Resident Evil 5

This is probably the best co-op experience I've ever had in a game. No, really. A good co-op experience in a game is hard to find. So often, it just seems like you happen to be in the same area at the same time, doing independent things. RE5 has you and the person you play it with actually mattering, very much, to what the other is doing. My friend and I dialogued about strategy and planning, were yelling at the other for help, thanking the other for a save (Scripted or we just shot a guy about to hit the other) or a close shave, responding to nice shots or throws, asking for a heal, asking for ammo... etc.
Part of this is due to how Resident Evil is structured, though. You're not, as characters, great at dodging. Your partner shooting a guy behind you is really something that saves you, as you aren't going to dodge that. Your inventory is limited, so you can't both have all the guns (So, there becomes dialogue about who gets what). Ammo is scarce, so you have to work with your partner to make sure you both have ammo. Healing, as well, is done in a great way in this game. Any healing item used near your partner heals both of you for the same amount. Finally, though one of you dying results in you both losing, the game is littered with checkpoints, so you rarely lose much effort when you game over. Thus making it hard to get mad at your partner regardless of what happens.
Of course, this requires having a partner that isn't an ass. You have to compromise, share resources, etc. If you can get that, then you're golden.

The other important but non-gameplay aspect of RE5: Atmosphere/How scary it is. So, 4 and 5 are much less horror, more action. But, see, the only type of 'fear' that works on me in games is the fear of a big enemy about to kill the fuck out of me. And this game manages to achieve that pretty well. The game gives every boss the feeling of difficulty, all the big pitched battles feel rough, etc. It's nice, actually.

Really, the rest isn't terribly important. It's the least story intensive Resident Evil, the graphics are amazing, the music works pretty well, etc.

I do, however, have 2 more gameplay related things to talk about. QTEs and the final boss. And, actually, how they relate.
See, I don't like most QTEs. I like the QTEs in this game. They're not terribly common, add to the game instead of just fluffing out gameplay, and aren't abused. The ones in combat are all attack or dodge related. If you stun an enemy, hit X to QTE if you're in melee range and you do a special attack. Alternatively, any of a number of enemies will have you able to dodge attacks by various QTEs These are the faster, less telegraphed attacks. The cutscene QTEs are kind of annoying, but I can forgive them for not being overused ... and that it's kinda cool to see your characters die in the various cutscene ways. >_>
So, the final boss fight was horribly badly designed. At least in co-op. In Single Player, it's fairly straightforward, as you're only playing one side of the events. In Co-Op, though, you have to figure out, in the beginning, to run from the final boss, as shooting him then does no damage and you get no indication of this. And then, once you run, you sort of have to figure out exactly how the QTEs work and how to trigger the rest of the boss fight, again, with no real indication of how to do it. After about 6 tries of just getting through what felt more like shooting in the dark at how to get the arcane magic of this fight to go, we just checked GameFAQs and got along to the real part of the boss fight. It was pretty disappointing, all told.

Still, an overall great game for Co-op. Single player? I'm not so sure if I'd have loved it as much, to be honest. I might go through in single... Or I might just co-op it again with another friend. Maybe on hard, if the person can import a normal difficulty character. And I know I'll have a damned blast.

Plants vs. Zombies

The best $10 game I have ever played. And I've played Peggle. *And* Puzzle Quest. Yes, it's really that good. I've already gotten a good 10-15 hours out of it, and I've still got a lot of Puzzles and Minigames and Survivals to do. So, it's a *long* 10 dollar game. It's also amazingly fun.

Plants vs Zombies is a Tower Defense/Defend Your Castle type game, but with an interesting twist. Your goal is to defend your house from zombies. You do that by planting your lawn with plants. Each plant costs a certain amount of sun to grow. Sun drops from the sky and also is produced by sunflowers. You have to manage resource building with zombie killing. It's much easier (Well, the main mode, anyway) than flash based defense games, but it's not a pushover. A few of the levels gave me a good run. I never died, though. The main adventure has 50 levels, with the Minigames, Puzzles, and Survivals being another 50.

The game has, actually, a surprising amount of depth. There are dozens of plant types to plant, 5 different stage types, and then also dozens of zombies to counter. And then each of the puzzles and minigames is something different but along the same line as the main game. In one game, you play as the zombies, trying to beat a plant setup; in another you play Bejeweled, only with plants. And zombies coming to eat the plants.

Oh, and the game is surprisingly funny. Each plant and zombie has an entry in an almanac in the game. Most of them are worth a chuckle, and some of the zombies are just hilarious to see.

There's no story and the music is just sort of in the background (Though, it does have an *awesome* credits song). The graphics are great. Gameplay carries the game, though. As it should.

Very, very worth 10 bucks. Worth even the $20 it goes for on PopCap, but just get it on Steam for $10.

Ace Combat 6: Fires of LIberation

So, I had an interesting experience with this game. I started it on Hard, my first time doing that for an Ace Combat game. It's also been my first time playing in the crap planes for awhile, as all my recent Ace Combat has been on New Game +. So, getting used to planes that can't turn worth crap was interesting. I didn't breeze through the game, but I also didn't have that hard of a time, even on hard. Well, okay, that's not true. Before I got entirely used to the new engine (Which was halfway through the game. >_>) I was having a bit of a tough time.

The Flight Engine engine is a bit tighter, and the graphics in air are beautiful. The biggest addition to the game is the High G turns, though. Hold brake and accelerate at the same time while turning and you turn on a dime. It's sorta crazy. However, it kills your speed and you stall out pretty quickly on planes with low stability. So, it's something to use in dogfights and dodging missiles. I found it out during the first Superweapon mission, which made it sorta much easier.

Other changes/additions:

• Flak cannons are SCARY. Holy crap. Instead of just a bit of a shake when you're hit and some damage, it's explosions all around you in air, and when you're hit, you shake for awhile after. It throws off your mobility a bit, too. It's great.
  
  
• ESM. It's an area of effect where your RADAR works a bit better/Enemy RADAR is worse and your missiles do more damage. Your enemy has it, too. It's done by planes or groundbased RADAR stations, which you can destroy. The effect isn't huge, but it was noticeable on hard.
  
  
• Allied Support options. So, you only have a wingman, who you can control in the form of cover or attack. Cover means he'll cover you, attack means he'll attack a target. Now, that's normal. However, you can also do Allied Attack/Allied Cover. This controls *all* allied planes in the area.If you want a certain something destroyed? Allied Attack and whatever is in front of you *dies*. Allied Cover and all the planes attacking you and annoying you and causing you to be in constant Missile Alert? Good bye. Your allies are actually not that bad in this game. It's kinda crazy. You only have a certain amount you can do this, based on how much you've destroyed.
  
  
• Missile/Plane changes: You get a buttload more. You start with around 100 normal missiles on the weakest plane, going to 250 on F-22A. Specials get the same treatment. The F22-A has 72 XMA6 or 40 QAAMs. Speaking of QAAMs, they got nerfed. They're normal missile range with a bit better handling. The enemy aces dodge them pretty regularly. Still, pretty effective, but not UBERHOMINGDEATH like they used to be. Also, much limited amount of planes. You only get about 18 total in the game, 2 of them only unlocking after you beat the game. And you can't change planes for the first 3 or 4 missions. So, yeah, sorta lame.
  
  
• Certain missions are structured differently. Huge missions are now broken up into objectives, where you have to complete X objectives out of Y total objectives. You can choose to only highlight targets for one objective, choose what type of combat you want (air or ground), etc. They're always something like 'Assist in doing X'. It's pretty cool. Though, it stretches you kinda thin, as you can fail objectives and none of them will succeed without you. So, yeah, standard Ace Combat where your entire military relies on you being awesome. Long missions also tend to have checkpoints at objective changes, too, which is nice. So, long mission, then, all of the sudden, OH GOD ENEMY ACES ... That's a checkpoint. It's so nice.
  

Now, my opinion on all this? I dislike how the missions are larger scale. It takes away from the feeling of you being awesome, somewhat. The first Superweapon mission involves 5 Aerial Battleships bedecked with AA/Flak and then the enemy Ace squadron. Kill em all. See, this sounds insane. However, really, your allies end up blowing up more than you do. It'd be impossible to do on your own (... I tried), so it's just kinda... Meh. I ended up only downing like 2 of the enemy Aces, which is sorta lame. This happens a few times, where the mission was impossible to do without Allied , but using those make it less AWESOME! Meeeh.

The story is ... Well, okay. I didn't pay attention to the story after the first few missions. But, see, that's because I got bored. The story, in this game, is about the people affected by the war. It's not about you (AC:Zero), it's not about your squadron (5), it's not about the rival squadron (4), it's about ... civilians. I found it to be boring, so after about mission 3 I just spammed start through the cutscenes. It got preachy. Bugger that. Though, the radio dialogue was pretty cool, but that's a given. No one as standout as Chopper, but... Eh. No one's been as cool as Chopper.

A final, amused note: The final mission has 2 trench run situations. Did the first one in one attempted, the second in 2. I'm getting better at them, apparently. Wait, one more thing. The plane you get for beating the game is sorta absolutely insane. CFA-44, Nosferatu. It turns on a dime even without High G turns, but it can't High G turn for very long due to low stability. The Nosferatu's also got a missile, the ADMM, that targets 12 targets. 12. 12. Each of those 12 parts tracks better than a QAAM, too. It has a Railgun and an electronic warfare thing for making missiles miss, but the ADMM is the clear weapon of choice here. I actually sorta prefer the F-22A over it, aside from Bullsiht missiles, though. Go figure.

Overall? Not as good as 5 or Zero. A bit better than 4. Really, it was the story and shortness of it. The game is only 15 missions. The missions are longer, overall, than previous games, tho. Still, my game completed save clocks in at about 4 hours. Maybe, maaaaybe double that if you include time spent on all failed attempts. That sounds a bit high, though.