Ratchet & Clank taught me a very valuable lesson this week. If I start a planet, I better damn well finish it, because it doesn't matter where I save my game; when I play again, they'll dump me at the beginning with my ship. Sure, all the puzzles I solved still remain solved and I have everything I obtained, but it doesn't mean I want to go through the whole level again with enemies and all just to get back to where I was when I quit. Soooo I played for a total of 30 seconds once I was smacked with that yardstick. The patience just wasn't there.

So I turned to my stack of games in search for an RPG. It's been a long time since I've played one, and all of the droolworthy commercials for Lost Odyssey has made me want to pick one up again. I dusted off Baten Kaitos and my poor neglected GameCube and checked my WaveBird controller for batteries. I know that Baten Kaitos is quite old, in terms of game years. It came out in 2004, right around when I started to edit for AMN, now Kombo, and the reviewer gave it fairly high scores so I picked it up. And then it promptly sat on my shelf collecting four years of dust.

I was only able to log in about two or three hours, so I don't have a definitive judgment on it, but it passes and fails in different areas. I'll start with where it passes.

Like any other Japanese RPG, the graphics are beautifully detailed and very Final Fantasy-esque. But hell, if I wanted to play an RPG with beautiful, Final Fantasy-esque graphics, I'd just pop in Final Fantasy X. Thankfully for me, the fighting style twists off from FF. It's still turn-based play, but with a card system. My favorite thing about the card system: the opportunity for playing defense cards while the enemy attacks during its turn. No longer do I have to sit during the enemy's turn and watch it smack around one of my party members. Of course, if I have no defense cards in play, I still sit and watch an enemy smack around one of my party members, which brings me to one downside I found in the card system. I can only have three cards in my hand at a time. So if the enemy attacks and I have only attack cards in my hand, I can't do anything, and vice versa if all I have is defense. However, you still have to put something in play, so it counts as a missed attack or defense.

BK fails in one important aspect for me: teaching me how to play the game. I wondered while playing if I could rearrange the cards in my deck, and later why the cards I found throughout my journey weren't appearing in my deck. Playing CoM taught me how to build a killer deck, and it would be nice to apply something I learned from that game to another. I couldn't find any instruction in game or while looking at my deck that would point me to building my deck. I had to open the instruction booklet to learn how. Tsk, tsk. I never want to open that instruction booklet unless I haven't played the game in months and forgot how to play. While reading about building my deck, I also stumbled upon learning how to level up. I simply assumed that you leveled up with experience, like any other RPG. Well, that's half of how you level up. The other half comes from visiting a church and praying with the high priest for strength. I've been to that church, but no one would speak to me there, so how was I going to learn that I needed to pray to level up? Grrrrrr.

Bad, BK, bad. No cookies for you yet.

However, as I have said before, I haven't logged enough hours to give a final judgment on it. I believe that with RPGs, you have to give at least ten hours before making a final decision. (Unlike Heavenly Sword because well, you could beat the game two and half times with that much time.) I can say so far that I know Shawn will never watch me play it. Turn-based play sends him screaming from a room more quickly than handing me a platform game.

I will throw in a tout for an Xbox 360 game before I close this entry. Might as well mention all the major console developers, right? Lately I've only seen one commercial for a game on TV (no, I actually don't watch much TV) and that's been the oh-so-gorgeous Lost Odyssey. The other day, I saw a commercial for a different game, Devil May Cry 4. I have never played any of the games in the DMC series, so I have no idea what it is about or what any of those games look like. I was mesmerized by the beauty of DMC4. I forgot about Lost Odyssey for a moment. One of my colleagues at work has been yammering on about it, so I asked him about the gameplay, style, etc. I didn't want to fall for another Heavenly Sword. I remembered that the Kombo reviewer really liked it, but I couldn't remember anything distinguishing about why. My colleague said that he doesn't own the game yet, but he's played the demo over and over again. He talked about Dante firing a gun, and I was turned off immediately. I am bad at everything dealing with aiming firearms. Then he mentioned Dante's big sword... I downloaded the demo when I got home from work. This is the first game I've seen on the 360 that fully displays the graphics capabilities of the console. It even beats the beauty of Heavenly Sword. I want, I want, I want!

Before someone points out that it also comes on the PS3, I know that it does. I even downloaded the PS3 demo to see which one I liked better. If it required use of the SIXAXIS at all, I was out. The demo didn't show any requirements or even suggestions for using the SIXAXIS, but for some reason I can't describe, I didn't like it as much. I think it may have been a controller preference. Or it may have been that the 360 is ten times quieter than the PS3. Really not sure.

Now I'm going to go play that demo for a third time...

Panasonic making a Wii-proof TV

I was editing articles for this site and I cracked up when I came across this one. However, it's really not a bad idea and I can think of more pluses to having such a TV besides protecting it from my drunk friends. Luckily for me, the only Wii mishap I've had is spilled wine. (No, it was not me.)

I have been a complete slacker on gaming as of late. I have a few reasons why it takes me forever to play games, and I'm not going to count the pissed off factor.

1) I cannot play games too close to going to bed.
 Laugh at me if you must, but I really can't. It overstimulates my mind to the point of not settling down for hours. If I stop playing because I'm stuck somewhere, the time it takes me to fall asleep triples. On weekends, it's okay if I do this, but during the week... the results aren't pretty the next day. The last time I played a game during the week was the last time I played Twilight Princess. For some reason, I had an incredible difficulty getting past three Twilight Messengers (turns out I wasn't performing the kill move correctly), and I was up almost all night thinking about it. I have not been one of those people who can survive and be pleasant all day on less than six hours sleep since I worked at a news station. Let's not forget the fact that as of two years ago, I was banned from caffeine.

This inability to game during the week really hampers my gaming time. If I could play three to four hours a night, oh hell, let's just say two hours a night, I would probably blaze through my current playlist. After seeing and reading everything about Xbox's new game, Lost Odyssey, I really wish I could blaze through everything so I could get my hot little hands on this pretty puppy.

2) Why are my weekends so damn busy??
I don't know if it's a combination of my new nesting powers or if the weekend is the only time I can see my friends, but I rarely have gaming time on weekends lately. When I was playing Kingdom Hearts, I pretty much had that thing running 24/7 on the weekends. Just a year later, I can barely find time to use my Xbox to watch the anime I've downloaded. (Which, by the way, is an awesome feature of the 360. We've retired the computer that was hooked up to the TV thanks to this networking wonder.)

I know that things are going to get worse when Gabe arrives. However, I also know that I won't be working anymore, so I'll have four more days to play with. Perhaps when he goes down to bed at night...

I'm sure the latter is just a phase that will pass. I hope it will. I still love playing games, and I still get excited about new ones so I know it isn't that I'm losing interest in this hobby like I am others. I just need more hours in the day or less dependence on sleep.

I've decided to shelve Naruto for a little while so I can play the game I don't own. I figure it would be nice to return the game before I pop instead of after, because after... who knows when I'll be able to finish a game especially since I have my KH2 and TP resolutions to consider. I am still having fun with Naruto though, especially after I downloaded the patch for the Japanese voices. I'm not anti-dub by any means, but I prefer the voices I've been listening to for the past four years.

I really wish that I had discovered Ratchet & Clank sooner. As frustrated as the game makes me at times, I have a lot of fun playing it. I love trying out the new weapons. So far my favorite is the Glove of Doom. The glove unleashes four robot dogs who run around and explode when they reach an enemy. Oh, and they laugh maniacally while doing so. Even Shawn got into me throwing them around. My big prayer right now is that I get better at the swingshot. I have great difficulty in timing the release for some reason. I sent Ratchet screaming down this one ravine so many times, I expected him to flip me off at respawn.

Gotta cut this short again. We're off to a Super Bowl party.