www.minecraft.net
This game was made by one guy.
It costs around fourteen bucks.
It has 8-bit graphics.
There is no story.
There are no quests.
There are no bosses.
There are no spells.
There are no skill points.
There is almost no music.
And I can't stop playing it.
Let me try to explain. Minecraft dumps you on the shore of a randomly-generated 8-bit 3D world made entirely of cubes. There are trees made of cubes, mountains made of cubes, sand, water, lava, grass, snow, and precious metals like iron, gold and diamond.
"It is morning, I can tell by the giant square sun low in the sky. I have nothing, no weapons, armor or tools, not even a tutorial. What am I supposed to do?"Hmm, I know I would feel a lot better if I had a weapon. How do these games usually start? I seem to be able to dig up blocks of sand and dirt with my bare hands and keep them, lets try it on that tree.
"Ahh now that I have some wood, what do I do? There's a crafting pane! Putting the wood in makes wood planks! Making a pole shape with the planks makes a pole, or a handle. Putting the planks in a square shape makes a work bench! Hmm what if I use the pole as a handle and put the wood planks in a sword shape
"Bang! Wooden sword! What else can I make? It would be nice to get some better materials, wood is pretty weak. What about a pick axe shape?
"Pow! Pick axe! Now I can get some stone. Let's make a stone sword, how 'bout some stone armor! Stone pick axe seems to work much faster and last longer, I think I'm getting the hang of this.
"Ok it's starting to get dark, how am I going to see in this dark? I got some coal while picking the stone, ah I can make torches, good deal. What are those noises?"
Gurgling...
Moaning...
Whispering...
Footsteps...
"Oww an arrow wtf? A skeleton! AHH he is killing my ass! SWORD QUICK AHHH! Ok I'm dead... ugh I dropped all of my stuff and I'm back where I started, and it's still night!
Day 2
"Ok, after
a night of repeatedly dying at the hands of zombies and skeletons I've learned a valuable lesson: if I'm going to survive, I need to get a shelter built pronto. I light my new house with torches, make a door, some glass windows using the stove I built and some sand and now I'm pretty well protected. Whew!"During the day I find a cave. Let's follow this down, I'm going to need a lot of torches. It gets dark fast, I can hear monsters in the dark. Delving deep into the earth I come across precious
metals, endless passageways, lava, and even a dungeon full of enemies and treasure! This world is huge! It's scary and full of discovery! I feel like a kid again! Like I'm in my fort keeping the monsters at bay!"My shelter becomes a house. My house becomes a becomes a castle. I build an elaborate mine cart system. I have switches that control far away devices, huge traps that kill the monsters for me and collect their loot. I grow crops, decorate my citadel with bookshelves and colorful paintings, and craft diamond weapons to slay my enemies. I even build a magical gateway that takes me to a terrifying nexus world!
"How long have I been playing this?
There is no story.
There are no quests.
I am alone.
This is incredible."
"Bit. Trip Beat" is "Pong" meets Paul Oakenfold in this retro-trippy, rhythm game. More than a little difficult, I spent hours being punished only to return for more. The music is fun, thumping, 8-bit fair that sets the old-meets-new tone for the game. The stylistic graphics, matching that of the games music, make this a challenging and fun title I must recommend to gamers looking to reminisce about their early days of gaming.
"GOD OF WAR"!!! This game is HUGE! It's MEAN!! It's TESTOSTERONE INCARNATE!!! BOOBIES!!!! Santa Monica has really gone all out with this title. The game play is highly satisfying, the pacing is spot on and the game design is wonderful. It is truly a sight to behold. The boss battles, the enormous set pieces, this is a Hollywood blockbuster on steroids. I found the ending to be somewhat implausible from a character standpoint, but the ride was absolutely thrilling.
I know, this game is actually came out in 2009, but I'm not reviewing that version (which I did purchase for the PC back then). This is a review of the 2010 iPhone version! "Plants vs. Zombies" really shines with touch controls. This one of only a couple of games my wife will play over and over. The graphics and game play are super fun as you try to defend your home from a horde of ravenous zombies! This has something for all types of gamers.
Let's just admit it, "Star Craft" is the king of real-time strategy, and Blizzard is possibly the king of game developers, they're definitely the most profitable. The production value of this title is through the roof. Everything from the voice acting to the multi player maps are polished to a fine sheen. I found the campaign to be well paced, fun, and beautiful to behold. Its obvious merits withstanding, I would have preferred that the cut scenes were pre rendered, rather than using the in-game engine with my getting-quite-old graphics card. Also, the learning curve, especially in the multi player ladder system, is quite steep. It seems unbalanced when you can defeat multiple NPC opponents on high difficulties, but don't stand a chance against the lowest of human counterparts. I had a lot of fun and equal frustration with this game, mostly due to my own ineptitude.
Man this game is heart-racing! "Heavy Rain" broke so many barriers, it was an experience that changed what I thought games could do. You decide how the story plays out. There is no "game over" screen. If a character dies because of your choices, that character will not return in the rest of the story. This also creates a myriad of different endings and plot twists that make re playability high. I have yet to revisit "Heavy Rain" because the experience was freaking intense! I guess I'm still deciding if I want to put myself through this game again, haha.
Bioware is currently my favorite developer. Their stories are so well told, and finally in "Mass Effect 2", unlike the previous installment in the series, the game play has been brought up to match. The choices you make, the incredible graphics, the thrilling design, this game is phenomenal. You learn to love your team, making the final battle exciting on a level rarely achieved in any medium. I played through this game twice back-to-back in order to experience the extremes of the story telling. As a paragon, I was able to save the lives of all of my crew, but as a renegade, I lost one. While my first play through had a somewhat underwhelming ending, I must say losing the crew member really gave a deep emotional impact to the overall story. This marks the first time I have played a game and have been glad for the mistakes I had made. In any case, there are many ways to experience this deep and highly entertaining story. "Mass Effect 2" will top many lists this year.
This game is like fourteen bucks (the price is in euros, I forget what it was in dollars). There is no story. There are no quests. There are no bosses. There is almost no loot. The graphics are 8-bit. There is almost no music. And I haven't been addicted to a game like this since WoW. This game makes me feel like a kid, a kid who is afraid of the dark. A kid playing legos hiding from invisible enemies in the dark. If you would like to read more, I go into greater detail in a post. Do not miss this game.
"Red Dead Redemption" made me LOVE a genre I hated as a child. I won't go into a full rave about Red Dead, as I've written a post previously, but man, what a rich and wonderful world Rockstar has re imagined. I could play this game forever.