Xbox Features

Even two console generations ago we stopped batting our eyelids if games contained other, smaller games within them. It didn’t even seem odd if whole games were made up of dozens of little ones. Nowadays we use minigame mechanisms to open doors, enact fancy stealth kills, slaughter bosses or open chests. Minigames are everywhere, be it shoving boulders in Conan, coercing peasants in Oblivion or doing anything at all in Thrillville or

Before you get started with this article, we’d like to begin with a very sincere, simple statement: we love BioWare a whole squishy huggy bunch. Their narratives are usually awesome and we’ve spent an embarrassing number of hours playing their games.

That said… with the recent release of Dragon Age 2, it dawned on us how many similarities there are in their recent games. It’s gotten to a point where we can immediately recognize an NPC archetype after only spending a couple minutes with the new character; we took some time to jot down a detailed guide of each of these copy-paste characters so you’ll know precisely how to act the moment they open their easily written mouths...

Before you get started with this article, we’d like to begin with a very sincere, simple statement: we love BioWare a whole squishy huggy bunch. Their narratives are usually awesome and we’ve spent an embarrassing number of hours playing their games.

That said… with the recent release of Dragon Age 2, it dawned on us how many similarities there are in their recent games. It’s gotten to a point where we can immediately recognize an NPC archetype after only spending a couple minutes with the new character; we took some time to jot down a detailed guide of each of these copy-paste characters so you’ll know precisely how to act the moment they open their easily written mouths...

Every dog has its day. But we're not talking about dogs. We're talking about video games. Video games that were once great and mighty and strong but have for whatever reason failed to retain their status as being a big deal. These are all games that at one time or another created a deafening, self-perpetuating buzz around themselves. But now...? Well, they're just 'big' games that don't get the love like they used to.

Every dog has its day. But we're not talking about dogs. We're talking about video games. Video games that were once great and mighty and strong but have for whatever reason failed to retain their status as being a big deal. These are all games that at one time or another created a deafening, self-perpetuating buzz around themselves. But now...? Well, they're just 'big' games that don't get the love like they used to.

Since time immemorial, mankind has gazed upon missiles and secretly thought, “Hey, that’d be fun to ride.” For whatever perverse reason, the idea of straddling or surfing on what amounts to a blazing rocket engine packed with deadly explosives is wildly fascinating to just about everyone, particularly if someone else does it.

For too long, political correctness has choked expression much like smoking might choke someone’s lungs. Back in the good old days, it was common for prominent pillars of society to be seen smoking: baseball players, gangsters, Popeye. Now it’s incredibly frowned upon, because “smoking may slowly kill you,” if you believe “proven medical facts.”

They actually got paid for that crap, you know