PixlBit

I was thinking the other day about the games that really formed the core of my gaming. Many of them are games with campaign co-op as an option. It goes back all the way to the 80s and arcade games. So here's a list of the five games that everything else revolved around over the years.

About a week ago, I went to my local arcade, Pinball Gallery, to play a pinball machine that was released in 1967, the year I was studying for January, Derby Day by Williams. I took a picture shown below:

My music listening project for this year is to listen to as much music as I can from each year starting with 1968. I'm slowly adding music to my iPod playlist every night, month by month. So far I have stuff like Blue Cheer's Vincebus Eruptum (with the song "Summertime Blues"), Iron Butterfly's debut album Heavy, Steppenwolf's debut album containing the hit "Born to Be Wild", Blood, Sweat & Tears debut album Child Is Father to the Man, Mothers of Invention's We're Only in it for the Money, and Joni Mitchel's debut Song for a Seagull. I mention this because I'm also investigating what games were out that year. Here's a breakdown:

But not before I spent an hour or so grinding on Claptrap's Robot Revolution in Borderlands 1 to see if I could pick up a few more collectibles from fallen claptraps. I got a few more of each type but didn't unlock any new achievements yet. I'll continue to just replay that DLC every week and see if I can't get those. 

I finally had enough of Borderlands 1 this weekend. I got the achievement for the 6 midgets in the General Knoxx DLC and the one for getting to level 61, but I'm leaving five achievements unfinished. Three are related to collecting random items dropped from Claptraps in the Claptrap's Robot Revolution DLC. Mark and I mined for that stuff by playing the entire DLC several times and busting up just hundreds of Claptraps; but I swear, I got maybe a half dozen more items, that's all.

I am a long time mix tape creator. Magnetic tape gave way to a laser and compact disc and I made mix CDs. Then the internet and ipods came on the scene and now I rip all sorts of formates to my PC and arrange them how I will on my iPod to take on the go. The arrangements have gotten more and more complex as access to more music has happened. My latest arrangement has me focusing on one year for a whole month. This month it is 1967. I collect as many albums as I can get my hands on and shuffle it all on my iPod while I drive at night for work. Well, why stop there, I said to myself. Why not include games as well and go super retro, or, at least, play stuff that may be related. So I researched board games and arcade machines that were released in 1967. Then I realized comics are closely related to all that stuff, so I researched what was new in comics as well. Thanks to wiki, I now have a pretty cool list of stuff to check out. Here's the list:

Mark and I started by mopping up all the side quests in the Claptrap's Robot Revolution DLC. I got the 3D glasses collectible achievement and found the six claptrap statues for another one. Then we took a tour of all the levels, beating up on claptraps to see what else dropped. There are three more collectible achievements connected to random stuff they drop. I got a few of the items like pizza slices, oil cans and fish in a bag, but I'll need more for the achievements.

Gamer's guilt got thrown to the skags as I knocked off another full day of Borderlands this Sunday. Details to follow. 

Today, a lot of the first Borderlands. I thought Mark and I might finish all the DLC and start Borderlands 2; but no. there's a lot of content in those DLC missions. Also, I'm thinking I might start cutting back on my gaming time on weekends. Further info below. 

I finally stopped playing Diablo III and got totally committed to my run of the complete Borderlands series. Mark and I are about 18 hours into Borderlands 1 and getting near the last few missions. It's been so absorbing and fun with only a few of the usual frustrations and disfunctions. Here's the breakdown.