The biggest caveat in being swept up in the gaming hype cycle is that sometimes you just can’t help but feel a bit disappointed about your latest purchase. Drank a bit much of the Kool-aid, so to speak. Two such culprits immediately spring to mind in 2008. Both of these games went down the well trodden path of having their respective hype machines going for a bit longer than they should have been running. The first had a painstakingly long drip-feed of information every day for a half a year, nourishing its rabid fanbase consistently but eventually leading to an mostly unsurprising game. The other was heralded as the next big thing in gaming every year for the past five years, dazzling everyone with its high concept game play in spite of its continually slow development time. Both of the games had extremely high expectations; and even though those expectations were met on the retail shelves, something about both of them just didn’t sit right with me and I almost felt cheated out of good gaming experiences. Ultimately, the reason that I opted not to declare Super Smash Brothers Brawl as the most overhyped game of 2008 is this: Super Smash Brothers Brawl I can see myself playing with friends in the future. I cannot see myself playing Spore again at all.
Spore was supposed to be one of the most high concept and advanced games ever made; every decision you made had a consequence later on in the evolution. When I finally got my hands on it, I found out that was somewhat true. But I just could not get over the fact that the difficulty was just not there – Spore unfortunately played like a very dumbed down collection of minigames. If I wanted to play an RTS game, I would go and play an RTS game. I would not play Spore in its place.
I will freely admit that the Spore Creature Creator is an exceptionally powerful tool and that it’s still interesting to see what the Spore community is able to make. I’m definitely proud of the Mr. Saturn species that I was eventually able to grow and evolve from its meager roots as a single celled organism. However, the Creature Creator is only a small component of Spore – its just not enough to sustain my interest in the game that was supposed to be the apex of all god games.
One of the biggest factors in my personal gaming resurgence this year was the fact that a lot of new games that I looked forward to actually came out exclusively as downloadable titles. Ranging from Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 to Echochrome to Pixeljunk Eden, there’s something for everyone online, regardless of whether it was on the Playstation Network store or the Wii Shop channel or XBox Live. There’s always some value priced instant gaming gratification to be found online – plus, it saves me some gas and a trip to the store.
This year, Capcom took the reins and led the charge in the downloadable realm across all three of the major gaming platforms. Beginning with Bionic Commando Rearmed in August followed by Megaman 9 in September and most recently with Street Fighter 2: HD Remix this past November, there is no question that Capcom had set the bar as far as downloadable titles go. Megaman 9 impressed me with its bold retro direction; an 8-bit game being released sixteen years past its prime is very meaningful in its own right. SF2:HDR showed me what a rabid fan following and community can do when handed the wheel to a beloved game franchise. But to me, it was Bionic Commando Rearmed that really set the standard of what a downloadable game can and should be.
Capcom took a tremendous risk with Bionic Commando Rearmed, especially considering that it very much wasn’t a well established franchise like Megaman and Street Fighter. Bionic Commando, as beloved as it was back in the NES days, did not have the storied history that the other two series had. For all intents and purpose, it was a forgotten franchise. But somehow Capcom allowed Grin to work with the intellectual property and BC:R wound up being much more than a simple remake given a high-def makeover – the game was completely modernized. The classic Bionic Commando soundtrack was completely remixed and features one of the best soundtracks of any game all year. Archaic features of the original NES game were completely re-thought out; the old luck based wiretapping was converted into a three dimensional cyberspace puzzle minigame. Add in a new two-player co-op and challenge room modes where you can compete against the rest of the world and you have one of the best value games of the year.
The year has come to a close and if there’s one thing that has to be said, it is that 2008 was an excellent year for videogames. While this is often the case every year, I don’t quite remember the last time when I had been completely swept up in the game hype and release cycles. The sheer number of quality titles that were released across all platforms was absolutely astounding; there did not exist a month this year in which I was not looking forward to a new release. Added to that is the fact that I don’t have access to the XBox 360 nor impressive software library – proof enough that a lot of good stuff came out this year.
Every year around this time the major gaming websites put out their lists for Games of the Year and other related awards. Although I originally wanted to follow suit, I realized that the following two obstacles were clearly in the way of me being able to construct such a list:
- I have not played nearly enough games to really make a decisive ranking on which ones are the best, and
- Of the games that I have played, I love them all a bit too much to put them in any sort of an order. Kind of like picking your favorite ten children. Or something.
Moreover, a categorical approach seemed to be easier for me to manage in my head. As such, I will be presenting to you my Best of 2008 every day until the New Year.
Here’s to a great year and here’s to 2009 being even better! Hope you enjoy the read!
…Oh, and I changed the theme to celebrate such an occasion! Hope you enjoy it.
Every year, Lev Grossman of Time magazine writes up a list of the Top 10 videogames of the year. This year’s list was as follows:
1. Grand Theft Auto IV (360, PS3, PC)
2. Braid (360)
3. LittleBigPlanet (PS3)
4. Rock Band 2 (360, PS3)
5. Gears of War 2 (360)
6. Dead Space (360, PS3, PC)
7. Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (Wii, 360, PS3, DS, PSP)
8. Hunted Forever (free Flash)
9. Fieldrunners (iPhone)
10. Spore (PC)
Grand Theft Auto IV, LittleBigPlanet, and Gears of War 2 are there as expected. Some of the other choices continue to point to the fact that Mr. Grossman doesn’t have any pulse on the video game industry. There’s no mention of Metal Gear Solid IV, a superior convergence of the film and game entertainment mediums than GTAIV. There’s no mention of any of the first party Wii games (Super Smash Brothers Brawl, Wii Fit, Mario Kart) which continue to destroy everything in their paths in sales and broaden the market. World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King is conspicuously missing from the list with its 2.8 million first day sales. Where’s Left 4 Dead? Fallout 3? Fable 2? Burnout Paradise?
Time is a magazine with a huge circulation that reaches a very wide audience – the list is very demonstrative of that fact. With his choice of games on the list, Mr. Grossman seems a bit more representative of the general gaming cross section than someone who actually pays attention to the industry. So much so that it feels less like a Top 10 list and more like Lev Grossman’s “Hey, I happened to play this game this year” list. If Grossman wanted to really make a Top 10 list, perhaps he should play more games rather than limiting it as such.
