Video Games I need more of: Bully!

After I acquired my first PS2 I did the standard "What games can I use this thing for?" research and came up with a nice little treasure trove of games that I wanted to purchase. Among them were obviously exclusives for the Sony consoles such as Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories and Vice City Stories, as well as another Rockstar hit, Bully. The concept of Bully was a bit weird for me, at first, but after I purchased the game and gave it a bit of a play through it really sprouted out and became a game that my mind wished there was more of.

In the game Bully you play as Jimmy Hopkins, a 15 year old with a bad attitude, which is a slight departure from the main protagonists Rockstar is putting into their GTA series. Jimmy is sent to Bullworth Academy, a boarding school, to help him adjust said attitude. While at Bullworth Jimmy makes friends and enemies along his (mis)adventures through both the school yard and the adjacent town.

Bully plays a bit like a GTA game, but has its own environmental feel and works really well, although I always felt the overall area was just too small, as I was more familiar with the land masses of GTA games by this point. Even so, the game played great and there were plenty of story missions, side missions and many other miscellaneous things to do to keep yourself busy and entertained for quite some time. But once everything was collected, all the missions were done and all that was left was driving up and down the streets on Jimmy's moped, there was an undying desire to see a sequel.

A few years ago I acquired a copy of Bully: Scholarship Edition for the Xbox 360, which added more things to do, as well as beefed up the graphics and made everything look far more presentable and likewise appealing. Sadly, I had bought a copy of the game that had a hairline crack in the disc. When combining the need for the disc to be spun to be read, as well as the heat the Xbox 360's DVD drives are known for, the crack quickly grew to the point it would no longer boot up.

Although I got a fairly good taste of what Scholarship Edition was about, I never got the full experience, which only made me want an additional, more modern version of Bully even more, and I'm NOT a modern console gamer! I'm not sure where Rockstar would go with another installment of Bully, but I'm sure I'm not alone in this feeling of wanting to experience more. With all the improvements they've made in the GTA series, I bet another Bully would be nothing less than amazing.

GTA V

Since the release of GTA IV everyone has been looking forward for GTA V. As events such as E3 come and go without so much a sneeze, cough, burp or even fart from Rockstar or Take Two about a new GTA, the rumor mills still spin wildly out of control. With rumors abound ranging from cast lists to release dates, only the developers and distributors know the truth behind any of them.

I'm a massive GTA fan, as I'm sure many of the people who play GTA are, because the game draws you in and holds you tight. With each installment we're treated to a bigger and better world, which only stands to reason as they've taken their time to get things right. With the absence of a Grand Theft Auto for anything other than the handheld consoles in over 3 years, the fans are getting restless. I don't count the DLC, even though released on disc as well, as a GTA release because they were simply adding on to the base of GTA IV.

Fans are in a hurry to see GTA V and rumors say they may be holding GTA V for the next generation consoles, whatever those may be. At first I was pretty upset thinking we may have to wait for the Xbox 1080 to come out, break down within 2 weeks after people shucked out $700+ for it and go through this whole fiasco again before we see another GTA. But I was simply reading what was written and not between the lines.

To say they're holding GTA V for the next generation consoles makes perfect sense! We're due a modern Vice City and San Andreas, which hopefully we'll be allotted before we're forced to suffer through another money grubbing system scheme from Microsoft and Sony.

I'm hoping we see something soon from Rockstar, if nothing more than to cool the embers of rumors still burning up the internet. Their silence speaks loud and clear, they're working on the next biggest thing. Whether it be GTA San Andreas 2, Vice City Returns or whatever they're cooking up, we know for sure they can't afford to let the GTA series die.