Twas the week before Thanksgiving and all through the house, you could hear the kids play Call of Duty 4, Super Mario Galaxy, Rayman Raving Rabbids 2, Crysis, Assassin’s Creed, Medal of Honor Heroes 2, and so forth. The holiday rush of games is upon us and boy do I have the credit card bills to prove it. There’s also a pretty big milestone for the history of online console gaming: the Xbox Live service has turned five years old. Hopefully you were able to take advantage of the free Carcassonne game or perhaps you got 500 MS Points for being around since 2002 if not, there’s always 2012. Unfortunately for me, way back in 2002 I had my own Xbox Live press account for a now defunct website so I didn’t get the bonus. I know you all pity me.

So since we’re talking about the Xbox, let’s quickly discuss the two new games added to Live Arcade. First there’s Shrek and Roll, released interestingly enough during the same week that Shrek 3 is now available on DVD and HDDVD! How convenient. While the game’s graphics are true to the movie, the actual game play of moving a see saw up a wall isn’t a whole lot of fun. And this game is $10? That’s almost as much as the movie! I think I’ll pass, but thanks for the trial version!

The other new game is called Screwjumper! and no it’s not porn. Think of it instead as 3D Mr. Driller where you also have to go back up after you’ve gone all the way down. Perhaps that’s not a very good analogy but then this game isn’t very enjoyable either. I like the concept behind it but the game just doesn’t seem to give me any staying power. Then again, maybe I’m just getting old and cranky. I can do better things with my $10.

We did get some great information this week regarding Live Arcade – original Xbox titles will now be available for download. Why go to GameStop and buy Crimson Skies used for $3.99 when you can buy it over Xbox Live for $15! What a deal! These games will not have achievements and of course, if you still have that 20GB hard drive, well you’re basically screwed as one DVD can be up to 4GB – finally a reason why I have the Elite! 360 Arcade owners and Core system owners, well..ummm…sorry.

With the release of a new Need For Speed game, EA brings back that wonderful disease we all know as Lumines Liveitis: for a mere 2800 points ($35 or 58% of the cost of the game), you can unlock all of the stuff you would have unlocked by playing through the game as well as the Collector’s Edition swag! Now here’s a game that should be bundled with some MS points!

EA wasn’t all Satan this week; they were kind enough to release a new course for Tiger Woods for the low low price of FREE! Now that’s an offer I can’t refuse. Not that I refuse many offers anyway, but you know what I’m saying.

Many people were enjoying Guitar Hero 3 despite the $6.25 price for downloadable content and then realized that the boss battles couldn’t be played in quick play as a one off song. Not sure that anyone was really dying to play that Tom Morello song, but the Devil Went Down to Georgia was a definite song to play. Anyway, in a shocker, Activision has released the “Boss Battle Track Pack” for the (say it with me) low low price of FREE! That’s right! You don’t have to pay anything to play the songs that came with the game in career mode! Isn’t that awesome?

In other news, for 300 points ($3.75) you can obtain three items for each character in Virtua Fighter 5! So, if you like your characters with items blow the $3.75! Rounding out the 360 offerings, we have a multiplayer demo of TimeShift, so if the single player didn’t interest you, here’s your chance to get online…or something.