Don't bother calling me at work on Wednesday

So, my review of Mass Effect 2 will be up the same time this post goes live. You can read the review (which is good because it bumps up the page views) and I basically say it's an awesome, awesome game. I've been hearing about this game from Arone (you'll recognize him from the game's QA credits) for about a year and every tidbit I've heard was really exciting.

The last time he and I spoke (before I had finished the game) Arone said this is the first game he's looking forward to play after it's published and I honestly didn't believe him. The man has spent countless hours testing this game and he still wants to play it? When we went to CES, we spent an hour talking to Jesse, an associate producer on the game. He confessed he was on his fourth playthrough. Again: really?

After 22 hours, I can say these guys are right. I booked this Wednesday off and Daorcey was skeptical that I would want to play the game for 12 hours more. I'm even more excited for Wednesday even after all the hours I've put in for the review.

We, meaning all Canadians, should be proud that we have such a great game development studio in Canada--even if it's in Edmonton. (Cheap shot, I know.) BioWare could have just made the same game with new areas and some new guns, but they didn't. Daorcey and I could go on and on about the things that bugged us. I practically nagged Arone to fix one minor detail (which fought for and it did get changed--awesome). And they fixed pretty much everything that was wrong with the first game. How's that for customer service? It's an odd feeling to beat a game and feel pride in your country rather than thinking how awesome it was (which it was too).

For those that gripe that Canada doesn't make kick ass action games, they should play Mass Effect 1 and 2. There is so much action and story, that it's much better than most Hollywood movies.

Anyways, since my review says that in about 1900 words plus a bunch of photos, here is a tidbit I couldn't put in the review because it didn't apply (for now).

In my brief time with the game, I found some Canadiana. I'm sure I'll find more soon.

• On a prison planet, I encountered a prisoner in a cell. Talked to him and nothing amazing happened. Go onto the next cell and there's another prisoner and no dialogue happens there. But I notice the prisoner's designation--Prisoner 403. Thinking there's something to this I go back to the previous prisoner and he's Prisoner 780. Yeah, they used the Alberta area codes.
• There's a set of armor called Blood Dragon. The description of the armor says it's based on the armor of the Edmonton Blood Dragons team. Whether it's hockey or football, it's unclear. Cute.

The last night in Vegas

Edit: The photos have been added.

There are photos to go with this post but they are trapped on my phone and the wireless at the airport is not playing nice. Check back tomorrow for some snaps.

We decided to head out to Freemont St where old Vegas lives. We liked it much better as drinks were slightly cheaper and we got to gamble with nickels.

Daorcey enjoying a drink. It was pina colada.

Our first stop was Mermaids where they have a free money draw every 30 mins. We didn't win at all. Then gambled with nickels. When you win, you can have the coins rain down in a bucket! That's Vegas. Of course your hands are grimy.

The coins!

Mermaids also had deep fried Oreos which were just okay. We were looking for deep fried twinkies but they were out.

Then we watched the light show which was inexplicably a five-minute ad for Kiss. Deeply cheesy.

Daorcey is entranced by the Kiss light show.

Then we went to the Golden Gate Casino. Played $5 blackjack where I won $2.50. Golden Gate Casino is also the home of $2 shrimp cocktails so the boys (we were hanging out with 2 fellows from Montreal) each bought one. After that delicious treat it was back out on the street where we met the owner of the Golden Gate Casino. Or so his business card said. Also, the dealers in the Golden Gate Casino that are female and young are made to dance every 2 hours in the evening.

While waiting to decide what to do next, we saw a guy run by, quickly followed by security personnel. The security personnel were then followed by a crowd of civilians. Lastly, a girl from Mermaids (dressed in a garish neon green and yellow pantsuit) ran by.

This guy wasn't involved in any shenanigans. He was just being sculpted in clay... posed like that.

We finished the night at the Golden Nugget where one of the Montreal journalists won $100 on a big slot machine. It was huge this slot machine. It took two hands to pull the lever and it dropped massive $1 coins. It was a poetic end to our week in Vegas as we had hung out with the journo pretty much every night and he decided he would only play large slot machines, and there were quite a few.

So now, we're sitting in the Vegas airport and I have to say I'm ready to go home to my bed and vegetables.

Vegas, day 2

It's about 9 pm. I'm sitting in one of our hotel rooms and the room is filled with music and laptop typing.

We just finished our first CES event. It was CES Unveiled and it was filled with people. So many people hovering over the coolest gadgets.

But there was food, although we did not touch the free sushi. And there were free drinks. We had rum and cokes in the style of Cuba. Rum, rum, rum and a splash of Coke for colour.

There were some cool gadgets. There was a UK gadget that promised to stop all spam calls.

Daorcey was particularly enamoured with an analog Duck Hunt. Sadly, there isn't a dog to taunt your bad aim.

Tomorrow is a full day of press conferences. We'll see what comes.

This photo we took was a hovercraft that was more impressive when you realized it was part of a VR game. On your iPhone you would see this hovercraft surrounded by enemies which you had to blast away. If you convinced a couple other friends to spend money on this foolish thing, you could also battle them. It's an upgraded Pokemon I guess.

On an unrelated note, we stopped by O'Sheas, a divey casino. Mike told us that during the day they have an angry midget berating tourists but at night there's nothing. Inside O'Sheas is a beer pong area. They also run beer pong tournaments. I feel old but I felt concerned that these ping pong balls are in dirty hands, on dirty floors, and then thrown into beer which is then consumed. Gross, gross. Ah, Vegas.