by mento
Hooray, a new one of these. What eclectic mix of interactive entertainment will appear on here over the coming months? Can I beat last year's total? Will anyone care? The answers to these questions and more, only on Mento's "List of Games Beaten in 2011".
So let's answer some of these questions, and others, with another stats round-up like I did with 2010's list. Maybe it'll be of interest to you, mister random person who probably clicked this list in error:
Showing 1-10 of 59 items
02/01-13/01. So it turns out this game is really big. I've spent the better part of two whole weeks just blowing up army bases and statues of a Kim Jong-il knock-off. It's still pretty awesome though.
13/01-15/01. Man, this game is harsh. While Retro Studios gets kudos for injecting a lot of DKC nostalgia into this reboot, I don't recall them ever being all that hard, and certainly not to this extent. Worthy of note is the Mario Galaxy-esque cinematic dynamism of each stage, though (oddly enough) not knowing what the hell was going to happen next was more often than not detrimental to DK's survival.
17/01-19/01. Kind of ambivalent about this one. I liked all the references, even if I'm not the biggest horror/King fan (though those Night Springs things were fun.) There's only so many hours you can spend running through a dark forest with possessed hicks chasing you before it gets monotonous though. Good lead up to Dead Space 2, mind, which I hope to play very soon.
2010-20/01. Arbitrarily decided that the cut-off point was when I unlocked everything. Maybe it should've been once I'd heard all the conversations at least once. One of those games, like Crash Course, that costs so little its only requirement is that it's not a complete waste of time. Which this wasn't.
22/01. This.. barely counts as a game. That's not a knock on its obvious amateur qualities (which, like most of the game, is oddly charming) but its generally minuscule length and difficulty. Still, it did come free with its apparently way-meatier sequel, so watch out for that. On this list I mean.
23/01. Well, I did say I'd get around to it sooner than later. This one was a bit prettier, smarter, trickier and Hitlerier than the first game, none of which are a bad thing for a sequel to be (except maybe Hitlerier). For the £1.50 I paid for the duo, definitely good value. If only more Indie games were as cheap as they are brief and satisfying.
28/01-03/02. One of those glitchy, labor-of-love CRPGs from a country no-one's heard of ("Germany"?), beloved of the Snider and those of a similar disposition. It was quite a bit of fun, just to explore a whole island on my own terms (kind of a theme this year, what with January's Just Cause 2). I also love the ridiculous old-school charms of a bottomless inventory and managing to somehow sneak away with something you shouldn't from an area or NPC way too high-level. I should add more 90s PC CRPGs to this year's playlist. Screw all this indecipherable Zettai Hero Project and Resonance of Fate garbage I had going on.
04/02-06/02. Like the first, it's definitely serviceable as survival horror IN SPACE! but it doesn't feel like a whole lot has changed or improved. It's now become a "franchise" instead of a video game series, with this, the gaiden games, the books and the cheaply-animated movies simply repeating scares and set-pieces to move a larger plot along. Well, fuck them and their marker.
08/02-12/02. Nice looking game. Amateurish in parts, but definitely a class product from Messrs Holowka and Yu in the then re-emerging Indie market. Of course, now it's a pretty big industry of its own, and I can't help but feel this game (and Cave Story) probably can take some credit for that. As well as the sad reality that every fifth Indie game now is a Metroidvania, but I suppose there are worse genres for the Indie machine to be stuck on (tower defense, tower defense, TOWER DEFENSE).
13/02-23/02. Well. Well, well. Certainly not the disaster I was anticipating, but also not exactly a step in the right direction if JRPGs (and Japanese games in general) want to stay a significant force in the industry. I'm not saying the watered-down, glorified shooter/sandbox WRPGs are any more imaginative, but Final Fantasy badly needs to make bold strides the way FF12 did while simultaneously cutting the dead weight: Nomura, ATB (i.e. waiting in real-time battles for your turn), the hokey dialogue and stories, Nomura, transitioning to different screens for battles, severe linearity in its progression and Nomura.
