For me it’s Spectromancer: League of Heroes.
I like strategy games, that take less than hours to complete. There doesn’t seem to be many of those released.
Mass Effect 2 for me. One of the few sequels to improve on every aspect of the already-awesome original. Great graphics and art design, memorable score, and (crucial for an RPG) brilliant writing and voice acting. One of the best RPGs ever made.
Dude if RDR is your game of the year and you haven’t played Undead yet you must play right away. It’s the best DLC ever and is better than 90% of the full games at the store.
Heavy Rain proved that a realistic, serious game can be made without resorting to brown/gray color palette. Heavy Rain’s colors were deep, bold and diverse. Heavy Rain looked more or less like real life, not like life through the eyes of a dog. (To me this destroys the argument that games “need” to be brown/gray in order to look “real.”) For this alone I think it deserves an award.
Fallout: New Vegas for me.
This game is the game that you think bucks the brown/grey trend? Really? In all seriousness, I think you might need your vision checked.
To be fair, one of those screenshots had some red in it. And another is full of murky greens! It counts as color if the washed out, monochromatic world isn’t brown or gray, right?
Heh, even the name of the game invokes a washed out color palette.
Believe me, when I first put the Heavy Rain disc into the PS3 for the first time, I was completely expecting it to be another browngray game, and was all ready to dismiss it. However as soon the game started, I was immediately proven wrong. If you had actually played the game, you’d know what I mean. From the very beginning of the game (Ethan’s house and the shopping mall) you see the colors the game is capable of. Madison’s apartment also looks amazing. There are some washed out areas but there are many others that aren’t. The color saturation is good and the colors look vivid.
In my opinion, this was one of the best scenes in the game, graphically.
A full spectrum of color is used throughout Heavy Rain. If you actually look carefully at all those screenshots, you’ll see it, even if the overall aesthetic is dark. Bits of color are judiciously used to punch up even the grimy areas of the game.
There’s no comparison to stuff like this.
How is that any different from Assassin Creed II, Red Dead Redemption and Call of Duty, all of which you whined about in your latest brown/grey rant?
Compared to Assassin’s Creed 2, there’s more contrast, basically, and more saturation. Those two things make a big difference.
I never criticized RDR…I actually like it a lot. The colors are very good. I don’t think it’s “brown/gray” at all.
Toss up between Mass Effect 2 and Fallout: New Vegas. Considering that for days it bugged me that one of my companions died at the end of ME2, I will give the edge to that one.
Edited to add: bugged me not because I felt like I failed in the game but because I felt bad he died.
As opposed to every single game except FO:NV mentioned in this thread?
Or, for that matter, in the other thread (which Argent Towers seems to have mysteriously abandoned).
Don’t worry, he’ll post another one 4-5 months from now, but this time he’ll focus more on Fallout 3, RE5 and Assassin’s Creed 2.