Games I beat in 2011 or played enough of that I know I don't want to finish them. My focus this year has definitely been trying to diminish the backlog a bit.
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While the Tales series often receives criticism for not acknowledging that JRPGs are supposed to have dark and/or angsty story elements, I found the bright, colourful, uncomplicatedness of Vesperia to be totally refreshing. Just after the 2010 holidays, I spent about 20 hours playing this game and was impressed by the art style, characters and deep, but easy to grasp skill system. Unfortunately, I've never much liked fighting-game style combat in RPGs and wound up getting tired of the combat system before finishing the game. I will likely pick this up again at some point.
I spent most of the second half of 2010 playing P3P (I completed the story 3 times -- I was working on a FAQ for it at one point), but I have also played my share of it during 2011 as well. Persona 3 is, without much doubt currently, my favourite game. It has become my go-to when I'm having a bad day or am in need of a sure distraction. I will likely play this at least once per year for many years to come.
While I have never been particularly interested in brain teaser puzzles, the stories in the Layton games have received so much praise that I decided to try this one out. Unfortunately, I found myself FAQing the puzzles to death in order to advance a story that I found wasn't worth making the effort over puzzles I didn't enjoy. This series is definitely not for me.
This shit is bananas. Glad I played it, had an awesome time, also glad I never have to play it again.
Classic. One of the most hilarious adventure games ever made.
As a big fan of the Ace Attorney series, I found AAI to be a pretty tremendous disappointment. I've always liked Edgeworth and was excited about playing a game that was centred upon some of his adventures in prosecution, but the further I got in to AAI, the more it started to feel like a cash-in. I was happy for some of the fan-service and felt like side characters from the series were incorporated in interesting ways and I enjoyed meeting a lot of the new characters as well. Unfortunately, the writing in the cases themselves felt rushed and ill-considered: the sad attempts at multiple crowning moments of awesome in the final case are probably the best example. Also, despite there being almost ridiculous limitations on Edgeworth in some instances, I felt like this game utterly failed at creating the kind of tension I felt while playing the first two Ace Attorney games.
Digital: A Love Story was one of the few games that actually drew my attention away from Persona 3 Portable in 2010. After recommending it to some friends and seeing that its creator had recently released a new game, I decided to give it a second playthrough. It was just as good, if not better, the second time around.
I most definitely did not connect with this game as I did with Digital: A Love story. I felt like the subject matter in the story was fairly timely and interesting, but the ending that I got felt stunted and awkward without making me want to replay the game to see one of the other endings. I also found the anime-style art to be a little jarring since I generally don't associate it with high school kids in Ontario.
I had a great time re-playing The Longest Journey for the first time in a very long time (probably too long). I decided to download this and give it another try after being so disappointed in Ace Attorney Investigations. I wanted to play a game that had a story that would grip me and hang on until I was finished, and it definitely served that purpose. I've been thinking about re-playing Dreamfall as well this year, but I'm not sure I want to tackle those horrible stealth and fighting mechanics just now.
With regards to setting and tone, L.A. Noire is kind've my video game wet dream. L.A. Confidential is probably my favourite movie of all time and I've been a huge fan of James Ellroy's novels since I first started reading them when I was a teenager. I felt like L.A. Noire did a great job at bringing the spirit of both the actual time period in which it takes place and also the fictional genre it's borrowing tropes from. The cases were interesting and so was the overarching story about G.I.s and their issues after the Second World War. The game collapsed a bit, however, under the weight of its own repetitiveness. The 3 types of action sequences as well as the interrogations were far too repetitive and felt a little too gamey in such an otherwise immersive world. I would love to see a much-improved sequel to this game, but it's very unlikely. Amazing and disappointing all at the same time, but still one of the best games I played in 2011.