Wow, a good week in late January? Must be global warming.

Advance Wars: Days of Ruin - Even though the series seems to be taking a more mature approach to its characters and plot, Advance Wars has always been serious, seriously awesome. And the DS juggernaut quietly rolls on. Gee, I wonder what's coming out for the PSP this week? Hmmm, Rainbow Islands Revolution. I bet that's not as lame as it sounds. (Sony paid me to say that)

No More Heroes - I admit, I was skeptical. I didn't think beating people to death with a fluorescent light bulb sounded all that fun. I was wrong. More No More Heroes!

Pirates of the Burning Sea - Even though I'm more of a ninja guy, the opportunity to plunder peoples' booties as That Scallywag Dick The Butcher does sound like fun. Speaking of Pirates vs Ninjas, isn't it funny that more brands of banditry aren't in on the debate? Maybe we need to open this thing up to:

Desperados - What the hell happened to these bad buckaroos? When did they ride off into the sunsets of our imaginations, and when will they return?

Vikings - Got their chance to plunder our fancies in Beowulf, failed. Back to your longships, heathens.

Cultists - These guys had serious cultural cache in the 70s. I mean, think about it, what's cooler, a band full of stinky guys on a boat? A disciplined cast of assassins? Or a psycho hippy visionary and his murderous band of LSD fueled teenage girls? That's some tasty Kool-Aid! Unfortunately, more contemporary cultists have ruined things for this subgroup of villainy, including David Koresh, whose two accomplishments (embarrassing the ATF and dying in a fire) are only impressive when compared to those of Marshall Applewhite, whose Heaven's Gate cult got together and committed mass suicide. That Kool-Aid sucked.

Mafia: I'm using Mafia here as an umbrella term for all family oriented organized crime syndicates, because I don't have time to research and list every different one. Be that as it may, the Cosa Nostra is obviously awesome. Depp's Jack Sparrow may have been cooler than Tony Soprano, but was he cooler than Al Pacino's Michael Corleone? Fuggedaboudit!

Agents: We aren't just talking about The Matrix, Mr. Anderson, although that movie did tap into a cultural fear factor of men in black that I didn't even realize was there. This group also includes James Bond, who probably kills a ninja before he does his hair in the morning, and has sent more pirates to Davy Jones' locker than the Bermuda Triangle. There's a historical dark side to government agents, too, especially when you refer to them by their other name, secret police. It's a good sign that these guys are mostly out of the public conscious - may they stay that way.

Socially Conscientious Misfits - Also known as vigilantes, this group includes Robin Hood and his Merry Men, as well as Batman (is it a coincidence then, that Batman's sidekick is Robin?). The beauty of these characters is that they're so certain they know what is right and what is wrong, that they're willing to become criminals to uphold justice. You'd think they'd just capture themselves and call it a job well done.

In conclusion, I think this list makes it perfectly clear that we shouldn't get hung up on one or two types of banditry, but rather to embrace a wider spectrum of misanthropy, mischief and mayhem, while admitting that ninjas are way cooler than pirates.

Anyway, back to games:

Endless Ocean - Two interesting things happen to scuba divers: They get eaten by sharks, or they surface too fast and their lungs come out of their bodies. Pretty sure neither one is in here. Boo.

Burnout Paradise - Oh, wow. That completes a good game hat trick!

But for every good game there's something like this week's Ship Simulator 2008, offering you "the chance to pilot an oil rig." Shouldn't that read "the chance to crash an oil rig"?

Wow, that's a lot of writing. I will have more for you later.