Let's not forget EA classics like M.U.L.E., Seven Cities of Gold, and Battle Chess.

More listed here

One memorable game for me from Ubisoft was a 2D platformer released for the Playstation1 called "Rayman". Of course, Ubisoft managed to ruin that too when they turned it 3D, the same when Shiny made a 3D Earthworm Jim, and Crystal Dynamics (now EIDOS) killed the Gex game with 3D sequels, oh, and lets not forget Blood Omen, Legacy of Kain. The first one was great, didn't care much for the second one, by EIDOS.

I stopped reading here...

Speaking of Electronic Arts, this has to be one of EA's best games yet:

http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2009/12..._microturbine/

I don't see why, but fine, I moved it to the bottom and marked it as my personal opinion that these two companies now suck beyond comparison.

I rarely play, but if I do, it's either nethack on my computer or some FPS on PS3. As the games on PS3 are very expensive, I tend to either borrow one from my friend to try it out first (or rent it from Blockbusters), then I can make a decision whether to buy it or not. The problem with PS3 games is that they are relatively short. If I can complete Modern Warfare 2 in a few days, that must be really short. If not for MW2's online game options, £44 would be a total rip-off.

Before 2005 I used to play a lot of strategy games on windows (Heroes 3/4, Age of Empires, Commandos 1,2, The Settlers 1,2) I wish they ported such old games to PS3.

Honestly, I really enjoyed Ghost Recon Advanced War Fighter 1 & 2 and Rainbox 6 Vegas 1 & 2. Both were very well developed games and very fun online. Vegas 2 had more bugs than I find acceptable for a $60 game but beyond that, I don't think they were bad games at all. I understand this is just a personal opinion thread.

Everyone has their gripes. I personally can't stand Squarsoft...they keep making these Final Fantasy games (now I think it may be under EA) but SquareSoft made my personal favourite game of all time in 1997. A little game nobody ever heard of called Einhander...best game I ever played on the PS1.

Well as far as Squaresoft goes, I think they milked the Final Fantasy games to death. Don't get me wrong, I did like Final Fantasy, but I preferred the SNES versions the most, as well as the SNES version of Chrono Trigger. I stopped paying any attention to Final Fantasy after X & X-2 for PS2, just horrible IMO. Actually, from VIII and up it just went down hill for me. VII was OK. To be fair, I guess Nintendo did and still continues to milk the Mario series, but they do find interesting ways to doing it at least.

My advice: Read the reviews in a reputable gaming magazine. Even better, get one that comes with demos.

Personally I buy very few games. So I generally stick to what I'm pretty confident I'll enjoy - eastern RPGs mainly, the GTA series, and racing games.

FFX is great, as is FFIX. X-2 was a bit dodgy, but it's not a BAD game. FFXII is decent, but I never got round to finishing.

The Kingdom Hearts series rocks. KH I and II are brilliant. 358/2 Days is a bit weaker, but has one heck of an ending, and gives a new perspective on aspects of KHII. Haven't played Chain of Memories.

In general, since Enix bought Square things have gone downhill. Since then we've had the gazillion FFVII spinoffs. Also SquareEnix have the extremely annoying habit of scattering related games across different consoles. Take Kingdom Hearts as an example - KH I and II are on the PS2, Chain of Memories is on the GBA and PS2, 358/2 Days on the DS, Birth By Sleep on the PSP, coded on Japanese mobile phones. That's just annoying. I'd love to play Birth By Sleep, but I don't have the money to buy a PSP just for that. I'll probably never get the chance to play coded, or Final Fantasy VII Before Crisis for that matter. They form part of the story, and it rankles to be denied them. By analogy, how would you like it if the next Discworld novel were to be an Australian-only Kindle exclusive?

Arrr, matey! This be the key! Arr!

For real.. The first-glance check.. If the screenshots resemble another game, you can rest assured that the game in question is 99% the same as the other game (complete with bugs).

If you liked the previous game despite the bugs
buy it.
else
don't buy it.

IMO, the most awesome, most recent games you can get today are -

Dragon Age: Origins
Borderlands
Mass Effect


DAO had surprisingly smooth gameplay without any significant flaws that ruined gameplay. (that I observed)

Borderlands had very few.

Mass Effect was a very interesting game, only somewhat buggy.


Also, avoid EA games.


ETA - It's good to see that so many other people also don't like EA games much. Ubisoft occasionally publishes something worthwhile (hasn't happened in a while), but for the most part EA and Ubisoft's games feel like one of two things..

Cookie cutter, rushed, generic(AND EXPENSIVE!) FPS/sports game

or

Horrible port, not worth paying for.

Well, you know, I'm open to suggestions. If somebody can recommend me one game from each of the two companies I now despise: EA and Ubisoft, say for the PS3 (because mine still works), that are the best they they got, and that will convince me to stop hating these companies, I'll promise to buy them and play them and then reach a final verdict.

Is that a good deal ? So, go on, what are the best new games by EA and Ubisoft, the conditions are:

1) DRM is ok in this case, because it's the PS3 and everything is DRMd. But it must be on the PS3, because of this.
2) NO, and I mean NONE WHATSOEVER, in-game ads. I can't stand them. If they show me a single one, it's going out the window.
3) Should be as bug-free as possible.
4) Should focus on gameplay, NOT graphics. Don't recommend a game with incredible graphics but no gameplay, I will hate it.
5) Should NOT have (or as little as possible) political propaganda. Yes, it has become an issue recently, I'll explain below.
6) If it has a plot, it should NOT be a demented one. If it's just hack and slash with no plot, that's good too, but they shouldn't force me to watch too many long cutscenes in this case.
7) If it has classes, they should be as balanced as possible.
8) Should not be so ridiculous as to be unbelievable or stupid.

One recent notable example of political propaganda in a game is Valkyria Chronicles (on PS3). I don't know why I bought the game, maybe because it sounded interesting, and it is interesting, but full of pro-war propaganda ... it's so obvious you can't miss it. That and the absolutely demented plot really lower its status, cuz it could have been a lot better. That and the classes were not balanced, and the surreal take a anti-tank rocket to the head but survive almost unscathed thing.

As for ridiculous, a good example is Wanted (for PS3) ... now if you think the movie was ridiculous, wait till you play the game ... I want to snap the disk in half. Same goes for Stranglehold (PS3), which goes beyond even Wanted.

Anyway that's about it. I'm not looking for the perfect game, I know they cannot make such a game, but I want something that will not disappoint me as it usually does.

The problem with games is the lack of new concepts and game play. I see more and more games to be moving towards interactive stories and or 'throw away' games because there is no replay value. This isn't necessarily a bad thing! It depends on the Cost of the final product to the consumer V.S. a amount of enjoyment per time playing the game.

Ubisoft for example have GREAT mechanics and stories. Unfortunately, the mechanics enjoyment last 5 minutes, the stories 1.5 hours, the play time 3 to 10 (depending on how many side quests), with very linear game play. This may constitute a bad game if the price you pay is $60. But if it's under $30, why not?

EA? well again, some are worth only $30 when they sell them for $60. Mirror's Edge for example; great $25 game. I enjoyed it a lot. But the time spent playing it isn't worth $60 regardless of the replay value of it being a racing game.

Fortunately, a lot of games can be decided on these factors just by looking at them and knowing their genera. The best way really, if you have the money, is to have a subscription based game rental and buy the games you actually want to own. You will end up owning less games, but the ones you do, will be the ones you actually want. And you will get the 5 minutes of enjoyment that many games still hold. There are no ultimately BAD games, just games not worth the time or money.

Sonic for PS3 for example failed in the two worst ways possible. Horrendous and unnecessary loading times. As in, a 1 minute loading time for a 5 second dialog, for a 1 minute loading time, for a 2 minute mini game that's required to obtain an item to complete the game, only you will fail at the mini game many times to have to sit through the loading time and dialog again, and again, and again! Along with unoptimized rendering for extreme lags in large areas, coupled with repeated failures and no real excuse for making it playable by anybody but the top 5% of gamers. BUT, the cut scenes were beautiful and the larger levels were temporarily fun. It's a game worth playing for the first level or so but not to buy or even complete.

The only really bad game, is the game where it is impossible to complete the first level within your personal tolerance level. Their by offering no enjoyment and in effect 'wasted' time.

EDIT:
Wanted... as in the movie? it was a terrible movie to begin with, why expect any more of the game? Even if it wasn't a bad movie to you, some things should remain just that! Lord of the Rings for example. Great story for a book. OK movie, could have been better. Games made just to capitalize on the hype.

Stranglehold... Not worth full price, mildly interesting, badly paced. I did feel like I was playing the movie included on the disk (had you bought the special edition) which my or may not be a good thing. Did you enjoy the movie Hard Boiled?

Because opinions are always personal, my own advice is to obtain a demo (or equivalently loan the game from a friend, but then you could play it through without buying anyway) and check it out. If it feels good, the full game probably is too, and if it's horrible, the full game surely is. I don't think I've ever seen a good demo of a bad game, so that's the way to go. Not all games have demos, though, for example the Assassin Creeds and later GTAs (GTA 1 demo was super)...in such cases it's either borrow or blind date. I don't do renting, because it's either like paying for a demo (which should be free, in the end it's just an ad of the game) or losing all the fun trying to beat the game as quickly as possible to get the most out of th renting price. If I rented a game to try it out and then bought it, it'd be extra expensive, which is a no-no.

Reviews work only if you agree with the person who wrote the review, which you only know after you buy or otherwise get to play the game, so there's no point in reading them in the first place. Even if the review somehow could represent the opinion of a majority, yours might well differ.

Yes, this really sucks.
America's army - one big propaganda tool for the USA Army.
Modern Warfare 2 - American troops portrayed in an idealised way (as opposed to others who are depicted as bad guys, terrorists: an infamous airport mission when the Russians execute innocent civilians)

I am aware that the development of America's Army is officially funded by the US government/army, what about Modern Warfare?
I doubt the developers themselves are that 'patriotic.'

I agree that indeed, if these games made by EA and Ubisoft were in the discount pile for like $10-$20 I would definitely pick them out and try them, but they're not, and I don't like paying $60 plus tax for each one, when they're not worth half that.

In fact, many of the games I recently picked out (with good reviews, and not by EA or Ubisoft) weren't worth even $10. Great graphics all of them, I won't complain about that, but either the gameplay was terrible, the controls horrendous, the plot demented, the game boring and senseless ... always something that they really f'd up on. It's so hard to find a good game these days. I say, why don't they take their money OUT OF THE GRAPICS !!! and distribute it evenly among the other categories that so need attention. I swear, all most gaming companies care about now is graphics, maybe they're trying to fit with the new gamer market ? Do new gamers care only about graphics ? I certainly don't. I mean sure graphics are great, but when you lack severely in the other important categories, when they don't even bother testing a game before they shove it out the door with tons of bugs ...

About the movies, I think in ALL cases, the movies are always better than the games (and books better than movies). So:

book > movie > game

Any exceptions, well, not really ... can you name any ?

Well, of course America's Army is nothing but a propaganda tool, and I dislike it.

However, the bigger problem is that other games are also full of propaganda, most notably war-like games (Battlefield *, Call of Duty *, Medal of Honor *). Now, some have less, some have more, but when you make a game about war, maybe you can't help infusing in some propaganda.

I remember many of the C&C series had plenty of propaganda too, Splinter Cell, Rogue Spear, and others.

It's just that there are times when it is excessive, and it seems that nowadays, there's more and more of it.