Too many games

Fall of 2008 was considered the best year for games release in about a decade. 2009 may actually prove more entertaining and if nothing else there will probably be even more games that deserve your time, money, or both. I think a couple of my favorite games of all time may have dropped in 2008 so for me to be even half as excited this year was surprising.

The Orange Box has to be about the best value in the history of gaming. It contained everything Halflife 2 related which is the sequel to the game that basically set the bar for gameplay and story telling in the first person shooter genre. HL2 didn't disappoint and I am looking forward to the next episode. The orange box also included Portal which may be an FPS but is basically a puzzle game. I would describe as the best 3 hours you can spend with a mouse and keyboard. Last but not least was Team Fortress 2. This may actually be my favorite game of all time. I just can't get away from it and fortunatly neither can Valve. This week marks the third free major update and it is the largest yet. New maps, new match types, an update to one of the classes...AHHHH I can't wait! Expect to see me on a LOT next week and if you want to try it head to www.steampowered.com. You can play for free from Friday through Sunday.

Another of my favorite games ever is Bioshock. The story telling and gameplay are superb. I simply cannot get enough of the game's location. Rapture, the underwater city looks amazing and someday I fully intend to build a system just to go back and play this game using 3 monitors running at the highest graphic settings possible. My wife may say otherwise but it would be fun.

Call of Duty 4 completely caught me by surprise. A friend of mine had let me borrow CoD1 a couple years back and even though it was one of the only games at the time that I just sat down and played straight through I hadn't kept up with the series. CoD3 wasn't released for PC and the reviews weren't as positive so I didn't run out and purchase CoD4. It got a lot of buzz so I downloaded a copy(wrongfully I know). I don't know why but I just thought I would get it and maybe play it someday. I think I played through it during the next two or three days in its entirety. I couldn't put it down. At that point I knew I owed some game developers money so I promptly went to the store and bought it. A game like that deserves your money and those devs need to know that there are people out there willing to pony up so they have some incentive to make a sequel. I will be pre ordering the next CoD that Infinity Ward makes.

Tomorrow I will get into all that is coming out for 2009 and see if I can organize my list of what I will be hoping to actually play through.