Gaming enlists with the US Army

According to an article by GamePro the US Army is taking advantage of the realistic quality of today's current video games. The Army will be spending a reported $57 million and using the Crytek's CryEngine 3, the engine behind Crysis 2, to come up with the "most realistic video game ever made." 

As prior Army and a current gamer I can honestly say that I am a little jealous. I can only imagine how intense this "game" will be. Users will have a head mounted display attached to their helmets and a rucksack packed with the latest gaming tech. It also will have 360 degree sound, motion capture and extreme in field customization so that the combat area can be updated for current missions.

To be honest, I am some what surprised someone didn't decide to do this long ago. While I personally did enjoy the "urban training" that I did while in the Army. It seemed less than realistic with a very limited training area and less than realistic buildings and terrain. Not to mention that you had to have a pretty good imagination and the ability to view your buddies as the enemy. All together it was fun and better than nothing but not anywhere what I would think a soldier would need to get ready for actual combat.

Gamers save money with twitter and facebook

Well I just recently started using Twitter and while I have a personal account on Facebook I didn't add anyone that I didn't personally know. I recently started writing for examiner.com about PS3 news for the DC area so I decided I should probably get as much information as quickly as possible so I made a Twitter account and created a new Facebook account just for gaming.

Now, I know that this is nothing new to many people but I figure if I'm just finding this I can't be the only one. So anyways I started following EA on twitter and EA Insider Deals on Facebook. Yesterday I saw for the second time on twitter they were running a deal on their Facebook page if their posting received 2000 likes they would release a code for the EA site for 50% off NFS Hot Pursuit and Shift 2 plus free shipping. Now admittedly these games are not brand new but they are still $60 and around $50 used on Game Stop or $45 new on Amazon.com (at least the PS3 version), with this code you could get them for $30 each brand new(one day only). While I personally had dismissed all NFS games as worthy of my money, for 50% off I figured it was worth a shot. So I put in the code and order Hot Pursuit for $31 and some change total. Now even if the game sucks I can put it on eBay and get most if not all of my money back.

So I ordered it, during check out it said that I should have my game in hand in 4 days. It took about 15 minutes to actually get a confirmation email for my order, probably due to heavy traffic. The next day no item shipped email, I'm starting to wonder if I will have my game by Friday. The following night 20 minutes short of 48hrs from the time of my confirmation I get a shipping notification, still estimating Friday. Friday is here and so is my game right on time. Overall I can't complain about the process. I will be posting my review of the game in another post in a few days. At this point I have played some of the career mode but my obsession with Battlefield Bad Company 2 is getting in the way.

Well just as a great for me update, today I got a visit from the UPS man and to my surprise he was there to give me a free copy of NFS Hot Pursuit.