The games of my year 2010

[Prpl_Mage]

Same as last year, short reviews about the games I played.
Also the consoles I bought.

Let's start with the DS.
Old console and I still got a lite despite all these DSi and DSi Xl and stuff. Great size, got all the things I need.

So what did I get this year? 2 games. Kingdom hearts and Pokémon Heart gold.

Kingdom hearts 368/2(?) days:

I liked this game, it reminded me a lot of the original Kingdom Hearts battle wise. They had a new odd / unique AP equipment thing with sizes and shaped instead of simply the points like in the previous games. Pretty imaginative I guess.
But when it came to the story mode I kinda felt like it was rather lacking. They've made all the 13 members of Organization 13 playable but in the story mode you only control Roxas.
At the start of the game you get to go out on missions with each member but Xemnas and Saďax but after that your most common partner is Luxord, Xaldin and Axel.
I thought this game would be all like "Play through Axel's story, play through Demyx story" ect ect. But it only had Roxas.

Also, the story mode is made up of missions. So you take one of the missions available to you at that point and you complete them. And there's basically no interaction with any disney characters. It's usually something like "defeat these heartless", "collect this many points" or "collect these items". So in the end it kinda got a bit stale in that fashion. I still like this game but I got bored of it trying to play through it a second time.


Pokémon Heart Gold:
Let's face it, Pokémon will always be pokémon. If you like pokémon you'll like this. If you are one of those people who claims new pokémon to be ugly and unimaginative - this game is for you. It's pretty much a remake of Pokémon Gold. Except for some improvements there were few changes beside all the additions from Generation 3 and 4.

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Next up : Psp.
I finally manned up and bought one this summer, so many different models and versions of this console out there. And they seemed to have fixed most of the most apparent bugs when this was released some years back.

Games then. Tekken 6, Kingdom hearts birth by sleep, Final fantasy dissida and FFIX(it counts).


Tekken 6.

To make this as clear as possible.
This game is the PS3 game without overkill graphics and the story mode.
You can't costumize your characters as much, there is a "Gold rush" mode which makes money grinding pretty easy and you can gain those character levels against CPU players. (You had to play online to get past 1st Dan or something on the PS3 version).
If you like Tekken and want to challenge your friends without having to visit them - this is the game. It's also pretty good for practise.


Kingdom Hearts birth by sleep.

After a kickass teaser trailer some year back my expectations were high and yet none.
But DAMN. After the intro movie I was stuck. Great game, interesting differences between characters and some new "formes" and stuff which added some more variation to an otherwise pretty stale Hack n' slash. Also, MP is removed and skills are usable as spells.
You have a neat "command system" where you can throw commands into a list and use them with the D-pad thingy of the psp.
 
Just too bad that the characers' stories basically were the same. But I loved the fact that they continued where the other's left off. For example. Ventus visits Castle of dreams and makes Cinderella's dress. Terra visits the castle of dreams and find Cinderella with a torn dress and escorts her to the ball and watches her dance with her prince. And then during Aqua's story you follow her as she helps the court find te wearer of the glass-shoe.
I found this great. Love this game.


Final Fantasy Dissidia:

A fighting game by Squareenix? And it isn't the Bouncer.
I like this game because it's not just simply "Mash attack button". You have slow attacks that hurt the HP and you have rather quick attacks that increases your bravery - which in turn directly affects how much hp damage you can deal.
If you like your Final Fantasy characters and like the universe - you'd like this as well probably.
It's hard, it's frustrating and it can be generally luck based. In other words - it's a fighting game.


FFIX (PSOne)

I downloaded this game to my PS3 and threw it over to the psp from there.
For some reason this game looks much better on the psp than the ps3.
This game is a great game that took the FF series back to its' roots pre FF6. Lots of hints towards old games such as Gulug Volcano or mentioning of old characters from old games. It's a tribute to the series that unfortunately didn't work well with the crowd that learned final fantasy with 6,7 and 8.

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PS3 then, great graphics console. Just a shame that lots of companies seem to put loads of effort into just that - graphics.
Luckily, I played some games that weren't simply relying on their looks.

Valkyria Chronicles:

Can't really remember when I got this but I had no idea what it was.
Then I played it and grieved as my "Soldier" died from a large tank. I learned the game, upgraded things, played through the story and loved it.
It mixes turn based strategy with some neat RPG features as well as Fps(Although I have to add that fps with Accuracy factors aren't my thing. If I shoot a guy straight in the forehead with a sniper and instead hits his body 2 meters away in the leg - it feels awfully unnecessary to have a sniper.)
When it is your turn you pick a character and can move X-ammount of steps and use equipment once. Such as shooting, healing, repairing. But if there's a soldier looking at you as you're about to move - he'll shoot you. So you can't just move behind some guy and shoot him in the head and let the CPU do the same.
It had some neat cell shaded graphics and the overall feeling of the game was great.


Star Ocean Last hope:

I played Star Ocean 3 and it's the only star ocean I've played.
This game felt like it followed the footsteps of the old games. Some stuff was gone and some stuff was added.
It felt a lot like Star ocean 3 up till the end when **** his the fan, I still haven't completed this game yet but I think it's the end at least. It feels very point of no return with fancy FMVs and stuff.

The one thing I can complain about is the characters. Beside the 2 you start with I can't decide if this is making a but fun at anime and game characters or if they just though these were cool ideas.
You have a kid, who is in fact 10 years older than she looks but was attacked by demons blablabla sealed her body. You have a furry cat girl who wants to eat everything, and a angel girl who surprisingly is more blonde than Colette in Tales of Symphonia.
And the like.

I kinda liked the characers of SO3, only Pepitta and Roger were the comic relief. This time it feels like only 4 people are serious about saving the world.

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Wii then, nintendo's masterpiece with lacking graphic possibilities compared to Xbox and the ps3. But it's great, more people make games then.


Onechanbara:

Don't judge me. I don't even know why I got this, it said multiplayer at the back and was a hack and slash. I didn't know that fan service could reach these heights.
To summarize the game:
You are a japanese girl wearing a mix of cowboy attire and a bikini. You have samurai swords and you kill loads of zombies. The story seems like a fanfic and all bosses are the other 3 playable characters.
Super.
Note. The coop only works in free play or survival so it wasn't really worth it.


Monster hunter Tri:

I already made a thread about this some time back.
It's killing large monsters, taking tons of damage and upgrading equipment.
Also you go on quests, farm components and grind for materials.
If what you read above don't suit your taste - don't bother. But if you are a MMORPG-damaged individual like myself - you'll find it rather pleasing.

The single player mode offered plenty of stuff to do, enemies to kill, a sidekick to upgrade and farms to be used. You could give a herb, mushroom, bug or honey to the farm and they'd give you back it like tenfold. Great stuff.

But after clearing the single player mode you realize that you never fully upgraded your weapon. So you go online and read on gamefaqs or the wiki. In order to get the "more valuable" materials for weapon and equipment you have to play against harder versions of these monsters online. And in order to fight them you need to get a high online ranking by earning quest points.
So yeah the grinding became more grinding and all monsters are harder online. So if you don't know anyone in the same continent as you who play this - you'll fight for your life online. Great challenge though.



Metroid Other M:

I didn't expect much of this seeing all the critique it got. But I thought I'd give it a try. Prime was a step to the side of the main series so why should this be a bad thing as well?

Well, I don't really like the controls. You have a 8dir movement, the camera is fixed and you pretty much have to mash the 1 button to shoot everything dead(Or jump on top of their heads). Then in order to shoot FPS as you have to do sometimes - you have to aim the wiimote at the screen. In this mode you can't move and need to hold down the B button to look around - but while doing that you'll get Lock On on everything that you scout over(exaggeration but still annoying).

And sometimes in the story they put you in FPS mode and don't let you move away until you find what they want you to find.
Kinda like, you see some guy dead on the ground. And they wanted you to look and get lock on on a small pool of blood some meters away. This is actually kinda cool, but they don't let you know what you're looking for.

Now for the thing I actually have the most problem with - enemies don't drop life. And most enemies hurt you pretty bad.

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PC:


StarCraft 2:

I don't remember much of starcraft 1, I played it a bit at my cousin's place and thought it was the coolest thing ever.
This time though I finally feel that my years with strategy games paid off. Resource handling, issuing commands at large groups of units. Upgrading stuff, building, expanding. These are the things that might very well decide the victor of the battle.
I don't really fancy playing online and neither against CPU enemies. But when my buddies want to play - I'll enter the fight with all I got. Zerg, Terran or Protoss I got enough experience with most of them to make a challenging enemy and don't expect me to use the same tactics twice.

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So, that was that. What did you guys play this year? Anything odd or special you really want everyone else to hear about?

[HackersTotalMassLaser]

People must suck at other m.

I STILL hear the "too much damage, no heal drops" thing.

[Prpl_Mage]

People must suck at other m.

I STILL hear the "too much damage, no heal drops" thing.

Wobbling the Dpad will make you avoid like 70% of all incoming attacks but once you try to shoot fps you end up taking a couple of hits in a row when you get downed.
Jumping on top of enemies feels rather cheap. They die but there just isn't any effort to it.

And lava hurts like ***.

Also, I think I died like 15 seconds into the first boss fight. He hit me, then he hit me again, and when I got up he hit me a third time and that was pretty much it. There wasn't even the cutscene with the freeze guns.

[HobomasterXXX]

Good PC Releases in 2010:

[X_marks_the_ed]

So, that was that. What did you guys play this year? Anything odd or special you really want everyone else to hear about?

Tried No More Heroes....until the motorcycle (thing) got stuck three times.

[Cerebus]

Call of Duty Black OPS. Was very disappointed. The game isn't all that bad, but I expected so much more...
Cataclysm. New things, yes. But still WoW. And the changes they did with the Talent Points... I really don't like it.
Assassin's Creed Brotherhood. At first I pretty much bought it because my friends were playing. The Multiplayer is fun, though for some reason I have a hard time finding games... it's fun, though.
Fat Princess: Fistful of Cake. Fun, but lacks something I don't know... too bad it's only like 8 player online, rather than the 32 players of the PS3 one.

I might get Golden Sun Dark Dawn if I ever manage to find it. And maybe New Vegas when I'm finally done with Fallout 3.

[Prpl_Mage]

I actually didn't get WoW. Still think it's worth the money which is pretty much 4sek each day if you narrow it down over here.
Anyway, won't glorify it.

What did they do to the talent points? I keep getting annoyed at their new site layout since you can't find anything of important.

Also, my brother got black ops and he liked it at first, then he got gran turismo and later on cataclysm. So I guess it wasn't a lasting feeling of good.

[Cerebus]

The CoD Point system in Black Ops is actually crap. At first it's all like "Nice, I can get the camo/attachment/perk I want when I want!" and then it becomes "Well, there's no real challenge now." and it just sucks. Having to do some challenge to earn a camo, attachment or whatever was actually better in my opinion, because it was more of a, well, challenge. And the maps are pure crap, especially if you're the Sniper type. Luckily, there is a new map pack coming, with two maps already made but not included in the game probably so they could sell them later. All in all, it's crap, after all.

About the WoW Talents, well, it's now completely impossible to be a hybrid, since you need to put 31 points in a specific tree before switching to another. And it's 1 Talent Point per 2 level. No more Ranks for spells, they just update themselves each levels. The huge downside is that now, you often get only one new spell per level, if not after 2, and some spells are obtained way later than they used to. For example, the Mage Frost Armor is now at level 54. Can't remember which level it was at first, but I do remember I had it with my 20 Mage.

I used to like my Paladin. But now.. meh. Consecration is now 30 sec Cooldown, Divine Storm and Crusader Strike both share the same Cooldown, and Divine Storm does way less damage than it used to, they implemented a "Combo Point" like system, which is Holy Power. Divine Shield is now 8 sec rather than 12. And some other things like this.

I don't know, I don't really like it now... trying to adapt, though.

[zuhane]

If you count TF2 updates as new games, 2010 was absolutely fantastic for new games!

[Razor]

I came into this thread expecting a "what games are we looking forward to in 2011" thread
and I'm rolling with it

Portal 2 and Duke Nukem Forever (lol)

[SaiKar]

I bought a DS last year and have been buying one game every two months or so, so it's all new to me!

[Zerlina]

Duke Nukem Forever

AHAHAHHAHAHAHA!


But seriously. Real games.

[HobomasterXXX]

AHAHAHHAHAHAHA!


But seriously. Real games.

But it's been confirmed for release!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[A Forgotten Legend]

http://www.dukenukem.com/

[Zerlina]

I know it. I don't believe it.