PC Game of the Year Awards 2008

And so it is time to present our choices for Best games of 2008. Most of these are PC games, as to be expected from our current staff. We have had much fun here at the offices with these titles over the past year, and they are a great pick if you are looking for a new game to play or to see what you missed in 2008. So, without further delay, here are the awards!

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Gameplay Awards

Best Story: Assassin’s Creed

It is true, we have enjoyed the story in AC quite a bit and believe it deserves the title overall.

Best Graphics (Art): Prince of Persia

There should really be no arguments here. Artistically, this is the best looking game we have played this year. AC comes close, but the cell-shaded technology wins out.

Best Graphics (Technical): Crysis Warhead

Once again, the CryEngine2 continues to dominate in the technical graphics department.

Best Music/Sound Design: Red Alert 3

We don’t know what it is about music in the Red Alert series, but it always gets us going with its catchy guitar riffs and heavy backup vocals as we destroy each other with our armored bears.

Best Atmosphere: Fallout 3

Truly a game where you feel alone, out in the wilderness. As you exhale with relief after finding someone to talk to in the Wasteland, you realize how immersed you are in the experience. Only thing missing would be a great multiplayer component.

Best Voice Acting: Grand Theft Auto 4

There was no competition for this title, Rockstar has picked out the best voice talents for their otherwise equally impressive characters.

Best Character: David McNamara from Overclocked: A History of Violence

This is one of the most memorable characters this year, for his deep emotional personality, dark past and unstable condition.

Best Multiplayer: Left 4 Dead

We have had tons of fun with this game over the past few weeks. While the online communication is sufficient, it is nowhere near the satisfying experience of sitting together and yelling out loud as the horde rushes you. So we personally recommend visiting an Internet cafe at least once to enjoy L4D the way it was meant to be played.

Best Gameplay Design: AudioSurf

Independent games are known to break gameplay barriers, and this year it was no different. The game creates a custom track for all of your songs, which you then travel on at speeds which vary depending on the song’s rhythm. Well worth checking out.

Best New non-sequel Game: Dead Space

This title was a great effort by EA, what Iwe liked most about this was the effort they went to creating a bit deeper than usual backstory, downfall, the animated comic. The game wasn’t half bad either, great horror sections, good pacing, balance of weapons and enemies and terrific audio.

Continue to Special awards….

Special Awards

Best News of 2008: Good Old Games

GOG has executed an idea that was around for many years – to offer users old games for a cheap price. But they took it one step further and modified the games to run on modern operating systems. For putting so much effort into preserving and making classic games avaliable, GOG deserves this award.

Worst News of 2008: New forms of DRM

From the “Great Spore revolts”, to allowing only 5 installations, to placing unidentified software on your PC, the issue of DRM really taken the front pages of gaming news in the past year, and unfortunately so. While the idea behind this is to protect the income of publishers and developers, it is clear that the current approach is wrong and more sales are lost because of it rather than gained. A new solution is needed, and quick.

Worst Game Everyone Played: Gears of War 2

If the original is any indication of the quality of the sequel (which it is, since it’s practically the same game), then all we can say is that console gamers still lack taste.

Best Game No-one Played: Spore

After all the negative hype, anti-DRM and other bad news are gone, people will realize what a brilliant game they have missed. Sure it’s not a very deep game at times, but it is non the less a must-play, and easily one of the most innovative games in years.

Most Over-hyped Game: Left 4 Dead

Yes folks, it’s a great multiplayer shooter. But the fascination some people have with zombies is plain frightening at times. The amount of hardcore hype this game has received is greater than anything else we saw this year.

Worst Port: Grand Theft Auto 4

As dissapointed as we are, there was no contest here. GTA4 is easily the worst ported game this year. Not only does it look rather poor by PC standards even on Max settings, it is a matter of luck to actually get the game to run on anything above medium even on our top-end Quad machine.

Worst Game Overall: The Club

Sure, shooting is pretty mindless fun. Score points for faster, more precise shooting? Sounds innovative… Too bad this is a horribly executed idea. No gameplay values, no montivation to play through the story, weak multiplayer. A word of advice – stay away.

Continue to Genre awards…

Genre Awards

Best Driving Game: GRID

No other game out there really challenged GRID this year for the best driving game. Great physics and driving, fun to play, lengthy campaign mode, and solid multiplayer make this the best racing game of the year.

Best Platformer: Prince of Persia

Once again the game had little competition in this category, and takes the win deservingly.

Best Shooter: Crysis Warhead

While Warhead remains a very good-looking game, it also manages to pull off exciting open-world gameplay combined with a strong story and interesting characters.

Best Action Game: Grand Theft Auto 4

With GTA4, the Rockstar series continues to dominate the Open-world action-based genre with its high production values, good story, great amounts of multiplayer fun and a breathtaking city to explore.

Best Strategy Game: Sins of a Solar Empire

This massive strategy game lets you easily command humongous fleets spread out across multiple star systems in real-time. It’s brilliant, addictive, and a great strategy game in every way.

Best Adventure Game: Overclocked: A History of Violence

This game had a great story, it is very atmospheric and the puzzles are challenging as they are rewarding. The gameplay is also unique and memorable, and the climax of the story is a shocking series of events that need to be experienced.

Best Role Playing Game: Fallout 3

This was a great achievement in the RPG genre. As a standalone, it did a great job of pushing the genre further into unexplored and innovative territory, while remaining true to its roots as best it can. Not all fans were happy, but this is still the best RPG this year.

Best Sports Game: NBA 2k9

If you are sports gamer, you should have no doubt about this year’s winner. For years, EA Sports franchises have been feeding us crap PS2 ports of their sports games while consoles got the good stuff. Well this is a huge step for the PC platform, as 2k Sports is attempting to enter the market, and what a great start they made. Here at NGN we do not have many basketball fans, but as sports fans we was absolutely amazed at the level of gameplay and graphic detail that can be found here. Watch out EA, your monopoly may be coming to an end if 2k continues this trend and brings its other sports titles to PC next year.

Best Simulation: FIFA Manager 09

Football Manager series fans may be upset, but FIFAM has been the soccer management sim genre since the 2007 edition. Good learning curve, interesting gameplay and of course, top-notch 3D match simulation really put this series above anything else that the competitiors offer.

Contiue to Game of the Year…

Game of the Year

Fallout 3

Fallout 3 is a superb action role playing game with many interesting and varied side quests. In a world that genuinely feels like things are happening to you and other characters. Large amounts of rewarding exploration throughout the wasteland with engaging and satisfying combat.