Achievements Earned Today

• Survived 100,000 - Geometry Wars Evolved
  

Game Review: Geometry Wars Evolved

Every time I go into one of the larger retail stores, I always head towards the video game aisle just to check things out: what's new, what's on sale, what different accessories are out, etc. While in Target not too long ago, I see a pre-paid card for a game download in with the regular 3-Month Gold cards and Microsoft Point cards. The one I picked up was for Geometry Wars Evolved and it was only 5 bucks.

While fundamentally I'm against the idea of the Microsoft Point system, I really like the fact that I can go buy a card for one single game and then with the code, download it via the XBOX arcade.

The game is a really simple game. You use the left stick to move your ship around the screen, and use the other stick to control the direction of your firing. Your object is simple survival as there are other geometric shapes trying to attack you. You start with three lives and three screen-wiping bombs. The theory of the game is simple, playing it, however is hard. However, it balances the two perfectly. You get so agriavated that that one simple ship killed you, but you gotta keep playing to try and get a better score. I've become really addicted to the game, and while my highest score is very low, I've noticed a real progression in my skill and I'm sure my score will keep climbing.

While this is only a single player game what is really interesting is the online scoring system. If you are online whilest playing your best score will be recorded and put in a leaderboard setup. Right now, my best score is around 120k and that's good enough for like 410,000th place. The top scorer has a score of over 6 million! I don't think I'll ever get THAT good, but it's certainly a goal to strive for.

Now onto my second favorite topic (first is fun gameplay): Achievements. Since this is an XBOX Live Arcade game, it only has 200 available points. The achievements seem easy enough to get as they are primarily based on your score. For example get 100k points, 250k points, 1 million points. Also there's ones for getting 100k points in one life, etc. The hardest one for me was the survival achievement. All you have to do for that one is survive for the opening minute of the game without firing a shot. Embarrassingly. it took me around an hour to complete this one. I'd get to around forty seconds and a fast moving enemy would come up and kill me. However, it did help me learn how to effectively move around the screen to avoid the enemies, so I'd say, for the beginner, this would be a good achievement to strive for, because it builds skills you'll need for getting the other achievements and for getting better at the game itself.

Overall I'd give this game an 8 out of 10 stars. The graphics are decent for the game and the music is pretty good too. The gameplay is very addicting and also very fun. I'd highly recommend this game to anyone who is looking for a great game to just sit back, relax, and waste some time with.

Website Review: My GamerCard.net

Today I will share a website I check out very frequently. It is www.mygamercard.net It is an official Microsoft Community Developer. It is also a really fun website to check out if you are interested in your gamerscore. I know it's hard not to be, but if you are primarily interested in only the games you play and the fun you have with them, then this site probably isn't for you.

In terms of setting up an account is does take a few minutes of work, but, in my opinion, it is worth it. You take a few steps to verify that your gamertag is actually you and then you are all set. On the site you can look at your rankings compared to all of the other users or just other users in your country. There are stats based on your full gamerscore, your percent completion in all your games, and also those same stats broken down on a game by game basis. I must say it's pretty neat to have an actual visual cue to see which games are more popular based on the average gamer points earned in them. For example Halo 3, which we can all admit is fairly popular, has an average gamerscore earned from the site's members as about 476. On the other hand, Project Gotham Racing 3, an older game and probably not as often played since there's a new version out, has an average of around .

One other feature they offer is on the main page you can customize your own gamercard in multiple ways. One that I really like is this setup:

What I really like about this as well, is that it gives you very simple HTML code that can be used at places the normal code that Microsoft gives you can't. Also, there are many different styles so you can customize it to your liking.

I've only scratched the surface of all of the items this website offers people who are really into statistics regarding their gamerscore, so head on over to www.mygamercard.net to check it out for yourself.

Achievements Earned Today

• Hong Kong Marketplace Completed - Stranglehold
  

Achievements Earned Today

• Refuge - Halo 3
• The Key - Halo 3
• Return - Halo 3
• Campaign Complete: Normal - Halo 3