The Games of 2008 (Part I)

Here’s the first part of the two-part feature in which I’ll outline 10 game titles that will define the year 2008 in gaming, and make this a year not to miss out on.  Some will be console exclusives, others will be multiplatform, but all are either highly anticipated or looks like it has promise as a videogame.  These aren’t ranked in any particular order, just my list of games to look out for this year.  Some are already out, others are only rumoured to be out this year – but here’s the future of the gaming landscape as I see it.  So, let’s begin!

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Grand Theft Auto IV
Release Date — April 29th 2008
(PS3, Xbox 360)

This has to be the one of the, if not the  most anticipated game of this year.  The  king of freeform, sandbox videogames is  back for the new generation of consoles.  Calling itself ‘4′ labels the previous two installments (Vice City and San Andreas)  more like expansion packs to GTA III rather  than forwarding the series in any meaningful  way.  Hopefully, this means GTA IV will be  as big as leap as GTA III was.  Only time will  tell, but from rumours and trailers, it looks  like it will a big improvement.  San Andreas’ map was just too big, with miles of countryside and desert sounding good on paper, but meaning the game lacked focus and spread itself too thin.  GTA IV focuses on one city, Liberty City (a take on New York).  No desert areas, just a living breathing city to play in.  Yes, the map might not be as large, but the detail within it more than makes up for that, and the shear scale of things available for you to do looks as though it’s grown by leaps and bounds.

You play as a character called Niko Bellic.  Little is known about him except he’s Eastern European and is immigrating to Liberty City to live the American Dream.  His cousin, Roman, is also living there, and is possibly one of Niko’s first contact to do missions for.  A lot has been said about GTA IV – it’s improved aiming and cover systems, its more freeform approach to missions, the new wanted area mechanic, the multiplayer – but it’s impossible to know how these elements will play out until you play the game.  I’m predicting many of the rumours, or even confirmations, of the smaller aspects of gameplay probably won’t come true.  I remember there was something going around about San Andreas about how CJ (the main character) could buy and smoke cigarettes.  There was some excitement over this (I have no idea why – it’s a pointless addition), but it didn’t end up in the final game.  For that reason, I’m taking a lot of the rumours with a pinch of salt until I get my hands on it and actually play it myself.  Missions spanning over days and you being able to do your own thing while waiting for an interview or some other event sounds good, but will it be as good in execution?

One thing’s for certain, this game will sell by the bucketload, and based on the previous games in the franchise, it will be an amazing, epic experience.  Being able to just free roam the city is where a large proportion of gameplay hours come from, giving this almost unlimited and unrivaled replayability.  You will get your value for money with this game, and I strongly recommend everyone with a PS3 or 360 picks it up.

 

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Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
Release Date — June 12th 2008
(PS3)

Probably the most sought after PS3 exclusive of this year, maybe even of all time.  Metal Gear Solid 4 charts the final chapter of the epic gaming series.  I’m not completely up to date with the story (I have played MGS2 + MGS3, but the parts of the story I can remember I don’t really understand how it fits into the larger picture), so I did some research on the series story, and I’m very surprised about how deep it is.  For a game, this is very cinematic stuff.  And, I realised I’ve only played as Solid Snake for a very short sequence in MGS2, so nows my final chance.  In this game you play as ‘old snake’.  Well, he looks old, but that’s only a side affect of the cloning process (he was cloned from the main character in ‘Snake Eater’).  This is five years after the big shell incident in MGS2, and this game is the direct sequel considering that MGS3 was a prequel.

Right then.  This might get a bit spoilerish… and complicated.  The antagonist of this game is ‘Liquid Ocelot’.  Essentially, a man called ‘Big Boss’ was injured, and in an attempt to keep his genes going, he was cloned into three others – Solid Snake, Liquid Snake and Solidius Snake.  Big Boss was killed before the Metal Gear Solid series started, Liquid was killed in MGS1 and Solidius is killed in MGS2 and Solid Snake is the last of the ‘brothers’ remaining.  But, a man called Ocelot has Liquid’s arm grafted onto him, and Liquid is now living through Ocelot, and by the time MGS4 rolls around, Liquid has taken complete control of Ocelot, creating the games antagonist – Liquid Ocelot.  As I said, a little complicated, but hopefully that makes things a bit clearer.  As you see, Liquid is really the only person connected to Solid Snake left alive, so this game charts the fall of Liquid (I think).

The story of Metal Gear Solid is fascinating and rich, providing a great background for the game, and although I’ve caught up on the story mainly through research instead of playing, I can’t wait to see out the final chapter of the game.  There’s going to be a reappearance of the MGS2 character Raiden (who had a mixed reception), but he now has a ghostly white appearance due to having white blood and an almost entirely mechanical body.  It looks great.  Maybe not for everyone, and I’m sure there’ll be a healthy dose of exposition laden cutscenes and talking throughout, but it’s to forward a truly interesting story.  Stealth might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but the narrative is what is really interesting to me for this.  Throw in an online multiplayer mode and I’m there!

 

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Okami
Release Date — June 6th 2008 (Europe)
(Wii)

Don’t let the screenshot above fool you, this game is beautiful, and it’s one of those games that the critics and people who buy it love, but no-one buys.  If you have a Wii, you should buy this game and support games like this.  It’s wonderfully inventive, where you basically travel the land to revert a demons work and add life back to the world.  It was released for the PS2 back in 2006, and is now being re-released for the Wii, using the motion controls as a brush and making things more fluid than having to use a Dualshock controller to do all the work.  Controls using the Wii Remote may take a bit of getting used to, but for using the ‘celestial brush’, it has the upper hand.  It has vibrant, alive colours, and a unique premise for gameplay, but this isn’t mainstream.  It has the feeling of a cult game, and it feels very Japanese, which can be a good thing.  It’s a marmite type of game that won’t appeal to everyones tastes.  If you’re usually found blasting away the covenant in Halo, this might not be your sort of thing, but it’s worth at least giving it a shot.  

The critics have praised this no end, with it getting extremely high average scores, but it doesn’t matter about what the critics think.  If this doesn’t sell well, less money will go into other types of games like this, and the market instead will be saturated with things that do sell well, like First Person Shooters (although, I can’t see Japan not continuing to create things like this).  I’m not saying a good FPS can’t be great, but there needs to be games like Okami out there to provide something different from the norm.  With the re-release for a next-gen console, it’s worth having a look and making your own mind up.  

 

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Borderlands
Release Date — September 2008 
(PS3, Xbox 360)

It’s strange for me to include this on the list, because I know little to nothing about it, but what I do know makes it sound very cool.  It’s a mix between an FPS, RPG and has some full-speed vehicular combat.  Something which jumped out at me is that Borderlines contains 500,000 different weapons.  Now, that isn’t entirely true since it counts variations of the same weapon, but each of the 500,000 has a different affect and handling.  If you have trouble remembering what each of the different guns do in your average FPS, you’re going to have trouble here! 

You play a fortune hunter who takes on the various weapons and quests available to you across the planet Pandora.  Yes, and like Pandora’s box it seems to be full of bad stuff.  The graphics (as evident from the above screenshot) look staggering, and it’s open to four player co-operative online play, which is available to activate at any time during your single player adventure.  You have a variety of different missions which involve general gunning, chasing after people in these buggy-type things and lots and lots of different stuff.  I assume the RPG element will be mainly levelling up your character.  I’d love to see them pull a GTA IV on this and give a free-roam around the world type online option, so you can race around with someone before jumping onto their buggy and blowing their brains out.  Simply put, I have no idea what this game is going to be like, but I’m going to be monitoring its progress carefully.

 

 

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Resistance 2
Release Date — Fall 2008 (N. America) // November 2008 (Europe)
(PS3)

The first Resistance game was a launch title with the PS3, and it surprised many people with its quality.  It may not have reinvented the genre, but it was damn good fun to take charge of Hale (the protagonist) and fight off the Chimera, while he was battling his own demons.  Finally, we’re getting a sequel.  Hale becomes a part of a new group called ‘The Sentinels’, working with others who are resistant against the Chimera virus and fighting against them when they launch another attack on the world.  Apart from that, there isn’t much else that we know about the second game.  Although, an interesting feature is that it will have two campaigns.  The single player is Hale’s story, and the co-op one is a story running parallel to Hale.  A reason to get another controller for the PS3 if I ever heard one.

Since there isn’t a lot about Resistance 2 to talk about, I think I might cheat a little and include another FPS, Killzone 2, scheduled for release exclusively to the PS3 in September this year (so, a similar time to Resistance 2).  Killzone 2 was originally unveiled to show off the graphical capabilities of the PS3 in the infamous E3 video.  While the graphics might not be quite that good, they’ll certainly be a sight to behold.  But, graphics aren’t what make a game.  The first Killzone was a disappointment after all the hype, hopefully a lesson has been learnt and the fight against the Hellghast will be more enjoyable this time.

 

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Well then.  There’s the first five (technically six) I think you should be keeping your eyes open for in 2008.  Hope it’s been enjoyable and opened your eyes to some games you may not have heard about otherwise.  If you did enjoy it, be sure to leave a comment and I’ll make an effort to do more of these sort of features in the future.  

Read Part II here!