To say that Amanda and I don't follow football is a big understatement -- when we got the idea to do our own Madden Bowl, not only did we have to look up which weekend the Super Bowl was, we had to look up who was even in it. So as you might guess, our Madden skills aren't that great. Well, that's not entirely fair -- they might actually be great, but we wouldn't know since neither of us has ever played Madden before.

All things come in good and evil forms. 30 Rock and According to Jim. Modest Mouse and Nickelback. Chocolate and white chocolate. The power of a game to suck away time is not so awesome when you look at the clock and realize it's 2:45 in the morning and you have to get up for work in four hours.

Four weeks down and another pound lost. I’m feeling pretty good this week, not just because I’m starting to see some results, but because the game I used this week was actually very good. As I mentioned in my previous article, I was starting to get a bit discouraged with all of these fitness games. After all, I knew I was approaching the end of my program and I had only found one game that I felt comfortable recommending, but that has now changed thanks to My Fitness Coach for the Wii.

Once a game is proven to be a success, it tends to get cloned over time to the point where it eventually loses its luster. Thankfully, some creative programmers have taken to honoring their favorite games and gameplay mechanics in quirky and original ways. In this month’s Free Bytes themed medley we explore the wackier side of gaming remakes and tributes.

Turning on a dime from a niche title to a massively popular game, Puzzle Quest has received so many rave reviews in the past two years that there's little else to add. The blend of a match-three-type puzzle and a classic role-playing game proved to be such a successful idea that it released on nearly every platform. If, like me, you have played Puzzle Quest so intensively that nothing is left to discover or battle (except perhaps the ridiculously tricky final boss), you'll be pleased to know that a sequel will be released on February 24.

We typically play games because we enjoy the gameplay, like the challenge, or simply want to escape from our "real world" responsibilities for a while. It's not often that I find myself eagerly awaiting my next game session because I can't stop thinking about the game's main character, wondering how the next part of her story will play out. Most big titles have some kind of story with varying degrees of complexity, but rarely do stories elicit a deep interest or genuine sympathy from players.

When video games first gained popularity in the 1980s, female characters were basically there for one of two reasons: to be rescued or to serve as eye candy for adolescent boys. There are a few exceptions, but for the most part, this is how it was. And while we still see quite a few upper body disproportions today, we’re also seeing more and more smart, strong, complicated, and even inspiring female characters. This is a list of the 10 best.

In the inky blackness of space no one can hear you curse at the top of your lungs from inside your airtight helmet, except for the hungry aliens that have just infiltrated your vessel in search of a human snack. When your spaceship is boarded by man-eating alien creatures and a crew-member accidentally jettisons all of your guns, things aren’t looking so hot for your small team of space adventurers. With few options for survival remaining, it’s time to resort to drastic measures.

I loved the first Elebits game on the Wii. Those little guys were so damn cute! I even have some stuffed ones sitting on my desk, looking at me as I write this. Needless to say I was delighted when I learned the Elebits were making their way to the DS with an actual story behind the game this time. Unfortunately, it didn’t turn out quite as I had hoped.

Like so many successful casual games, PathWords is a confluence of existing ideas and concepts -- the video game equivalent of "two great tastes that taste great together," if you will. In this case, it's a core conceit based on Boggle -- that is, creating words using adjacent, randomly chosen letters -- that uses a refillable game board like those seen in puzzlers like Hexic HD.