The 2007 Game Awards, Part II
In Part I I detailed the games I played this year. It’s not strictly necessary to read that list to understand what I’m doing here, but it may be useful if you see something omitted because I only pulled games for these awards from that list. After all, how can I comment or recognize a game I never played? So before you get upset, check the list and make sure I played it. If I missed a game you thought was fantastic this year, feel free to send me suggestions.
The Honorable Awards
Best Rental Game
Winner: Crackdown
For a few days I was absolutely enthralled with this game. They did so much right with it, from the comic-book style to the wonderfully exaggerated powers to the tight controls, it was really hard to put down. Crackdown even offered a sense of scale that is rarely seen in games: The achievement-landing leap from the top of the Agency Tower literally induced a sense of vertigo as I plummeted and the enormous city was so well crafted that it was (finally) an open-world title I really wanted to explore. Unfortunately the game is over really quickly unless you count orb-hunting (which is really only fun until you get your attribute bonuses filled) and that feels strange in a GTA-inspired game. But rather than hold that against Crackdown, I feel it deserves note for being a really triumphant rental game.
Runner-up: Beautiful Katamari
Most Gripping Multiplayer
Winner: Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat
Forget Halo 3. It’s nice, for a time. But it’s extension device is Forge which, for load-n-play shooter fans, is not exactly the kind of structure craved for an extended time frame. It’s more of a playground, having its place but forgetting that rigid competition is what the online gamer craves. Enter CoD4′s unexpectedly thorough ranking system: It’s an achievement-based matching and progression tree that is divorced from the ubiquitous Xbox 360 Gamerscore platform yet captures the essence of what makes the score-chasing fanatics (yours truly included) salivate. The common complaint about barrier-to-entry is largely unfounded as Infinity Ward has infused its system with enough leniency to avoid ever being punishing but offers enough tantalizing reward to encourage pushing through whatever small pains may remain. The game’s design brilliance is hinted at in the single-player campaign but only occasionally achieved (usually in unexpected ways) but the core design shines and demands one shade their eyes when the specter of AI is shed leaving behind only the simple joy of knifing some poor schlub in the neck while he tries to play a claymore.
Runner-Up: Carcassonne
Favorite Internet Meme
Winner: Portal’s Weighted Companion Cube
So much about Portal is great: It has a sublimely minimalist narrative, some of the best comedic writing in a game ever and a nifty gameplay mechanic that feels fresh and rich enough to carry the game. But nothing about Portal is as great as the year’s top in-joke: The Weighted Companion Cube. Whether you actually feel for the thing or not is beside the point: That you believe you could is all that matters. The ‘net exploded with plushies, pictures, YTMNDs, paper crafts and all manner of parodies almost immediately after the game was released and while the song at the end of the game (“Still Alive”) made the rounds and is just another small element to the brilliance of this game/morsel, it’s spoilerish lyrics made it less of a joy to share.
Runner-Up: Pac-Man: Championship Edition’s surprising brilliance
Best Control Scheme
Winner: The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass
I admit, I was really skeptical about Phantom Hourglass’ stylus-only controls. No Z-locking? No sword-swinging? How was it going to work? Well, I can tell you how it works in a single word: Brilliantly. That the game manages to return the series to form with less early-game pacing issues and more whimsy than even the excellent but under-appreciated Wind Waker could muster is just icing on the cake. The real star of the show is the pitch-perfect controls and the best use of the DS as a platform since Kirby’s Canvas Curse and Trauma Center.
Runner-Up: Halo 3
Most Thought-Provoking
Winner: BioShock
2K Boston’s creepy and atmosphere-saturated shooter does a lot of things that aren’t exactly original but when crafted this finely the originality comes from a general sense of coherency. It’s strange that a mostly horror-styled shooter could be so intellectually intriguing, but the way the game plays with its central moral quandary and the questions that are knitted tightly within but never explicitly asked made and continues to make for fascinating discussion.
Runner-Up: Mass Effect
Best Original Setting
Winner: Mass Effect
Building original settings and characters is hard. It’s why so many games, movies and other forms of narrative media are knock-offs, licensed properties and sequels. But the folks at BioWare created in Mass Effect a pulpy SciFi setting that straddles that line between nerdcore obsessiveness (akin to what hard core GMs do with their world building exercises) and accessible familiarity. It’s got the sort of attention to detail that is really vital in bringing an expansive place like this to life, and the mythology that permeates the world of Mass Effect is compelling enough to make for a marvelous story. In some cases the game is a bit too proud of its own exhaustively considered backdrop, but you can hardly fault BioWare for wanting to leave no avenue for sloppy storytelling, and it’s clear they find these rigid guidelines liberating.
Runner-Up: BioShock
Best Music (Score)
Winner: Halo 3
Strangely enough this may have been the most difficult award to grant because three games really raised the bar on the musical front this year (music in this case excludes music-specific titles like Guitar Hero and licensed music-fests like Madden): BioShock which was ultimately disqualified for its over-reliance on licensed period tunes, even if they were brilliantly applied; Mass Effect whose pitch-perfect score was so fitting of the already remarkable environment (see Best Original Setting, above) that it seemed an integral part of it and, of course, Halo 3. Halo won out in the end because the score of Halo is the most anthemic modern game soundtrack and while Halo is a capably molded FPS with a fairly interesting plot, I find that so much of the emotion of the story is derived from the score that I wonder if I’d even like the games without it. I’m even hard pressed to tell you specifically what has happened in previous Halo games, but I know how I felt in certain key moments because I can recall the soundtrack. Marty O’Donnell pulled out all the stops for Halo 3 and it elevates the game closer to where its hype level suggests it ought to sit, even if the game itself never quite manages that mesa.
Runner-Up: Mass Effect
Best Handheld Title
Winner: Planet Puzzle League
It’s almost impossible not to fall in love with PPL. It has a simple mechanic, but a surprising depth. It boasts a wonderful soundtrack and appealing visuals, it offers an insane amount of game modes and types, it has nearly infinite replayability but what really makes PPL the handheld game of the year is that it gives you some of the best multiplayer gaming you can find on handhelds or on consoles. The fact that you can play for hours with a single cart should be evidence enough that it’s doing something special, but that the single-cart play isn’t some one-trick wonder but has depth and options in itself really seals the deal. Plus it has WiFi play with plenty of puzzle addicts online around the world and none of that even touches the options available when multiple players own the game. With all those Tetris-playing moms out there I can’t understand why this game hasn’t exploded the way Brain Age and it’s ho-hum Sudoku has, but I challenge you to find someone who un-self-consciously dislikes this game. If you own a DS but not this game, you’re doing something wrong.
Runner-Up: The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass
Best Downloadable Title
Winner: Puzzle Quest
Puzzle Quest is a flat-out remarkable game. The curious genre blend—executed almost flawlessly—is so compelling that the most common sensation generated while playing is awe that no one thought of this before. Taking an addictive but fundamentally flawed core mechanic (Bejeweled, essentially, which is enjoyable but lacks enough focus to make it fun for any gamer who’s ever branched beyond PopCap) and adding purpose and depth to it creates an experience that is an improvement in all respects over the basic gameplay and in fact transcends all the individual pieces creating something sublime. Now, this game won best download title and not best handheld for a number of reasons but the principal is that a new DS or PSP copy runs in the neighborhood of $25-30. The XBLA version—identical in every respect—is a mere $15 and has achievements and online vs. play. Don’t even bother looking for a better way to spend a quarter what it would cost for a full retail title: Such a transaction does not exist.
Runner-Up: Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Strongest Ending
Winner: The Orange Box
It feels odd to give the best ending to a collection, but really the award is more about Valve than any single game. When compared to games like Lost Planet or Bullet Witch, examples of horrific video game writing, you can easily see where Valve’s care in crafting not just experiences but experiences that engage a player and make them care serve them well. But it takes comparing to games with a better understanding of interactive narrative to really see the shine of Valve’s brilliance. Compared with the ending to BioShock, the end of Episode 2 encapsulates more emotive power than either of 2K Boston’s largely glib closing cutscenes. Looking at the cliffhanger wrap-up in Mass Effect finds Half-Life 2′s creepy deja vu conclusion more maddening in its appetite-whetting partial resolution. Even Halo 3′s melancholy but satisfying final moments don’t hold a candle to the triumph felt from completing Portal and the delectable reward that is “Still Alive.”
Runner-Up: Mass Effect
Game of the Year
Winner: The Orange Box
What criteria do we use to determine the best of the best? Is it quantity, as in the most enjoyment over the longest sustained period? I played through BioShock twice, enjoyed it intensely for almost the entire time (minus the final boss battle) and probably got a full 35 hours of spectacular entertainment out of it. Perhaps it’s value, where I’ve sunk 45 hours into Puzzle Quest for a mere $15 entry fee. Or maybe it’s just an experience, something that strikes you in a way you didn’t expect or that gives you pause, like the fully interactive cut scenes in Call of Duty 4. But then, wouldn’t it be all those things? The Orange Box includes, essentially, Episode 2, Portal and Team Fortress 2. The inclusion of the original Half-Life 2 and Episode 1 is generous gift from Valve saying, “Hey thanks for checking out our stuff. Maybe you haven’t seen this yet?” Half-Life 2 itself is not perfect but certainly pushes the edges of what one might expect from a shooter, especially as seen a couple of years ago. Possibly BioShock batters those edges even more intently, but then you get to Episode 1 where short-form content is explored as a means of connecting with a character even under the artificial limitations imposed by Valve’s previous design decisions.
Somewhere along the line you note that both of these games existed before and then you reach Episode 2 which does as much to create a sense of place and time as Halo 3 yet achieves an emotional connection Bungie can only hope to one day entice. Oh and then you skip ahead to this little gem called Portal. Portal is a small game with big purpose. The fact that it rattled people’s expectations so violently suggests that there is room left in the industry for revolution and in the case of Portal it got everyone’s attention for all the right reasons. It is dark without being morbid. It is funny without being crass. It is challenging without being forced. It is well-written but not over-wrought. It is brief but dense.
All of which indicates that The Orange Box is among the most amazing packages in gaming, something that could have commanded full price with one fraction of its sum (I didn’t even fully explore the cleverly designed multiplayer bonanza TF2) but has here been somehow casually tossed into a single regular retail-priced container and presented not as anything particularly remarkable but given as if Valve were saying, “How great would it be if all games offered this much…” and allow you to fill in your criteria of choice. Value? Fun? Polish? Depth? Variety? It’s all here and more, in what must be the best of 2007.
Runner-Up: BioShock
BioShock can’t manage the same girth offered by Orange Box, but it bears mentioning how a fresh new setting (recall that despite being a spiritual successor to System Shock, BioShock takes place entirely outside that realm) was able to seize so many people’s imaginations. 2K Boston’s attention to atmosphere and detail creates a world that evokes many of the reactions the game wants from you: Awed fear, or uncomfortable fascination.
What they were able to do with the medium in terms of pulling a player into a world and then battering expectations, casting the player as more than casual observer but an integral part in the experience is nothing short of remarkable. Sure, there were things that could have been better, which is ultimately why BioShock is the runner-up and not the winner. But there are moments when BioShock surpasses all of the Orange Box’s triumphs, if briefly, that speak volumes about what 2K Boston might be capable of in the future. If you have to pick just one game to buy this year, you’d better make it The Orange Box. But if you can squeeze in two, you’ll find no better examples of what video games offer as entertainment, storytelling mediums and visceral experiences than those found in these two packages.
Dishonorable Awards
Worst Difficulty Settings
“Winner:” Guitar Hero II
The ramp up between Medium and Hard is among the most jarring transitions I’ve encountered. While earning five stars on “Free Bird” seems like it should prepare a player for what they are about to experience in the easiest songs on the next step up, the truth is you have no idea what to expect. With contracts ending and the teams splitting to do the Rock Band/GHIII face-off later in the year it’s no surprise that no one bothered to fix the broken difficulties of GHII when it hit the 360 this year, but it was such a problem that despite my soldiering forward and eventually completing Hard, I traded the whole game away within a month or so because I had no more fun to be found.
Runner-Up: Contra 4
Game Most Hampered By Its Pack-In
“Winner:” Crackdown
Maybe Crackdown would have found an audience without the Halo 3 beta key. I’d like to think that a solid original IP with fun gameplay and a cool sense of style would have succeeded. Unfortunately we’ll never know since plenty of people bought the game only to play the Halo 3 beta and Crackdown was largely seen as—this is strange to think about for a $60 game—bonus content for the beta key.
Runner-Up: BioShock’s Limited Edition with Broken Big Daddy Figure
‘King Kong’ Award for Biggest Achievement Hand-Outs
“Winner:” TMNT
Five hours, 1,000 points. Simple. Easy. Not the best use of five hours, but not the worst either, unless you’re one of those people who gripes about the “devaluation” of gamerscore points. Probably the only reason this game got as much attention as it did was those simple points. Which brings up an interesting question: Will we see other games including “cheap” points as a way to gain attention for their mediocre titles?
Runner-Up: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Biggest Disappointment
“Winner:” Beautiful Katamari
It seemed so perfect: Katamari on a next-gen system, with achievements and DLC. Instead we got a tiny package with no graphical improvements, short campaign mode, lame achievements and on-disc bonus content that had to be “unlocked” by paying money. Lame, lame and more lame.
Runner-Up: Lost Planet