GameGuide » Blog Archive » The Games Of 2010

2010 is looking to be a bit of a cracker year as far as gaming goes, so rather than do our usual what’s hot this month, we figured we’d do a what’s going to make this year so damn awesome list. But a couple of things to think about before we let you start reading. First, and this should be obvious to any gamer by now, release dates are never set in stone. Second, this is not an exclusive list, there are other games out there that may be worthy of being on this list, it’s just that we didn’t think of them when we were typing this list. Sorry. 

Crackdown 2

Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Ruffian Games Four-player co-op throughout the campaign, 16-player online multiplayer, a whole new set of abilities, and weapons and fighting moves to use when leaping around the city. Crackdown 2 may have shifted developer to upstart studio Ruffian Games, but it’s not lost that special something that made the original so much more than a Halo 3 beta extra. This time, the ‘evil’ agency has a mutant threat to deal with in a revamped and now cel-shaded Pacific City, which for some reason translates to underground sections as well as all the building-leaping hilarity. As long as you can still kick cars down hills as a ludicrously muscular cop, we’ll all be happy.

Max Payne 3

Publisher: Rockstar
Developer: Rockstar San Diego The last few years may have turned him in to a bald, fat and ill-looking bloke, but Max can still shoot. Complaints that Max Payne 3 isn’t ‘noir’ any more are pretty ill founded – noir isn’t just about being set at night – but it’s the blasting that’ll keep fans happy. Will that be enough to make it stand out? Only time will tell…

Battlefield Bad Company 2

Publisher: EA
Developer: DICE More destruction? Check. More banter? Check. Bigger multiplayer? Check, check, check. 2008’s most underrated shooter returns with more confidence and cohesion than before, blasting its way through anything and everything, and loving every minute of it. Fans will not be disappointed.

Dead Rising 2

Publisher: Capcom
Developer: Blue Castle Games Somehow, Capcom has managed to make this game even more mental than the first. Set in Vegas, there are over four times the amount of zombies on screen than in the first game, and you can combine stuff you find lying about to make impromptu weapons. As long as the save system isn’t borked, then this won’t disappoint.

Alan Wake

Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Remedy It’s been a long, long time coming, but Remedy’s take on survival horror is nearly here. It’s lost some of the graphical punch that it carried back in 2005, but the sense of foreboding dread mixed with moody lighting and haunting audio should compensate for that. And the fact that almost anything in the environment can be possessed and hurl itself at you in a gut-bustingly terrifying fashion. Anything other than horrific excellence, though, and Alan Wake will go down in history as one of the great gaming flops. The pressure’s on.

Fallout: New Vegas

Publisher: Bethesda
Developer: Obsidian Announced earlier in the year, this isn’t an explicit sequel to Fallout 3 but another adventure set in the same world – this time West Coast USA. It’ll be a while before we get more details, but you’ll be reading them here just as soon as we find out.

Just Cause 2

Publisher: Eidos/Square
Developer: Avalanche Ah Rico Rodriguez. You’re a great man. You can leap from plane to chopper to car to train, you’ve got amazing hair and you even share your name with a UFC fighter. Let’s hope your open-world sequel can match the ambition of your dress sense.

Dead To Rights: Retribution

Publisher: Namco Bandai
Developer: Volatile Games It’s not exactly the finest series in gaming history, so why DTR has been selected for a reboot is unknown. Still, it’s full of bone-breaking violence.

Red Dead Redemption

Publisher: Rockstar
Developer: Rockstar San Diego Rockstar’s Wild West opus combines long horseback rides across dangerous open desert and countryside with the inevitable shootouts and train heists.

Kane & Lynch 2

Publisher: Square Enix
Developer: IO Interactive They’re back, they’re in trouble, and they’re in grainy YouTube-o-vision.

Split/Second

Publisher: Disney
Developer: Black Rock Studios Every time we see Split/Second, it looks better. The speed is unquestionable, as are the looks, but it’s the raw, visceral thrill of seeing a plane crash into the track or watching huge ships collide into one another that keeps us coming back for more. This could turn out to be a one-trick pony, but for first impressions? Incredible. It’s about time something challenged Burnout’s domination of arcade racing, and the Brighton-based Black Rock is confident that Split/Second will be the game to do it. It’s easy to see why.

Mass Effect 2

Publisher: EA
Developer: BioWare Few could have predicted just how early BioWare’s sci-fi sequel was going to arrive next year, but it’s only a few short weeks after New Year before we can continue the story of Shepard and his crew of alien avengers. We’re promised a deeper, darker narrative with seriously tough choices to make. Depends on your definition of tough, really. After killing everything that moves in the original, we’re sure we’ll be able to cope. Come on BioWare – challenge our morality.

Fable III

Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Lionhead Studios At a recent Bafta lecture on videogames, the ultimate ideas man Peter Molyneux announced that Fable III would definitely feature Project Natal functionality, but wouldn’t be drawn into exactly how. What we do know, however, is that Fable III is painted in broader strokes than its predecessors. It’s all about becoming a ruler of Albion rather than just a hero, so expect to be dealing with economy, town planning, and hopefully farting in important peoples’ faces. Brimming with promise.

BioShock 2

Publisher: 2K Games
Developer: 2K Marin Multiplayer. BioShock. It still doesn’t sound right. After one of the finest stories and settings in videogame history, it seems a shame to cheapen it by letting us all run around as Big Daddies trying to put bees in each others’ mouths. Never mind – there’s still a fantastic looking single-player, where you play as the original Big Daddy and learn about the origins of Rapture, and just where it all went wrong.

Splinter Cell Conviction

Publisher: Ubisoft
Developer: Ubisoft
Splinter Cell slipping into 2010 was a blow to Microsoft in the Christmas battle. And rightly so, as this looks to be fantastic, as does the whole of 2010.