Games Beaten 2014

[prfsnl_gmr]

I still feel confused and upset.

As a film noir fan, I should have seen the ending coming a mile away...but I didn't. Regardless, I am really glad you enjoyed the game. The Wolf Among Us is easily the best game I played this year.

(Now, your homework assignment is to watch The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye, two Raymond Chandler adaptations from which, IMO, the game clearly drew inspiration.)

[J T]

I have got to get back in and finish The Wolf Among Us. You guys are getting me excited to complete it. I restarted a few months ago to try to get my wife to try it, but she was quickly turned off by the violence and I haven't gone back to my saves since, but I really enjoyed the first chapter and a half that I played.

[TheSSNintendo]

Finally finished The Last of Us. I might have to New Game + it sometime.

[Jmustang1968]

I still feel confused and upset.

As a film noir fan, I should have seen the ending coming a mile away...but I didn't. Regardless, I am really glad you enjoyed the game. The Wolf Among Us is easily the best game I played this year.

(Now, your homework assignment is to watch The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye, two Raymond Chandler adaptations from which, IMO, the game clearly drew inspiration.)

I bought and read all the Fables comics after beating it.

[isiolia]

I bought and read all the Fables comics after beating it.

I've read most of the comics, but haven't played the game.

[Sload Soap]

I've read most of the comics, but haven't played the game.

I sail on this boat as well. Looking forward to playing the game. Might just chunk out and do it all in one burst.

Star Trek: Legacy (360)

It's kind of weird to me how many Star Trek games focus on violence considering the show's, mostly, pacifist tendencies. I used to think it was more a weakness of the medium but now I think it has more to do with some unspoken desire for Trek fans to let off steam and watch some carnage.

And so Star Trek Legacy is a space combat/strategy game wherein you command up to four Federation ships (or Romulan, Klingon and Borg in skirmish mode), set phasers to kill and blow the shit out of everything. The game wants you to think that there's more here, some more Trekkie staples like scanning planets or investigating nebulae but those objectives will always come with large amounts of enemy ships to obliterate.

The game's main selling point is a story that manages to contrive a situation where it can feature the voice work of all the main Trek captains, from Scott Bakula's Archer to Kate Mulgrew's Janeway. It's a shame then that it's only really Patrick Stewart who puts in anything approximating effort. Bakula sounds like he'd rather be anywhere else and Shatner just sounds...old.

The story is mostly forgettable. I think a Vulcan scientist is experimenting with the V'ger probe and maybe makes herself a batch of logic obeying Borg. It stops making sense pretty fast and just becomes a series of references to older, better Trek pretty quickly as a pretense for explosions. I'm so glad Star Trek has moved beyond such pandering behavior.

Anyway, while it is cool to move from Enterprise to Enterprise through the ages, Legacy doesn't really have any missions that ask you to do much other than blow up enemies and tellingly when it does, those missions suck the fat one.

It also doesn't exactly help that while you can switch between the ships in your fleet at will, you can only control one at a time and the AI for the others is often infuriating. Uncontrolled ships have horrible tendencies to drift off and do pretty much the opposite of what you want.

Example A: One missions requires Kirk's Enterprise to sneak into Klingon territory, lasso a prototype Bird of Prey and haul it back to Starbase. I wanted to grab the BoP with the Enterprise, stick impulse to max, set it on a direct course to the stardock while I used my other three ships to cover the retreat. Nice simple plan. It wasn't to be though. Everytime I set the Enterprise on it's course and switched ship, the 'Prise would turn to face its attackers. This is doubly annoying because with impulse at full it wasn't actually able to fire anyway so it just kept moving back into danger unable to even help. God damn it, Kirk!

This is just one example. The game has four missions out of its fifteen that are ragequittingly bad and the rest are mostly just turkeyshoots. Not awful turkeyshoots but all the same total destruction of your enemy is always the easiest route to success.

All said though ship to ship fighting is actually pretty decent and there are nice touches like being able to do short warp jumps and altering the energy output to different ship systems adds some depth. Also, I think for an older 360 title it looks pretty nice and runs quite well even when things get hectic.

But yeah, the game sucks basically but I did find some nerdy enjoyment from the setting and the attention to detail on the ships.

[J T]

Star Trek: Legacy (360)
It's kind of weird to me how many Star Trek games focus on violence considering the show's, mostly, pacifist tendencies.

For this reason, I think that FTL is the best Star Trek game (without actually being a Star Trek game). And now, with the right mods, you can even fly The Enterprise in FTL.

Thanks to MrPopo for turning me on to this game.

[MrPopo]

The thing about Star Trek is all the ships come equipped with cool weaponry. So people want to see that weaponry used.

[CFFJR]

Well I haven't posted in this thread in a while, so I have a few to add.

1. Mortal Kombat II - 32X
2. Cosmic Carnage - 32X
3. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Arcade - XBLA
4. X-men Arcade - XBLA
5. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Hyperstone Heist - Genesis
6. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time - SNES
7. Metroid: Other M - Wii
8. Donkey Kong Country Returns - Wii
9. Metroid Fusion - GBA
10.Star Trek - Xbox 360
11.Fable Anniversary - Xbox 360
12.Ranma 1/2: Chougi Ranbuhen - SFC
13.Sailor Moon R - SFC
14.Super Tempo - Saturn
15.Crash Bandicoot - PS1
16.X-men Vs. Street Fighter - Saturn
17.Wave Race 64 - N64
18.Mario and Sonic at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games - Wii U
19.Mario Kart 8 - Wii U
20.Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island - SNES
21.Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Eye of the Beholder - Sega CD
22.Ico (HD) - PS3
23.Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - PS1
24.Resident Evil 2 - PS1
25.Wonder Boy in Monster World - Genesis
26.Resident Evil: Code Veronica - Dreamcast
27.Ninja: Shadow of Darkness - PS1
28.Freedom Planet - PC
29.Resident Evil: Revelations - Xbox 360
30.Lost Planet: Extreme Condition - Xbox 360
31.Need for Speed: The Run - Xbox 360
32.Donald Duck Goin' Qu@ckers - Dreamcast
33.Binary Domain - Xbox 360
34.Injustice: Gods Among Us Ultimate Edition - Xbox 360
35.Doom - XBLA
36.Super Smash Bros. for Wii U - Wii U
37.Wolfenstein: The New Order - Xbox One
38.Banjo Kazooie - XBLA
39.Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze - Wii U
40.Diddy Kong Racing - N64

Injustice: Gods Among Us - Xbox 360

I beat the story mode, and ran through the "arcade" with a couple of characters. It was fun, controls well. I still prefer just straight Mortal Kombat, but I have no complaints about this.

Doom - XBLA

My usual replay.

Super Smash Bros. for Wii U - Wii U

Calling it beaten for unlocking everything. I think its the best smash yet, and while I miss the old version of the classic mode, as well as the adventure/story modes, its still an absolute blast to play.

I had a get together on release day, and everyone loved the hell out of the 8 player mode.

Wolfenstein: The New Order - Xbox One

This is everything I want a modern shooter to be. A big arsenal, the speed and mobility that reminds me of old shooters, big badass bosses, the option to go in guns blazing if I so choose rather than popping out of cover for seconds at a time, awesome levels, and no tacked on multiplayer to drag the whole package down.

And to top it all off a great, lengthy story with characters I fell in love with. Loved that ending too.

This is probably my game of the year.

Banjo Kazooie - XBLA

A replay a long time in the coming. Such an excellent game, every bit as good as I remember. I'm working on Banjo Tooie right now as well, shouldn't be long before I'm listing it here.

Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze - Wii U

I didn't think they could outdo the first game, but they did. Returns has the advantage of a few more levels that really wowed me and a couple of song not featured in Freeze, but that's about it. The game is ridiculously pretty, and I'm very pleased with the additions of Dixie and Cranky.

Its platforming perfection and I love it. I'm hoping Retro is working on a third title. And while we're at it, Nintendo should give them another franchise to dip in gold.

Diddy Kong Racing - N64

I've had this game for many years and never beaten it. I never beat it because I never really liked it.

But people talk about how great it is, so I figured I'd power through it and give it another chance. Now that I've beaten it, I have to say my mind hasn't been changed.

First off, I see so much praise for the adventure mode. I don't get it.

"First world, run these 4 races."
"You're done? Ok, now run the same 4 races again, but pick up my loose change while you're out there."
"Found it all? Ok, now go run the same races a third time. Just because."

Repeat the boss fights in the same way. The only different challenges were those unlocked by the keys.

I mean, its fine and all, but its constant repetition, nothing really special about it.

Other than that, I really don't care for the game's uneven difficulty, and I find the controls to be clunky. Yes I'm aware of what a skilled player can do, its impressive, and I've become pretty good at the game myself. When it works, its great, but I still think its clunky overall. I can't tell you how many times I slammed in to some piece of scenery that my character wasn't actually touching.

So, I appreciate the game for what it is, but its no great shakes. It boggles my mind that when Sonic Transformed Racing came out, people were claiming Diddy is still better. There's just no way.

I'll say this though, the game has some great music, and its responsible for bringing us Banjo and Conker. I'm very thankful for that at least.

Enough rambling. 40 games. I'd like to hit 45 by years end if I can. I'll be happy with that considering how little time I actually got to spend with games this year overall.

[Xeogred]

A third DKC Returns with the Kremlings coming back once and for all. Come on Nintendo!