I know, I know…old game is still old. So one more opinion isn’t going to hurt anything.

If I hadn’t played a few chapters of Gears of War 2 first, I would never have gotten into the Gears franchise with the first game alone. In many ways, I wish I had just stuck with the second game and ignored the first, because the first game has soured my opinions of the series a little bit.

The gameplay was always fun, so don’t get me wrong there. However, I need a little more than that to go on to truly like a game. I picked up the original game because I wanted to learn more about what was going on in this post-apocalyptic world. What are the Locust? Where did they come from? While I understand why they didn’t go into all of these explanations with the first game, a little narration as to what is going on would have been nice. At the very least, it would have been nice to know what the hell they were doing at all.

I rolled along just fine with the first Act and about halfway through the second Act. At that point, I thought that the team was just trying to find a way to get back to base. I didn’t understand why they went underground until they planted the resonator. Then I thought, “Okay, now I just got to get them out alive and back to base.” Nope. Now we’re running through Fenix estate and boarding a train with a light bomb. I know I’m a natural blonde, but I shouldn’t have had that hard of a time figuring out what was going on.

The plot seemed to be so scrapped together as an after-thought, like the game was meant to be a shooter first and then the story was tacked on. And you know, that’s most likely what happened. I’m not saying that this makes it a bad game, just not a game for me. I like shooting things as much as the next shooter fan, but I like to know why I’m doing it other than kill them before they kill me (which really is a good reason).

So yes, unfortunately, Gears of War is not something I can recommend unless it’s a bargain bin purchase. That said, I’m still really looking forward to Gears 3‘s release as I approach completing Gears 2.

Back when I originally dabbled in PC gaming–the Age of Mythology era–I had considered getting into Dungeon Siege when it first released, but I was warned that it wasn’t suited for newbies to PC RPGs, so I stayed away. I never heard anything from the franchise since, until I went to E3 in 2010, when Square Enix announced it was bringing the game back and was publishing it for consoles as well as PC. I wasn’t able to play Dungeon Siege III at that E3 or this past E3, but I was still intrigued by the demo. So I blindly purchased the game, and I was definitely not disappointed.

The best way I can describe Dungeon Siege III is that it is a hybrid of a linear action-RPG and Gauntlet. I say Gauntlet because it has the capabilities of supporting up to four people playing at once, and the combat reminds me a lot of Gauntlet:Seven Sorrows, but with a lot more depth. It’s definitely not a button-masher as combat requires a fair bit of strategy, but it’s not nearly as complex as typical action-RPGs.

My only complaint about the game is how short it is. Playing on Normal and finishing all the sidequests took me only 14 hours to complete. I believe the reason for this is that you have the opportunity to play as four different characters, which gives you different perspectives to the overall story and the opportunity to make different choices throughout the game. Decisions you make greatly affect the ending, which is half the reason why I’m already playing through again as a different character.

Another possible reason why the story is so short could be due to the co-op capabilities. Players can drop in and out of a co-op game at any time, but if you want to play with friends for the whole game, it’s a little hard to get four people to agree to set aside time to play a 30-hour game together. Fourteen hours is far easier to coordinate.

As for the story, it wasn’t the greatest RPG story on the planet, but it kept me guessing. I thought I knew what the twist was going to be, and I was pleasantly surprised to be wrong. RPGs have a knack for being rather derivative when it comes to story, so it’s always refreshing to have a wrench thrown into the gears.

Dungeon Siege III hasn’t had a lot of marketing or discussion since its June release, but it’s a sleeper hit that’s a must for action-RPG fans, especially action-RPG fans who have a small nostalgic pension for Gauntlet. If only there was a narrator telling me that my Archon needs food badly.

In case you hadn’t noticed from my Monday gaming diaries, I loved inFamous 2. I’ve rarely ever played a game through completion TWICE, so playing it twice back-to-back is rather unprecedented–I didn’t even play renegade Mass Effect right after I finished my paragon playthrough of ME2. Granted, by the time I got near the end of my evil playthrough of inFamous 2, I was more than tired of the gameplay and of the swamp monsters, especially.

However, I had to see how being evil changed things immediately. I wanted to know far more badly than I did Mass Effect. (It also helped that I knew I could burn through the story quickly, but that’s a different matter.) That says volumes about a game as someone who is never looking for replay value in a game.

As for the gameplay, when I said I was tired of it by the end, I really meant that I was tired of playing these missions again. Zapping people with lightning really never gets old, but there were some boss fights and mini-boss fights that I really didn’t want to relive. However, I think we can all say that about games. I personally loved the gameplay, aside from how “sticky” Cole would seem to get. In other words, Cole would gravitate toward things to climb up or grab all the time. While you’re trying to make a weird jump or float to a grindwire, this is awesome. But when you’re just running down the street, you don’t want to suddenly grab onto a pipe to climb, particularly when you’re getting shot at from all directions. This is, though, my only complaint so hey, if that’s all I found wrong with it, then there’s really not much a problem.

Many complained that the game provided just more of the same from the game, with no real improvements on powers or newness to Cole’s abilities. I think this is another case of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t.” I personally like that it kept the same premise and power ideas from the first game, especially since it let me float around from the get go. If the game deviated too much or tacked on even more, I think there would have been plenty of complaints that it wasn’t like the first game. After everyone bemoaned Cole’s new look, did anyone really think SuckerPunch was going to change up Cole’s powers?

So yes, inFamous 2 is basically more of inFamous, but that is exactly what this gamer wanted. If you’re a fan of the first, you’re definitely going to like the second. Just, uh, be prepared for the unusual endings.

I specifically packed Professor Layton and the Unwound Future in my Japan luggage because I knew this would be the perfect time to play it. This game was meant for those train rides! And sure enough, I was right; those train rides were perfect for solving a puzzle or two.

However, like its predecessors, the story behind the puzzles is what kept me up until 1 am playing, despite the fact that I had walked my feet off all around Japan that day.

All of the Professor Layton games have stories that completely jump the shark, but they fit in a way for why this professor of archaeology and his groupie constantly run into people with puzzles to solve. The stories would NEVER fly by anyone without the puzzle solving mechanics, and I think that’s part of the charm and fun of the games. The story of the Unwound Future jumped a bigger shark than the others–I’d love to explain why but I won’t for spoilers’ sake–but I found that I liked it best. It centered around some of Layton’s past and explained the histories behind a few running characters, which really appeals to fans of the series.

As such, it’s difficult to recommend this game unless you have played the first one, Professor Layton and the Curious Village, as so many characters are given zero background information. For example, without playing the first game, you will really have no clue about Don Paolo or Clara or even Layton’s history with Inspector Chelmey. It also goes without saying that if you didn’t like either of the first games, you won’t like this one either. It’s more of the same, more mini-games, and more brainteasers.

I cannot wait for the fourth game to release in the states.