Todd Terwilliger

It’s that time of year when everyone and their mother’s cousin decides to look back and rate the best of the past year. Why should I be any different?

My criteria are simple: these are the games I had the most fun playing in the last year. I don’t care about revolutionary versus evolutionary improvements, gameplay innovations, or graphical perfection. This is all about the fun.

Here we go (in no particular order):

Too Human

This game got hammered harder by the gaming community than London during the Blitz but I had a really fun time with it. The combat is easy to get into without being overly shallow, the loot-collecting is addictive, and the online co-op works and works well. I put a ton of hours into this game and have held onto my copy to put in a bunch more. For a game that’s 99% combat with only four or five main enemy types, it’s got to be doing something right to hold my attention. Judged solely on my total time spent playing, this would have be my top game of the year.

Saints Row 2

It’s not GTA IV but maybe it’s a good thing. I’ve had more fun playing around in Clearwater than I did in Liberty City. It’s violent, over the top, full of absurd mini-games, and totally charming. Great online co-op (sensing a pattern here?) is just icing on the cake, the cake a stripper jumps out of before doing a lovely, lovely dance.

Gears of War 2

I’m starting to think that the importance of story in games is overrated. Playing Gears feels like playing an ’80s sci-fi action flick (in the best possible way). All the story I need is to get me from one set-piece to another and there’s a ton of set-pieces. And there’s co-op. And there’s Horde.
(Honorable mention: Resistance 2)

Left 4 Dead

A co-op zombie apocalypse. I need say no more.

NHL ‘09

Just the best video hockey I’ve ever played and I’ve played a bunch. Sure, you can still game it if you try but it does a great job of playing good solid hockey. Playing online with a full squad of real players is epic with good teammates. Stay away from using human goalies though unless you’ve got a really good one. There’s nothing as deflating as watching your net-man give up cream puff goal after cream puff goal.

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Games I either have played yet or haven’t played enough yet: Fable 2, Fallout 3, Braid, Dead Space, among others.

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