Curse You, Roundabouts! - My Adventures in Euro Truck Simulator 2

Onward to adventure!  Or at least to the chemical plant.

I'm very late to the party in playing Euro Truck Simulator 2. It's not as though I was unaware of the adulation being heaped on the game, or even that I wasn't curious about it. I was, but, for whatever reason, I just kept on procrastinating on giving it a shot. That's all changed now and like countless others have stated already, it's quite surprising how much this game can grow on a person. Never would I have thought I'd be having such a good time hauling nitrogen, furniture, and tractors across Europe. Yet here I am, blasting down the highway, slowing only because of the speed cameras, dead set on getting my load to its destination as fast as I can just so I can start the process all over again.

Review: Out of the Park 14 (PC)

The baseball season has started it playoff period, bringing a lot more eyes to the sport than it enjoys during a regular season that goes on for so long than non-fans could find it interminable.  This seems like a good time to spend some time with the latest iteration of the near-legendary sports sim Out of the Park Baseball 14.

For those who haven't played an OOTP game before, here is a quick rundown:  OOTP allows players to take the role of team owner, General Manager, and/or field manager of a professional baseball team (Major League, Minor League, current, historical).  The most important trait of the game is that players have near-total freedom to play the game as they choose.

Review: The Sims 3 University Life (PC)

That Steely Dan song proclaimed you could never go back to your old school, but the Sims have done just that in The Sims 3: University Life.

For the Sims 2, gamers could take their Sims to college. And now Sims 3 gamers can do the same, by sending off their Sims to school for a degree and experience college life, including the whole dorm experience, in a college campus addition to the Sims 3 realm.

Obviously the main focus is studying and earning one of six Sims degrees, but what would college life be without the social scene? University Life has that covered.

Review: The Sims 3 - Supernatural (PC)

Mystery, mystique and magical merriment have always been a part of the Sims gaming, a respite from the daily Sims routine in both the original Sims and Sims 2. Now, The Sims 3 has cast its own spooky spell with The Sims 3 Supernatural. In the town of Moonlight Falls, gamers get their chance to transform into their own supernatural citizen, from witches and wizards to werewolves, vampires and fairies.

Review: Out of the Park 13 (PC)

This is certainly not MLB The Show

Baseball simulations like Out of the Park Baseball 13 are perhaps the most anachronistic of all video games. In an era when the focus of most developers is on realistic graphics and physics, it is amazing a game can not only survive, but actually thrive, with no graphics or physics (to speak of). Instead, games like Out of the Park 13 and its competitors focus on being the most detailed, accurate simulation of all aspects of professional baseball. Out of the Park has changed a lot since I last played it (apparently OOTP 2012 was a major overhaul), but the core simulation engine remains the games focus and its strength.