Another triumphant return!

Like a zombie, rising slowly and menacingly from the grave, Linz returns to the blogosphere.  (Did I seriously just use that term??)  But seriously, I have missed you guys.  And gaming, big time.  You may recall from our last giveaway that 6 weeks ago I gave birth to baby Magneto, and since then my time has been totally eaten up with mothering the little mutant and taking him home to Iowa to meet the family.

So all of this has left me little to no time to game.  I finally got Super Mario 3D Land and my 4-yr-old promptly took it under her wing to play and dominate at it.  I've only been able to sneak in a couple levels.  And, as you all know, Debbie and I both got SSX upon its release and, even though it is the love of my gaming life, I have barely scratched the surface.  Pity party for me!  I am home now, and going to start re-dedicating myself to some "me time" (which translates into "Xbox time..in party..with Debbie.")

This lack of actual time to game has left me with a lot of time to think about gaming..and when I think about it, I often think about the prices of things.  Big on my radar right now: the price of games, and the chance that next generation systems are on the horizon.  When we were visiting friends I got to talking about gaming and found that I am super cheap, and often refuse to buy games when they are brand new and crazy expensive, but I am far from alone.  I have many friends who feel like they have been so burned by purchasing a game for $60 only to have it be less than 10 hours of game play, or drop in price in a week or two.  Commence gamer rage.  I am seriously questioning the logic behind the $60 price tag.  I think the companies would sell so many  more copies and so much sooner if they dropped back down to $40, or even $50..  People could buy the games when they're new, thus raising the game companies numbers, instead of just waiting around until the game is old and drops in price or they can pick it up used.  Just a thought.

And this thought that next generation consoles are coming.  I still haven't even upgraded from my ancient Xbox Elite system (meaning I don't have the fancy new slim one, or the even fancier Star Wars one ... Debbie.)  I don't want to be forced into buying another new system yet!  Granted there is no release date or really any specific news on new systems, but they are always there, hovering like expensive ghosts on the horizon.  All I can say is that when they come, they damn well better be backwards compatible because the lack of that makes me hulk-sized-angry.

The same friends I was talking to about the price of new games were saying that when new consoles come out they refuse to buy.  My own husband even said that when they come he will just play our current system until it dies, and then give up gaming instead of continuing to try to keep up with the new stuff.  I don't know if I could ever give it up..but man, if these current gen systems came out at $400+, just think of how much the next ones will be.  How much are you willing to spend to game?