For her entire life, the Vault Dweller had slept on a small cot in a small room of the dilapidated fallout shelter of Vault 101. She lived under the totalitarian rule of the Overseer and saw him clash with her idealist father, James. One morning, after 17 years of dull, tranquil life, she awoke to the news that her father had broken the one rule of Vault 101: no one ever leaves.

Deemed a menace to the peace of the vault, she escaped into a world more horrifying than she could ever imagine, the Capitol Wasteland. With a post-nuclear holocaust Washington, D.C., ahead of her, she set out to find her father and discover the purpose of his actions and the part she’ll play in his attempt to save the world.

The Capitol Wasteland is an eerily familiar place. The U.S. Capitol, the Lincoln Memorial, even the National Archives are recreated as rundown husks of their former glory. Filled with giant scorpions, violent mutants and anarchic Mad Max-look-alike Raiders, these former bastions of America’s success are overrun with all manner of evil.

The only way to stop evil, in the world of Fallout 3, is with all manner of grungy, do-it-yourself weapons. Average weapons like assault rifles, pistols and the occasional missile launcher exist (as well as science fiction staples like mini-nukes and laser weapons), but the real shining stars of the Fallout series are the homemade variety. Freddie Kruger gloves made from the hands of velociraptor-like reptiles, the Rock-It Launcher that relies on empty soda cans and cigarette cartons as ammo, and my personal favorite, the Railway Rifle, a steam-powered gun that fires railway spikes as bullets (with an obligatory toot of a train whistle after each shot) are just a few examples.

Fallout’s story revolves around the exploits of James, the vault exile. James seeks a way to honor his wife’s memory by devising a way to purify the irradiated waters of the Potomac River’s tidal basin. The player’s job is to assist James and later, ensure the remnants of the national government, the Enclave, doesn’t destroy everything her father has worked for.

But the main quest only takes around eight to ten hours to finish. The real bulk of the game takes place in one of the many secondary quests. Exploring the entire world of Fallout 3 can take anywhere over 40 hours to complete. Little gems lurk around every corner, like small settlements of people who have developed a rather bloody appetite for other survivors or even an apocalyptic Pinocchio, an android who wants to be a man.

Fallout 3 shows that great games don’t need to be over-the-top bloodbaths (although the game doesn’t pull its punches when it comes to shootouts) or be about a plumber looking for a princess. It shows that while a nuclear holocaust spells disaster for most people, it can also be a lot of fun.

Crouched behind minimal cover, hordes of vicious, scaly-skinned enemies bearing down and down to my last clip, I did what anyone with a chainsaw-bayonet-equipped machine gun would do; make ‘em work for it.

Gears of War 2 slams itself into gamer psyches this holiday season with a new game that once again defines cooperative gaming experiences. Just as main character Marcus Fenix is never without his hetero life-mate Dominic Santiago, never should a gamer be without a trustworthy second controller.

The game once again revolves around the actions of Delta Squad. With the Locust Horde on the offensive, Marcus, Dom, Baird and Cole are once again thrust onto the front lines. The story incorporates mainstays of the science fiction realm: giant worms, mysterious superhuman enemies and big guns. It also adds some much-needed humanizing through Dom’s search for his wife, Maria, and hints of Marcus’ strained relationship with his military-hero father.

However, the final act seems rushed. The hulking, demonic boss turns into a painfully easy gunfight and short vehicle chase. While the story may use the best of science fiction staples, it falls prey to the clichés, as well. Why oh why did the Locust Queen have to be a voluptuous Maxim model look-alike?

Teamwork serves a major purpose; enemies will attempt flanking positions and can only be taken down by unloading half a dozen bullets into their surprisingly resilient bodies. With a friend, the enemies fall like dominos. Without, players are often left wondering where their computer-controlled support went.

If playing with one other person is exhilarating, then playing with seven other people is heavenly. The multiplayer deathmatch returns with several variants that spice up the action. The most notable are “Submission,” a type of capture-the-flag where the flag shoots back and “Wingman,” where small two-man teams vie for dominance. Nothing says teamwork like a coordinated curb stomp.

The shining gem for multiplayer is now “Horde” mode, where teams of five face ever increasingly powerful waves of enemies. With 50 waves, it’s easy to lose an hour fighting and fortifying your position against the Locust threat.

Gears may seem like it wants to be taken seriously, but don’t let it fool you. It’s all about the ride. It may have it’s missteps, but it takes them all in stride and gives one of the best gaming experiences of this year.

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Everyone needs some love, and much like the world’s oldest profession, it’s available in every price range. And due to dozens of new releases this holiday season, many titles get pushed off the shelf to make room. These hidden gems lie on the mythical “clearance rack,” and games sit, waiting to be plucked, like juicy apples.

The first forbidden fruit is John Woo’s Stranglehold for Xbox 360. Mr. Woo’s first foray into video games continues the story of detective Inspector Tequila from John Woo’s Hardboiled, because if there’s one thing John Woo likes more than his own name, it’s gun-toting, nigh-indestructible cops.

Tequila’s path of vengeance takes him through Hong Kong, Chicago and paths of hundreds of identical enemy goons. The story exists to give a reason to the mass amounts of collateral damage and bloodshed that ensues from Tequila’s brand of justice. Everything can be destroyed in a furious spray of bullets, from the wooden tables the bad guys use as cover to the dinosaur skeletons in the Chicago Natural History museum.

Chow Yung Fat reprises his role as Tequila and lends his face and voice, adding serious weight to the otherwise action-flick dialog. Something about seeing Li Mu Bai from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon sliding across tables, bars and riding food carts in glorious slow motion is extremely satisfying.

While the game didn’t get Gears of War huge, it is a largely enjoyable way to kill a few hours on a slow afternoon and is definitely worth the $20 fee.

The old saying “never judge a book by its cover” holds doubly true for games like Zack and Wiki: Quest for Barbados’ Treasure for Wii.

Sporting a golden, flying monkey on the cover and a main character with hair large enough to house a flock of songbirds, Zak and Wiki: Regrettably Convoluted Title looks like a game better suited for diapers than diplomas. However, the game requires serious smarts to play, especially the “I-can-solve-a-Rubik’s-Cube-in-ten-minutes” variety of smarts.

Zack and Wiki lulls the player into a false sense of security early on, with puzzles no more difficult than “pick up the saw” and “cut down the tree.” But once past the first boss stage, the developers decided to punish anyone who picks up the controller. Where the in-game hints actually helped, they soon digressed into a form of mockery not seen since grade school. Imagine a bully chanting “loser” over and over while his victim lies face down in mud.

“Remember that bats are wild animals,” chirped the adorable hint-giving rabbit pirate. Apparently that “hint” explains that because bats are wild animals, they should be afraid of fire. By bringing a torch into the cave, they might be startled and fly near enough to be transformed by a magical, ringing bell into umbrellas. These umbrellas would then be used to float gently down the cliff to the next level. I cannot stress enough that everything in this paragraph is absolutely true.

Steep learning curve aside, Zack and Wiki is an addictively fun game. With a fun story that includes pirate children, mechanical monkeys and possessed treasure, it hugs the line of difficult and fun. Except for that $@#&ing hint bunny.

Hundreds of years ago, heroes roamed the land. They hunted evil throughout Albion for the betterment of their fellow citizens. But something changed. After the famous Hero of Oakvale destroyed Jack of Blades, his brethren grew lazy and cared more for food and drink than for swords and magic. Angry that their heroes no longer protected them, the citizens rose up and destroyed them and their Hall.

It’s now been 500 years since the time of heroes, but the bloodline still remains. Tasked with avenging a wrongful death, a new hero, Sparrow, rises up to claim the attention of Albion and the mantle of Hero.

Fable II is a quaint, renaissance-style world overcome with danger and roving bandits. Sparrow’s rise from peasant to legend is laced with needs. Each mission bestows renown, and with greater renown, comes greater influence and additional missions.

Most missions fit into the overarching story of vengeance, but the ones that don’t really shine. Ranging from destroying a zombie invasion unleashed by hapless brothers or helping a closeted son come out to his traditional father; every side quest is a blast and helps slow down the otherwise lightning-quick story. The actual story only takes about eight to 10 hours to grind through, far shorter than your typical role-playing game. However, add in the additional quests, various side jobs and even a possible career in real estate, and it ends around the 17 to 20 hour mark.

While the game may not last that long, it certainly leaves an impression. Every mission allows you to change the world, for better or worse. The morality system from Fable returns with an additional boost: an additional bar representing how pure or corrupt you are. Changes in either slider will change Sparrow’s appearance. A morally chaste character will glow with an otherworldly light (complete with halo) and corrupted, evil characters resemble a recently deceased corpse with demonic horns.

The supporting characters are other Heroes recruited to the cause. They too have their own philosophies and reasons for joining. In a heart-breaking sequence of events, the resident do-gooder monk and Hero of Strength, Hammer, watches as her own father is brutally murdered. Cradling his body in her arms, she denounces her faith and its tenants of pacifism and sets out to restore her belief in hope.

Fable II rests heavily on the laurels of past pieces of fantasy works but creates a fully encompassing realm that can be changed. But whether the needs of the few or the needs of the many will be fulfilled is entirely in the hands of a Hero named Sparrow.

Grade: A

Isaac didn’t ask for anything to go wrong. He didn’t ask to be stranded on the USG Ishimura with no power and failing life support. And he certainly didn’t ask for an alien presence to reanimate the recently dead corpses of the crew. Now, the engineer who volunteered for the mission to see his now-missing ex-wife must play soldier and find a way to escape the hell he now finds himself in.

Dead Space sets the bar for video game horror. From the darkened, claustrophobic hallways to the limited inventory, every genre cliché is present but integrated in a realistic way. In a future where humans strain to survive on limited resources, the Ishimura is designed with little wasted space and less wasted energy. The inventory system is, in truth, a holographic projector on the chest of Isaac’s suit. He even moves his head to focus on the selected item; he is after all the one accessing the system.

Between the suit and the stark but infrequent bulbs, Dead Space makes use of every bit of the Xbox 360′s computing power. Every light source in the game is dynamic. This means that shadows are rendered in real time. Sitting in a dim room, watching a monster crawl and lurch down a hallway bathed with high-definition, realistic shadows, not succumbing to headshots, is enough to make a little pee come out.

That’s right. These zombies cannot be taken down with headshots. Whatever the reason for their re-entrance into the land of the living, the corpses can only be destroyed by removing their limbs. Take away a leg, they fall down and keep coming, albeit now at a disturbingly slow crawl. Only by removing three or more limbs (the alien virus enjoys mucking around with human genetics) can they be taken down for good.

The game breaks down into 12 chapters, each one revolving around some item necessary to Isaac fixing and escaping the ship. While each mission is more or less a fetch quest, it never feels contrite. Isaac is an engineer; his job revolves around collecting materials and solving problems. Although, when forced to backtrack three decks to collect a kilogram of blasting gel even though his primary weapon is a plasma cutter capable of launching super-heated ionized gases, why can’t a highly trained engineer just cut the makeshift barricade down? Oh, that’s right; there would be no reason to go to a different part of the ship. And it would cut down the story from a 10-hour do-it-yourself repair job to a paltry 3-hour walk to the ship escape pods.

Much like science fiction classics, Dead Space creates a world horrifyingly real. Drenched in subplots involving religious fanaticism, conspiracies and shady characters with shadier motives, the game makes the player unravel the plot in tidbits. Don’t play it, experience it.

Grade: B+

I didn’t want to like Saints Row 2. I convinced myself that it would be just a poor imitation of Grand Theft Auto. I brainwashed myself so much that I almost didn’t realize how much fun I was having. The GTA series may be considered the Steven Spielberg of video games, but Saints Row is the Michael Bay. It may not win any critical awards, but it’s a hell of a lot of fun.

Saints Row starts with you waking from your coma in jail, the victim of a bombing accident from the first game. You quickly escape from jail, helped by your new recruit Carlos, and discover the Third Street Saints, your gang, isn’t quite what it used to be. The Saints’ fall from grace is about to be eclipsed by its meteoric rise with you at the helm.

And what a dynamic leader you are. The game features an impressive character creator where you can customize everything from hairstyle, body weight or even the distance between your eyes. The city quaked with fear whenever my balding, 300-pound hoodlum with a Latina woman’s voice strapped on his gun for battle.

Battling gangs and playing side missions are the bread and butter of Saints Row 2. The newest feature to be included is co-op play. Every mission can be undertaken with a friend. With four gangs to topple and hundreds of side missions, you would be amazed how quickly the hours can slide by. Missions range from simple “storm the stronghold” to “spray sewage on properties to reduce property value.” Seriously.

In fact, one of the complaints about the game is one aimed at most sandbox games: sometimes, there just isn’t enough direction. I had logged in 10 hours and had only met with my gang three times. Also, for a game about reclaiming your position as the untouchable gang in the city, you’re pretty much a one-man army. The second mission places you inside a packed, highly publicized courtroom to rescue your second-in-command. You waltz in, plug every officer and bystander, grab your friend and waltz out. After the mission, there’s no sense of laying low. The suspension of disbelief is set pretty low at this point; so later in the game you have no qualms believing it’s pretty easy (and safe!) to get your hands on toxic waste.

Saints Row 2 is for gamers who like their characters outlandish, their violence over the top and their dialog filled with f-bombs. If you want a serious, dramatic look into the life of organized crime and gang warfare, look somewhere else. But, if you want to have fun and play one of the best games on the 360 right now, then look no further than Saints Row 2.

Grade: B

Your name is Starkiller. As Darth Vader’s secret assassin, your mission is to destroy anything that stands in the way of his Empire. Set between Star Wars: Episodes III and IV, the game fleshes out the story of how exactly the Rebellion began and the role Vader played in shaping the universe. Your path of discovery takes you to five brand-new locations in the Star Wars universe full of brand-new species to terrify and crush beneath your boots.

And crush you will, eliminating hapless victims with primeval force powers. Lightsaber in hand, you can lift, throw, crush, electrocute and otherwise dominate stormtroopers, Wookiees and Jawas alike. Your ability to channel the Force into hurricane-level winds and Delorean-powering lightning bolts is easy and fun; each move is regulated to a single button on the Xbox 360 and one (sometimes) simple waggle on the Nintendo Wiimote. As you progress in the game, any move can be charged up for additional damage and awe-inducing graphical effects.

Interestingly enough, the 360′s processors are put to the test and several times the game slowed considerably when there where multiple enemies on-screen. While the Nintendo Wii didn’t have this problem (not hard considering LucasArts ported the Playstation 2 version over), swinging the Wiimote to simulate a lightsaber seems like fun until you actually do it. With no 1-to-1 ratio of motion detection, the “intense lightsaber combat” described by the various ads devolves into wrist-numbing waggling sessions. Every boss battle on the Wii can be fought in the same way; hang back and electrocute the living hell out of ‘em.

Story-wise, the two games are as similar as reading Moby Dick and reading Moby Dick: The Pop-Up Edition. Whole sections of the story are left out in the Wii version, like how the droid companion PROXY (think C3P-0, but less effeminate) is designed to spend every spare moment thinking of ways to kill you. For the seemingly delicate Nintendo players, PROXY is just a walking, talking transmitter that Vader uses to talk with his apprentice. Also, where the 360 users get to literally pull a Imperial Star Destroyer out of the sky with the Force, Wii players get to watch a video of the ship falling to the planet surface while Starkiller looks constipated and grunts.

Really though, these faults are few and far between. The game plays well, and you feel every weight stone, crate and body you toss around the levels. While the story is a bit hard to swallow at times, most Star Wars fans by now are used to taking what they can get. The game truly shines once you hit your rhythm and get used to flinging enemies, electrocuting droids and slicing Jedi.

So give into your dark side and give Star Wars: The Force Unleashed a try. You will definitely not have a bad feeling about this.

I think the best thing about the French language is the false cognates. Anyone who has taken a language course knows about these guys – they’re the words that we English speakers have stolen from other languages, perverted the meaning of and use on a regular basis.

Even better than false cognates are the words I assume are false cognates. Take the phrase “le petit commis.” When said out loud, it sounds like “Petite Commies,” and all I can think of is a tiny Karl Marx or Joseph Stalin that I can put in my pocket and carry around with me. Just imagine the little fistfights those two would get in. Little Marx would get fired up because Stalin warped his dream of the Communist state, and Tiny Stalin would be cranky because Little Marx ate the entire saltine cracker I left in their food dish.

It’s almost too much to imagine. I can only dream of coming home from a long day’s work and hearing the pitter-patter of their little feet as I put down my briefcase and sweep them up in my arms. Little Marx would give me a kiss on the cheek to welcome me home, and his beard would tickle my skin. I would laugh and toss him in the air and he would giggle and yell, “Higher! Higher!” But I would put him down because Tiny Stalin would look grumpy. He hates when I play favorites.

“What’s the matter, T.S.?” I would ask. He would act standoffish until I give him my crazy eyes and say, “I’m gonna getcha! I’m gonna getcha!” He would run off and I would give chase, letting him just barely slip out of my fingers whenever I got near until, finally, I would seize him and tickle the little guy until his voice grew hoarse from the merriment.

Then we would all lie on our backs and watch the ceiling fan until their tiny heads would droop and fall asleep. I would carry them upstairs to their bassinets, tuck them in and hope that tomorrow the Johnsons’ dog wouldn’t be out when I take them for their morning walk. The last time that devil dog chased my darlings up a tree and Tiny Stalin cried and cried for hours because he didn’t want to be gobbled up.

But, looking at their little faces, I’d have a flash of insight and I would know what true love is. True love as only a person who owns diminutive versions of historic 20th-century figures can know. I’ll pat their little heads, kiss them on their foreheads and whisper little words of love and affection into their ears. Then I’ll turn off the light, take a last look at them and close the door, proud of the little men I’m raising and looking forward to tomorrow and the adventures it will bring to me and my “Lil’ Commies.”

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I have been a pizza delivery boy off and on for about four years now. Most of the time, I can say it’s a simple enough job. I get paid to drive around the city and eat free pizza. It’s perfect, except for one thing: Some people own dogs.

First off, dog owners act like a different breed all together. Dog owners are used to yelling at their pets, having cataclysmic barking fits occur whenever the doorbell rings and picking up poop in little plastic baggies. Also, the smaller the dog, the more dog-related stuff they buy. If you own a Great Dane, then your neighbors probably don’t even know it exists. But if you own a chihuahua or a dachshund, you might be in the running for owning the third-largest collection of chihuahua-themed knick-knacks in the continental United States.

Just the other night, I delivered a pizza to a nice family with a love of dachshunds. I could tell because of the personalized vanity plates reading “DACHSHUND” or even the sign reading, “This PAW-perty is protected by Weiner dog security system.” I rang the doorbell and was greeted by the smallest, yet bravest dog I have every seen. The owner popped up, grabbed him and opened the door with a little bit of wisdom: “Don’t worry, he’s more bark than bite.”

I don’t want to seem cynical, but I have yet to be afraid of any creature whose name contains the word “wiener.” If I was afraid of something so tiny and adorable, I doubt I would ever leave the house. Could you imagine if I were to see a cougar or even a fluffy kitten? I bet I would need to wear a diaper. But I digress.

On the exact polar opposite of these people are the dog owners who own giant, Kujo-looking mothers and insist that they’re harmless. Right. It could just be me, but whenever I glimpse a large, snarling, pony-sized beast, my bladder leaks a little. It’s always a huge dog that appears to desperately want to eat my face and a little wiry guy barely holding on to the behemoth’s collar and asking me if I like its glossy coat. Sure, buddy, the thing I’m focusing on isn’t the bared fangs or the frothing maw that might spell my doom. It’s the beautiful, lustrous coat.

Another thing I can’t stand about dogs is that they’re always sabotaging my tip. How many times can dog owners open a door and not expect their dog to attempt a run at unleashed freedom? The door opens, the dog bolts and I get an eyeful of scorn. Is it my fault that no one in the entire history of humanity is capable of using a foot to stop any kind of animal?

Anyway, no matter what I say, I still have to deal with it. I may be a cat person in a dog person’s job, but at least one hasn’t actually eaten me. Yet …

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When people talk about heroes and men of action, they say names like George Washington, Martin Luther King, Jr., Captain America and Chuck Norris. These are men who would, and in some cases did, sacrifice everything for the greater good.

We joke and say that they had “ice water in their veins,” “they could spit in the devil’s eye” or they had some serious “cajones.” If that’s true, and bravery is determined by the size of a man’s testicles, then I have found a man with the biggest balls of all: Stanislav Petrov.

You may ask, “Who is Stanislav Petrov? Why should I care?” You should care for one very special reason: Colonel Petrov is credited with preventing World War III and saving much of the earth from a nuclear holocaust.

On Sept. 23, 1983, during the height of the Cold War, Colonel Petrov was manning his satellite surveillance post near Moscow. The satellite detected a launch of one American nuclear missile. Petrov dismissed it. America wouldn’t send one missile to attack the Soviet Union. But then, another missile was launched. And another. And even two more. He had no way to verify if it was true. Land radar couldn’t pick up anything past the horizon, and by then, it would be too late.

He had two choices. One was to wait it out and hope that the missiles were “false positives” and didn’t exist. If he was wrong, then five nuclear-equipped missiles would demolish the Soviet state and he would be the man who allowed it to happen.

Two, he could launch a counterstrike, ensuring that America wouldn’t survive for a second volley. If he were wrong, the counterstrike would become a first strike and America and the U.S.S.R. would enter into a devastating nuclear war caused by him and a faulty satellite.

“Ballsy” doesn’t even begin to describe Petrov. The amount of testosterone needed to keep such massive testicles healthy must be indescribable. I can only imagine that once the threat of a nuclear holocaust was averted, Petrov then saved children from a burning orphanage while delivering triplets and drinking three gallons of vodka. This sounds like the kind of guy who would give the finger to a charging bull, kill it by crushing its head between his pecs and then bang its wife to teach all bulls a lesson.

I almost feel sad for the guy. Where else can he go but down? Even if he wins the Tour de France, Wimbledon and the Super Bowl, they’ll all pale in comparison to saving mankind from mutually-assured destruction-although, he does have the best laurels to rest on.

Imagine, he loses a game of badminton to a complete tool. Petrov can just smack him in the face with the fact that even though he lost, 20-4, and lives in his parent’s basement, he saved all of mankind from a complete nuclear-assisted extinction.

Then he’ll probably go bang the guy’s mom as punishment for raising an idiot.

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