How awesome are the new 5 mans in the Frozen Halls? I know right? Er, well … I haven’t seen them yet. What little time that I have had in WoW was spent setting up add-ons and running one PUG with the new dungeon finder tool. I’m determined to use pitbull again but ver.4 has a different learning curve to setting up than ver.3 did. I figure that since this should be the last major patch until the 4.0 roll-out prior to Cataclysm any time I spend on getting my UI just right will be worth it.
Considering that I don’t have much to comment on with patch 3.3, I figure I’ll shift the focus on this entry towards console gaming and the upcoming diversions from WoW. There have already been a large number of games released this holiday season that I’m interested in, but I’m always looking forward. Assassin’s Creed II, Borderlands, Uncharted 2 … Meh! Who needs them right? Let’s look to first quarter of 2010 for what really has me excited. Old games are old news is what I always say ^^;
Right out of the gate January has two games that I am really looking forward to: Darksiders and Bayonetta. The buzz revolving around Darksiders is very positive, but I’m hoping a demo gets released in the coming weeks so I can try it out for myself. I downloaded the Bayonetta demo and WOW that’s how you start a demo. It doesn’t slow down in January either with Dark Void and Mass Effect 2 on their heels. Dark Void is likely to get overlooked by many but I’ll check it out based off how much I loved Crimson Skies. Mass Effect 2 is a no-brainer … but I still need to pick up Mass Effect and finish it first.
February isn’t quite as packed with titles that cause me to salivate but there are a couple of titles that I’ll mention. As blasphemous as this might be I could care less about Bioshock 2. I didn’t like Bioshock, the control just felt off and as cool as the atmosphere seemed, it just didn’t grab me. Where Bioshock 2 fails to excite me Star Trek Online exceeds in tapping the inner-trekkie inside of me. Away missions aside the game looks amazingly fun. DS9 uniforms?! Hell yes. I loved TNG and DS9 (season 4+) and cannot wait to captain a cruiser through the Gamma quadrant and kick some Dominion ass (okay, that might be getting ahead of myself).
February closes with a bang with Splinter Cell: Conviction which is a little surprising coming from me. I’ve never been a fan of the Splinter Cell series, but Conviction just looks bad-ass. Obvious inspiration from the Borne movies as well as Fox’s 24 seems to have shifted Conviction into a game that I look forward to playing. Speaking of 24, season 8 is going to absorb my Monday nights. I am a huge Jack Bauer fan and should my wife and I ever have a boy, he will be named James “Jack Bauer” Rainwater. 
Finally the grand-daddy of all diversions will come in March as Final Fantasy XIII is released. As much as I love the Warcraft universe, Final Fantasy has and will always be #1 in my heart. Once FFXIII drops my WoW playtime will disappear until I’m completely satisfied and finished with FFXIII. I just need to decide whether I’ll pick it up on 360 or PS3 should a PS3 slim find its way into my home during the Christmas holiday.
