Doolies, Steven, and I played through Halo 3 last year. This was Doolies's first First Person Shooter (FPS) game. FPS games show the world through the character's perspective as if you were looking through her eyes. You use one thumbstick to move the character, and the other thumbstick to aim your gun and shoot bad guys. It takes a bit of coordination and practice to play.

We ended up running through the game twice, first on the normal level and then on the hardest level. We played about one or so levels per night, and It took many nights to get through the game. For the most part, it quite enjoyable. There's a microphone attached to the joystick, so Doolies and I could speak to Steven and plan our next attack.

We played through the game cooperatively, that is, us against the computer. There is a story behind the game displayed through cut scenes (like little movies). It is not the game's strong point as it made little sense, and for the most part took away from the experience, particularly when it interrupted the game play. While Doolies and I like the occassional competitive game (although our competition sometimes gets vicious), Steven is a co-op-only guy. My favorite games are a combination of the two: a team of players (like the three of us) pitted against other teams of real players.

Steven was a careful, good player. He rarely died and kept the team alive on most occassions, while sitting back and picking off bad guys from a distance. Doolies and I didn't have the patience. We ran into the fray and tried to kill everyone, often dying in the process. Luckily, the game respawns the characters near living players, and we rinsed and repeated until all the bad guys died.

This became more problematic after we brought Ziggy home: we'd be in the middle of a very difficult part, and Ziggy would decide that he had spent enough time on the couch and jump off and run around barking. I would have no choice but to chase after him, while Doolies and Steven continued on the game, one man down. They somehow managed without me, and Ziggy eventually calmed down and returned to the couch to continue his job as my personal warmer.

We've been looking forward to playing another co-op game, but so far there hasn't been many interesting games available. I'm hoping that changes soon as I've been itching to play video games again.