Wednesday 5 February 2014

50 Greatest games of all time (part 9)

15. Mashed: Drive to Survive



   It's another of those games to make it on multiplayer alone. Basically, Mashed: Drive to survive (hereby referred to as simply 'mashed') is Micro Machines, but better. It doesn't have the fun aesthetics that driving around a kitchen table gives you, but it does have polar wharf, perhaps one of the best racing tracks ever.
   In case you haven't played this game, or micro machines for that matter, the idea is that you, and up to 3 other cars drive around a track (duh) with weapons, in an attempt to knock them off the side of the track, or damage them enough so you can get away from them because you get a point by getting so far in front all other players go off the screen. Then it mixes up other points, for example, if 4 are playing, the person who wins will get 2 points, the last other person standing, 1, 3rd -1 and 4th, -2. This means you can be there for 10-15 minutes without generating a winner, despite the fact that you only need 12 points to win (and you start on 6) and each point tends to take between 10-30 seconds to gain.
   Back on polar wharf then, it's basically a big over, that is icy, with 2 big 180 degree tuns at the end. It sounds so simple, but it's perfect for multiplayer as it means the game comes more down to what you are able to do to an opponent to remove them from the race, rather than racing ability. Sure, there are other good tracks too, but this is the standout. Hell, it was even included in the 2012 spiritual sequel 'wrecked: revenge revisited' (but let's not besmirch the name of mashed by talking about that).
   There were other game modes, sure, you could team up and have 2 on 2, or a handicap 3 on 1, there were time trials and chases (on single player, but the only reason to play single player was to unlock all the tracks and cars), so there was a decent mix of things to do, but the simple 4 person face off was always the best. Of course, the biggest question of all is, do we want to put the air strikes on?



14. GTA V



   It was exceedingly difficult to find a picture that encapsulates this entire game, so this one will have to do (it's got police in, what more do you need?).
   Everyone knows what GTA (grand theft auto) games are about by now, at least, you should do. It's about being a master criminal in a giant free roaming world, having shootouts, 'jackin' cars, police chases, finding hidden packages and constantly getting rang to go bowling in the middle of a mission (or was that just GTA IV?). Everyone waited for years for baited breath for this to come out, it was 5 years since GTA IV had come out (the worst since 2 if you ask me, but most don't seem to share than opinion) and when we all knew a release date, everyone rushed out to get it, making it to this date, the single fastest selling game, and even entertainment product of all time, making over $1 billion in 3 days. Which means that if you need me to tell you about it, then have you been under a rock?
   Nevertheless, the story revolves around 3 men looking for a big payday by pulling off a series of heists, and all the build up and prep in between. For the first time it allowed you to play as 3 different characters and switch between them whenever you wanted, with each character completely different on the personality spectrum, as well as big gameplay differences, such as different special skills, their own personal wealth (no shared stuff for these guys) and separate levelling up on the basic skills for each character, as well as different starting points for them all.
   Of course, it wouldn't be GTA without an array of silly jokes, which some people complained about being too on the nose, but the satire of LA (which Los Santos  (where the game is mostly set (as well as Blaine county, the map is massive after all)) is based upon) can be excellent at times. A lot of it done through Michael's daughter, who wants to become a celebrity herself. There's plenty to do outside of the main story and just general messing around too, there's hidden packages to find, spaceship parts, UFOs to see and a military base to try and break into in order to nick some coll stuff and attempt desperately to get it back to your garage before you get killed (which is exceedingly difficult) as well amongst hundreds of other things
   Then there's GTA online as well, which gives you the open world too, populated by others, with lots of online games to play (although it has all been done before, races, death matches, smuggles run style of objective grabbing and delivering and more), and with the freedom to tackle these however you want, due to the open nature of the game.
   This is a game with everything in it, and one of the most complete experiences that you'll ever play. It probably doesn't excel at any one particular thing (hence why it's only 14th), but does so much very, very well.


13. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.


   Don't immediately smite me, there was nothing wrong with this game. Granted, you can look back at it now, and blame it for what COD, and general FPS' have become, and it's probably accurate, but it was only copied because it was so good, the problem is that there has been very few improvements since. I had played both COD 2 and 3 before it, and they were fun, including online, but I was always playing these alone, plus at the time, we had WW2 shooters coming out of every crack in the gaming hemisphere, and I'd had enough, which is why the more modern (warfare) setting was a nice change.
   Single player first then, and it was actually quite good, in fact, the whole modern warfare series had a pretty good story running the whole was through (especially MW2), but I imagine that by the time MW3 came out, about 10 people probably played that. It also had the mission 'ghillies in the mist', which was a truly outstanding mission. The series of games leads up to a breakout and finish of WW3, and the first modern warfare can be compared to the first Mass effect, where the plot of the first seems somewhat small in the grand schemes of things, but sets up everything to come.
   On to the big seller then, multiplayer. I spent a lot of time playing this online with friends, and it had everything that you would want. Varying game modes, great maps, encouragement to play over and over to unlock more. It has been argues that you shouldn't be rewarded for playing so much, as some people play none stop, and when you start you stand no chance as they are both better players, and better equipped,but what are you going to do, take things away as you level up? what kind of idea is that?
   It started the small child insulting culture that now exists in online gaming, being told what they had done to your mother by an eight year old (how proud their parents must be). Which is a set back, but isn't really the games fault, but the culture that has been formed around it, which is one of the (many) reasons why traditional gamers hate it so much now, as well as issues discussed above, but it should not be forgotten that COD 4 was played by this group, and everyone enjoyed it so much, that it slowly built in to what it is (sadly) today.


12. Sonic the Hedgehog 2


   Maybe it's because i didn't play the first Sonic the hedgehog until after this (or maybe it's because the boss on the labarinth zone was so hard (and it wasn't even Bowie themed)), but this stands as my favourite platformer of all time, and by far the game that I've completed the most times in my life. I'm not one for playing games through more than once, so playing something twice is a rare happening for me, but I've probably finished this dozens of times. The reason for this is hard to point out, why I prefer it over the previously included sonic 3 (and knuckles), but maybe it's because it's first, or there wasn't any levels that annoyed me like in nearly every other platforming game, they even removed (mostly) the water level from the game (who in the world likes them, seriously, why are they included in games?).
   There was a great mix of levels, and a debug mode, the best put together multiplayer of the Megadrive era Sonic (racing on some of the main levels). It also had the best super sonic music, because it was so unfitting and silly (which is always fun). The special levels where you collect the chaos emeralds were tough, but do-able given enough patience, but even Super Sonic didn't help that much, because you got no rings for the final boss, actually there were 2 (To be fair they weren't that hard, so long as you had a few spare lives you could learn metal Sonic's moves and what order they came in, and the Death Egg Jr. was exceedingly easy (just duck down in the corner).
   I grew up on this game, and was probably the start of my controller smashing (that still exists to this day), and I will never forget it, hell,  I'll probably still try playing it again when I'm on my deathbed.


11. The Walking Dead, A Telltale Game series (season 1)



   Maybe I played the wrong games as a child, I never played the secret of Monkey Island, or any adventure game, and this is probably why the Walking Dead is so high up on this list, but that's fine by me. 
   So, is it really a game? What constitutes a game? This goes for all adventure games really, as there is little to no gameplay, are they videogames? They're like choose you own adventure books really, but you've got to class them as a game really, they're interactive, and even though they don't have much gameplay, you do decide on the way the story heads, which is something most games don't include, so maybe they aren't a game in the more common understanding of what a game is, but they exist in their own space, where the game really is the decisions that you make (Not that, that doesn't happen in other games too, but it's far more important here).
   The game itself is, obviously, set in the same world as the TV and Comic book series 'The walking dead', which is a tactic that Telltale games love, having made Back to the Future and Jurassic Park games in the past (though never to any real success) and now having acquired the rights to do a Game of Thrones game, amongst others, with their series based on Fables (Comic book series) already under way, with the second episode releasing just yesterday. Yes, the game was not a big single release, but released in 5 episodic (almost DLC like) parts. It helped, because it spilt the game up, rather than playing through a whole game, with no gameplay to keep the excitement going, so you couldn't really get bored, but could get you hyped up for the next episode, which seems like a great tactic by Telltale.
   The story relates to a man, Lee Everett, a prisoner who escapes due to the zombie outbreak, who ends up finding a young girl, Clementine, and becomes a father figure to her, and helps her both grow up, and, with the help of other characters you meet along the way, learn to survive in a world fallen apart, and try to find a new home. There is such a great dynamic between them that leads you to care so much, and, not to spoil anything (although it kind of will), the ending is devastating. Season 2 has become now, and looks set to keep the great story going, but the way I see it is as a sequel, hence why I haven't included this.
   It is all about the story here, the gameplay sections are few and far between, and usually just fetch quests anyway, but it is such a well told story, in a world already beloved by many due to the pre-existing comic and TV series', and a great justice is done with the source material and a fantastic story is told.

No comments:

Post a Comment