Thursday night represented a heavy return to the gaming. Fired up my newest XBox title Full Spectrum Warrior and made it through the training missions. MOUT (Military Operations on Urban Terrain) is the name of the game. The player guides squads of soldiers toward objectives through hostile city scenarios which remind me a lot of Ghost Recon. Fools be shootin’ out of their bathrooms and strapping their dogs up with dynamite to deal with the American infidels. It’s more about strategy than anything and there is no first-person shooting. It feels like Madden with automatic weapons and explosives.

I’m facing the same problem Tim has with XBox screenshots but I’m sure we’ll eventually cook up something. In the meantime, here’s one I stole:

Softly Softly Catchy Monkey

Once that was finished, Erin and I spent over 5 hours playing Roller Coaster Tycoon. How many missions did we finish? One.

That game has a sick addictive quality to it that you just can’t deny. And we’ve gotten to the point where all the missions take at least 2 hours to finish. Look for completion in 2008. I should be graduating right around then…

I’ve yet to find a good way to get screenshots off my Xbox. Jess and I have been obsessively playing 2-player co-op Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, a hack and slash RPG. The story is really mundane, but the action is a lot of fun and the graphic engine is one of the best I’ve ever seen. The 3D acceleration is amazingly smooth and solid.

When you equip new armor or weapons, you can see your character close up and their appearance changes to match your new items. One silly thing is that when you switch armor, it flashes a quick shot of your character in their underwear. If you sell your old armor and buy new armor, your character runs around in it’s underwear until you equip the new armor. This is a great feature when playing the elf woman with the double D’s, but not so great when playing the Dwarf in the saggy yellow briefs. There are a lot of big boobies in this one. They appear even bigger thanks to the great graphics engine that allows them to jiggle and sway hypnotically; back and forth, back and forth…

Lots of back pain in Baldur’s Gate…