Farewell Old year. Give us a better one, Universe!

So, 2011 is leaving us. The world didn’t end this year. Hopefully the next one will not be the last too. I mean, The Mayans must just run out of stone to carve their calendar. But I am here to talk about my year.

I decided to blog. It started when the PS3 was jail broke and I saw a lot of people defending the practice as a right. I choose Destructoid at the time because it was a fun, intelligent site with good amount of traffic. My first blog sucked, because both my English sucks and I was still learning how to use the tools at my disposition.

It took time to find my way and decide how to do things. After some attempts, I discovered my pleasure in doing Top 7 lists, a thing I probably will start doing here at my own blog. Another was the PVC comics. I love doing those.

I left Destructoid after perceiving that they were not the same site I liked before. The community is great, mind you, but they are leaving a lot to desire about their main page and editorial side nowadays. Going there would mean generating traffic for the site, supporting their editorial line. Even if I only used the community blogs it would count to their general traffic. So I decided to leave.

After a while, and after trying 1up community, I decided to do my own blog. I know I will not have the same visibility, but at least I am more comfortable here. Thanks for everyone coming here.

Anyway, my gaming year was very good. Mass Effect 2 was great, as it was Catherine (my personal game of the year) and Battlefield 3 has being lots of fun. Sure, a lot of troubles too. On-line passes became a major issue for a lot of people, the PSN got hacked and down for almost a month (but hey, free games after that), and review’s systems have being heavily criticized. Busy year. People even started dooming gaming, which seems a little stupid.

Catherine is a great game. It is a combination of puzzles and dating sim elements. It deals with very mature themes, but mature themes that common people deals everyday, like marriage, fidelity and responsibility. I don’t know if the demo is still available, and I recommend trying it first. It is a great game, but no for everyone.

Battlefield 3. See the video. Enough said.

Mass Effect 2 was another good surprise. Great game, well done, with a likable cast of characters, many places to go, missions to do, a lively universe and good gameplay. I am eager to see what they will do for 3.

My greatest disappointment surely is LA Noire. I was expecting a great game, and while the missions and investigations where nice, it was boring to do it. Probaly very like real cop work. Well, not my cup of tea.

The PSN hack showed the worst side of gamers. People were in fact happy that it happened and rooting for the hackers. Of course, by their comments, they were not PSN users. They gloated in the misfortune of others. Except when every other game company like THQ, Square, Sega and even Steam started getting hacked. Then the modern Robin Hoods hackers were became a bunch of nerds living in their parent’s house who should get a life. Awful stuff. Hope 2012 they keep it quiet.

The last thing is about ‘reviews’. Here in Brazil we don’t use the word for review (avaliação) for things like movies, books and music. That is because a review imply objectivity and you cannot objectively review media who heavily rely on subjectivity. We call a text about music, movies and books a critic (crítica) and it is not supposed to tell how good or bad a music/movie/book is, but to the critic share his personal opinion.

I will talk more about it later, but a review is not about a personal opinion, but a objective evaluation of something. And videogames cannot be reviewed anymore.

On other front, the anime one. I saw several Gundam shows. Giant robots are great, but I noticed that Gundam follows a ‘same-y’ theme every show. The best I saw this year were Ben-to and The World God Only Knows.

Ben-to is about a guy called Sato, who in his foolish attempt to get a half-priced ben-to (a typical Japanese lunch box) is beaten by several fighters called wolves. They fight everyday in several markets for the half-priced food, following a code of honor made by them. It is incredible funny and surprising. It does not rely much on fan service; the fights are entertaining and the cast likeable.

The World God Only Knows is about Keima, a student addicted to dating sim games who, due a misunderstanding, is forced to hunt fugitive spirits who posses the bodies of several girls. To capture them, he must conquest their hearts and forces the spirit out. At first glance it seems like a typical harem anime, but it is very interesting, have several twists and have a great cast.

Movies this year… they sucked. I don’t now if it is just me, but it seems that is harder and harder to see a good, outstanding movie nowadays. Everything seems to follow a guideline and honestly? I haven’t seen a single movie in theaters this year. Most movies I saw were via blu-ray, DVD and cable. Hope 2012 gives me some surprises.

Well, that is it for my year. I intend to dedicate more time for my own blog, generating not only comics, but more impressions, reviews, Top 7 lists and opinion pieces. Hope to have a lot of people to share it with. And that lot of people to have a great new year.