Christmas is just hours away and with just a little insight into the gamer in your life, the choice of the perfect video game becomes surprisingly simple.
At the top of the list is a game guaranteed to leave any gamer beaming. Call of Duty: Black Ops is the number one video game on the market right now. With its cinematically ripping pace and starkly realistic visuals, Black Ops will have anyone riveted for dozens of hours, online and off.
However, it is likely the hardcore gamer in your life has already pumped hundreds of hours into Black Ops. Fear not, for there are other equally enticing action titles. Both Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood and Battlefield: Bad Company 2, for instance, are action-packed and available across multiple platforms.
If the gamer in your life is more of a story-driven, role-playing gamer, there is no shortage of choices this season. Red Dead Redemption, Fallout: New Vegas and Fable III are all epic in length, captivating in story and leave much of the gaming experience in the hands of the gamer, allowing them to carve out their experience as they see fit.
For the sports fan in your life, NHL 2011, FIFA Soccer II, and Tiger Woods PGA Tour II have all received rave reviews, with all three showing stark improvements over their predecessors. Personally, my pick would go to Grand Turismo 5, an amazingly vast, beautiful and realistic racing simulator.
The holiday also brings with it some amazing titles exclusive to each platform. For the Nintendo Wii, Mario is back, blending old roots and new creativity in Mario Galaxy 2 with more mind-blowing puzzles and impressive platforming than ever. On the PlayStation 3, with its bold sense of scale and exhilarating combat, God of War III is a heroically powerful final journey for the mighty Kratos. And for my fellow Xbox 360 fans out there, one name stands out above all others — Halo: Reach. Gripping campaign and wonderfully fluid multiplayer makes it a must-have for any 360 fans out there.
Perhaps the gamer in your life has every game out there. Well, what makes Christmas 2010 truly stand out is the new hardware available. Building on the motion-sensing technology that launched the Nintendo Wii into stardom four years ago, both the Xbox and PlayStation have released their own versions of motion-based technology.
The Xbox 360 Kinect is a controller-free system that uses two cameras and voice recognition to allow a player’s whole body to act as the controller. While certainly more innovative in design than PlayStation’s Move, it’s not as precise or as versatile as originally heralded by Microsoft. And though an amazing addition to family gaming, it requires more calibration and a larger amount of living room space than its Sony counterpart.
PlayStation Move, a combination of camera and new controller, continues Sony’s commitment to keep the hardcore gamer in mind. Unlike the lagging Kinect or the kid-friendly stigma attached to the Nintendo Wii, Move allows for motion gaming to be used for big-boy games like Killzone 3 and Heavy Rain.
As with all hardware innovations, both the Kinect and Move will need a year to season, to work out the kinks and to find their niche. For now, your best bet — and certainly the cheapest — is to go with games for your holiday shopping. ‘Tis the season to be jolly and with a video game sitting under that tree come Christmas morning, not even the jolly fat man himself could have chosen better.
When he’s not teaching junior high, St. Albert Catholic High School alumnus Derek Mitchell spends his free time attached to a video game console.
