So far this year, I don't think i've found much joy in any of the new releases. That may be because I haven't bought many of them, but that's mainly because the things I've heard about them puts me off. SimCity was pretty good, but I got quite bored of it after a weekend of playing it. Crysis 3 was... meh, and I haven't even bothered to shell out for Tomb Raider after hearing it was a bit of a Mashy-button, hold this to climb kind of game. I've got a lot of hope for Bioshock infinite, which I've been waiting patiently for with everyone else. I'll be getting that on friday, so expect a review soon after that.
There's still a lot of games coming out later this year that I can't wait for, though, and in no particular order, here they are.
1: The Elder Scrolls Online
When this game comes out, or i'm accepted into the beta, you will find me out on the streets waving a foam sword while belting out the Dovakiin song as loudly as I can. Although it pains me to say it, i'm one of those people who have only really played skyrim out of all the elder scrolls games. I have oblivion and morrowind, and have started playing them on numerous occasions, but I can never get into them. However, that doesn't affect the fact that I squeal whenever seeing gameplay of the elder scrolls online. I've grown to love the continent of Tamriel, and the thought of being able to travel through it as a huge MMO world entices me. I love the more gameplay orientated approach to the MMO genre that zenimax are taking, and the Guild vs Guild combat, although not completely original, looks especially exciting. However, good old Zenimax have made some big promises about the game (Having the whole game run on one huge server sounds great, but extremely problematic) and I'm hoping that they deliver those promises instead of pulling a WarZ. If not, then they will have some seriously angry fans to deal with.
2: State Of Decay
This is the kind of game that, deep down, I have always wanted. A zombie survival game where you create a base, recruit survivors, send those survivors out to get resources, get them killed, get more survivors. At least that's how I think it's going to go. This game reminds me of last year's excellent XCOM: enemy unknown. I have a feeling i'm going to be forging a bond with my survivors as I send them out to find things so that my team can thrive in the apocalypse. Then, when my tiny civilisation hits a bump and things go downhill, i'll probably end up doing what I always do in strategy games such as XCOM. Spiral into deep depression, decide i'm never going to play the game again, and then crawl back to it three minutes later. There's probably something wrong with me for thinking this, but that sounds like the perfect game.
3: Rome: Total War
One of my favorite parts of the total war series is zooming in on my tiny virtual soldiers and watching them fight it out with the opposition. I spend most of my time giving them names and imagining them in awesome cinematic set pieces. The other thing that I love is the enormity of the games. Seeing dozens of units sprawled out across the battlefield fills me with a kind of warmth that I can't describe. I've heard that Rome: total war is going to do both of these things better than ever before in the series. You can control over forty units in battle, and have both sea and land units in one battle. You can zoom in onto your units and and get a close up view of all of your soldiers, and their animations are going to even more realistic. Every single soldier is supposed to be an an individual person instead of being the same guy cloned 100 times. I know that all this stuff may not be as great as it's been cracked up to be, but when it comes to total war, creative assembly rarely disappoints.
4: Beyond: Two Souls
Only after christmas did I finally play Heavy Rain. I've heard about how great it was, and seen people on the interwebs talking about some of it's famous (and infamous) scenes. Having played the walking dead last year (More on that later) I was no longer a stranger to the quick decisions I had to make. I knew what I was in for. And yet I was still blown away. When my characters faced danger, I truly panicked, because I knew that if they died, that'd be it. I was obsessed about the way my story was going, and I would end up shouting at the screen on many occasions. After I finished Heavy Rain, my excitement for Beyond: Two souls instantly grew. Although many more game developers are beginning to copy the "Heavy rain" kind of formula into their games, There is a painfully small amount of games that offer the same type of story immersion and character development similar to that of Heavy Rain or The Walking dead. And that annoys me, because I can't get enough of this. It's a truly unforgettable gaming experience and it always leaves me wanting more. That's why I
can't wait to play Beyond: Two souls. From what I've seen, it offers another Heavy Rain-esque exhilarating and emotional story, with some more interesting gameplay elements thrown into the mix, what with the spirits and stuff. I can't wait to jump into Beyond: Two souls and roll around in it's characters, story and Ellen Pagey-ness.
5: Arma III
Ok, I have to admit. I could probably wait to play this game. From the Alpha version of Arma that i've played for a bit, it seems a bit like more of the same from Arma 2. That isn't necessarily bad, but I was sort of hoping for some new stuff in the game. There is the diving mode, which is pretty fun, but i'm not sure if that will be enough to make me spend another 40 pounds on Arma 3. However, it is only in alpha, and it's still very fun. I look forward to seeing how this game is going to evolve before it's release. I'm a huge Arma II fan, so that reason alone will probably convince me to buying the game when it's released.
6: Company Of Heroes 2
I don't know why I loved the original company of heroes. There's a certain feeling that you get from playing a strategy game that is hard to describe. When a tank that you've been producing finally pops out of that garage, a warm glow spreads through you, and you watch gleefully as you send it out to make everyone die. When you finally take that base you've been fighting over vigorously for the last twenty minutes, you get that same glow. I think that it's the feeling of leading an army to glory, using your own tactics to dominate the battlefield. Company of heroes captured that in a great way, as you tailored your units to fit the needs of the battle, and then carefully executed your tactics, telling your squads to dash from cover to cover and hoping that they make it without getting shot (they usually did when I was playing) calling in your paratroopers to wipe the smug virtual smile from your enemy's face as they flank the opposing units. I hope that I get that same feeling from company of heroes 2. I was a little worried for the sereis when I heard the shocking news that THQ had gone bankrupt, but, luckily, Relic (Developer of the company of heroes and Warhammer 40K series) is soon to be in the safe hands of retro console making, creative assembly owning Sega.
7: The DayZ game
I have heard next to nothing about the standalone game for the excellent Arma 2 mod, DayZ, but it's bound to be amazing. All they really need to do is polish off the DayZ mod and stick a price tag
on it, and it will still be great. But I do know that they'll be cranking up the realism, adding in diseases such as Cholera, and also encouraging players to check their symptoms and diagnose themselves.
My very few hours commando crawling around a zombie (And bandit) infested Chernarus were terrifying and exhilarating, and if it was more accesible, and, like I said, a bit more polished, I would probably spend most of my gaming hours sneaking around in villages looking for baked beans with my friends.
8: The Walking Dead Season 2
Telltale's The walking dead episodic game series is possibly one of the greatest games I have ever played. I read six volumes of the comic, and have yet to have tried the TV series, but I feel so much more emotionally invested to the characters in the game after 5 episodes than the characters in the comic after 6 episodes. I loved building relationships with the characters in the game. When it came up "So and so will remember that" you don't usually expect these things to ever pay off, but by the end of the first series, almost everything memorable you say to a character has had consequences, good or bad. One of the other amazing features of the game was the absolutely crushing moral choices. And they... are... crushing. The game doesn'
t forgive you. You only have a short time to make a decision, and once you do, there's no turning back. And whatever you do, there will be implications. It's not like, "Kill this guy to have everyone hate you and try to murder you whenever is possible, or kill this guy to slightly anger one member of the party for a few seconds until you save his life and he forgives you," like I feel when I have to make moral choices in other games. In Heavy Rain, I was worrying about how my actions were affecting the story, whereas in The Walking Dead, I was worrying about how my actions were affecting the characters.
I truly cannot wait to play the second season of The Walking Dead. I want to know who i'm going to meet next, what I'm going to go through. I also can't wait to see what decisions I'm going to have to make, and then see what happened to everyone else. That's another great thing about this game. Your story is your own. Each person will have different opinions on each character, and part of what I love about playing this game is that once you have, you have a story to share with people. But I digress.
Telltale have said that The next season of The Walking Dead is set to come out this autumn, and there may be even more of the game before that. I cannot be happier about that.
9: Rainbow Six Patriots
This is another one of those games that I really haven't heard much about. After its announcement it sort of went dark, and I haven't heard much about it yet. But I'm still excited to play it. I was a big fan of rainbow six vegas, specifically terrorist hunt mode. Me and my friends would spend most of our time choosing our gear, each taking a specific role, and then making our way around the map, taking out the terrorists together. This is probably one of my happiest memories in gaming, and I really hope that this kind of co-operative play with in-depth gear customisation makes a return in patriots. I also love tactical shooters, so I'm sure I'll be at home with Patriots. Although I do have a hunch that Rainbow Six: Patriots is going to be delayed. A lot. I guess we'll see.
10: Planetary Annihilation
From the moment I heard about this game, I was already
sure I'd be buying it. I mean, it's a game about building a freaking huge robot army, and then sending that freaking huge robot army to fight other freaking huge robot armies on other planets. It's battles on a truly massive scale, and you know how I feel about big armies. Apparently, this game is a spiritual sequel to Total Annihilation, so I guess I'll check that out for the time being.
11: Watch Dogs
My favorite types of games: Strategy games, "The Walking Dead" style adventure games, roleplaying games, and open world games. Oh, how I love open world games. I can spend days Galavanting around sandbox pits like Just Cause 2's island of Panau, or even Skyrim's Tamriel. I love it even more when you are given what could be called a special ability, like Just Cause 2's grappling hook. Months before that game had even came out, I was dreaming of taping cars together and then flying them over mountains in helicopters. I'm already getting the same feeling with Watch Dogs. Seeing the gameplay demos where you could bend the world around you by hacking things gives me goosebumps. In my head, I'm already hacking ATMS and blowing up lamps. If that's possible. Still, I really can't wait to play this game.
This will probably continue on soon, as more games get announced. I will also probably find a bunch of weird indie games on steam that I'll instantly want to play, so expect this to continue. Thanks for reading this long first post!
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