I’m in a bit of a gaming rut. I’ve got loads of games, but nothing to play; nothing that’s grabbing me.I bought four games recently. The first I dove in on was Vice City, which I don’t find as great as everyone makes out. Okay, so you can run around and kill people in a frenzy of power over digital life, but when couldn’t you in a videogame? The mission difficulty gets ramped up pretty early on and the ‘plot’ is pretty, well, crap.Secondly, DOA: Xtreme Beach Volleyball. No volleyball (xtreme or otherwise), loads of tits.Third on the plate was Soul Reaver II. Now, I should like this game, I loved the first. It was everything later Tomb Raiders should have been, great story, well scripted and brilliantly innovative gameplay. But playing this was like watching a rather shit movie, you played the game for five minutes, which was basically locking in on a target and mashing the fight button, then it’s ten minutes of FMVs. FMVs that are pretentiously scripted, complex and ultimately confusing. I got to the second save point and decided that the game was too laborious.My last game from the stack was Crimson Skies. Brilliant brilliant game. It looks great and plays great, but it very soon got frustratingly difficult. The game forces you to replay the missions, you’ll rarely complete them first time round, so you can learn the pattern of attack and predetermined flight-paths of the enemies. You never get the feeling that you’re beating the game because you’re good at it, but simply because you know what’s going to happen. Frustrating.It seems rare that a modern game gets the difficulty in the rules of engagement right, which it then balances with a good story well told. I don’t want to play the same part over and over because the developer is taking a cheap shot at an IGN rating bar for ‘longevity’. And I don’t want to spend more time watching FMVs than actually playing the game; if you’ve got a movie script then punt it elsewhere, it’s not for a videogame.I’m really disappointed. Really, really saddened. And I don’t even buy the games that are considered crap, I know games and I know when there’s a buzz. So, if these games are some of the best on offer now am I missing something? Am I getting too old for games? Am I spoiled by my massive collection? I don’t know. I will say that I wouldn’t want to play the duds.