The Games

Of course, what would be a year in gaming without a look at the games themselves?  While we had plenty of ups and downs in this department this year (like every year), there were certainly some games that were events unto themselves and are worth a note here - be they good or evil as the case may be.

The next generation is here, of course, but so far none of the games really feel all that next-gen.  If the next generation is supposed to be about so much more than graphics, why aren’t we experiencing it?  And shouldn’t we have been experiencing it since last November when the 360 launched?  There have been some great games, sure, but is Gears of War really more than a shooter?  Is Resistance: Fall of Man a drastic departure from traditional FPS conventions?  Is the Wiimote controller (can’t you just hear Elmer Fudd saying that?) really such an advance?  If so, why did Red Steel suck so hard?

In any case, following are some of the more memorable games released this year for the current generation and the next one.

Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence

What was so impressive about the re-release of Solid Snake’s latest mission, the 2005 blockbuster Snake Eater?  On the surface, nothing.  There was the same game with a few small tweaks and bonuses - the same kind of re-release we’ve seen from several MGS games - but this one had one thing the others did not.  This one had online play.  And playing Snake online (or playing Snake style online anyway) is every bit as cool as it sounds.  This is the kind of addition that made the game worth buying again and proved that there was still a good deal of play in this generation’s MGS while we all await Sons of the Patriots for the PS3.

Kingdom Hearts II

What is it about these flagship PS2 titles from Square that keep us coming back for more?  When the first Kingdom Hearts was announced for PS2 I was one of those who grumbled “Disney meets Square?  What’s the point?”  Like everyone else who said anything like that, I changed my tune when I played the game.  Then I eagerly awaited the sequel which somehow managed to live up to all the hype - even years later.

Mark Ecko’s Getting Up

Critics across the board gave this game some pretty average reviews.  So, if everyone thought it was mediocre, how is it listed here?  The gameplay may have suffered from some severe problems, but the concepts of this game were off the hook.  It was not that Getting Up presented us with something we’d never seen before (remember Jet Grind Radio on the Dreamcast?), but it took the graffiti tagging culture and wove it into a storyline set in a bizarre day-after-tomorrow future.  It was... cool.  The commercial failure of this game is something of a letdown because other developers, wary of taking chances, look to games like these to see whether they should proceed.   Hopefully the fact that some of us bought and played this is enough to encourage some green developer out there to go ahead with his wacky new title.

Black

Is there innovation left in the FPS world?  This summer the developer best known for the Burnout games gave us Black; an FPS that attempted to  do something new in the genre.  With destructible environments, smarter than average AI enemies, and the complete lack of any multiplayer mode, the game was supposed to impress us by being a “pure” one player FPS.  What we found was that the environments were indeed almost completely destructible (and shooting the living crap out of almost everything in sight was indeed a blast), but the AI wasn’t as smart as it should have been and, after completing the eight or so levels that the game had to offer, there was no reason to play it again.  Pureness schmureness.  If Black had been given a multiplayer mode that was even half as cool as the single player game I’d still be playing it today and so would you.  Instead I’m writing about it and you’re reading about it and saying “ooooh yeaaaashhhh… I remember that game…”

Tomb Raider: Legend

For many gamers Lara Croft was but a memory, dead and gone; killed by her own abysmal games - especially Tomb Raider III, Tomb Raider Chronicles on the Dreamcast, and Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness.  She was resurrected this year, however, in the impressive if not perfect Tomb Raider: Legend.  This is what the Angle of Darkness Lara should have been but never got to be.  At least Lara came back to life to see the dawn of the next generation in gaming .  Now we can hope that the next Tomb Raider really will be legendary.

New Super Mario Bros.

It’s been oh so long since Mario and Luigi shared in one of their plat forming adventures the likes of which helped to make gaming what it is today.  At last on the Nintendo DS the duo is up to their old tricks and the modernization of the classic formula couldn’t have been done any better.  The game is amazing on its own but really gives us hope to what the next Mario game will look and play like on the Wii.