The Xbox and Me: 1 Month

So it's been a few weeks now with the 360 and I have to say that I don't
really have a positive or negative overall feeling about the thing.

The only other system I've bought at launch was the GameCube. I bought
Super Monkey Ball and Luigi's Mansion. Two radically different games and
ones that I really liked playing. With the 360, I bought Perfect Dark
Zero. I've said before that I bought it out of nostalgia for the N64
Perfect Dark, and while the game is growing on me as a Perfect Dark game,
there is one huge glaring side effect: Xbox Live.

Usually video games draw Nicole and I apart, especially if I own a game
like Perfect Dark: Zero, a game that makes her nausious with all that
spinning around. But Live brought us Hexic. And Hexic is a game that we
watch each other play and spot ways to help. It's pretty fun and seriously
good spousal communication practice. You can very easily find a place to
sleep on the couch if your not careful (whatever that means, I've never
had to sleep on the couch before!).

So what does Live have to do with Perfect Dark? Well, I have a history
with Live and the game Burnout. I played Burnout: Takedown. I played that
game for hours everyday. It was the only game I liked (aside from SOCOM II
& III) that people really couldn't cheat it online. Glitch, maybe. But
cheating...I mean, what would make you want to cheat with the point of the
game is to smack the crap out of each other into a wall at 120mph.
Hmmm...I digress.

Perfect Dark: Zero on Live is just about as addictive. Once you find those
5 or 6 people that play a fair game and all know each other, it's pretty
hard to get into a game you don't enjoy. It's like when we played Halo LAN
accept with less smack talking and more ambient talk about what you did
that day. I guess if you don't know someone like you know your best
friends, you don't really feel comfortable calling them overly-"Rated M"
names. But the chemistry is still there. Online gaming is addictive to me.
I check my Live messages even on the computer when we're watching tv. I
won't tell Nicole to turn off The Daily Show to play, but I think it. And
if I can't play I'll go outside and do something to get it out of my
system. It calls to me. I know it watches me.

So that's basically been my life with teh 360 for the past few weeks. I'm
still not interested in purchasing any games for it again. Live Arcade is
offering me the most options, with the upcoming Live Street Fighter II
download in a couple of weeks. And Hexic is going to have us tied up for
awhile until we figure out how to unlock all the achievements, something
magical that has been captured on YouTube.com to an exterem level that
I'll never attain.

I've even been thinking of pulling out Burnout: Takedown to see if anyone
is still online with it. If anyone has it, send a message to ThrustinJ
360. I'd love to dust that game off and grind you into a guardrail with it.