So the Star Trek video game: not great reviews and let's face it movie tie in's are rarely any good ( although on a side note that isn't going to stop me picking up Fast and Furious Showdown on Friday ) and the market is saturated with FPS games anyway.

But a strange thing occured in my house. My eldest lad, who turned 16 last week, has never watched anything remotely Star Trek related and obviously just not been interested. So when the game turned up on rental ( is that soon to be a thing of the past? - sorry couldn't help it ) he had no expectations about it.

So what happened? He put the game in and actually quite enjoyed it - to the point that he borrowed the first movie from me and now wants to go and see the second one! He is also talking about watching so NG/DS9 etc. So the game converted him.

Maybe the game isn't so bad after all and it's pre-conception that killed it?

Anyway now I have shared that nugget I will go back to cooking dinner

So the wife is back in hospital again and I believe right now she is "under the knife". My 12 year old and I left at 5am this morning to take her in - she was due to be first on the list so had to be there by 7am. Got there to discover she had been bumped to 2nd.

We waited with her until about 10:15am but she then insisted we leave to get back home where our 15 year old was looking after the 9 and 7 year olds! Just as we got home ( about 12 ) I got a text saying they were about to take her down. 

**UPDATE** Just spoke to one of the nurses and surgery is underway! Might not hear anything until 7pm ish though so a few more hours of this waiting

I'll be taking the kids to see her tomorrow afternoon

Think I might go and game for a while to try and take my mind off it.

Hope you all have a great weekend.

So after all the hassle regarding my wife's surgery ( which is currently rescheduled for the end of this month - fingers crossed ) we decided that everyone could do with cheering up!

So we went out and bought a new TV for the living room and set off a chain of electrical equipment movement round the house:

• The old TV from the living room went to the gaming room ( which really pleased our 12 year old as he is the primary user of that room and it was a bigger TV )
• The TV from the gaming room went up to our 15 year olds room - again bigger TV so he was happy.
• The TV from the 15 year old's room went into the room our 9 and 7 year old's share. Although not a size upgrade their old one had a couple of dead pixels plus no iPod dock so an improvement all the same

And the new one in the living room - well we figured it was time to get a 3D TV and also a 3D BluRay/DVD player so everyone was happy.

Once it was all set up everyone queued up for a turn at Black Ops 2 in 3D - lots of fun!

Anyway other than that I'm back on Forza Horizon for now with the new DLC on it's way. Looking forward to Grid 2, Ashes Cricket 2013, MotoGP 2013 and Fast and Furious: Showdown over the coming months. Too many games and not enough hours in the day

Right coffee break over, back to work ( currently setting up my new iPhone 5 - a work phone so this counts as work ) - take care everyone and great gaming!

Follwing on from my last blog - and many thanks to all the well wishes there is an update.

My wife was alone in the hospital, in the waiting area for theatre, about to "go under" when the consultant called it off. Argh. He was a "new to the case" consultant and at the last minute decided he was unhappy with something that hadn't been done right.

Now - more tests and reschedule the surgery for June/July

My wife is 80 miles away in hospital, about to have major spinal surgery. I dropped her off last night ( they had a spare bed and she is first on the list this morning ) and left her about 11 last night. Basically given the distances involved, the length of the surgery and the ages of the kids we had no-one we could ask to look after them so we made the horrible decision that she would have to be at the hospital alone so I could be home with the them.

Been texting her but it isn't the same - next few hours are going to be tough

Laters everyone!

.....bought a WiiU at the weekend. Not for me as such but for the wife ( mainly ) and kids. Actually quite impressed to be honest. Picked up Nintendoland and Rabbids with the bundle and Mario ( for the wife ) plus a couple of Wii games like Mario Kart.

So far it has been a big hit. As a family ( wife, 4 kids, eldest's gf and me ) spent almost all day yesterday playing Nintendoland. Haven't heard so much laughter and screaming in a long while as occured playing Mario Chase - silly really since, as most of you know, we all game a fair amount so being amused by such a simple game.......all good though!

laters fellow gamers

So ever since subscribing to Sky Sports to watch F1 my kids have been watching WWE - before that it was highlights shows on Sky 1 only. Now it's 3 hours of Monday night Raw and 2 hours of Friday Night Smackdown ( watched on Tuesday and Saturday respectively ). We also watched all the pay-per-views in the last 12 months.

So reasonably big fans and lots of debate as we all have our own favourites!

Currently The Rock is WWE Champion having beaten CM Punk twice. John Cena won the Royal Rumble so challenged Rock for the title at Wrestle Mania ( which is on April 7th ). However he agreed to put his ticket on the line against CM Punk on Monday night Raw this week - with the winner going to the match with the Rock!

I won't spoil it by saying who won but the match has to be among the top 2 or 3 I have seen in the last 12 months of watching. It was a good clean fight, back and forth, no interference awesome entertainment. The result did split the family a little as was inevitable

And yes I do know it's all scripted and I can now acurately predict the outcome of a good 70-80 percent of matches ( a big name loses a big fight then will obviously win next time out against a smaller name etc ) but think the story writters do a better job than the Eastenders writers!!

Peace to all

Hello everyone, haven't blogged or written a review for a while so thought I'd do both. Here's a link to my review of WRC 3 for the PSVita:

http://uk.gamespot.com/wrc-3-2012/user-reviews/803251/

Please feel free to post comments about it - all feedback gratefully recieved!

My older 2 kids both got BO2 hardened edition as an early Xmas present and are consequently very happy

My littlest baby turns 7 at the start of December time flies by so quickly!

Have a good weekend everyone

Angry Birds Trilogy for the Xbox popped through the letterbox this morning ( from Lovefilm ) and OMG it is so addictive. Now you may be surprised to know I have never played Angry Birds before! Yes my kids play it on the iPad but I never have. It is so addictive and the wife and I have been trading high scores!

Pokemon Black 2 - I went and picked this up for my 8 year old this morning - I promised him it would be in his DSi in the car when I pick him up from school

Also picked up WRC 3 for me and yes I went and bought a copy of Angry Birds Trilogy so we have two copies for the weekend and I'll post the rental back on Monday I think

Hope you all have a great weekend of gaming and whatever else you may be doing!

So I got to thinking the other day - who makes up your friends lists on XBL/PSN?? I suspect different people have very different answers. My two older kids for example ( being 15 and 12 ) their lists are made up almost exclusively of "friends in real life" and friends of those friends. Then only one or two people they "meet on-line".

My XBL list on the other hand has:

• wife and each of our 4 kids
• a couple of kids friends including the eldests' girlfriend
• The local Game deputy manager
• People from here ( GS )
• People meet on-line

By far the biggest group is the people from here meaning that I have never met the majority of my "friends" which is clearly a direct contrast to my older children.

My younger children on the other hand "have to" either know the people on their two lists or have them vouched for by the older kids if you see what I mean. The younger two are 8 and 6 so family and friends of the older ones make up their lists exclusively!

So what about you folks? What is the break down of your lists??

Weekend and finally sucumbed to the cold the kids have all had - typical. Still life goes on and I'm not one to mope around feeling sorry for myself, still running with the dogs twice a day so........

My self set aim of scoring 1000 grams a month is going really well - needed to be on 20,000 by the end of September and I am now at 21,100 odd so am thinking of adjusting the target to 24,000 by Xmas ( instead of 23,000 ). Been playing Moto GP 09/10, PGR 4 and now F1 2012 ( on rental ) along with the odd XBL Arcade game and they have been keeping the score ticking over nicely.

Still on the fence about whether to go and buy F1 2012 - I might just keep it a couple of weeks and see how it goes.

Anyway the dogs are saying "we've been back from our run for a while now - is it breakfast time?" so I'd better feed them and get some jobs done so I'm ready for the Singapore Grand Prix this afternoon Go Lewis

Enjoy the rest of the weekend folks and great gaming

As you may be aware I use an on-line game rental service - LoveFilm and have done for a number of years. With 6 gamers in the family it is a very cost effective way of trying games we aren't sure of. I currently pay £19.39 per month and this entitles me to 4 games at a time with no limit to the number rented in a month. So we generally get through 12 games a month as a fair few are a case of try it for 10 mins and send it back.

Anyway I have said it's an all round great service and especially happy today as they have posted me F1 2012 of the Xbox360 so it should arrive tomorrow on it's launch day. I've been on the fence about this title as I haven't put enough time into either 2010 or 2011 so the chance to rent immediately is a bonus

Looking forward to the weekend now and great gaming everyone

Yes that's right I have made it to this milestone reasonably intact I reckon

Kids were more excited about it that me and made me wear a massive "Happy 40th Birthday" badge when I did the school run so got lots of comments in the playground

Got a few bits and pieces, T-Shirts including the current Liverpool FC home shirt, 4200 MS points, a game card ( nothing out at the moment that I want but that all changes over the next few weeks! ) some "nice" chocolate that I wouldn't normally buy. Happy with that - especially as I told the wife not to go mad so.......

Anyway need to get some work done now so have a great weekend folks and get some gaming in

......my dog has been watching too much wrestling

So what's been happening?? Well I had a long weekend ( took Friday and Monday off ) which was good. Got in a bit of extra gaming, caught up on a few household chores and spent some time with the kids. Stayed up until 4am Monday morning so we could all watch the WWE pay per view event "Summer Slam" live which was pretty good. The younger 3 kids went to bed and I got them up in time for the pre-show but the wife and I along with the eldest and his gf stayed up playing London Olympics on the Xbox.

On the gaming front I have been playing Zuma's Revenge - love it and finally went back to NFS Shift to try and get the last few achievements. While doing that I decided to get the Ferrari DLC so have put a good few more hours into that game!!

I went to my local Game store as it opened on Friday to pick up Super Mario Bros 2 for the wife and she spent the rest of the day and most of the weekend playing it

Minecraft on the Xbox has become popular in my house for some reason - don't get it myself but the wife and 3 older children are all playing it to death. I find it very amusing listening to my 8 year old up in his bedroom talking on the headset to my 12 year old down in the gaming room while playing in their shared world!!

Enjoy the rest of the week folks and have fun gaming

Being old ( 40 next month ) I am finding it difficult to adapt to "text speak". My eldest son's girlfriend sometimes texts my wife and I can barely understand even the gist of the message. What with text speak specific "words", only using the first couple of letters of a word and horrible horrible shortenings it's like a whole new language.

I am far too old to adapt but even as I say that I do find the first few "textisms" making their way into my texting habits. Maybe an old dog can learn some new tricks after all

Been working from home a lot in the last few months - my wife is quite poorly so I need to be around as much as possible for the kids. Luckily my job makes this both possible and easy. It's now the school summer holidays so all the kids are home. Peversely this is making working easier as I can start earlier ( instead of after the school run ) and don't have to clock watch for pick up times!

My eldest keeps having his girlfriend round and when she isn't here his best mate is. Both sleeping over multiple times a week so making the house feel fuller than normal

Still managing to fit plenty of gaming in - just finished the "career" part of DiRT Showdown and what a lot of fun that was. Highly recommend to people who like arcade racing and destruction derby games

Picked up the uDraw and art game package for the Xbox the other day ( only £16 brand new free postage from Ebay ) and that's pretty cool. I was almost "forced" into buying it as one of the rental games that turned up needed it ( Marvel Super Hero Squad Comic Combat ) and my 8 year old was upset he couldn't play it got some brownie points in the "Dad stakes" when it arrived!

Anyway that's morning coffee break over so better get back to work now.

Laters gaming friends

......because the wife and kids are watching the Olympics opening ceremony. I am looking forward to seeing some of the sport but the opening ceremony....really??

We all ( 6 of us ) stayed up on Monday night to watch the 1000th episode of Monday Night Raw ( that's WWE wrestling for those that don't know ). The younger 3 kids went to bed for a few hours and I got them up at quarter to one. We had popcorn and coke and sweets and we all had a blast. I personally didn't like the way the last match panned out but we'll see where that story line goes now!

Got the wife her 3DS XL today - she was a big fan of the DSi XL and so it was a bit of a no brainer. Traded in her 3DS and the DSi XL and got money back from buying the 3DS XL so that was a bonus!

Noticed there is a new NASCAR game due out in November but I bet we don't see it over here in the UK!!

Friend's 40th surprise party tomorrow night so we are all going to that. Can't laugh too loudly as I'm the next one to reach that particular milestone!

Have a great weekend everyone

....so thought I'd do one for Lego Batman 2 - there is a link below so if you have time to read it I'd appreciate and comments

http://uk.gamespot.com/lego-batman-2-dc-super-heroes/user-reviews/796759/platform/xbox360/

On a side note picked up Bang Bang Racing from XBL Arcade and what a great little game it is - having lots of fun with it - reminds of the game I cut my racing teeth on back in the 1980s - Super Sprint ( also known as Championship Sprint )

Thanks for reading