Fortunately, one nominee as stepped forward to fill that void. Backed by the powerful Rooster Teeth organization, Chic Cramney is asking for your support and vote for president.

But the game is still one of the best of 2011, due not only to its humor but also its soundtrack. Sixty-four different tunes accompany Chell in her journey through the bowels of Aperture Science — and as of today, they're all available as free downloads

The soundtrack includes the closing (not credits) song, "Cara Mia Addio" also known as the turret opera, which employs Ellen McLain (GLaDOS)'s bad high school Italian for its lyrics. Independent artists have recorded an a cappella rendition of the tune that's available on iTunes:

Jonathan Coulton's "Want You Gone" is also part of this free download — but before you hear the song in-game, you have to defeat the final boss. This encounter's own moments of hilarity can't be fully appreciated in the heat of battle, so enjoy this playlist of three YouTube videos that captures the dialogue of the personality spheres:

I may've griped about Portal 2 being an expensive sequel to an affordable game, but the freebies like the soundtrack go a long way toward setting things right.

(Hat tip to Dave McClelland and GermanSeabass)

[Show as slideshow]

Despite the lack of backward compatibility with the original Xbox, I asked for and received my 360 as a gift for Christmas 2008 and immediately proceeded to load it with downloadable goodness. Although I'd predicted purchasing plenty of retail games for the console, I never weaned myself off the ease and affordability of XBLA. I could enjoy a game like Shadow Complex for as long as I would any disc-based game, but for a fraction of the prize. Even though I was cutting retailers (such as formerly myself) from the equation, there were just too many reasons, from the day I got my Xbox through 2010 and today, to stay home.

Batman: Arkham Asylum and Portal 2 were the games that got me off the couch. The former has a great demo that reminded me of the stealth aspects of the fantastic Metal Gear Solid series, and the latter is the sequel to one of my favorite 360 games thus far. Accustomed as I was to paying $1–15 for an Xbox 360 game, I waited for the prices on each to fall, paying $20 and $35, respectively.

I've not yet played Batman, but Portal 2 is proving fun … though slightly less so than I hoped. The story is somewhat predictable so far, and many of the puzzles seem oriented toward figuring out what to do instead of how. I'd rather be given an objective to decipher than placed into an empty room with no clear goal. In that respect, more of Portal 2 is like the final stages of its predecessor, when Chell has broken out of the test rooms and is navigating the tunnels of the facility. I didn't like that part, either.

But both games are successfully imbued with liberal amounts of humor. I'm looking forward to the end game sequence and the closing credits song, but in the meantime, even little gestures like the defective turrets' dialogue are uplifting:

What will be the third game I'll buy for the 360? There are none currently on my radar, which perhaps bespeaks of my fall from "hardcore" status. But There's plenty to enjoy in the meantime.

Their 2011 preview wasn't quite as impressive, as they showed only a trailer, not a full episode or four. But Season 9 nonetheless promises to be as awesome as Season 8, as fans can now see for themselves, with today's online release of said trailer. It starts off seeming to pick up where last season left off, but soon, things start seeming amiss…

What do you think? Is Rooster Teeth going in the right direction by taking Red vs. Blue backward?

When I got home, rather than pre-order the 3DS in anticipation of its March 27 release, I dusted off Nintendo's previous 3D system. The Virtual Boy, released in 1995, was Nintendo's only 32-bit system and the supposed successor to the overwhelming success of the Game Boy line. But its lack of portability, weak software library, screenshot-free nature, and antisocial design combined to make it a faster failure than even the Sega Dreamcast: the Virtual Boy was discontinued 15 years ago this month, on March 2, 1996.

But it wasn't until three weeks later, on March 22 — today — that the system's official death knell sounded with the release of its final game, 3D Tetris. It and two other Virtual Boy games, Waterworld and Nester's Funky Bowling, were exclusive to the United States, while eight other games were never ported from Japan. No one country enjoyed all 22 games, but several of those released in the USA were actually quite a bit of fun.

[Show as slideshow]

My favorite is Mario Clash, a variation on the original Mario Bros. game that has Mario romping through the sewers, jumping on turtles. Mario Clash's 40 levels challenge players to knock enemies off ledges in multiple dimensions, sometimes requiring throwing shells "into" and "out of" the screen to hit fiends on the Z-axis. It's the first game I played after getting home from PAX, and it lasted me a good hour.

Other interesting applications of the Virtual Boy's 3D technology (which was invented in Massachusetts, not far from PAX East) include Teleroboxer, a boxing game with an intuitive control scheme that uses both D-pads; and Vertical Force, a shmup in which the ship can descend and ascend. Of course, several of the games weren't worth the plastic they were printed on, as the Angry Video Game Nerd can tell you.

The Virtual Boy failed to replace its handheld predecessor, though according to Shigeru Miyamoto, the black-and-red system was misperceived: it was intended as a toy, not a console. In that respect, it's a fun and amusing diversion, well worth the $30 for which rental stores liquidated their rental units, with games at $10 a pop. But as a gaming system, it lives on as an inside joke, the occasional cameo, and a potential portent of the challenges to face Nintendo's next handheld.

I missed the Parsely session last year but bought my own copies of some of the scripts from Memento Mori Theatricks so that I could run them for an audience of retrocomputing enthusiasts. Wanting to be in the audience for once, I made sure to attend PAX East 2011's Parsely session. so I could be in the audience for once. Unfortunately, the first game that host Jared Sorensen presented was Action Castle, the same as last year's and the one I had run. It was still fun to watch, but the challenge for me didn't arise until that game was won and he dusted off the sequel, Action Castle II. I captured excerpts from both rounds in this YouTube video:

Some post-event thoughts and collected photo album to follow. In the meantime, be sure to catch up with photos from day one and day two.

[Show as slideshow]

See also photos from day one and day three.

[Show as slideshow]

Does this year's Cammy live up to last year's?

See also photos from day two and day three.

[Show as slideshow]

To decide which games are sufficiently artistic, the museum has created an online voting site where gamers of all ages are invited to vote for the software whose visual imagery warrants a place in history. The games are broken down into multiple eras and consoles:

• Start! (1970s – early 1980s)
  • Atari VCS
  • ColecoVision
  • Mattel Intellivision
• 8-Bit (1983 – 1989)
  • Commodore 64
  • Nintendo Entertainment System
  • Sega Master System
• Bit Wars! (1989 – 1994)
  • Sega Genesis
  • Super Nintendo Entertainment System
• Transition (1995 – 2002)
  • DOS/Windows
  • Nintendo 64
  • Sega Dreamcast
  • Sega Saturn
  • Sony PlayStation
• Next Generation (2003 – Current)
  • Microsoft Xbox
  • Microsoft Xbox 360
  • Modern Windows
  • Nintendo GameCube
  • Nintendo Wii
  • Sony PlayStation 2
  • Sony PlayStation 3

Gamers may vote for one of three games in each of four genre categories per console: action, adventure, target, and combat/strategy. Since there are 80 categories (four genres for each of 20 consoles), the system allots 80 votes to choose your favorite games from 240.

I put off casting my own vote due to the requirement to register for the voting system — an understandable precaution to prevent ballot stuffing. Fortunately, "registration" means only inputting one's email address. Should one wish to return later to finish casting one's votes, a four-digit PIN is provided as a password.

Once registered, I found the experience seamless, though the choices challenging. The exhibit is called "The Art of Video Games". Does that simply mean "the best graphics"? The Super Nintendo's adventure candidates were Chrono Trigger, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, and EarthBound. Since EarthBound (ie, Mother 2) was originally an 8-bit game, it can't compete with the other two in terms of graphics. But is it equally artistic? I cast an inalterable vote for Chrono Trigger before asking myself that question (though of the three, Zelda 3 is my favorite).

I was heartened to see indie games like Limbo and Minecraft included in the nominees but disappointed to note the absence of entire platforms, such as the Nintendo Game Boy or the Apple II (though one can vote for ports of games from these systems). The museum's FAQ addresses these issues:

Your genres seem odd. Where are the RPG, Fighting, Racing, MMOG, etc. genres?

There are so many different types of games that we knew our show could not feature them all. We looked for four broad categories that would allow us to offer a wide selection.

How could you leave out my favorite games?

It was really difficult to narrow the tens of thousands of game choices down to just 240 titles and we appreciate that there will always be games that people feel should have made the cut but didn’t. The games that are being considered for the exhibition represent certain points in time for each of the 20 systems that also contribute to the overall narrative of the exhibition.

Where are the arcade games, handhelds, and system XYZ? How could you not include these?

We considered the size of the museum’s galleries that will house the exhibition, as well as the time that visitors will need to experience the content. The 20 selected systems represent significant points in time for the eras described. Hopefully this will be the first exhibition of many that explore the medium of video games.

That may all be understandable, but breaking from the traditional generations of consoles nonetheless seems a strange division.

When I was done voting, there was no way to indicate I didn't wish to use my remaining 40 votes, or to output a scoresheet marking off my choices. Rather than share my selections here or compare them with friends, I will have to wait for the winners to be included in the final exhibit:

The exhibition will feature 80 games through still images and video footage. Five games will be available for visitors to play for a few minutes, to gain some feel for the interactivity—Pac-Man, Super Mario Brothers, The Secret of Monkey Island, Myst, and World of Warcraft. In addition, the galleries will include video interviews with developers and artists, large prints of in-game screen shots, and historic game consoles.

Gamers have more than a year before seeing these games on display: the exhibit is scheduled to run March 16 to September 30, 2012

(Hat tip to Gabriel Perna)

UPDATE: The winners have been announced! The Web site doesn't have much information, but the 12-page PDF offers a more comprehensive breakdown of the winners and genres.