2010: Never Forget - ChaseB's Blog

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ChaseB's Blog

2010: Never Forget Stuck

Posted on January 3, 2011 at 07:24 PM.

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When it comes to video games, it's sometimes shocking how quickly gamers and media alike move on to that "next big game" on the horizon. Games are too often seemingly forgotten and pushed aside the same week that they are released.

It's an alarming ongoing trend, but it's also perfectly understandable. Simply put, new games are exciting. It's fun to talk about them, and it's even more fun to speculate about how good or bad an upcoming game is going to be. You see similar trends here at Operation Sports. You can scope out someone talking about their predictions for 2011, or you can simply go to the forums and witness the popularity of anything that is considered a "preview" for the next big sports game.

At the same time, when a new year rolls around it's also very popular to look back at the year that was and review what the biggest stories and games were from that year. In a way it's absolutely idiosyncratic. We're all so eager to move on to the next big game, yet we make a big deal out of the end of year awards and take the time to look back on everything we played too little or simply ignored?

Really?

Regardless, that's the way it is. Operation Sports will be doing end of year awards here in the coming weeks, and I'm sure each one of the editors or writers will have a moment where he realizes how little he played some title or just completely ignored another.

But I don't want to talk about our end of year awards in this space. What I want to do here is cobble these two conflicting forces together. I want to look back on the year that was, but I just want to look back at some "smaller" games, stories or moments. There will be no talk of Call of Duty or NBA 2K11 ahead.

Video Games Come Out All Year?

This might have been the most consistent year of game releases ever. Do you realize that Mass Effect 2 came out in January? Whether that particular decision was by design or because of a late delay, it was refreshing to see a game of that magnitude released right after the holidays.

Bayonetta and Darksiders were delivered to us during the first week of January. In addition a new S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and BioShock came out in February, as well as the PS3-exclusive Heavy Rain. The summer months were still lighter than they probably should have been, but overall it was nice to be able to play big games all year long.

This game came out in January!?

Since we are so preconditioned to assume that every big release is going to come out during the final couple months of the year, the 2010 release schedule even made the fall release season seem almost light and disappointing. While it seems like next fall will mark the return of "too many games too little time" for gamers everywhere, hopefully the rest of 2011 will be as consistent as 2010.

Ultimate Team Invades More EA Sports Games

I have already talked about my love for NHL 11 Ultimate Team in the past (I believe I own over 1,600 players at this point). Plus, this is hardly a small story in the grand scheme of things. After all, when it comes to sports gaming and gaming as a whole, microtransactions are one of the biggest stories of the year.

Weekends have been destroyed by this mode.

Still, I don't want Ultimate Team as an idea to be overlooked. I love online team-based modes and their various forms in most sports games, but those modes rely on other individuals. Ultimate Team is unique in that it's a cure-all mode for people like me. It's something you can do on your own while online, yet you don't have to simply choose from the same 30 or so authentic teams during every head-to-head online match. Instead you have a team that is always changing. For people who can never stick with a franchise or just have no interest in playing the CPU, this is a perfect mode for them.

So from a selfish standpoint, it's good to see Ultimate Team succeeding and "infecting" all of the other EA Sports titles because it's easily my most-played mode this year.

Enslaved Out Uncharts "Uncharted"

Yeah, I made up a word for an awful pun, deal with it.

I really don't think any other series has received as much universal praise as Uncharted has during this generation of consoles. And, for some reason, the game seems to resonate even more with sports gaming fans. There is an unequivocal love affair with Uncharted here at Operation Sports; it's not even surprising anymore to see someone preface what they're about to write about Uncharted by saying, "I usually just play sports games but..."

All of that praise is certainly deserved, too. Uncharted has set the gold standard for cut scenes in video games. (I am not a believer in cut scenes in video games, but the ones in Uncharted are so well done that even I have no desire to skip them to get back to the action.) Nathan Drake as portrayed by Nolan North does Indiana Jones proud, and everything that might be "borrowed" from the Indiana Jones series still works in the Uncharted series.

The magic of the half-tuck is undeniable.

Enslaved hits on a lot of the same high notes as Uncharted. The graphics are not on the same level as Uncharted, and the overall gameplay is not either, but Enslaved sets the new gold standard on a presentation front. With the help of Andy Serkis, The characters on screen never look out of place, and there is a palpable sense of believable emotion that is generally hard to get across in a video game.

And when combining the richness of the characters with the soundtrack and cut scenes, Enslaved hits all the high points.

Perhaps the best argument I can make for Enslaved is that at the end of the game, the developers basically just let Andy Serkis take it home and make the finale of the game work. Without Serkis and the overall story of Enslaved, this game is nothing more than an average title with played out game mechanics. (However, I do think the fact that most of the game is an escort mission -- something that is generally despised in gaming -- and that element never gets in the way is an amazing accomplishment.)

The elements beyond the gameplay are top notch, and they are the reason I will remember this title more than any other from 2010.

There is not a character alive that has delivered the word "Okay" in a more convincing fashion.

The Rise and Fall and Rise of THQ

Speaking purely about the quality of the games, it was certainly a strange year for THQ. There was plenty of goodwill built up after the first UFC Undisputed was released in 2009, but much of that went out the window after version two came out this year. There was also a good amount of hype for Smackdown, but again, the promises did not quite live up to the end result.

So what should have been a great year for these two marque franchises ended up as just average years.

And from an in-game perspective, neither game was "rising" to end the year. The Nexus DLC for Smackdown was unimpressive (it gets some slack for a first attempt at worthwhile DLC), and UFC is simply stagnant at this point.

So the real reason I think the teams behind these games are rising again is because of the community focus. THQ has a renewed focus on the community, and the community is reciprocating by helping THQ out by filling out surveys for both UFC Undisputed and Smackdown.

When Undisputed comes back in 2012, and as Smackdown continues to try and find itself in 2011, I have to believe the renewed focus on the community will only help to improve these games for the communities they are being made for in the first place.

Too Many Racing Games

Blur, Split Second and ModNation Racers. These three games epitomize the point of this list.

All three of these titles came out during a seven-day window of racing-game overkill. And all three were mostly forgotten by the masses. I love the "holy crap" moments in Split Second; Blur hit that Mario Kart note just right for some; and ModNation Racers was customizable and inviting. Still, it would be hard to find anyone who spent a sizable chunk of time with all three games.

If you played Blur, then you probably missed out on ModNation Racers or Split Second.

Maybe that's a good thing, but Blur led to the possible downfall of Bizarre Creations; Black Rock Studios has once again not received the recognition (or sales) it deserves (Black Rock Studios also developed Pure), and a strong first-party title from Sony was not met with the same amount of attention as something like LittleBigPlanet.

If these had been spread out throughout the year, maybe the results are different. Either way almost every gamer missed out on a very good racing game because of the released-and-forgotten cycle mixed with just a dash of release date bungling.