Game Archive 1

Ok, I'm going to post old stuff I've written about games and music here so I have all my crap in one place.

Beyond Good and Evil (PS2)


It's truly sad that nobody played this game, because it is a gem and available for all 3 current-gen systems. It's a mix of Zelda-style puzzle-focused dungeons and exploration with sci-fi themes and a heavy emphasis on stealth. I think the design succeeds more than the actual execution in some parts. Jade isn't the best-controlling main character ever, but the design IS great, and she's the star of one of the better game stories I've ever experienced... I'm not talking about your crazy RPG plots, I'm saying I actually gave a damn about the characters and felt for them. Truly a game that everyone should play. My only real problem was that completing the story required you to collect a bunch of pearls to repair your vehicle, and that can get tedious.

Bully (PS2)


It's cool to see one of these sandboxy, open world games that has a tighter approach and doesn't have a gangster theme to it. It's actually not that open, it would have been cool to play the different factions against each other, but all you really do is proceed through the storyline missions, gaining the respect of all the groups before the final showdown. Having to go to class and stuff like that could have gotten in the way, but it's fairly easy to skip class if you want to, and once you've passed them all, not only do you not have to go anymore, but you get a lot of new moves and upgrades that help you out with the rest of the game.

It's slightly awkward at times, but the story is entertaining, and this is probably the funniest video game I've ever played. It's stuffed to the brim with funny moments and dialogue from the various school kids. The combat system is fun too, you have plenty of moves to make fist fights enjoyable and there are a lot of clever non-lethal weapons to play with. It's a bit glitchy in spots, but it's definitely a fun experience.

Call of Duty (PC)

Call of Duty's creators, who split off from the original Medal of Honor team, manage to do something that seemed to be missing from that other World War II series - make it intense. You're never too far from dying and the extremely loud, chaotic battles are broken up once in a while with an uneasy silence.

The game has many great set pieces that make you really feel like a war hero, fighting alongside your allies and comrades... parachuting into D-Day, holding a bridge from a large siege, storming into Stalingrad with nothing but a few bullets in your hand. It does get a little silly sometimes, especially in the British campaign, when you clear out and take down a heavily fortified dam singlehandedly, race to an air base, and hold off several bomber planes with a single turret.

It's a very fun, exciting shooter, enhanced by the presentation which is strong even now, although I wish more time was spent fighting alongisde large groups rather than by yourself or with a few others.

Dreamfall: The Longest Journey (PC)


It's a little hard to rate Dreamfall, but what it hinges on is whether you think a game that clearly ignores gameplay in favor of story is worthy of a good score if that story is good. If you don't you will hate Dreamfall. But I choose to view it as more of an interactive story than a normal game, which is what it was designed to be, and it succeeds well at that.

The gameplay is pretty bad... the normal adventure gameplay is okay, but fairly simple. The main problems come from the stealth elements, which are poorly realized, and the combat, which is completely putrid. It's comically bad. It also makes one of the three characters you play seem completely worthless, as his story is much less fleshed out than that of the other two and all he does is fight a few people.

But what the game focuses on, the writing and story, are excellent. The characters are generally very well developed and sympathetic, and especially in the magical world of Arcadia, often quite funny. Some awkward animations slightly reduce the effectiveness of the dialogue and voice acting which is much more believable than most games. Despite a couple bits like the increasingly cliche creepy little girl and evil mega corporation, the story is a unique and deeply engrossing tale that grabbed me and kept me playing late into the night to find out how it will all end, which unfortunately it really didn't. The game ends on a cliffhanger with many threads left unresolved, and I hope the final game is released somewhat soon so I can see the end. I do know I will definitely be checking out the first game to see what happens there in the meantime.

Gears of War (360)


I still say Okami has the best graphics artistically of any game I've seen, but Gears of War easily takes the cake from a technical perspective. Seriously, it looks amazing. I have the good fortune to have a roommate this quarter who has a widescreen HDTV around 40 inches in size, and the game is really a sight to behold. It sounds pretty good too, with solid voices and sound effects.

It wouldn't be a good game without gameplay of course, and Gears succeeds there as well. I'm really not that big of a shooter fan, but I still had a great time moving tactically through the war-torn environs and ravaging Locust with my trusty assault rifle, with the enjoyable chainsaw at the end. The cover system takes a little getting used to, but it works very well, by the end it was rare for me to end up in a spot I didn't want to be in. My problem is that I wasn't huge on the pacing, there wasn't much of a rise and fall in action. There were quieter moments and slightly bigger scenes, but it seemed to have an intensity level a little too consistent. I might have preferred a few more extended moments of calm to coincide with huge, desperate setpieces. Still, I felt like I could just play the game straight through if I wanted to because it kept pulling me forward with the solid shooting and great graphics.

God of War (PS2)


I can't tell if my opinion was affected by the tons of praise this got. It's definitely a good game. But I really can't see how it deserves PS2 Game of the Year over Shadow of the Colossus, Resident Evil 4 and Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones. Or in the case of awards givers who cut off holiday games until the next year, how it's better than Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal. Anyway, God of War is a fun game. The combat is very fluid and rewarding, as you progress and become more powerful as the game goes on. There's fairly good enemy variety, although I wish we could have seen a few more centaurs and sirens instead of an overdose of undead soldiers and harpies, and that the Cerberus were just there instead of starting as annoying little shits that spawn like popcorn.

The combat isn't why I like it though, what I really like are the adventure elements and the story. Although it seemed a bit long, the Temple of Pandora was a brilliantly designed area, and really pulled off the feel of an epic, hazardous dungeon. And the cutscenes were more interesting than I expected, by the end I understood Kratos a bit more and wanted to help him kill Ares. The animation on Kratos' double jump is pathetic, but the platforming is fairly enjoyable for a non-platforming game. What really hurt the game was the design on the whole end of it, starting in Hades. They were just lazy (or short on time) here, instead of making what could have been a really cool area, they just threw a bunch of enemies on steroids and idiotic spinning spike hazards at you, and it really isn't fun or interesting. We're nearing the climax, I'm not supposed to be getting bored. After that you fight Ares, and the whole sequence with him is no good either. After the creativity of the first two boss fights, Ares is just a cheap bastard who blocks all of your attacks and winning the final conflict is more about luck than skill. The only redeeming part about the end is how they tied off the end with the gravedigger. So, overall, a fun game, but it's lacking in ways that make it hard to call truly great.

Guitar Hero (PS2)


I don't usually play games that I perceive as having no point, sports games, racing games, and music games. But I tried Guitar Hero and decided to pick it up, because unlike DDR and its ilk, I find it fun as hell. In most rhythm games, you're just timing button presses (or footsteps) to some music and getting points. I don't find it very compelling. But in Guitar Hero, you're not playing along, you're actually creating the music yourself. If you mess up a part, you don't just lose points and get closer to failing, the guitar part drops out. When you get it right, it's like you're actually playing these famous riffs yourself, and that makes all the difference. The controls take a bit of getting used to, but before long you'll be rocking out harder than you thought you could. In just a week I've gone from bad to capable of doing well on the hard difficulty. The more complex the tune, the more satisfying it is when you execute it perfectly. It's also a ton of fun with friends. Check it out if you like fun.

Guitar Hero II (PS2)


Guitar Hero is still just as addicting as ever, as you find yourself continually saying "just one more song". It's still great fun to rock out and play some good tunes, although the setlist isn't nearly as good as the first game's. I hardly recognized any of the song names when I first read the list, although I still heard the majority of them before and just didn't know the name. The songs are all still fun to play and usually catchy, but it's just harder to get into a song and really feel cool if you don't actually know it well.

A couple definite improvements are the hammer-ons/pull-offs, which actually work this time and are necessary on the harder difficulties, and practice mode, which lets you work on and experience any part of any song without having to actually be good. Other improvements are minor, GHII is probably a better gameplay experience but it's just not as amazing when you've done basically the same thing before.

Half-Life 2: Episode One (PC)


Episode One is the continuation of, in my opinion, the best first person shooter of all time. The gameplay engine remains simply the most enjoyable to just run around and shoot things in, and Valve's level design is impeccable. Everything here is created with the intention of making a good video game combined with a strong narrative experience. I love the way Half-Life presents its story, it's just a much more immersive world than almost anything else.

I miss exploring the wide open countryside around City 17, and the game is a bit short even for only being 1/3 of a game, so it might not have been as good if it weren't for one thing - Alyx, thanks to a combination of great voice acting and the best facial animation I've ever seen in a game, is one of the most endearing and likable game characters ever. I really care what happens to her, and it wouldn't be the same if she wasn't around, watching my back. This is one of the times where graphics actually matter in pushing a game over the edge. I can't wait to battle Hunters out in the wilderness in Episode Two.

Best Games of 2006

It's a little late for yearly picks, but it took me this long to finish some of the games I wanted to play. No arbitrary number of selections, just my personal list of notable, great games. It came out to a round number anyway, but that's not a guarantee.

Best of 2006

5. Bully (PS2)


This is partly a feel-good choice, but I just really liked that Rockstar was able to put out a game this enjoyable, and you can't even kill anyone. Sure, you can beat the crap out of people and threaten them and hit them with bottle rockets, but no dying. Seriously, it's funny as hell, charming, and honestly a lot of fun to play.

4. Gears of War (360)


A lot of things about Gears are imperfect besides the graphics, making it really hard for a shooter, already limited by its genre, to do much better than this, so it's quite a rousing success. I wanted to play Gears for a long time, and then I got the chance, enjoyed it while it lasted, and then moved on. I marveled at the presentation. I laughed at a lot of things, like the probably-too-frequent glitching, the throwaway taunting dialogue ("Eat shit and die!"), the bizarre moment where Marcus and his pal turn from grizzled war vets into Vaudeville characters slipping down a wet incline, and the ridiculous carnage of a chainsaw to the face. I wondered about the lack of good weapon selection - there are two assault rifles, one of which blows; a shotgun I never saw as valuable since being in close combat was so dangerous; and a few situation-specific weapons that didn't have enough available ammunition to really spend time playing with. I also wondered why they tried so hard to make a completely harmless enemy like the Grub seem scary. I did have a lot of fun running for cover and shooting ugly dudes in the face, though.

3. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii)


Twilight Princess is a great game that still manages to be overrated. When I hear Jeremy Parish say things like (slightly paraphrasing) "It's like Ocarina of Time, but much better," I literally cringe. Yeah, TP improves on OoT in a number of ways, most notably in graphics and difficulty of block pushing puzzles. But Ocarina of Time was freaking revolutionary. You can easily bring up how much A Link to the Past influenced that one, and I won't argue with you because I didn't play it, but OoT still set the formula for what three-dimensional Zelda games are, and more importantly, how three-dimensional action adventures in general are basically supposed to work. TP doesn't surpass that just because it managed to set the franchise record for most elements and mechanics directly lifted from previous games in the series.

I don't completely agree with Jeff Gerstmann's score, but he's totally right in his points that it's a well-designed, well-executed game that doesn't stray from a formula that's worked in the past but is maybe a little dated. And just because they haven't done voices in the past doesn't mean that's a defining Zelda characteristic. People said the same thing about Metal Gear Solid's camera until they realized the one in Subsistence was much better. I'm probably bashing my number three game too much, so I'll stop. Excellently crafted game, not the best.

2. Okami (PS2)


I kind of wanted this to be my game of the year, though I must admit it isn't. It is a tremendous game though. Amazing art, excellent use of traditional Japanese music sty le and storytelling, great level and gameplay design. Like Zelda, it was too easy, but at least it seemed to be challenging in spots. The faster pace of combat and more clever use of brush techniques instead of a large inventory made it more satisfying, and the final boss at least seemed daunting, even if it really wasn't. It really is a shame games like this don't get played, but at least the will of its developers lives on in SEEDS.

1. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (PC)


No game from 2006 gave me more entertainment than Oblivion did. It's not just a quantity thing though, I didn't calculate this by hours of enjoyment. When it came out, I played the crap out of it, and I played the crap out of it again on two other occasions during the year. I still intend to go back and play the crap out of it some more, since there's plenty of quests I haven't finished. I haven't been a vampire, or even got that far in the main storyline. There's just so much to do and it's all so well realized. The melee combat is spotty in places but quite good for an RPG, the stealth is as good as you'd want, and the depth of the magic system is great. So much of the crap that you don't need is thrown out, but there if you want it. A lot of Morrowind fans preferred that game, and I won't argue against them because I didn't play it, but I can't imagine myself doing so, since Oblivion does so much in terms of the technology that it would probably feel ancient. It's not a big choice for favorite, but it's definitely mine.

Notable Exception

Half-Life 2: Episode One (PC)

I had a great time with it, but as much as I liked it, I can't bring myself to include something that only lasted four hours in a real "game of the year" discussion.

Delayed Entries

These are games that were released before 2006 but I didn't get around to playing until then and warrant mentioning.

Beyond Good and Evil (PS2)

The fact that not enough people played it caused people who did to overcompensate by talking it up too much, which I contributed to. The same thing happened with ICO. Both very good games, both not quite deserving of their adulation.

Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening (PS2)

I actually played the Special Edition, which came out in 2006, but I don't count rereleases. It rightly brought respect back to the franchise, as it's quite the slick, fun, challenging action game. The thing is, it has to reinvent itself a little more fully and seperate from the whole survival horror thing/vibe completely. That was cool when Resident Evil still sucked, but times have changed.

God of War (PS2)

Another good game I think is overrated by most. Yeah, the combat looks cool, but any joker off the street can pull off a sweet looking combo. Just because the animations look nicer doesn't make your combat deeper than a normal button masher.

Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (PS2)

Again, I actually played Subsistence, but I don't count rereleases. Great story, really good gameplay, I'm really glad I didn't have to play with the other camera (except for the final battle for some reason).

Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)

The Colossus battles were totally, completely awesome, and the story was interesting, reserved, and well-presented. The rest of the game could have been better.

I actually played a ton of great games in 2006. A landmark year, really. I'll also do posts like this for music and movies, but not baseball moments of games or anything like that, for two reasons.

1) I don't watch enough non-Yankee games for it not to turn out horribly biased.
2) Even with just Yankee games, there weren't that many amazing moments last year. They left early in the playoffs, and it's kind of hard to have strong, memorable moments during the regular season, in fact, I can only think of one that really stands out, and it's not the five games in four days massacre of the Red Sox in August, which was horribly painful to watch. I've never seen so much mediocre pitching in such a short time.

No, I'm thinking of a game against Texas back in May, when they Yankees were behind 9 to 0 in the second and game back to win on their final at bat. It was amazing in several ways.

1) Obviously, the huge come-from-behind win.
2) I actually predicted this would happen when they were losing 9-0. Proof.
3) They won the game despite three of their starters being out with injuries (still leaving them with 6 all-stars, huge payroll, I know, shut up).
4) They actually had to come back twice. They took an 11-10 lead, but lost that and were down 12-11 with two outs in the bottom of the ninth.
5) Jorge Posada was absolutely ridiculous. He blocked the plate and got absolutely plowed by Mark Teixera, but he held on and saved the run. This isn't a huge deal, but he stayed in the game, and drove in five runs, including two on a walkoff home run that won it. It was the only time all season I actually shouted in joy when the Yankees won.

Anyway, yeah, that was the Yankees season.