I hope that this doesn’t sound douchey in any but here it goes. Meh, I actually hope that it sounds a little douchey anyway, but here it goes again. My most grateful game of 2011 is Gears of war 3. The game itself I found to be nothing nothing short of amazing and more so the massive changes that it brought into my life.

It all started out this fall where I was invited to attend a preview event for Gears of War 3. Like most events, you are places in this room with a very nice setup. You are being fed and given a pretty tv to play on. Most of the other journalists there were seasoned vets of this series and were helpful enough to get me into this multiplayer portion. That being said, this was my first time ever playing a Gears game and it was an instant attraction. I personally suck at first person shooters and playing this game gave me a feeling of accomplishment that I never got with other shooters. The way that you can strategically camp and run and gun really gave way to my play style.

At this time, I also did not have an Xbox, so when I received the review copy I could only do one thing and that was make a poor attempt at an unboxing video. After staring at the game for what felt like ages, I knew that it was time to start looking for a 360. I knew what I was getting into when I started shopping on craigslist for the system. FYI, if you try to buy one used, make sure that it works BOTH offline and online before you hand over the cash. After a few days, I was able to find a gently used system with a few games that happened to be about an hour away. So, I geared up and rode my motorcycle down to San Jose to meet with the seller.

After meeting the seller and having him test out the system for me, I was quite happy with it and agreed to make the purchase. What was really cool about this deal is that the seller hooked me up with about twenty games in addition to the three that were in the ad for free! So now I have the 360, the cables and all the games. Now, bear in mind that I do not have side bags on the bike so I had to get somewhat creative with my backpack. After I got it together, I had the system, the games, my laptop, and some clothes all in and on my bag in all of its 50lb glory.

Now, if you can imagine me driving down the highway with this huge pack strapped to my back. It was a little scary because balance is very crucial when flying between cars at high rates of speed.  It hurt a little too, now that I think about it, with all the weight that was pressing on my back.

So after driving completely around the bay, I was able to bring in the haul home. Here are the spoils:

There was some really great stuff in there along with some classics I have always wanted to try out like Jade Empire.  So now I have the 360, Gears of War 3, and quite a few more.

I love Gears, in fact, I loved it so much that I went out as soon as I was done with the campaign and picked up the previous two Gears games. I have now recently completed the trilogy and am very pleased with the story. The dramatic themes and twists all intertwined so perfectly for me that I was almost sad when I completed them.  Of course there is always the multiplayer which has given me hours of enjoyment and feeds my addictive personality by having all of those checklists for winning those Onyx Medals.

So the game I’m most grateful for happens to be an excellent one. But more so, this was the one game that pushed me to finally get a 360, carry it all on my back and now Gears has blew open the door to the world of 360.  Now all I need is a Kinect.