Juliette: I played Telltale’s The Walking Dead game on PS3. I’m not a very patient person, so I waited for all five episodes of the first season to be available before starting to play it. Though the game uses simple point and click mechanics, it didn’t fail to deliver a gripping story; I actually cared about little Clementine and the other survivors I was with. I actually cried, no other game has made me cry before then, and no other game has made me cry since.
I need to give a special mention to Bethesda. Fallout 3, Fallout New Vegas, Oblivion, Skyrim – all fantastic games. The studio has created such consistent open worlds, with great opportunity for roaming. I still can’t get over the fact that I could just pick up stuff to do something with, or stuff to do nothing with. I lost hours in all four games, looking for every single side quest I could do, exploring every single cave, vault, dungeon, or factory I could find.
Simon: Skyrim, GTA IV and V, Fallout 3, and Red Dead Redemption all blew me away with how much richly detailed space they gave me to scamper about in. Ultimately though, I think all of those games struggled with pacing their central stories and so I don’t really look back on any of them with much emotion unrelated to shooting people in the knees with arrows.
What has me more excited for the future is that storytelling in games has become more diverse. The way games are promoted and delivered to us has changed so much in the past decade that we’re seeing inspired yet relatively tiny productions scoring huge hits in a congested market based almost purely on word of mouth, often more because of the way they tell a tale rather than the game mechanics they employ. I loved every second of Braid and Limbo; their ideas and the way they put them across will stay with me for years.
There have also been some pretty powerful narrative twists in the past generation, and I’m a real sucker for a good twist. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, Assassin’s Creed 2, Mass Effect 3 and BioShock were all blockbusters with fairly brave surprises lurking under their glossy surfaces. Heavy Rain takes the biscuit for me though, having successfully pulled the wool so far over my eyes before its big reveal that I felt like I was the gimp at an S&M party for sheep.
Zoey: For me the most important thing to come out of this generation is a return to smart gaming. We’d been innundated with shooters for too long so the unique puzzlers of the gen are the ones that stand out for me. I was captivated by Limbo, Braid, ilomilo, Fez, Stacking, and the Portal games. Each of them was so individual in their styling and gameplay, providing plenty of opportunities to really apply myself. I also have to give a shout out to Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons for its wonderful story telling and innovative control scheme.
The immense popularity of Telltale’s The Walking Dead is a testament to our readiness for consequences to not be so black and white. As much as I enjoyed the Fable and Mass Effect series’, Telltale showed that we really do want 50 shades of grey. Long may it last with the second series round the corner, and The Wolf Among Us series just started.
Obviously I couldn’t possibly write this section without waxing lyrical about a few kooky Japanese games. I adored Bayonetta from start to finish. With it’s styling, sexiness, level of violence, and upbeat soundtrack it was just a joy to play. And whilst it was short but sweet I also loved Lollipop Chainsaw. Meanwhile I continue to be addicted to JRPGs with my top pick for the generation being the amazing Tales of Vesperia.
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