Final Fantasy XIII
Square-Enix is hitting two years in the row with this award, and it is only that much more hair pulling when it is the bigger, more anticipated release. Announced back in 2006, the first grand entry of the Final Fantasy series on the HD systems stumbled on its face. Though I was not a fan of Final Fantasy XII, I was damn proud of the fact that Square-Enix slapped the mindset of JRPG’s in the face and said that change can exist when it comes to the genre they helped forge. So why did they retreat to many of the stereotypes we got sick of? Linearity, a lousy story, a good but very flawed battle system and the annoying characters Snow and Hope held back a giant that could have expanded its audience like how Final Fantasy VI and VII did before it.
BUT! I do have to admit that one aspect I loved in the game was Lightning, the very strong willed heroine of the game. From beginning to end, she truly stood out as a terrific lead character that shared her strength with her comrades. Great leads are an element that many Final Fantasies lack, with Vaan, Tidus, Squall, and yes, Cloud as great examples. Ironically, Lightning's the strongest lead I've seen from a Final Fantasy since the last female lead, which is Terra from Final Fantasy VI.
Donkey Kong Country Returns
When I think of the 16-bit days, Rare’s Donkey Kong Country 1 & 2 where absolute masterpieces in my eyes. The first one caught me off guard with some amazing pre-rendered visuals and slower, yet steadier platforming, and the second installment outdid the first in every way. Longer, brutal and containing my favorite game soundtrack ever, DKC2 was 16-bit platforming at its finest and it holds up today. So when Nintendo announced that Retro Studios, the guys behind resurrecting the Metroid series with the superb Prime trilogy, took the reigns of DKC, I was thrilled to say the least. Sadly all Retro did was take the idea of Rare’s design of the first DKC and watered it down. No Kremlings, no underwater stages, no significant focus of barrel throwing, boring mine cart stages and a continuing reminder of its overall inferiority of what made DKC great (a similar feeling of what I felt with DKC3), Donkey Kong Country did not return, it rusted.
With the bad behind us like 2010, we’ll continue by starting the honors as always with the runner-up:
GotY Runner Up: Super Mario Galaxy 2
When Mario Galaxy 2 was announced, I was quite shocked and for good reason. It’s a very un-Nintendo move with having such a relatable sequel to a Mario game and having it on the same console, to the point that I had to wonder why it exists. Then I played it. While I liked Mario Galaxy a lot, the sequel blows it out of the water in every way, shape and form. I hear of sequels that goes leaps and bounds over its predecessor like with this year’s Red Dead Redemption, but Galaxy 2 takes what is known as the best game on its console and iron out any faults to create a wonderful and near-flawless game. This is one of those rare games that are so well crafted that when something wrong happens, you know (whether you admit it or not) it was your fault. Super Mario Galaxy 2 is placed as one of my favorite games of all time and a testament of how pixel-perfect the gameplay of 3D Mario games are since my favorite game of all time: Super Mario 64.
Game of the Year - Halo: Reach
I wouldn’t have guessed this when I saw its announcement. Or when I played the beta. Or when I bought it. Or when I beat the campaign. I knew when the year ended and I was still playing all fronts of the game: campaign, firefight and matchmaking consistently.
This is Goodbye…
Halo Reach is the swan song of Bungie’s involvement of one of the most influential gaming franchises of all time. Reach takes the decade of experience that Bungie has learned since the original Halo and masters the pick up and play formula the series is known for. Leading the way after 2009’s awesome Halo 3: ODST, Reach again does not star Master Chief, but as another Spartan, Noble 6, right before the events of Halo 1. He or she (since they are customizable) joined the NOBLE Team to investigate an incident that first thought to be an anti-military action by civilians, but then realized it’s the dreaded Covenant invaded the planet Reach. The planet was always mentioned in previous Halo games, but it was always about how mutilated it became after the Covenant invaded it. Because we play these events, we see how the planet falls against impossible odds against an enemy that was too swift with their strike. Reach is as sad as ODST was lonely with the story containing unexpected twists, desperation and concluded by a very depressing finale. Reach and ODST really show the maturity the franchise developed since abandoning the superhero Master Chief story arc, and it’s better because of it.
…A Long Lasting Goodbye
Halo has always been famous for its multiplayer with its superb splitscreen/LAN matches from Halo 1, rewriting the rules for online multiplayer with Halo 2 and the introduction to Firefight in ODST, but Reach fine tunes all of those fronts. This is one of the biggest reasons that I have such a high regard for this game because it brought me back to something I thought was lost to me forever: online multiplayer. Since the somewhat-disappointing Halo 3 and the rise of popularity of Call of Duty, I have completely lost interest in playing against strangers on Xbox Live. Perhaps it’s because the gameplay in Reach performs so well, because that the community is much more grown up than it was before or perhaps it’s because the loud kids play Call of Duty now.
Reach’s multiplayer beta back in the spring really hooked me, which was unexpected, but the final product has me truly addicted. The thanks goes to daily and weekly challenges for matchmaking, campaign or firefight that score you bonus experience points (XP) for completing them. You always have to come back to those challenges because once you gain a lot of XP and earn a high enough rank, regular matches doesn’t net you enough XP to level up in a fast enough rate.
Matchmaking hasn’t changed much in Halo, but that’s a good thing. The series has a special flavor that really makes you feel at home from the same consistent text that tells you to “Hold X to pick up weapon” to the omnipotent voice that declares the start of a multiplayer round. The game has an easy menu system to show all the playlists to choose from: Team Slayer, Team Objective, Rumble Pit, Multi-team, etc. Thanks to user input, Reach added more playlists to divide people’s tastes to a dedicated direction like Community Slayer, DLC-only matchmaking, Campaign co-op matchmaking, Infection (formally Zombies) and my all-time favorite, SWAT.
Though I faded from matchmaking fights online in the last few years, my return was like riding a bike all over again. Thanks to the perfect balance that Reach’s weapons have like with the new Needle Rifle, a fixed Needler, the upgraded DMR Battle Rifle, ODST’s Magnum and good old Assault Rifle and Sniper (plus more) as well as grenades and melee damage. What’s better is what’s not in the game anymore, mainly Halo 2/3’s SMG and dual wielding because they seemed to be the reason why Halo felt so unbalanced. For once in a Halo game, you can have the ability, talent withstanding, to perform a strategic kill with any weapon.
Multiplayer for Everyone
One of the best things to happen in multiplayer was adding a mode that instead of fighting one another, players need to work together to tackle waves of enemies. Halo’s introduction to such a mode with Halo 3: ODST’s Firefight, and it rose to a new level with a wide level of customization with make-your-own skulls, stipulations, custom enemy waves and more. Elites make their debut in this mode too, so all available Covenant troops (besides Prophets) are now available to kill. In addition, Bungie added Firefight for matchmaking too, so you’re not stuck with only those that are on your friends list. The mode is a blast to play, especially if you choose the Rocketfight and Sniperfight matches since they have unlimited ammo and the latter is pretty good sniper practice. Not as popular in Firefight however is the poorly implemented versus mode. Similar to Left 4 Dead’s, players can be Elites in Firefight as long as there are human-controlled Spartans, but with the lack of matchmaking and no option for CPU Spartans, it’s a wasted mode with a lot of unused potential.
Reflection of a Legend
Seeing Bungie step away from Halo is upsetting because I’m afraid that we won’t see the series in this high of regard for some time. These guys built a community that they love with toys, books, graphic novels, collectors/legendary editions and even an online sitcom, and took the industry by storm. In the end though, it’s the games that make those other experiences worthwhile and Reach is the best Halo game yet. Bungie shows us with the development, final product, and post-launch updating that Reach is a true example of lessons taught, listening to their fanbase and never thinking that anything is good enough in an industry full of Ubisoft/Activation-like franchise milking, Nintendo/Sony-ish bullheadedness and Midway/Eidos-style wrong turns (time and time again). Reach has an effect on me that I haven’t felt since 2001’s Super Smash Bros. Melee where I am so determined to practice it while constantly having so much fun with it every day. It brought back the meaning of online multiplayer to not only me, but also friends who thought to never renew for Xbox Live again. Finally, it also has the power to keep drawing me in even though I have a pile of games that are still unopened and craving to be played, not to mention ending a Pokémon HeartGold/Picross 3D/Dragon Quest IX streak that glued me to my Nintendo DS for months.
It’s cute that at the end of most of Bungie’s announcements and events such as the Reach beta, they end it off with “Love Bungie,” well it’s time for me to tell those guys that I love them right back. And thanks.
Quick Honorable Mentions:
No More Heroes 2- A well done sequel to a game that had one too many flaws.
Mass Effect 2- Winner of the most GotY awards that I’ve seen, Shepard’s sequel smoothed out all the edges of the first to make one heck of a third person shooter/RPG. Its steady flow of DLC had me coming back to it a few times throughout the year.
Sonic & Sega All-Star Racing- An excellent kart racer that I must say beats the tar out of Mario Kart Wii.
Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver- Remakes to the best Pokemon games ever with the updated gameplay of Pokemon Platinum. Not only are they just as addicting as the games before it, HeartGold and SoulSilver contains the longest campaign of all four Pokemon generations. I was exclusively playing this all spring. The Pokewalker was a neat little device that saw it’s milage with conventions like PAX East.
Picross 3D- They took my personal GotY of 2007 and transformed it to cubic sculptures instead of 2D pictures. Still proving itself as the best puzzle series ever in my eyes.
Red Dead Redemption- Westerns were something I always wanted a good game out of and Rockstar finally did it. To me, the sandbox genre for a western feels more complete than the urban setting of GTA, though it was Rockstar’s top tier amount of depth is why I can say that.
Dragon Quest IX- A really good evolution to the long running Dragon Quest franchise adding a Borderlands-style co-op to a turn based RPG. Me and my girlfriend played this all summer while friends of mine easily when into triple digits worth of playtime hours.
Professor Layton and the Unwound Future- I still say this series is a must play for everyone. The gameplay hasn’t changed one bit, but the story is as cunning as ever.
Goldeneye 007- A classy, modern retelling of the Goldeneye movie. Eurocom really gave Wii owners one heck of a FPS.
Sonic Colors- Hell must have frozen over with two Sonic games here. Colors is absolutely worth playing since they finally made a good Sonic game. Here’s the catcher: it’s not just good, it’s a surprisingly superb platformer.
