2008 Gaming Retrospective

Here we are, the last day of the year 2008. Being a gamer, it’s amazing to look back and see the multitude of great experiences that were had this year… and also grieve my wallet’s slightly anemic form. Regardless, it was an idyllic year in gaming. Even just describing them can show what a diverse crowd showed up.

In what other year did you defend small hula-children, command an army of eyeball-creatures with drum beats, get in the shoes of a fresh-blood defense attorney, solve the case of a very curious and puzzling village, relive the thousand years of an immortal, beat up every imaginable Nintendo character, play a game of life or death in an alternate-reality Shibuya Tokyo, find the twisted American dream via a sociopathic Russian immigrant, control the wind by waving your hand, solve Escher-esque puzzles by rotating black & white structures, conclude a megalith of a storyline by sneaking around as an old man, grow a psychedelic garden by swinging and jumping ever upward, take on pseudo-Nazi forces with a bionic arm, wage a yakuza gang war, drive floaty racers through gorgeous techno-cities, continue the pixel-bound adventures of Mega Man, perform parcour through the eyes of a master, avenge the murder of your sister by entertaining people with farts, experience total immersion in a derelict space craft, slap your sack-buddies into spikes and create ridiculous rocket-ships, combat an alternate-history watercolored World War, search for purified water in a post-nuclear wasteland, save a gorgeous world from a very Fern Gully-esque opponent, or dive into a TV to combat kidnapped victims’ manifestations of Id before they kill themselves?

That’s right, I didn’t think so. Here’s a lot of pictures.

(Additional games also came out this year! These are the ones that stood out to me in an artistic and innovative way.)