I remember that day, when I entered the Blockbuster video store...I looked at maybe 20 previously played XBOX titles that they were selling off.

I came across this game I had never heard of called Serious Sam. The pictures on the back of the box seemed cool enough, the storyline seemed as interesting as could get for a first-person shooter, and the box front had this cartoony dude...cool, but yet I was leary...

Little did I know when I purchased the game for $9.99, that I was in for one of the best FPS games of my life!

Graphics were awesome, sound appropriate to each scene, and awesome onslaughts of enemies beyond one' s imagination! There must have been almost 200 onscreen enemies at one time in this particular scene!

The enemies ranged from large frog-sized creatures to towering monsters of at least 100 feet!

Your adrenaline pumps so hard that you sweat buckets wondering if you' ll have enough ammo to make it through to the next area.

This game has a co-op mode and a multi-player deathmatch mode.

As for options, you can adjust everything from the color of the enemies blood to the split-screen orientation (horizontal or vertical). The level difficulties are significant, with the highest difficulty being insanely difficult (but not impossible).

This game currently sells for about $5-7, and is well worth any gamer' s money.

Serious Sam 2 is expected out somewhere between late 2004 to early 2005 and is expected to cost $20. I' m getting this one too!

Anybody else have a story about Serious Sam (or any other game for that matter) that they would like to share?

Serious Sam: The Second Encounter has been out since February. It' s a little better than the original, although mostly the same thing- mindless shooting.

It' s fun, but it tends to get old quickly, like most games with virtually no point. I do want to pick it up for Xbox at some point, though, it' s worth playing for an hour or so to relieve some stress.

Yeah, I rented it for the kids, but have a blast myself playing the game. As I said in another post it' s just a fun gun-toting, chainsaw weilding, going beserk hoot!

I rented it for the X-Box and honestly couldn' t stand any more after the first two levels.

The XBOX version is both the first and second editions found on the PC.

The next release was called Serious Sam 2 probably because it is the second in the series on XBOX. This version is to be released some time in the near future.

I can' t wait...

lotusson, the first two levels are tame compared to the mid-to-late levels, as those first several levels are more to get you acquainted with the game' s mechanics.

Rent it again...and play through to the middle levels, at least. At that point, the action becomes more fierce...it will keep you more than busy.