Top 9 games to watch

I repeat: top 10 lists are overrated.  Top 9 lists are how I roll.  And, to throw another number into the mix, my husband and I just celebrated 7 years of marriage.  Happy Anniversary, baby.  Here are the top 9 games (in no particular order) I have watched over those (and a few more) years:

1. The Resident Evil Series - Neither my husband nor I can remember exactly which installments of this game series I have watched.  All I know is that these games give me just enough tingle.  They are psych-yourself-out scary.  This may be where my video game voyeurism began, in a dark dorm room, with about 12 other students, laughing at the gamer who just peed himself.  

2. World of Goo - simple, but awesome.  You manipulate goo for pete's sake!  I was pregnant for the first time when this came out.  It was about all my brain could handle.  It was soothing in its "mesmerization." 

3. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas - I know this game should offend me, but it does not.  Sometimes I even felt bad for Carl.  His life (and his woman) was no picnic.   

4. Puzzle Quest - watching this game was almost romantic.  I would curl up on the couch behind my husband while he played.  We would listen to The National over the game's goofy soundtrack and unwind.  I would help him find groups of four gems.  I would state that he was "victorious!" when he defeated the enemy. 

5. Rainbow Six Vegas 2 - As I mentioned before, this was a first person shooter I could get behind.  It had class.  I watched the co-op mode of this game almost every night for awhile.  I even learned the cheap places you could stand to take out a dozen guys as they came down the ladder.   

6. Burnout - Mostly I just liked watching the part where you strategically launch your vehicle in the air so that it would crash into as many tankers as possible, blowing up as many other cars as possible in order to gracefully slide through the icon that would blow you up yet again so you could get "times 4" points.  Yeehaa!

7. Shadow of the Colossus - Epic.  Even though the hand grip timer gave me anxiety attacks similar to middle school gym class, I always loved watching this game.  I enjoyed the hunt for the glowing weak spots atop the huge hairy beasts.  Stab on.  

8. The "mount her" fighting game - I can't recall the name of this game and I am too lazy to find out.  During fights, the narrator constantly chants "counter," but it sounds like "mount her" and it cracks me up every time.  Fighting games are fun to watch in general.  The outfits and character names alone make it worthwhile.

9. Super Mario Bros. - A few football seasons ago, my Baltimore Ravens lost a playoff game to Indy.  Everyone who gathered for our viewing party almost left completely distraught.  Thankfully, two friends busted out the Wii to play the original version of Super Mario Bros. to close out the night.  We all rooted them on, shrieking at the near deaths (those enemies are ruthless in their strolling along).  When they beat the entire game by the skin of their teeth we all felt somehow justified.  And satisfied.

I hope you enjoyed my list.  Now tell me...what do YOU like to watch...

We're gonna have a good time

My birthday is coming up and I am throwing myself a big party.  Call me old fashioned, but we will neither play nor watch any video games at this gathering.  I believe we will still manage to have some fun.

My husband's birthday is coming up in a few months.  We will not be throwing him a big party so I want to be sure to mark the occasion appropriately.  Brainstorming has begun.

I know something he would really like: a PS3.

His console coveting has slowed down.  He waited in line all night to buy a PS2.  He drove all around Baltimore to find a Game Cube the day after it launched.  He nearly froze to death at the midnight release for the Wii.  He settled on a 360 after the second time around.  But he has only ever talked about a PS3.

Now, despite my "involvement" with video games I have never bought my husband anything video game related.  It is a line I have chosen not to cross.  It works for us.  However, I am willing to cross that line to ensure my husband's fourth decade is more pleasurable than his third.  The dilemma I am really facing is that if he owns a PS3 it pretty much guarantees he will play Battlefield 3.  

I just can't get into watching these schizophrenic, sensory overload, run around and shoot like its a penny a round, first person shooters.  I hide my face behind my Real Simple.  Bathing to Black Ops is not relaxing.  I long for simpler, quieter times.  I miss Rainbow Six Vegas 2.

I would lie on the couch, curled behind my husband.  I would wear the headset.  Not only did I get to bark orders to our friends, I got the dish on their new girlfriends.  I had a purpose.  I was comfortable.

So, I don't know.  I am just glad my husband also plays games like Puzzle Quest.  If he wants a PS3 as much as I think he does perhaps I will break down and buy it for him.  BF3 is coming out for the 360 anyway.  Maybe love is Battlefield.