I may be crazy enough to call Halo 3: ODST the best installment in the Halo franchise yet. It seems particularly insane, since the game started off as DLC, then sprawled into a full release. All of this while not shaking the Halo 3 umbrella, because it wasn’t long enough, it wasn’t a full game, et cetera, blah blah. But I’m going to lay it on the line: ODST is shockingly superior in narrative and presentation to all the other Halo games. It left me with a sense of satisfaction that I haven’t gotten since the original Halo. And that’s what, eight years ago at this point? But I’m not bullshitting you.

Master Chief Sucks.

Oh my god fifteen million people just shit their pants. Fanboys are falling over and fainting and arming electronic messages of hate. But I love ODST so much more than the other Halo games because it finally put a human face to the epic, generic sprawling war that encompasses the Halo mythos. Master Chief is awesome because he can take an ass-kicking that would fell a tank, he does cool shit like hop out of spaceships, and he’s apparently schizophrenic and talks to computer AIs in his brain.

But can anyone relate to Master Chief?

I CAN, I TOTALLY READ THE SEVENTEEN BOOKS PLUS I FOLLOWED ALL THE VIRAL MARKETING, AND OH YEAH, I’M AN OVERWEIGHT GAYLORD FANBOY

Yeah well, let’s say that you’re someone who hasn’t read all the books, decoded all the messages, spent a million years on the Bungie message boards ruminating with fellow Halo fanatics. Is Master Chief anything more than the standard John McClean trope? No, not really.

I can’t tell you anything about the first three Halo games at this point. It’s been what, two years since the third installment came out? It’s forgettable slop. Yeah, I said it: forgettable slop. It’s a mushy Sci-Fi tale that borders on non-sensical for anyone who doesn’t want to sit down and hash everything out.

So what you’re saying is that the storyline sucks because you’re too stupid to understand it?

Actually, maybe.

But what I’m really trying to emphasize is that I haven’t connected with Master Chief and the primary storyline because it stars a sterile, unrelatable hero, with poor presentation.

So prior to playing ODST I thought that telling a lovable tale in the Halo universe was impossible.

Then I met Buck and Veronica.

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Poor Final Fantasy VIII. It followed VII, which made roughly eight-zillion nerds who had never played an RPG fall in love with the genre. Myself included. Little did we know that most were mine-fields filled with shit, slow-ass battles, and mediocrity.

I loved it. All my friends hated it. It was definitely not Final Fantasy VII 2.0 Us being neophiles to the series, that left a lot of us befuddled. Holding on to one another, crying and asking where Cloud and materia were.

It had the Draw System.

I loved it.

It was Dawson’s Creek in Space and Time.

I loved it.

And now it’s coming to the PSN shortly.

Awesome.

Time Line:

Sony releases the PS3 Slim.

I say to myself, that’s hot as hell. But Ian, you’re broke and unemployed, you can’t afford it.

Gamestop announces you can get 150$ towards a PS3 Slim if you trade in your old PS3. I begin to waver.

Not Sony shows this FFXII Themes PS3 Slim.

My conviction continually wavers. It’s fucking hot. I generally don’t enjoy Game-Themed consoles. I may, it’s not my Final Fantasy XIII-player. It’s a general console. I know it’s irrational, OCD type shit. And I know I’ll hold strong…despite this. Probably. But if I was ever going to buy a themed console. It’d probably be this. Jesus.

Ah, god bless the shitty motion controls gimmick. I thought it was going to die. I thought that maybe, somehow, people weren’t going to dig it. But now everyone is into it.

And then, somehow, I thought that maybe shitty motion controls remakes would be relegated to the Wii. Stupid Resident Evil 4 with motion controls. The Metroid Prime games re-released with motion controls. I mean, what’s worse than the stupid gimmick that is motion controls? Making some cheap cash off of rehashes with the gimmick smashed into it.

Well guess what, PS3 fans! Apparently you’re going to get to re-buy Resident Evil 5 and Littlebigplanet so you can shake your little wrist to make them uh, do stuff:

Via Kotaku:

Well, we now know what that “Resident Evil 5: Director’s Cut” stuff was all about. It’s a re-release of RE5, built to take advantage of Sony’s upcoming motion controller.

The game will be out in Spring 2010, and it’s far from the only existing PS3 title to take advantage of the new peripheral. During SCEJ’s TGS press conference, Sony’s Shuhei Yoshida revealed that the controller will also work with existing games like LittleBigPlanet, EyePet, Flower, Pain, High Velocity Bowling “and more”.

Sick! More phallus-shaking action! Christ, between jacking off compulsively and now wasting money on shitty motion-based rehashes, I’ll have the wrist of a god! Which is uh, good for nothing.

Hey, let’s churn some obvious bullshit and pass it off as news!

Via Kotaku:

[Uncharted 2] doesn’t conclude the story at all. The expectation with Uncharted 2 is that it can be an ongoing franchise as long as people want more of it.

Wait, really? This news blows my mind for two reasons:

1) I thought middle installments of stories always conclude the tale.

2) I always thought they didn’t make sequels to successful franchises because they didn’t want to milk it to death.

Seriously, this is staggering news. As a non-snarky aside, I can’t wait for Uncharted 2. The original game is still my favorite PS3-exclusive. It doesn’t pioneer anything, but it executes on so many levels with bonerfying proficiency. Hilarious typical wise-ass lead, beautiful visuals, addictive and challenging gameplay, the quinessential shotgun of fury. Every game should have a shotgun of fury. It’s scientifically established the shotgun is the coolest gun in any video game. Ever.

But seriously Naughty Dog, this is good news. But could you take a break and give me a PS3 Jak and Daxter? I’ll sell my nana to you. And my dad.

I haven’t played much ODST yet, but I figured I’d vomit up some impressions for those curious. Let me first begin by saying what you’ve already read everywhere else: as a single-player campaign, this isn’t worth sixty bucks. Maybe with all the online nonsense that I’m really not even going to touch, but if you’re looking for some single-player lovin’, seek elsewhere.

What’s awesome? The narrative. It’s only taken Bungie four Halo games, but they’ve finally made something compelling. The storytelling is much better than the previous games, and I already care more about these ODST scrubs than I do about the Ender’s Game rip-off known as Master Douche.

Blah? The graphics. C’mon Bungie. You look like you’re running last-gen stuff here. I’m not a graphics whore by any means, but you’re getting shredded by countless 360 games.

It’s a good game. Addictive even. I’m only taking a break to do some nightly reading and writing, or else I’d still be in there. It’s probably for the best though, since I’ve been told it’s only about five-hours or deliciousness. It’s a good, engrossing narrative so far, wrapped around the same tried-and-true gameplay. You may love it, but it’s refried beans to me at this point.

I’ll write something else up when I complete the game, which again, is about as long as one of my farts. (Which are probably longer than should be humanly possible, but extremely short in the grand scheme of even a mortal’s life.)

Final Fantasy Tactics is up for download on the PSN. Final Fantasy Tactics is one of my favorite Final Fantasy games. When I first bought it, it broke me over its knee and left me for dead. Be gone, nub player it told me. And I nodded at it and left glumly. Years later I returned, a wizened young adult, ready to have his ass served to him repeatedly in the name of strategy. And by the end, with my legion of Monk/Ninjas, I was double-fist punching the shit out of every goon in my way. I still own my original copy, but if I didn’t, I would be on this like fanboys on Felecia Day.

Ah, Trish Stratus. I had forgotten about you. I had forgotten about all the hot summer nights I sat in front of the TV with a raging boner as you fought other WWF “divas” and strutted about all scandalous. It seems absurd now, but my hormonal teenage body couldn’t handle your generic bleach-blond hair and fake boobs. But then I grew up, and you slid, slid so far away from my mind. And now you’re back, with your own Wii game?

Via Destructoid:

Fitness model and former WWE actor Trish Stratus has teamed up with Frima Studio to develop a new yoga game for the Wii called Stratusphere. The game will make use of the Wii balance board and other Wii accessories in order to make it so you can do awesome things to yourself.

What is going on with this world?! And then Trish, I saw what you’ve done to yourself! Brown hair? Glasses? You know how to play us, Stratus! You’ve gone from cajoling the yokels and the teenage kids of the world with your fake boobs and your blond hair to manipulating us nerds with your sexy glasses and business suit! You’re vile! You’re evil! I love you. Again.

Oh snap! BioShock 2 is dated! Dust off your copies of The Fountainhead, put your thinking cap on, and get ready for the sequel to what I consider the smartest video game of all time. The game is dated for February 9, 2010. I can’t wait. Did Bioshock need a sequel? No way. Am I concerned that they’re milking a sequel, especially since Ken Levine isn’t involved? Of course. Do I think a multiplayer mode is the dumbest shit ever? Certainly. But still, it’s a sequel to BioShock.

I’m ready to spend some time in Fort Frolic for real. Dated!

When I heard that the Brutal Legend demo was available to people who pre-ordered the game at Gamestop, I got my uncleansed ass to the store today. I threw down five dollars and giddily stared at the download bar as I penetrated my 360 hard drive with metal thunder.

God damn.

Brutal Legend looks to be a handjob to every metal geek like my friends and myself. I generally don’t play demos, since I like to keep things virgin. Like I was, for twenty-five years. But I couldn’t help it. Like Keanu Reeves in The Matrix, it seems like this is the shit Jack Black was born to play. The demo throws enough ridiculous shit at the metal head in fifteen minutes to leave them panting over their Anthrax collection. Swinging huge axes, the typical Hot Topic metal chick, and electrocuting people with a Flying V guitar.

All of this would be just another sloppy homage if it weren’t for the fact that the gameplay seems to deliver. Mastermind behind it Tim Schafer throws the kitchen sink at you. You have metal-Zelda gameplay, driving a god damn hotrod, and some Prince of Persia style teaming-up with said Hot Topic chick.

And then to close it off, they preview the rest of the game while blasting Three Inches of Blood’s song “Deadly Sinners”. What sort of homo would like a 3IOB song blaring while a trailer plays? Someone like me, who rocked out to them to the point that I named my WoW guild after them.

The line starts behind me to give Schafer a blow-job.