TSA’s Top 100 of 2011 Recap: 30 – 26

Massively expensive, massively online, massively insane, massively-muscled and massively, erm, alien?  Today’s recap brings with it three games that have made it to release in 2011, one that should, despite delays, and one that will not.

30 – L.A. Noire

Despite L.A. Noire comfortably topping the U.K. charts for three weeks, becoming the fastest selling new IP in the UK and selling almost 900k copies in two weeks in the U.S. we were not overly enamoured of Team Bondi’s Rockstar-published 1940s crime thriller. “There’s something new and refreshing about a witty, intelligent game that requires a little bit more thinking than the norm”, said Josh in the review,  “however, it’s a bit repetitive and kind of loses its way after the halfway point. ”

We gave it a 7 out of 10 which is somewhat at odds with the 89 it received from Metacritic on both Xbox 360 and PS3.  Some have defended L.A. Noire against the criticism that it is repetitive by pointing out that of course police investigations have a set structure and procedure to them.  When the game took its turn in our WeView feature 10 of the 16 readers who took part rated it “Buy It” which is a hearty, if not resounding, recommendation.

Unfortunately, post-release publicity for the game has not focused on its sales success or string of DLC cases.  First there was the ridiculous disagreement over whether L.A. Noire or the end-of-PSN-outage firmware update was causing PS3’s to suffer the ‘Yellow Light of Deeath’.  Then there were the questions that arose over the working conditions at the developer.

Testimonials from staff at Team Bondi about what they endured during the game’s seven years of development and the reaction to them across the games industry lead to suggestions that Rockstar would not be publishing any more Team Bondi titles.  The latest news this week is that Team Bondi are now selling assets as the studio is facing bankruptcy.  Sadly, it looks like the developer of the technologically ground-breaking and most expensive video game ever created in Australia does not have much of a future.

29 – DC Universe Online

If you had to pick a genre for an MMO that might challenge the established might of various fantasy worlds and give players something they would really like, superheroes have got to be near the top of the list.  Console-based MMOs are still something of an unknown quantity this side of The Atlantic. With Free Realms still A.W.O.L. over here, DCUO remains our only option.

At the game’s release back in January Jim hailed it as “a heroic triumph, innovative and downright addictive” in our suitably massive review that awarded the game 9/10.  Elsewhere the reaction was more mixed with the game’s Metascoring 67 and 72 on PS3 and PC respectively.

The ultimate success of an MMO though seems to be gauged by its longevity and as such it is too soon to tell whether the “ground-breaking” DCUO will be a longer term triumph.  It has certainly been a testing year for the game with the infamous ‘PSN Hack’ putting Sony’s gaming networks out of action just a few months into the game’s life.

I am not an MMO player myself but, as an outsider looking in, one thing that does make me wonder about the game’s future is the continuing erosion in number and consolidation of DCUO’s servers, culminating recently in the roll out of “MegaServers“.  That is not necessarily bad news as it seems to make it easier to jump between PvP and PvE and rather than having to switch servers to find a friend you now simply visit the JLA Watchtower or Hall of Doom and switch to your friend’s “Phase”.

So while diminishing numbers of servers does not outwardly look good it may actually help the player base become a more focused and cohesive whole which could help the game build further momentum based on word of mouth from its core fans.  Besides, who wouldn’t want to unleash their hand-picked superpowers against the Joker’s minions, fighting alongside Bats himself…

28 – Alice: Madness Returns

Somehow the blood-soaked sequel to American McGee’s Alice slipped down the rabbit hole and escaped review here at TSA.  Reviews elsewhere have left the game with a Metascore that would rank as “quite good” around here, 70 on both Xbox 360 and PS3 and 75 on PC.

The return to Alice’s world(s) begins in a dark caricature of late-Victorian London where the adults are, for the most part, gnarled and twisted in appearance.  The beautiful, lithe, Alice with her straight dark hair and green eyes stands in stark contrast to those other inhabitants.

It is not long before she finds her grasp on reality slipping away once more and she is plunged into the bright technicolour world of Wonderland where she is greeted with ominous words by her old ‘friend’ the Cheshire Cat.

The game is stunning to look at and it really was delightful to recognise where the artwork has drawn inspiration from John Tenniel’s original illustrations for Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.  The gameplay does not quite live up to the promise of the artwork but the desire to see more of it keeps drawing you into the game.

Running, leaping and floating through Wonderland’s diverse environments, Alice’s long locks flowing behind her, slashing away at foes with the Vorpal Blade and dodging their attacks by momentarily turning into a cloud of bright blue butterflies is great fun.

If you are looking for somewhere to escape the insanity of the modern world or the typical space marines versus aliens battles of many modern games you could do a lot worse than spend some quality time in Alice’s charming company.  However if space marines and aliens are your thing, keep reading…

27 – Gears of War 3

The original Gears of War is the reason I have an Xbox 360.  The graphics and gameplay simply blew me away when I played on friend’s consoles and I simply had to get me some of that.  Third person, cover-based shooters were new and Gears came fully loaded with an awesome co-op campaign and brilliant multiplayer action.

Gears 2 left me feeling somewhat disappointed and I hated running around inside that worm.  Aside from the new (and now much imitated) Horde Mode I did not enjoy the multiplayer much either.

If Gears of War 3 had been able to keep to its original release schedule, we would have all been playing it since April and I would know whether it offered me the thrilling gameplay of the first or disappointing let down of the second. When Lee compiled his epic (see what I did there) Top 100 list, Gears 3 had been re-scheduled for November.

Now the game is set for release on September 20th and we have had a chance to try out both the multiplayer beta which left Matt smiling broadly and go hands on with with its “breathlessly entertaining” and “hugely promising” Horde 2.0 mode.

With barely more than a month to go now before the game finally arrives, we can fully expect the massive Microsoft marketing machine to put its full weight behind its second most important console-exclusive franchise.  Indeed, it looks like we only have to wait until August 16th for the explosive launch of the marketing onslaught.

26 – Aliens: Colonial Marines

This is the game ‘sequel’ to the film that is almost certainly entirely responsible for every game featuring space marines and aliens that you have ever played, including that one up there at #27.

With Aliens having long since become part of pop culture and being one of those rare films that has aged incredibly well (it’s 25 years old!) you would be hard-pressed to find a more suitable setting for a co-op shooter that should really be able to immerse players in its universe.

That the developer behind the game is Gearbox, who have recently proven their co-op FPS talent with the brilliant Borderlands, and that they have employed Syd Mead, the film’s original concept artist, to flesh out the game’s universe is just heaping one giant spoonful of good news on top of another.  This is already easily my most anticipated game of 2012.

You can probably already imagine running around the corridors of Hadley’s Hope, wielding the film’s iconic signature pulse rifle and motion tracker, replete with their instantly recognisable sounds, the flickering lights occasionally picking out menacing silhouettes that tell you that you are most definitely not alone.

So far, all we have are a handful of screenshots for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 and a single teaser trailer.  Aliens: Colonial Marines is probably also coming to Nintendo’s Wii U (Nintendo don’t seem to be allowing any developers to confirm Wii U games yet, leaving only talk of “protoypes”) which could actually be the console to play it on.  The game features split-screen co-op so you could be running around the Sulaco with a friend, your Motion Plus controllers used as traditional light guns to put a pulse rifle in your hands.

The killer Wii U feature for the game though will be its use of the Wii U controller.  At times you’ll use it as the device used to hack the doors, as seen in the film, by playing a mini game on it.  At other times it will be an interactive map, again just like the film.  The most exciting use of it though will be when it becomes the motion tracker.  Awesome.

Spring 2012 cannot come soon enough.

Join us again on Monday as we begin the final week of our recap by clowning around in an ice cream van.