Nazrhite Rating: ★★★★★★★★★¼ 

Spoken812 Rating: ★★★★★★★★★☆ 

Let me tell you… I can’t think of another game that has been so much fun, while also being appealing to almost any demographic.  I’ve shown this game to hard-core strategy fiends, casual gamers, and even a couple of people that are controller-phobic.  Not once did people struggle with the game, not once did they not get engrossed in the game.  

Buy this game. Now.  And then kiss a couple of hours goodbye.

BTW:  I’m not the only one drinking the kool-aid.

Xbox.com     Giantbomb.com     Gamespot.com

What happened to the old site…you said more functionality was coming?

I know…I know…stop clowning.  What happened was it never got finished.  We’ve been so busy working on other aspects of the business the old site didn’t get the attention it deserved.  While it looked tight…it never got to the point where it actually did much other than help us hype it up for events. Eventually the timelag caught up with us.  Now web 2.0 is here, and it’s a whole new world out there and the old website strategy just doesn’t stand up to the current standards.  So we scrapped the whole thing.

In the meantime, it’s on and crackin for new events, new games, and the future of gaming here in Portland, Oregon.  If we, and this site, are new to you…be sure to check out the Introduction page.  As far as the old faithful contingent, I’ll post some more images later of some of our past…when I get some time. Let me get more of the site done first though.  Don’t forget to Get Involved.  We got some important things coming. Hit me up at nazrhite [at] pdxbox.net…or just challenge me on Xbox Live.  Did I mention mama said knock you out?

1. I’ve added a couple of new staff members to help with website operations and other things.  Josh Hodges is our new video editing specialist, and he also is an extreme sports fanatic.  Our next addition is Shali Muldrew.  Shali is a coding fiend.  Unfortunately, he also plays WOW.  Yeah…nuff said.  Luckily he loves writing games as much as he playing them.  Wish them both luck as I’m a slave driver.
2. Seeing as now I have a staff, I needed a place for us to work and play games, err…conduct research.  After searching high and low, I was able to find the perfect loft for us to call PDXBOX.NET Headquarters.  We will be conducting renovations and other changes in preparation of our November 14th launch.  That’s right November 14, we will be opening the doors here at PDXBOX.NET Headquarters.

 Check out the flyer here.

I’m not the only one to think Halo 3 is going to unleash another evolution in community involvement.

MTV - BusinessWeek - Wired - XBoxer - SmoothSpan - Last100

Oh yeah… They just released the numbers on Halo 3 sales for the first 24 hours: $170 Million. Yeah, its a record.

Sorry Spider-Man.

Now that Halo 3 has been released, and I’ve had a chance to dive into it’s greatness, I don’t really know how to explain this other than this:

The world will never be the same.

A little dramatic don’t you think? I mean it’s just a game. And some people don’t believe this game really looks next-gen at all.

Well okay, I’ll give you that one. But the truth is, Halo 3 was never gonna be the game that blew the top off of unbelievable graphics in a game. Microsoft had Gears of War for that. Halo 3 has better graphics than Halo 2, but they really couldn’t have tried to make it look too much different….it’s a sequel. People want a better game, but they still want it to be Halo. I believe MS made the right call there for sure.

I think this game is gonna blow the world away over the next 12 months. But not just because of record sales, or even the media hype. Too me, Halo 3 is going to blow the lid off of community engagement & involvement. Let me explain.

First off, Bungie has been leading this ground for years (community empowerment), and the tools they have put into our hands with this release are phenomenal: Saved Films, File Share and Screenshots. While MS could have done a better job branding this trifecta of gaming goodness, the concepts themselves have me drooling with anticipation. For example being able to capture high resolution screenshots of the game and making them available for community enjoyment. Nice.

(I was planning on inserting a nice piece here about my own screenshots…but Bungie.net is not registering my gamertag for some reason. I’ll update this once I get the kinks worked out. Trust me tho, the screenshots are hot!)

Also this is the first time you can gain Achievements for a Halo game, which alone is a reason to cry. Plus when you add The Forge… MAN! Halo 3 will have a footprint in society greater than any video game ever, and I include Pac-Man, Pong, and all the greats.

1. NBA Street: HomeCourt
2. NBA Live 07
3. Madden 07
4. Halo 2 - 4×4
5. Gears of War
6. WSOP: Tournament of Champions
7. Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six® Vegas
8. XBLA - titles to be determined
9. Racing title - to be determined

“Gears of War is going down.  Halo 3 is gonna kill it.”

I guess I’ll have to wait and see.  In the meantime check out these pics:

       

Thanks to www.cinemablend.com for the headzup.

But the biggest reason is of course…HALO 3. Of course this game needs no introduction, we’ve all been waiting for this to come out since 2004. The really cool thing about the Halo franchise is the value Microsoft  has put on it.  The original Halo put the Xbox on the map, and Microsoft believes this fall Halo 3 will help give the Xbox 360 dominance over their gaming rivals once and for all.  But not only is Microsoft heavily investing in Halo 3 but they are actively developing additional games based upon the Halo universe.  My favorite (other than Halo 3) is the upcoming RTS game Halo Wars.  I’ve long been a fan of the RTS genre, all the way back to Dune 2  (which by the way, Command & Conquer 3: The Tiberium Wars has an official release date of March 28, 2007.  Whoo-hoo!)  Just imagining being able to control SPARTAN forces in a massive battle against the Covenant….yeah…I’m ready now.

In addition to things on the Halo front, there are several franchises coming out with new versions in 2007 that I just have to have:  Spiderman 3, Burnout 5, Nba Live, and of course Madden.

The problem is how to fit all of this gaming goodness in this year. I’ve been totally swamped at my day job with the Vista launch last week, and it doesn’t look like its gonna slow down anytime soon.  Look for new announcements to come about our spring activities later this month as I begin to organize league play for 2007.  But in the meantime there’s still Gears of War - so Don’t Play…Compete!