entertained, not rocked to the core and getting value for money you should be good. It's not difficult and you will blow through it but it's worth it.

Gears of War 3 Epic Edition

As I said earlier, I got paid for the first time. I am a self employed graphic designer on contract at the moment and got paid for my first month of work. As is obligatory, I made a stupid purchasing decision. I really wanted to build a new PC but with bills and small debts that isn't going to happen, so I decided to go smaller. It was a stretch for me to buy the regular edition earlier this week, but by trading it in for the Epic Edition I got as much as I paid for it. A fair trade for once.

At £100 this is an expensive edition of the game, and is essentially the 'limited' edition in a much larger box, and a statuette of Marcus Fenix. I am a sucker for nice packaging and everything about this is higher quality than I have come to expect from games. As Jeff mentioned, the Styrofoam packaging has symbols etched in to them. The box is felt and feel nice to the touch. It also contains a load of junk such as the Hammer of Dawn schematics but the real meat of this edition is the COG service medal (which feels really weighty and solid), a high quality art book and the massive Marcus statuette.

The statue is simultaneously larger and lighter than I imagined it would be. There is a lot of detail on the figure and unlike a lot of figures the face is accurate to the game model . Oddly the lancer he holds is detachable, and I don't know why. You have to slot it in place. I guess you could hold it and pretend you are a giant soldier. Anyway, I will leave you with a photo I took of it (including a cardboard backdrop that comes with it) that I took with my iPhone. Terrible quality, I can never seem to take good photos with it. Until next time...