In The Year 2000!

Thanks for sticking with me for my top ten. If SPIN did top ten's in the amount of time it took me they'd be a yearly publication. Which I would support. Actually, I'd support them being a decade publication. Axe to grind? Yep, sure do. "Radiohead's new album has enough bleeps and blips too cause pandemonium in your heart." See, I could write for them. Just read every article in a British accent because that's how I imagine them all sounding.

Upcoming is an article about the history of Resident Evil. I'm currently playing through all the games. Well, correction, my brotha Chris is playing and I'm watching and taking notes. As soon as I get through the series I'll publish the article. Also, I'll be giving a review of LA Noire and most likely do a piece on Peyton Hillis gracing the cover of Madden 12. My eyes tear up just thinking about it. I believe The Trooper will also be back at the typewriter. Or, his Mac. Go Brownies!

1. Resident Evil 4

Most of the time the original is the best. Dumb and Dumber and Homeward Bound didn't need seconds! Give me a break Nickleback...you made Silver Side Up, quit "remaking" it. They recently released Titanic 2. Now, perhaps I didn't quite grasp the first one but I'm fairly certain the damage was catastrophic. However, as Scream 2 is kind enough to point out, there are the occasional blips in the radar that make certainties impossible. ALIENS and T2 are both better than the original (in my well researched aka I've seen them both opinion). Maybe James Cameron takes what is good from the originals, splices in what is missing slaps some new computer graphics on it and BAM, the conundrum of the superior sequel is born. Or maybe people just steal ideas and make lesser versions to scrape up some cash or recognition. JET took Iggy Pop's riff from Lust For Life and altered it enough to make it Are You Gonna Be My Girl. And Vanilla Ice was like "I added a DA" to Queens Under Pressure to make Ice Ice Baby. Why are they suing me? Didn't they here the extra DA? Sure, JET and Vanilla Ice's songs are catchy but are they as good? Are seconds or thirds really ever better? Yes, they are. Resident Evil 4 makes this point playable!

From Raccoon city and a mansion with more puzzles than an Indiana Jones movie to mowing through Africans with molotov's (apparently zombies have come a long way, remember when they couldn't figure out stairs?) Resident Evil has kept moving forward. Every new addition in the series sharpened the gameplay and pushed the story and the suspense and action. Resident Evil 4 is no different, except it took a leap into making the zombies more modern "infected". While many fans may have considered this sacrilege I came at the series from a new perspective. I grew up with a blue hedgehog and world war 2 games so when I played Resident Evil 4 on gamecube I was blown away. I had no bias about the series being raped or a jaded view of where I thought Capcom should take the game; I just played. The laser site of my pistol took that first zombies head off in the cabin. BLAM. Eat shit you undead farming bitch. Bear traps outside in the woods scaring the hell out of me when they chomped on my leg. Resident Evil 4 took the horror aspects from the first 3 games, vamped up the boss battles, dropped the ink ribbons (we will prolly have to find thumb drives in 6) and had a weird cloaked guy sell you guns and ammo. Welcome, Straaaaanger. Dude, we just met like and hour ago. I was the one who bought the rocket launcher. How do you not recall that?

In my eyes, 4 has everything I want in a game; it has violence, story, simple puzzles, collecting, upgrading and of course the undead...er...infected. It's not too hard but not too easy. I love being able to upgrade my guns so when I hear the cry of "erustedo!" from these Grapes Of Wrath zombies, I can blow two of them away at once.

I support open world games like Borderlands and Fallout. I will give Mass Effect props even though I don't care for it. But my ideal game is one that pushes me forward, hints at doors but doesn't open them. Points to enemies but doesn't tell me how to kill them. Has cut scenes but doesn't lose me. I don't need to wander all over the goddam desert or Liberty City to get my kicks. Just give me a gun and some zombies and an extra clip.

2. Halo: Combat Evolved

Slayer. This is a game about skill. This is a game about savvy. This is a game about memorizing every gun and health location. This is a game about dexterity and reflexes. This is a game that pumps you full of caffeine and sugar until your eyes are so red rimmed from lack of sleep your parents think you're a drug addict, which you are. This is not a game...it's HALO.

That was what the trailer for HALO:CE should've sounded like. All recorded in the deep, movie guy voice. AND THEN THERE WAS ONE (aaaaa aaaa oooo... ahhhh ahhh aaa) MASTER CHIEF. I know what WOW fans feel like, minus the shyness bordering on paralysis and the carpal tunnel from mashing Z to kill goats in the forrest. YES, 10 XP! This game was my first addiction. Now it's smoking. Man, If HALO would've been multiplayer online I might not have lung cancer in 30 years. But I had to start something to fill the void! Actually, I think I already said another game was my first addiction. Pokemon I think. Well, this was my more adult fix. It's like graduating from weed to cocaine. Life just forces you to grow up.

HALO had pristine graphics, tight gameplay, a controller setup that has been copied by every FPS since and an iconic character. It took things we know (aliens, sniper rifles, vehicles) and shifted them into perfection. Who is more important? The person who does it first or the person who perfects it? Halo might be both. Yes, I realize they did not invent the FPS but they said, "OK, let's class this up. Let's throw out the Natural Light and get some Heineken." And once you started playing you were like those guys in the Heineken commercial screaming like ladies because they had a cooler full of ALL Heineken.

Let me go ahead and name all the HALO multiplayer maps without Googling. Ahem. Chill Out. Sidewinder. Bloodgulch. Rat Race. Battle Creek. Prisoner. Hang Em High. Derelict. Wizard. Longest. Chiron. Boarding Action. OK, FINE! I googled Boarding Action! But c'mon, did anyone ever play that board. Oh, great, I got spawn raped. Awesome. Love this map.

Almost everyone had their speciality, despite their skill level. I was run and gun. Give me an assault rifle, grenades and a shotgun and I'll shoot melee my way to 25 kills and 25 deaths. I was a liability. There was always a friend who would only snipe. He'd stalk the invisibility and crouch behind the cement blocks on Hang Em High. You'd see your body go limp and hear a snicker from across the room. TIM! You fucking screen looker. I was crouched in the passageway with an overshield. You couldn't have known. No way! Then an outline of Master Chief would be humping your body.

One friend just railed off clips of the pistol from one end of Bloodgulch to the other and still killed you. 3 shots...dead! Then there were your campers. I like to refer to them as Opham from Saving Private Ryan. You're getting stabbed in the chest by a pissed of German with no machine gun rounds and Opham is downstairs talking to himself. There were vehicle whores and sticky experts and people who constantly boasted about their 15 rocket launcher kills. I have never used nor heard the phrase "no way" more often than in my HALO LAN parties. "How did I...with invisibility...NO WAY". Campaign Co-Op, a gritty, exciting and addictive multiplayer helped prop xbox up on its wobbly legs and pull Microsofts chestnuts out of the fire. Master Chief should be their CEO. Those board meetings would be intimidating. Game Over.

Much love to The Trooper for the vid.

3. Bioshock

Welcome To Rapture. Would you kindly read my opinion?

This game is the definition of what video games can and should be. Art. The story line is literary and bloody. Sweet and savage. Fraught with moral turmoil and hero vs. villain battles. But who is the villain? Is it always that cut and dry? You either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain. I believe in Harvey Dent. Would you kindly believe, too?

You see the deep aquatic landscapes behind dirty glass and twist between barren and lush environments. Pushed on by Atlas. Kill Ryan. Andrew Ryan. You control bees. You have a shotgun. You control ice and fire. You wail at Splicers with a wrench or shock them in puddles of water. But politely guided. Politely pushed. Be free and make decisions. I'm telling you to. Would you kindly kill everyone in your way?

Little sisters infuriate or soothe your hands. Turn them into a slug so you can be more powerful or save them and suffer the consequences at the point of the Big Daddy's drill. How big is your heart or how empty your soul?

This game had me climbing a ledge. Scaling to get a better view because I was certain there was something beautiful to see at the top. Atlas told me so. But right before you grasp that last last overhang and pull yourself to the peak, you get a sinking feeling that maybe you weren't right. Maybe things aren't what they appear. And that's when your legs give out and Rapture leads to enlightened. Don't be overly certain lest you have the rug pulled from beneath your feet. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe this isn't art. Maybe it's not even a decent video game. But before you make a judgement, play the whole game. Listen to the violin play your sick eulogy. Would you kindly?

4. Left 4 Dead

I hate forests. I hate trains. I hate zombies. Yea, well Francis, I don't hate them. As my top 5 will show I am quite partial to flesh eaters and brain dead shufflers. Blowing off limbs, cursing seemingly erratic horde charges, ingesting entire bottles of pain pills (which apparently just make you run fast) and carrying red gas cans to strategically hit the Z's where it hurts most...the brain.

Bill was my vicarious avatar to stalk the walking dead streets in Left 4 Dead. I walked the sewers and the streets and the rooftops with that old, crotchety man painting walls brain colors and jamming LT furiously to get out of jams. One tip for the inexperienced player...MELEE. Unfortunately it's not as "convenient" as Modern Warfare 2 where someone is sniping me from an abandoned garage and then all of a sudden are sticking a knife in my chest. OK, Infinity Ward, that's not a "perk", that's fucking infuriating. Commando ability my ass. Point is, flailing your gun while those grey celled monsters are swarming you and Luis is having a tea party with Zoe and Francis is too busy hatin to help you detach some limbs, is the best way to get out of a tight spot. Also, it puts you in a spot where your stomach is clinched and if you weren't on your fake leather sofa playing you'd be shitting your pants. I'd never really felt that way playing a video game before. Sure, the Resident Evil's are creepy and Dr. Eggman from sonic always scared me as a kid (damn him and his molester mustache), but I'd never clinched. When I popped this disc in during one of my breaks in college (and by breaks I mean skipping Sociology, like anyone gives a shit) to play this, the first time the tiny horn sounds like a retreat call on a Civil War battlefield, and all those zombies coming sprinting and shambling down the halls of a decrepit house, I turned to my friend and was like, "We're fucked. There's no way out!" But he snapped me out of it Patton style, "Get your head out of your ass, soldier, and pour it into em!" We pump action shot gunned that horde and I've never looked back. Claw your way to the red door safe rooms. Make last stands in the corn field with only dual pistols left, your other guns smoking and empty. Light the Witch Bitch on fire and let her scream. Read the writing on the walls (Entire city is gone. If you can read this...LEAVE!) Let the yellow burst of your gun blowing out rounds guide you. It's always 8:24 according to the clock in the first house. That's when the Zombie Apocalypse starts! There is no cure. There is no escape. There is only getting past the wretches of Boomers to a loading screen where you see Louis only managed to nix 25 Z's. Total.