Where Have We Been for So Long?

And what have we been up to?

Well, Stephanie (and Adam) had a baby, which has proven to be a far more time consuming activity than finding all the skulls in Halo 3. And Renee has been inexcusably busy, so much so that when she had to start prioritizing activities, blogging fell (unfortunately) by the wayside.

But this does not mean, blogosphere, that either girl has stopped gaming. In fact, once Stephanie went on maternity leave that was the only activity (aside from watching Netflix instant) suitable for baby waiting, and then (post baby) baby tending as it can be done while sitting and in short (or long) bursts allowing time for snack breaks.

Renee has also continued to game, mostly with the Halo Reach. I call it 'the' Halo Reach because I am secretly a very old man. However I've barely even had time to do that, restricting gaming sessions to those nights when I have a partner (defeating the purpose of the big flat screen television I got for my birthday this year specifically because I couldn't read the Halo Reach writing on the old one. That may be the nerdiest fact to know about me) because gaming alone is not nearly as fun (and for some reason--high fives if you know how to fix this, we've tried everything on the Internet to no avail) I can't connect to folks online anymore because my NAT type is not open.

But I still play, and both awesome (when playing against a bunch of noobs) and awful (all other times). You'd think that after 5 years pretending to be Master Chief I'd be better at it.

Have we gotten any new games? For sure. I will leave it to Steph (once she finds the time) to go over which games are best to play while babies are sleeping on your lap because I'm sure she and Adam have accumulated a good stockpile of new titles since Tractor was born (that's the baby. Not really, but that's what we like to call him).

I have only 2 new acquisitions, both only moderately satisfying. The first was a complete Rock Band set up (including 2 games) that I picked up in a consignment store for $40 of store credit (WIN!). Unfortunately the drum pedal doesn't work, which takes all the fun out of being the drummer, and I haven't been able to justify buying a replacement one because when do I have time to play the pretend drums? I can't even find time to play the real piano in my apartment.

Moving on, I also came across a Power Gig guitar and game on sale at Big Lots (who knew they sold bargain bin electronics? $8 Blue Tooth anyone?) which I got and promptly decided was not very fun. This is the one place I can actually offer some valuable perspective (though I'm probably the millionth person to mention this): the stupid game is billed as being akin to playing a real guitar, and providing you with transferable skills to become an actual guitar player, however this is not the case. It's essentially Guitar Hero (or Rock Band) with strings instead of buttons. You can push the strings down, or you can strum them, but the strings in no way correspond to real notes and playing the game will bring you no closer to being able to actually fumble your way through Stairway to Heaven than Dance, Dance Revolution will get you ready for Juilliard. I played it once and now it's sitting in the box next to the tv stand, like it's waiting for the day I sell it or give it away.

So those have been the majority of my recent adventures in gaming. I also finally joined the rest of the world and picked up a smart phone last month, allowing me to see what all the fuss was about Angry Birds. We actually played it on a train in Italy, of all places (way to be jerky American tourists) and of all the phone games, I can see why it's super popular (can't say the same for the sequels, though. There's only so much fun to be had from sending birds flying into wooden blocks).


I'm definitely excited about the new Halo game, though. Maybe I'll actually play through the campaign on that one (though I doubt it).