I would consider the August 25th release of Batman: Arkham Asylum as kicking off the Fall/ Holiday gaming season. Some football/sports game fans might even consider that season to have begun yesterday with the release of Madden 10. Whichever one of those groups you are in, it’s either here or quickly approaching. This is an alphabetical list of the 10 best games that have been released so far in 2009 (Madden 10 excluded) and why we think they’re the best. There’s also a little section at the bottom for games that released in 2009 that you should avoid.
ARMA II :
I’ve never played this game, this was one of Andrew’s selections that I wasn’t familiar with. Here’s what he had to say about it; ” Still an in depth shooter with one of the biggest learning curves.” He also told me during a conversation that this isn’t an FPS for your standard Halo fan, it’s realistic and has a deep set of options.
Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood :
This is the second of two selections Andrew made that I had never played. I wasn’t sure how a game taking place in an era where six-shooters were prevalent would fare, but apparently it’s a good game. “Solid shooting mechanics and it makes the civil war era pretty fun.” – Andrew
Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars :
The highest rated Nintendo DS game ever and for good reason. There’s a decent amount of games that pack the hours onto a DS cartridge and Chinatown Wars is one of them. Most of the games functions from stealing cars, to trading products, to selecting your gun were done using the touchscreen. That really brought me into the game and made me want to keep playing it. This game is fit to bare the Grand Theft Auto name, whether or not the creators of the series agree.
Infamous :
Even though the choices aren’t that difficult to make, being able to choose whether to be a super-hero or super-villain in a game is very cool. Electricity may be all you have to work with, but the different ways you can use it make it a lot of fun.
“Though the powers are kind of one sided and the story is preposterous…its a solid game.” – Andrew
Killzone 2 :
A fantastic FPS with some of the best graphics out right now. The single player campaign was great and challenging, but the multiplayer is even better. A class-based multiplayer system where you unlock the ability to select more advanced classes by earning points in matches. It gets very addictive very quickly. This was almost the only game I played online from February-May.
Prototype :
There’s so many upgrades in Prototype it’s hard to keep track of them all. That’s not a bad thing though, it caters to the play styles of different people. Throughout the game you unlock Wolverine-like claws, Hulk-like fists, a sword arm, an extending tentacle-like arm, and a muscle mass ability that makes you stronger(and allows you to punch foes into red mist). There are different upgrades and consume moves for each of these powers, so just imagine the possibilities. You can get lost in the game world fighting in seemingly impossible battles and come out victorious if you know what you’re doing, and that’s a thrilling and satisfying experience. If you’ve ever been let down by an open world super-hero or anti-hero game Prototype will make you forget that they ever existed.
Punch-Out!! :
Oh, Nintendo, where have you been? Many people, myself included, thought Punch-Out!! was just going to be another cash-in attempt by Nintendo. We all thought they would dumb it down for younger players and force you to use motion controls. Surprisingly they didn’t and thanks to that they have a great game here. If you knew how to play Punch-Out!! on the NES, you can play it on the Wii. Just make sure to flip your Wii-mote and hold it in your hands sideways, feels familiar doesn’t it.
Red Faction:Guerrilla :
If there was an award for finishing a game way faster than I should have because I played it so much, this would be tied with Prototype. I couldn’t put the controller down once I picked it up to play Red Faction: Guerrilla. I think it’s the game engine that really did it for me. Did you play Battlefield: Bad Company and liked the fact that you could just blow holes in walls, but didn’t like how you couldn’t take down buildings? Apparently the people at Volition felt the same way, so they created a game where you can destroy virtually anything you can see. The destruction in this game is so hectic and exhilarating that when I died because I took down a building, it fell, and crushed me I didn’t even care, it was too awesome for me to be mad. The enemies in this game will cut you no slack, so you need to hit them harder and faster. Or you can just blow up everything you can see.
Street Fighter IV :
“It’s F**king Street Fighter!” – Andrew
I couldn’t agree more. This was one of the most anticipated fighting games in recent memory. I love Street Fighter so much i spent $120 on the Collector’s Edition that came with a Blu-Ray and a little Ryu figure (I don’t know why I didn’t pre-order it). This is the other game I was talking about when I said Killzone 2 was almost the only game I played online. Even though I was getting my ass kicked, i kept going back for more. The graphics are just so good, the new fight mechanics work so well, and the character roster is greatly balanced and varied. Many people will be playing this game for a long time into the future.
UFC 2009: Undisputed :
You can say whatever you want about this game, but it is very good. The fighting system is quite deep and the large roster makes pick up and play games tons of fun. This game gave me an insight into the fighters in the UFC and actually got me more interested in MMA. If that was part of what they were going for, then I think they succeeded; the UFC is only getting more popular.
That takes care of the 10 best games to be released so far this year. With the crop of games coming out later this year, I think only a select few of those games are safe for the end of the year list.
Now on to the major bummers of 2009. This is also completely a matter of personal opinion. We of course didn’t play every bad game that was released this year, but here’s what we thought were the worst of what we did.
The Three Worst Games 0f 09 (from Bad, to HOLY SH*T)
Bad
Wanted: Weapons of Fate :
DO NOT begin your game with the main character saying that people who sit around and play video games are losers. That’s not a good way to gain fans. The voice actor that plays the main character Wesley does a great job of sounding like a dickhead, hopefully that’s what he was going for. The game also doesn’t look very good, the story is blah, and the curve-the-bullet shooting mechanic only works about half the time. Stop blindly praising Pete Wanat for only being involved in the creation of good movie tie-in games, because this one sucks.
Worse
Terminator: Salavation :
Shoot robots, don’t rinse, repeat. Do you have a bad taste in your mouth? Its probably because that’s all you did for 3 hours and you finished the game. I’m not surprised you don’t remember playing part of it. You went into that same trance you do when you drive home from work and don’t remember how you got home. That tends to happen when you repeat the same thing so much. There was no reason this game should have been released on store shelves. It’s a $15 downloadable game AT BEST.
HOLY SH*T
Damnation :
You know that part in the Big Lebowski where Walter yells “This is what happens when you f**ck a stranger in the ass!” while smashing the cars windows with a crowbar? Well, this is what happens when everything in a game goes terribly, terribly wrong. There are no redeeming qualities about Damnation. I usually don’t hate games this much, but I played it for an hour because I blindly thought “maybe it will get a little better”, but it didn’t. I played this on the PS3 and the next time I went to use my PS3 it wouldn’t recognize discs. I was shocked that my PS3 wasn’t working. It was obviously apalled at the last disc I wrongfully forced it to play and decided that it was not going to stand for such injustice. Damnation killed my PS3 and cost me $156 and around three weeks to fix (I know it wasn’t really this game that did it). I know I said this was going to be the three worst games of 2009 so far, but I can’t really see any game being worse than this.
