Xbox 360 Features

Even two console generations ago we stopped batting our eyelids if games contained other, smaller games within them. It didn’t even seem odd if whole games were made up of dozens of little ones. Nowadays we use minigame mechanisms to open doors, enact fancy stealth kills, slaughter bosses or open chests. Minigames are everywhere, be it shoving boulders in Conan, coercing peasants in Oblivion or doing anything at all in Thrillville or

Before you get started with this article, we’d like to begin with a very sincere, simple statement: we love BioWare a whole squishy huggy bunch. Their narratives are usually awesome and we’ve spent an embarrassing number of hours playing their games.

That said… with the recent release of Dragon Age 2, it dawned on us how many similarities there are in their recent games. It’s gotten to a point where we can immediately recognize an NPC archetype after only spending a couple minutes with the new character; we took some time to jot down a detailed guide of each of these copy-paste characters so you’ll know precisely how to act the moment they open their easily written mouths...

Before you get started with this article, we’d like to begin with a very sincere, simple statement: we love BioWare a whole squishy huggy bunch. Their narratives are usually awesome and we’ve spent an embarrassing number of hours playing their games.

That said… with the recent release of Dragon Age 2, it dawned on us how many similarities there are in their recent games. It’s gotten to a point where we can immediately recognize an NPC archetype after only spending a couple minutes with the new character; we took some time to jot down a detailed guide of each of these copy-paste characters so you’ll know precisely how to act the moment they open their easily written mouths...

Thanks a bunch, Christopher Nolan. Ever since Batman Begins took the universally-reviled cinematic bastardization of a cool character and redrew it in the drab colors and long shadows of The Dark Knight Returns, the “gritty reboot” has been back in fashion. In Hollywood-speak, the term's a nice way of saying “we've screwed this up, can we have a do-over?” Of course, games being a forward-looking sort of medium, players have been wise to this trick for years now – and we're still suckers for it.

Whether it's a deeper-'n-darker sequel or restarting from scratch, rejigging your series with a darker palette and more distorted guitars is a great way to draw attention to what might otherwise be just more sequel-abuse. But how well does it work? From a player's perspective, a gray coat of paint is hardly going to turn gameplay upside down... but from a “cataloguing the tricks they'll pull to sell a new installment” standpoint, dark reboots are just gravy...

Decca Records famously passing on signing the Beatles because they thought ‘guitar bands were on the way out.’ George Clooney’s suit being given plastic nipples in Batman & Robin. That’s two quick examples of history been plagued by downright ridiculous decisions right there. Video games are no different. And whether it’s Mircosoft failing to give the 360 a feature the Dreamcast enjoyed 10 years ago or Hideo

E3 2009 was a monster. A huge, massive, face-eating beerdemon that erased the agonizing memory of 2008’s meager, emaciated E3 from our minds with a flood of great-looking games, earth-shattering announcements, and a few quizzical oddities we never want to speak of again. After this, we mean, because some things are so good, bad, or just bewildering that you just have to tell people about them.

Every dog has its day. But we're not talking about dogs. We're talking about video games. Video games that were once great and mighty and strong but have for whatever reason failed to retain their status as being a big deal. These are all games that at one time or another created a deafening, self-perpetuating buzz around themselves. But now...? Well, they're just 'big' games that don't get the love like they used to.

Every dog has its day. But we're not talking about dogs. We're talking about video games. Video games that were once great and mighty and strong but have for whatever reason failed to retain their status as being a big deal. These are all games that at one time or another created a deafening, self-perpetuating buzz around themselves. But now...? Well, they're just 'big' games that don't get the love like they used to.