Games

I love games. All my life, I've loved playing games of all kinds - card games, board games, random games my brothers and I would make up, etc. This probably comes from my dad, and his side of the family, because they would always play games as kids too. And growing up with three siblings, and lots of kids on our street who were similar in age, we always had people willing to play. So, I'm going to share my Top 10 games (of all kinds). As of now, they aren't in any particular order, because I do actually have to study, but I might come back and reorder them at some point.

Rock Band
This one should be a no-brainer to anybody who knows me. I love playing Rock Band, mainly because it combines my love for games with my love for music. Plus, since each "level" is just the length of a song, it's easy for me to just fire it up and play for 15 minutes before I head out somewhere. Usually, when I have a craving to listen to a song that I know is in Rock Band, I'll just fire up the game and play it!

Dodgeball
In high school (and even now, when I go home), my friends and I would go play dodgeball on weekends. We'd go find a public tennis court that wasn't in use, and my friend Zach would bring out the Water Polo balls that he had (his dad was the coach). Then we'd split up into teams, and play on the court, using the lines as boundaries, and the net as the dividing line, and play for a couple hours. Sometimes, we'd plug in a boom box, and blast music while we did it (techno makes surprisingly good dodgeball music!).

Zap Your Neighbor
This is a game that my dad and his friends came up with back in high school/college. They took an existing game, similar to Uno, and modified it, giving every card a function. The object of the game is to empty your hand of all cards - but there are lots of ways to get people to draw more and more cards. It's essentially Uno, but a LOT more fun (in my opinion). We played it a lot my senior year of high school (a lot meaning, every day in two or three class periods), after the AP tests, where it was affectionately called "Acid Uno". It is kind of slow-moving and complicated at first, but a real blast once you get the hang of it. I'm going to make the rules into a PDF file, and link to it from here later.

Air Hockey
I like all kinds of tabletop games like ping pong, pool, and foosball, but my favorite by FAR is air hockey. It's fast-paced, nervewracking, and intense. Whenever I go somewhere with an air hockey table, I always try to find somebody to play against. I'm not particularly good, but I love getting into the game anyways.

Pokemon (the Gameboy games)
I know people will judge me for this, but I don't care. These games are exceedingly complex in terms of the training and battle mechanics, and they are very deep games (in that there is a LOT to do). They have incredible replay value, and if you ever get bored, you can always start a new adventure. Because that's what these are - great adventure games. I don't bother with anything else the franchise does any more, but I like to get the new games when they come out - it's pretty much the sole reason I still own a handheld gaming system.

Scrabble
Despite being a math major, I do like words. I love Scrabble, and wish I could play it more often. There's not much to say about it - just a fun game that pushes you mentally. That, and it's always fun to drop a bullshit "word", and bluff your way out of having it challenged. =)

Capture The Flag
This game, and its many variants, has been a constant part of my life. We used to play a variant every other Friday in elementary school, and that was always a great thing to look forward to. In middle school, there would be days where we'd play a different version during PE, and it was probably the only activity that EVERYBODY would get into. Most first-person shooter video games have a capture the flag mode, which always requires a good amount of strategy. And my friends and I would sometimes play it out in the parks at night. It's a common activity for floors here to play during Welcome Week, and a group of us actually played "Laser Tag Capture the Flag" during training my sophomore year (that's what the picture is from - it's one of my favorite pictures too).

Manhunt/Infection
These are two versions of the same game that my friends and I would play pretty often during high school. We'd go out to the parks at night, and select one person to be "it". In manhunt, this person runs into the park, and hides, then the rest of us would try to find them, tackle them, and pin them to the ground. We soon replaced that with the more interesting game of infection though - all but one person would hide, and the one "it" person (the infected) would try to find the others, and tackle them. Once you were tackled, you also became "it", and you worked to bring down everybody else. The game would start off very slowly, but as soon as somebody got picked off, the game picked up pace, until it was a whole horde of people trying to take down the last survivor. Yes, we were weird. But it was always fun.

Monopoly
Monopoly is my FAVORITE board game ever. I love getting really into it, cutting deals, making decisions using probability of dice rolls, and so on. It basically sums up my math/econ interests. Oh, and the feeling you get from bankrupting another player? Awesome.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare
Even though I play Rock Band more regularly, I'd say that Call of Duty 4 is my favorite video game right now. I can play for hours when I get into it, and the online multiplayer is really good. The levels are all extremely fun (with the exception of Bloc), and there are a lot of little things that just make it the best multiplayer shooter out right now. My favorite thing has to be the class system, because I love unlocking new guns & abilities, upgrading them, and combining them in the most effective ways. The single player campaign has a great story too though, and definitely shouldn't be overlooked. And I'm really excited that Modern Warfare 2 is coming out at the end of this year. The fact that this one has kept me entertained for almost a year and a half now bodes well for the quality of the next game too.