Here's a short list of some of the games that I'm looking forward to playing this year. This will be the first time where I don't really have time for gaming, so these few games are the ones I will be playing over and over. God I hope they deliver.
Over the Christmas break I confronted my fears and played ME1 all the way through, twice. It only took about 24 hours, but anyone who knows how messed up some of the game mechanics were should empathize me. Boo hoo... I still really enjoyed the game and actually began to really like the universe that Mass Effect had to offer. After ME1, I jumped into ME2, what a refreshing feeling. Streamlined inventory was a great idea (too bad they removed loot collection though)and the combat felt a lot more personal and bad-ass. I beat that last week and save for the codex and some DLC (Kasumi, Overlord, and Shadow Broker), I'm itching to see how it all ends.
Dude, Deus Ex was the shit. Enough said.
Dead Space 1 is the first and only game to really have me on edge and on the verge of soiling myself. The scarcity of ammo had me playing more strategically than say, Call of Duty (because we all know how important strategy is to the gameplay) and the variety of monsters/aliens and environments, such as zero gravity encounters, kept the game from getting stale. The new installment looks like more of the same with a more cinematic approach and greater sense of scale. That's awesome because it illustrates the point that Isaac Clarke is just a guy alone in the void of space. Creepy.
Arkham Asylum had everything I wanted out of an action adventure game: good combat, story, traversal, and some exploration intertwined into the Batman universe which is very dark and gloomy as hell. There was a good mix of characters and the performaces by the voice actors of Batman and Mark Hamill as the Joker were near perfect. Now take that same formula and apply to the whole of Gotham City and you have yourself a game son. Even though it's slated for Q4 of 2011, I hope it doesn't get pushed into 2012.
Not sure if this will make it into 2011 releases, but if it does...
Don't know too much about this game other than you're a cop in 1930's L.A.. Already that's pretty cool, I'm curious to see what Rockstar gets up to. I hope it draws some inspiration from Mafia 1.
