Merry FAQin Christmas

Can’t believe it’s FAQing Christmas again. Lol, you get it? You have to say it “fack-ing” funny isn’t it? You know what, never mind. Anyway I’m sure you all know how it facking works (sorry I’ll stop): you guys were kind enough to send us your burning questions via our Facebook, Twitter and Formspring so it only seemed right that we answer them in a (mostly) sensible fashion. So, a warm welcome to: Mark, Lorna, Rook, Adam, Ben, Samuel, Richie, Ed and Mark S. Oh and Kat. If you’d like anymore info on any of the writers or to take a look at their previous articles just click on the “Writers” tab in the top menu. No wait, dont go now, you can have a look later.

On behalf of everybody here at GamingLives we would like to thank you for visiting us this past year, we’ve got a load of awesome stuff planned for 2011, so keep coming back. For now though we’d like to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a game filled New Year.

Are there any particular games you go back to at this time of year because they are in some way festive?

No, because I tend to NOT play games over christmas… usually we’ve got a load of people staying and it makes it difficult to get any gaming done because you end up being ignorant while people sit on the sofa watching you game as they pick their toe nails. This year, however, there are no visitors… so I’m hoping to get through as much gaming as possible. I’m hoping to complete Two Worlds 2 and Fallout: New Vegas so I can get started on Arcania… which will likely take me months to complete!

There’s nothing that I can say I go back to as such, it’s rare that I ever go back to a game that hasn’t had DLC for it, which is a shame really. There’s too much out around Christmas for me to go back to; that said I’ve got a craving to go back to Mass Effect 2 to finish the DLC off but the Lair of the Shadow Broker isn’t what I’d call festive. I can’t actually think of many Christmassy type games – there may be a gap in the market there, why not? There are Christmassy films, Christmas music, Christmas books, even Christmas chocolate so why not have Christmas games? I always thought it would be cool to have stupid things like Santa hats or reindeer antlers for your Spartan in Halo Reach over Christmas (oh I always play Halo on Christmas day, after present opening but before lunch) but the only game I can think of that does anything close to that, and acknowledges the winter period that we have back here in the boring arse real world, is World of Warcraft. Nintendo games make me feel Christmassy but I think that might be more because they take me back to my childhood, games like Lylat wars, Zelda, Super Mario. You know that kind of thing… oh man, I wish the 3DS was out this Christmas. While I’ve been rattling though I have just thought of the most Christmassy game I can think of and it’s the same as the greatest Christmas movie ever made. Die Hard and Die Harder that where part of Die Hard Trilogy on the PlayStation 1. But I can’t go back to it because I don’t have a PlayStation any more.

James Pond: Robocod perhaps because it is fairly festive, however, you’re usually fucked off with it in five minutes if you didn’t use the invincibility cheat right at the start. Also, Super Mario Land for the original GameBoy as I remember playing it on Christmas day many many years ago. This year I fancy playing Hitman: Blood Money again…no idea why…it does have a Christmas level in.

There are no games that I go back to because of the festive season but there is one that I always think back to. It was 2 or 3 years back and I remember playing Banjo Kazooie through XBLA. It was Christmas day and I was going to family for dinner and I remember I was playing the Christmas level in the game, collecting presents for polar bear cubs, climbing inside a Christmas tree and bringing down evil snowmen

As a house rule, straight after the morning presents session in the house of Adam and Lee, we make it a point to go onto Xbox Live and play Halo for a few hours. Ok so it’s hardly Robocod but the LIVE community still has that Christmas feeling to it with everyone up for having a good giggle. For anyone who dares to disrupt that, they soon feel the wrath of the Christmas masses and quickly find themselves laughed from the lobby.

Not really, no. I was thinking about this the other day whilst playing the Grubbins on Ice DLC for Costume Quest… there really aren’t many Christmas games, at least not any worth playing. Die Hard Trilogy, as the section based around Die Harder is set in an airport at Christmas, is the only one I can think of. But that’s a great game generally, so I play it all year round when I get in the mood. Grubbins on Ice was pretty good, if somewhat short. Completed it in an hour and a half. Maybe that’ll become my new Christmas gaming tradition? Ask me next year.

"Come out to the coast, we'll get together, have a few laughs..."

What would your dream game be?

Short and linear. It’d be epic though, in terms of things you can do and things you get to see. Action sequences, stealth sequences. No QTEs, minimal cutscenes. It’d be easy to beat but harder to master with leaderboard action to keep you playing. It wouldn’t try to be funny, nor would it feature a single licensed song on the soundtrack.

Something with naked men in it.
And maybe dinosaurs.
But lots of cock, definitely.
Not dino cock mind, that would be weird.

Seriously messed up, and with true to life graphics, judging by how my dreams normally pan out. It’ll seem totally real, completely immersive, and then suddenly you’ll be chased by a giant spider before waking up screaming and covered in cold sweat. Finally you’ll tell your therapist about it for £120 an hour, a couple of weeks later.

Oh that’s easy… a complete remake of UFO: Enemy Unknown with HD graphics but no changes whatsoever to the gameplay. Same tactical manoeuvres, same control over the Geoscape and the base building… in fact basically just let me take every graphic ever used in the game and update them and slot them in to the original game. That’s my choice. I’d play that bugger to death, as I have the original. If I have to be more creative than that though… an RPG in the vein of Oblivion/Fallout but with additional functionality such as being able to buy your own land and construct properties so that you are creating your own villages and towns, allowing them to grow. Nothing as in depth as The Sims where you have to control characters and let them get through life but just to be a landlord who sets taxes, provides businesses, sets pricing and allows the villages to grow naturally… then when the village is nearing the point where there are no more properties available, you can travel back and expand as well as collect your taxes and earnings. There would also be an in-game construction kit for building weapons and armour from scratch by selecting base models and adjusting them to suit by adding bits on here and there with special attributes. I could go on forever… but I won’t.

What’s your longest stint on a single game?

Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door. I’d borrowed it from a friend, it was half term and I can’t remember if I wanted to hurry up and give it back or if they’d asked for it back and I was still early in. Either way, it took a 14 hour long continuous stint with a food break and a couple of toilet breaks, skipping a bunch of side quests and extra stuff to complete it. That was about 3 years ago now, I think, and the most I’ve been able to get to since then is about 12 hours. Marathon gaming is not for me.

Around 30 hours I think..?
My mind doesn’t really recall too much of it now. Was when Wrath of the Lich King first launched and I got back from my midnight launch, entered the serial key (and thus upgrading my account) and literally played non-stop for over a day.

Bloody hell..!
Years on Dungeon Keeper, months on Oblivion, Mirror’s Edge, Alan Wake.
In one session though? …I’ve done ‘all day’ jobs with Animal Crossing, Burnout Paradise, Oblivion, Hitman, Commandos and many more

Not sure which game it would be but it would definitely by an rpg. I’ve lost hours to games like Final Fantasy, Oblivion, Fallout 3 and that’s just with one play through. Getting to a stage where I am only turning it off because I need to get sleep if I want to get to be able to get up for work the next day. When you find a game you enjoy so much, you just don’t see the time going by.

When I was a teenager I spent a week playing Command & Conquer Red Alert and its expansion packs, all in one sitting, only getting up to go to the toilet and to get things to eat. Six days without sleep plotting the downfall of an alternate reality Soviet empire results in hallucinations, I discovered. But I won the day and saved the world, so that’s all that matters. Right?

The sixteen or so hours that I spent on Dead Rising one saturday (for the 7 Day Survivor) achievement would be the longest and most shameful.
I used to put a lot of time into Civilization on the Amiga, but 50% of that was just me waiting for the AI to think up all its moves.

I notched up over 230 hours in Oblivion on my first play through and I’m sure there are still other things I could be doing. A lot of that time was spent collecting ingredients and going back around the Oblivion gates so I could create better spells. I say “a lot” but it wasn’t really, perhaps only twenty hours in total was spent collecting, but I did spend a considerable amount of time going over the entire map to make sure I’d visited all locations and spoke to every interactive character.

I went a good 12 hours on Final Fantasy VII and did disc one in one sitting, playing for that sort of time can mess with your head. The only time recently that I’ve come close to that was when I joined Kat for her 24 hour Halo Reach charity thing, but I was very off and on; how she managed that I’ll never know. Fellow GamingLives writer Pete deserves a mention, he played a good 20+ hours. I can’t manage stints like that anymore, I start to have problems with reality and end up wanting to parkour my fat arse up buildings and drive my car at excessive speeds. Don’t look at me like that those things have crossed your mind as well after too much gaming.

What’s the hardest game you’ve ever completed?

I thought I had a better answer than the one I’m about to give you, but it turns out every game I’ve found difficult to complete I simply haven’t. Bastard Mario Strikers: Charged Football. It’s a toss-up between F-Zero GX and COD4′s Veteran Mode. The latter takes it because it was way more unforgiving, frustrating and lacked a lot of fun when it then took me days to complete missions.

Tomb Raider. The original game was just plain retarded in terms of difficulty and the internet was not at the stage where it could be on hand to help you through it. The puzzles were genuine brain teasers, responses had to be sharp and the end boss was just cruel. That the PC version enabled you to quicksave was one up on the Playstation and Saturns system of Save Crystals but even that could not spare you from the anguish of seeing this one through to the very end.

Angry Birds was quite hard. Does that count? I’m pretty sure if a game is too hard I wont complete it without putting it on super easy mode or using cheats.
At least with Angry Birds it wasnt an option and was done using pure skill and hours and hours of free time.

Tough question. Probably haven’t completed as many games as I should have…oh wait. Fucking ‘Lost in Blue’ for the DS…what a bastard hard game that was and I nearly borked my save right at the end. I never actually completed any Speccy games without cheats.
If I had, they would have been on here.

Erm gah! I dunno, I’m struggling to think of the last hard game. I originally started my answer with Fallout 3, but when I got thinking about it I can’t really say it was hard. Halo Reach on legendary on your own is pretty hard but I’ve not finished it yet. I found Dragon Age pretty hard, but again I haven’t finished it yet. I’m struggling to think of many games that I would class as hard from this generation; Rainbow 6 Vegas 2 was a bit tricky, but for a really hard game I’ve gotta go back to previous generation’s games like Resident Evil and Tomb Raider. I don’t know if that’s because I’m older and better at games or if it’s because games are getting easier, or a bit of both but I think the days of “hard” games are a thing of the past. The big games now cost millions to make and the developers want us to finish them. I’m not saying hard games don’t exist anymore I just think they are made by the indie studios and, as a result, end up as downloadable games on PC with a few of the more arcade style ones appearing on the consoles.

Two Worlds. One of the achievements was for finding all locations on the map… including underground… and that wasn’t easy. By the time I’d completed the game, my entire map was unfogged apart from the invisible wall areas such as the top of mountains that were genuinely unreachable. If I could go there, I went there, and the map was unfogging pixel by pixel as I progressed. I think it took me a couple of weeks JUST to discover all of the locations, and I remember being excited when that *plink* happened to say that I’d done it, because I never expected it at that point; I thought I still had a way to go yet. I think, however, if I’d bothered continuing with the tracks on Trials HD, that this would have been the most difficult game to complete. I haven’t even completed the medium tracks!

Call of Duty 2 possibly.
It has some genuinely tough sequences and a habit of killing you unfairly, making you go back and do those sequences again. I genuinely didn’t think I’d manage it.
EDF had its moments also and for XBLA titles getting a one-credit completion on Contra was no joke.

Who are the 3 most irritating characters you’ve come across whilst gaming?

Mario – I’m just sick of his smug looking face.
Harley Quinn – Arkham Asylum – she may be damn sexy, but her voice grates on my tits like I can’t tell you.
Einstein – from Skool Daze. The number of times the creeping bastard dobbed me in to Mr Whacker and I ended up with 10,00 lines, getting me expelled, was too many.

I wanted to murder Navi from Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, and I still do any time I play that game. If I hear “LISTEN!” one more time…
The nemesis in the Pokemon games, Gary or whatever you decide to rename him to (I tend to go with something we can’t publish here), is a really annoying pain in the hole. He’s easy to defeat. But he’s really, really annoying.
Dr Eggman in the Sonic games. Mostly because of his name change. Doctor Ivo Robotnik is an awesome name, renaming him to Eggman and changing the difficulty of his boss fights so that the only real danger is the awful camera in the 3D Sonic games was just such a lame move on SEGA’s part.

Turns out I’ve mentally blocked a lot of them out, because this was hard for me to answer, especially as some of them are purposefully annoying and when they are I actually find them more funny than irritating. So here are 3 random characters in games that irritate me.
Those people in Assassin’s Creed who used to randomly push and attack you and reveal you to be an assassin, but if you kill them YOU are the jerk.
Baird from Gears of War. He’s such a stereotypical whiner in the series that he doesn’t so much as stand out from the others as much as he makes you want to punch him in the face. Or maybe that’s just me.
Carth from Knights of the Old Republic. His story is well fleshed out and he’s written and voice acted superbly, but he’s just so irritating to put up with that I cut him out of my party as soon as I could and was so annoyed when I couldn’t kill the useless dissenter in the game’s conclusion.

Fawkes, for continuing to take all my glory whenever I make a kill in Fallout 3… you do NOT win again… you were standing back trying to get your Gattling Laser off your back while I slaughtered everything, let’s be honest here mate.
Clap Trap… he annoys the hell out of me, not ALL of them… just the one that you meet when you step off Marcus’ bus in Borderlands. I’ve wasted so many rounds of ammo trying to take that little prick out but he just keeps spinning around doing Michael Jackson impressions.
Pete… he irritates me whilst gaming by texting mid-game to the point where I’m getting killed because he’s tarting it up and hasn’t got my back… oh and there are times when he’s too busy checking out loot to bother covering me and so I end up getting killed… so yeah, Pete gets my third vote. Sorry Pete. I’m not really.

Luigi –Luigi’s Mansion: Maario….MAAAAAAAAARRIIIIOO..mario? Maario…..MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARIO!
Agents –Enter the Matrix: Bad as this movie tie in was, the Agents were incredibly irritating in the sense that they were designed so that they simply could not be defeated. You could literally go toe-to-toe with Agent Smith for an hour and never get anywhere with him, save for one scripted occasion where you manage to knock an Agent out the back of a cargo plane. There was only one solution: RUN
The G-Man –Half Life: That you never quite understand this especially shady character is infuriating. Catching those rare glimpses of him as you progress through Valve’s masterpieces really can make your blood boil, and next to no satisfaction is given when you finally get some face time with the sallow-faced man.

The Witcher from ‘The Witcher’ turns out to be a bit of a sex mad bugger. While not irritating, it’s pretty funny. I’ve not played it the whole way through, but he has sex with about 15 women, a couple of witches and a vampire woman. I guess it’s just irritating that I don’t live in the Witcher’s universe. Other irritating characters: Hope or, in fact, any of the characters from the latest Final Fantasy game. What an annoying bunch of buggers they were. Also the little annoying FBI agent from Heavy Rain. That guy did my head in but he turned out to be the hero in my game.

Seymour in Final Fantasy X was more than a touch annoying and don’t get me started on Slippy Toad.
Crown jewel of annoyance though goes to Navi from Ocarina of Time.

“Hey! SHUT YOUR STUPID GOD DAM FAIRY MOUTH”

Hey! Hey listen! Hey! Hey! LISTEN!

That guy – you know the one he’s normally American from somewhere like Nebraska, he’s noisy and rude and comes out with the stupidest things. You’ll normally encounter him in a game like Halo or Call of Duty where he’s busy screaming at his team mates things like “my god, you guys fucking suck” “what the fuck is wrong with, you are you retarded!” and “god, jesus fuck can’t you guys play this fucking game” things like that. That guy is an arsehole, it’s everybody else’s fault that your team isn’t winning. He always seems to be in the lobby on his own though (probably because he’s a dick); I would feel bad for him but, if I’m honest, I have too much fun poking the bear, and just occasionally will shoot him in the leg or toss a grenade in his way. You have to find that balance though, you need to do enough damage to him that it pisses him off more but not so much that the game will give him the option to boot me. Yeah that’s right I’m the other guy – mwahhahahaha

The lead character from Blade Kitten is lucky that she doesn’t exist as I’d go Ike Turner on her every time she opened her stupid, fucking mouth. The end boss from the arcade game Shinobi is by far the least fair boss battle in history, taking supreme skills to get to before destroying you in seconds with seemingly unreadable attacks. Frank Lampard’s horrible fucking face in the FIFA games is realistic enough for me to want to punch my television.

Have you guys thought of doing a live show online?

Yeah, but I’m afraid the BBFC wouldn’t allow it to go out there… some of us have some really bizarre sexual fetishes. Oh you didn’t mean THAT kind of live show!? Well, logistically speaking it’d be difficult because we’re all in different locations across the world but I’m sure it’s something we’ll look at doing even if it doesn’t turn out to be live. We have too many readers every month to not consider something like this.

Me & my husband have brought our 12 and 14 year old a playstation 3 for Christmas, they’ve been pestering us for a playstation for months it came with uncharted 2, little big planet and sims 3. Any suggestions for games I can tell the family to get them?

It’s tricky to be able to recommend games to anyone of any age with such a diverse selection on the market and appeal limited solely to the interests of those in question. Of course the most popular games amongst teenage audiences tend to carry 18 rated BBFC certifications, red stamped for a very good reason: the content is very much unsuitable for younger gamers. Sports games and racing games always cut straight through that problem being entirely devoid of any controversial content. I can’t recommend Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit enough (You can read our review here) or look back into the second hand area and look to pick up some cheap copies of The Orange Box and Prince of Persia.
On the off chance that a relative buys a game you don’t think is suitable, type it into Google or YouTube and do a little research on it. As a former servant of gaming retail, I promise you that staff in a dedicated gaming high street store will be more than willing to exchange any unwanted gifts after Christmas and will be more than helpful in picking out something else for you.

I enjoy gaming with my eldest daughter and would recommend the Ratchet and Clank franchise, Katamari Forever, Lego Star Wars and ModNation Racers.
Something like the Singstar karaoke games or Buzz! Quizzes could be good fun for everyone over the Christmas and New Year break too.

Grand Theft Auto 4,
God of War 3,
and Silent Hill.
…Kidding.

Ratchet & Clank would be a good starting block, then you’ve got a few more options depending on your children’s preferences. Singstar would be great if you have a budding singer in the household as would Rock Band 3.
You’ve also got numerous sporting titles should they be that way inclined.

What was your game of the year

For me there can only be one, it’s not even a hard choice, and no it isn’t Halo Reach. My game of the year was Mass Effect 2. There have been lots of great games this year but none of them drew me in like Mass Effect 2 did; it’s full of pure “woah” moments right from the start… But thats all you’re going to get out of me on the matter. If you’d like to read the GamingLives writers’ nominations for ‘Game of the Year’ you’ll need to wait a few days and keep checking back for the full article on our thoughts, and details on how you can vote for the GamingLives.com GOTY.

What’s your favourite game movie?

Well they did make a series of films based on the Die Hard trilogy game that was on the Playstation 1. It’s hard to decide which was my favourite though. The first one was good because it had Alan Rickman in it, the second one had planes in and a wicked bit at the end where the hero, John McClane says “yippee ki yay mother fucker” as he lights a trail of jet fuel and blows a plane up as it’s taking off; the third one was good too – it had a lot more car action in it than the others, but so did the game. There was this bit in the third one with a puzzle that involved trying to get water in to jugs; it didn’t make any fucking sense. Despite that, it’s well worth a watch if you haven’t seen them, you might have to get um on video off eBay or something though – they never really caught on.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. It’s also my favourite film of 2010, from everything I saw in the cinema this year. I know that technically it isn’t based on a game, but on the graphic novels, but both are so absolutely chock full of gaming references and gamer geek culture that I think I can get away with saying it. Nintendo are notorious for not letting film studios use anything from their games after the fiasco that was the Mario Bros film, but even they were convinced by Edgar Wright to give permission for Scott Pilgrim to feature the theme tune to The Legend of Zelda, after he sent them some early clips of the film.

Tetris… that was awesome!!
Remember the bit when the square came down and there was nowhere to put it so it just stacked up on to some of the other blocks?! I nearly shit myself then.
Also the bit when three rows all collapsed at once… jeez!!

I also really want to cheat and say Scott Pilgrim Vs The World. I genuinely believe that that film is the closest we’re going to get to a good game movie for a long while, especially considering the shit that’s been churned out lately. However, it’s not a movie of a game, so I’m going to have to go with a potentially controversial choice: Uwe Boll’s Postal. Not that the film is any good at all. In fact, it’s horrendously written, directed and acted. It tries way too hard to be controversial and full of dark humour; little of it makes sense and it has such a terrible sense of humour that you almost feel sorry for it because it’s, quite frankly, shit. Even when it pokes fun at itself you cringe more than you want to laugh. Which means it’s incredibly accurate to the series of games it’s based on, probably moreso than any other game movie we’ve ever seen. Otherwise, Prince of Persia was actually a lot better than it’s been given credit for and the FPS part of DOOM was pretty sweet.

Mortal Kombat.
It’s faithful to the game, has tons of action in it and isn’t too cheap and nasty.
I liked the follow-up also.
Fight me.

Do you feel social gaming (i.e. farmville, anything else on facebook) has or will affect the gaming industry as a whole at all?

It’s as much to do with my sort of gaming as X-Factor is to my sort of music.
A completely separate world that I can happily, and easily, ignore. It might bring in people to gaming but it won’t take any away. Either way, Farmville is for idiots who I’ve invariably blocked on Facebook by now.

Yes, a massive one at that, but I don’t think it’ll be a lasting one.
It could be argued that the resurgence of social gaming has also helped the Indie development scene (which is great) but I think it has now reached a point where it can’t go any further, at least in its current guise.

I think social gaming has definitely affected the industry. It seems that every single game these days needs to have an online multiplayer aspect, following the rise of MMOs and Xbox Live and Facebook games. I’m not convinced, personally. It works sometimes, and I can have a lot of fun playing with other people, but I just don’t see what was so bad about playing a game by yourself either.

No, because I don’t really see it as gaming per se. It’s just an app on a website like a chat box or a messaging service where you interact with your friends, but I don’t see it as being a game because there are no goals… when you’ve got all the available space you can on Farmville then you’re going through the motions until another pseudo holiday arrives where they can change all their furniture and properties into that particular theme and get you to spend money on them. There is no means to an end though, it’s just an exponential waste of time and money… been there, done that, sold the t-shirt in a micro-transaction.

But my friend, it already has! The popularity of things like Farmville and iPod games are ones that developers have to take notice, and hopefully will sooner rather than later. Not that I’m hoping all games turn out like Farmville, because that’d be traitorous. It’s more that the casual audience is harder and harder to deny and it’s going to be hooking those casuals into the hardcore scene (much like Nintendo tried to do and Microsoft and Sony are now doing) which is the all-important step. Integrating the games into social networks is something that’s pretty awesome as an idea and needs to be better implemented to maximise its potential. Though technically, you can also cite Xbox Live and all MMO games as social gaming and be completely right. It’s a necessary part of gaming, yet one developers all are-too keen to cut out Single Player for at the detriment of the game as a whole.

Yes, it can’t not. Anything which makes a stack of cash gets attention and will inevitably be copied (motion control/casual games). Social games are huge, with great potential, make the most of perfect viral marketing opportunities, and operate with the golden egg of micro transactions to keep the devs snug. We may yet see them come to XBLA/Home – I wouldn’t be at all surprised – Windows 7 Phone especially.

What game are you looking forward to in 2011?

Mass Effect 3. Whilst it’s going to be sad to see the series reach its end, the incredible impact the first game made and the fantastic leap to its superior sequel can only point towards the definitive gaming experience of our lives.
No pressure Bioware.

There are a few games out next year that I’m looking forward to, as I’m really into my MMORPGs and Star Wars The Old Republic is at the top of my list.
Then there are Arkham City, DC universe online.
Oh… and Guild Wars 2.

It WAS Two Worlds 2, but I caved and bought the European version instead. At this point I’d have to say that my trousers are straining for Crysis 2 but I’m also concerned that it’ll let me down… but that’s par for the course with any new game in a series really. Crysis was an incredible game, so much fun for someone who doesn’t play first person shooters at all, and so I’m hoping that they’ll be able to push the boundaries with Crysis 2… as long as my gaming rig will actually play it, but there’s no way in hell you’re going to get me playing a game like Crysis 2 on a console. Never.

There are a bunch of games I’m looking forward to next year. Test Drive Unlimited 2 is one I’ve been banging on about for ages now, and keeps being delayed, and Two Worlds II is another. The new Legend of Zelda, Skyward Sword, will be a must-buy for me too, as well as Crysis 2 and Dragon Age 2. If it comes out next year, Mass Effect 3 is something I wanted since I finished the second game, but I doubt we’ll see that until 2012. And rightly so, since it’ll give Bioware a chance to do it properly.

Aliens: Colonial Marines. Four-player co-op shooty action set on the Sulaco? I’d suck tramps just to play the demo. I’m a massive Aliens fanboy but we’ve been shat on in recent years by the films and games.
If it’s good though, I’ll literally spawn deadly eggs EVERYWHERE.

That would be Portal 2. I had played Portal first when I got The Orange Box because I like puzzles but I had no idea how much I would enjoy Portal. I played the game until it was complete because I was enjoying it so much and I’ve been back and beaten a number of times since. Having an extra 14 levels to play through when it was later released through XBLA just wasn’t enough. I want more! and that’s what Portal 2 will be

There are too many things coming out next year that we know about; it’s good but it kind of sucks at the same time. Off the top of my head next year we have: Bulletstorm, L.A. Noire, Portal 2, Need for Speed: Shift 2, Gears of War 3, Mass Effect 3, Uncharted 3, Resistance 3 (wow that’s a lot of 2′s and 3′s) and there’s bound to be a Call of Duty and all the other yearly stuff. Short term though, my next purchase will be Dead Space 2; beyond that I’m not sure but it’s the things that I don’t know about yet that I’m most looking forward to. I love reading the rumours on Kotaku and the “no comment statement”, then nothing for a day of two, then BLAM! and it gets announced. I don’t know if we’re going to get a lot of that next year – all of the big boys are busy with the above – I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

Splicerman, Splicerman, does whatever a Splicerman can...

Oh no wait I just thought of one.
Bioshock Infinite and a 3DS I want a 3DS please.




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8 Comments

  1. Adam R AdamR says:

    Hey you used my question! Awesomesauce! Very imsightful look into youse guy’s and gal’s brains. Hope yall enjoy your respective holidays!

  2. Ste says:

    Nice article, can’t believe I was late with my answers though! Doh!

    By the way, I facking love Die Hard Trilogy for the PS. Great game!

  3. Rook says:

    Aaaww maaan. I could have mentioned Call Of Duty: World At War on Veteran difficulty / EDF 2017 on Inferno difficulty or the Inferno II track in Trials HD to complete all Extreme tracks in the hardest game to beat section.

  4. Samuel Samuel says:

    Bioware announced that Mass Effect 3 was coming out next Christmas literally the day after I wrote my answers to this and predicted that it couldn’t be out until 2012. Bastards.

    Interesting to see how everyone else answered these!

  5. Lee says:

    Gah I wanna watch die hard now

  6. Pete Pete says:

    Great read guys and gals! Nice to make it onto a list ;) I should point out that despite being distracted by the shiny shiny I rarely let you bleed out dood lol

  7. Mark R MarkuzR says:

    I wanted to change my most anticipated game of 2011 to Elder Scrolls V after the announcement of Skyrim… but I think I’ll stick with Crysis 2 anyway as I tend to play more RPGs than anything else so at least I’m shaking things up a bit with Crysis 2. I’m sure Skyrim will kick some serious ass anyway, although I DO think that MS and Sony need to start thinking about the next gen consoles because the heavy games are starting to look a little tired in terms of textures and polygon counts so many years on after the release of the current gen. Crysis and Skyrim will look great when you’re running at full speed but I bet they’ll look shoddy when you stop and look around.

    Great read though, always enjoy seeing what other people are thinking and funny to see all the “Dammit” responses when people remember other things afterwards.

  8. Edward Edward says:

    Great to see everyone else’s responses and what they thought of answer-wise in comparison to me. Some interesting choices here and there but I think it works well that we’re all able to pick different things rather than all go “Yeah, it’s that one. Just that. Nothing else.”

    :D

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