2009 Personal GOTY

[joefro]

What's your personal Game of the Year for 2009?

My GOTY goes to Dragon Age: Origins for many reasons, including but not limited to:


Epic Fantasy
Amazing Story
Blood & Gore
BioWare

Honorable Mentions:
inFamous
Left 4 Dead 2
Resident Evil 5
Uncharted 2

[Xefi]

I'm just starting on Dragon Age Origin (PC). That game is graphically
good looking on max setting on my PC. It'll also get a GOTY for 2009
from me.



Other good games that i would've like to add but will probably not reach America:

Melty Blood Actress Again (only in Japan though)
Exceed 3rd Black Package (only in Japan though). It came out on 12/31/2009, so it's still 2009. :P

[joefro]

Yeah, I've heard that Dragon Age is really great on PC. I got my copy on the 360 but I'm thinking of getting the PC edition.

[GJARE]

Blazblue continuum shift if arcade only games counts :S
The games really fun :3

[Xefi]

Yeah, I've heard that Dragon Age is really great on PC. I got my copy on the 360 but I'm thinking of getting the PC edition.

if your PC can handle the game on max setting or close to it, I'll
have to say "GO FOR IT!" You can zoom in and out on the PC version.
Playing the game with the mouse and keyboard is much easier for me in
this game, probably because i preferred playing games on computer more.
I think you can get this game for like $40 now on PC. That's a pretty good
price for a game that just came out pretty recently. :pizza:


Edit: @GJARE: Oh man, Blazblue...that game is awesome! I haven't seen Blazblue Continuum Shift yet,
but i'll bet that game is definitely good because i'm a fighting game fan.

[amtalx]

I wholeheartedly agree that the PC version of Dragon Age is superior. The isometric perspective isn't available on consoles, and makes it much easier to plan you battle tactics if you want to tackle the higher difficulties. I've loved top down D&D style games since Baldur's Gate and Planescape. This is no different. Bioware was firing on all cylinders with Dragon Age.

I also throw my GOTY vote to Dragon Age.

[AC9breaker]

It's between Noby Noby Boy and Uncharted 2 for me.

Biggest surprise of 2009

Batman: Arkham Asylum


Now how about biggest disappointment of 2009?

I was sure it was gonna be Killzone 2, that was until I got King of Fighters 12. Actually throw in multiplatform developers for the PS3 are biggest disappointments since seems like quite a few PS3 games have gotten the short end of the stick, Bayonetta and Ghostbusters come to mind.

Worst plot in 2009
Bionic Commando hands down.

Most overlooked game of 2009
Noby Noby Boy and Flower

Game I was most hyped for that didn't live up to my expectations?
Modern Warfare 2 and Ghostbusters the videogame

My most addicted game of 2009
Tie between Dawn of War 2 and Demon's Souls

[Zeek123]

Mine's got to be Batman: Arkham Asylum.

I loved Uncharted 2, but to me, it was more of the first game. But online play is kickass. It was bigger, badder, and louder.

I haven't played Assassin's Creed 2 just yet, but I'm about to get on it. So I'll give my final judgment then.

I've been a long time die hard Batman fan, and it was so awesome to see a super hero game finally work out right. Excluding inFamous. Which was awesome too.

[Outrider]

I actually think most of the blockbusters I played in 2009 were actually games from 2008 or earlier. If I had to put down my vote, it would probably be for ODST or Shadow Complex.

I just started playing Dragon Age, though, and it's really good. I've also just started playing Torchlight, which is so incredibly good that I can't wrap my head around it.

I'll have to update this later on once I've looked at what came out in 2009.

But seriously - have you guys played Torchlight? It's great.


EDIT: Holy crap, I really haven't played any of the major titles this year. I haven't played Uncharted, I haven't played Mario, I haven't played MW2. I really need to get on that.

Yeah, I guess my vote is for ODST, as it's the only game that came out in 2009 that I actually completed that was really good.

[amtalx]

I've heard about Torchlight, but every time I play a Diablo clone it just makes me want to play Diablo. Its got a demo so I'll try it out.

[Outrider]

I've heard about Torchlight, but every time I play a Diablo clone it just makes me want to play Diablo. Its got a demo so I'll try it out.

See, I tried but couldn't get into Diablo II back in the day but my tastes today aren't the same as they were 9 years ago. However, most reviews and comments I've heard have said that this is the first game to do it right since then. (Heck, even my brother, who was a Diablo fanatic back in the day, seems to be enjoying it.)

[amtalx]

See, I tried but couldn't get into Diablo II back in the day but my tastes today aren't the same as they were 9 years ago. However, most reviews and comments I've heard have said that this is the first game to do it right since then. (Heck, even my brother, who was a Diablo fanatic back in the day, seems to be enjoying it.)

I tried Torchlight. Awesome. It feels exactly like Diablo, almost to the point of being a spinoff/reboot. Turns out that the designers worked on both Diablo and Diablo II. I know its intended to be a smaller experience, but it really makes me want Diablo III. Not because I think there is anything wrong with Torchlight, but simply because Diablo III will have more content and a robust online component.

[Zeek123]

I've heard about Torchlight, but every time I play a Diablo clone it just makes me want to play Diablo. Its got a demo so I'll try it out.

I knew I'd heard of this game. It's studio is related to Blizzard North, the developer of Diablos I and II. It's the co-founder of Blizzard or some junk. So I guess that's why it borrows a lot of the same elements.

[Outrider]

The leads on Torchlight actually worked on both Diablo and Fate.

(Fate is Wild Tangent's wildly-successful Diablo clone aimed at the casual crowd. The pet characters, fishing, and a few other elements found in Torchlight were taken wholesale from Fate. I picked up the game for $5 a while back - I ultimately found it rather dull, but like I said, this isn't my favorite genre.)

Even more interesting, the development team is mostly staffed by the original group that was building Mythos at Flagship, before Hellgate caused the company to implode.

[Akaimizu]

Hmm. Not sure what my favorite game of 2009 is. I do have notable ones in certain genres.

For Dungeon Hackers (or an off-brand mix). I'd have to go with a balance between Sacred 2 and Borderlands. Of all the games released, this past year, I've put more hours between those two games than anything else. And while I don't play them so much, now, it doesn't quite matter when literally hundreds of thrilling hours was pumped into it.

Borderlands is solid, though Sacred 2 had so many more hidden parts, character-specific quests, and hidden side-quests. In fact, some of the not-so-obvious to find side-quests were so large, their multipart quest structure may last a few or so hours. One of my favorite finds, was a quest that uncovered a web of intrigue and mystery between two town provinces, their rulers, ties with demons, and how certain events in them affected events that happened with other quests you've possibly run into. It ended with you joining an organized raid (WoW style) on a town, and permanently changing the town's rule on success.

I'm going through Demon Souls now, and while that could have the potential to be a winner, I was late to the game in playing it. I haven't gotten to the point of liking it on the level of the previous two yet, but I'll give it more time to grow on me.

Portables: This was a tough one, because I have to admit, sometimes a game can beat another game (in my eyes) simply because it was great in a genre that I have a guilty love for more than the other genre. While Disgaea 2 did release on PSP, with a list of improvements and additions. And I normally would say it's among the best value of gameplay-to-cost on the system. I have these picks because I love my dungeon crawlers.

PSP: Tie between Monster Hunter Freedom Unite, Phantasy Star Portable. (Japan-only) Phantasy Star Portable 2 practically pulls ahead of these two.

DS: Played some good stuff on here, but I have to say Phantasy Star Zero was an easy pick for me. There are plenty of great stuff here, outside of the genre though. I've been hearing good things about Might and Magic Clash of Heroes, too; but I haven't played it so it's not in the standing. It also isn't a dungeon crawler in PSZ's style.

RPGs:
Dragon Age (Of straight RPGs released in 2009, and not in 2008 and before, the pickings are a bit slim. But we do have some good ones.)

Biggest surprise hit of addiction, in my personal opinion (And a very late 2009 release):

Divinity 2.
(Made by a smaller developer, and thus not quite the smooth graphic quality of the AAA big-budget dev games. I was familiar with the previous games in the series, on PC. I have them. Still, I didn't really expect a lot from this release. I expected something pretty good, given the previous games, but I was oddly hooked by the demo. Got the full game, and am so far rather impressed at what this relatively small team delivered. More of a single-player dungeon hacker with an emphasis on a strong single-player storyline and presentation, it also harkens to the difficulty of old games and Demon Souls.

Mainly by:
1. Allowing the player freedom to take many quests in any order.
2. Having specific areas, on big maps, where enemy levels have their ranges.
3. Big sprawling world maps for the player to run around freely.

So yeah, you can easily move around and initiate yourself to new areas, where you'll face enemies that'll tear you up as soon as you get there. You start to learn to take things a little slower to survive, or you run into a situation where you're just gonna get killed.

If you can get into the game, it expands on you later. You'll have two forms to fight in, and stats to raise between the two of them. Not to mention, plenty of opportunities to build great character builds and hybrids. (The game encourages hybrid ideas). It eventually becomes a ground-based dungeon-crawler. An aerial battle game (combined with Dungeon crawling). And a bit of a sim where you're collecting resources, sending out folks to gather materials for you, using workers to craft you better stuff. You choose to help outfit your gatherers and improve their weaponry, for better spoils, etc.

While it does say Divinity 2, the game has the potential to be one of the more dark storylines out there. Possibly darker than Dragon Age, even though Dragon Age sets a somewhat dark initial tone. (I'll need to see this to the end, and compare the two, to have a verdict on which game is darker.)

The bad is that it didn't release without a bug or two. To ensure proper saving, one needs to make sure that save is always saved to a new slot. They can delete old saves manually, from within the game, if they need. Still, the overwritten save bug exists.)

P.S. -- I just recently got the Torchlight demo. I haven't played it enough to really have a full opinion on it. I normally like to get the idea of what makes it unique before commenting.

[amtalx]

Sacred 2? Really? I tried that in an attempt to satisfy my need for a dungeon crawler. After 8 hours of fetch quests and dealing with one of the worst UIs in years I uninstalled it and reinstalled Diablo II and LoD. It may be almost a decade old, but it still does every thing better in all respects.

[Akaimizu]

Yeah. I still have Diablo 2 installed, mind you, but I enjoyed Sacred 2. The interface between the PC and the 360 versions was different, but I actually liked it. To a certain degree, it was a trade-off. I did like the information given for the PC version's menus better. The extra info helped a lot when learning the game, giving the 360 version a bit more of an unintended learning curve, for how things worked. As far as controls and combat flow, I think the 360 version faired better because you could map so many useful controls to a convenient button or shifted-button. Thus I played the 360 version longer. The combat interface, for the PC, left a lot to be desired. It just wasn't setup so that important controls, you use often, were situated in one easy-to-reach location. You kind of have to mouse to various parts of the screen to do actions you do often. In this regard, they did the 360 version right.

Content-wise, it had fantastic stuff. And yet while it does have fetch quests, it has 600+ quests. So it had a whole share of plenty of interesting story-based quests, and other quest styles, along with the fetch ones. It's just that with so many quests, you're bound to have to deal with plenty of fetch ones, too. Monster combat was nice, and the abilities with which you fight with provided some real satisfying results, and finding out you could do it was half the coolness factor. The good fortunate thing was the quests that numbered, by far, the least, were escort missions. There are only but several in there, total. However, they are probably the most annoying of them.

Building a character isn't as cut and dry as Diablo, but the variation of character builds is much higher. So you kind of need more of a plan where you're going, as you level. It's not done in that tree-fashion. It also takes a little more time to open up all the stuff you can config on your character, as well. It's definitely a bit more complicated in character setup, but once you get it, it makes sense. I definitely see how some reviewers would say that it understandably takes the German developer approach to RPGs. Give the players plenty of stuff to do, and a lot of player data to browse. I'm no stranger to games released by the region, so I understand where they came from. Thankfully, the game also has a General Player attributes screen to quickly view all of your bonuses culminated from all your equips and passive skills. And being, quite a few Crawlers don't have this screen make me wish they all had it, instead of looking through various menus to find what's doing what in total.

However, it was a *content* game, and had good combat abilities, mounts, etc. There was a lot to get out of it, and different character-quest arcs for the different characters based on their chosen alignment. And while there are some *bleh* quests, it's balanced by some rather brilliant ones (for its genre). Not to mention, probably the only true good multiplayer Dungeon Crawler with mounts, so far. Previous multiplayer dungeon crawlers with mounts, often really messed up everywhere else. I did play it a good while, on the PC; but I do have to admit. I think they got the UI (outside of certain missing text info, in comparison) much better on the 360.

How it made the poll, for me, is that the 360 version released in 2009 while the PC version, 2008. The humor really sent it over the top for me. The game was chock full of classic lines from the characters and from the guys you fight. Made even better in how the character speech increased as you played different difficulty levels and went up to higher levels. It kept things kind of fresh on 2nd, 3rd playthroughs, etc. So it's always nice that after a couple hundred hours, they can still hit me with a new line that makes me laugh. This mainly happens between all the context-sensitive character and monster banter, you hear, as you fight things. It's done in character, and almost always funny. Every once in a while, it'll break the 4th wall, just to keep you on your toes saying, "Did they just say what I thought they said?" Love it when these games don't take themselves too seriously. They know us Dungeon Hackers want to get to the fight, and not be bogged down in too much serious story detail.

[DoubleJG]

Too many games to choose from... The most highly anticipated game for me this year was definitely Phantasy Star Zero.

However, the game of the year for me would probably be Left 4 Dead. If it has to be a game that came out in 2009, then I would probably saaaaay... Modern Warfare 2. I want to say Borderlands, but it doesn't get played nearly as often as MW2 does.

[amtalx]

There is something I can't stand about German RPGs. Risen, Divinity, The Witcher (Poland, but close enough) all have terrible UIs and mechanics, bad enough that it makes playing the game a chore. It all just feels so unpolished.

Diablo isn't very heavy on story, but there is still a narrative. It's not heavy enough to get in the way, but still has enough of a presence to make me feel like I'm working toward something. Sacred 2 just felt like "Random Quest Vending Machine v2.03". Nothing felt connected, and trying to separate plot quests from side quests is futile due to the incomprehensible UI.

[Akaimizu]

Actually, knowing the plot quests from side quests was the main thing Sacred 2 made easy. They color-coded it. Main quests were Gold, Character-specific class-quests were Blue, and side-quests were white. For the most part, Gold and Blue were guaranteed story plots, with cut-scenes and the like. However, there were some surprising total side-quests that also had a narrative complete with cut-scenes. There was a full plot in Sacred 2, you just had to follow the Blue and Gold ones to get it.

[amtalx]

Maybe I'm just an idiot. I saw the color coding system, but the quest log doesn't have clear labeling of what's what. Eventually I figured out that the gold quests where plot quests because...well they were gold and that's obviously more important than the other colors. Although I'm the type of person that likes to do every available side quest. The problem with that is that the enemies don't scale, so by the time I got around to actually doing a plot quest, all the enemies dropped after one hit and gave 1XP.

[Akaimizu]

No, enemies don't scale but so far. They have limited scaling, but they stop after a certain amount of levels based on area and difficulty. So in general, it doesn't take too long before enemies in area A only give 1XP because they're in the low-level area. So you need to move or farm a different area to expand the difficulty. But it's true (particularly for the first main area (the elven kingdom)) that if you do every quest possible, the enemies for those side quests start to give little reward. Believe me, it's a monumental effort to do *all* the quests. They really weren't kidding with their estimated quest numbers. You could spend 500-800 hours doing them all. It takes well over 100 hours just to uncover the entire map. Unless you're trying to get a final achievement, normally you'll get fed up of being in the same area, too long, and press on. Opening that map, so you can vary your areas better.

Still, it did me well as a nice hold over for Diablo III. OF course, I can't wait until that comes out.

[Tetsaru]

My 2009 Game of the Year? Uncharted 2, definitely. Its one player story was fucking awesome, and the online multiplayer's not too shabby either. If you have a PS3, I highly recommend getting it.

[joefro]

My 2009 Game of the Year? Uncharted 2, definitely. Its one player story was fucking awesome, and the online multiplayer's not too shabby either. If you have a PS3, I highly recommend getting it.
Online is awesome indeed, but I really hate the skeleton character skins...:no:

[SStrikerR]

I didn't get many games this year. I'm gonna have to give the award to Uncharted 2 though, even though I don't even have a PS3. I played it for a few minutes a few days and just...wow. It was great.

Next to that, Assassin's creed 2.

[Split]

phantasy star online episodes I & II

[Zeek123]

Next to that, Assassin's creed 2.

Well, I only have one or two story mode missions to go, and I have to say that Assassin's Creed II is such an improvement over the first.

The game is great for trophies/achievements. One playthrough and I'm looking at a platinum. Never had that before.

The graphics are basically good. As good as such an open world game can be I suppose. The blood bothers me though. You stab someone in the back through to the stomach and it shoots straight up... Plus it looks... not so good.

The voiceover work actually had some effort put in. Several sentences are in unabridged Italian. AC I's work was absolutely awful. The main character had an American voice... ugh.

All around good game. Story's kept me involved, side missions are fun.

My biggest gripe with it is that it just gets kind of repetitive and boring... It's all run here, start mission, open new area, sync all the lookouts, do side missions, rinse, repeat. As bad as that may sound, the individual Assassination side missions are really quite good. Sneaking in and going for the perfect kill is a lot of fun.

[SPOILER-BOX]Venice is huge by the way[/SPOILER-BOX]

But all in all, Batman still remains my GOTY. I went through Batman three times and never got bored. Can't wait for the next one.

[SStrikerR]

A.C. 2 just kept me hooked in, unlike it's predecessor, and then the last few missions completely blew me away. I loved the ending.

[Monochrome]

Final Fantasy Dissidia

The game that (along with Crisis Core) finally made my PSP worth owning. Phantasy Star Portable was better than I expected too.. but I've spent over twice the amount of time with Dissidia thus far. Of course, if one is not a FF fan, their mileage would probably greatly vary.

[amtalx]

I finally got Uncharted 2. Definitely one of the best of the year, but not sure I'd give it GOTY.

[Randomness]

Can't really say... I can't even remember what I got in the first half of '09, for instance.

[BahnKnakyu]

Well, some of the games that I spent a lot of hours on weren't released in 2009, but here goes. And it looks like not a lot of you import. :P

PS2: King of Fighters 2002 Unlimited Match - best, fucking, KoF, EVER.

PS3: Soldner-X (though I know from shmup experts it's not the best shmup ever, it's still pretty fun), Bayonetta (even though the PS3 port blows balls)

PC: SF4, RE5, DMC4 (I know this was released in 2008, but I only seriously started playing it early 2009)

PSP: Hatsune Miku Project Diva (it's like a cross between Beatmania and Elite Beat Agents topped with moe), Ridge Racer 2 (European/JP only release!, and yes I know it's an old game), Warriors Orochi 2, and MOST IMPORTANTLY Phantasy Star Portable 2

Wii: I stopped touching my Wii ages ago.

DS: The only DS title I tried was PS0, and I wasn't too impressed by it.

[Outrider]

I forgot at which outlet I saw this, but one "top games of 2009" list gave RE5 the award for "Best game that you already forgot about."

I definitely have to agree with them on that. It really can be a fun game, but there's very little reason for it to stand out amongst everything else that's been coming out.