What Is Your Game of the Year? 477
It's that time of year again. Last year's response to our Game of the Year post was so enthusiastic that I thought it would be worthwhile to give it another go. So, once again, some of the Slashdot folks have come together to offer up our 'games of the year'. Scuttlemonkey, Scott Collins, Chris Brown, CmdrTaco, and myself have all put together quick blurbs about the games we couldn't get enough of this year. When you're through reading those, it's your turn to speak up. What was the game you couldn't put down? The next-gen consoles really came into their own this year; was it one of those games, or something for the PC? In your opinion, what was the best game of the year?
Slashdot Engineer Chris Brown: If you read game sites at all, by now you've probably had more than your fill of cake and Weighted Companion Cube jokes. But Portal remains one of the best games to come out this year, well worth the price of the entire Orange Box just by itself. It's a darkly funny genre-bender of a game, and every minute of it is enjoyable. The only thing a reasonable person could still wish for is more of it - it's a short game by anyone's standards. And Ellen McLain's brilliant voice acting as GLaDOS makes me giggle like a schoolgirl.
My only regret is not experiencing the game on my PC. The Xbox 360's controls are awkward and the general ambiance of the environments seemed pretty drab and washed out.
Slashdot Engineer Scott Collins:
My favorite game this year (outside of WoW, I'm required to admit) was something of a surprise. It started at a chili-dinner party when a friend pulled a deck of cards out and said "Let's play Fluxx." Everyone else seemed to know what was going on, so I didn't require any convincing. It turns out to be a pretty fast-paced card game where you play: 'Action' cards, such as 'Pick a card at random from another player's hand'; 'Keeper' cards which are assets you collect to win, like 'The Brain', 'The Toaster', 'Dreams', 'The Rocket', et al; 'New Rule' cards that change play, like 'Draw 4' which changes the initial game of "draw 1, play 1" to "draw 4, play 1"; and 'Goals', like 'Milk and Cookies' meaning that while that is the current goal, the player who has played both the Milk and Cookies Keepers immediately wins. It ends up being a very strange and fun mix, something like Nomic combined with Uno. But that's not the end of the story.
The game was so much fun that when I got home I looked up the maker, Looney Labs, to buy a Fluxx deck for myself. There I discovered Zombie Fluxx.Zombie Fluxx adds a new kind of anti-Keeper: the Creeper; while the Keepers are things like 'The Chainsaw', 'The Can of Gasoline', 'The Shotgun'; the Goals are things like 'I alone survived', where if you have a Friend (Keeper), and the Car, and no zombies --- and everyone else has at least one zombie, you win. I managed to play Zombie Fluxx with all of my kids at once. At Thanksgiving, we had a game with three generations playing (just regular Fluxx though; I don't think Grandma and Grampa are ready for Zombies). The decks are designed so you can easily combine regular Fluxx and Zombie Fluxx for an even bigger game (and easily separate them again).
Patrick "Scuttlemonkey" McGarry:
This year saw a rather violent shift in my gaming appetites, as I decided it was time to kick the World of Warcraft habit.Any game that required too much of my time was avoided like the plague.That being said, the Wii's Mario Galaxy turned out to be my perfect game this year. So long have I been engrossed in the massive "pretty factor" of games (Quake, Doom, F.E.A.R., Warcraft, EVE, Empire at War, etc) that try to impress users with graphics, huge storylines, or tons of options that I forgot how great it could be just to find a simple game that offers a little bit of distraction and fun. Mario Galaxy really is the ultimate realization of the Mario franchise so far. It offers all of the glory of a platformer while offering several new twists.The first major expansion beyond the normal Mario world was their use of 3D and gravity. Many surfaces in the game acted as their own planet, complete with gravity well and the ability to traverse all sides of the object. There are also many fun manipulations of gravity throughout the game.Mario Galaxy also takes advantage of many unique controls available on the Wii to really make the gameplay interesting, without being overly hard.
Many games I have played recently really required a great deal of time to hone your skills to that "expert" level, and while that may be fine for a game with the scope of World of Warcraft, I shouldn't need that level of dedication for a simple platformer and Mario Galaxy delivers spectacularly. There were just enough challenges in the game to make it interesting but it was easy enough I could just pick it up and put it down whenever I felt like it without getting frustrated. The other major advancement Mario Galaxy has made was in cooperative gameplay. The new "co-star" mode makes it possible for you to include even the most staunch non-gamers in the Mario Galaxy experience. The co-star is given a cursor on the screen with which they can pick up power-ups, halt incoming enemies or enemy attacks, assist with stronger jumps, and even stun enemies for easy dispatch. Keep in mind that while all of these things are helpful if you happen to have a co-star, the game doesn't require you to have one, so that helpful individual can come and go as they please.
This makes it ideal for friends who drop by or loved ones that don't want to really jump in with both feet. All in all Mario Galaxy is a great casual game that can provide entertainment for just about any gaming appetite, definitely worth a look.
Rob "CmdrTaco" Malda:
My entry for game of the year is almost more about multiplayer gameplay. From fighters to first person shooters, there are just so many games out where I can invite a friend to join me, and then one of us crushes the other. Don't get me wrong, this is fun, but in many of those games, the person with the superior skill is bored while the less experienced player is defeated over and over again. It can get old.
Enter Rock Band. It might be the perfect party game. Someone drums, another plays bass, another lead guitar. And the most daring of any you takes up the USB microphone and goes nuts karaoke style. Instead of competing, you are a team. When one person fails out, another can bring them back by pulling off an overdrive move. And with the multiple difficulty settings, I can play on hard, while a friend plays on easy, and we can both be challenged and entertained.
It's hours of fun. It has problems: too many cords, not enough songs that everyone agrees on, and finding a spare guitar right now seems to be impossible. But each of those problems is addressable and doesn't take away from the fact that everyone can rock out for a few minutes. Everyone can be equals with a common goal and be challenged (well, maybe not people who have mastered expert mode, but I have no sympathy for you ;) It's got a steep price tag, but if you have 3 friends, it's worth it.
Michael "Zonk" Zenke:
My game of the year 2007 was decided during the 2006 E3 event.Mass Effect, at that point, was nothing more than a trailer about some space marine talking to an alien bartender. Years of patient waiting culminated for me in a 45 minute drive to the K-Mart in Portage, WI. Being able to buy a game a full week and a half before it releases generally is a special treat - moreso for me because of the chance to review the game before it came out. With a review in mind, I spent a full week leisurely exploring the world of Commander Shepherd, trying to stop Saren from carrying out his mad plot.
Over the course of that week, I was deeply, fully in love with the game. Yes, it's got some major flaws. The game's UI ranges from barely passable to amateur hour, and there are some honest frustrations to be voiced about character AI. Just the same, I was hooked, happily using the conversation wheel and Paragoning my way through the game's endless content. In some ways it reminded me a lot of Oblivion, my pick for last year's GOTY, in that the story fully drew me in. I've played Mass Effect quite a bit less than Oblivion; the exploration elements are just not as engaging.
But quality easily makes up for quantity, and my time with Mass Effect has been amazing. The moment that cemented this title in my personal hall of fame was actually the climax. Oblivion's ending is something of a 'whatever' - the joy there is in the journey. With Mass Effect, Shepherd's final confrontation with Saren is easily one of the most memorable gaming moments I've ever experienced. It's an incredibly fitting cap to the game's epic story and (somehow) actually makes me want to play through the whole thing over again.
Blemishes and all, Mass Effect is my game of the year for 2007. It reaffirmed for me the storytelling potential of western-style RPGs, and let me put to rest a burning anticipation I've had for quite some time. And, of course, now I can get ready for the next chapter in the series. When do you think Mass Effect 2 will be out?
Super Mario Bros. 3 (Score:5, Insightful)
And there will be... cake... (Score:5, Insightful)
So Portal hands down, with BioShock in a good solid second place. I can't find out until after Christmas what I'll place in third, because that's when I'll be getting the rest of the games I was hoping to try this year.
Seriously... UT2004... (Score:4, Insightful)
Wii Sports (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd even go as far to say that if Wii Sports was not bundled with the Wii at launch, the Wii probably would not be the runaway success it is today.
Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance (Score:2, Insightful)
Metroid Prime 3 & Rock Band get no love... :( (Score:3, Insightful)
I'll confess I haven't played Portal yet, but Metroid Prime 3 was my GOTY pick for a while. Eventually it got over thrown by Mario Galaxy, then by Rock Band 360 (which has been played constantly since it came out).
Which is exactly why those are my top 3 for the year as they are not only awesome games in their own right, but they also shift your perception of what to expect/demand from the entire genre.
I don't understand why Metroid gets no love, yet people trip over themselves to complement for Bioshock which is "above average" at best.
Re:Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (Score:2, Insightful)
MP1 with MP3's control scheme would be wonderful.
Super Mario Galaxy (Score:5, Insightful)
This game has brought back everything that I used to enjoy about video games back in the 90's console era (NES/Genesis/SNES/TG16) - joy, frustration, a sense of wonder, and an as-of-yet unresolved addiction. (10 more stars to go!) The control scheme took all of 30 seconds to master. The graphics, while not super-detailed, are incredibly smooth (with the exception of some underwater bits). The score is spectacular - haunting, epic, whimsical, and nostalgic as the need arises.
I bought the game on release day (while on vacation), somewhat on a whim - thinking "It can't live up to the hype", "Hopefully it will have good trade value" and "At least it will give me something to do after I finish Guitar Hero III". So far, I've probably put 60 hours into SMG, and perhaps six hours into GH3.
Having played all of the other Mario games to some degree (I never owned an SNES, but played a fair bit of SMW) only SM64 has been as much of an addiction as SMG. (My virtual console copy of SM64 hasn't been played in almost a month.)
I also recently got a used copy of Rayman Raving Rabbids. It has been an enjoyable game thus far, although the control is sometimes lacking (the 'slam the outhouse door' minigame is very inconsistent).
Please, not Flux (Score:5, Insightful)
If flux is your favorite game, you really need to see what else is out there. The game is so random, the decisions you make are pretty much irrelevant. The fact is a friend of mine played against his cat, and lost! [boardgamegeek.com]
There are a ton of good boardgames out there: From Descent to Agricola, with oldies such as Carcassonne, El Grande or Tikal.
As far as videogames go, I've played pretty much every nominee, and Mario Galaxy is head over shoulders above the competition. Mass Effect did nothing KOTOR hadn't done better years ago. Better writing, better characters, better inventory system, better AI. The romance arcs were so absolutely lame they had me longing for Baldur's Gate II. Bioshock has a great story, but it's a pretty average shooter. Half of the plasmoids are pointless, and there's not much enemy variety as the game goes along. Portal is much better, but it is very short. Rock Band is better than Guitar Hero, but they did screw up with the manufacturing problems, and the lack of career online mode is disappointing.
It's Galaxy's year.
Too many choices but... (Score:2, Insightful)
Absolutely beautiful. Fluid gameplay, constant intense action, Great story.
Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts
Such a sweet game, the graphics are delicious, the gameplay is fantastic. The replay value seems near infinite and one of the best multiplayer games I have ever played.
Assassin's Creed
Vast Beautiful lands with free roaming much like GTA series. Intense action, fluid gameplay. Tends to get a little redundant but if you play the same each time, it would be. Changing plans per assassin is able and suggested.
Guitar Hero III
Simply fun! Great song lists, online multiplayer, Coop story, better gameplay. Guitar Hero II and Guitar Hero III are some fantastic party games.
Portal
This game was so addicting is incredible. My brain felt alive. Not to mention how funny it was. The female voice was perfect but I only giggle like a schoolgirl when a kitten sniffs my eye.
If anyone want to play Guitar Hero III for xbox my nick is Stink Sleeve
Re:Bioshock (Score:5, Insightful)
Where Bioshock scored for me was that, for the first time since Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines, it dared to treat adults like, well, adults.
Other games have "moral ambiguity" but, let's be honest, most of them are simply, "There's no right option here." Do you help evil but rights of the individual side A or do you help evil but common good side B? Do you side with guy A's story or guy B's story. And you're left with no real doubt that that's as far as they've thought it through.
Bioshock's genius comes from:
Not just "Do you harvest little sisters for more Adam or be 'good' for less?" but really pushes you to think: What am I doing by "saving" them? Am I just taking out their symbiotic host so they die anyway? How do I feel about killing them if I know either option kills them?
[SPOILER ALERT] When saved, they talk about getting sleepy and appear to climb in the vents to die. When it's later revealed that they really are just going "home" - it adds an aching emotional response if you chose to kill them for your own goals. The "good" ending taking that even further.[/SPOILER ALERT]
Now add in insanity storylines, deliberate murders of families, stories of holocaust survival, Ayn Rand type debates. Even better, much of this happens off screen. Sure, the Manhunts or GTAs of this world will kill a family in front of you and have politicians up in arms for something with next to no emotional impact. Bioshock can imply it, off screen, leaving it to resonate in your mind on a vastly deeper level.
I love GTA but it's candy violence and candy swearing. None of it means anything. It's like watching a Die Hard movie. Sure, it's "adult" but kids want to go and see it, and understandably so, because it's nothing but a fun adrenalin ride.
Bioshock on the other hand is like the Godfather or, yes, Lolita. None of the violence, none of the swearing is there for a quick and cheap thrill. It's there because it's absolutely appropriate to a storyline that engages your brain on a much higher level. It shows you uncomfortable concepts, it doesn't tell you that it'll all get better if you just shoot everything, but still takes you on an intense journey that'll stay with you.
And so, in the same way, Bioshock matters like great films matter. There are tons of Disney games. There are huge numbers of action movie games. There're a few, like Ultima Underworld that manage to be great ET or Bridge To Terabithia type (PG but really makes you think) games. It's incredibly rare in gaming though for there to be a non-gratuitous, truly adult in the sense that adults are trusted to think for themselves about darker concepts, games.
Bioshock managed that.
Yes, System Shock came close - which is why Bioshock is openly talked about as its spiritual successor. Even then, the medium's evolved and it's like comparing The Godfather to a great silent movie. So much more, technologically, can be added now - from detailed objects to animation flourishes, objects in the distance to quantity and quality of audio.
Deus Ex was also a great game. Again, time moves on and a modern DVD, filled with the kind of quantity and quality of content a modern game budget allows, will always surpass it. Yes, pretty graphics for pretty graphics sake is meaningless. But, when used well, all of these advances really do enhance your immersion in a game just as VFX in a movie doesn't save a lousy movie but massively enhances a great one.
So, we've got a level of meaningful adult content that's rarely been in any prior game. We've got advances in the medium that allow those earlier ideas to be more richly realized.
Beyond that though, you're listing three games (if we ignore sequels) in 15 years. Even if we accept it does nothing new, one utterly engaging game in all of those ways, every four or five years, means it more than merits adoration - even if it isn't utterly unique.
Re:n00bs (Score:3, Insightful)
One more deserving mention... (Score:3, Insightful)
Talisman
http://www.blackindustries.com/?template=TM&content=talisman-history [blackindustries.com]
Enemy Territory ftw (Score:2, Insightful)
For all the griping about linux gaming, there was little fanfare when a top-tier title was released and has great linux support. It's a really fun game too!
Re:ugh (Score:2, Insightful)
Burn me at the stake. (Score:3, Insightful)
Compared to Super Mario Sunshine, SMG is very linear. Yes, you can do the galaxies in pretty much whatever order you want, but they chose to have more galaxies in favor of more options in the individual levels. There was no searching for stars in the main area - they just dropped a hungry luma in your lap when you achieve a certain goal. There is absolutely no need to challenge yourself to get coins. They replaced the red coins in SMS with purple coins and saved all those levels for the end. The levels themselves were very linear and didn't provide for any exploring. All in all the game was much less challenging.
Re:Bioshock [SPOILERS] (Score:3, Insightful)
SS2 was particularly engaging because you needed to be careful about how much ammo you use, how many nanites you spend (because you needed the things for anything from purchases to weapon repairs), which weapon you use when (because degradation might mean the thing breaks down when you need it least), which skill you learn etc. The decisions turned out to be pretty complex. ("If I level up Repair now, I can use the grenade launcher - but I suck with heavy guns and I kinda need to get past that one security station - but then again, another Hacking upgrade would require me to find two more upgrade modules and I'm not quite ready for the storage area yet...")
I like to call Bioxshock "System Shock: Terror From the Deep". Like TFTD was UFO Defense with an undersea settings, new graphics and minor modifications, Bioshock is System Shock 2 with an undersea setting, new graphics and minor modifications.
Bioshock is by all means not an outright bad game, it just doesn't live up to the game it was cloned from. Probably because SS2 was an FPS/RPG while I'd argue that Bioshock just tries to be an FPS.
Re:The QA game (OT) (Score:3, Insightful)
You, sir, show a level of dedication that I find quite frankly a bit frightening. I applaud you for it while simultaneously hoping you are not near me in meatspace.
Metroid Prime 3 (Score:5, Insightful)