I have decided to do my GOTY awards for 2009 a little early this year. I know it isn't over yet, and I'm expecting some games for Christmas, but it has been quite a while since I've done a meaningful blog and want to get my awards together.

A small note, I do not remember this year's games as well as last year's, but I've tried my best to remember most of the one's I've played. It also doesn't help that I really haven't played very many games at all, let alone games released in 2009.

Here is the list of games I will be working with:

Games from 2009; played and completed:

• Assassin's Creed II (360)
• Crayon Physics (PC)
• Shadow Complex (XBLA)
• The Sims 3 (PC)

Games from before 2009; played and completed:

• Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts (360)
• Burnout Paradise (360)
• Crackdown (360)
• Devil May Cry (PS2)
• Shivering Isles (PC)

Games from 2009: played by NOT completed:

• DJ MAX Fever (PSP)

Games from before 2009; played but NOT completed:

• Battlefield: Bad Company (360)
• Dead Space (360)
• Driv3r (PS2)
• Fuzion Frenzy (Xbox)
• Prince of Persia (360)
• Prince of Persia CIassic (XBLA)

I will make any additions as required and add an "[UPDATE]" tag to the blog title, but don't think things will really change that much.

AWARDS

There will not be an "overall" winner from me, just like last year. This is because no game is capable of being the "best" overall for a year.

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Best exclusive game(s)

Crackdown, Devil May Cry, Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts and Shadow Complex

All these games are fantastic, all for their own reasons. It would be very difficult for me to choose a "winner" out of the four. I enjoyed them all almost equally. However, the one that stood out the most from the rest would probably be Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. It struck me as an incredibly fun game with a hugely unique concept that was really well-integrated, despite all the Banjo fan criticisms. A very solid game that was much fun to play.

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Best multiplatform game

Assassin's Creed II, Burnout Paradise and Shivering Isles

Again, all these games are great, but the one game that stands out quite easily among them is the one I waited quite a while for and was completely fulfilled with. Assassin's Creed II wins for best multiplat game of the year. It is a visually stunning game with a crap-load of stuff to do. Not to mention that it built on the previous iterations formula amazingly well, and made for an amazingly improved sequel.

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Best artistic graphics

Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts, Prince of Persia and Shivering Isles

There is a clear-cut winner in this category, hands down, despite the quality of the other two nominations. Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts is an artistic masterpiece, that is very bright, very pleasant to look at (especially in HD) and extraordinarily colourful, the exact opposite of most games to be released this generation; from brown town.

I would like to give an honourable mention to the other two nominations. Prince of Persia was another gem to look at, and Shivering Isles was quite unique in terms of design.

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Best technical graphics

Assassin's Creed II, Dead Space and Battlefield: Bad Company

Another clear-cut winner. Assassin's Creed II. Absolutely stunning environments, animations and character models.

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Most boring game

Dead Space and Driv3r

Ugh... I wish I didn't have to make this category, but it is necessary, if only to talk about the winner. Dead Space. I watched the anime, loved it, highly expected the game to be almost the same thing, but possibly even better. Then I get into playing it and ugh... repetitive level design, overly predictable scares and bleh horror elements. Granted, the game is good (in contrast to Driv3r being not good at all), but I just couldn't get into it. I'll give it another chance down the road, but only after I have nothing left to play. Definitely a hit-or-miss game. I don't "hate" it, but it definitely would benefit from some better/more-varied level design and much less predictable "jump scares" and more atmosphere. It is a lot like the first Assassin's Creed... a lot of potential, but not that well executed.

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Most surprising game(s)

Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts, Shadow Complex and Shivering Isles

Again, all the nominated games fulfill the category quite well, but there is a winner out of them all. Shadow Complex definitely takes the title as "most surprising." When I first saw Shadow Complex getting good reviews, and heard it was a 2D action-platformer "reminiscent" of Super Metroid and Symphony of the Night, I knew I had to try it. I downloaded the trial, and within 5 minutes I bought it. Absolutely fantastic game, worthy of being called a "successor" to the Metroivania/Castleroid styIe games, and very much so an "improvement" over Super Metroid. A game that definitely has more quality content than many $60 games.

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Most mediocre/decent game

Prince of Persia and Crackdown

Both nominees are very decent, or "average." They have an air of "mediocrity" about them, while still remaining fun. There was quite a bit of room for improvement, but it remained a good idea nonetheless. Crackdown was far closer to "great" than it was to "average," but its overwhelming repetitiveness was somewhat detracting from the experience, even though it was incredibly fun to kick cars like soccer balls and do other great things. Prince of Persia however is the winner in terms of mediocrity. It was a good concept, spread out far too thin within the total length of the game (which I haven't finished yet), but still remained pretty entertaining. And also for once, chose a unique religious tradition to build off of: Zoroastrianism.

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Most disappointing game(s)

Dead Space, Driv3r and DJ MAX Fever

This is a hard decision to make. But in the end Driv3r takes it. Dead Space was pretty disappointing, and DJ MAX Fever was pretty damn disappointing... but Driv3r almost ruined my love for the original Driver games on the PS. I've wanted to play Driv3r ever since it came out (2004), and only recently decided to get it because I thought that it "was about time." Boy what a mistake that was. What an incredible waste of money and time. Driver and Driver 2 were hard and were pretty broken, but had some very redeeming aspects about them, especially some of the missions. Not a single mission in Miami in Driv3r was "fun." It was a complete waste of time. The gunplay was broken and weak. The mission design was terrible. And the story was quite meh. The driving, which what the game should have been centrered around, and not remaking GTAIII, was the only good part. But unlike Driver and Driver 2 back in the day, I just couldn't get into driving around in a pretty lifeless world looking for police chases. I was very disappointed in Driv3r, especially after 5 years of wrestling with whether to get it or not. I would love to see it through to the end, just to say as a Driver fan that I did it... but **** it if I could make it through.

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Most improved sequel

The Sims 3 and Assassin's Creed II

This isn't even a contest. Assassin's Creed II is the winner. The series went from "pretty good concept, lacklustre execution" to "amazing execution of an exceptional concept." Everything about II was better than the first. There was variety, depth, customizability and always something to do. Amazing game, and would definitely be a contendor for my overall "Game of the Year," but given games like Shadow Complex and Nuts & Bolts, I just couldn't make that decision.

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That is my GOTY list for 2009. Hope you enjoyed it.

You may not believe this but just about every item you all received was thanks to the GS editorial and GS Live Production staff. While the last 5 blogs are deleted to clean up my profile, majority of the items you may recall seeing came from them.

Feel free to use this blog to check in with a huge thanks to them! All of them have contributed in some way, and obviously we wouldn't have had some of them items if it wasn't for publishers and developers continuing to make awesome schwag for their partners and fans. While I might have done the grunt work to packaging, here is our awesome crew worth applauding for their donations!

Editorial/News

Shaun McInnis
Ricardo Torres
Andrew Park
Justin Calvert
Brendan Sinclair
Brian Ekberg
Chris Walters
Tor Thorsen
Sophia Tong
Kevin VanOrd
Lark Anderson
Stanley Lin
Thomas Magrino
Giancarlo Varanini
Bethany Massimilla (former staff who donated Blizzcon goodies)

Video Production

Ryan MacDonald
Frank Adams
Dan Mihoerck
Homer Rabara
Takeshi Hiraoka
Jim Maybury
Tyler Winegarner
Justin Porter
Anthony Errisuriz

Last but not least, I wouldn't have been able to do any of the packaging without Charles Harrington's effort to round up boxes, packaging, and tape (difficult to get in the office!).

Feel free to use my blog to post your pics if you have any worth sharing of your game rooms or decorations.

I consider Valkyria Chronicles more Strategy than RPG.

Also I went to the dentist today. They yanked out 4 of my teeth on the count of the braces. Oww!

I also ordered anew graphics card and power supply for my computer

it hasn't exactly started yet but I'm making a union about electronics. just them in general. cell phones, computers, video games, iPods/MP3 players, TVs, DVD/Blu-Ray players, etc. but I wanted to find some people that would be willing to help me start the union by being an officer. you don't have to be the best officer ever, I'm just asking you to be somewhat active. actually.. if anyone could just be a starting officer so that way I could start the union and they could leave after that and eventually let someone else be officer, that would even help. I've been a member of Gamespot for about 4 1/2 years and I just wanna try being a leader of a union lol if it doesn't work out then it doesn't work out. I don't have exact plans for the union but I do have ideas. and I'm sure a lot of things could be discussed cause electronics are a big thing in most peoples lives. we could discuss many different electronics, give each other advice on how to fix things or advice on what to buy. maybe post our own reviews on something that we recently bought or already own. I think it seems like a decent idea that has the potential to turn into something good.

so is anyone willing to help me give this union a try? I'd really appreciate the help and if anyone could just help me get it started, that'd be more than enough help. just comment this blog or send me a message if you're interested. thanks

No More school! Winter break has come- I will be playing Xenosaga, Killer7, BlazBlue, and other good stuff. I'm getting better with Rachel Alucard, love the frog hehe. Also got a chance to open up the photoshop and make some new No More Heroes sigs, the sequel comes out next month ^^

Finished up a loli mecha series called "Sky Girls", was quite sugoi. Read my review if interested, comments are much appreciated.

Well that's it for now, take care everyone and enjoy your holidays!

It's 46 minutes into the day and I'm 16!

Got a History Mock Up exam but I really can't be bothered to do it...

Hey guys! I'm bored so I decided to write another blog post. A lot has happen since my last blog, like I finally got a car. It's nothing fancy. It's a 1980 Ford Thunderbird. I can't drive it yet though. Something is wrong with the brakes. My dad told me what was wrong with them, but I don't know anything about cars so it was like he was speaking a foreign language, lulz.

I've been gaming quite a bit the past few months. I finally got around to playing the Gears of War series. I enjoyed both games. They are flawed, but fun. I also completed the NES cla ssic (Friggen Gamespot. ), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2: The Arcade Game. My only complaint with this game is that I bought a lousy copy! It's very fickle. Sometimes it works, other times it doesn't, but it is almost twenty years old! I rented Modern Warfare 2 last week. I liked this game too, even though it's basically just like the first Modern Warfare. It's really more of the same. I'm currently playing Lego Rock Band. It has some genuinely funny moments, and a great but short song list. The Final Countdown and The Passenger FTW!!

I haven't seen a lot of the more recent movies at the box office. The last few I saw were Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Zombieland, and Extract. All three were excellent. I'm really looking forward to the DVDs. I think Cloudy is becoming one of my favorite movies, LULZ! I saw it three times at the theater. I just love its absurdist humor. Zombieland was badass. I only saw this movie once, so I'm especially excited for the DVD release. Even though it flopped at the box office, (It only played two weeks at my local theaters. I saw it both weeks! Lulz!) Extract is an excellent and hilarious film. I think its humor is almost too subtle for a lot of people. The only movie coming out soon that I really want to go see is Up in the Air. Though I'm keeping my eye out on some other movies, like Avatar.

I can't believe it's almost Christmas. Time has been going by super fast! I'm honestly not in the Christmas spirit. It just doesn't feel like Christmas to me. It seems like Halloween was just last week! Hopefully I'll feel more Christmassy once we got our tree and decorate the house…and watch Christmas Vacation. "SQUIRREL!!!"

Thanks for reading!

Wow, it's definitely been a while since I last posted a blog on here. (I wonder if anyone will even read this.) I basically stated in my last post that I'd be leaving GameSpot and making a home for myself over at GameTrailers. It's been over one year since I did just that, and I enjoy it a lot over there. Unlike the majority of my early blogs here, all of my entries on GT are pretty lengthy and a lot more meaningful.

I can't believe I'm at level 30 over here. I haven't even reached level 20 on GT! Maybe leveling up is easier here, or maybe it was because I used to post in the forums like crazy here. Not to mention all the blogs.

Anyway, I still check in regularly. If any of you read this, how are you doing? What have you been up to?

We released an update to the GameSpot forum search today. The changes were made to provide more reliable search results and make the forums perform a bit better.

The searches are now running on the Sphinx search server. Sphinx is designed for full-text searches and is a perfect match for the forums. Because the searches are running on the Sphinx server they no longer cause general forum slowdowns when a large # of searches are done at once.

If you are interested, there are a few tips & tricks you can now do to get more specific search results.

The "|" character allows you to do an OR search. e.g., search for: mario | zelda

The "+" character allows you to require a word to be part of the search. e.g., search for: (mario | zelda) +time

If you surround your search term in quotes (") then it will search for that exact combined term. See the difference between: of legend and "of legend" You'll notice that The Legend of Zelda is not included in the second search.

Good luck & good searching!

Ya school started early this year...dang lol but im on my last year, for im a senior lol. my summer wus a blast! every week i hanged out with freinds from church so much that i almost forgot evry1 from school dat i hang out with. every week, i played tennis with them on saturdays and sundaysand on fridays and mondays we would go cosmic bowling! (cosmic bowling is bowling but with da lights off and the disco ball, the disco lights on, and the big screens come out with music videos)

also evry thursday the church would take the high school and the jr. high to the beach so ya i went to all of them LOL it wus so awzum!

plus, my wii broke in july and its still not fixed....i called ninty asap but i didnt get the repair form in 3 weeks cuz i called them saying dat i didnt receive it yet and guess wut? they spelled my email wrong! so im sending it 2morow and will have to wait about a week and a half or maybe 2 weeks to get it back. but u kno wut? my mind wusnt on the wii, for i spent my weeks with my freinds playing their xbox360s lol its so awzum

my schedule is pretty good but theres alot more people and the school is way crowded! last year the student count wus 2,800 and this year its 3,700!!!! ay ay ay! but its all good being senior lol but it looks like a busy year with government and spanish AP!

so dats it...about that computer being back up topic....its still da same with strict limits and stuff so ya maybe when the family problems die down

well dats it guys, take care and fire emblem is full of awesomness!

Well it's been a fun 3 years coming here to talk about video games and other stuff and being part of the GS unions. College is going to start for me soon and I have lost my desire to come here anymore I'll pop in every once in a while so I will see you guys around. It was fun talking to a lot of you

By the way, my Xbox Live gamertag is Zemonstar in case any of you want it.

Hey all, back from Anime Expo 2009 at the L.A. Convention Center over the July 4th weekend. It was pretty fun, the weather in L.A. was amazing.

The convention was cool, nothing too specific or special I really did. We mostly just walked around, looked at things, bought stuff, got free junk and took pictures. I went with 6 other people, all stuck in the same hotel room. That was fun lol. I didn't take as many pictures as I could have or as many as I did last year.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=28450&id=1331481450&l=fe0ab27cc7

Those are some of the pictures I took, I uploaded them on Facebook and I don't want to re-upload them here xD. And yes Angel I got your fan LOL.

Thanks

~Anthony

Well, first off: I hope everyone enjoyed 4th of July! I know I did. I got to see three dudes compete in a firework show competition. xD

I just recently reached 40,000 Gamerscore on the 360. I was happy to do this 10,000 gamerscore this year from games i liked, rather then crap ones that were easy points.

Last, but not least, I would like to say that I do have a skype account if anyone wanted to contact me. Just search for eliteman24 and the name Grimlock should come up.

Everyone have a good week!

More to come,

~elite

Yep, E3. I happened to see the Nintendo Press Conference, and I definitely liked it slightly better than last year's conference. Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Metroid: Other M. I'll probably never play them, but they looked nice and were a welcome difference from all the grandparent-friendly crap they wanted to highlight...

Those were my thoughts. BRB, gotta see Sony nao...

bom bom bom

there is, a house, in new orleans.

testing now

I finally decided to get one. It's so user friendly and there are a lot of wicked features! So far I only have Halo 3, and the 2 crappy games it comes with. Oh yeah. I also have Worms and Uno. My Gamertag is Ledimed (SOMEONE took Ledime!!) So add me please. I got the 60G hardrive. So yeah, add me please!

I got a Wii!

Yes that gift alone made the holiday very enjoyable. In addition I received 7 Wii games and quite a handful of handheld games. Here's the list of acquired games:

Wii:

1. Wii Sports
2. Wii Play
3. Dream Pinball 3D
4. Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz
5. Super Paper Mario
6. Mario Kart Wii
7. Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure

DS:

1. Sonic Rush
2. Wacky Races: Crash & Dash
3. Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa
4. Kirby Super Star Ultra
5. Quantum of Solace
6. Lego Batman

GBA:

1. Kim Possible 2: Drakken's Demise
2. Spyro: Attack of the Rhynocs

GC:

1. TMNT

Goodness looking at the list makes me realize that I'm more fortunate than I often think. This break has been and is still very enjoyable. Although I'm dreading the idea of going back to school I'm going to try to make the best of the remaining vacation. Happy Holidays everyone!

_=pastgamesrule=_

dont really go on here as often but my blog posts can tell u ive wanted a ps3 for a while. i bought a wii last year but sold it because it was too boring. now i moved up to a ps3 and man am i impressed at it. if u dont have one, i reccomend getting one of these beasts. its amazing and the ps3 couldnt look better on that 1080p tv. well merry christmas all and happy early new years putos. hahaha.

Hey guys, I know i dont really do this Gamespot thing anymore but ive been bored recently so whatever. I Just beat Dead Space, It was a pretty sweet game, although i felt like it could have been etter. I cant tell you exactely what could have been better it just feels like something is missing. Oh. How about a coherantly good story? It was farily recycled crap and the so called "twists" had no impact on me. How about for Dead space 2 they make a story i actually care about huh?

Lets see, since i havent been on in forever i wil also mention that i beat assasins creed and metal gear solid 4. For all thr hype surrounding MGS 4 i was farily excited being a huge mgs fan. Ultimately as a stand alone game it is outstanding, but for an entry in the Metal gear Franchise i was dissapointed. It felt like it was a too big a leap from the other MGS games and it felt like a shooter far too much. My favorite entry remains as metal gear solid 3. The boss battles in 4 were crap and half the game turnes into a shooting thing. Although i was satisfied by the final battle with liquid that was pretty sweet.

And assasins creed was fun, there is not much else to say about that one. Took a while for me to get into it but after i killed half the people i was supposed to kill i finally got interested. Yeah. Weird ending.

Anyway as for my personal life i am still going out with my girl, which is pictured below. Still in college, Prolly going into sometype of buisness major, maybe accounting or some crap like that. Anyway, nice talking to yall again, see ya later