Since wrapping up GTA IV: The Ballad of Gay Tony, I've tackled two other DLCs: Red Faction: Guerrila: Demons of the Badlands and Prince of Persia: Epilogue, which I'd bought weeks back when on sale. They were exact opposites, thematically. Badlands is a prequel, while Epilogue takes place immediately after the end of its game. They're both fairly short with no more than about five hours each of gameplay, if that. And they were really both more of the same, with Badlands adding a few new weapons and Epilogue adding a new power plate for the Prince and Eleka to bound off of. And neither was all that challenging.

This weekend I got back to real gaming with (mostly) fresh material. After reading so much good stuff, both on GS and Twitter/Facebook, I had to get Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. I've only barely started, and am really only passed the tutorial bits. That said, the opening sequence alone has enough heart-skipping thrills to feel my $60 was well-spent. Next week I should really be able to chip away at it. As for multiplayer, it only suffers from no free-for-all deathmatches and almost no one having mics. I've yet to sample all the modes, but without free-for-alls, I won't really stick with it, especially since there's almost no trophies used as carrots to keep you playing. I hate being dragged down by n00bs in teams modes, and I hate being that n00b even more. I played a lot today and found some maps I like, but it's not enough to keep me from trading this in towards Dragon Age: Origins the second I'm done with it.

I'm also chipping away at Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection. As much as I love videogames, I've always loved the silver ball more, and this really is a great sampling of Williams' non-licensed hits. The game has about a dozen tables, and I love that it's spread pretty even among favorites of mine that I know intimately (Taxi, Black Knight), some I have some basic familiarity with (Gorgar, Space Shuttle), and others I know in name only or have never heard of (Sorcerer, Medieval Madness). The sounds are all authentic and true to original, that I can remember, and the gameplay is the best of any video representation of pinball I've played. My favorite of all the ones on the disc, Pin·Bot, I'm hoping to have the willpower to save for last! Honestly, they could probably get away with at least one more disc of Williams' other greats, as well as at least a disc or two of those released under their Bally banner, before being accused of scraping the bottom of the barrel. The only sad thing? No Bill Paxton Pinball!

That's all for today. Have a great weekend, everybody!