Most Disappointing Misuse of Star Wars License (Since the Last One) - Star Wars:The Old Republic. 2004 called, Bioware - it wants its stale MMO gameplay back.
Awesomest Tweener Who Won’t Be Winning Any Readers Digest “Model Teen of the Year” Awards - Tiny Tina, Borderlands 2. She’s hyper-violent, funny, a genius at explosives, and enjoys her hyper-violent tea parties - what’s not to love?
Best Example of Ruining a Franchise (So Why Do I Still Love You?) - Resident Evil 6. Its sins are numerous, its virtues are few, so why do I still like it so? Hell if I know.
Best Inclusion of “Unnecessary” Multiplayer Which Turned Out Totally Awesome - Mass Effect 3. Who knew my most dreaded addition to a hitherto-SP-only action-RPG would turn out to be so much fun?
Best Example of Ruining Awesome Multiplayer with Shitty-Ass P2P Element - Mass Effect 3. Fuck you, EA Booster Packs, and the cash cow you rode in on.
Best Post-“Master of Magic” Fantasy Strategy Game I Totally Should’ve Bought By Now What the Hell Is Wrong with Me? - Fallen Enchantress. I can’t even claim it’s because I got burned by Elemental, because I never bought that, either. Maybe I’m just allergic to really great strategy games now?
Best Forum Gaming moment of 2012: dannimal plays the Duke of Lies to steal the Hedron Cannon from Justin Fletcher. It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it.
The Rivet-Counters’ Sour Grapes Award goes to fans of IL-2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover who somehow think that having the creators of Rise of Flight involved in the next IL-2 project is a bad thing.
The award for Yawningest Chasm Between Critical and Popular Opinion goes to Mass Effect 3’s ending.
The award for Yawningest Chasms goes to Dwarf Fortress.
The award for Best Game I Didn’t Play goes to Borderlands 2.
The Golden Disc for the Game that Most Prevented My Finishing Other Games goes to Kerbal Space Program.
And Gothic 3 with community patch is a close second.
STOP EVERY FEW MINUTES TO CLEAR INVENTORY AWARD: Goes to every MMO ever made, apart from Ultima Online where standing outside the bank in Britain solved it fairly quickly, unless you macroed “BANK BUY SELL VENDOR GUARDS!”.
STOPPED TO SOLVE THE INVENTORY PROBLEMS SOMEWHAT AWARD; Guild Wars 2 with the collections.
STOP EVERY FEW SECONDS AND HOLDING “E” TO LOOT A CONTAINER AWARD: Borderlands 2
STOP AND THINK ABOUT MOST UNREALIZED POTENTIAL AWARD: Far Cry 3 for having the big island with so much real estate… and so little to do.
STOP-PED PLAYING TO PLAY JUST CAUSE 2 INSTEAD AWARD: Far Cry 3 who made me realize that despite the satisfying gunplay; i could be having more fun with my grappling hook and a parachute than trying to find 3 more crocodile leather to make a bigger inventory.
STOPPED TO PICK UP FLOWERS AWARD: Far Cry 3, Botanists rejoice.
Most Improved Sequel: Darksiders 2. I really disliked the first one, but the second one is pretty good. Not a game of the year, but going from trash -> solid is a nice leap.
Best Game for Making me Anxious Around NPCs: I Am Alive. WHY DO YOU MAKE ME SHOOT YOU?
Environment of the Year: The caves, Dear Esther.
Game With the Worst Horrible Places, Just Terrible: Dark Souls. Blighttown? Sen’s Fortress? Ruins of New Londo? Tomb of the Giants? FUCK YOU
Sequel With the Largest Improvement in Gameplay Mechanics but the Biggest Drop in Actual Gameplay: Darksiders 2. The original was a solid action adventure game that had no shame in throwing a bucket of rehashed weapons, items and gameplay at you. The sequel has a ton of technical improvements (woo, you can climb shit!), but it is plodding, tedious (oh great, I have to climb more shit) and withholding. Many hours into the game and all you have is a grappling hook and some thing that summons ghosts to stand on switches? Come on, I want something cooler than that. At least give me a boomerang or something.
Best new gaming podcast: [/B]The Game Design Roundtable, with Messrs. Shafer and Knemeyer. Begun only a month ago, but already five episodes done. The right balance of casual gaming conversation and substantive design discussion.
Runner-up, best new gaming podcast: Broken Record. Four episodes so far, including great discussions of Mechwarrior, Warhammer miniatures, the Sword of the Stars series, photography and beer. A promising start.
Best Continuing Podcast: Three Moves Ahead, mostly hosted by Rob Zacny, occasionally by Troy Goodfellow. Consistently high quality discussions of design and play of both digital and board gaming. Keeps my attention, even when an entire episode is devoted to Gary Grigsby’s War in the East.
Still Listen, But Its Hit or Miss: Jumping the Shark. Not sure which was worse: Danielle leaving or Bill returning to Dark Souls for the PC version.
The game is super fun, and those places are so horrible they become comical, so yeah, it was a pretty light experience for the most part… That reminds me, though:
Most Horrible Gaming Moment Of 2012: Draining the water in New Londo and seeing what was beneath.
Best thing I bought almost by accident but have surprisingly ended up not regretting: PSVita.
Most disappointing thing that I will likely buy as a Monster Hunter Box since the Wii: WiiU.
Best thing to blow your hard earned cash on if you are bored with all the damned sequels that seem to have completely taken over the Video Games Industry: Warmachine.
