For Your Comparison

At the end of last year, I made mention of how, in 2005, I stumbled across a list made by IGN of the 100 Greatest Games. And how a new, updated list has arisen since.

This in turn got me thinking: With ten years separating these lists, how do they compare? What does this say about the games listed that have particular staying power? Is this truly the definitive list as it's made out to be?

So what I'll do for this post is to compare the lists: The 2005 original, the 2007 update and the 2015 iteration. Lets see if there are some common threads between them...

Firstly, the games that made both the 2005 and 2007 lists:

Alone in the Dark
Archon
Bionic Commando
Command and Conquer: Red Alert
Day of the Tentacle
Dragon Warrior
Dune 2: Building of a Dynasty
Fallout
Final Fantasy 4
God of War
Gran Turismo 3
Grand Theft Auto 3
Mafia
NHL '94
Panzer Dragoon Saga
Pokemon
Prince of Persia
Prince of Persia: Sands of Time
Quake 2
Rayman 2: the Great escape
Rome: Total War
Sam and Max Hit the Road
Secret of Mana
Shining Force 2
Sid Meier's Civilization 2 
Sonic the Hedgehog
Star Wars Arcade
Super Mario Kart
Syndicate
Ultima 7
Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution
Wave Race 64

~*~

Next, the games that made both the 2007 and 2015 lists.

Final Fantasy Tactics
Mega Man 2
Shadow of the Colossus
Silent Hill 2 
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness
World of Warcraft

~*~

And finally, the moment you've all been waiting for, the games that made all three lists:

Advance Wars
Baldur's Gate 2
Battlefield 1942
Burnout 3: Takedown
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Chrono Trigger
Contra 
Deus Ex
Doom
Final Fantasy 6
Final Fantasy 7
Goldeneye 007
Grim Fandango
Half Life
Half Life 2
Halo
Ico
Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Mechwarrior 2: 31st Century Combat
Metal Gear Solid
Metroid Prime
Mike Tyson's Punch Out!!
Ms. Pacman
Resident Evil 4
Sid Meier's Pirates!
Sim City 2000
Star Wars: TIE Fighter
Starcraft
Street Fighter 2
Super Mario 64
Super Mario Bros 1
Super Mario Bros 3
Super Mario World
Super Mario World: Yoshi's Island
Super Metroid
System Shock 2
Tetris
Thief 2: The Metal Age
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2
X-COM: UFO Defense

 ~*~

So there you go: Forty-one games, that provide a common link between the three lists. 
So what does this mean? One can imagine that these forty-one games have been influential and have proven to have considerable saying power - even compared to the more recent games listed in the 2015 list.

That's saying a lot when one considers that these games represent a nineteen year time period, with the earliest, Super Mario Bros, hailing from 1985 and the latest, Rome Total War, coming from 2004. Indeed, one can only wonder what the more current games listed in the 2015 list will look like in 2025....

Days of the New Republic

Happy New Year everyone! And here we go again with another year of Game Tumour.
So what did I play over my Christmas/New Years break? None other than Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic!

Okay so yes I did get sucked into the hype over the new movie and yes it is in anticipation for giving the oft-maligned KOTOR 2 a look (and with the Steam release promising restored content and achievements how could I refuse?) but I made it a point to revisit KOTOR 1 due to several points of interest.

Firstly, I last played this game in 2009 on the original Xbox. This time I played it on Steam and with a better idea of what I was doing. Seeing as it's been seven years between drinks, it is interesting to see the game from such a perspective. And I can safely say that KOTOR 1 still holds up well - it's still fun and engaging and I even encountered some content I missed the first time around. And even with the knowledge of the big plot twist, it still comes across as well-orchestrated that you never really see it coming.

Secondly, I am playing this game when the ownership of Star Wars has changed hands to Disney - and subsequently slit the throat of the Star Wars Expanded Universe. This move is something I have mixed feelings about: On one hand, the EU was nothing short of huge and could be intimidating to newcomers - so scrapping the EU and starting again does invite a tightly controlled, and more coherent, continuity. But on the other hand, the end of the EU does mean that some quality material will be left by the wayside - and KOTOR being one of them.
Which is indeed a shame as KOTOR is easily one of the strongest entrants in Star Wars and could certainly show anyone working on the new continuity how it's done. It manages to achieve that difficult balancing act of being new and familiar - something that eluded the grasp of the prequels.

Thirdly, it is interesting to see this game now that Force Awakens has descended down from Heavens in a golden chariot. Much has been made that how this Star Wars has gone out of this way to have plenty of diversity in it's cast (not least Finn and Rey) but somehow that attention may have been better directed at KOTOR who did it first. There's no shortage of diversity in your companions (Bastila, Mission, Juhani and Jolee) but there is a real freedom being offered in who the PC is and how the player creates them. In fact, I find it funny how people rave about Rey being the strong female character that the Star Wars franchise needed when my character, Nicst Elhob, did it first.
In addition, the new Star Wars films have the unenviable task of being new and familiar at the same time. Whilst I did find Force awakens to be both enjoyable and an apology letter for the prequels, it still seemed to be leaning on the A New Hope a lot - at the expense of having something of it's own to say (hopefully Episode VIII doesn't fall into the same trap and be a retread of Empire Strikes back)- unlike KOTOR who again, certainly had something to say and within the context of the Star Wars universe.

And finally, KOTOR still represents the prequels that should've been. It's been said that there was a germ of an idea in them that sadly got overlooked. But that wasn't a problem with KOTOR: So Anakin Skywalker was truly The Chosen One who was meant to bring balance to the Force? So what - Nicst Elhob did just that. Yep, within the field of a RPG, I had the freedom to be precisely the Jedi I wanted to be. I got to make decisions that swung in the directions both good and bad. An why wouldn't I? This is an RPG, where the players are free to mould their character in the way they seem fit. Furthermore, the lack of a Mass Effect conversation reel yields no indication of how certain conversation responses will go over - therefore it becomes impossible to do a 'pure' light side character and, to me, makes the game better for it.

Personally, if I was charged with making a new Star Wars movie, or even a reboot of the prequels, I would look to KOTOR - because it got so much right it wasn't funny.

That was the year it was: 2015

Well here we are at the tail end of 2015. The festive season is well and truly upon us so now is the time to step away from this blog and spend some time with family and friends - which is what we all should be doing around this time.
Therefore, this will be the final post for Game Tumour in 2015.

This year has been a quiet one: Its not just because I choose to scale back the amount of time and effort in this blog due to outside commitments.
No, much of my time has been invested in playing Star Trek Online. But if playing World of Warcraft has taught me anything it is too easy to fall in the trap that is common with MMORPGs: You find it is the only thing you play, the one thing you invest the most time in that the other games tend to get neglected and because you're continually investing money in this game you convince yourself to make the effort not to make the investment going to waste (WoW with the subscription, STO with Pay-as-you-go). But being in that trap doesn't mean you can escape from it.
Why, in the past week I've found myself moving away from Star Trek Online and enjoying an old favorite, Dragon Age Origins, again.

Still it's not all been bad news: I've knocked down more games off my Hall of Shame: System Shock 2, Curse of the Azure Bonds and some of the Leisure Suit Larry games.
Other highlights of 2015 have been:

• my delight at seeing the Gold Box finally make it's way to GoG
• Convincing a friend to play Divinity Original Sin and both going into it blind - and both of us finding it quite enjoyable
• Meeting Bajo and Hex
• In another coup for GoG, the arrival of the original Star Trek Adventure games!
• Obtaining a copy of New One Lives Forever (and defying the legal confusion preventing it's re-release)

So what can I take away from 2015? Well, I think the less time I spend on MMORPGs, the better. Yes they are time-sinks - hell, that's what they're designed to be! - but the amount of hours invested in a MMORPGs can really be better invested in working on some of the many games that I have left untouched.

You know, I've been playing a lot of Western RPGs these past few years that it's been quite some time since I last played, and enjoyed, a JRPG.
Therefore, I think I will, in 2016, play Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky...

So this concludes Game Tumour for 2015. Thank you to everyone who has visited this blog over the past twelve months and I look forward to speaking to you all again in 2016 :)

It took ten years to get here

It is well documented in this blog that whilst I have had an interest in gaming over the years, it is only since late 2005 that it really took off and entrenched itself like it has now.
What really triggered this interest was tumbling across a list by IGN on the 100 Greatest Games of all Time. Curious, I sat down and read through all of it. As i did so, i found myself recognizing games I was familiar with, games I knew of and games that were completely new to me. In any case, it became clear to me that I had been missing out on a lot. So I made it my goal to track down all of these games and give them a shot.

That was a full decade ago.

 So where are we now?

Well I am pleased to say that, out of the hundred games listed, I have managed to obtain all but five.
Not a bad effort if I say so myself. Many of these games have been obtained as physical copies whilst others as digital downloads (through the Virtual Console and later GoG).

So which are the five that eluded my grasp? Well:

• Star Wars Arcade (no idea how I'm going to obtain that game)
• Pokemon Red/Blue (Pokemon has a massive fanbase. It scared me off)
• Advance Wars (truly worth getting a GBA for?)
• Super Smash Bros Melee (Somehow owning Brawl made owning Melee redundant)
• and Panzer Dragoon Saga (and good luck finding a copy of that).

And after ten years invested in this project what can I say at this point in time?

This project of obtaining the (then) Hundred Greatest Games of All Time has really been my stepping stone into the wonderful world of gaming.
What originally started out as a goal of hundred games has ballooned into (according a Raptr) a collection of just under three hundred games (!).
I have played, and enjoyed, games I have originally missed out on.
I have found much to love within games I originally never thought possible.
I have got off my arse and got my true first console the PS2 - and later, the Wii and 360.
I have stepped into the world of gaming and have made many friends through doing so 
And I have started this blog and have been rambling on it ever since.

They say that it often pays to acknowledge one's roots and to never forget where you've come from. And I acknowledge that this list sent me down a path that was bewildering but at the same time lot's of fun. In fact, now that I think of it, the original list pretty much functioned, to me at least, as a way to acknowledge gaming's past and to salute the pioneers that brought us all here to then then present state of 2005. And that's what I've done with this collection process: I have collected games, many of which I've never played before, and I've seen how they've managed to shape and inspire those which have followed in their wake. I've found material that have been completely new to me and it's interesting to see where certain ideas have originated from.

So where do we go from here?

Through obtaining, and playing, these games I have gained a sense of history and, like any gamer, built up some treasured memories to call my own. Indeed, one could say that I have forged my own identity as a gamer and have seen many more new places emerge before me. But that wouldn't have happened it it not been for those magical 95 games.
Okay so yeah a fair number of those 95 games have gone unplayed but i reiterate: It's important to know where you've come from. Why, recently IGN has released a new list of the 100 Greatest Games of all Time. And I found this new list places a lot of emphasis on more recent titles - but it means little to me as it seems more a celebration of the previous generation than a salute to the pioneers that the 2005 list was. Maybe it's a generational thing?

But no matter: This post marks the endpoint of a ten year journey so where do we go from here?
I have no idea but I tell you: It's going to be a lot of fun :)

Dark as the Darkest Night was Diablo

Lets talk about Diablo for a minute.

With the passage of time, I find Diablo something of an oddity: It was a huge hit in it's day but now no one seems to talk about it a lot. Okay so maybe the game has, in the years since, been surpassed by many RPGs, and Blizzard have made other games, but I still believe this is more to this franchise than it's most recent iteration.

I first played Diablo in 2002 - where I got my copy of a friend. I was to reluctant to play it at first (largely because I knew of the big twist that happens at the end of the game) but within time, I played Diablo all the way to the end (with both the Rogue and the Warrior) and it was quite enjoyable. As an action RPG it was a lot of fun but in the terms of atmosphere and art direction, the game was unbeatable. It was indeed engaging to have this mood of dread creeping throughout the game - the type that no other game has done since (with the possible exception of Eversion).

In fact maybe that's what I got the most out of the first Diablo: It does Dark Fantasy really well. These days Dark Fantasy seems to be a tag used to describe fantasy set in less-than glorious settings (ie Dragon Age and Game of Thrones). But I however subscribe to the traditional description of Dark Fantasy in that it's the combination between the genres of fantasy and horror. And it's that niche that Diablo fills nicely. It's not just slaughtering demonic enemies and slowly descending into Hell: It is, again, the atmosphere. It is the increasing discomfort that resonates the further progression is made. It is, again, that feeling of dread that drips throughout the game itself.

But really, the strengths of Diablo as a Dark Fantasy is best viewed through the intro:

Original video located here. Accessed 11th December 2015

To me this is Dark Fantasy done right: The ruined buildings, the use of shadows, the foreboding  music, the monsters all accumulating to the scream at the end. Indeed, one can't not deny just how being constantly returned to that sword in the ground suddenly comes across as unsettling. Amazing how this intro is still compelling nearly twenty years later.
In fact i can just point tot that intro and say: "That's Dark Fantasy".

Which in turn makes me wonder why no one has ever done anything to match it. Sure anyone can use Dark Fantasy to describe certain fantasy settings but Diablo truly feels like a game that walks the walk. Perhaps no one has bothered to try an match it: because the first Diablo game it so well.

So have I bothered with the other Diablo games? No I haven't. I will admit that the afore-mentioned twist at the end of Diablo left me feeling cheated of victory that it was enough to put me off further explorations in the series. It may sound petty but I don't know: I spent all this time with this character so having them befall the fate that was handed to them does indeed feel like a rip off. But then again, maybe that is part and parcel of a Dark Fantasy.
I will admit that it would've been a cool idea to have the stats of the PC in Diablo being imported over into Diablo 2 (like in Mass Effect) but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Still, you can't say that the trailer to Diablo 2 broke from the Dark Fantasy template:

Original video located here. Accessed 11th December 2015

"....There's something dark within me now..."

Telling a Tale of Batman

Apparently, Telltale games are making yet another series of games to add to their stable. And this new one will be a Batman game series.

What hasn't Batman got enough games already?

Trail of Torment

Nothing much to say for this week so here's a classic for dusting off: the trailer for Planescape Torment.

Original video located here. Accessed 4th December 2015

Its a compelling trailer but what is fascinating is that none of this footage actually appears in the game. Granted the game was still in development when this trailer came out but its interesting to see, with hindsight, how many ideas got scrapped. We do get to see Vhailor, Ignus, Nordom and the Lady of Pain as well as a glimpse (however fleeting) of The Nameless One. We also see Coaxmetal getting out and about.
Make no mistake: Planescape Torment is one of the best games I have ever played and one I will proudly champion. However looking at this trailer one can only wonder how much got left on the floor during the development phase