Console Game of the Year (Nominations)

I've not played PGR4 or COD4, but Im sceptical how the 4th take of a game can be up for game of the year. I was a fan of MSR on the Dreamcast and Call of Duty PC.
I imagine that PGR5 and COD5 will have slightly better graphics so I'll nominate them for next years awards.

Where has innovation gone?
 
Weebull said:
Yay popularity contests.

As much as I'd want to vote/nominate Mario Galaxy, it's clear that a 360 game is going to win this, by the sheer amount of "Oh I've not played Mario" posts. Ditto with Portal/Orange Box (which are we counting? The separate games or the box as a whole?).
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That's a good point actually, I've not played Mario Galaxy yet, but so many people say its fantastic, and its the "real" sequel to Mario 64, It makes me believe i would absolutely love it. Considering i loved Mario 64, and unlike a lot of people, i also loved Mario Sunshine. No doubt, If I'd played it, I'd probably consider it in my top 3.
 
Warbie said:
Mario Galaxy took it all :)

The mistake I made was playing Galaxy before these other games. As good as they are, none are wowing me now.
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But what Mario offers in Innovation, something like CoD4 or The Darkness offer in game Direction. I'd rather play a brilliantly directed game than an innovative game.
 
You're suggesting that Galaxy isn't also well directed. I can't think of a game that provides a better momentum, or one that continues to surprise hour after hour. In 90% of games you see what they have to offer in the first 20 mins - Galaxy is still amazing me after 30 hours.

I'm not trying to take away anything from CoD4 or The Darkness - but neither of these blew me away or provided something that didn't seem familiar.
 
There's different styles of direction, Mario offers very much a progressional direction in that you accomplish 'a' to proceed to level 'b'. It's the same method they've used for decades, and it works well.

The style of direction of Call of Duty 4 or The Darkness are very in keeping with an interactive hollywood blockbusters. Character conversations, nuances and events happening around the character.

I know what I mean, but I'm crap at putting it into words.
 
Both games are linear in their structure COD4 has you proceeding from point A to point B yet it veils this well with the way in which it presents its narrative.

I think what your maybe trying to say here Nokkon is that the narrative techniques used COD4 give you/your character a greater sense of place with in that world and also provide the illusion of having a wider impact upon events in the story. This also gives you a better sense of why you are performing these events and why you are traveling to these locations. Where as with Mario the narrative is presented in a much less sophisticated and immersing way. As a result the story can often become secondary to the action, if you were to stop and think why am I in a toy world running on a giant version of myself to collect a magical star you wouldn't find a decent reason beyond it being just plain fun.

Having said that I think Nintendo have begun to make more of an effort to flesh out the story elements of this franchise with Mario Galaxy. Its certainly interesting to look at the two side by side and get a view of what was the old conventional way of doing things and where we are headed with gaming narratives now. Of course what feels fresh to us in gaming has often been the convention in film narrative.

Would you say you are someone that primarily enjoys the story telling/narrative elements more than the game mechanics them self Nokkon?

*I appologise if I'm way off with this ramble but its fun to think out loud sometimes.*
 
RuMp3l4$k1n said:
Where as with Mario the narrative is presented in a much less sophisticated and immersing way
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Less sophisticated, perhaps (I guess it depends on what you mean by sophisticated narrative), but certainly no less immersive. When I play Galaxy I am Mario in this trippy world in which nothing needs to make sense. Surreal and abstract - each bite-sized chunk draws me in completely. There's something so refreshing and involving about a game that simply celebrates playing.
 
Come on now, you can't try and knock Mario on the basis of narrative, it's freaking Mario, not some sophisticated Tom Clancy game. People are getting far too jumpy now. It's bad enough that some knock games just for having no multiplayer, now you want certain incompatible genres to go together.
 
Warbie said:
Less sophisticated, perhaps (I guess it depends on what you mean by sophisticated narrative), but certainly no less immersive. When I play Galaxy I am Mario in this trippy world in which nothing needs to make sense. Surreal and abstract - each bite-sized chunk draws me in completely. There's something so refreshing and involving about a game that simply celebrates playing.
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I agree entirely about being drawn in to it and to me it feels fantastic to just get out there and soak up each trippy level one of the other without any great cause or story concerns, but the story is not driving the gameplay forward in Mario and thus becomes a side issue to the game. To clarify its not the game world I feel is less immersive but the story and characters behind it.
But thats fine as Mario really doesn't need that as the gameplay and ideas it throws at you are unrivaled imo.
You can however certainly see that there is an effort being made with Galaxy to tell a deeper story than they have before in the franchise and I think that will continue to happen.

Some people want that blockbuster film experience from gaming and others of us prefer the tactile feedback of the game mechanics and the madder possibilities that gaming can provide. Personal taste makes the nominations all the more interesting does it not?

I wouldn't 'knock' Mario as I think its the very best of this years games, its just a discussion of how tastes are evolving with in gaming. :)
 
Havnt played Mario Galaxy as i want something to do over christmas so im saving it (can barely contain myself), most likely.

Call of Duty 4
Orange Box
The Witcher
 
The Orange Box
Even discounting HL2 and EP1 because i already played them, TOB is such an awesome package. TF2 is my favourite of the 3 as well, which seems unusual as most go for Portal then Ep2.

Super Mario Galaxy
Mind blowing. Really. By far the best platformer i have ever played (followed by Psychonauts). All out pure fun. Also home to the most inventive level design i have ever experienced.



Not sure about the third... it is either gonna be STALKER or Crysis i think. I like CoD4 but SP is very short and i have serious issues with the constant spawning of enemies that come from no where in particular. The first few levels were awesome but i really noticed it in the latter ones and it ruined the whole immersion thing.
So i am gonna go with:

STALKER
Never played in a FPS that has done the whole persistent world with RPG elements thing quite so well. Certainly has it's issues and the plotline could do with being smoothed out. There were some really cool ideas that just really need some plish to make it a truely awesome game. Still, extremely good game. I am looking forward to Clear Sky.
 
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