I can’t believe it’s already here, but the Extra Life marathon, while I’ll attempt to play video games for 25 hours over a weekend, is THIS weekend. I’m not sure who is less ready for this–me or my husband, who will have to take care of two kids pretty much by himself most of the weekend. I still need to plan snacks, a schedule of sorts, and what games I’m going to play.

From the poll, I’m definitely playing the following games:

• Tomb Raider;
• LEGO The Lord of the Rings; and
• Bastion.

There’s one vote for Batman: Arkham City and for Dragon’s Dogma, but I’m going to lean more toward Dragon’s Dogma just because I’ve had several people ask me to play outside of SGR back when the game released. And I’m not in the mood to be trapped with some stealth. Yeah, I’m wimping out, but them’s the breaks.

If I need a bit of a distraction, I’m also going to play Saints Row IV, since I really want to finish that game and I’m bummed I just ran out of time with other game releases and, well, my baby son. I think that should be more than enough, and probably more than I can play in 25 hours time.

If I do happen to run out of stuff or I just get sick of what I’m playing, I’m going to check out Telltale’s new episodic game, The Wolf Among Us. Hopefully that won’t scare me as much as The Walking Dead did.

And if you haven’t donated to my awesome Extra Life cause yet, please do so! Every $10 you donate goes toward winning a strategy guide of your choice!

Before I delve into this, let me make one thing clear; I am excited about LEGO Marvel Heroes for several reasons. One, it’s a new LEGO game, and I love these games to absolute pieces (pun intended). Second, it’s Marvel, and I love practically everything Marvel.

However, this weekend made me realize I’m really excited about LEGO Marvel Heroes’ release this week for one big reason: I’m so sick of playing LEGO Batman 2 with my son.

My eldest boy is really into Batman everything right now. He’s going to be Batman for Halloween, he wants Batman toys, and he loves the LEGO Batman game on his iPad. Since I refuse to play that horrific game, I offer to play LEGO Batman 2 with him on my PS3. The first time we played together was an absolute nightmare, as it became readily apparent that it’s a problem he can’t read and the controls are often a bit complex for him. I often had to take the controller from him to maneuver through some areas he just couldn’t figure out, even with me telling him which buttons to press.

He begged me to play with him again, and I prepared myself for another somewhat painful experience, but this time, he got it. I would only have to remind him what buttons to replace every now and then. I would have to keep his attention at times and tell him where I needed him, but for the most part, he really had the game down.

So now, guess what we play together every time he notices I’m not feeding the baby? I have this game memorized inside and out. I hear the dialogue in my sleep. As much as I love Clancy Brown, Troy Baker, and Travis Willingham, I’m really sick of this script running through my head.

Gabe really likes the Avengers, so I’m hoping this will distract him a bit so maybe we can trade off which games we play between Batman 2 and Marvel Heroes. Then I’ll have two games I’m absolutely sick of.

At the same time, it is fun playing these games with him, even though I could most likely play them in my sleep.

My five-year-old has really been getting into video games (as much as a kid his age can) over the last year or so. He has my old iPad, so he’s played some games with that, and he’s become a star at all things Angry Birds. Levels that make me want to hurl my iOS device across the room he easily conquers and gets mad he only got 2 stars.

But of course, the iPad won’t satisfy him for long, and he’s developed a slow interest in my own video games, especially when he saw me playing LEGO Batman 2 on the PS3 last year. The game features two of his most favorite things: LEGOs and Batman. Of course he’s going to want to play. We’ve tried playing it together a little bit, but the controller is a bit much for him and it’s hard that he still can’t read to really learn how to play. It also doesn’t help that he has the attention span of a gnat, so he doesn’t really listen or retain what I tell him in how to play.

So on a whim one day, I looked to see if the game or a facsimile of it was available for the iPad. It indeed is, called LEGO Batman DC Heroes, and it’s the handheld version of the game. Two control schemes are offered, touch and virtual controls, so I set it on touch controls for him and let him go to town.

Holy crap this is the worst game to have as touch controls. For starters, you jump by performing a two-finger zoom-out swipe. You have no idea how much harder that is to execute and control than it sounds. I have sent more Bat-characters careening to their deaths in one scene than I have an entire game. The virtual d-pad is almost worse.

All I have felt is frustration when he asks me to “help” (a/k/a, play this part for me) to the point I’ve pretty much passed it to my husband who has a truckload more patience than I do. He comes to me when he gets stuck, because he isn’t as versed in LEGO games as I am, so he doesn’t always know what little things to look for when trying to progress through a level.

I cannot wait until Gabe finishes the story mode of this game. I’ve told him we’ll help him through the story mode, but then he’s on his own. I’d rather play a platformer than go through that game ever again. It’s just yet another reason why I rarely play iOS games, and why I’m ready for him to enjoy playing games with a controller.

I’m glad he loves it for now, but I’m not sure it was $4.99 well spent.