Talking About My Generation Games

Since it's NBA Draft Night and I'm in the mood of compiling my own selection of picks, I thought I shared my choices for IGN Game of the Generation Poll. I loved taking part in these polls and finding out the results even though IGN tend to be doing these Best of list almost every other month.

Now I gave quite a bit of thought as to which three games should make up the top 3 but not nearly as long for the rest on the list. Mostly I just knew the other games had to be there no matter what the order were, most were really early in the generation so no game had the benefit of making the list just because I recently played it. Well, except The Last of Us but I don't think anyone would argue it isn't a game for the generation.

1. Red Dead Redemption - Playstation 3

I wasn't as hyped up for this game when it came out, in fact I patiently waited for the GOTY edition before picking it up and really took my time to play and finish this. But it's pretty apparent this game did everything right even down to the DLC and multi-player mode. I was pleasantly surprised by how good the writing was, now I'm used to playing Japanese games so most of the time the story is just serviceable or sometimes things get lost in translation. Red Dead may be about outlaws and lowlifes but the conversations are never random babbling or meaningless chatters, and you don't have sit through a long cutscene most of the time too.

2. Super Mario Galaxy - Nintendo Wii

Mario 64 was my first 3D Mario game but it was years after release when I finally played it on the Nintendo DS. Let's just say the controls on the DS remake are not nearly as accurate as the original without an analog pad on the handheld. So Super Mario Galaxy was more like my first real taste of 3D Mario platform and the game works so well because Nintendo didn't just do a 3D version of conventional Mario platform levels like how the early 3D Castlevania games were.

3. Catherine - Playstation 3

This was a first day buy for me despite not having played much of Atlus' previous games. I bought this game after being intrigued by  the premise and characters but the only reason I replay this game is solely because of the addictive puzzle/block-climbing. In fact, I wish you could just skip all the evening drinking session because once you played through it once, those nightly sessions can be a chore.

If you look at the rest of my picks, you may think I deliberately left out any Capcom's games but the truth is, most of their game released this generation just weren't very good though Dead Rising is noteworthy exception.

Guns Not Included

Love them or hate them there is no denying that downloadable content (DLC) is here to stay in the gaming scene. What kind of content constituted as being okay to be released as DLC and what content is absolutely necessary to the core experience that should not be released separately as DLC? For a game like Dead Rising 2, i can certainly live without the additional costumes and raised attributes as the game is already filled with enough costumes and apparel in the basic game.

Prologue/epilogue episodes like in Dead Rising 2, LA noire, RE5 or Lords of Shadow? Again nice to have but like an issue 0 to a comic book series not absolutely necessary to experience the core story. A trio of guns from a shooter game ? Now that's a big no-no especially when it's a tough shooter like Vanquish. Three weapons in Vanquish were pulled from the game and released as a Pre-order bonus from selected stores during the game initial release. Playing the game without them is like playing handicap though you can certainly finish the game, removing these guns significantly alters the difficulty of the game. I had no choice but to begrudgedly purchase this from the PSN store recently but it wasn't like Dead Rising 2 where I enjoyed the game so much to the point I didn't mind spending an extra dollar on the game's DLC.

What's your reluctant DLC buy?

Fangs for the Memories

I have been spending a lot of time and money on Castlevania of late, picking up the Limited Edition Lords of Shadow and then the Santa Lilio artbook shortly after. The sheer volume of Ayami Kojima artwork in the compilation is simply overwhelming I'm not sure if all her Castlevania works are there as I have yet to finished going through.

Could this sudden surge of interest in Castlevania stems from the 25th anniversary of the series looming this year? It felt like only a while back when the 20th anniversary package was given with pre-orders of Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin but I guess the years have a way of creeping up on you. I remember gleefully going through the package as every game in the series is nicely chronicled in an art collection booklet and a series timeline foldout pinup. Aside from Mercury Steam's DLC expansion episodes to Lords of Shadow, very little is known of what Konami has in store for fans this year. Hopefully this 25th anniversary of the series will not go by unnoticed.

The Foreigner

I have a very unique history with the Castlevania series considering I was more familiar with the handheld games than its console brethens. My first Castlevania game was Belmont's Revenge on the original Gameboy a game far too easy back then to seriously considered a classic.
Then on, I have pretty much possessed or played every Castlevania handheld game before and after Belmont's Revenge save perhaps the legendary Castlevania Legends. I even have the Tiger handheld game system of Simon's Quest to indicate how far my roots with Castlevania portable goes.

The Castlevania fan in me had little interest in any new Castlevania without team IGA participation like the recent reboot, Lord of Shadows. That was until I decided to try the demo on PSN network and discovered how polished the game was. Castlevania most prominent features like the art design and music remained as striking as ever despite the absence of series mainstays Michiru Yamane and Ayami Kojima. Ultimately when the Red Dead Redemption GOTY edition announcement turns out to be a little premature, I decided to get Lord of Shadows instead. The Limited Edition was still readily available on local game forums and being priced at a standard game was just too good an offer for me to resist. I have learnt to be more open-minded about foreign developers working on big Japanese game franchise after taking the chance and being pleasantly surprised with Dead Rising 2. At the very least Lords of Shadow looks like a really good horror-themed action game, whether it can do justice to the franchise would be icing on the cake for a long time fan like myself.