Since November, we have only seen a few nice game releases, including Dragon Age: Origins and CoD: Modern Warfare 2 of course. There was also James Cameron's Avatar: The Game and DiRT 2, and a couple of other games, but Christmas seems like a dead season for new games (but don't get me wrong, everything shows up in a big gulp right before Christmas) Well February seems to pick up the pace again. Mass Effect 2 is an amazing game (I have only read countless articles and watched tens of YouTube trailers) and probably to only notable game release of January 2010.
Well now we are in February, and if you are looking for a new game, you've come to the right place. Several games have been anticipated for a while, and are finally being released in February. These games include: Star Trek Online, Bioshock 2, Everquest II: Sentinel's Fate, Napoleon: Total War, and even though it is being released on March 2nd which is not in February, I have decided for the sake of this blog entry to also include Battlefield: Bad Company 2 because it is just that epic! I have not been following the release of games for very often, but in my own research, I have noted down that a lot of these are sequels, or expansions to existing games. Hopefully you were able to notice this too because, well... except for Star Trek Online and Napoleon: Total War, all of those games include a '2' or 'II', and in the case of Sentinel's Fate, it happens to be an add-on to a sequel!
Now notice that one of the games that doesn't include a 2 in it is Star Trek Online. That, however, is totally fine! I mean who wouldn't want to play a game called Star Trek after seeing the movie? Well not me because I'm not a huge fan of online games anymore: Either you want to keep doing the same thing over and over, or everyone else wants to do the same thing over and everyone else is really good AND you either suck at the game or you get addicted.. In other words, they are addictive. Anyways, Star Trek Online looks like a pretty sick game. As far as I can tell from previews, there is quite a bit of combat, and something I thought was really cool is the fact that you can create your own species!!! Wouldn't that be awesome? Create a species, and describe how you came into the galaxy (like you discovered some Mass Effect relay in the 22nd century... Wait that sounds like the humans in a game I like called "Mass Effect"!) Star Trek Online has revealed that the monthly cost will be $14.99, similar to several other popular MMOs. It was created by the same people that brought you City of Heroes, City of Villains and Champions Online so it should be an interesting game!
The other game that doesn't include a '2' in it is still a new addition to an ever-so-popular series, the Total War series. This is an awesome set of games, albeit strategy games (I haven't grown accustom to this genre of games, but it still looks awesome anyways!) A new feature present in Napoleon which wasn't included in the other Total War games is a new multiplayer mode. While I haven't played many strategy games, I certainly don't remember ever seeing a multiplayer strategy game before! It may just be because of my recluse-ness to those types of video games. Anyways Napoleon: Total War is enticing to me, just the fact that there are several gameplay modes and historic battles you can play through (my History class has turned me into a little bit of a history fanatic... Yes, I have started reading "U.S. History for Dummies")
Now we have two of those games out of the way, I'd like to talk about Bioshock.. TWO! Bioshock in my opinion was a really interesting sci-fi game. The website is a real treat to the eyes, but I'm almost certain the website is nothing compared to the game. The original Bioshock had some really great graphics, an interesting storyline and some unique features creating a gameplay which you couldn't experience twice. Now the sequel, Bioshock 2 claims to take you back to the underwater city of Rapture to re-experience the unique elements of the games setting. The game also features multiplayer modes, which obviously don't appeal to me because I suck at multiplayer BUT that's probably one of the best features in the game, I mean who doesn't enjoy shooting the crap out of other people online? 2K Games did a great job with the first and they sure got my attention in this sequel.
The other game worth mentioning is Everquest II: Sentinel's Fate. No, I didn't forget Battlefield: Bad Company 2, I am just not writing about it this month. That is for next month. Anyways, the Everquest game is a nice MMO for multiple audiences, it incorporates those nice fantasy features that everyone loves, and of course it's got a bazillion expansion packs. The only game I would ever pay monthly for is a game that is always being improved on. (Imagine paying even a dollar a month to play Half Life 2; it lasts for a while but after playing it for a year or 6 and only getting two new episodes, not to mention the multiplayer which gets old too unless you start modding) This happens to be the 6th expansion (9th if you count the three adventure packs) and it features a new level-cap, new dungeons, hundreds of new quests and thousands of new items, an plenty of new land to explore and quest on.
Now, my disclaimer, I haven't played more than about 5 hours each of the original BioShock, I've never played any Total War games (but I've watched plenty of previews of most of them) and I've never played any Everquest (well I got about an hour into a free trial and lost my password.... long long ago...) and I've only played small portions of City of Villains and Champions Online. Therefore, I am not the most knowledgeable on any of the above mentioned games BUT I can still give you my opinion and save you an hour or two of extra research (which you are likely to do anyways because of your curiosity :p)
