The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

I love Saints’ Row: The Third. Completely and seriously. Love it. I snapped up that Season Pass because I wanted more of it. I was so excited to learn that Genkibowl came out yesterday. So excited!

Genkibowl is such a disappointment of a DLC.

Okay, I’ll say this: the actual activities themselves in the DLC were fun enough. I enjoyed them, and beat them all. However, basically all of them were rehashes. Apocalypse Genki is just the normal Super Ethical Reality Climax, but with a different setting and such. Super Ethical PR Opportunity is just a slight modification on the missions with the tiger and the people fucking in the back of your car. Sexy Kitten Yarngasm is just Mayhem, but with a really, really weird vehicle. (To be fair, that one felt pretty different, but still.)

The one event that was pretty new, Sad Panda Skyblazing, was a TON of fun, though. It was fast paced, and full of the crazy that you expect out of Saints Row. That was good stuff.

But of course, there’s not much of it. There’s only two instances of all these events! And while you get a bunch of fun toys, for instance being able to summon sexy Genki fursuit people, and call in a gigantic ball of yarn at any time, you no longer have any missions to play with these toys in after you get them! There’s just so little content there!

That wouldn’t bother me if there was more dialog. I love Saints’ Row’s dialog. A lot. But the boss doesn’t say ANYTHING in these missions. This really saddens me. The Boss talks right at the end, but she’s wearing the voice thing from the opening of the game for absolutely no reason… except for the fact, of course, that they didn’t want to record all 7 in-game voices. Assholes.

I would hold off on the Season Pass if you haven’t bought it yet. This makes me worried. I certainly would not buy this DLC alone. There simply is not enough there. Hopefully this was their “quick out the door” DLC, and the others will have more story to them. I hope.

I was talking with Aesa, and I ended up rambling about Silent Hill 2, and then Earthbound, because they were games I called “must plays.” Then I got to thinking that no, must play isn’t right. I tried “Flawless,” but as I started to make a list, I realized that wasn’t right either. Many of these games have flaws. I finally settled upon “Untouchables.” This list I was making was a list of games that, if I had the magical power to enact change on them however I wanted, I would not touch. They are something special, close to perfect, warts and all. Anything I’d do to adjust them would just ruin the magic, so I wouldn’t. These are likely games I love, yes, but many games I love have things I would fix. Take, for example, Space Channel 5. I love Space Channel 5 from the bottom of my heart, and if I was listing favorite games? It would be on there. But that game is messed up in so many ways. It’s got huge problems that could probably be fixed while keeping its charm and what I love about it! It isn’t an untouchable game.

Does that make sense? Anyway, I’m going to try this out as a series. We’ll see if I decide this is a stupid blog topic or not. I’ve made a long list, and I’ll just start writing thoughts about them, hm? We’ll see where this goes.

As I started writing down the list, one thing hopped into my head which shocked me. Bayonetta is a perfect game. I very much WOULD say that Bayonetta is a game without flaw. That surprised me. I’m still just not into that kind of combo-driven, perfection-demanding gameplay that Bayonetta has in spades. Why would I feel it so perfect? But dammit, it is. It is perfect.

Again, I am no expert at the combat in this game. I cannot do any sick combo videos or anything of the sort. I’ve seen them, and goddamn, are they a thing of beauty. The game clearly rewards that kind of play, which is fantastic. If you persevere, you will become badass. But normally these kinds of systems sacrifice accessibility for that. If you don’t put in that time, you’re useless. Bayonetta’s easy mode fixes that completely. Much like how Rock Band makes me feel like a skilled musician, the Bayonetta easy mode made me feel like someone making ridiculous combo videos to youtube. And while I’m sure the high you get from actually pulling that stuff off, and the much, much more complex stuff you can do if you’re in full control, feels much better, it let me have a taste that I never, ever would have had otherwise. That’s the mark of a great game.

Similarly, I stand by Bayonetta as being one of the best female characters this generation. She has depth, she’s a sexual being without being stereotypical eye candy for no reason, and you like her. She’s a fully realized person, and that is just so rare in games. On top of that, the game has an entertaining and batshit insane storyline that you feel like you could never follow, BUT YOU DO. Somehow, every fucked up thing in the world of Bayonetta quickly makes sense to you. Being that crazy, but somehow that grounded, is great storytelling.

I wouldn’t change anything about Bayonetta. This is a game that should be affecting how people design games. I don’t know if it truly is, which is a shame. Don’t make a sequel to Bayonetta now! It doesn’t need that, though I will fully admit I will play it. But it should shine as one of the high points of this long console generation. I truly think it should.

It’s Friday the 13th! oooOOOOOoooh! And what better way to scare yourself than by reading about BAD GAME DESIGN DECISIONS! ooooOOOOOOOOOOHHHH!

Anyway, Tropico 3. I was playing along, quite enjoying my time with the game. I mean, it’s got a clever angle, and it’s pretty fun, although I knew it wouldn’t be fun that would last for me. Still, I was having an enjoyable few hours with it before I returned it to Gamefly.

I got to a mission where I was on an island that sucked at farming. So the game, after I get going, pops up a tooltip: why not build some fishing wharfs in order to make sure your people have enough food? A great idea! I didn’t know that was an option! A flat beach area is the only place you can really build one of those, but luckily, my island had a long beach off to the side of the dock the game started me with. I prepared to build some fishing wharfs there, and soon enough, they were completed. All I needed then was to hook up the wharfs with roads so the fish could be transported quickly and get everyone fed. I whip out my road-building tool and start putting a road there.

Only I can’t.

The game will not let you build roads with really sharp turns. The game will also not flatten terrain that it considers too intense, like, say, the little rocky mountain thing by the beach where the dock and wharfs are. It also doesn’t let roads intersect with buildings.

The initial placement of the docks was such that there was no way to build a road around them to the only place where you could build those wharfs. You’d either make the road clip into the area blocked off for the dock, so you couldn’t build it, or you’d hit the mountain, so you couldn’t build it, or the road would turn too sharply, so you couldn’t build it. You simply couldn’t get trucks to these wharfs. It was impossible to actually set up what the game’s tool tip told you to do. It took me like 20 minutes of trying desperately to move shit around to figure this out. I restarted the mission three times, figuring I must have placed SOMETHING in the wrong location. Nope. It’s just impossible.

Needless to say I quit that mission immediately and played another one. But thanks for that, Tropico 3! That was pretty frustrating.

SHPACE MURHEENS?!

I played some Warhammer 40K: Space Marine. I was going to play all the way through it, but it didn’t want me to, so, you know, fuck it.

Anyway, it seemed like a competent game? You ran forward and hit people with a chainsword. That’s what you’re supposed to do, right? You can shoot people too, using bolters and whatnot, but there’s only one way to refill your health, and that’s by doing a dramatic takedown on an enemy, so basically you’re only shooting at dudes you can’t easily cut with your chainsword! And that’s fine. That’s certainly pretty much like what I know about Warhammer.

By far the most fun in the game that I had was when it gave me a jump pack. I got to rocket all around this area and smash the shit out of people from above. It was empowering and just totally cool. And then the game took it away from me for flimsy reasons. Come on, game! Just because I’m walking into close quarters doesn’t mean I might not be in non-close quarters LATER. Why did I have to take it off? I guess I’m basically saying that most of the game should have been designed around that Jump Pack, because it was just tons of fun.

Really, though, the game is designed around being stupidly difficult. I mean, I’m a goddamn Space Marine. I’m supposed to be this unstoppable juggernaut. On top of that, I put the game on easy. I should not be almost instantly one-shotted at the same point in a firefight many times in a row on the THIRD CHAPTER OF THE GAME! That’s just ridiculous. If that was the level of difficulty the silly game was demanding of me on easy, I didn’t really want anything to do with it. I’m a content tourist! I just want to see all the stuff! Assholes!

But yeah, the game seems fine and I’m sure the Warhammer fans were very happy about that. I was done with it pretty quick, though. But hey, what else is Gamefly for?

Okay, NOW let me show you my Skylanders. I’m just going to go down the list! Here we go!

Spyro: I was fairly surprised by how not-good Spyro is. I mean, he’s fine, I guess? He doesn’t completely stink. But his damage output is just terrible, and there doesn’t really seem to be a lot you can do about that. His one good quality is that he was by far the most maneuverable of the Skylanders I owned. His Fire Ram thing let him run around maps quickly, especially once upgraded to last for longer. That made him useful for speedrunning through boring parts or dodging the several bullet hell sequences in boss battles, but really, he just wasn’t that good for someone with his name on the box.

Gill Grunt: This guy is the best one you get in the starter set. Maneuverable with his water jetpack, heavy pinpoint damage with his harpoons, decent spray and pray damage with his water hose. He has a good answer to about any situation. I specced him for Harpoons, since Jeff of Giant Bomb fame did the other one, and I was really happy at how much damage his harpoons did once upgraded and made to split into three. You could murder dudes right and left!

Trigger Happy: He’s just amazing to play as, because when you shoot, he’s constantly making these insane laughs, and it makes you feel badass. I don’t really understand why I can’t just hold down A to keep firing. I mean, having to jam on the A button to keep up his rapid fire makes things feel more manic, and I guess I couldn’t have charge shots if that wasn’t the case? But when Drobot does similar damage with his eye lasers and you can just hold the button down for him, it feels like Trigger Happy doesn’t work as well. Still, a solid choice.

Drobot: He’s a robot and a dragon. There is good reason he is Giant Bomb’s Skylander of the year. His eye lasers just do crazy amounts of damage, and once you upgrade his jet flight it makes him decently maneuverable as well. His bouncing gears are not great? But are useful in tight corridors, so, you know. He’s also just one of the coolest looking of all the Skylanders, which means something when you’re getting a toy that sits on your shelf.

Hex: This is the first extra toy I bought. She is very defensive, which is pretty different from the rest of the Skylanders I have. I didn’t get much mileage out of her bone shield because I suck at defending, but once you upgrade it so it does damage, it’s much more useful to deal with a group closing in. Her default attack never gets great, but her skull bombs, which fly up in the air and home in on targets, are incredibly useful, especially once upgraded. They do decent damage, and you can charge them while you run around and dodge. Hex would probably be nearly broken in a two-player scenario, as she could likely use those skulls constantly unhindered.

Dino-Rang: I personally find Dino-Rang to be so lame, he is awesome. He is a dinosaur that throws boomerangs. IT’S RIGHT IN HIS NAME! He is probably my favorite Skylander because of this. It doesn’t hurt either that he is a combat machine. His boomerangs do SICK damage. He can’t fire as fast as other distance Skylanders, but the amount of damage makes up for it, and his little “spin the boomerangs around him” move is really, really good at taking out big groups. I even found use for his little earth traps during some boss battles. This guy is really awesome, one of the best Skylanders I got, power-wise, and if you find his lameness as entertaining as me, you should get him.

Prism Break: This was the Earth Skylander I originally wanted, and I eventually got him. His gimmick is really neat, and he’s a solid guy, but in the end, I stuck mostly with Dino-Rang because he just brought the beats. Still, he is really quite neat, with the way he summons crystals to split his default laser about. Once you get the upgrade where enemies you kill with your laser become crystals, it makes it really easy to fill a room with lasery death, and his crystal eruption attack is also fairly effective if enemies get close, which is nice. But yeah, still prefer Dino-Rang in all his stupid boomerang-throwing glory.

Sonic Boom: I don’t know what to think about Sonic Boom. She throws eggs as an attack, which break open and become little babies which attack on their own. Not a very loving mother! Still, her default attack, with it’s decent range for a melee, bit of knockback, and wide arc, made her a great melee choice for just charging in there and destroying shit.

Stump Smash: This guy looks so stupid! But I needed a Life Skylander, okay? And the one I wanted, Camo, wasn’t out yet. In any case, as far as Stump Smash goes, I don’t really like him. He’s probably my least favorite. I mean, his melee attacks do lots of damage, but getting in there to do them just felt like a death wish. His little acorn thing does a debuff of speed, but that’s just not useful against normal enemies, especially since it’s hard to hit with that thing anyway. I wouldn’t recommend him.

Eruptor: He was some sort of lava man? I really wanted Sunburn but I guess Sunburn isn’t out yet? So I got this guy. His greatest strength is also his biggest weakness. His default attack is thrown at an arc, and it is really useful to be able to hit people above you while they are sniping you, because the vast majority of attacks cannot do that and you just have to run around until your reach the enemies later. Unfortunately, it can make it hard to hit dudes right in front of you. Sometimes the game realizes what you’re aiming for and compensates on his arc? But sometimes it doesn’t. It’s kind of a crapshoot. It’s also a shame his little area effect attack has such a long charge-up. Maybe if you go in that branch of his upgrades, that fixes itself? I don’t know. But it was so slow as to be nearly useless, to me anyway. He’s alright, but I’m sure there are better.

That’s all of them I bought! WILL I BUY MORE?! Probably not. I’m going to be good. At some point, though, I will have a 3DS, and buy the 3DS game, and then all bets are off!

Hello and greetings. Let me tell you about my Skylanders. Well, okay, wait, I guess I’m going to tell you about my Skylanders tomorrow. Today, let me tell you about Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure, a game you can purchase and play on your Xbox 360.

Skylanders is one of those games that makes me wish I had children of the right age, so I could play it all day with them. However, Skylanders is also a really good game… if you can get past the gimmick. Luckily, I kind of ended up finding the gimmick to be part of the fun. So that wasn’t a problem for me! But, you know, I could see some people being really pissy about having to pay 8 dollars for a new character. And if you break it down like that, it does seem pretty shitty! But I dunno, having the cool little statue makes it okay to me. Your mileage may obviously vary, though. If you can’t get over that, then this just isn’t a game for you, and that’s fine. I certainly kind of feel embarrassed being okay with it, but I had fun, dammit, so I don’t really care.

I was asked earlier today “Is Skylanders basically Gauntlet: Legends?” The answer is yes, but unlike Gauntlet Legends, which I will admit to playing a ton of as well, you have a lot of characters that actually play differently to choose from! Seriously, one thing that really shocked me was how different and varied all the Skylanders feel. After my TOTALLY STUPID hunts for more and more Skylanders, I ended up with about 10 toys. Each one feels unique and different, which is hard to do in such a simple game. But they all have their own little strategies and things they are good at, and that’s not even counting the elemental affinities. They aren’t all equal, but they’re different, and since you can swap them out at will using the magical-seeming Portal of Power, any time you feel like you aren’t being as effective, you have a new strategy at your fingertips. It’s great.

There are certainly parts of the game I feel are weak or frustrating. Each Skylander has a branch in their skill tree, and it really only gives you a vague idea of what skills are in each branch. You can’t check them ahead of time. I never felt like I made the wrong choice on these, but still, it would have been better if it had just told me what I was getting for each branch. I felt dirty getting big XP bonuses for buying more toys. I mean, obviously the game wants you to buy more toys: it shows you goddamn sizzle reels for each Skylander and is all like “BUY THEM TODAY!” But somehow that stuff bothered me less, because I wanted to know what I was buying, and those sizzle reels did a good job of quickly running down how each Skylander played. “Oh, if I want to set up laser traps, he might be good. Okay.” However, those XP bonuses are just pure greed. “To play more optimally, buy more toys.” I took their XP boost, but I felt dirty about it. Also, you could often swap Skylanders and, due to how the game pauses or doesn’t pause the action, have your new Skylander teleport in and immediately lose most of their health. I seriously swapped a character in, and had them die before I even got control of them during one of the final boss battles. That was pretty annoying! There are three achievements in the game that are real hard as well. Two I could probably get with practice, but the last one, beating the last boss without swapping Skylanders, just seems ridiculous. I barely beat the last boss using all 10! He was SO MUCH HP! It’s like he’s the last boss of a Mario and Luigi game or something. That bothered me, because I kind of wanted to S Rank this game.

These are minor complaints in the grand scheme of things. Overall, this game was simple fun. It strikes that nice medium where it’s never so complicated or taxing that you need to really think hard, worry, or be frustrated, but it’s also interesting enough that it isn’t a boring grind all the time. It’s the perfect game to play while listening to a podcast or audiobook, or while catching up with a friend on the second controller. I am really glad I decided to give it a chance, and I’m excited that it’s so popular that you can’t even find any toys in town, because I am excited to play Skylanders 2 when it comes out. The things people are going to have problems dealing with are up front: either you’re down with the toys or not. Just know that if you decide you are, there’s a pretty damn good game underneath it all that’s aimed for kids, but certainly enjoyable by adults.

What’s next on my list of things I should have written about months ago? Hm. Ah, Crimson Steam Pirates. That sure is a game!

I like the idea behind the game, as well as playing it. You were a steampunk pirate fleet: nothing wrong with that. The gameplay itself felt a lot like my time back in the day with Pirates of the Spanish Main. You moved all your ships each turn, and then saw how it played out for a few seconds before you picked moves again. It’s a kind of strategy game that’s pretty perfectly suited to the iPad, and I’m surprised I haven’t seen more of them. (I think Steambirds is one like it? I dunno, I haven’t played it.)

The game is microtransaction-based, in that there are “episodes” of content, and while the first one is free, the rest cost money. This is a fair model, and the first episode seems of a decent length. I certainly didn’t beat it. However, it also seems like the first episode is mostly a kind of tutorial, showing you various mission types and ship types that you can have in your fleet. Again, nothing wrong with that, I suppose, but I got kind of bored with it by the time I stopped.

There are plenty of things in the game that had potential. You could assign crew, and different crew members had different abilities they would give the ship. However, this really seemed mostly pre-set: you had a small amount of customizability, especially when you captured a ship mid-mission and decided who would leave your ship to crew it, but not as much as I would like. This game needs you to be able to pick your own fleet, and play missions your own way. I wasn’t really seeing that, though maybe that’s something that happens in later episodes? I dunno.

The game is polished, and it’s free to try, so you might as well try it! Again, it controls perfectly, and might have what you’re looking for. I found it lost my interest really fast because I was not invested in my fleet or tweaking it to make it work in various scenarios. That seemed like where fun would be in this sort of game, but maybe I’m wrong.

Sorry for the quickie: I’m quite tired, but I didn’t want you to go without blog content, even when it’s over something I haven’t played for months and don’t have time to refresh myself on! Am I the worst sort of blogger? You be the judge. Anyway, I’m off to bed.

Let me look at my list of blog topics…

Goodness, Mega Mall Story? Damn, it’s been awhile since I played that. Best clear that off of there. Maybe this week will be “Games I should have written about like two months ago” week.

In any case, Mega Mall Story is Kairosoft’s attempt at making SimTower, and to be fair, this is probably one of the better Kairosoft games. However, in some ways, I feel like it suffers a bit from the smaller scope Kairosoft tries to stick to. They always keep their types of whatevers limited and dole them out slowly over time to make you want to keep going. However, in Mega Mall Story, I was really feeling it. I simply didn’t have enough store types to expand far enough to unlock more store types, and that felt weird to me. You don’t, say, but two different book stores in a mall. You just don’t. Whereas in, say, Hot Springs Story, it made sense that you were putting like a million hotel rooms down of the same type: that’s what goes on at those sorts of places. Maybe that’s just me thinking too hard about the scenario. Then again, you build apartments with your own money, but don’t collect rent from them, but instead just get another customer in the area. So if I want to pick apart the “story” of the game, there’s probably more interesting things to poke at.

But I digress. The game attempts to fix this problem of not enough new stuff by having “combos,” which are strings of stores placed together to make certain types of customers come. For example, if you put a toy store, a candy store, and a capsule vending machine together, you get a “Kids” combo. The problem is, while most of the combos make some sort of sense, the game doesn’t outright tell you about them. You have to either stumble upon them accidentally, or you have to buy them from this guy to learn about them. More unlockables, sure, but I’m not just going to move my stores around for no reason to try to find these things, you know? Plus, when you buy them, you may get plans that involve stores you don’t have access to yet. Not knowing them gives me no way to plan a new floor in a new or interesting way. I clearly thought my stupid original layout was fine. I don’t want to change it without reason, you know?

Still, if you liked SimTower at all, and, uh, don’t just want to buy SimTower under it’s original name, YootTower, on iOS, Mega Mall Story is for you. I find I have more and more diminishing returns on Kairosoft’s games. They are all pretty similar. Yet they all still have the magic of previous games in there. I feel like it’s just something where you should pick the one game that really speaks to you more, whether it be Game Dev Story, Pocket Academy, or whatever, and play that one to death, you know? You probably don’t need to play every single one like me. I’m pretty sure I still have Grand Prix Story sitting on my iPad, as of yet unplayed. But someday I will play it! And it’ll be cool, I’m sure. Kairosoft is good people.

Maybe I mentioned this? I ended up playing a bunch of iPad games while I wasted time Christmas morning and eve and whatnot. It was fun! It had been awhile. I think I mentioned that? I dunno.

Anyway, one of the things I played was the now almost laughably named Sonic 4 Episode 1. Because, there’s clearly going to be more episodes. Yep. Totally going to be. Most certainly going to be more episodes of that.

The game was fine. It’s very much a callback to old school Sonics, and there’s nothing wrong with that, if you’re into that kind of thing. The thing that’s really surprising is that it doesn’t play like complete garbage on the platform. It turns out that Sonic is mostly about holding to the right and then clicking the jump button appropriately, and the virtual thumbstick can totally handle that! You just hold right and just go! It’s fun! It does get a little more complex when you get to, say, boss battles that require you to actually maneuver, but even then, I didn’t find the virtual thumbstick that bad. I was able to beat the bosses I faced without TOO much trouble.

All that said, it almost seemed like too much of a throwback to me. Like, I dunno why you would play this over another run of Sonic 2 or something. I mean, it’s way easier, because they seem to throw lives at you constantly and whatnot, and the levels are like… all generic Sonic level with nothing really new about them. Okay, so, there’s little gimmicks in each level, but in general? Just Sonic level. Oh, look, here’s some Casino stages. Oh, look, here’s an airship of some sort. I’m not a huge Sonic fan, though they’re fun enough? I haven’t played the games to death, but it even seemed dull to me. I dunno. I’d rather play Sonic Colors. It would have a better soundtrack too. (Also, I hear Generations is really great? I can’t wait to try it whenever Gamefly decides to send it.)

But I mean, fuck, I paid a dollar, and it’s a solid product. Just not a particularly interesting one. Still, I’m sure Episode 2 will be even better! Coming any day now! Yep.

There are always games that are considered, but don’t make the prestigious (?) cut of being on my top ten list. Still, I like to point them out, as they’re still fine games. But before I do that, let’s talk about what games are glaring omissions from potentially being on any list. These are games I simply didn’t play this year. They might have had a shot, but it just didn’t happen.

Skyrim: I’m sure I’ll love it. I never got to it.
Kirby’s Return to Dreamland: I will clearly love the fuck out of this one, but again, haven’t cracked the plastic on it.
Stacking: Double Fine is pretty fantastic, and I’m sure this is funny and clever, but even though I own the thing (I bought it during a sale) I’ve never loaded it up.
Fortune Street: What a smart looking board game! But I haven’t spent near enough time with my friends recently to even think about playing something like that.
Professor Layton and the Last Specter: Got it for Christmas, haven’t tried it yet. It’s kind of a known quantity, but it’s good stuff, I’m sure.

Anyway, let’s get to those honorable mentions! These aren’t in any particular order.

Dark Souls
I thought that, much like Demons’ Souls, I would play this as just a curiosity and send it back to Gamefly, but this much-improved spiritual sequel really got it’s hooks into me. It’s probably still a bit more obtuse than it really needs to be. But there’s just something to the very skill-based combat and the way the world feels like a cohesive place you’re stumbling through that keeps me wanting to go back again and again, even as I die over and over and probably build my character wrong.

Neuroshima Hex
A port of a board game I didn’t know anything about, Neuroshima Hex hits the sweet spot between being complicated and being simple. Each of the armies plays very differently and gives you lots of options, and the Hex-based placement system makes turns go fast, but you never feel like a turn is unimportant. Sure, it’s a bit of a learning curve figuring out some of the icons and how the initiative system works, but once you’ve got a grip on that, you’ve got a damn good hotseat versus game that will only be improved once they get around to putting in online asynchronous multiplayer.

Ascension: Rise of the Godslayer
A card game port I didn’t know anything about, Ascension is a twist on the Dominion formula, but instead of picking a set of decks to play with every time, you have a static deck you cycle through with tons of options. In some ways, this makes the game even more strategic, because you always know what strategies are open to you from the get-go, but you can’t be sure the deck is going to deal out key cards to buy in time. Asynchronous multiplayer just adds to how awesome this game is. I guess there’s an expansion now that I haven’t tried? But the base game alone is worth the price of admission.

Virtua Tennis 4
If you had told me a sports game without “Mario” in the title would be anywhere near any best of list of mine, I would have told you that you were insane. However, I really considered booting Tiny Tower for Virtua Tennis 4 on my list for much longer than I probably should have. I just can’t believe how fond I think back on my time with that game. The honestly ridiculous board game campaign was just so much fun, and seemed created just for me, and the way you could make custom “super shots” that tailored to your playstyle was genius, even if they took a bit too long to unlock. If they kept that campaign in the next game and refined it more, I could see me buying Virtua Tennis 5, and me typing that feels weird, but it’s totally true.

Trenched
I guess it’s Iron Brigade now? But the name doesn’t matter. Double Fine made a game that has actual gameplay mechanics instead of just some stuff you do while you wait for more jokes, and that is awesome. The customization on your Trench is a lot of fun, letting you play just how you want to in a group, and when you get four people together online, this game is magic. It has some flaws: the lack of endless modes at launch was one, for example, and the boss battles didn’t completely work as well as the normal stages. But it is a blast. If you have friends you can play with, purchasing this game should be a no-brainer.

That’s it for gaming of 2011! I look forward to playing way too many games in 2012 as well. Off we go! To the future! And, you know, to Ragnarok.