By Dillan Ducar ’13
THE ROUNDUP
2010 has been full of many exciting new things in gaming technology: the reveal of the Nintendo 3DSi, PlayStation Move and Microsoft Kinect to just name a few.
But all of these gaming devices would have little to no value without their games.
Games are what sell the console and this article will explore the five best games of 2010.
God of War III-PlayStation 3 exclusive
The God of War franchise has forever been exclusively for PlayStation, and we finally get to see it bloom into the game it was meant to be.
Many things were amazing in this game, including the horrific and gruesome cut scenes of your avatar mutilating a beast.
But the heart of this game lies in the graphics.
“God of war III” takes full advantage of the PS3’s better than average graphics card, and boy do they make it noticeable. Sometimes looking like scenes pulled straight out of movies, the visuals are simply astonishing.
This game includes intense action and amazing cut scenes, but lacks in the patchy storyline landing it a clean 92 out of 100.
StarCraft 2-PC
Yes guys, I know what you are thinking, this game is for PC. Although that may be true, it is still one of the best games of 2010.
After what seemed like a couple of years of attempts and failures by many companies at real time strategy games, Blizzard released “Starcraft 2” and amazed us.
It is not like they had to come very far; it took them 15 years to release a sequel that is, for the most part, the same game.
But boy does this game live up to its potential.
With a new beautiful graphics engine, reworked online play and extremely balanced factions, it has one of the highest replay values of all time ranking it 94 out of 100
Mass Effect 2-Xbox 360 Exclusive
“Mass Effect 2” is what some gamers might call a true embodiment of a role playing game.
Made by BioWare, a major name in the role playing industry, this game does what it is meant to do, connect you to your character.
The game gives you complete character customization from superhuman abilities right down to the color of clothes your character has on.
Taking place directly after “Mass Effect 1” might be the only downside, because of the amount of references the game makes towards it may confuse the player.
High customization, nice graphics and cinematics that you don’t want to press A to skip rank this game 94 out of 100.
Red Dead Redemption-PS3/Xbox 360
After coming from a long line of great role playing games based in the world of a gangster, Rock Star Games switched time periods to the Old West.
“Red Dead Redemption” is a huge leap forward in western games. It conquers some of the many challenges like gunplay and is humongous when compared to maps of previous games.
The game takes place on the American-Mexican borderline and is simply beautiful in terms of graphic designs. One could ride around just to sightsee.
One of the major aspects of this game is the online play; incorporating the same large map to complete quests in or the ability to play objective-based matches, it is so expansive it could easily pass for its own game.
Beautiful scenery as well as a very well thought out story line and quest system gives this game a 95 out of 100
Super Mario Galaxy 2-Wii Exclusive
Nintendo wowed the world in 1996 with “Super Mario 64,” again in 2002 with “Super Mario Sunshine” and once more in 2007 with “Super Mario Galaxy.”
Super “Mario Galaxy 2” is undoubtedly the best game that the Wii has to offer, not because it is as good as a game as “Super Mario Galaxy 1,” but because it is much better a game than “Super Mario Galaxy 1.”
Nintendo stuck to its guns in almost every way by making players travel through diverse worlds to snag those stars at the end, the key word here being diverse.
The game is masterfully creative in the level design, while being superbly balanced in difficulty, allowing for many hours of replay time.
Keeping you always on your toes and amazed with the level design, the only downside of the best game of 2010 is that I don’t have a Wii to play it on; 97 out of 100.