Today is Veterans/Remembrance Day, so not sure if news will be slow. If you see any veterans today, be sure to stop them and thank them for their service. Thanks to the current troops as well. We're waiting for your safe return this holiday season!

However, after the three pitchers of sangria we just had, there's no telling how we'll feel in the morning ...

I really need to figure out why it is that each time we crack open a bottle of wine, it makes me sleepy beyond control. We had company last night, made dinner, and had some wine, and sure enough, snooze fest all around ... again!

As if Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3 and L.A. Noire weren't enough to keep gamers busy, tomorrow is the launch of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (check the link for our review).

I was looking forward to Rockstar's latest masterpiece (where's my Red Dead Redemption, damnit?!), so I let it download on Steam overnight (a whopping 12 GB) only to find that Norton detects the game's ypatcher.exe as a virus and automatically deletes it. This makes the game not start at all. Lovely!

I've been playing some Modern Warfare 3, and while it is fun, I can't shake the feeling that it's not that different from MW2. I've only played through the campaign so far, so maybe once I get through that, I'll be amazed by the multiplayer innovations. Maybe ...

What's going on? Celebrities are dropping like flies these days. CBS's 60 Minutes Andy Rooney died last week, boxing heavyweight champion Joe Frazier passed on Monday, and yesterday, rap icon Heavy D passed away at the age of 44. Heavy D's death came as quite a shock as he had just posted on his Twitter feed, "Smokin Joe Frazier, RIP."

Next weekend, we're going to an advance screening of The Muppets, for old times' sake and to see if Miss Piggy is as annoying as I remember. With cameos by Mila Kunis, Zach Galifianakis, Neil Patrick Harris, Jack Black, Emily Blunt and appearances by Jason Segel and Amy Adams, it can't be all bad, right ? And Dave Grohl?! :)

Today is the big day! Modern Warfare 3 comes out! I finished up Battlefield 3 a little while ago, and while the single-player campaign was a bit on the short side, the multiplayer portion (both online and co-op) is great fun, so it'll be interesting to see the MW3 experience in comparison. I'm watching my timer on Steam count down. Only 7 more hours to go!

Last night, we watched the latest episode of The Walking Dead and Terra Nova, both interesting developments, but definitely not the best of episodes.

Our month-long war in Stronghold Kingdoms has come to an end, so for now, we're repairing castles, gathering resources, getting fresh troops and farming faith points until the next conflict.

Not sure if we're going to go see any movies this weekend, as nothing really appeals at the moment. A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas sounds like fun, but I'm not sure I want to pay full price for it just yet, so we might wait a week or two. The same goes for  Tower Heist. However, J. Edgar and Immortals look interesting, but they aren't out yet. Oh well, DVR it is, I guess.

CBS's 60 Minutes Andy Rooney has died at the age of 92 from complications following minor surgery. Rooney was 60 Minutes' signature essayist since 1978 and made his final appearance on the weekly show only five weeks ago.

Wow, my internal clock is all messed up. I thought it was Saturday today. Talk about a rude awakening!

My fascination with Stronghold Kingdoms is wearing thin. After a month-long war with an opposing house, we're at a stalemate, with agreements are being broken and multi accounters ruining the fun. (Oddly enough, only the second or third account gets banned, not the main one, so whoever cheated can soldier on.) On top of that, several of our players don't seem to have the stomach to fight a prolonged war and are simply quitting the game. Can't blame them. Honestly, I'm thinking of doing the same because it simply sucks up too much time.

There's no denying that the holiday rush has kicked off, judging by the list of titles shipping to stores over the past couple of weeks. Lots of new games to check out, although there are equally as many "WTF?" titles in there. You know, those titles that make you think, "Who the hell came up with this game/idea?"

Adam got to see A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas last night, so keep an eye out for the review later this week.

Been making my way through the single-player portion of Battlefield 3, and while I enjoy it a lot, there also seems to be an equal amount of frustration. For starters, your squad AI seems to be either blind or use bent barrels. They miss enemies that are right in front of them, rendering them all but useless. The gameplay variety — tank battles, dogfighting, bombing runs — gives it a nice change of pace from the infantry-style battles.

Apart from meeting up with some friends for pub food and beers, we have no particular plans today, so errands and DVR watching it is!

Watched the newest episode of Sons Of Anarchy last night and must admit that there seems to be a lot more action going on than last season. Good stuff!

Back from the concert, and while my hearing isn't quite shot, it's definitely diminished. We ended up being a bit late due to traffic, but Thin Lizzy's "The Boys Are Back In Town" made it all worthwhile. Black Label Society was a bit of a jumbled mess, but Judas Priest was awesome. Two hours of highlights from the past 40 years. Jolly good show!

No specific plans for this weekend yet, no movies that are on our must-see list, so we'll probably catch up on some DVR and maybe play some Fallen Earth and Battlefield 3.

This week's Twitter giveaway is Bejeweled 3, so if you want a chance to get a redeem code, keep an eye on the WP Twitter feed.

Finally got around to playing some Battlefield 3. Graphically, it's quite impressive and runs smoothly. Jumped in a few multiplayer matches and got my ass handed to me right away, so obviously I have to run through the single-player to get familiar with the mechanics before I foolishly rush into online matches. The first impression is positive, although dealing with the web-based interface is a bit annoying.

Later on this afternoon, we're heading out to the Judas Priest concert, so anybody calling on Friday will have to speak up. I might be hearing-impaired for a day or so ... \m/

Tomorrow we get to duck out early because we need to head out to another concert. We usually don't do gigs during the week, but we made the Judas Priest farewell tour an exception to the rule. With opening acts Black Label Society and old-school rockers Thin Lizzy (once upon a time featuring my beloved Gary Moore), it starts earlier than usual, so we need to head out in the early evening. We even plan on making a pit stop on the way to have some BBQ.

Finally got my Battlefield 3 PC code, so I'll let that download overnight. Hope the servers will be a little more stable, so Tony can stop complaining about getting kicked all the time.

Until then, I'll be Breaking The Law, be on Painkillers, but always remember You've Got Another Thing Comin'.

Battlefield 3 is coming out today, so I guess it'll be a slow news day in many regions. As a PC gamer, I'm quite disappointed that I'm stuck with the Xbox 360 version, so hopefully some half-intelligent PR rep will pay attention to my request for a PC copy/redeem code (cough! ahem!).

In the meantime, I've been grinding through Fallen Earth and still enjoying it. Mainly slogging through PvE missions to rank up and increase my stats, but it's fun and a pretty huge world. I haven't even started to get into the crafting system yet ....

TV-wise, we're fighting a losing battle, we watch 2-3 episodes and by the time we're done, equally as many have been recorded. Over the past few days, we watched The Good Wife, NCIS, 2 Broke Girls, Fringe, Kitchen Nightmares, Blue Bloods, Terra Nova and Castle.

Paranormal Activity 3 was expected to do well, but it became the biggest horror opening of all time this weekend, grossing as much as all other movies in this weekend's top 10 combined. We've seen the first one and passed on the sequel, but from the sound of it, we'll have to catch up so we can check out the latest one. Quite surprising ...

Yesterday we went to Adam's place and watched Tucker and Dale vs. Evil. It was a good, over-the-top slasher, so it was rather gory, which of course made it funny at the same time. Adam's place has a mini theater in the complex, so reclining seats, Blu-ray, a big screen and surround sound made it extra fun!

Tomorrow we're going to go see Johnny English Reborn, and while it most likely will not be a box office topper, we're big Rowan Atkinson fans (Black Adder, not Mr. Bean) so it should be a good time. Speaking of Black Adder, it seems that after more than a decade since the last iteration (and almost 3 decades since its debut) there is a new installment in the works. Now THAT is a cunning plan!

What's up with those Batman: Arkham City issues? I can understand that something slips through the cracks, but no less than four snafu's in one package? That's just inexplicable and unforgiving. Good thing I'm waiting for the PC version later this month, maybe they'll have found their head, because it's sure isn't on top of their torso.

We are all caught up on Sons Of Anarchy, and tonight's episode recorded while we were watching the other two, so we got a triple dose. It's a good thing since most of the episodes ended with cliffhangers. This way, we didn't have to wait a week to see how it plays out.

Big shipping day yesterday, and I suspect this will be the case for the next month or two until the holiday rush is over. At least we'll have a few good games to play when this is all over.

On Friday, we'll be giving away Deus Ex: Human Revolution - The Missing Link DLC codes, so keep an eye out on our official Twitter feed if you haven't picked it up yet.

Now that GamersFirst has made Fallen Earth free to play, I decided to check it out, and I'm enjoying the experience. There have been some server issues (no doubt due to the player influx after going f2p), so that is annoying, but so far so good. Currently scouring the apocalyptic wasteland with my steed, but I hope to be able to craft some better vehicles soon.

TV season is in full swing, and the DVR is filling up fast, so we've been watching Fringe, The Sing-Off, Person Of Interest and Terra Nova. Running a few episodes behind on Sons Of Anarchy, but that will be remedied by tomorrow.

The season two opener of The Walking Dead was pretty good, and if you have not seen the episode yet, be prepared for your jaw to drop at the very end. Good stuff.

Saturday evening, we went to the Night Ranger/Foreigner/Journey concert, and it was an awesome time. While neither of the bands may be on the cutting edge of today's music, it was great to belt out the classics from a few decades ago. The place was packed with 22,000 rock fans, and most of them brought their kids to show them what the good old days sounded like.

As a sign that I'm getting older, I keep thinking, "Man, they don't make 'em like they used to," and that applies to both music and video games.

Our trip to the theater for Red Tails was a total letdown. The organizers had overbooked the place, and the turnout was huge. We arrived "only" an hour before it started, resulting in us being in the back of the line and sent home with a free movie ticket.

What's worse was that we wanted to see Contagion, but changed our mind at the last minute to pick Drive instead. That turned out to be a big mistake. There were two decent car chase scenes and some t&a, but the rest of the movie was a big snooze fest. (Drive scored 93% at Rotten Tomatoes. Did someone reverse the numbers?)

I should have known that the movie was going to be lame when the intro credits were in pink, cursive letters.

While our movie night may have been a bust, I just stumbled upon the Act of Valor trailer, and I'm so there!

Looking forward to Sunday's second season premiere of The Walking Dead, which is a series that I really enjoyed. Got to slog through a few more episodes of Terra Nova, and while it's decent, I'm hoping for it to pick up some steam.

Tonight we're going to a super advance premiere of Red Tails, a WWII movie about African American pilots in the Tuskegee training program. The movie's not due for release until 2012, but I guess they want some early feedback and do some extra editing/changes based on that. The few trailers have looked interesting, so we had planned on seeing it anyway.

Looking forward to the weekend already, not only because I might actually get to sleep a bit, but mostly because we are finally going to the Journey/Foreigner/Night Ranger concert. We got our tickets way back in March, and back then, the concert seemed so far away, but it's only a few days out now ...

In a few weeks, we're also going to the Judas Priest farewell concert. After many decades, they are finally calling it quits as a band, but I suspect that lead singer Rob Halford will carry on with one of his spinoff bands like Fight or Halford.

Oh, and we just got free tickets to watch Red Tails! It's going to be an awesome weekend!