Which of these mouse-and-keyboard marvels drew us in most in 2009? You're so close to finding out that you can practically taste it! Gross!
While the release of Windows 7 certainly grabbed a lot of headlines, there were also plenty of games out in 2009 that really took special advantage of the benefits that being on a PC brings. But none took better advantage of that extra power and control than our PC Game of the Year!
It's pretty fitting that the best PC game of 2009 is a game that, if not for its impressive graphics, feels like it could have been released on the platform a decade ago. No other 2009 release felt more like a PC game than Dragon Age: Origins. Hell, even if you were playing BioWare's latest on the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360, you probably still felt like you might be able to Alt-Tab away to a browser to read up on spell combos. And you know what? That's awesome.
There's a reason why party-based, strategic, 50-hour epics were fun ten years ago, and that reason is why Dragon Age still works today. That part wasn't really much of a surprise, though. It was the ease at which this type of game shed its Dungeons and Dragons backdrop and ruleset and fully embraced a whole new world that really made it work. BioWare came up with something that not only kept the complexity of its lineage, but made it accessible to a new crop of high-fantasy players. That's pretty hard to do when you consider the game's main audience were the same people that ripped Fallout 3 to shreds last year.
Similar parallels could be drawn to Dawn of War II, which proved that the PC is still the only place you really want to play a real-time strategy game, even when it removes the need to manage dozens of on screen troops like the latest Warhammer 40k game did. Both titles showed that old tricks still work, and work even better with a new perspective.
While the release of Windows 7 certainly grabbed a lot of headlines, there were also plenty of games out in 2009 that really took special advantage of the benefits that being on a PC brings. But none took better advantage of that extra power and control than our PC Game of the Year!
It's pretty fitting that the best PC game of 2009 is a game that, if not for its impressive graphics, feels like it could have been released on the platform a decade ago. No other 2009 release felt more like a PC game than Dragon Age: Origins. Hell, even if you were playing BioWare's latest on the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360, you probably still felt like you might be able to Alt-Tab away to a browser to read up on spell combos. And you know what? That's awesome.
There's a reason why party-based, strategic, 50-hour epics were fun ten years ago, and that reason is why Dragon Age still works today. That part wasn't really much of a surprise, though. It was the ease at which this type of game shed its Dungeons and Dragons backdrop and ruleset and fully embraced a whole new world that really made it work. BioWare came up with something that not only kept the complexity of its lineage, but made it accessible to a new crop of high-fantasy players. That's pretty hard to do when you consider the game's main audience were the same people that ripped Fallout 3 to shreds last year.
Similar parallels could be drawn to Dawn of War II, which proved that the PC is still the only place you really want to play a real-time strategy game, even when it removes the need to manage dozens of on screen troops like the latest Warhammer 40k game did. Both titles showed that old tricks still work, and work even better with a new perspective.
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