Bad Company 2, Final Fantasy XIII, God of War III - there were plenty of actual games to discuss on the 'box this week. And somehow, they actually were discussed - rather than being overlooked in favour of fashionable meat products or terrifying dating diasters.
Also on the agenda - web-based strategy games and people becoming upset by In Bruge quotes... eh?
To make sense of it all, we called in Best Of newcomer OneDaveOfMany, who brought short, sharp justice to a week of chat...
War Games
Large portions of the chat this week surrounded the recent release of Battlefield Bad Company 2 on both the 360 and PS3, boxers new and old were signed up to squads and clans and spent many a morning regaling heroic stories of the previous night's skirmishes. With our well established clan tag of 'NaN' dominating the servers it was another testament to the 'box bringing people together in the carnage of the online killing fields.
St00 summed this up in his own indomitable way on Friday: "Pretty much 12 v 12 all bloggers for at least two matches last night. It was incredible. Bubbles of laughter joy kept escaping at times. I may have squeaked at times." Beaniedad on Friday revealed the sacrifices he has to endure for the greater good: "Wife making 'Did you really spend three hours playing games with people you don't even know?' comments this morning." Chin up soldier, you're an example to us all.
Though such harmonious discussion was derailed slightly on Tuesday when some rivalry broke out between the 360 and PS3 players, which led to some not particularly threatening smack talk and oneupmanship, all in aid of a conflict that can never actually able be resolved. Much like real war then, I guess.
New Games
The other big new released discussed this week were mainly God Of War 3 and Final Fantasy XIII, Chubster led straight out of the gate with the former on Monday morning with his usual enthusiasm: "God of War III then - blimey. My socks have officially been knocked off on a number of occasions. 'Bombastic' is probably the best word to describe it. How is everyone else getting on with it?" The answer to this seemed to be very well on the whole with the blog appreciating the game's epic scale and over the top gore, though a couple of people did reveal frustration with some of the jumping mechanics and Shadowmind was having trouble even getting started: "right at the beginning (30secs in), there is a fallen tree across your path, and you have to tap 'O' very fast. well I can't get past that, I was going crazy". All together now: you're doing it wrong.
The talk of Final Fantasy continued in a positive vein as well, though one of the game's biggest proponents OfficePest seemed to have forgotten one of the key mechanics by the end of the week: "What's the big robot-ish looking thing that eats the dinosaur looking thing in the cut scene?! What's the massive thing in the background on the plains of Pulse?!! I'm scared! Am I going to have to fight these big, scary monsters?!!!" Maybe you could just try and be friends?
Elsewhere CBPodge, erstwhile fount of FF knowledge, gave a concise and informative summary of nearly all the previous games on Wednesday (too much to quote here I'm afraid) and there was continued discussion of the various games in the series 'boxers have enjoyed over the years.
Quote pro quo
Wednesday saw the return of an old 'box favourite, a TonyHayers quote causing offense to someone unfamiliar with his tendency to steal the words of others. This time the instigator was the film In Bruges (a 'box quoting favourite to begin with) as discussion had strayed onto discussion of the city. Questions as to whether an apology, by way of another quote from the film, actually counted remain unanswered. EnglishRed however didn't seem to be taking it all very seriously: "a quote too far? I love that film, Anthony Hopkins was miscast though." Still the incident fired up some discussions on blog etiquette, BigWorv laid down his law in no uncertain terms: "The chatosphere will never be reached if comments aren't made because someone may not 'get' them. This isn't the Early Learning Centre of chat." With this, the topic died down and normal service was quickly resumed, rumours of engagement in a virtual group hug were strongly denied by all involved.
A Serious Hobby
Another throughline of the week was the ongoing manoeuvrings of those locked in the web-based strategy games Diplomacy and Neptune's Pride. Both provided ample opportunity for bloggers to form and break alliances and generally confuse the rest of us with their tactical planning. RustyJames tried an unusual tack to eliminate players from the game: "Re: Diplomacy I think rob may have left when I tried to charge him 'inter-galactic council tax'." Still the experience was obviously enjoyable as another game of Diplomacy was already being organised by the end of the week, and there was even a play-by-email game of Civilization 4 in the offering care of Limni.
Miscellany
As usual with the blog there was an excess of smaller topic covered over the course of the week, so a quick shout out to alcohol chat (Wednesday), older women blog (for the umpteenth time unfortunately – Wednesday), programming tricks (Monday), Ridley Scott yay or nay (Thursday), books into games (Friday), the ongoing PES Cup (all week), Home vs. Microsoft games room (Thursday), RIP the Bill (Friday) and finally the constant spam attacks and their unexpected self-awareness possibly leading to the creation of Skynet and the destruction of all mankind (all week).
Get Stuck In
New to the box, or unable/unsure about joining the weekly chat but keen to get involved? We have a rather extensive Wiki set up and maintained with details of people's gamertags, PSN ID's and the like as well as specific details for individual games such as PES. Find it here.
If you want to get involved then why not add yourself, and start befriending some of the Chatterbox faithful? They're a lovely bunch I promise. At the moment we have nightly Battlefield Bad Company 2 games going on both Xbox 360 and PS3, albeit in a rather haphazard way and a slightly more organised Thursday Modern Warfare sessions on the PS3. Alongside this Goody84 is always on the lookout for new PES players for the various leagues and cups that he arranges.
Quote(s) of the Week
"Pleased that I managed to kill one of the baby giant Turtles on the Pulse plains."
Umboros23 does serious damage to his RSPCA application.
"Apparently they've abolished the Rule of Thumb. Nanny state."
HenryPootle despairs at the latest restriction to his civil liberties.
"Does Richard Branson still own Virgin Internet? I want to stamp on his beard."
PicPicPic plans a very specific revenge strategy.
"I woke up next to an empty Pot Noodle this morning"
Lazybones tries a new approach to dating.
Welcome: Tinkermann, Chubbz, EndofLevelBaddie , Ronarid , destry54, MagneticNW, w3rthers, Sayzar
Films: Wall-E, Shutter Island, Alice in Wonderland, Moon, Kick Ass, Looking for Eric, Zombieland
TV: The Pacific, Twin Peaks, Man Men, Pineapple Dance Studios (!), Generation Kill, Heroes, The Wire (shocking I know), The Bill
Music: Nine Black Alps, MGMT, Laura Marling, Gay Dad, Mansun.
