Gaming: 2009 got there in the end

 

Like a lopsided lolly bag, he year in gaming tossed out a few goodies for the first nine months before spewing out the really tasty stuff in the final quarter. Hayden Meikle looks back on the good and the bad in gaming in 2009.

 

It might have been the year of the sequel - and, in some cases, the threequel - but that did not mean it was a year of bored gaming.

Sure, there were months during the winter when it seemed we gamers might have had to go out into the real world or lower ourselves to watching television because there were no new games around.

But, as always, the year gathered speed in about late September and the new releases started flowing.

Maybe there weren't QUITE as many good titles in the last quarter as in previous years, evidence that the economic downturn has indeed had an effect on the gaming industry.

But my year in gaming wasn't too bad:

 

GAME OF THE YEAR: Borderlands.

Yes, I can hear the screams of the Call of Duty and Uncharted fans from here. But it was fun, it was different, it was addictive and it was very well done.

Honourable mentions: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was shocking and brilliant. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves somehow improved on an already sensational game. Dragon Age: Origins brought PC-quality role-playing to consoles.

PLEASANT SURPRISES: I wasn't really that excited about Halo Wars but the real-time strategy addition to the first-person shooter series was very good. And Brutal Legend was different, in a good way.

GAMES THAT WERE SLIGHTLY OVERRATED: Killzone 2, The Sims 3 and Prototype.

GAMES THAT WERE SLIGHTLY UNDERRATED: The Godfather 2, Skate 2 and Wolfenstein.

WORST GAMES: Tony Hawk's Motion, Ninja Blade and UFC 2009: Undisputed.

WAITING TO BE CONVINCED: Assassin's Creed 2 sure looks good but I need to put in some more hours over summer.

BEST GAME TO PICK UP AND PLAY: Ice Age 3: The Dawn of the Dinosaurs.

BEST SPORTS GAME: Wow, a lot to choose from this year. Very hard to separate Fight Night Round 4, Grand Slam Tennis, Madden 10, Virtua Tennis 2009, Fifa 10 and NHL 10. But I might lean towards Madden.

BEST ARCADE SPORTSGAME: The Bigs 2. Baseball on speed.

BEST DRIVING GAME: Another crowded field. Forza Motorsport 3 and Need For Speed: Shift were outstanding sequels. But Colin McRae Dirt 2 was the king of car games this year.

BEST HANDHELD GAME: Grant Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars. Many were sceptical when it was revealed the Grand Theft Auto series was going to the DS and PSP. But Rockstar did an unbelievable job.

An honourable mention has to go to Resistance Retribution.

BEST STRATEGY GAME: Cities XL did a pretty good job of updating the playing-God genre.

GAME I HAVEN'T PLAYED BUT AM ASSURED IS GREAT: Batman: Arkham Asylum.

BIGGEST NEWS STORIES : Crunch. That was the sound of the gaming industry running into the same economic troubles as everyone else.

Boom. That was the extraordinarily successful release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, the biggest launch in entertainment history. Just over 55 million copies by latest count.

Slash. That was the major companies cutting the cost of consoles. Finally.

What the? That was Microsoft unveiling (sort of) its new Project Natal hands-free technology at E3. We might get a look at it in late 2010.

Aaatchoo. That was the sound of Sneeze, the internet game released following the swine flu outbreak.

Yawn. That was the sound that followed the release of a new, slimmer PS3. No major hardware releases, then.

BEST GAMING WEBSITE: I still tend to go to Giant Bomb for most of my research, and the Button Masher site is an excellent forum for New Zealand gamers. But it's hard to go past Kotaku for regular news and interesting features.

BEST MOVIE TIE-INS: The Lord of the Rings: Conquest, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Ghostbusters, Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings.

BEST MUSICAL GAME: Beatles Rock Band was technically just an add-on. But it let you be a Beatle!

BEST GAME BASED ON A PHILANDERING SPORTS STAR: Tiger Woods 10. And we don't even want to know what the 10 refers to.