WTB New Game PST

In the recent months, me and lady have discovered something about me that was previously hidden while in the grips of the various lifesucking video games that I have tended to drift towards. It seems that when I am bored, my mood shifts from my usual cheery, perma-grin demeanor, to one more anxious and surly. You might call it "a case of the blahs". I become a sheer joy to converse with, as I'm sure she will attest to. Previously, there was usually some game that had me in its grips, be it Star Wars Galaxies, World of Warcraft, or whatever flavor of the month FPS that was out at the time, ultimately leading to a situation where I would absolutely never be bored.

These days I am in a sort of gaming limbo. Most recently, my crack was World of Warcraft, but a stale game coupled with conflicts between friends turned me off entirely from the game, and since then I have been game hopping, looking for a place for either me or my group of friends to land comfortably.

A recent big title (no, not Halo), was Bioshock, which I ended up picking up based on a very positive critical reception and recommendation from friends. Fortunately, the praise was merited. While it is not a particularly spectacular shooter in terms of how the game plays, the story is brilliant. The story is a sort of "what if" where the game takes place in a dystopian city where individualism is wholly embraced and free market capitalism in pure form is the rule. Heavy stuff that I hope raises the bar for future games and makes me feel good about video games as a medium.  HOWEVER, I still haven't beaten it weeks later, as I cannot bring myself to play it for more than a few hours in a week, and thus, it is not the answer to my boredome problem. By all means though, pick up the game if you havent (on PC and the 360). It is a must have.

I also tried out City of Heroes/Villains, and managed to bring my friends over with me. As I'm sure you guys have read before, the game was such a breath of casual fresh air after WoW, and those first couple of weeks with everyone there were great. Unfortunately, interest has waned, and at best we'll have 2 people from the group on at a time, often making it a single player experience. From MMORPG genre I have developed a taste for companionship and comradery in my games, especially in games that fall into said genre, and thus, I think CoV is on it's way out.

So where does that leave me? Well, there are games in the horizon. Crysis, Left4Dead, the Orange Box (Portal!). Tabula Rasa was a dud after trying it, but Age of Conan is still a possibility. I have noticed one thing. I've recently become very jaded about upcoming releases. Where I would usually don rose coloured glasses and have high hopes for games, these days I have a cynical attitude about them. I suppose it might be a good thing, as setting a low bar means you'll be dissapointed less often. I think Lonk is rubbing off on me.

Until those games are out already, what to do?

Tentative to-do list: Clean my dirty old Mostin-Nagant already. Go out. Not be a nerd. Read a book. Do homework. Join a gang and deal drugs (I am from the streets after all). If I had a working TV and some disposable cash, I'd consider getting a Wii.
Or I could just click my time away reading new sites and video game news sites. Good times.