The Video Game Revue

Summer Gaming Drought

The current lack of new releases is painfully obvious. Not only have I been deeply sucked in by relatively minor new stuff such as Half-Life 2: Episode 1 and Street Fighter Alpha Anthology, but I've recently caught myself getting swept up in random old stuff--such as firing up Guild Wars (which I haven't played in well over a year) just for the heck of it, or playing Quake III on Dreamcast, of all things. One evening I spent several hours playing Oolite, an open-source remake of the classic space sim Elite. This is the sort of idle game noodling that I do when there's nothing truly compelling around.

It's kind of funny (and perhaps disturbing) how even though I have this massive library of great games at my finger-tips, many of which I've only just scratched the surface of, I continue to pine for new releases. A large part of it is the excitement and potential of the "unknown" games forth-coming. I can go back and revisit old games or play games from years ago that I've never seen before, but either way I can't shake the feeling that I've been there and done that. It really would be good for me to pick up something that I never properly mastered and take the time to really enjoy it, but it seems to take a lot for an old game to really surprise me anymore. With a new release, there is always that exciting possibility that I'll get a novel experience out of it.

That having been said, it looks like I'm going to have to find some way to cope for the next couple of months, because it's not until late August that I see anything on the horizon to get very worked up about. Of course there will be some nice-to-have releases between now and then, and I'll have some good gaming experiences like I've had with Half-Life 2: Ep 1 and Street Fighter Alpha Anthology in the last few weeks, but I'm also going to have to largely occupy myself with finally polishing off Disgaea, perhaps starting on Digital Devil Saga II, getting better at Tourist Trophy, and other staple delights such as Counter-Strike: Source and Day of Defeat: Source.

As for when the drought may let up, I'll list five titles in chronological order that I'm currently looking forward to. All of the really big stuff (World of WarCraft expansion, Final Fantasy XII, Zelda: Twilight Princess) is holding off until October or later, so these are five titles coming out no later than the end of September that have caught my eye. The release dates are off of EBGames.com. You'll also notice that almost all of these are PS2 games.

King of Fighter 2006 (Aug 22nd, PlayStation 2)

I completely skipped out on KoF: Maximum Impact, which is supposed to have sucked really badly, but I do like tournament fighters a great deal. It sounds like this one is going to be a big improvement over Max Impact, even though it is still going to be 3D. The 3D thing is a pity (even Street Fighter wasn't able to properly make the transition to 3D with the EX series), but who knows--maybe it'll end up being worthwhile. If nothing else, I'd like to demonstrate that there is still a market for KoF games by buying into this one.

Disgaea 2 (Aug 29th, PlayStation 2)

This is a no-brainer, really--I'm a big fan of Nippon Ichi RPGs, and I've already sunk over 60 hours into the original Disgaea. I'll probably be playing Disgaea 2 long after I've gotten my Wii, even.

Yakuza (Sept 1st, PlayStation 2)

On the down side, this is yet another Grand Theft Auto rip-off. On the plus side, it's supposedly a very good Grand Theft Auto rip-off, and with a badass Yakuza theme to boot. I never bothered with San Andreas, so the last GTA game I payed any attention to was Vice City. It's probably been long enough now that I can stomach another one.

Okami (Sept 5th, PlayStation 2)

I want this game largely for the same reason that I want to go see "A Scanner Darly": it sounds moderately entertaining and has lots of eye candy. This looks like exactly the kind of game that I'll be willing to forgive for being mediocre in every other respect as long as the visuals are entertaining. And if it turns out to be a solid game on top of that, well, that'll be a nice bonus.

Neverwinter Nights 2 (Sept 19th, PC)

Neverwinter Nights is a very worthwhile RPG, mostly due to the fantastic toolset that allows you to create your own NWN modules. I haven't been keeping a close eye on what BioWare is planning for the sequel, but if they can improve on the experience provided by the original, I'll definitely be in for that

posted by Parappa @ 12:50 PM