Monday June 1st, 2009 will see the kick off for E3 2009 with Microsoft’s Press Conference and they claim to bring lots and lots of treats for everyone this year.

Its no secret that they’ll be showing off Halo 3: ODST and promoting this title. But what else could they have in store for us? Well if they do as well as last year, then I think they’ll entertain all of us for sure.

I’ve already set my Uverse to record all of SPIKE TVs coverage from E3 and my evenings will be more an likely filled with scanning through hours and hours of coverage. With Microsoft up first and then on Tuesday we’ll hear from Nintendo and Sony, followed by a number of things from various Game Developers attending E3.

I predict that Microsoft will bring the best presentation once again. I think Nintendo will come out and show us their numbers front an center as they did last year. I can only hope Sony can pull something together and bring a little more Wow this year, I mean could they get in worse really?

Last year Sony showed Home again and its out, but nothing to jump up an down about. The best thing they had last year was the reveal of MAG and I hope they’ll have a lot more to show us in that respect. I don’t own any Sony systems, but this is more an likely the only title that has my interest and makes me think, hmmm what about a PS3. The PSP Go has been leaked now and this is more than likely the first gaming system from Sony I’d look at getting. Then again I would have to already have purchased the new Zune HD first.

What ever happens this year, I think gaming is stronger than ever and I’m sure each camp will have something to look forward to. I just can’t help but feel the appeal that Microsoft brings is so much stronger. But my family is multi-console now and even seen the new addition of the Nintendo DSi to the household.

Next week will be a blast of video game news and I’m a sponge just waiting to absorb all they can throw at me now.

On Any Sunday, a 1971 documentary movie about Motorcycle racing on and off the tracks explains why people who are passionate about motorcycles and racing do it.

Ripping around the track and leaning the bike over and getting your knee down on the tarmac is why they do it. The thrill and rush and being one with the bike is hard to explain to someone that has never rode a motorcycle before.

So why am I talking about all of this on a gamers blog? MotoGP 07 was the one game I had looked at and wanted to really play. The only kicker is I'm not very good at this game. That being said, I've decided the only way to get better is to actually play it and do the races. So these past two Sundays, I've made sure to complete a Career Race and plan to complete a whole season.

I might very well be the worse racer in the end of the season, but I'm going to do this and see what I can do to get better. I can only go up from here, right? The important thing is to try and have fun doing it at the same time. This is a game on my list of games to master and I really want to get better at this game.

So Sundays are my MotoGP racing days now on the Xbox 360 and I might even start playing more Forza Motosport 2 as well. Why not make Sundays my day to just race? I'm not sure if I'll go as far as to get a NASCAR game, but I'll throw in Mad Tracks or GripShift perhaps. I still could even street race in Grand Theft Auto IV in the evenings.

But my focus will be on MotoGP and through out the year. Being a motorcycle rider myself and a fan of Motorcycle Racing, its a mission I'm looking forward to and plan to master. Now I need to get ready and prepare for my Race at Istanbul Park, Turkey, wish me Luck now.

Well its the last day in February and Game Over Month is coming to a close now. The challenge was setup by the Married Gamers and all you needed to do was grab some of those games that you've started and hadn't finished. Games you walked away from or forgot about.

I decided I'd jump in and try and finish some of my games during this Month, I've done some other things like this and done well, perhaps I could put the same effort into my gaming. I picked 8 games to attempt at knocking out. I think it was a fairly big list and would be a real challenge to get them all. Here are the targets I selected and I've crossed out the ones I managed to beat.

• Bioshock
• GRAW 2
• Gears of War
• Gears of War 2
• Fable II
• Frontlines: Fuel of War
• Rainbow Six Vegas
• Halo 3

So I managed to take out 5 of my 8 targets during the month. My time to game can be a challenge in itself at times and with that being said, I'm fairly proud of myself for getting the 5 marked off. Not to mention that I also had Thirteen Days of Gears of War 2 going on as well an that involved a lot of online play time.

I think the online play could be the big hurdle for me and the reason a lot of games don't get finished. Its one of the things I love the most, being able to go online and actually play some games with friends, family, and co-workers for example. Its another reason I enjoying being an Xbox Live Ambassador, to meet people and play games, as well as help others out when I can.

So this month I had to play a little less online and focus on the stories in the games. I have to admit, I have a pretty decent collection of games and with so many games of late coming out, I think that could be another reason I didn't finish some of these. Its like a buffet of games and I found myself sampling more an more and perhaps had to many to choose from.

The old saying, "Finish what's on your plate" comes to mind here and thankfully Game Over Month came to my rescue and I can feel that I've gotten more of my monies worth out of some of my games now. I still have a lot of games to tackle and will see what I can do to do that for the rest of the year and I'm going to look forward to more Game Over Months in the future.

Mark your calendars now and join the rest of COGs online for thirteen days of playing Gears of War 2 and your chance at winning some cool prices. In order to get an entry for each day, you have to play in the following types of games for that day. Signup at Xbox.Com and we'll see you online. Details listed below as provided by Xbox.Com.

Sweepstakes Entry
Between February 1 - 13, 2009, registered players will automatically receive one entry (limit one per person per Daily Prize Period) when they log into Xbox LIVE and play the specified multiplayer match type in Gears of War 2.

Prize Periods
The Entry Period consists of thirteen separate Daily Prize Periods, as shown in the table below. In addition, if you earn a valid entry into all thirteen of the Daily Prize Periods (one valid entry per day during the Entry Period), you will automatically receive one entry into the Grand Prize Drawing.  Otherwise, each of your entries will only be eligible for the Daily Prize Period Drawing that corresponds to the Daily Prize Period during which it was received.

Prize Information
After the close of the Entry Period, we will randomly select the following winners from among all eligible entries received.

Sixty-Five Daily Prizes Packages (five winners Per Daily Prize Period):

• Gears of War 2 video game soundtrack
• Gears of War Aspho Fields novel
• A 12" x 18" Gears of War 2 promotional poster autographed by members of the Epic development team
• An in-game Golden Hammerburst and Lancer weapon

Thirteen Grand Prize Packages:

• A Samsung 40-inch 1080p flat panel LCD HDTV
• A Locust Bust
• A red Xbox 360 Wireless Controller
• A Marcus Fenix bronze statue
• Gears of War 2 video game soundtrack
• Gears of War Aspho Fields novel
• A 12" x 18" Gears of War 2 promotional poster autographed by members of the Epic development team
• An in-game Golden Hammerburst and Lancer weapon

The Play & Win and Download & Win promotions from Xbox.com are an easy way to jump in and interact with the Xbox LIVE community. It's easy to enter and you could win some great prizes. Look for more exciting Play & Win promotions in the future!

Funny how after all the hard work on a game is done and its release to the public has come, something always could be changed it seems to make it just that much more.

Not to long after people power through a game, the reviews will start to pop up every where. I'm not talking about all of the mainstream reviewers here, but the average gamer, giving his two cents here and there in the forums or blogs.

That's right your just reading a blog here and like everyone else, we all have points and opinions on the subject of our interests at the time. So where am I going with all of this then? A game comes out and in a lot of cases it will get high marks. So a 4 out of 5 or 9 out of 10, what ever the markings for the review, it gets the thumbs up at the end of the day.

Does it mean the game is perfect? Not all and I'd say you could pick at pretty much anything and find a flaw or something to change. Doesn't mean the game is bad, just means a feature here or there is flawed or missing. This game has Solo only or multi player, this game has this or that and on an on we could go.

Now some games have little bugs, screen glitches and flaws and at times they'll be fixed. I ran into one with Gears of War 2 during the campaign an half my screen would go white and the game would end in a death and send me back. Now the challenge was not beating the level as much as beating it and the flaw in the scene. I made it and hopefully that will be the last of that.

So when I look at a game like CoD4 and think to myself, this game rocks and is awesome in almost every aspect, I still think to myself, its missing Co-op and I'd like the ability to take cover an peek around things like other games.

Halo 3 is a real joy but I feel a bit let down with the type an way it ended. I wanted a huge battle with the Elites and Brutes I guess and didn't feel I got that in the game. I'd also like a cover system or at least the ability to go prone perhaps an not just stand or kneel down.

Looking at Fable II and the wonderful world to explore and the genre of this game is great. Still I could do with out all of the town people falling in love with me and following me about. If I go into one of my homes, let me shut the door and at least lock it. For now I never want to go home and remain out on quests it seems.

I could pick up just about every game in my collection and find a small part to tweak or add. Then again you can always wait for the next addition to come out. They are bound to fix that little thing that bugs you right?

Well I haven't noticed that with any of the Halo games at least, but the new Call of Duty, from another company mind you, at least it has added a Co-op mode. Maybe Infinity Ward will think about that with their next addition of Modern Warfare they plan to release. I can also hold out hope that Halo 3: ODST will have something more to offer in it an not just a new set of characters wrapped around an existing game engine.

Still good games and I'd say we over look those little things that lack and it gives us something to wish and hope for in the end. I for one at least get over it and accept all of the hard work that was put into the game when all is said and done, after all its just a game.

Alright it was back in the summer of 2008 that I had wrote about finishing up some games. Now the list of games is still in the works and I wanted to update and add a couple games to the list. So we are looking at trying to finish up the story line campaigns for the following games. The following is what I have slated from here until July 2009 as my goal.

• HALO: Combat Evolved
• HALO 2
• Fable
• Bioshock
• Assassins Creed
• GRAW 2
• Half-Life 2
• Half-Life 2 episode 1
• Half-Life 2 episode 2
• Portal
• GTA iv

In addition to the list above, I have a few more games for 2009 to finish up. These are some games that I've started from rentals or purchased after my first post. I want to try and get a hold of these and wrap them up as well. All of these I'm looking at beating the story campaign. I'm not saying a full 1000 points in all of them.

• Gears of War
• Gears of War 2
• Fable II
• Fallout 3
• Mass Effect
• Frontlines: Fuel of War
• Rainbow Six Vegas
• Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
• Call of Duty: World at War
• Halo 3
• Halo Wars
• Halo 3: ODST

Well it looks like I have a pretty busy card ahead of myself for Games to work on for the Year. Only problem is some games in my bottom half of the list are close to finishing and will make working on my top half by the Summer a challenge.

No its not the Nintendo Mii's pictured above, perhaps they got the idea from the Playmobil line of toys though. I have to say the Mii's look like them to a degree. Don't get me wrong, those simple looking Mii's are really fun & cool in the various games that are available on the Wii. But still, they are very simple and that's about where it ends with their abilities.

Now with the release of the NXE on the Xbox 360, more and more people have been saying that the new Avatars are like the Mii's. I just don't see it though or not as much at least. Just look at one of the OXM Editors Mii's that was created and used back in their March 2007 OXM issue and then compare it to one the NXE Avatars now for one of the OXM Editors. Side by side we are looking at simple basic shapes & colors for Mii's and compared to the fully animated characters of the NXE Avatars.

Now I've got a Wii and I just don't see any of the Community features that Live has to offer on the Wii. Ok, you can send a message to a Wii friend, provided you can remember that super long Wii number... Man I hope that I send this to the right person now. You can also spend the money an get Wii Speak with Animal Crossing and then chat with up to 4 people now. Where can I chat with a larger Party all at once again?

Should I even mention Sony and their Home project here and who are they ripping off? I think its more of a copy of the virtual reality world of Second Life than anything else. I'd rather have my Avatars in the NXE than mess with all of the Home stuff. You think scrolling through 100 friends in NXE is going to be some work, try running around a huge virtual world and searching for all of your friends. Oh wait, they can just come to my home and see me... like that will really fly.

Sometimes you just have to look at things side by side, to really compare them. I'll give you this, Home is not for me and I'm sure its fine for others that want that. The NXE I feel is great and the Avatars don't take away from my gaming in the end really. In fact I think its cool to see the Avatars and what people look like or how they see themselves at least. In the end I'm still just going to be playing games and the NXE is more than just the Avatars when all is said and done.

Yes some of the old Themes don’t work anymore and lucky for me I've never purchased a Theme. I feel bad for some that might be affected, but when it comes down to it, are we not playing games more than looking at our Dashboards? Things change over time and I feel the new performance and look & feel with the NXE is awesome in the end. Hopefully in time those not use to change will start to feel the same way.

Microsoft has decided to close Ensemble Studios after the completion of the Halo Wars project. This is shocking news before the launch of an upcoming game release.

At least when Shadowrun launched it was 4 months later when they pulled the plug on that company. Problem with that is people had already bought the game only to find out no additional content or upgrades would be available.

With this news, you can only expect that sales will suffer at the start and keep people away. They already know the project is done and now no more updates or changes more and likely. Perhaps I'm wrong and maybe Microsoft will do something else and develop this project further in house, I have to think that is not going to be the case though.

I'm still looking forward to this project and checking it out, but it slides down on my list of instant buys a bit more now with this news. I can wait and perhaps pick this up at a reduced or used price later now. We'll just have to wait until the game launches and see what its like and how it does in spite of their Game Over sentence being handed down.

Dice is now preparing for the release of Battlefield: Bad Company and has a demo slated for June 5th on Xbox Live, in anticipation of their retail releases on June 25th in North America and June 27th in Europe. The Battlefield: Bad Company beta has since come and long gone now for this game, but now its time to ramp those servers back up again and get some game on via a demo.

If you've followed any number of Podcasts and gaming sites over the past couple days then you more and likely saw them giving away codes to get in before the public date of June 5th. This is what I call a soft launch and a controlled demo release.

But come June 5th, you can expect to see larger numbers of fans playing the demo and working their ranks up. Its nice to see Dice giving these codes to the masses of Podcasters, Bloggers, and Indie game reporters to give away to their audiences. After all this was the same groups that spoke out about the micro transaction ideas, discovered from the beta, to unlock certain weapons in the game. This was just what a beta was suppose to do, the unexpected feedback helped change those portions and have now provided ways to unlock those weapons with out any extra costs.

So mark your calendars for some gaming action and take a look at what Battlefield: Bad Company has to offer now. Here is what you have in store when you get in to the demo on June 5th.

Demo includes:
Single player
·  Early look into the quest for Gold with Bad Company

Multiplayer
·  Play the all-new Gold Rush mode on the Oasis map, featuring land, sea and air vehicles.
·  Reach rank 4 in the demo to unlock an exclusive in-game weapon

It's time for four more maps on CoD4, talk about a breath of fresh air for the game of the year title. A little something for everyone is available in this collection and I can honestly say that I think I'm looking forward to every map in this pack.

Broadcast was one of my favorite levels in the campaign and I like close combat fighting and looking forward to some team death match with my friends on this map. Plenty of places to move and multiple levels, not to mention various methods to assault the main room.

Creek is a snipers playground and I'm looking forward to checking out every part of this map and working on my sniping skills. A lot of people like to run and gun, but I get more fun watching and picking off from a distances sometimes, not to mention its just cool when someone walks right by you hiding in some grass and never looking twice.

Chinatown is the nighttime map in the bunch and looks to be very promising from screen shots and video clips that I've seen so far. Finishing up the pack is the Free For All Killhouse and could be fun for some custom practice on take a buildings and such as that. Why not use it for some practice and general tactics right, its what the thing was built for, right?

Check out the Xbox Live Marketplace tomorrow and grab this sure to be instant hit for only 800 MS points. If you don't have enough on hand, I'm sure they'll help you out and bill your card at checkout time. I'll see you in the battle, unless you see me first that is.