(If you’d like to donate to WFMU, the best listener-supported radio station in the world, then please go here – and make sure to pledge towards The Best Show so Tom can stay on TOP!)

Last year I skipped out on bible study so that I can listen to The Best Show on WFMU and donate during their pledge drive week.  This year was no exception and in both cases I played the PS3 while listening (after calling in my pledge of course – priorities, people).  It’s usually hard to play video games and concentrate on what’s happening outside of the video universe but I think I’ve found the perfect combination.

Last year’s game was an easy choice for me (at the time) because I had just rented Ratchet & Clank from GameFly and was trying to finish it so I could send it back.  It’s engaging enough so that your mind isn’t empty while playing it but the action and collection aspects of the game can be a good choice for those trying to focus on other things, while also trying to make progress.

While Tom Scharpling was yelling at his flock to call in and give money, I was at home collecting bolts and weapon experience to bolster my arsenal and defeat the weird fish aliens I kept encountering.  Don’t think I didn’t hear the Patton Oswalt bit that was just as hilarious as my rocket gun was devastating.  Don’t believe, for one second, that I didn’t hear Death Cab for Cutie’s/Zoey Deschanel’s  Ben Gibbard and Ted Leo taking requests for each pledge just as I was finally making that difficult jump.  I may have even finished the game during the marathon, but don’t you dare think I didn’t hear Tom reject my request for Just the Way You Are.

This year was a little bit easier for me in the engagement department.  I don’t have any current PS3 games I am trying to complete so I went with trying to make some progress in Hot Shots Golf 5.  This type of golf game is really the only type I can get into.  I don’t care much for the more realistic guess-what-strength-you-are-using Tiger Woods series.  I am an old school sports game fan at heart.  I need meters, meters and more meters.

The advantage of having meters in this game is that I don’t really have to pay attention much while I play.  I can just hit the button to make the club pull back, hit it again to mark my power and hit once more to mark my control.  Since golf games usually line you up straight with the pin, I only have to adjust my direction a little bit for the wind.  The rest is all buttons.

I probably blew through 10 rounds of golf while listening to this year’s pledge drive.  I felt like I had gotten something done for once in my life.  I’m always behind on my work and writing but I’m about 10 rounds ahead in my golf game.  Thanks be to Sony and WFMU!

Really, who cares what my favorite video games of 2008 were/are?  It’s not like you’re not all assuming it’s Rock Band 2.  That is, of course, assuming that you are even making any assumptions about my thoughts for the year, which is assuming in itself (if that’s possible).

Instead, I’ve decided to make a best of list of my favorite albums in 2008 that I haven’t listened to yet.  I know what you’re saying… I take that back.  I couldn’t possibly know what you’re saying.  I’ll just tell you what I’m thinking:  ‘How the heck am I supposed to rate something I’ve not even experienced, much less put them in any ranking order?’  Well, that’s the beauty of this list, so leave me alone and go to the next post if you’re going to be a jerk about it.

TOP TEN ALBUMS, THAT I OBTAINED IN 2008, THAT I HAVEN’T LISTENED TO YET BUT PLAN TO PROBABLY SOMETIME IN 2009

10. Bone Thugs-N-Harmony – E 1999 Eternal
This is an album I downloaded because I hadn’t heard it since, probably E 1999. I was a fan of all hip hop music at the time and I’m ashamed to say that I probably listened to this non-stop. I can’t remember much on it except 1st of tha Month and Tha Crossroads. Who can forget Tha Crossroads? I think we all miss Wi$h Bone’s Uncle Charles just a little. My favorite thing about this album, without listening to it, is the uncomfortable mash-up of E. 99th St. and the year 1999. It’s a little bit of a stretch but what can you expect from four guys who wrote the lyrics:

If I could teach the world (whole wide world)
to be a thug-n-harmony (harmony)
Then I would teach the world (whole wide world)
to be a thugsta just like me (like me)

9. Brian Green – One Stop Carnival
Shut up. Don’t you dare doubt me on this one. Brian (Austin) Green put a rap album out back in 1996 and it was as relevant as anything else from that era. He raps a bit like Ahmad (who did Back in the Days) and his beats all sound like Black Eyed Peas first album. There’s a reason for that, of course. The Black Eyed Peas (pre-Fergie) helped out on this album by doing some production as well as a chorus or two (they may have even rapped, I haven’t listened yet). Slim Kid 3 from Pharcyde also did some production. If that sort of company doesn’t thrill you, then you’re not thinking straight.

8. Calloway – All the Way
You may not know who this is, but you certainly remember their hit, I Wanna Be Rich. I have such a soft spot for soft-spotted R&B/pop from the 80s. That song is so awesome in my book (coincidentally, my book entitled Soft-Spotted R&B/Pop from the 80s will be in stores – and on best-of 2013 lists – next year). Back then, when I was a child longing for acceptance and Jawbreakers, I never really bought records. Sure, I got the occasional Storm Front for my birthday but I never really went to record stores and chose things. In the last year or so, I’ve made a goal for myself to rectify this and get all the albums I missed and here’s one of them. Here’s to 2009, when I’ll finally get to enjoy this wonderful jem.

7. Clannad – Macalla
Okay, for some reason this year, I got onto this huge Robin Hood kick and I was just looking for anything Robin Hood related to consume. Of course, I ignored all the literature on the legend and instead went to Wikipedia and popular media. I didn’t find much in the way of American TV or film (at least nothing that I hadn’t already seen) and so I navigated the Google waves and found a ton of British TV (new and old) to satisfy me. One of the series I found was this one called Robin of Sherwood and the opening theme song hooked me right away. It was performed by this band called Clannad. They are a Gaelic band and I think this was one of the first times they sang in English. The album is total medieval synth-goth pop (totally). I picked up the album they released right after this one to see if they continued the same sound because that Robin Hood album was a hit. I don’t know if this one is good (naturally) but Bono sings on a song so something happened in the time between ‘84 and ‘85.

6. Dan Hartman – I Can Dream About You
All you Fletch fans will recognize this guy… Well, all you Fletch soundtrack fans will. Dan Hartman did the song Fletch, Get Outta Town, which THANKFULLY includes the title of the song in the lyrics. For the rest of you, the title of the album will definitely ring a bell. And for even more of you Dan Hartman’s name, alone, will ring a bell just because you are older and/or you have a good memory for one-hit wonder artist names (or in this case, two-hit wonder).

5. Huey Lewis & the News – Picture This
Something snapped in my head recently, and I decided I needed the entire Huey Lewis & the News catalog. I already have Sports and Fore! but I have a compulsive disorder that requires me to own discographies. Todd Barry jokes about buying box sets saying, “I don’t own one CD by the Oakridge Boys. I think it’s time I owned every CD by the Oakridge Boys.” I’m that guy. I already own Picture This on vinyl but come on. You can’t expect me to actually get out my record player and listen to the vinyl I buy. It’s solely a fashion statement.

4. Jellybean – Wotupski !?!
Jellybean Benitez dated Madonna for two years and remixed her debut album, along with producing Holiday. Can you fault me for wanting to hear his solo stuff?

3. Kanye West – 808s and Heartbreak
Kanye West has the biggest balls in the world to record an album like this. This list admits that I haven’t listened to it yet but I’ve read enough reviews to know that he sings instead of raps on the entire record. Firstly, the guy has been making rap records his whole life and all of the sudden, when he wants to start getting introspective and emotional (even more so than the crybaby tour I got the privilege of seeing) he starts crooning. I’m all for artist experimentation, but this is like something Ben Folds would sing about in Sports and Wine. Second, not only does he completely change what he’s been doing, he does it in such a way that proves to us why he started rapping in the first place. You don’t bust out the Auto-Tuner if you are a good singer – at least not in EVERY SONG. That’s like me telling all my friends I’ve taken up guitar and to come see me do my first performance. Then, when they get there, they see me playing Guitar Hero.

2. Martin – Show the World
Someone told my brother that he didn’t like Martin because he was trying too hard to sound like Michael Jackson. My brother said, “Michael’s not making music like this anymore. Why not let someone else?” I’ve cheated with this album because I couldn’t help myself and during the making of this list I’ve started listening to this album. It’s so good – particularly the first two songs. Show the World could fit easily on Bad and When I’m With You sounds like something Stevie would’ve played on a In Square Circle tour. If this album is too current day poppy for you (there’s certainly a current day hook to the songs) then pick up Private’s My Secret Lover from last year. The main guy from Private produced the first track from Show the World

1. The Monkees – Pool It!
I’m a sucker for 80s reunions of old bands. Well, I should say that I’m a fan of old bands who had to make it through the 80s and, in doing so, picked up a couple of synthesizers and popped up their sound for a record or two. I love it. The Moody Blues are a great example of this (Your Wildest Dreams may be one of my favorite 80s songs). I remember when this reunion happened because I was watching all the reruns of The Monkees on MTV but I just don’t really remember any of the singles. I can’t wait to jump in to this pool!

I’ve always thought that rhythm games were meant to teach you something about whatever subject the game is based in. In DDR, you learn foot placement memorization and rhythm which is key to dance. In Guitar Hero, you learn how a string on a guitar works. In Rock Band, you actually learn how to play a basic drum set.

I guess I should explain the game before I tell you why I don’t care about it. The game takes any song that you give it and creates a track for your spaceship to fly on. On each track, there are squares that show up based on whatever is the loudest part of the song and those are the game pieces. Depending on which mode you play, the pieces will have different colors and below your spaceship, there is a Klax-like area that fills up with the pieces that you fly into. You have to match the colors to make them disappear and I’ll let you guess what the magic number of pieces needed to complete a set is.

In addition to the placement of the pieces, the actual track itself is created to fit the rhythm and that’s where this game really shines. As you are playing a song, the BPM of the song can make the track go up or down and, thanks to the awesome game engine, it actually corresponds with how the song wants you to feel. For instance, when a song is building up to a climax – maybe the drums are slowly getting louder, or they keep adding instruments until the singer explodes on the track and you can’t control your body – the game’s track is structured like a roller coaster. You keep going up and up the track and when that singer explodes, it’s all downhill from there.

That’s what makes the game so great. Audiosurf allows you to listen to your favorite song like it’s the first time you’ve ever heard it, but with that intense feeling of knowing exactly when it’s going to move your soul. You’ve heard the song a million times so you know everything about it, but it all feels new again. If this game teaches you anything, it teaches you how to listen to your music. The fact that a song doesn’t end when you make a mistake proves that the game knows it’s purpose.

That’s why I don’t really care about the game aspect. I had some fun playing with it but I was more interested in the "Freeride" mode which just lets you ride on the track without worrying about points. I usually have the hardest time explaining to people what makes a song move me so much. Now, whenever I’m having a hard time again, I’ll just forward them a video of me playing the song in Audiosurf.

When I was a kid I was obsessed with the uncontrolled falling of ball-like things. Plinko? Check. Pinball? Check. Pachinko? Check. Okay, maybe I didn’t need to say ‘ball-like’ but the chips in Plinko weren’t balls. And don’t get me started on how I knew about Pachinko living in America as a child. Okay, get me started. My mom owned a Pachinko machine and I have no idea where she got it. Was she part of some sort of underground Japanese Yakuza based in Parma, OH? I’ll have to ask her. It’s not important enough to ask now so you’ll probably never know if she was in a Japanese gang.*

Somewhere along the line, I stopped caring about such things. I don’t know if it was the Atari we had or the He-Man figures I was temporarily allowed to own and play with. Maybe you can blame it on the hardening of my heart and the decimation of my emotions and sensitivity (tell that to my iTunes playing Nick Drake right now). Who cares? That’s all changed! The PC game Peggle, developed by PopCap Games, has renewed my love of falling balls.**

In Peggle, you are tasked with the elimination of orange pegs from a playing field mostly covered with blue pegs. There are a number of characters (all animals) who, for some reason or another, HATE orange pegs. To accomplish this, you are given a cannon that can shoot shiny balls that will eliminate the pegs (both blue and orange) upon touching them. When one of the balls hits a peg, the physics of the game will bounce the ball around the field much like a pachinko ball. The catch is, you are only given a certain amount of balls with which to accomplish your task. You can get extra balls by getting a certain amount of points with one ball or by catching your ball in a bucket that swings back and forth at the bottom of the playing field. Each character that you play with gives you a special power that can be activated by eliminating the scarce green pegs that are scattered around each level. The powers include a bigger bucket, an arrow that shows you where your ball will bounce to when you shoot it, multi-balls, and so on. It’s a much more advanced version of pachinko that you just couldn’t possibly have without a talking animal at your side.

There’s something about this game that satisfies my heart’s hunger. When the ball shoots out of the cannon and it bounce around the field like some bouncy ball in a closet it entertains me to no end. When the points build up with every bounce and that extra ball sound rings I feel like I’ve just conquered Europe and put my hand in my military vest. When the ball accidentally falls into the bucket and I get it back I thrust my arm into the air, usually pulling the mouse from the USB port. It satisfies on every level and not many casual games do that for me. Its hypnotic gameplay is only further expanded with a soundtrack that includes a reworking of the sample used for A Tribe Called Quest’s "Electric Relaxation."

ATCQ and falling balls? Can it get any better? Yes. I forgot to mention a swedish unicorn named Bjorn. It just got better.

*unless a Yakuza video game based on my mother’s life comes out and I care enough to review it
**HAHA BALLS FALLING – GET IT?

There’s a new guy on the scene in the world of video games. His name is Mario and he’s a plumber, if you can believe it. He’s starring in a new game for Nintendo Wii called Super Mario Galaxy. This mustachioed, short, pudgy fellow is jumping from planet to planet and galaxy to galaxy in order to save the princess of Mushroom Kingdom. Along the way he’s got plenty of friends to help him including hungry stars, adventurous mushroom people and a brother who’s always getting trapped – emotionally – by his own fears and – literally – by glass domes. It’s a very big world and gamers will have plenty of hours spent exploring every nook and cranny.

Before I get into what makes this game so great, I should probably explain a little bit about the story of Mario. While doing some extraordinary plumbing, Mario gets sucked down a pipe into a magical kingdom ruled by Princess Peach and continuously terrorized by an evil, fire-breathing turtle named Bowser. The princess is kidnapped by the evil terrorist and Mario is off to save her. Walking mushrooms, hammer-throwing turtles and fireball-spitting plants are just some of the enemies he encounters on his quest. His brother, Luigi, is also part of the family-trade and plays a role in Mario’s adventure. He can jump a little bit higher than Mario but he has a hard time controlling his jumps. It’s a fun little universe and Nintendo has put in a lot of work to make sure it’s memorable.

Super Mario Galaxy is a platformer in the truest sense. What that means is the main action in the game is devoted to trying to get to the next part of a level by dodging enemies and taking death-defying leaps to a series of higher or lower pieces of land, or "platforms." Mario has plenty of moves to help him like wall-jumps, backflips and specialty items that turn him into things like bees (so he can fly) and human springs (so he can jump higher). These jumps are accomplished by pressing the "A" button on the Wii Remote (It’s the big button in the middle of the remote that says "A"). The player can also make him do a spin move that will hurt enemies and help him jump higher by shaking the remote.

All movement is done with the Nunchuck accessory. By hooking up the Nunchuck to the Wii Remote, players will be able to move Mario in any direction they choose by moving the joystick accordingly. For instance, if they want Mario to run forward, they can press "up" on the joystick. If they don’t want him to move anywhere, they can just let go of the joystick and Mario will stay put. It’s a very intuitive system and kudos to Nintendo for creating such an interactive experience.

Okay, now let’s get back to what makes this game so great. When I first got home from purchasing the game at Circuit City (for more on how to do that, see my "Video Games Purchasing Tutorial" posted on GameFAQs.com), I opened up the video game case, stuck in the DVD and I was ready to play. Nintendo allows you to do this by including a special DVD player in every Wii system. The DVD player spins the DVD and a laser reads the data from the disc, sort of like a futuristic record player (remember those???). The data is then interpreted by the Wii and the game is transmitted to your TV through the RCA cables also included (pro tip: HDTV owners can purchase a separate cable that allows them to view the game content in High-Definition, or Hi-Def as Dante Terrell Smith calls it).

In addition to being able to play the game, Nintendo has also implemented a feature that allows the disc to be ejected so that other games can be played. It’s just one of the many genius ideas in Super Mario Galaxy that really sets Nintendo apart from other software developers. I’m so impressed by the Wii and Super Mario Galaxy that it would be hard for me to recommend any other video game system or game. I give this game a 7 out of 7 on the amazing scale and you have my word that I am giving you my word.

Okay, seriously, do I really need to give you another glowing review of Super Mario Galaxy? It’s the game of the year and I’m talking about 2008. Just buy it already.

You’ve played Guitar Hero I & II. You are a big fan. You love that they haven’t really changed the formula. You are hoping they have done the same with the third installment. You are disappointed. You are me talking to yourself in a mirror.

Don’t get yourself wrong. You think Guitar Hero III is great and kudos to Neversoft for not messing with the fundamental gameplay. The notes still fall down. You still play with a plastic guitar. You still get to play classic rock songs that you know and love. You can still play against your friends in head-to-head matches. It’s all there, except, that it isn’t. You can’t quite put your finger on it, but you know something has changed. You think it may be the fact that they’ve amped up the difficulty. You’re not sure if it’s in the songs that they’ve chosen this time around or if they’ve made the notes fall faster. You’re just not sure.

You love that the hammer-ons and pull-offs seem easier to, well, pull off. You love that they’ve highlighted the notes that can be connected in a hammer-on or pull-off by a brightened icon. You feel like a guitar god when you pull one of them off and you hit a string of 15 notes without actually flipping the paddle. Still, you feel as if in going for realism, and by not making all of the close notes connectible (and more like how a real guitarist would pluck the strings), that they’ve lost the "game" part of the game. You know, like when you play NBA Jams and you fly through the air to pull off that slam dunk from half court? Or maybe you don’t. Maybe you haven’t played NBA Jams since the Sega Genesis was in full force. You haven’t.

You love the new battle mode, but you hate, hate, HATE that you have to play in the solo career. You like that it adds to that "game" element that you were just talking about but you hate that it’s a requirement to finishing the game, rather than just a fun new way to play with your friends when you get bored of just playing the songs. And while you’re on the subject, you also hate that you have to play through Co-Op Career in order to unlock certain songs. You had to use a cheat code to unlock those songs because you don’t have any friends that also own Guitar Hero to play with.

You love the new online mode and you have nothing bad to say about it except that you can’t seem to connect with people and play unless you create your own game.

You like the song selection, but you also feel as if they missed the mark a little bit. You love playing Cult of Personality and Reptilia but you hate playing Slipknot. You understand that everyone has different tastes but you also remember that there are so many classic rock songs where guitarists wanked off on their axes enough to make challenging-enough songs for Guitar Hero. You hate using the word "axe." You really wish they put another Thin Lizzy song on the playlist. You also thought playing Sabotage would be more fun than it actually is.

In looking back at the entire package, you start to think about why you liked Guitar Hero in the first place. You remembered that you really loved the thrill of "becoming" each individual artist as you tore through a new song. You really felt like Brian May and Phil Lynott (when you played the bass part). Part of that came from the realism of the game. Each fake note or chord that you tapped on your fake guitar actually felt like the real notes and chords on a real guitar. The best part about it was that even though the songs were hard, you still felt as if you could get better and that over time you would be able to master each song and be able to last until the end and get that satisfying "You Rock" from the programmers of the game. But, this time around, you actually start to question your skills as a player. You wonder if in hoping for more of a challenge you actually lost sight of why you liked the original games.

Then, you forget all of that, leave the bathroom and get back to playing because you’re addicted and you don’t care if it’s not as good as the first two. It’s good enough.

I have a weird obsession with rhythm games. I’ve even betrayed my next-gen video game consoles by threatening to become completely guitar-rock game-centric. They’ve since convinced me that I would feel very lonely without them but my passion remains (as does my weird talking relationship with my consoles).

I’ve decided to talk about a few of the more experimental music games because everyone knows about Guitar Hero (and it’s soul-saving capabilities) and if you’ve never heard about Dance Dance Revolution then you probably just figured out how the wheel works. The games in this review are all available for the Nintendo DS, the most innovative handheld video game system since Simon. If you’ve never heard of Simon, then you probably don’t even know what a wheel is.

Electroplankton is a random yet, perfectly controlled, video game music maker and that’s the easiest way to describe it. Its creator, Toshio Iwai, is some crazy genius. He’s created musical art installations (one called Piano – As Image Media in which audience members control a grand piano by using a trackball to "write" lighted dots projected onto a sheet of fabric that lead to the keys of the piano), TV shows (UgoUgoLhuga is a show from the 90s that had kids sending in drawings of sumo wrestlers that Iwai scanned in – audiences would then call in for their pick and the louder they screamed, the stronger their sumo drawing became), music machines (Tenori-On is a sixteen-by-sixteen grid of illuminated LED switches which can be activated in a variety of ways to create a changing musical soundscape) and various other video games. If that doesn’t give you an idea of the creativity involved in Electroplankton, then you need to get into the accounting field.

In Electroplankton, players interact with different types of "plankton" and create music through one of ten different playing methods. For instance, the Tracy plankton makes music moving along lines that you’ve drawn with the stylus. If you draw a line from left to right, the sound will start in the left speaker and end in the right. If you draw from top to bottom, the pitch will go down as the Tracy follows it. The plankton will move at the speed that your line is drawn. When the plankton gets to the end of the line, it will start over and continue looping until you stop the process. There are 6 different Tracies that work at the same time so this leads to a lot of musical possibilities.

The other plankton all use different methods to create music or sounds. Rec-Rec is basically a 4-track looper that records through the microphone. Volvoice records your voice and then plays back the sound in different ways based on its shape. Beatnes let’s you reconfigure original Nintendo theme music. There’s plenty here to keep you digital music freaks busy. It’s also a great way to get your hipster friends to play with your DS.

Daigasso! Band Brothers is the next game in my list of three experimental music games. I’m kind of cheating on this one because there’s nothing experimental about the music you play or the way you play it. It’s basically your average notes-come-down-the-line rhythm game (although the notes stay in place as a line moves over them in this one). What makes this one so special is the difficulty it throws at you about halfway through the songs. It’s not that you have to have musical experience to be able to master this game. No, you have to have octopus fingers.

The notes in this game aren’t signified by arrows or gems but by icons that correspond with the DS buttons. In the Beginner Mode there are only 3 icons. A D-pad icon, a face button icon and a touch screen icon. The D-pad icon allows you to hit any direction to make the note. The face button icon allows you to hit any face button (A,B,X, or Y) to hit the note and the touch screen icon requires you to touch the screen to make the music happen. In Amateur Mode, things kick up a notch. You no longer get generic icons. You’re now forced to hit Up, A, Down, X, etc. in order to make the music happen. Pro Mode is where your butt gets musically kicked. Not only do you have to hit all of the buttons to make music but sometimes you have to hold L or R in order to turn your notes sharp or raise the note one octave. You also have combinations of notes. For instance, you might have to hit Up for one note, A to complete the chord, L to make it sharp and R to raise it an octave. All of this happens regardless of the speed of the song and your fingers have to twist around each other, all while being able to hold the system in your hands.

What makes this game innovative is that it basically turns your DS into an instrument. If you get a note wrong, it doesn’t just miss it, you actually play the wrong note, something Guitar Hero lacks. Also, each song can have up to 8 instruments that you have to play so there are plenty of reasons to keep coming back.

The best part of Daigasso! is its multiplayer mode. You can have up to 8 people playing at once, everyone using a different instrument. It’s an amazing little piece of software and unfortunately it looks like it’s staying in Japan so you’ll have to import it.

Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan also falls under that non-experimental music banner but the way this game is played (and its story) is an interesting take on the music genre. Instead of icons falling from the screen, or a line moving across notes, you have numbered circles that must be hit in time to the beat and in sequential order. You also have circles with tracks extending from them. A rolling ball moves from one side of the track to the other and you have to follow it with your stylus. Lastly, you have a spinner that you have to rotate in time to the song to fill a gauge to a certain level. It sounds complicated and when you first start playing it’s hard to tell how the movements correlate with the rhythm of the song. After you get the hang of it though, you really start to enjoy its process and are impressed by its originality.

The fun part of the game is its storyline. You are part of a team of male cheerleaders who are posed with the challenge of cheering up people with music so that they can accomplish their goals. One person is having trouble studying for a big exam. One person has lost the inspiration to make pottery. There’s even a love story you have to work through. These people cry out for help and Ouendan shows up to scream out crazy words (Japanese) to lift these spirits. It’s very funny, mostly in that, "Hey, aren’t other cultures weird?" way but also because its fits the tone of the music perfectly. There are some other music games with stories, but some are so ridiculous it hurts to even wonder why they tried to add one (I’m looking at you Donkey Konga).