DualShock 4Though some were no doubt disappointed in Sony's PS4 announcement for every reason from general ennui with the whole videogame thing to a passionate allegiance to a competing platform, I fail to see how any real videogame enthusiast can come away anything but impressed at the promise of it all. The keyword of course is "promise," since everything sounds great on paper, but we don't really know how much will be executed how soon (and how well), nor did we have an actual appearance by the apparently camera-shy console itself. You can find many summaries of what Sony did unveil online, including a good one by PlayStation Universe, but I'll try to cover some of the high level highlights.

My games on the iPad while vacationing...This time no Pandora, PSP, DS or 3DS for my portable gaming needs.
Suffice to say that my phone more or less features the same setup.

Armchair Arcade TV is now in high definition (720p) and available at a wide range of locations, with a wide range of subscription options, and in a wide range of formats, including YouTube, iTunes, RSS, and many more via blip.tv!

In a record store (there's an anachronism for ya), I would call it the cutout bin. I guess at Toys R' Us it could be called the same. I laid out the $9.99 for Atari Anthology for PS2. Is it worth it? I'm not sure.

I never had the Atari 2600, having only played it at friend's houses, until I got my Atari computer, but I always remember looking at the JCPenney catalog each year at the screenshots of the games and circling which ones I would get if I actually had an Atari. This is back when the JCPenney in East Brunswick, NJ still had a cafe and I would eat the blueberry cheesecake with my older sister, who worked in the catalog department.

So tonight, I tried a few of these games, in lieu of a few extra hours of sleep, job hunting, paying bills, or whatever else folks do at night when they're not playing video games (yeah, I could think of a few others).

LifeLine (Konami, 2004, PS2): Image from GameFlyWell, I must say, it's been very enjoyable gaming for me the past few days, despite having limited time to really get into anything at any length. I'm still chomping at the bit to sit down and play MLB '07 The Show from Sony for the PS2, which I've only had time to dabble in so far, and I only just took a few hours this morning to actually do my family's taxes, as well as there being the ever-present 800-pound gorilla ("the book") in my life and needing to finish organizing my videogame and computer collection (adding to many other things).

So, while these are not in-depth overviews, I wanted to quickly and specifically talk about LifeLine (2004, Konami, PS2), the infamous adventure game driven mostly by voice commands, and Jetpac Refuelled (2007, Rare, Xbox 360), the latest ~$5 release for Xbox Live Arcade based on a classic game.

Sony PSPI was thinking about the relentless Sony bashing of late, which has been brought upon in big part by Sony themselves. Frankly, they have certain company representatives who simply can't help but mouth off in the most inane manner with a ridiculous amount of bravado and disregard for basic common sense. To put it bluntly, no one likes the 800-pound gorilla (especially in America, we prefer to root for the perceived underdog, justified label or not) or the "dick", and Sony has been both for some time now.

Superman's Buns of SteelIn honor of the newly released movie, 1up has a very colorful feature up called Gamer's Kryptonite: Superman's 10 Worst Games. The article starts with Superman for the Atari 2600 and covers titles from many computers, consoles, and arcade machines. It's really curious how easy it is to take a big budget and really make a cringe-worthy game based on a mega-popular franchise. I mean, how hard can it be to get a Superman game right? I distinctly remember playing Superman: Man of Steel on my Amiga and thinking how lousy it was. Then again, Superman's powers don't necessarily lend themselves very well to a videogame--he's simply too powerful. It's hard to translate his powers into compelling gameplay. About the only challenge left would be strategic ones--assuming Superman can only be in one place at the same time (an assertion challenged in the movies). Should you save a bus from going over a bridge or Lois Lane from an earthquake?