2014 In Review - Games

Another year is done and gone. I'd like to recap my highs and lows in games, movies, and television for 2014 by coming up with a few categories of award for each medium. I'll start with this post on video games. So without further ado…..

2014 was the first full year with the new next-gen consoles. I didn't jump in to the current generation until late August when I bought a PS4, so I didn't see a whole lot prior to that. That said here's my take on a few of the games from the last year.

Best Game - Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor

This came really came out of nowhere to surprise me. I've never liked an Assassin's Creed game, and licensed games are notoriously horrible. Not to mention that the elevator pitch for the game (AC traversal meets Arkham combat) sounds like the kind of generic crap that gets spat out on beginner game dev message boards every day. But leave it to Monolith to take a banal sounding design for a game and back it up with amazing systems that bring it to life in a way most games can barely even hint at.

The Nemesis system in Shadow of Mordor elevates the game in such a way to take it from being a good open-world game with fun combat, to make it an amazing game. Running into the various orc captains in the world is a lot of fun. The great Arkham-style combat is, of course, a large part of that. Getting caught in a brawl with 5-10 orcs is immensely satisfying even at the outset of the game. The combat feels fast and fluid, and you're never entirely safe going 1-on-1. The other orcs hold back just enough to not make you feel overwhelmed, but attack frequently enough to not seem like a bad action movie where the henchman just wait in the wings for their turn.

When the game really starts to shine, however, is when you lose a fight and an orc gets promoted. When you then run in to that same orc again later, and he recognizes you and starts smack-talking to you, is when the game world comes to life. Throw in a rich hierarchy of powers to unlock and a lot of good side-missions to indulge in, and you have one helluva game. Sure, if you really poke at the Nemesis system, you can start to see the seams, but that will happen in any game. Another Monolith game, F.E.A.R., was much the same. It had what seemed to be a brilliant artificial intelligence for the enemies, but once you really pushed against it, turned out to just be exemplary scripting. The Nemesis system starts to show similar issues when stretched to it's limits, but most players wouldn't ever even see that.

My only real gripe with the game is the Tolkien-esque trappings. I love the LotR mythology, but sometimes I think being beholden to the Middle Earth storyline holds the game back. Case in point: Gollum. The only reason he seems to be in this game at all is to say, "Hey! Remember this is a Lord of the Rings thing! Precious! Precious!" Once Gollum has done his thing, he just disappears. You could literally lift that section out the game and throw in a few expository lines or flashbacks to accomplish the same thing. The rest of the story just seems to be a pretty generic fantasy theme. I can only wonder what kind of story we could have gotten if the licensed shackles weren't there.

I'm curious to see what other developers do now that the Nemesis system is out there and widely popular. Much like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare's multiplayer leveling system revolutionized shooters for the last 7 years, I think the Nemesis system will have a huge impact on how open-world story driven games play for the foreseeable future.

Most Disappointing Games - Titanfall & Destiny

This category is for two games that although I enjoyed, was overall disappointed with for various reason. The first I held very high expectations based on what I saw in the game's beta. The second, shows such glimmers of genius in the finished product, but just doesn't go far enough. Perhaps my expectations were too high, but both of these games are so close to hitting the mark, yet so far.

First up, Titanfall. This first outing from Respawn Entertainment, formed by the creators of Call of Duty. I was incredibly excited at the beginning of the year. I got access to the beta on PC over a weekend about a month or so before the game released. This limited beta included the modes Attrition (team deathmatch), Hardpoint (domination/point capture), and Last Titan Standing (king of the hill with giant robots). After the beta weekend I was excited about the potential and thought it was going to be amazing. In fact, the last post on this blog from nearly a year ago, is me talking about exactly that.

So what happened? Why is Titanfall one of the games I found most disappointing this year? I've got one word for that: depth. The game has no depth to speak of. I was really hoping that the campaign mode in the game would bring something new and fresh to the shooter world. Instead, it was a series of multiplayer missions with a few voice over bits of story shoved in. I found it lackluster compared to the multiplayer, so I switched to playing just that, thinking I would come back to the campaign for a change of pace later on. Several weeks later when I tried to do just that, the campaign mode was a complete mess. I was trying to jump in to something like the 4th mission in the story, but because no one was playing, it would eventually just drop me in to the 1st mission which I had already played. I was never able to continue on in the campaign, so that was a total bust.

The other big disappointment in Titanfall was the multiplayer. Yes, the modes that I played in the beta were fun, and they're still fun today. However, the other modes included didn't do anything to really change things up and weren't as fun as the base three modes from the beta. By the time they launched the update with the "Frontier Defense" horde mode, I had lost pretty much all interest. The game is fun, and I'll still jump in from time to time, but it just didn't have everything that I hoped it would.

The next game on this list is Destiny. I've always been a fan of the Halo series, and I was really excited to see what Bungie did next. This was another game where I played the beta, but this one didn't really excite me as much as the Titanfall one did. Maybe my expectations were a little more tempered after that experience. What it did present though was a gorgeous looking shooter with great mechanics. Throw in the fact that it's made by Bungie and I was sold.

I know that the overall Halo story could sometimes get a little to self-serious with it's overbearing religious themes and schlocky sci-fi, but Bungie always made a shooter that at least had me interested in what was going on in the world as I played. So I went in to Destiny expecting the same kind of world-crafting and character building that was present in Halo. Boy did that not pan out.

The story is so paper-thin as to be almost non-existent most of the time. There's this amazing sci-fi, post apocalyptic, setting that you're thrust into without any real explanation. None of the characters exhibit any motivation for anything beyond some mystical understanding of what "must be done". And when tied in to the actual mission structure of the game, it seems so contrived. I don't know how many times I've cleared out some area on a planet to end a mission, only to have the very next mission send me through that same area, clear it out and then have that mission end in a place just a bit past where the last ended. The repetition is maddening at times.

But their are moments of brilliance that shine through in this game. The moment-to-moment combat feels amazing. The game is absolutely one of the best looking games out there right now. The world that they have built, even though the story around it is lacking, is extraordinary. I would love for them to get the story stuff right in the future so that I can further explore the universe they've created. Unfortunately, as it stands, the game is merely a very competent shooter with pretty graphics and some average MMO trappings.

Best Bad Idea - Elite: Dangerous & a H.O.T.A.S.

This category is for a recent set of purchases that I made that I'm absolutely excited about but know represent a huge black hole of lost time in my future. I recently purchased a Saitek X55 Rhino H.O.T.A.S. And Elite: Dangerous for my PC. Elite Dangerous is a space flight/exploration/dog-fighting/trading game. Frontier has modeled the (so they say) entire Milky Way galaxy to explore. You fly around in your spaceship, fighting other pilots, mining asteroids, and exploring unknown regions of space.

The X55 is a Hands-On Throttle and Stick system. It's two separate pieces, one being a throttle with a ton of buttons and toggle switches all over it, and the other being a flight-stick with a ton of buttons all over it. It takes up an ungodly amount of space on my desk. It is also one of the most awesome things I own. I started playing Elite with my Xbox 360 controller and was having fun with it, but the X55 completely transforms the game. I can't wait to play more of it.

I've also purchased Microsoft Flight Simulator X off of Steam. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm sure it will suck me in as flight sims have always interested me, I've just never had the equipment to fully enjoy them. I should just apologize to my wife in advance of all the time I will be spending in the office.

Favorite Game - Hearthstone

Lastly, we come to the game that isn't necessarily the best game I played this year, but is undoubtedly my favorite. Hearthstone from Blizzard Entertainment. I come back to this game almost every day for at least a little bit. My iPad is constantly chirping out the sounds of this game, much to my wife's chagrin. Hearthstone has completely drawn me in a way that only one other game has in my life; Magic the Gathering back when I was in high school.

The game is incredibly simple and easy to pick up. The rules governing each turn and how all the cards are played can be understood in the time in takes to play the first tutorial. But even with how simple the game is, it is incredibly deep and full of strategy. Putting together a deck and getting some wins in either ranked play or casual is extremely satisfying. The arena mode throws in the random fun that comes with playing draft style CCG games. Add all of that to the fact that the only time I've spent a dime on this was to unlock the Naxramus expansion, and you have one hell of a game. I'm excited to see where Blizzard goes with this in the future.

Wrap-Up

So there you have it; my take on games in 2014. In my next post I'll go over what I thought about in the world of cinema.