Long gone are the days of the pack-in game. The act of purchasing a new console and having a new top-tier game right there in the box to show off what your new hardware can do has slowly faded from reality to fable to legend.

With Kinect Adventures, the pack-in title with Kinect for Xbox 360, however, you’re not only getting software that shows you what your magical new piece of hardware can do, you’re also getting an EXTREMELY fun multiplayer title that will have you laughing and smiling so much you’ll think you’re seven years old on Christmas morning again.

I haven’t bought a Dragon Ball game since Dragon Ball Burst Limit for the Xbox 360 in 2008, and even then it was only because I wanted a Dragon Ball game in HD.

There’s a lot of reasons that despite how big a fan of the series I am, Dragon Ball games stopped being interesting to me long ago (at least the fighting games; action RPG Buu’s Fury on the Game Boy Advance was pretty awesome). Sloppy mechanics for one thing. I know that the series is mostly known for its intense fights that look like they’re on fast-forward, but that doesn’t make a fun game. Adding on to that, large rosters are impressive, but I get bored when you have over 100 characters and they all control the same.

I posted this on Twitter earlier but I wanted to have it cataloged for all times. When our latest game rental arrived from GameFly today and I opened it up, I was greeted by this Geico ad. I have to say, it’s really cool to see such a big company go out of their way to focus their ads on the demographic they’re hitting.

I read the Star Wars: The Old Republic boards pretty regularly, as I’m obsessed with the game and have more free time at work than I should. A lot of it is just people discussing the game, getting opinions on character classes and generally just passing the time until launch.

I’m mostly on the board for the Sith Warrior class, as it’s the class I’ll be playing and I like to see what other people are saying about it and keep on top of any new information. When I made the decision to play an Imperial character so I could play with friends I knew I’d be in for more than my fair share of immaturity from teenagers who are all about being GRIMDARK and listening to songs that make their mom mad, but sometimes what’s said on the boards is simply appalling.

Because it is ALL STAR WARS ALL THE TIME for me I decided to bring out my old lightsaber prop I made and make a cool picture. Click to embiggen!

Only the baddest mothas carry purple lightsabers.

Here’s a close up of the hilt. I made it back in 2002 or so, using a sink pipe, rubber O-rings, PVC and the button from an NES controller.

Last weekend Christina and I finally went out and bought a Kinect. We’ve been meaning to for a while because the games looked like fun and we’ve been looking for a fun way to exercise at home without needing expensive equipment. She just got a new job (yay!) and will be making better money so we decided to go ahead and take the plunge.

Holy crap this thing is awesome.

First of all, the technology behind it is nothing short of wizardry. You can register your face with your gamertag so when the Kinect recognizes you it will sign you in to Xbox Live. When I activate the Kinect sensor, it scans me from across the room and says “Welcome SpaceKappa!” Christina will enter the room and sit next to me and, without ANY prompt from us, she’ll be greeted with “Welcome LadyStarstorm!”

Navigating menus with your hands isn’t as intuitive or quick as using a controller, but it’s way more fun. Moving my hands around to make selections makes me feel like I have telekinesis or something. It’s astounding how well it works, but your first instinct isn’t even to be impressed because it all feels so natural.

I’m writing about Star Wars: The Old Republic again. Considering that literally about 85% of my day is spent thinking about it, you’d better get used to me talking about it!

Anyway, what I’m writing about today is the decision I’ve made regarding what class and faction I’ll be playing. I had originally planned on playing on the Republic side as a Jedi Consular, because hey, it’s Star Wars, who DOESN’T want to be a heroic Jedi character? I had been talking to my friend Matt, trying to coordinate things since we planned on playing together, and he had mentioned that some of his coworkers would be playing as well. He later informed me that they’d be playing Imperial characters.

A couple of weeks ago Destructoid posted a leaked survey that Disney had sent out to get input on Disney Epic Mickey 2. Those surveyed were asked to choose between several cover designs and game subtitles, but the most interesting part of the survey was the information that the game would not only be released for Wii, but for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 as well.

I’m not a console fanboy (I have my preferences but I own and enjoy all three systems) but it was disappointing to see such an important Wii exclusive game have its sequel go multiplatform.

Of course it’s good that the game is being made available to a wider audience (not that I think there were many, if any people who wanted to play Disney Epic Mickey and didn’t have a Wii), but it’s a shame that Disney felt that the series couldn’t prosper as a Wii (or Wii U) exclusive.

There’s been a few requests for a chatroom for a while now, so I’m glad to finally provide to you the PK Bloggin’! IRC channel!

This channel will be open 24/7 for whoever wants to join in and will supplement our Google+ hangouts. If you’re sitting on your computer with nothing to do, why not see who’s on IRC?

All you need to do is download an IRC client (I recommend mIRC) and connect to the DarkMyst server. From there, all you need to do is join #pkbloggin and you’re in!

Basic IRC commands are easy to find through Google, but one thing you’ll for sure want to do is register your nickname with the server to make sure no one can pretend to be you.

I also have it set to play a noise every time someone says my name, so keep that in mind!

So yeah. It’s all set and ready to go! See you there!

I’m going to be topical today! How quaint.

Dragon Quest X was re-announced last night, much to the joy of every single citizen of Japan ever. I say re-announced because it was originally announced back at the same time as IX, but never mentioned again.

Dragon Quest, Square-Enix’s OTHER beloved long-running RPG series is a national treasure in Japan. The Japanese government had to ask Square-Enix (then just Enix) not to release Dragon Quest games during the week because too many people would stay home from work and school. This isn’t a law, like people believe, but this is the internet so trying to convince people that a rumor is inaccurate is like trying to yell at the ocean to stop being so wet all the time.