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Namevah

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Other Games of 2012 (2015 Edition)

With 2015 coming to a close and my mind wandering to my favorite games of the year, I looked over my past lists and realized that 2012 was never included. Likely, I just moved away from these lists, never realizing that I still had a year left to include.

These games aren't the greatest or were disqualified for some reason (I tend to push retro games I've previously played on my Other lists, for instance), but as with similar lists from previous years, they're games I want to talk about.

List items

  • I previously rented (or borrowed, I can't remember) the Xbox version of Alan Wake, and the only thing that stopped me from buying the game is that I finished the game. There isn't much else to do once the credits roll. Regardless, I loved Alan Wake, largely because it has a great tone and decent writing.

    Unfortunately, the story was never finished. DLC extended the story, as did the downloadable game Alan Wake's American Nightmare, but developer Remedy has since moved onto a new series, Quantum Break.

  • Sometimes a story gets in the way of a game. Far Cry 3 is such a game. The cast is unlikable and the protagonist is boring, so whenever a cutscene starts up, I heave a sigh and wait those handful of minutes before I can jump into the tropical island jungles and clear out an enemy stronghold or find myself face-to-face with a lion (which really happened).

    The best thing that future Far Cry games can do is grant us a simple story that allows us to quickly get into their sandbox environment and make our own stories.

  • Halo 4 stars Master Chief and Cortana again. They're on the ship from Halo 3, when they're attacked by Covenant. Then it gets sucked into a artificial planet and stuff happens, leading them onto a space station where people become dust. Then it's back to Earth where copies of Cortana kidnap an alien.

    The story is stupid and forgettable, but it was a joy to jump back into the Chief's boots and take aim at new enemies. As a Halo game, it's my least favorite, but I'd still take this over Call of Duty or modern Battlefield.

  • One of the Operation Rainfall games, The Last Story became overshadowed by Xenoblade Chronicles despite having two of the creators of Final Fantasy, Hironobu Sakaguchi and Nobuo Uematsu. Sadly, the real-time combat never quite clicked with me. It features a cover system -- unique for an RPG -- but I found that whenever I ducked behind something, my companions would already be wailing on enemies.

    I do wish to return and give The Last Story another go. Maybe I missed something about the combat?

  • I frigging loved Soulcalibur IV, but Soulcalibur V gave me the cold shoulder. Unfortunately, I'm not enough of a fighting game guy to identify the problems, other than so say something felt off or simply different. Or maybe I reached the point where I no longer had an interest in a traditional fighting game.

  • Wario's first game plays more similarly to a traditional Mario game than the sequels: Wario collects hats that grants him additional abilities, while taking damage eventually turns Wario into a pint-sized anti-hero. Still, the charge attack and ability to stun enemies to carry and toss them gives Wario Land its own flavor.

    It certainly helps that it's filled with secrets. Sequels moved Nintendo's greedy character further away, but the original Wario Land shouldn't be ignored.

  • There's an argument that Wario became Nintendo's most powerful character in Wario Land II simply because it's impossible to die. Standard attacks knock Wario back and drops coins, but nothing else. Being crushed flattens Wario, allowing him to float like a leaf to narrow paths. Even being caught on fire and turned into a zombie are minor annoyance with their own benefits.

    Best of all, Wario Land II is packed with secrets, including multiple routes with their own levels. Just exploring the first level can take a while thanks to Wario's apparent penchant for hiding coins behind walls.

  • The world of the Witcher is a dark one filled with bloodthirsty monsters, racism, and the ugliest people. It's a place that I never want to visit, and by extension have a difficult time wanting to drop the disk into my 360. It doesn't help that being a Witcher is largely thankless job, which makes Geralt's occasional dry sarcasm so welcome.

    I'm of two minds about the combat. I like the physicality of the combat, but enemies take so many hits while Geralt takes precious few, even on the easiest difficulty. His assortment of spells helps, but I guess I'm just not good enough to use all of the tools at his disposal.

  • When it comes to adventure games, I have a problem that Virtue's Last Reward exemplifies: I can't look up answers to puzzles, at least not until I'm about a step from quitting the game entirely. Consequently, I'm often left tired and unwilling to continue immediately. And that immediately often stretches to indefinitely.

    It's a shame since I enjoyed the story. I'll get back to Virtue's Last Reward someday, probably just before the third Zero Escape game.

  • A late addition to the list, PlayStation All-Stars is Sony's attempt at creating their own Super Smash Bros. To its benefit, All-Stars can be surprisingly fun.

    Unfortunately, the basic gameplay is flawed and the character selection is... weird. Why BioShock's Big Daddy and not a Final Fantasy character? Worse yet, the more realistic Nathan Drake and Kratos clash with the cartoony Parappa and Sackboy. DLC characters are equally odd. Dead Space's Isaac Clarke? Emmett Graves from Starhawk? Who picked these?

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