Looks like my admission that last weekend’s weather was going to be nice (and it was!) brought a curse to the area this weekend. Yeah, that’s it…a Halloween Curse. Anyhow, it’s been raining non-stop for about three days and signs indicate that it won’t be getting better over the weekend. So now everyone has an excuse to play plenty of games, as if we wouldn’t anyways!

Have a good weekend everyone…rain or shine!

Ricardo Gonzalez, PipBoy Polisher: Fallout 2, Puzzle Quest, and Psychonauts ( finally! Best B-Day present ever! )

Ryan Lea QA: Z-Dub and Phantom Hourglass

Orin Tresnjak, Graphics Programmer: Quake Wars—which, by the way, is a phenomenal game that is not getting the attention it deserves! Go play it! Also Warhammer Fantasy vs. my roommate, my orcs against his dwarves.

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Looking my window, the weather outside looks downright dismal. I was somewhat hoping it would hold up so I could talk about how guys here would have no reason not to lock themselves inside and play games. Turns out though, it’s supposed to be sunny and in the high 70′s, so there goes that idea. I guess it doesn’t matter, since we work at a game studio, playing games over the weekend is a regular, expected thing.

On to this week’s rundown of what we’re playing. I’ll kick it off since I want to emphasize how incredible Everyday Shooter (PS3) turned out.

Matt Grandstaff, Community Manager: Everyday Shooter, Orange Box, Halo 3, Oblivion

Dane “The Main Vein” Olds, Artist: Hellgate: London Beta, TF2, The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, Metroid Prime 3, Wii VC stuff.

Adam Adamowicz, Concept Artist: Shivering Isles, Adobe Photoshop CS2

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…at least, not officially…yet. That’s the real Erin Losi, PR/Mktg Manager extraordinaire for Bethesda, on the left. The image on the right is from a photo Erin got from a journalist who sent her the image (click on the righthand image to see the full, original photo).

You gotta admit, the resemblance is pretty striking. Apparently it’s an image from a photoshoot or something for the Pussycat Dolls in Europe. At least, that’s what we were told and the best we can figure at this point. A picture may be worth 1,000 words, but it’s also worth at least a few questions:

• What is our colleague doing browsing Pussycat Doll fan sites?
• Is it possible that’s really Losi and she’s just not telling us?
• Does she have a long lost sister her parents never told her about? (even they were freaked out by this picture)
• If you are that old guy at the roulette table, are you really gonna be looking down at your chips in that moment?
• Can “The Gav” get the number for any of these ladies?

I thought our guys at the office had it bad for Bioshock when it came out, but I think the frenzy over the Orange Box might have eclipsed it. It’s not too surprising, it’s got Half-Life 2 and the episodic content, Team Fortress 2 for frenzied multiplayer, and that’s without mentioning the ingenious madness of Portal.

Still, there’s plenty of other games being played. Folks are digging pointing and tapping action of The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglas, and playing recent favorites like Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts, Halo 3 and Bioshock.

Here’s the rundown:

Joel “Dixie” Burgess, LD: Wrapping up Halo 3 campaign, TF2, Portal, Portal (flash!), Brain Age 2, Fallout 3

Phil ”Finger Puppets” Nelson, Aspiring Superhero Sidekick: Orange Box

Jonah Lobe, Character Artist: Team Fortress 2, Half Life 2: Episode 2, Red Orchestra

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A week later, folks at the office continue to battle through Halo 3 on both campaign and multiplayer modes. Earlier this week, I completed the game on Heroic, and now I look forward to some campaign co-op and some multiplayer with guys here at the office. I also got NBA2K8 and Zelda: Phantom Hourglass to check out before cheering on the Lions against the Redskins.

Outside of Halo 3, the buzz around the office seems to be Team Fortress 2, which is part of Half-Life 2′s uber pack, The Orange Box. A lot of guys are playing the beta and counting down the days until The Orange Box is released next week. I imagine the folks at Valve are pretty pumped about its release so they can go out and start playing Bioshock…poor guys.

Anyhow, here’s what the rest of the folks at the office are playing:

Gavin Carter, Producer: Halo 3, PGR4, On DosBox: Rise of the Dragon, Star Trek 25th Anniversary.

Dan Lee, Environment Artist: Persona 3, Picross DS, and perhaps some Pokémon Diamond to continue the “games that start with the letter ‘P’” trend.

Cory Dornbusch, Intern: Fallout 1 and 2, and Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts.

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This one’s going to come as a shocker. There’s plenty of guys and gals from the office that are planning on playing Halo 3 this weekend. You can count me in on that as well, though I also hope to get a little NCAA 2008 action in.

As for the rest of the crowd, here’s the weekend lineup…

Jangjoon Cha: This new game called Oblivion goty, and …(cough cough)…Halo…

Angela Browder, Associate Producer: Fallout Collection, Halo 3

Jesse Tucker, Level Design: Crackdown, Guitar Hero II, UT2004, I’m taking advantage of the fact that my roommate just got a 360.

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Kudos to the folks at Loading.Ready.Run for creating this. It’s genius. You might want to grab a sandwich while it loads up.

Me? I’m running to the store today at lunch to try to see if I can fight through the mob to get a copy of Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts. Kurt, Bruce, Jeff, and I still play multiplayer at lunch every day we can (Jeff and I had a stunning come-from-behind victory in Point Du Hoc yesterday) so we’ve been eagerly awaiting this day for a different reason than most of the rest of the known universe.

So what are we playing this weekend while we wait for Halo 3 to come out next week? Let’s go to the video tape! (Warner Wolf? Channel 9? Anybody?) …

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So as some of you may know, I’m a huge Michigan Wolverines fan. I grew up cheering for them, went to school there, and have suffered as Lloyd Carr would say, “tremendously” following the upset loss to Appalachian State as well as last week’s blowout loss against Oregon.

Cheering for another crummy team this year, Todd Howard is a Notre Dame Fighting Irish fan. The Irish have been outscored 64-13 in losses against Georgia Tech and Penn State. Even worse, the Irish’s offense hasn’t found the end zone yet.

Given that our teams, who are #1 and #2 in all-time win percentage square off tomorrow (for the first time both with 0-2 records), we decided to have a grudge match of NCAA ’08…in our theater, on our 121″ x 215″ HD-formatted theater screen (see below for more pics and details).

Now I’ve been playing this game since NCAA ’96 on the PS1, but apparently Todd takes it a little more seriously. The game started off with a few people watching, and for almost two quarters my defense came to play. But around halftime, Todd began to dominate, and eventually won the game 28-0.

Todd was pretty excited because he said I’d have to sing the ND fight song at our next team meeting, but I reminded him that the bet is actually for the real game tomorrow. So I might get to see him sing Hail to the Victors…but I’m not holding my breath.

Check below for some more details about our theater.

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