This year I did not lead Niko Bellic through Liberty City, create a Death Knight or chop up dudes with a Lancer. I don’t think I shot a single zombie. Despite playing only a tiny fraction of the games that came out this year, I did manage to log in few hundred hours gaming. So where did all that time go? Here’s a year in hours lost to games:
- 60 Hours—Final Fantasy Tactics A2 –The perfect game for long commutes!
- 50 Hours – Culdcept Saga – Monopoly meets Magic the Gathering; brilliant, but next time, guys, could you speed up the turns?
- 40 Hours – The World Ends with You – Innovative and addicting JRPG from the Kingdom Hearts team.
- 35 Hours – LEGO Indy/LEGO Batman – Unless LEGO Harry Potter really revolutionizes things, I’m done with you. You’ve made the same game 3 times now and the charm has run out.
- 30 Hours – Farcry 2 – The most immersive game I’ve ever played. You are the star of your own R-rated action movie set against the backdrop of war-torn Africa. Still only half way through it.
- 30 Hours – Lock’s Quest – Tower Defense brilliantly adapted for the DS with great art & story to boot.
- 30 Hours – Warhammer: Age of Reckoning – My only MMO of the year, this one was “research.”
- 25 Hours – Pixeljunk Eden – Gorgeous trance-inducing platformer with style to spare.
- 25 Hours – Ratchet and Clank Future – Looks great, but like those LEGO games, the devs are just remaking the same game. Yawn.
- 25 Hours – Professor Layton and the Curious Village—Brilliant and beautiful puzzle collection for the DS with great anime clips. First of a trilogy – want more!
- 20 Hours – Pixeljunk Monsters – Tower Defense for the PS3, filtered through a storybook. Brillaint execution of tried-and-true gameplay.
- 20 Hours – Wii Fit – Not really a game, but it’s pretty much the only thing I’ve used the Wii for in the last 6 months.
- 20 Hours – The Force Unleashed – In spite of some sloppy controls and a few buggy situations, I was totally sold on this over-the-top adventure in the Star Wars universe. A guilty pleasure.
- 20 Hours – Soul Caliber 4 – The best party game of the year. Nothing beats designing fighters that are brawny caricatures of your friends, then beating each other up over drinks.
- 20 Hours – Fable 2 – Fun, and ultimately silly romp through a fairy tale world.
- 15 Hours—Super Smash Brothers Brawl – The only traditional game on the wii I played this year. Meh. Wish I could have those 15 hours back. No more Nintendo nostalgia titles, thank you.
- 15 Hours – Rainbow Six Vegas 2 – My first Gamefly rental, and a solid title, but it’s very sterile and an odd narrative way to follow up part 1’s cliffhanger ending.
- 15 Hours – Little Big Planet – Great game, and I’ve only scratched the surface. There’s so much wonder and whimsy to this game, it’s intimidating!
- 10 Hours – Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune – A polished game that is way too by-the-numbers. Games like this are why I’m losing interest in “mainstream” games.
- 8 Hours – Spore – Considering the hype, shouldn’t that number be higher?
- 4 Hours —Patapon. Pata-pata-pata-pon! Shoot me-shoot me-in-the-head. Imagine playing the same Simon says combination over and over again for hours with little tolerance for mistakes. Sound like fun? Neither is this. Great idea, great look, but seriously missing the mark.
- 2 Hours – Braid – I know everyone loves this indy XBLA title to death, but I found it more frustrating than fun and gave up after collecting half the pieces.
Whoa… tallying up those hours, I think I have a new year’s resolution to make. That’s a lot of time – easily twice or three times what I spent reading! Another trend I’ve noticed – I like games to space out to. Hardly any adrenaline rushes at all anymore, and not many multiplayer games. Maybe that will change with Starcraft 2 comes out.
Game of the Year: PixelJunk Eden/Monsters.
Okay, that’s two games, but they’re from the same studio, so deal with it 
. I got more entertainment from these $9.99 downloadable games than any $60 retail game. Eden fuses indy gaming innovation with pop art polish for an incredible experience that defies categorization – it’s just a great game. Monsters’ storybook artwork and soothing music haunt my dreams. Both games are simple to pick up, difficult to master. And the best part is, you can play them at your own pace. Step away for weeks or months and there’s no complicated story or control scheme to catch up with. My wish for the new year – more games like these! I’ve got my money on Flower.
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wow…that’s a lot of game time >^_^< yea i’m pretty sure even i will lose hours of my life w/ the release of starcraft 2…it’s going to be super cool
hmmm… no guitar hero? Eh, I don’t blame ya for not playing that. It gets kinda boring after about 4 hours… Ever tried Tomb Raider?
Maggie,
I played a fair amount of Guitar Hero 1 and 2, but yeah, I never wanted to be a rock star so the whole thing got boring fast. I’m waiting for them to add tubas, violins, accordians, theramins and stand up bases to the mix for Rock Band: Devotchka and Guitar Hero: Arcade Fire.
Loved the first two Tomb Raiders back in the PS1 days. I’m curious to try out the newest one — it’s on my gamefly list.
Tomb Raider: Legend definitely ranks on my top game list along with Anniversary. Much better graphics and same gameplay for the Anniversary. Angel of darkness was alright but not up to a high standard.
I have Final Fantasy Tactics for the PSP yet haven’t reached past the third fight T_T
What do you think about the Sims games?
RE: Sims, I tend to prefer goal-oriented play, so while I admire the Sims games a great deal, I just can’t get into them.
Aw, no Sims games?!? I pratically oooze my life away on that game, I love Sims 2, got all the expansion packs, takes a year to load on my outdated PC, and I have every compatible hack there is. Even got Jareth & Sarah Sims, and they live a neighborhood full of Dragonball Z Characters (now, how is that for NERD?).
But truly, my life still yearns for the days of Doom & Doom II -[Uh, oh] I’m showing my age now.
Resident Evil 3 was my PS2 fav. I’m not fond of the DS Lite. I have it, but rarely use it. MMROPG games were short lived here, I played City of Heros for half of a year, but it became frusterating when the game moderators changed the specs of my Scrapper twice, and made her as weak as a kitten (bogus), and I had Xp debt the size of Montana from dying so much. It took me forever to level! (Then, those PL-ing cheaters who had a billion online friends and cousins, they always got to 50 in less than a week ~6 months later, I’m only a level 38…was stuck there for a month… ArGH!) ~i’m OK, i’m alright.
Personally, I like a game I can hack and reprogram. Then it gives me that sense of ‘ellysion peace’ I crave in an unfair world. (NOT).
By the way! Happy New Year!
Ohh, I almost forgot, Turok 2! Yeah, that was an awesome game from the PS1 (i think) years.
Aiijuin,
Thanks for the well-wishes! Sounds like you and I have very different gamer personalities. For you, the game it sounds like the greatest appeal is in bending the system to your will, whereas I fall into the camp of trying to master the system presented (which you’ve got to do if you’re into Japanese RPGS). It’s kinda ironic since I’m now working in game design or a living!
I loved Doom 1 and 2 as well. I remember in highschool hacking the school’s computers with friends to play network doom in the newspaper room after class. Fun times!
Yes, RPGS (especially the Japanese ones) definately present quite a challenge. My brother was into those. I loved two particular RPGs, but they were both Ultima based. Ultima Exodus III and Ultima Underworld II, still rank among the highest in my gameplaying experience for RPGs. The N64 had Legend of Zelda’s Ocarina of Time, which is still an all time fave. There are many awesome looking games out there, I sometimes tune into G4 just to find out the latest craze. I also like to hear the reviews. (Being a YouTube junkie): I watch playthroughs of the latest games. It assists in my decision to buy. RPGs also are the most thought provoking games out there, since there is a choice of direction. (Its like reading those ole’ choose your own adventure books). Well, good luck on your game designs! (Are you a designer of RPGs?)
I’ve always loved the Final Fantasy games that I have been privelaged to own (those only being FFX, FFX-2, and FF Tactics) and KH games of course. RPG seems so much more advanced in my opinion. I’ve also mentioned my love for the Tony Hawk games as well. Finally pulling off a 720 christ air kickflip really invigorates the spirit. Never played the Zelda games before because they were mostly for the XBox. I gotta admit that “Flower” looks pretty dang sweet.
Aiijun, you use the cheat codes for Sims 2 or do u play traditionally? I have Sims 2 as well and can’t remember how I managed without cheat codes.
Aiijuin,
Yes, I’m designing RPGs right now (can’t say what yet, as it’s still too early). I spent 2 years working as a writer/designer for an MMO that never saw the light of day — that was sad.
Would one of those games happen to be a Labyrinth RPG? *fingers crossed*
Have you seen more of the daylight nowadays Jake sensei?
Sims 2 was amazing….until it stopped working on our computer T_T Now the only version left to play is Sims Hot Date on the old Macintosh. I made a Jareth and Sarah too, but they don’t look realistic like Sims 2 allows you to do. They live in a neighborhood of Artemis Fowl, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Sweeney Todd, and Howl’s Moving Castle characters. Toby lived with them for a while, but unfortunate circumstances sent him off to military school (or he mysteriously drowned in the swimming pool, can’t remember which)
Jareth is always wandering in the downtown area whenever my other Sims travel there. He keeps flirting with all the female Sims too. Typical -.-
very typical. my cousin has the world ends with you and whatever games can before it. she keeps talking about them and always plays them during family gatherings. which pisses everyone but me off. so, since i don’t like socializing, i sit with her, who everyone is giving a cold shoulder to, and she explains the game, cause i always forget. and she STILL isn’t FINISHED! and OH MY GOD, i want a Labyrinth video game SO BAD! i’ve been looking for one for ages, and whenever i tell e geek-friends-who-play-video-games-all-day that i love labyrinth, they go “you mean that video game that [completely sucks]?” (well actually, they use curse words, but that’s not entirely appropriate, so…) and i always have to explain that it’s not. cause seriously, the “Labyrinth” game that’s out there now, for um…Nintendo DS, i think….it freaking SUCKS! anyway now i’m ranting. i should stop now…
Jake,
I’m sorry to hear that your MMO didn’t hit mainstream. You are an excellent writer, and I would have liked to have sought & bought that one. I won’t bother you about the Labyrinth VG’s, because I can see your writing is diverse as I explore the remainder of this site. (But because of RTL, there is alot of inspiration going on everywhere, you have started a new ‘legacy’ of obsessed fans –
sad to say, I wasn’t really into the Labyrinth until I bought Return to Labyrinth, then “BOOM!” immediate ultra-love, I had to see the movie again) Hopefully, you will design another MMORPG that will be embraced by gameplayers and reviewers everywhere (Goodness knows, this is really the time to strike the MMO market while the ‘iron is still hot’!)
~sorry it took me so long to respond, I’ve started back to college & work this week….
“Crisis Core” owned my life over the summer, and I’m not making any resolutions to lose weight or read more because “Dissidia” is supposed to be out sometime in the second quarter this year. Of course, I’ll find time to bury my nose in “Return to Labyrinth Vol. 3″ when it hits storeshelves in May.
Two of my favorite games are Lunar: The Silver Star Story (on PS1) and Grandia II (Dreamcast). I recently finished playing the latter. If you like RPGs I highly recommend these two.
Can’t wait until Return to Labyrinth 3 comes out!
[...] year I ranked my games by how many hours I played each of them. It was sort of depressing and I don’t want to go through that again. Rather than making big [...]
Hi again Mr. Forbes, I was wanting to ask you, do you ever attend Dragoncon in Atlanta? I noticed they had the artist for The Dark Crystal there last year. Would you and Chris Lie ever go to a massive convention in Atlanta? I’m sure your fans would love to meet you two their. I’m still looking forward to the last return to labyrinth book.