Wednesday, November 25, 2009

An Apology


It has been exactly one month since my last post. One, entire, month.

The inactivity around here is not something I am proud of, but unfortunately it was necessary. You see, while I wanted to write and have a lot of posts in mind, the reality was that I was just too far behind with the various things I do and something had to stop for a while in order to help me catch up. Unfortunately, it was the blog and I'd like to take the opportunity right now to apologise for the lack of updates. I'm sorry.

Recent months here have probably suggested a struggle to manage everything, with less posts being published than I would have liked. Such was the situation I was in, however, and by taking the break from the blog that I did, I managed to get myself in a better position with regards to everything else. From reading blogs, magazines and other articles to playing games in that ever-increasing backlog of mine, I gradually chipped away at it all and recovered from the overwhelming amount of things I wanted to get done. I even wrote some blog posts, believe it or not!

So why haven't they been posted then? Well, because they need editing first and foremost, but more importantly I decided to delay the publication of those posts until December, figuring that a fresh month would be a good time to introduce some fresh content. Basically, you could say that I took the month of November off from the blog -- whether I liked the idea or not.

So that's the story of why there has been a lack of activity here. The good news is that come December, I'll be back in full force so hopefully you will join me for some analysis and discussion on some of the games I have been playing in the past couple of months. Some of the games and content you can expect to see include the following:

- An in-depth look at Metroid Prime, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption via the release of the Metroid Prime Trilogy on the Wii. I'll be looking at each game individually, as well as discussing them as a whole series, including discussion on specific areas and levels of the games, the mood and atmosphere they portray, and just why I regard the original Metroid Prime as my favourite game of all time.

- Analysis on both Uncharted: Drake's Fortune and the recently released sequel, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. My focus will mostly be with the original, as I speak about how Naughty Dog -- the games' developers -- introduced us to the characters, narrative, and style of play of the game, as well as offering my opinion on some of the commonly discussed aspects of it, such as the introduction of certain enemies in the second half, and the dissonance between Drake's personality and the amount of enemies he defeats throughout the course of the game.

- Coverage of two PlayStation 3 racing games I've been playing quite heavily, MotorStorm and Wipeout HD, as well as a third racing game in the Xbox 360's Forza Motorsport 3. I love all three for different reasons and I will outline those in their respective posts. I'm also considering an experiment where I pick a track every week from Forza 3 and discuss the good and bad aspects of it, what makes it work and so on. We'll see how we go, though.

- I will also have a discussion of Assassin's Creed II with the added help of a friend of mine. Similar to my discussion of GTA: Chinatown Wars earlier in the year, I'll be exchanging thoughts and analysis about the game as well as a synopsis and reflection on the original. In my brief time with the sequel so far, it has already demonstrated some interesting and, I would argue, key differences to the first that seem to, so far, make it a much better game. More on that soon.

All of that plus a few more posts I have in mind will be coming in the not too distant future. As you can tell, my approach to writing is changing with these forthcoming posts as I try a few new things and experiment. I look forward to seeing how it all pans out and I hope you will join me in December when they start to go up on the blog. Until then, enjoy all of the awesome games that have come out recently and happy gaming!