Bought the Armored Fury booster pack for BF2. $10 may seem too steep for a mere 3 maps at first, but the maps are really fun. None of them come close to Karkand/Sharqi quality combat though. Many of the previews for Armored Fury had the designer stating infantry combat was much more well balanced into the pack, but this simply isn't true. Most of the battles are centered around tank combat, and the "Armored Fury" part of the title is very apt. The most popular infantry class on these maps is the Anti-Tank kit, as there's few opportunities for the other kits to shine in. Karkand and Sharqi have plenty of areas where infantry can hide from vehicles, and these areas stretch across the bulk of those maps. But in Armored Fury, most of the flag areas are separated by long empty areas. These areas are usually full of tanks, and it's not that easy to bypass these tanks with another vehicle besides a tank of your own. Once you do arrive at a flag area, most enemy tanks will be assisted by their team's UAV. This makes it very difficult to destroy the tanks with Anti-Tank or C4 attacks.

So yeah.. infantry, which to me (and probably most BF2 players) should be the game's focus, is very much set in a supporting role with this booster. Much of this could be rectified if EA released a patch for the booster that removed, say, half of the available tanks on each of the maps.

I think one way to counteract the effectiveness of the tanks at the flag areas is to make sure the enemy UAV is kept destroyed as often as possible. This is mostly easily accomplished with the use of the new scout helicopters and Spec Ops troops. Right now, due to the position of the UAV trailers (deep within enemy territory, surrounded by tanks), enemy UAV trailers are rarely destroyed. If you fly a scout chopper, I encourage you to do as many commando raids on UAVs as possible, and not just focus on the highly entertaining act of machine gunning the crap out of fleeing infantry ;-)

My final complaint with the booster is that all of the original jets are absent! D'oh! Flying jets is one of my fav things to do in BF2, so their absence in the booster is quite painful. This "booster" is supposed to expand the game, not shrink it. Boo!

Finished Genji for the PS2 last night. Great game. Very underrated IMO. Gamespot gave it a 7.0, but the user score is at 8.5. The game isn't very deep, but it's good fun and I think a good match for any casual gamer. Similar to the Onimusha games, you run around chopping up people for combo and critical hits. Unlike Onimusha, Genji actually has a decent inventory system. So you can drink health potions while in combat. Can't wait to see how Genji 2 turns out for the PS3. Looking forward to flipping giant crabs upside down and stabbing them for massive damage!

"X-men: The Last Stand" hit theaters recently and made a ton of money on its opening weekend. NPR has an interesting report on the film's social commentary. Hugh Jackman (Wolverine) mentions how the film's topic caused some heated political debate amongst the cast of the film.

Just finished the PS2 game, Ace Combat Zero. Pretty cool, although I think I got less planes to fly than I did in Ace Combat 5. Essentially identical to Ace Combat 5. The game has you playing the role of a silent ace pilot who quickly gains the name "Demon Lord." Here's a trailer for the game.

School's almost over. Couple more days and I'm home free. I need to get some exercise or something, cause I have a feeling I'll need a lot of energy when work at EA starts next month.

Anyway, I recently bought Warhammer 40k Dawn of War and its Winter Assault expansion for $15 shipped on Ebay. And I'm really dissapointed. There's only about 100 people playing the game at anytime online, and with good reason. There's no real logic to the game, IMO. No rules, no sense or balance. For details, try heading to the Gamespot forum for the game. It's a bit hard to explain..

Then there's massive latency problems in every game I've played. Meanwhile, Warcraft 3 boasts something like 30,000 players currently. The single player campaign was fun enough though, and the battles are still a blast to watch. So I'm not surprised the game is getting a second expansion. People must be enjoying Warhammer, but it sure ain't for the multiplayer.

Besides Warhammer, I had been playing the City of Villains and City of Heroes trials. Really enjoyed my time with these games, which is surprising since I usually despise MMOs. But the over-the-top battle effects, animations, and superhero powers are really cool. Gaining the ability to fly at level 14 was a trip, and the PVP zones where heroes and villains clash in mid-air were incredibly cool.

The games are set in a comic book-style universe. It's a huge breath of fresh air since nearly all MMOs are set in a sword-and-magic fantasy environment. After playing these games, I'm convinced that the Comic Book setting is a much overlooked gold mine waiting to be tapped by the video game industry. We need comic book Battlefield-style FPS games, comic book Neverwinter Nights-style RPG games... heck, comic book The Sims... comic book Nintendogs. I don't know. Comic book everything. I cannot stress enough how cool it is to shoot frikkin' laser beams out of your eyes while flying through the air without any form of mechanical assistance. That is pure awesome. Another major advantage of the comic book setting is that it's usually set in modern times, which, to me, makes it easier to immerse yourself in the game world.

Just got hired by Electronic Arts! Charlie Six is now a EA game tester *and* a video game mercenary for charity! WOOT!

I hope I get to test out Battlefield 2142. That'd rock.

E3 has begun, and some pretty amazing stuff has been pouring out of it ever since.

Biggest shocker for me, though, was seeing a certain soldier appear at the end of this Smash Brothers Brawl video. :O

My "Battlefield 2 Mercenary for Hire" auction was featured on G4TV a long while ago. But I could never find a clip of the video... until now! So here ya go.