{"id":69,"date":"2003-01-21T12:58:02","date_gmt":"2003-01-21T12:58:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/?p=69"},"modified":"2003-01-21T12:58:02","modified_gmt":"2003-01-21T12:58:02","slug":"the-wootties-continued","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/?p=69","title":{"rendered":"The Wootties, continued"},"content":{"rendered":"

As I promised, or threatened, depending on your point of view,
\nhere is the list the games that came close but didn’t quite
\nmake my previous list<\/a> of the five best games I played this year.
\nThese are numbers six through ten, presented in their unordered
\nglory.<\/p>\n

Warcraft 3<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

Warcraft 3 is simply the most polished real-time strategy game
\naround. Everything about the game just oozes quality.
\nGreat graphics? Check. Well-designed interface? Check.
\nA blast to play? Check. Everything that makes a good game
\nis ready and waiting. But that’s my only problem with it so
\nfar: it is still waiting for me. The game got a bit lost in
\nmy shuffle to get a new computer and has yet to reside on
\nmy newest machine. As a result, I haven’t finished it.
\nNo matter – the time I spent on the beta was fun enough.
\nThis is just a damn fine game.<\/p>\n

Aggressive Inline<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

Without the recommendation from a friend, I would never have
\ntouched this game. It’s published by Acclaim – a company that
\nhas a spootty record, a record that is even more questionable
\nwhen you consider that this looked like a simple clone of the
\nmost popular extreme sports game out there,
\nTony Hawk<\/a>.
\nBut it wasn’t. It took away the chains of a time limit, offered
\na bunch of new and inventive tricks, and gave you
\nenvironments that you could change (e.g. in one level, you can sink
\na cruise ship, opening an entirely new area). This one
\ngets quite hard near the end but, while it lasts, Tony
\nHawk 3 can’t compete. Now Tony Hawk 4, that’s another story.<\/p>\n

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

If I had only played the level where you storm the beach at
\nNormandy, this game would still have made my top ten.
\nImmersion is this game’s forte. Explosions rock the boat,
\nthe gate drops, gunfire peppers the beach, your squadmates
\ngo up in a nearby blast – it’s Saving Private Ryan in
\nvideogame form. The rest of the game is pretty entertaining
\nas well, sporting some of the best sound and event scripting around.<\/p>\n

Dungeon Siege<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

Dungeon Siege could really be called
\nDiablo<\/a> in 3d – beautiful, wonderful 3d.
\nClick and kill is the mantra here. The gameplay is simple but addictive.
\nThe fact that the game never loads once is a special treat. It
\ngarners special marks because the wife and I play it over my
\nlocal network. If they added a town portal spell, allowing you to easily
\nstop and sell your newfound junk, it would be darn near perfect.<\/p>\n

Grand Theft Auto III\/Vice City<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

I list both of the latest incarnations of GTA here because I played
\nthem both this year. Both of them are great examples of open-ended
\ngameplay. Here’s a city. You aren’t such a nice fellow. Go have some fun –
\na lot of fun. Steal cars, run from the cops, and cause havoc. The great
\npart of this very mature game is that it is what you make of it. You
\ndon’t have to beat the prostitute with a stick if you don’t want.
\nBut if you do …. Congressmen get all up in arms about its content.
\nI’d be surprised if
\nJoey Lieberman<\/a>, media’s personal watchdog, hasn’t mentioned
\nit at least once. Just remember folks, keep the kids away from this
\nguilty pleasure.<\/p>\n

That’s it. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a year with so many quality games and
\nso many quality choices. And if
\nMetroid Prime<\/a>, my current game of choice,
\nis any indication, next year could be even better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As I promised, or threatened, depending on your point of view, here is the list the games that came close but didn’t quite make my previous list of the five best games I played this year. These are numbers six through ten, presented in their unordered glory. Warcraft 3 Warcraft 3 is simply the most […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=69"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=69"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=69"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/plan.thewoottons.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=69"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}