Summary
Through each generation of consoles, there are games that come into the spotlight and seem to be the focal point of everyone’s attention. While it’s easy in the current age to over-hype a game, sometimes it takes years to realize the idea of a game was more exciting than the game itself.
TheXbox 360had some heavy-hitting games, both standalone titles, and key entries in now longstanding series. Sometimes, though, the hype runs out over time and players realize the games that have come out in previous generations weren’t as impressive as they seemed. The 360 has a few of those games that have lost their luster over time.
10Kinect Adventures
Dodge, Jump, Run
Nintendo’s Wii console was revolutionary for the era, and Microsoft and Sony were scrambling to think of their own piece of tech to rival it. Xbox soon revealed the Kinect addition to the 360 with specific titles for it, including Kinect Adventures.
An action game controlled by your own movements, it sought to bring an active approach to adventure games, and while millions of the Kinect sensors sold, the impressiveness of Kinect Adventures, as with mostKinect-specific games, wore off quickly. It did get people off the couch for some time though.
A classic that has stood generations, people of all ages can connect with theSonic the Hedgehogseries from the Genesis to the most recent generation of consoles.
The 2006 game sought to bring the high-speed excitement to the 360 and hopefully reach new audiences. While it was nice to see some upgraded visuals and keep the series alive, it was a broken mess of bugs, poor design, and terrible writing. It didn’t have the cult excitement as the previous year’s Shadow the Hedgehog game, or the new ideas that later games brought.
Another long-standing series, Duke Nukem once went toe-to-toe with games likeDoom,Serious Sam, andQuake. Its over-the-top action and edgy humor have been replicated in more games that you’re able to count, but Duke Nukem Forever sought to remind them who did it best.
Sadly, despite a pretty solid marketing campaign, its heavy push to stay relevant with the 2000’s brand of pop culture and humor led it to feel more like an off-brand version of itself than anything. Especially in comparison to series like Doom and Quake that re-imagined their concepts in the years following.
A game that was touted as the next big Ubisoft hit after Far Cry and Assassin’s Creed (albeit one of many), Watch Dogs got its start on the 360, and the response was rather positive all in all.
An open world that could be manipulated via critical hacking skills was an interesting concept. Sadly, over time the idea fizzled out in comparison to other open world games with more to choose from. There are still die-hards out there for this, Watch Dogs 2, and Watch Dogs: Legion, but fewer as time goes on.
WHERE TO PLAY
In the wake of games like Call of Duty and Battlefield, 2011 saw a new game in the FPS genre grace the XBox 360 in the form of Homefront. Sort of a video game version of the movie Red Dawn, it promised a U.S. on the brink of change.
It did well on its release, and scored highly by reviewers thanks to a dramatic plot and some pretty tense situations. It never really took off as a major FPS game or series though. Overshadowed by longer-standing series or just lacking in memorable moments, it just wasn’t a mix that aged well.
The idea to take the Alien universe and port it to a video game has been tried a handful of times over the years, and with varying levels of success. Aliens: Colonial Marines was an idea brought forward by Gearbox after the success of the first Borderlands game.
A mix of an adrenaline-fueled campaign and a four-person co-op against acid-blooded aliens was a concept that seemed like it should be all the rage. Post-release, it never really took off in comparison to other squad-based games. Thankfully, the Alien universe found a solid winner inthe horror game Alien: Isolationa few years later.
There are plenty of games that come forward with the idea to satirize a series well enough to stand on its own. you’re able to see that quite well in Eat Led: The Return of Matt Hazard.
A satire of games like theMax Payneseries, it hoped to fuelover-the-top actionwith humor that poked fun at itself and other games that took the shooter genre too seriously. The result was something that burned out all too quickly, with not enough entertainment value to make the critique hit home.
Catherine
In Catherine, you play as a young man named Vincent who is involves in a love triangle with two ladies with the same sounding, but differently spelled name. He must confront his nightmares and make the right decision - as it’s literally life or death.
The mix of romance with other genres of gaming may feel like it’s reaching its hayday now, but the concept has been around for some years now, as seen with titles like Catherine.
Part romance, part psychological, part puzzle platformer; it was an interesting mix that had many fans curious about what was in store for them under the competitive gazes of his longtime girlfriend and new flame. It was a fun and humorous mix that led to many games to follow in its footsteps, but not enough to be remembered often.
The early 2000’s were rife with FPS games that sought to revolutionize the genre. Unfortunately, they couldn’t all be the end-all-be-all of the race to the next best shooter.
There is still a cult appreciation for the Perfect Dark Zero game that was released back in 2005, and receiving mostly sevens and eight out of ten it can be easy to see why. Both its graphics and a campaign that was a little too on-rails made it fall to the wayside as time went on.
The Fable series is a lofty one on the shelves of many, both in and out of fantasy genre fans. It has done well over the years, balancing interesting stories, fun mechanics, and characters that stick in your head for years after.
Unfortunately, the success of the first and third games couldn’t be found in the second of the series. Fable 2 did quite well with the critics, even getting awards in 2008, but the unfortunate part of creating a long-lasting series is that sometimes other titles overshadow the ones in-between.
