Monday, December 27, 2010

best & worst of 2010

As the year comes to an end, we here at Gamedae sadly put down our controllers and spend time paying attention to our family, instead of our virtual family: Mario, Luigi, Princess, the Kongs.

Thus for our final post of 2010, I decided to get the gang all together in one post to reflect on the past year of gaming. What we have played what we have liked and what we are looking forward to in the new year.

Hit the jump to see what all the Gamedae contributers thoughts.

ANOTHERDAE

I have played some really great games this year and I see no end to that cycle anytime soon. Just this month I have my hands on the LBP2 beta and DC Universe beta and those aren't even full games! Seroiusly, I've never had so many great games at once.

I'm going to pick my favorite game based not on specs or hype but simply what I had the most fun playing. That would be Transformers: War for Cybertron. As a hopeless TFers fan this game really hit the mark. It adds to the already established lore of the TFers without stepping all over it. It is co-op and multiplayer allowing me to share the experience. And it is nonstop action with beautifully rendered cut scenes. The developers even hosted x10 experience points weekends which made for some fun leveling up sessions. I really hope we see another TFers game in the near future; after this game I wouldn't even hesitate to pick it up.

As for games I didn't like, I'm still not a huge fan of PS Minis and I haven't spent enough time with any sports games to truely not like them. I'm going to have to pick some PS Store games that weren't even worth the download time it took to get them. it's a tie between The Punisher and Dead Space: Ignition seriously, why were these games even made?

While I can't wait for another TFers game and who isn't looking forward to Uncharted 3; the game I am most looking forward to in the new year is Little Big Planet 2. Luckily (according to my preorder) I won't have to wait long!

GOOSE EGG

One of my new year's resolutions is to expand my video game repertoire. However, out of the games I did play this year, here are my picks:

I enjoyed playing Wii Monopoly the most; as a die hard Monopoly fan, how could I not pick this one? It's a great party game and you don't have to worry about a banker who may be cheating.

I couldn't choose a game that I felt was my least favorite of the year, so I decided to just throw it out there that Goose Egg should not be allowed to play first person shooters, especially, Call of Duty: Black Ops. When Anotherdae has his friends over for some drinks and gaming, I need to stay away from the television because I just make them sick because I cannot control the analog stick properly.

The game I'm looking forward to for 2011 is PixelJunk Shooters 2! As my previous post illustrates I love PixelJunk Monsters!

MG (AKA: VERDEBERG)

In a huge year for the Playstation 3 console this year also saw, what is in my opinion, the most devastating blow to the Playstation Home users. The removal of the EA poker rooms. I've seen the evolution of Playstation Home from the very beginning. I remember the first poker rooms in the Godfather area. I also remember the day the EA poker rooms were introduced, as well as the concept of playing poker for fake money, bragging rights, and for free. I may not be too proud of it, but I used to log into Playstation home nightly, no matter how late, to get in at least one game of poker. It was the perfect, simple, social, online gaming experience. Put a bunch of people in a room with 4 poker tables, 8 players per table at a time. People could make friends, trash talk, and gamble. It became many people's answer to the "Wednesday poker night"and it was FREE. I can truthfully say I have not signed into Playstation Home since they took away the poker rooms. Except I do occasionally sign in to check to see if they are back. I did notice that there were plenty of other new home additions such as the Midland room, the Downtown room, and the addition of poker tables that you can buy (real money) for your personal areas; but it's not the same. Those poker areas made me proud to have chosen PS3 and I would name "free poker" in the top 3 selling points to my friends as a reason to buy a Playstation. "Uncharted franchise, blu-ray, and free poker. Go buy a PlayStation 3." well 2 out of 3 ain't bad. Playstation Home peaked with the EA Poker rooms. There I said it.

B-REAL

This past year for B-Real has been quite surreal. I battled a Nintendo DS addiction early on in the year; conquering games such as Professor Layton and the Curious VillageProfessor Layton and the Diabolical Box and Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days. I also dusted off my PS2 and played a little Final Fantasy 12 to prep for Final Fantasy 13. Then B-Real put down the controller to buckle down on his homework, like a good B-Real does. But my life was not void of gaming at this time; no, I still found time to get a little gaming in with Goose Egg and Anotherdae. Then good fortune sprung upon B-Real and he was loaned a PS3, Ratchet and Clank Future and R&C A Crack in TimeStreet Fighter 4Dead Space and Darksiders were soon enjoyed till completion. Then Gamedae became bi-coastal, with B-Real relocating on the west coast!!! Here, B-Real has a Wii but little time to play Donkey Kong Returns (review pending)!

The game I enjoyed playing the most this year, must have been New Super Mario Bros. Wii with Goose Egg and Anotherdae. Goose Egg was the nuts, Anotherdae was the bolts and B-Real kept it together as the glue. This game was the best of the year because it’s a game which is most enjoyable playing with other people. And who doesn’t love Mario? I also loved playing ModNation Racers with Anotherdae, but I am quite nostalgic about Super Mario Bros...

The game that shouldn’t exist is Ghostbusters for Wii. They made an entirely different game for the Wii than for the PS3 and the PS3 version is awesome! The Wii version has poor controls, poor graphics and it is just too annoying to play.

The game I’m looking most forward to in 2011 is either the next installment in the Ratchet & Clank franchise (thanks Anotherdae for introducing me, cuz I’m obsessed!), or Dead Space 2.

2010 been a great year in gaming and I look forward to 2011! Thanks for reading!

Happy New Year from the folks at Gamedae.

2 comments:

  1. 2010 was a big game year for me in that it was the year that I finally embraced the RPG. Having finished my whole reason for wanting an Xbox, Bioshock, in 2009, I started 2010 with the purchase of another (at the time) Xbox exclusive, Mass Effect. Let me tell you, I was not prepared for the level of immersion and the number of hours this game would steal from my life. Finally, there was a game where I felt that I could make decisions that mattered and chose the direction of my character, combined with a slick Sci-Fi style that appealed to my love for Star Wars and Blade Runner. I did not want to leave the beautiful Syd Mead inspired world. Needless to say 2011 starts with Mass Effect 2.
    My 2010 was also dominated by MMA games and online competition. The second game in the UFC Undisputed franchise was released in May, which saw big improvements upon it's '09 counterpart(sway, cage work, plus a more unified grappling system), and some big draw backs(online ranked matches were dropped nearly everytime, c'mon!). In the fall EA sports MMA hit the scene and introduced their own unique grappling and fighting system. This game, in my opinion, created a more realistic fighting experience, and has dominated my gameplay in the last quarter of the year. I can't wait to see how they improve upon their rookie effort in following years.
    As far as thoughts on games that shouldn't exist, I'm going to say 90% of the content on the Wii. When I walk into a game store and look at their wall I'm truly appalled by the number of garbage 3rd-party games out there. If it wasn't for Super Mario Bros. my Wii would go completely neglected.
    2011 sees a lot of new releases, and narrowing it down to one game that I'm looking forward to most would be difficult, but I wouldn't be surprised that when I finish Mass Effect 2, I'll be more than ready for the next installment!

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  2. Jon
    You deserve a metal or trophy or a XBox 360 something for finishing Mass Effect 1. I got into Dragon Age (same studio) myself and thought doing just the first mission was a long journey. We love hearing your insights here on the blog and value your comments. Keep us posted on what your playing in the XBox 360 world. PS: How is the Darksiders shirt doing?

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