It's The End of November: What's your GOTY?

[denoginizer]

PC:  Civ IV (was Civ4 released in 2006?),  If not then Company of Heroes.

360: Gears of War

DS: Metriod Prime Hunters

PSP: Madden 07

Cube:  Nothing I can think of.

PS2: MLB The Show.

Overall:  Gears of War.

[metallicorphan]

i'm predicting zelda(i havent played it yet)......i hope i am not expecting too much from this title....i saw the commercial on TV last night(even though its another 2 weeks until release here),and it looked great

i really loved snake eater ,so i have to get subsistance...that has to be on the list somewhere

but my guess is the hype for gears of war will put that title on there as well(it was good...but...)


multiplayer on COD3(especially when they patch it up)..is definetly worth a mention for me

[Starshifter]

For the first time in years I'm having difficulty in deciding.  Not a particularly stand out year.  I base my love of games solely on the "emotional tie-ins" I get when playing them, never on the gameplay or technical aspects such as graphics etc.  Furthermore, how memorable the characters and story are and did I "think" about the game throughout the day at work or whatnot, are critical factors.  With that said, I'm currently leaning towards:

Tomb Raider Legends (X360) - Game of the Year for 2006

I'm guessing that Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess would have been a contender but I'm not really starting that one until mid December.  Still waiting on component cables.  Depending on how that goes I might change it later.  For now, I have alot of fond memories of Tomb Raider Legends.

If I were to make a prediction for 2007, unless KOTOR 3 is released I'm putting my money on Mass Effect to completely sweep me off my feet!

My previous Game of the Year Awards:

2001:  Halo [Xbox]
2002:  Star Wars Jedi Knight II:  Jedi Outcast [PC]
2003:  Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic [Xbox]
2004:  Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic:  The Sith Lords [Xbox]
2005:  Advent Rising [Xbox]

[ATB]

Tomb Raider Legends (X360) - Game of the Year for 2006

And along come Starshifter to turn everyone on their head.  That's why we love him.

More thoughts:

GOTY Played by Console (not necessarily released in 2006):

DS: Advanced Wars Dual Strike- The best TBS game I have ever played.  Perfectly balanced.
Xbox: Panzer Dragoon Orta- Planned to go through it again sometime, but I sold it.
PS2: Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty-  A true masterwork.
PC: Diablo II-  Uh. it's the only thing I played at all on PC. And that was just a flirtation.

PS2 was the hardest to make a judgement on as every game I've played on it (except for SotC) has been A caliber.

[warning]

DS: Advanced Wars Dual Strike- The best RTS game I have ever played.  Perfectly balanced.

RTS?  Real-time strategy?  Do you mean that odd little real-time battle minigame thingy or are you actually talking about the turn-based part?  You know, the part that was frigging awesome?

Be careful.  Stuff like this could show up in your Retrospective thread.... 

[Canuck]

Has anyone mentioned Okami yet?

[ATB]

DS: Advanced Wars Dual Strike- The best RTS game I have ever played.  Perfectly balanced.

RTS?  Real-time strategy?  Do you mean that odd little real-time battle minigame thingy or are you actually talking about the turn-based part?  You know, the part that was frigging awesome?

Be careful.  Stuff like this could show up in your Retrospective thread.... 

DOh! TBS TBS TBS! Fixing post.

[DamageInc]

I would have to say Gears of War and Oblivion

From what I have heard FFXII and Resistance: Fall of Man would be up there too

[Gratch]

Has anyone mentioned Okami yet?

Quite a few of us, actually.

[Laner]

Well, if I were to go by the games that got the most playtime this year:

Half-Life 2 (+ Ep1 and mods)
Enchanted Arms
Burnout Revenge
Hexic HD

[Rubyeye]

Man I suck.  I only bought 4 games this year and haven't played more than 2 hours on each.

PC:
Oblivion
Galciv2 (never installed)

PS2:
Gun (bought on black Friday)
Bully

None of those games held my attention but I plan on getting into Bully and Gun as soon as I get some time.  I have enjoyed playing BF2, Xwing/Tie-Figter, and IL2 too much this year.

P.S.  I remember I bought NFS:MW for the PC as well.  As sad as it is to say, I probably spent more time with that than any other '06 release so I guess that is my GOTY. 

[siege]

I just finished Twilight Princess this morning and it's defintely my GOTY, if not the best game I've ever played.

[Destructor]

PC: Oblivion, hands down. So easily GOTY it's not even funny.
Consoles: It's somewhere between Okami and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Haven't finished either yet (it's criminal, I know  ), but one of the two will take it.

[ATB]

I just finished Twilight Princess this morning and it's defintely my GOTY, if not the best game I've ever played.

Wow. That's some claim!

[IkeVandergraaf]

The early returns favor Company of Heroes on PC and Dead Rising on the 360.

[Calvin]

I just finished Twilight Princess this morning and it's defintely my GOTY, if not the best game I've ever played.

Come on bro, it was your GOTY as soon as the Wii + Zelda was announced 

[Kobra]

The early returns favor Company of Heroes on PC and Dead Rising on the 360.

COH was fun, a bit shallow, but fun.  Hardly what I would consider GoTY because of pretty serious flaws in it.  The pathetic AI would exclude it from any GoTY for me, and was inexecusable to ship with it in that form.  Add in the lack of sides, poor unit diversity, and deep balance issues, and I think at best, I would call it "One of the better" RTS games of 2006, but no way GoTY. 

[denoginizer]

The pathetic AI would exclude it from any GoTY for me, and was inexecusable to ship with it in that form.  Add in the lack of sides, poor unit diversity, and deep balance issues, and I think at best, I would call it "One of the better" RTS games of 2006, but no way GoTY. 

Given all that why would you even call it "one of the better" RTS's?

[siege]

I just finished Twilight Princess this morning and it's defintely my GOTY, if not the best game I've ever played.

Come on bro, it was your GOTY as soon as the Wii + Zelda was announced 

I dunno man. I've never been a huge fan of Zelda until this latest one. You can call me a Nintendo fanboy, because I am, but I think TP deserves high praise because it's actually a really good game.

[IkeVandergraaf]

As I said, these are early returns.  I didn't play that many games that were released in 2006, even fewer to "completion".  That said, I thought that CoH was outstanding.  I loved the production values of the campaign and I think it's tremendous fun MP.  It also has the finest RTS interface to date.  I thought it was considerably better than the other RTSs I played during 2006 - RoL, BFME2 and EaW, all of which, by the way, I enjoyed.  I think an Honorable Mention goes to HL2Ep1, which would have won easily had it been a full-size game.

With respect to the 360, I bought the console in the second half of the year, and while I've purchased too many games, I haven't given any of them the attention they deserve, with the exception of Dead Rising and NCAA Football 07.  When I finish GoW and play it a little on MP, who can tell?  THere's still a month left.  I did not buy any PS2 games that were released in 2006.

[CrimsonFox]

between Oblivion and Gears of War for me. I love both to bitter death.

[Kobra]

It also has the finest RTS interface to date. 

Paraworld wins in the interface catagory, no contest.  Now when I play an RTS without the Army-Controller, I feel like I am stepping back into the stoneage.  It really really SUCKS not having that as a standard in RTS games.

Given all that why would you even call it "one of the better" RTS's?

Production values, plain and simple. Given all of its faults, COH had some pretty massively good production values and immersion.

I thought it was considerably better than the other RTSs I played during 2006 - RoL, BFME2 and EaW, all of which, by the way, I enjoyed.

EAW I considered only "Very Good", then I applied the expansion and it became a great game, the expansion solved 99% of my complaints about the game, and added some pretty big gameplay to the main package.

[Calvin]

I just finished Twilight Princess this morning and it's defintely my GOTY, if not the best game I've ever played.

Come on bro, it was your GOTY as soon as the Wii + Zelda was announced 

I dunno man. I've never been a huge fan of Zelda until this latest one. You can call me a Nintendo fanboy, because I am, but I think TP deserves high praise because it's actually a really good game.

You know what, thats a very fair assessment! 

[Kobra]

I played one of the earlier Zeldas on the SNES and loved it, haven't played one since for the most part, but we got them all for the GameCube, even that rare collectors one with the old ones compiled into it.

I am starting to think I should play those and Windwalker, and see what I am missing.

[only1]

someone said "backlog?"  Yeah, that's me.  Add to that that I only play on PS2 and my list gets smaller.

If I had to guess overall GOTY, I'd go with Gears of War.

Personal is NCAA Football 07.  Just a lot  of fun to play, really the funnest football game I've played since NFL 2K5 and the best college football, again, IMO, since NCAA 2000.

[TheMissingLink]

I'm really, really tempted to nominate Rockstar Presents Table Tennis because it's just an incredible game, especially for the lower price-point.  And I'd feel bad giving my GOTY to Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence just because it's basically a special edition of Snake Eater...

But I'm withholding final judgement until I get through Okami (which is GOTY-material, it really is) and playing through Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops.

[DocD]

This is an easy one for me:

Fall From Heaven II (PC) Kael hasn't even finished it yet and it's better than anything else I've played all year.

docD

[Sparhawk]

Gosh, I don't know...

Oh yeah I do!

[pr0ner]

This will come way out of left field, but my GOTY (since I didn't buy a whole lot of new 2006 games this year) is Winning Eleven 9.

[Jancelot]

For PC it's either Oblivion or Titan's Quest.  Flip a coin.

For 360 it's Rainbow 6: Vegas followed closely by Gears of War.  I know I'll be in the minority for RB6 but it really is one of the best games I've played this year and has definitely received the most play time in the short while it's been out.  I suppose you could throw Oblivion in this category as well but I never played this version.

If I had to choose one it would be RB6: Vegas.

[TheMissingLink]

This will come way out of left field, but my GOTY (since I didn't buy a whole lot of new 2006 games this year) is Winning Eleven 9.

Ugh, I kept telling myself throughout the year that I needed to remember about WE9 when it came time for gracing my GOTY and yeah, WE9 is a biggie for me.  Near-perfection.

[warning]

This will come way out of left field, but my GOTY (since I didn't buy a whole lot of new 2006 games this year) is Winning Eleven 9.

Ugh, I kept telling myself throughout the year that I needed to remember about WE9 when it came time for gracing my GOTY and yeah, WE9 is a biggie for me.  Near-perfection.

I just can't wait until two more versions and then we'll have Winning Eleven Eleven.  That will automatically be Cool Game Name of the Year.

[Thin_J]

On the PC:

Company of Heroes. No contest. If I pick a runner up it goes to Dawn of War: Dark Crusade. All relic for me!

On the 360:
Tie between Rainbow Six: Vegas and Gears of War. Both have simply consumed my multiplayer gaming time since their release. I've already put more time into each of those games than I had any two other 360 games I played this year.

[gellar]

Hmm... I've given this some careful thought.  I've bought damn near every major release this year and have been disappointed by most, but here we go:

Company of Heroes - I don't even like RTS games and this totally engaged me for nearly a month.
NHL 2007 - Most fun I've had playing a hockey video game in... forever.
NCAA Football 2007 - Probably played more of this game than any other all year.

gellar

[naednek]

Company of Heroes - I don't even like RTS games and this totally engaged me for nearly a month.
gellar

That's like a year for us normal people

[gellar]

Company of Heroes - I don't even like RTS games and this totally engaged me for nearly a month.
gellar

That's like a year for us normal people

Totally!  I was amazed!

gellar

[Calvin]

Company of Heroes - I don't even like RTS games and this totally engaged me for nearly a month.
gellar

That's like a year for us normal people

Totally!  I was amazed!

gellar

And then you abandoned me and now refuse to try out the new patch with me

[gellar]

Company of Heroes - I don't even like RTS games and this totally engaged me for nearly a month.
gellar

That's like a year for us normal people

Totally!  I was amazed!

gellar

And then you abandoned me and now refuse to try out the new patch with me

New shinies have distracted me, sir.

gellar

[Calvin]

Company of Heroes - I don't even like RTS games and this totally engaged me for nearly a month.
gellar

That's like a year for us normal people

Totally!  I was amazed!

gellar

And then you abandoned me and now refuse to try out the new patch with me

New shinies have distracted me, sir.

gellar

Like the lights from the post office??

[TheMissingLink]

Should we use this thread for like, real GOTY stuff?

It just took me an hour to put together a top 10 GOTY list for 2006, and was wondering if we were gonna do an official thread or should I just throw it in here?