Almost as soon as I came back from Philadelphia for the holidays, I was on the road again, this time covering CES 2011 in Las Vegas. This was my first time reporting on the annual technology convention because it doesn’t always cater to video games. However, Microsoft had a large presence on the showfloor and a keynote to boot. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gave this year’s keynote, which I reported on here, here and here. I also wrote about Tetris coming to PS3 and being integrated into TVs here.

CES 2011 was very different from the eight E3 video game conventions that I have attended. I found E3 to be more cohesive and organized, but that’s just the nature of the video game industry. You’re more aware of the large blockbuster games before stepping foot on the E3 floor and what’s going to be “hot.” At CES, technology innovations are often found in the nook and crannies of the Las Vegas Convention Center. Big players aren’t always the ones that make big news.

Two days after returning to LA from Las Vegas, I was off to a New York City press junket to write about THQ’s 2011 lineup. It had been snowing pretty badly on the east coast that week, so the van ride from JFK airport to the London hotel took over 90 minutes. Right away, I secured some authentic New York-made pizza and observed a surprisingly empty city. Over the next few days, a bunch of game journalists and I braved the cold to write about Red Faction Armageddon, de Blob 2, MX vs ATV Alive and WWE All-Stars.

The WWE All-Stars presentation was noteworthy first-off because the game is good. The arcade-focused gameplay reminds me of the AKI-developed N64 games from a dozen years ago. Second, THQ brought in WWE all-stars to show off WWE All-Stars: Sheamus, The Big Show, Kofi Kingston and Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat. I’ve never been into wrestling, but appreciate the grappling system of the games more than most in the fighting genre.

The final day of the press junket was reserved for Homefront, the first-person shooter and Call of Duty rival THQ has been pushing. In order to get us from the London hotel on 54th Street to the event venue on 34th Street, THQ had us ride in a school bus – something that appears in the first level of the game. I haven’t been in a school bus since 2002, so this was a unique experience that all of the game journalists got a kick out of. “Wait, you didn’t save a seat for me? I thought we were friends?!”

Before heading back to the snow-less coast of California, I had dinner with my parents, who took the train from a station in New Jersey that isn’t too far from our home. We even got a picture in Time Square.