Which got me thinking...back in the early 20th century, Blondie was a very different comic strip: Dagwood came from wealth, and spent the first part of the comic strip in that capacity.

Until the 1930s, that is. The strip's creator realized that his readership, many of whom were poor and destitute in the Great Depression, probably didn't want to read about this rich playboy's life. So, Dagwood was disowned by his parents when he married Blondie, and, like the rest of America, had to get himself a job and eak out a living.

Now, it's 70 years later, and many people are saying we're on the verge of another depression, and once again, Dagwood Bumstead has something that many Americans don't: Job security.

So maybe, just to shake things up and get him in line with the difficulties facing the strip's leadership, he should come in to work one Monday to find out he's been fired because of cut backs. Maybe he should have to find work, and worry about how he's going to support his family.

And maybe, if the strip can find humor in those situations, this whole crisis will seem a little less overwhelming.

Just a thought, really.

So, when faced with a game that's coming out for all three systems, is there a reason to go with the seemingly inferior Wii version? I mean besides, "I don't have a PS3 or 360."

Obviously, the answer's going to be different depending on which game you're talking about. Some of the games are more or less identical except for some tweaks to the controls to take advantage of the motion controls, while others are going to be vastly different experiences.

So, in this case, let's talk about Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. The game came out for just about everything, and as has been noted, the first thing anyone does when they grab the Wii Remote is pretend it's a lightsaber anyway, so the game's a natural pick for the Wii.

This, unfortunately, is one of the games where the technical difference is rather noticeable, both in regard to graphics, and the physics engine. The bigger consoles got the touted "Ronin" physics engine which, among other things, would allow the games to realistically model every shard of broken glass that you created. The Wii, quite simply, couldn't handle it, so has a more standard physics engine with preset reactions for broken items.

The Wii version also lacked some other aspects of its bigger brothers; for one, the protagonist's droid Proxy has a habit of attacking its master, including a big boss fight, in the PS3 and 360 versions, while this just doesn't show up in the Wii version. There's also a sequence in the other versions where Starkiller has to bring down a Star Destroyer that was turned into a cutscene for the Wii, but from all accounts that sequence was so badly programmed that the Wii players got the better end of the bargain.

So, for all these shortcomings, what does the Wii version have going for it? For starters, however it looks, it's still a fun game, with some good set pieces, and by mid game it definitely gives you the feeling of being a near unstoppable Jedi badass.

I also liked how the Force powers worked through the nunchuck's motion controls. There's a nice, visceral feeling of thrusting the controller forward to send enemies flying with a Force push that is absent when you're doing the same thing with a controller. Swinging the lightsaber was fun too, even if you do risk tennis-elbow and the detection's a little spotty.

And I for one don't mind the lack of the super-advanced physics engine, because frankly I wasn't going to be looking to see if every shard of glass fell in a realistic fashion. I'm more concerned with the fact that I can throw Stormtroopers at eachother and zap them with lightning. That's all I really asked for in any version of the game, and the Wii version delivers on that front.

For Christmas 1998, I had asked for the Nintendo 64...well, I'd asked for it the previous two years too, but I really wanted it that year because The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time had been released, and I had to have it. To make a long story short, I did, along with a couple other games, including Goldeneye 007, which I still maintain as one of the best FPS games ever.

So, once the presents were unwrapped and the debris cleaned up, I hooked the N64 to the big TV in the living room, because my own TV didn't have the right hook-ups. After plowing through the Deku Tree, our relatives started showing up, so I turned the game off, until someone suggested popping in Goldeneye.

Now, this was the time when Nintendo was still generous to give you two controllers with the console (unlike last year, where I had to try four GameStops and a Walmart to find a second Wiimote), so soon the family was watching my older brother and my cousin blasting at each other for most of the rest of the day.

By the next time my cousin was over, we'd gotten two more controllers, and from then on, whenever he came over for a holiday, be it Christmas, Easter, or even Mother's Day, we'd all pile into my room, crowd around the TV, and hurl explosives at each other (Complex with Proxy Mines FTW) until we're almost literally dragged from the room. We've tried extending the tradition to include other games, but nothing's stuck with us like good old 007.

It's been 10 years now, and the competition's only gotten more intense; I used to win just about everything hands down, but now, though I still usually win, it's a real battle to come out on top, with alliances between the four of us changing at least three times a round. Well, when we aren't belting out "I Feel Pretty" or "Somewhere Over The Rainbow," anyway.

Yes, alcohol is usually involved. Why do you ask?

We've warn through several controllers, and nearly broke the console itself more than a couple times, but a quick blow on the cartridge is usually enough to get it working. Last year, I got the four of us brand new controllers, with custom symbol decals, which are now our official weapons. We've got ten years of memories, and each new game usually brings with it something to add to the list of stories, which up to now includes such classics "When James Cursed Out The Caves Then Blew Himself Up," "When Mike Executed Anthony," and "That's Not A Proximity Mine, Is It? (Yes, it was)."

And tomorrow, of course, the carols my mom will be playing will be accompanied by the sounds of a small war, occasional swearing, and drunken singing. And it will be glorious.

So, what special traditions will you be observing tomorrow?

As the medium's evolved to the point it has now, there's been a push toward removing the linearity of gameplay in favor of giving the player more freedom in how they explore the world and unveil the story. But is there a point where there's too much freedom? And is there merit to a linear game?

In short, yes. Well, for me, anyway. I understand the reasoning behind the whole "wide open sandbox" thing; you want to make the player feel like his decisions really made a difference, and make them really feel like a part of the world. But at the same time, too much freedom can be suffocating: Confront the player with too many options, and they'll get lost.

Personally, I tend to prefer more linear games to wide open games. I like the feeling that I'm making definite progress, that I've "completed" the game when I've gotten that last upgrade, and I'm on the last level. When I try to play one of those wide open games, no matter which way I choose, I always seem to feel like I'm missing something by making the choices I did. Yes, I could replay it later and do things differently, but these games are usually so big that I don't want to slog through the whole thing just to see what happens when I pick Door #3 instead of #2.

Which, I suppose, partly explains why I tend more toward action games, which even now tend to be a race from one end of the arena to the other where you smack around whatever happens to get in your way. I have been trying to play more RPGs, though, and I'm liking how the eastern RPGs tend to mix the linearity of the main story with the freedom of side-quests. If I want to just get on with it, I can, and the bulk of the game's content is right in front of me. If I want to explore the world a bit, I'm free to do that too in nice fun-sized bites.

So where do you guys fall on the scale? Do you like to be given free reign to wander the game world, or do you just like following the story?

As I mentioned in a previous blog, I'm re-working my way through the Legacy of Kain series. Having just finished Soul Reaver 2 this weekend, I'm pondering whether to play through Blood Omen 2 (which is no doubt the black sheep of the family, but a part of the story nonetheless), or just skip ahead to Defiance.

On one hand, I started replaying them with the intention off going through the whole story in one elongated go. Blood Omen 2 may be detached from the main story with future Kain and Raziel, but it helps inform that one.

On the other hand, Blood Omen 2 is probably the weakest of the games as far as gameplay goes, and has more than its share of bad bugs. Defiance, by comparison, is polished and really fun.

At the moment, I'm leaning toward Blood Omen 2, if only so Defiance will seem that much better when I make my way to playing it. What do you guys think?

Half the Mega Man fans out there were excited that the Classic series was getting a new entry, while the other half scoffed at the fact the game wouldn't be a 3D entry, or even a 2D game with hi-res, next generation quality sprites. Instead, Capcom was making what's effectively its first NES game in over a decade.

There were cries of laziness, among other things, but the anger was tempered a bit by the fact the game would be available for only 10 bucks for a download. Over the months since its announcement, it became clear that Capcom wasn't just doing it because it was easier, but to really call back to the Blue Bomber's glory days, by including sprite flicker as an option, and commissioning so-bad-it's-good box art like in the old days.

So, being a big fan of the series, I downloaded the game the other day. It's charming in its old school presentation, and all it's missing is an option to blow on the cartridge. The game plays as well as the old game, though personally I wish they hadn't gotten rid of Mega Man's slide and charged shot, because without them the game is pretty darn hard.

I've only gotten through two levels since I got it (Like I said, it's not an easy game), but so far I've loved what I've seen. The level design is challenging without feeling cheap, and the music is catchy. If you've got ten bucks to spare, I'd definitely recommend picking it up, especially if you're like me and grew up with the old school platformers.

I find, though, that sometimes it's more fun to mix things up, even if I didn't do it deliberately. For example, when I first started reading Discworld, I wasn't reading them in any particular order, and in fact the first book I read was toward the later end. In just about all the books, characters will make reference to previous events, and at first I thought they were just throwaway gags, like a line about how the main city had been burned down several times in the past, sometimes by enemies, sometimes by defenders, and once for the insurance. The gag is great on its own, but it became even funnier when I went back and read the first book, in which it happens.

For the most part, though, I end up doing this more with games, especially since many of the series I've played started back when I was in diapers. The Final Fantasy series isn't all that strict on continuity since each installment is entirely self-contained, but it's fun to go back and find out what the later games were referring to, and where things I thought were modern day advances started.

It happened with the Jak & Daxter series as well. I got the third game in the series as a gift, played through it, and loved it, even if I wasn't sure exactly what was going on. When I went back and played the first two, I caught a lot of the foreshadowing I otherwise would have missed.

And most recently, as I mentioned in previous weeks, I've been replaying through the Legacy of Kain series. It was another series I came into late, but at the second installment of five, so I wasn't too late. Now that I'm replaying it after having tracked down the first game, things are popping out at me that I completely overlooked the first time around. One area, for example, has a gigantic skull face just sitting on the ground. When I first found it years ago, I just sort of chalked it up to the gloomy atmosphere, or I thought maybe there was some giants somewhere in the world. Now, though, I recognize it as a continuity nod, as the giant skull was a prominent feature of one of the first areas of the original game.

I generally try to get things in the right order when I play them, but when I find myself late to the party, I like looking back and seeing how things came to where they were.