Another year, another E3 I didn’t get to attend. It’s okay though, because the conferences are my favorite part of the show, and I get to watch them online for free anyway. The biggest take away from this year is that the industry still doesn’t “get it.” Once again we’re being treated to nothing but shooter after shooter, and in a lame attempt to grab the expanded market, we’re shown absolutely insulting “casual” games.

Most eyes were on Microsoft this year since they’ve spent the last year telling us how great Natal, now known as Kinect, would be. It would usher in a new era of gaming much like the Wii and soon we would all be believers in Microsoft’s vision. Well in that year it seems all Microsoft has managed to come up with are a bunch of Wii-too titles including Sports, Kart racing, Dancing, and Fitness. Some games admittedly looked better than others, but nothing on display here is a game changer outside of maybe Dance Central, the latest rhythm game from Harmonix. Of the 15 launch titles, 4 of those launch titles will be Fitness games. Talk about overkill.

While some of these games could end up being fun regardless of looking like uninspired mini-game fests, will the public be willing to shell out the rumored 150 dollars for the device? That’s only part of the problem too. Microsoft wants the expanded audience, an audience they don’t currently have, meaning they need people to buy Xbox hardware in addition to Kinect. I imagine we’re going to be looking at something double the price of a Wii in the end. The people that haven’t bought a Wii yet will most likely pass on Kinect and an Xbox. For the people that already have a Wii, why update to Kinect? What is the incentive? Even if Dance Central turns out great, I get the feeling it doesn’t stand a chance against Ubi Soft’s Just Dance 2.

I can’t believe I was 8 years old when Super Mario Brothers 3 was first released on the NES. I had been lucky enough that SMB3 was released around my birthday, and being that my birthday and Christmas was the only time I would get new video games, I knew that this was my one moment to own the game. The fact that this is one of the very few birthday presents that I can recall opening up first thing that morning says something about the game. I remember peeling back the wrapping paper and exposing that bright yellow box. When all the paper was off I looked at that cover of Mario flying in that raccoon suite for a few minutes and the very idea of actually holding onto Mario 3 with my own hands finally struck me. I now possessed Mario 3, and I knew it was good before I even played it.

The build up to Mario 3 was rather incredible. Thinking about it, up to that point Mario 3 had to be one of, if not these most hyped game up to that point. There really wasn’t such a thing as a hyped game in those days. Sure there was licensed stuff that people couldn’t wait to play like Batman and Ninja Turtles, but nothing video gaming could claim as its own that the public was fully aware of. These days its common to find big marketing muscles behind stuff like the latest Halo, Call of Duty, or hell, even New Super Mario Brothers, but at those times it was unprecedented. Heck, Super Mario Brothers 3 essentially had a movie built around it in the form of The Wizard which hit theaters two months before Super Mario 3’s release. Talk about genius marketing. Then there was this commercial, which proved that in 1990, Mario Mania was at one of is heights. I would have said it’s peak, but looking at the sales of games like New Super Mario Brothers Wii, DS, and Mario Kart, the guy has never been stronger.

With so many “Top” lists going around, I figured I would give a list a shot. Instead of bringing you a Top 10 or 5 of the best games of the year, I decided to bring you a list of my favorite games that I played in ‘09 that didn’t actually come out in ‘09. So enjoy my personal picks, and maybe some of them will inspire you to hunt them down and try them yourself if you haven’t already.

5. Soul Bubbles – Nintendo DS – Released June 2008

For whatever reason Soul Bubbles is a Toys R Us exclusive. I don’t really know who thought that was a good idea, but it is what it is. I happened across Soul Bubbles around June of ‘09 and saw it for a measly 10 dollars. Hearing nothing but good things about the game I decided to give it a shot. Developed by a little company named Mekensleep, Soul Bubbles feels like a modern day version of the cult classic PC and Gameboy game Bubble Ghost. The idea is that the player has to protect a bunch of spirits by drawing a bubble (or bubbles) around them and navigating them through a series of mazes and obstacles. It is a simple concept, but the developers throw a few curve balls throughout the game that requires the player to use their head a bit, like knowing when to split bubbles, suck the air out of them, and eventually mixing them with different elements like water and gas. It is a breezy, often times relaxing game that is worth a serious look. In fact, I just spotted a bunch of them at my local Toys R Us just last night for the same price I bought it back in a June. Check it out.

4. Braid – Xbox 360 – Released August 2008

With yesterdays surprise release (well, we knew it was coming anyway) of Flipnote Studio for the DSi, I feel like I can safely say that the DSi has finally come into its own.

Flipnote Studio, for those who don’t know, is a free animation program that feels like it should have been called Mario Paint 2. Sure, as a somewhat experienced animator, I don’t truly have a reason to use Flipnote Studio. I get to use real deal stuff like Flash to do all my animating, but Flipnote is a pretty amazing piece of software regardless.

It features a simplistic interface with some bare minimum features, yet at the same time it has more than enough there to keep aspiring artists entertained for hours on end. Like any worth while animation tool, the program has a light box feature letting the creator to see the frames before and after each page. Users can sort their frames through the means of a film strip like timeline/editing bar, and even have the ability to work on two layers per frame. Sound wise, the DS microphone is used to record up to three audio clips and one music track. The music track can either be recorded with the mic, or imported as an AAC file. The timing of the animation is set by the means of a Mario Paint style “speed bar” where the user simply clicks a series of arrows to set a frame rate.

If you listen to Born Again Casual, you’ve probably heard my complaints about the mean-spirited cynicism that seems to dominate the gaming scene these days. It seems like most podcasts and game blogs are having an unspoken competition to see who can be the biggest smart-ass. To hear a lot of these people talk you’d almost wonder if any of them actually like video games at all. Well there is one podcast out there that shines through like a beacon of hope…

Whattheyplay.com is a web site that is primarily geared towards parents who want to be informed about the games that their kids are playing. The site provides information about games ranging from E-rated titles for kids to the M-rated titles that often elude parents. Even though I’m a gamer parent with a knowledge of games that is beyond most of the other parents I know, I still get plenty of enjoyment from visiting the site. One of the best features of the site is the weekly ‘What They Play Podcast’.

John Davidson (formerly editor of EGM/1up, and co-host of 1UP Yours/ListenUP) has put together a podcast that covers all of the angles listed above and also has insightful discussion about current game industry news and releases. The podcast manages to do all of this in under an hour, something that most game podcasts seem to be incapable of. There are no long-winded rants or diatribes, everything stays on point and on topic. It really has a feeling of professionalism that I feel is lacking across the board.

If you often frequent video game websites, you’re probably well aware that the Gameboy turned 20 earlier this month. I’m not going to go into the history of the little portable that could, because chances are all you already know how awesome it was, how Tetris did this and that, and how Pokemon literally pulled Gameboy out of a coma in the late 90s. Instead, I’m going to go the more personal route and run over a handful of the games that I felt really defined my experience with the Gameboy.

Super Mario Land Series

An easy way to get people to buy a Gameboy was to make a Mario game that played on it. Enter the original Super Mario Land, likely one of the top two reasons to buy a Gameboy at launch. This somewhat oddball Mario title, complete with shooter-like stages, was the first game I personally ever played on Gameboy and needless to say, it was love at first sight. Although Super Mario Land may have been the first true Gameboy experience for many people, mine was actually Super Mario Land 2.

With tomorrow’s release of Excitebots for the Wii, I can’t help but get excited about the fact that I’ll be super pie facing along with everyone else. It’s true that I’m a huge fan and supporter of Excitetruck, so I’ll try to do my part in spreading the word in what will inevitably be the best arcade racer of this generation. Big words I know, but I’m not alone as there are plenty of Excite fans out there that just “get” the idea. It’s interesting that this generation Nintendo has decided to turn the “Excitebike” franchise into an “Excite” brand. Throughout the years the Excite brand has come to mean big air, and intense racing. All four core titles all keep fundamental game design ideas in place (like turbo induced over heating), regardless of whether or not players are driving bikers, trucks, and now robots.

Excitebike – 1985

Excitebike is a horizontal racing game that was released along side of the NES, and is the only game in the series to be internally developed by Nintendo. This primitive racing game looks bland by today’s standards (outside of the iconic racer sprites), but I’ll still stand by the fact that it’s still as fun to play today as it was then. There was point in time where I felt like Excitebike’s then innovative custom track creator was it’s only real redeeming quality, but really sitting down with it a few years ago made me see the light. It’s still super satisfying taking insane jumps off those ramps, and the strange horizontal view works in it’s effort to force players to focus on exactly how their bike is going to land a jump so they don’t tip over and fumble off course. Excitebike was a hit back in those days, so it’s surprising to see just how long it took for Nintendo to revive the game.

I’ve logged about 6 hours into GTA: The Lost and Damned and I’m loving the goddamn hell out of it. At first I thought I’d miss playing as Niko and all that odd-ball characters that come with him. Still… Niko had a lot of baggage by the end of the main game and it was nice to drop all that and get back to the meaner, fun side of GTA. Less than an hour into playing as Johnny I had practically forgotten about our old Serb buddy.

Make no mistake, Johnny is a mean son-of-a-bitch. He’s not a conflicted criminal trying to make a living in a foreign land… he’s a murdering bastard who wants to make money… a lot of money. This was actually refreshing after a fairly heavy story-line in GTA4.

I love the refined motorcycle controls and after spending so much time with them, I prefer riding a chopper over any other form of vehicle in the game. This is totally different for me as I hated riding motorcycles in the original game.

As a somewhat loyal Nintendo consumer, I’m somewhat ticked off about this whole DSi thing, and for multiple reasons. For one, I do feel somewhat burned by the initial announcement of Nintendo’s latest update to the DS, which launches this Sunday. I held off on buying a DS Lite for a while, I had the sneaking suspicion that Nintendo was going to announce a new version of the device, so I decided to wait until after E3 of ‘08 to see if they would actually release any info on it. They didn’t, and considering how amazing the DS Lite is selling, I finally took the plunge and bought a beautiful Red and Black model. A month later the DSi was announced. At first it didn’t bother me too much, because I didn’t think the update would be worth owning. I figured I should stick it out with my Lite.

On top of the fact that Nintendo wants their customers to purchase their THIRD iteration of the DS, they also somehow managed to raise the price for the DS in the same move. Yes, the DSi costs 50 bucks more than a DS Lite, and since we know they’re going to phase out the DS Lite, Nintendo has effectively raised the price of entry for the DS. Normally I would say they would never get away with such a move, but considering how well the thing has been selling overseas since late last year, and the supposed amount of pre-orders here in the states, it looks like Nintendo is already getting away with it.

On that principal alone, I didn’t want to buy the DSi. Then at GDC, Nintendo decided to announce the zinger of all zingers; games that will only work with the DSi. While I’m positive from this day forward all Nintendo created DS games will have some sort of extra DSi functionality, the idea of DSi only games is troublesome to those of us that want to hang onto the Lite, and in the end, it could actually prove to confuse consumers. Why would there be games that only work with the DS? I imagine the only type of game would be one that uses the camera, and we won’t know until stuff actually starts to come into fruition. Still, it’s rather disheartening for us that don’t wish to upgrade.

This kind of falls into the obvious category, but I always wondered why the NES Ninja Gaiden is so similar to the original Castlevania in design. In a sense, Ninja Gaiden is to Castlevania what Onimusha is to Resident Evil. What makes sense there is that Capcom developed those two games, and they purposely set out to make a samurai game that played similar to their survival horror franchise. With Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden, one is obviously made by Konami and the other Tecmo. So just how the hell did Tecmo get away with totally aping Castlevania? Was there a team member that was involved with both games? Was Tecmo inspired by Castlevania to the point where they wanted to make a ninja version of the game?

For those that don’t know the similarities, or can’t see them as clear as day in those screen shots, the two games have much in common. The glaring similarity is the HUD in both games. Ninja Gaiden steals every single element that is on display in Castlevania’s HUD. Both HUDs display the stage, score, time, lives, item boxes, and a nearly identical health bar (right down to 16 blocks) for both the player and the stage boss. Both characters are also capable of finding sub weapons throughout the stages through means of attacking “tokens” (candles in Castlevania, various stage related objects in Ninja Gaiden) that drop said items. These tokens are also where the player can grab items that refill their ability to use sub weapons.

Digging slightly deeper, the games are also similar in design. While Ninja Gaiden differs greatly from Castlevania in the fact that it’s much faster paced and has a strong focus on wall jumping, they’re both action platformers that demand extremely precise control in order to actually make it anywhere. Both games are notorious for ridiculously well timed jumps, plenty of cheap hits, and a heavy focus on extremely tight close combat. They’re both some of the most unforgiving games ever created, although both titles are kind enough to offer infinite continues.