GunslingerD7 BlogGunslingerD7 Blog Server2011-12-27T19:00:00ZEnjoying "Bad Games". My own personal experience./blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2013/07/01/enjoying-quot-bad-games-quot-my-own-personal-experience.aspx2013-07-01T09:01:00Z2013-07-01T09:01:00Z<p><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>What makes a bad game? Is it the main concept, the way it was handled during development, how much time it was given, the controls? It could be anyone of these I mentioned or even ones I forgot to mention. What happens when a rare choice to pick a game out of pure sporadic curiosity turns into an experience you won&#39;t forget because you threw review numbers out the window &amp; decided on fun as your over all priority? I can tell you from my own experience that it was the way to go &amp; how we should choose to pick our games more often then not. I think we all can safely say we all have fallen into the net of relying on review ratings then taking the chance ourselves. Now it&#39;s not a negative habit to practice because we all can&#39;t afford every game that hits the shelves, gaming isn&#39;t cheap so shopping smart is wise to do but stepping out of our comfort zone every once awhile can bring unexpected surprises. I took a lot of chances this generation, some were bad made me just shake my head &amp; some were games I won&#39;t ever forget. Out of all the game choices I made 2 games stick out to me strongly. The first one being the cruelly underrated game in the Earth Defense Series called Earth Defense Force 2017 &amp; the other being a hilariously brilliant indie game called Shark Attack Deathmatch. &nbsp;&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>Now some people will call Earth Defense Force 2017 a bad game but I think the simplicity of it alone makes it a winner in my book. Yes the game&#39;s frame rate tanks when too many bugs are on screen, when your character jumps his knees don&#39;t even bend, the script &amp; voice acting come straight out of B movies, the outdated look of the overall game, lack of picking a class of soldier to fight the invasion off with, etc. I could go on more but I think you get the point. For me the lack of polish &amp; how hard it smacks you with all of it always makes me laugh when I play. They don&#39;t try to hide what it is. It&#39;s a rough draft of a pure death match survival run you &amp; a buddy can take on until you can&#39;t take it anymore. You are giving nothing except a bad cut scene, narrative bad enough it sounds like they are reading straight from a script &amp; an assault rifle that is laughable but what comes next makes it all worth it to me. Wave after wave of oversized bugs come crawling over city buildings like a waterfall &amp; the only instruction you&#39;re given is to kill every last one &amp; survive. It&#39;s an open world in the plainest of terms, you can&#39;t enter a single building but every single tree, car &amp; skyscraper you see can be leveled. The city you&#39;re ordered to protect can be wiped off the planet given you have enough fire power. The map size seems limitless as you can find yourself running &amp; rolling for your life trying not to get bitten in half by the jaws of tour bus sized ants. The game starts with a bang &amp; never lets up for 53+levels. The catch is with every ant you kill they may drop an item such as a new weapon, health packs to keep you alive or armor to boost your overall health bar that carries over to your next level. If you want the perks you have to turn yourself around &amp; head directly into the monster wave you were just running away from, Rambo style. The range of difficulties you are given are great for anybody who wants to play. Each difficulty you are still treated the same with pick ups, you still get new weapons &amp; armor but the harder the difficulty you choose the better gear you&#39;re given. This game thrives off of taking big risks in order to get big rewards. Throughout the entire game you can get collect up to 200+ different weapons ranging from assault rifles, missile launchers to experimental goofy weapons that with each shot clear entire city blocks with each pull of the trigger. Not to mention every weapon comes with infinite ammo, you only worry about each weapon reload time. Inferno being the last difficulty you may choose from may have you spending an entire hour trying to defeat a single level of your choosing. As you may be able to tell I&#39;m completely obsessed with this &quot;bad game&quot;. The graphics may not be the greatest, the way the frame rate tanks to nearly being in what feels like bullet time for a quick minute or 2, how stiff your character moves is worth every single laughable overwhelming second of being able to play as a Starship Trooper you&#39;ve wanted to be since you watched the movie yourself.&nbsp;</p> <p><span><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>The game is flawed in many ways but the things it does right beat those flaws every single time. Given so many weapons &amp; many varied levels gives you a surprising large amount of options for strategy. The game is simply laid out but littered with potential. I myself have spent nearly 200+ hours in the game mixing &amp; matching, clearing different difficulties &amp; playing couch co op with my cousin.&nbsp;<br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>Enough of EDF 2017, time to talk/ rant about another favorite &quot;bad game&quot; of mine. </span></p> <p><span><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>Occasionally I find myself in the Indie section of XBL just looking for fun stupid new games to play. They&#39;re a nice break from all the serious AAA titles we play. One day I stumbled upon a game called Shark Attack Deathmatch. It&#39;s a simple take on the FPS games we love playing but this one takes place underwater as you play as a nameless scuba diver. There is no story laid out to you, only the options of Survival &amp; Deathmatch. Survival is exactly how it sounds. You are given 10 minutes, a spear gun with unlimited ammo &amp; a knife for close quarter kills and the objective to kill as many man eating sharks or zombie sharks (not kidding) in that time limit. The air supply you have runs out so must go search for floating air tanks to refuel your air supply. Health works the same way, if you&#39;re hurt it won&#39;t regenerate you must go find floating health packs. The levels are simple &amp; decent sized. The ocean you&#39;re in is scattered with sea turtles, sting rays, coral, fish, boat wrecks, plane crashes &amp; sunken ancient ruins. The next game option is an exactly copy of survival called deathmatch, the only change is that now you &amp; 3 friends or anybody online is now out to kill you. If you can forgive the floaty (no pun intended) &amp; sometimes delayed controls it becomes a stupidly laughable intense free for all. Say you wound another diver with a spear you shot at em, they now start bleeding pools of blood into the blue ocean that once was a rare shark siting area. That clear blue map now slowly becomes a hangout for sharks &amp; they are hungry. The sharks smell the blood &amp; now start trying to attack the wounded player. Not only is the player trying to survive the other divers but now they have to defend themselves from a shark that is trying to eat them for a snack. It all becomes hilariously intense when each player is bleeding &amp; you now are all swimming to find health packs &amp; air to keep you from drowning, bettering your chances of surviving the entire scenario you&#39;ve thrown yourself into. You may try to hide in the wreckage left on the map only to be eaten &amp; startled because another player or shark found a big enough hole to fit through &amp; finish you off even before you know what hit you. The whole concept behind this game is brilliant to me. It may have been handled in the simplest ways &amp; may not have been given the love it deserves but that doesn&#39;t mean it simply shouldn&#39;t be looked over by the numerical score it was given. &nbsp;</span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><span><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>Sadly enough I see that both of those great &quot;bad game&quot; titles have been overlooked by many.&nbsp;<br /><br /><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>To close out this love letter to 2 of my personal favorite surprise games this generation I will say this. I think we all need &quot;bad games&quot; to play to help balance out all the great games we play. They make us appreciate more of the amazing AAA titles we spend so much time loving &amp; see a brand new way of creative thinking. Hell they may even turn out to be some of our favorite games we continue to play again &amp; again like I have with my 2 favorite &quot;bad games&quot; I mentioned above.&nbsp;</span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><span>No matter the score or what you think may be a bad game have fun &amp; enjoy. &nbsp;</span></p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 on story over gameplay (with a nod to controls)/blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2012/12/02/thoughts-on-story-over-gameplay-with-a-nod-to-controls.aspx2012-12-02T06:35:00Z2012-12-02T06:35:00Z<p><span> <p>There are many many reasons why we game, for the story, for the experience, pure competitive nature &amp; enjoyment, trying something new, trying to overcome a task in our way, etc the list is endless on why. I do believe story plays a major role though, it gives us some meaning &amp; weight onto why we are aloud these gameplay actions we make. Without story we&#39;d be some nameless ancestor performing awesome feats in Assassin&#39;s Creed for no reason or some random bear wearing pants in a goofy world in Banjo and Kazooie. It would be empty &amp; confusing as hell on how &amp; why we are here &amp; can perform these moves. Story is critical in my eyes.</p> <p>I also believe gameplay is critical as well, without it what would make us want to continue playing. No matter how good the story may be if the controls &amp; gameplay are horrible it&#39;s a deciding factor for some to quit playing. As my examples above I don&#39;t think it&#39;d be nearly as fun in Assassin&#39;s Creed if we couldn&#39;t pull off over the top kills &amp; have monkey like abilities to scale objects in our way. We need engaging gameplay to heighten the immersive experience we all want. I know it wasn&#39;t mentioned in the article but &nbsp;I also think controls are the same. Just as equal as story &amp; gameplay. If they are floaty &amp; unresponsive then they will only give us headaches. Pac Man or Super Mario wouldn&#39;t be what it is today without tight &amp; well thought quick simple controls in place. &nbsp;</p> <p>All in all I believe they are all needed equally. Of course there are great examples like used above (see article) where you don&#39;t exactly need story or gameplay to make something great but one is not any lesser important then the other. In our amazing medium we all love all must exist.</p> </span></p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 and thinking out loud with Easy mode in mind/blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2012/09/05/thoughts-and-thinking-out-loud-with-easy-mode-in-mind.aspx2012-09-05T08:58:00Z2012-09-05T08:58:00Z<p>&nbsp;</p> <p>There was an article that was just posted about how the creators of Demon &amp; Dark souls are giving thought about adding an easy mode to the experience. Here is my opinion piece about it coming up in question &amp; easy mode all together.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>My thoughts on Dark Souls alone. Just enjoy Dark Souls how it was made in the first place. Don&#39;t try to turn it into something it is not. I don&#39;t think just because it is crazy hard people shouldn&#39;t play it. That&#39;s not it at all. There is a learning curve to it. Part of the fun is learning how to do it throughout the game itself. There will be a lot trial &amp; error, strategy changes on the fly &amp; patience involved. That&#39;s how it was built in the first place. If you get pissed or whatever people like to do that made them turn it off in the first place shouldn&#39;t be ashamed of that. If it&#39;s getting you to react so strongly as that then it has accomplished part of its job. Strong emotion of any kind means strong connection no matter how you try to slice it. It may frustrate you to all hell &amp; want to swear off the game entirely but rethinking strategy &amp; trying to best what you just did it what it&#39;s all about. It&#39;s entertaining on those points alone in my opinion.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>We all have had one of those bad guys or bosses that we hated so much because they have beaten us to a pulp 1,000 times over already right? But we also all know that feeling when you finally get that edge &amp; be the one to triumph over them, it&#39;s the best feeling in the world. You find yourself standing up yelling or high fiving your friend sitting next you for earning that W. We also know the feeling that It may be short lived because the next encounter may be just as difficult as the last turning it into one of those &quot;oh ****&quot; moments but don&#39;t you think us as gamers live for one of those moments each time we play a game. We wouldn&#39;t be playing it the first place if we didn&#39;t like solving challenges, doing something new to us &amp; overall entertaining ourselves right? Now Easy mode has been around since games were invented. It will never not be apart of gaming, but here&#39;s a question. When do we know when to stop using &amp; implementing that mode?</p> <p>Not every game is created equal &amp; people should be ok with that. Not every game is made for everyone one in mind, we should get used to knowing that also. Now in my opinion when great games like Demon &amp; Dark Souls (another comes to mind being Super Meat Boy) roll around ever so rarely that were built from the foundation up to inflict damage &amp; crush us for its soul idea (no pun intended) of fun then it should be praised &amp; respected by playing it how was meant to be. There should be no exceptions. The creators built it with that full intention of making it so. Why not as a gamer step up to that original challenge &amp; accept it telling the creators &quot;alright I&#39;m going to beat your game, start thinking of new ways to try to make me fail in the next game&quot;. They set the rules &amp; want to see if we can best them at their own game. I think Easy mode is an afterthought truthfully. You ever wonder why every single game we start up to play is set on normal difficulty or doesn&#39;t have the option to change difficulties at all? It is because it&#39;s how it should &amp; be intended to be played. If anything Easy mode is training you so once you feel good enough about how the game mechanics work &amp; how the game works you switch the difficulty &amp; play the actual game. &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;</p> <p>We all know that there all different types of gamers out there &amp; everyone has different experiences with them, to each their own. Yes in Easy mode you may find it faster to get through but I think you&#39;re losing the satisfaction of taking on that original difficulty &amp; beating it knowing how it was meant to be played. I know we all have to start somewhere but some of the best things in life aren&#39;t easy &amp; some games shouldn&#39;t have to slap on an easy mode onto something it never intended to do in the first place. I have similar feelings towards MP too but that&#39;s for another time. If you followed even the slightest bit of news on Dark Souls or have heard of Demon Souls before its release then you&#39;d know damn well what your getting yourself into. Easy mode should be the farthest thing away from the Souls series. Easy mode is &amp; shouldn&#39;t be slapped on everything.&nbsp;I&#39;m pretty surprised to even hear this come up honestly.&nbsp;</p> <p>Now if you couldn&#39;t already tell I love the Souls series, the setting &amp; challenge alone make it great. All in all I&#39;m trying to say is that we need more games that push us to better ourselves as gamers in skill &amp; how we learn. Get us out of our comfort zone &amp; get challenged to a new feeling we&#39;ll grow to love. We need more games like Dark Souls &amp; Super Meat Boy,etc. It&#39;s not fun getting used to blowing through games &amp; getting used to feeling ***. Bring us back down the earth every once awhile and when we go sky high once again it&#39;ll feel that much better.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 discussion continued..../blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2012/05/31/dlc-discussion-continued.aspx2012-05-31T09:07:00Z2012-05-31T09:07:00Z<p><span> </span></p> <p>Jeff Cork posted a feature about day one DLC this is my thought on it all.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p> There&#39;s a fine line between DLC. It needs to be reigned in a bit in my opinion. Some of the first DLC that came to mind was for NInja Gaiden 3. That was atrocious. They gave us the choice to buy old weapons just to have em back in the game if we wanted options &amp; different gameplay styles that were in every games before it. Capcom&#39;s idea of buying roster characters instead of going though the game &amp; unlocking em like how it used to be. An asinine idea. Those are just few that I can quickly rattle off. There are plenty more to be named.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>On the discussion of day one DLC it&#39;s a bit crazy. I don&#39;t want thunder being stolen from the launch title itself just for some DLC that should have been in the game in the first place. Receiving the DLC right away does sometimes leave the &quot;blah or really?&quot; feeling for some people that it takes away from the initial excitement of the game at launch. To others it&#39;s the cherry on top. I personally fall into the latter category. I like finishing or putting some good time under my belt with the game I just bought before I&#39;m dangled another piece of it in front me even before I&#39;m done. It&#39;s a fine line on the subject because everyone is different on the matter. We all know the companies can&#39;t please everyone with the idea behind it so we have to be constantly voicing our thoughts on it all to slowly bring balance to it over &amp; over. Now if you think of more DLC later down the line to add or update to the game then that&#39;s great,release it. It&#39;ll bring back people to the game &amp; extend the game even more. It might even bring people into buying the game now if they didn&#39;t during launch. A good example is myself. I haven&#39;t bought Arkham City yet just because I was too busy when it came out but now with the GOTY Edition out I&#39;m picking that up as soon as I can. All the DLC included on it now are just extras for me that I scored on.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>This great article also brought up many questions to mind as well. While reading through it I couldn&#39;t help but think of questions I&#39;d like to hear. It&#39;d be really nice to hear more insight from the developers themselves,like if it was made during the same timeline as the build process for the game itself why not put in the content in the first place? Is it still wrestling with the idea to put it in the game? Is it on the cutting board until it&#39;s decided? What goes in on the thought process &amp; decisions for DLC itself? How big of a part does advertising play in the ratio to need &amp; want in the process? What makes it worth paying for &amp; free? To follow up that pay or free question I have Skyrim&#39;s recent free updates as example. Lately it has been receiving new free content &amp; patches. If that&#39;s an option then why isn&#39;t being practiced more often?<span> <p>Good article. It raises more questions then answers in my opinion but more discussion is always welcomed.</p> </span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 of hand DLC..../blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2012/03/22/out-of-hand-dlc.aspx2012-03-22T11:28:00Z2012-03-22T11:28:00Z<p> <p>I found myself disliking DLC early on &amp; now I full blown HATE it. It&#39;s getting so out of control &amp; needs to stop NOW. It&#39;s a **** business practice that&#39;s killing the industry &amp; games themselves. I don&#39;t care if it&#39;s free or not,it should be in the game already. I really wish we could go back to the days of unlocking new stuff by actually beating the game,different challenges or finding secrets in game,etc. Money has triumphed over passion &amp; creativity &amp; the quality of what a game should be in my opinion.&nbsp;</p> <p>Correct me if I&#39;m wrong but I swear Dark Souls is one of the only complete &amp; full games this generation. The only mention of DLC for it has been that they won&#39;t produce any because they are satisfied &amp; proud in what they produced. We need more people thinking that way,don&#39;t be cutting corners on the build of the game just so you can release the game out faster. If I have to wait longer for it then so be it, try to include everything in it you can. If not then save it for the chance of the game earning it&#39;s own successor &amp; include it there along with any new ideas you also have,at least I&#39;ll be more confident in knowing that I&#39;m getting a solid title. I&#39;m getting tired of games stealing their own thunder &amp; time from their OWN launch titles only to hear about DLC that shouldn&#39;t even have been announced in the first place because it should be included already.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>Quit pushing half assed work out the doors just so you can finish your game later by announcing DLC.&nbsp;Alright my rant is over,sorry but I had just watched a trailer for Ninja Gaiden 3 and its DLC weapons.&nbsp;We&#39;re not stupid.</p> </p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 Just Cause 2 moments..../blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2012/03/10/favorite-just-cause-2-moments.aspx2012-03-10T17:51:00Z2012-03-10T17:51:00Z<p> <p><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>This is easily one of my favorite games EVER. It came out a few years ago back in 2010 by Square Enix. We&#39;ve all had our chance to play it for sometime now &amp; see how nuts we can push the game. It&#39;s amazingly fun &amp; doesn&#39;t take itself seriously one bit (one of the many reasons why I love it),even the story is pretty much optional but the game itself is down right AWESOME. The world is huge,you can literally spend 5 or so minutes taking a boat to one part of the island. One important thing is that you can swim as well!! Go for a swim for a bit,the water is just as big if not bigger then the different islands themselves. lmao find a boat if you&#39;d like,take it to top speed &amp; hit a slope on some random island out there &amp; see how far you make it or actually jump one part of it. Just for the hell of it.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>In one sitting I found myself taking a plane from the airport flying to some huge snowy mountains jumping out of that plane when I was above the mountains &amp; skydived down to a big military base found on one part of the mountains themselves, once I reached the military base where I destroyed the entire thing just messing around. Guns,hand grenades,some of their own weapons on the vehicles,etc. Got a funny idea and took one of the parked helicopters &amp; flew it straight up to what felt like and endless vertical limit jumped out of it fell some ways down &amp; tried to get back in the same helicopter again by using my grappling hook, just to see if I could even do it lol. I failed to &amp; it came exploding down onto the base causing more big explosions taking out a fuel depot in the base. After that random crazy idea I found myself another helicopter that I hadn&#39;t blown up earlier,flew that to some big bridges in the mid area of the mountains,landed it there &amp; went base jumping off the tall bridges there to celebrate hahaha. Ended up leaving that small portion of the map to go find something else to mess around with.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><span style="white-space:pre;"> </span>Another one of my favorites is I bought myself one of those personal jets from the black market &amp; was just flying around scoping out where to land next. While I was flying around I found a big giant floating blimp,circled around to get a better look @ it &amp; found out that it was a special rich persons Mile High club or something along those lines. Started laughing to myself while landing my plane in a cut out underneath the club floating in the air that looked like a garage,climbed out found some stairs that leaded to the music &amp; dancing. I pop my head up &amp; find the club is a 2 story full blown outdoor club,stripper poles everywhere,open bar with characters dancing &amp; drinking on what looked like a disco floor &amp; more randomness. Walked around found some guards protecting the club started a big fight that ended with C4 going off &amp; huge fire fights sprinkled with grapple hook shenanigans in for the fun as well. With all the fun that was happening my jet that I flew here with had been destroyed....o well lol, I jumped off the edge &amp; went skydiving for what felt like a solid minute of falling because I was so high up. Landed back into the water &amp; continued my fun elsewhere on the island.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>I&#39;m curious to hear some of the funny stories that you pulled off or found yourself messing around doing in this pure creative sandbox fun of a game?</p> </p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 Resident Evil 6 Impressions..../blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2012/01/20/first-resident-evil-6-impressions.aspx2012-01-20T09:31:00Z2012-01-20T09:31:00Z<p> <p>Here&#39;s a question? </p> <p>We all know games tend to evolve over time by mixing &amp; matching different formulas right ? Yes it may not look like a trademark classic Resident Evil but can&#39;t there be different types of horror out there? I know it&#39;s late in the series but I like the change,the formula that has been working for all these years was amazing but along with the changing dynamics in the story itself there also needs to be a dynamic change in how we play it to fit that point in the timeline. I have high hopes for this game &amp; hope it sells by the millions. Change is good when the change itself it good. I have faith &amp; trust in the developers to know how to go with their love child of a series. &nbsp;&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>I say this looks likes one extreme situation of survival horror, it may not be where you silently creep through the halls getting ready to **** yourself when something jumps out at you or leading us into tightly closed claustrophobic places we&#39;re used to but being overwhelmed &amp; fighting for your life in crazy world ending scenarios shown in the trailer sure sounds like one hell of a case of survival horror to me. We all know the action has been ramped up more just by looking at the trailer but the intensity in story has also stepped up as well. I know I&#39;d be holding my breath &amp; trying to act quickly in any of those scenarios scared as all hell.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>To all the fans out there all I&#39;m saying is give it shot then judge it for yourself instead of shooting it down because it&#39;s something new in a series we have all grown to love.&nbsp;</p> </p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 Controls....past,present & future./blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2011/12/28/motion-controls-past-present-amp-future.aspx2011-12-28T15:00:00Z2011-12-28T15:00:00Z<p> <p>Now I&#39;m indifferent with it all. All the systems could always step up &amp; do better, and like every year they will all learn from the present year &amp; make it another awesome season for us gamers. Keep it competitive &amp; we&#39;ll be the ones on top. That being said though....</p> <p>There is one thing that bothers me,it&#39;s the motion me old school or content but I&#39;ll take a comfy controller,plug in steering wheel or mouse &amp; keyboard over what feels like prototype motion ideas any day. Yea it&#39;s a fun idea but they keep missing the mark in my opinion. Now if motion controls are here to stay then I think the companies should take a break from advertising &amp; invest more time &amp; money spent in R &amp; D. I get more excited hearing about the Kinect or any other motion controls being used in different ways other then gaming then using it for actual gaming itself. It&#39;s pretty cool technology when you think about it but if your going to try to make something then stick to your original plan &amp; dedicate time to it instead of half assing it. Maybe we don&#39;t fully understand it all yet or something I don&#39;t know.&nbsp;</p> <p>I know it&#39;s easier said then done but come on....if you want it to be the future of gaming then try to make a solid invested future into it.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>What are your thoughts on it all? &nbsp;</p> </p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7 games & surprise hit games of this year./blogs/members/b/gunslingerd7_blog/archive/2011/12/27/favorite-games-amp-surprise-hit-games-of-this-year.aspx2011-12-28T01:00:00Z2011-12-28T01:00:00Z<p>I know Jeff just did a article on this but I liked it so much</p> <p>My GOTY for me no questions asked,my most anticipated game this year as well. I&#39;ve been waiting for a great challenge that would try my patience again after playing Demon Souls &amp; I got it with Dark Souls. The lil details in it &amp; the strategy of playing it made it incredible. &nbsp;</p> <p> <p>My surprise hits would have to be Bulletstorm,Need for Speed the Run &amp; Orcs must Die. I know I can think of others but those are the first to pop in my head,so I&#39;m going with em. I thought Bulletstorm was going to be pretty fun just by how it was advertised but when I finally got my hands on it it was a blast!! The language &amp; story was funny to me,it rolled right with the over the top feel of it. Still wish they brought a competitive multiplayer experience to it but it didn&#39;t hurt me too much.&nbsp;</p> <p>As for Need for Speed the Run,I have been a huge fan of Need for Speed since it was born into the industry &amp; yea the game might feel a bit repetitive with the races but there is just something hidden in this game that keeps pulling me into it. I love the idea of a Cannonball Run story &amp; aspect of it. I love taking my 1971 Nissan 240z from California to New York. I have a feeling I&#39;m going to play this game over &amp; over again with new cars doing the challenges. I&#39;m kind of bummed that the police aren&#39;t as crazy as they were with Most Wanted but it&#39;s still fun.</p> <p>Last but not least Orcs Must DIe,I&#39;m a huge fan of old school &amp; arcade games. When I tried the demo for this game over Live I was so impressed with how simple &amp; how much fun it is. The art direction it took,the humor it had &amp; the fluid controls made it one of my favorite games this year. The entire trap/tower defense was original &amp; a lot of fun. The lil celebration dances your character did after clearing a level made me laugh every time. All &amp; all just plain fun.&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>I still need to pick up Dead Island &amp; NBA 2K12 though,both sound real fun.&nbsp;</p> </p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="" width="1" height="1">GunslingerD7