Close Encounters

Watch the skies.  In space, no one can hear you scream, and various other tag lines from the good old genre of science fiction.  I have been a sci-fi fan ever since I first saw Star Wars as a wee boy aged 6, you could say that it shaped the person I am today.  Without my good old sci-fi I’d never have amassed a huge collection of Star Wars toys that I sold before the market for them went through the roof!  I’d never have sat up late at night watching films that broadened my knowledge forever.  Most importantly I’d have missed out on an absolute shed load of games, sci-fi has been prevalent in so many game I can’t even start to count them, but I’m pretty sure it all started with Space Invaders.  With an important event looming I decided that sci-fi would help me to gain an upper edge once more as I blazed a new trail.

Boba Fett is great in Avatar games.

It had taken me just over a year to go from 50,000 gamerscore points up to my total of 59,945, the big 60,000 was looming and I knew it had to be done with something credible.  I’ve always enjoyed the Guitar Hero and Rock Band games so I decided to attempt to break through with Lego Rock Band, a game I had neglected a bit.  I played it for a good few hours and peaked out at 59,985, damn, it wasn’t quite there and I knew I had to change game to push me over.  I scanned my shelves, bursting with games to find what might be the game to do it, then I spotted my most neglected game ever… Dead Space.  Here was a game that I had started twice already only to move on to something new and completely forgot about it, it was credible and a genre I enjoyed so I figured why not, third time lucky.  I had a game save starting from chapter 4, so rather than starting a fresh game I jumped right in. Big mistake!  Usually when I play a game I instantly remember the button layouts, but here I was flummoxed and was getting decimated by the horrible aliens, I whipped out the manual, had a quick read and within a short space of time I was dissecting the alien scum.  Within a short space of time I had plinked 10 gamerscore points and was so very close to my 60,000 target, this was going to be easy, finishing chapter 4, 20 points plinked in to my balance.  Yay! I had cracked 60,000 and better still it was with a good game.

The achievement that popped my 60,000 cherry.

I suppose at that point I could have stopped playing Dead Space and went back to something else, but no!  I was drawn right in to the game: hook, line and sinker.  I was marvelling at the wondrous visuals, captivated by the story and enjoying the varied weapons and their uses.  Why had I shunned this game so much?  It was shaping up to be one of the better games I’d played in a long while, so much so that I spent the next three nights playing it through to the bitter end.  I was almost beaten by the final boss battle but I finally found the weak spot and exploited it for all it was worth, several plinks later and I remembered why I had started to play this game again, my score didn’t matter anymore.  So taken by the whole game experience was I, that I rented the manga prequel from the Zune marketplace and watched it with all the lights off last night, it was great.  I hate to admit that I got the Wii based prequel game called Dead Space Extraction last Christmas and only played a very small bit before I traded it in.  Now I’m looking to get it back again and play through that too, good job it can be got quite cheap these days.  Of course I also now have Dead Space 2 to look forward to early next year, it promises more of the same but bigger and better and I couldn’t be happier.

The hard evidence is here. I've played loads of games, not skill related.

In less than a week I’ve pushed through the 61,000 gamerscore mark and I don’t really care.  I’ve never been a scorewhore, just a victim of playing the next best thing before the last game was finished, I’ve learned my lesson now though.  I’m going to attempt to play through the games I have to the bitter end and there are more than a few I’d like to get round to finishing.  Assassins Creed 2, Left 4 Dead 2, Mass Effect 2 and even Red Dead Redemption all sit unfinished and I now feel I must get around to completing them.  First up though I have to finish Prince of Persia the forgotten sands, because like Magnus Magnusson used to say, “I’ve started, so I’ll finish.”


Posted

in

,

by

Tags:

Comments

Leave a Reply