By Nelson Schneider - 11/30/12 at 01:51 PM CT
Welcome to another look into the near future. The holiday season is now upon us. You know what that means? Tons of last-minute releases from developers and publishers who are desperate to get their products on store shelves in time for a Christmas purchase!
…
Well, that’s what the holiday season USUALLY means. This year, December’s releases are surprisingly, frighteningly sparse.
After barraging us with dozens of releases for the last two months, the creators of licensed games and shovelware are finally taking a break. December is giving the PS3 and Xbox 360 compilations of the individual episodes of “The Walking Dead” (not to be confused with next year’s “The Walking Dead: The Video Game”) which have been appearing on Steam for several months (and, according to Zombie Expert Chris, are actually good). The PS3 and Xbox 360 are also getting a single new exclusive licensed game each: A ‘Power Rangers’ Kinect game for the 360 and a ‘Lord of the Rings’ RTS for the PS3. The shiny, new WiiU is also getting an exclusive shovelware game in the form of “Family Party: 30 Great Games Obstacle Arcade.” In fact the only platform getting a new exclusive that doesn’t fall into the category of ‘licensed’ or ‘shovelware’ is the PC, with a new adventure game called “Haunted.”
The only other genre to get any love in December is, unsurprisingly, shooters. The multi-platform release of “Far Cry 3” is, however, the only new shooter this month. But the PS3 is getting two compilations of older shooters, the “Resistance Collection” for FPS fans and the “Mass Effect Trilogy” for TPS fans (which also marks the first time the original “Mass Effect” has been playable on PS3).
Other than that small number of releases (and including the PS3 release of “Mass Effect Trilogy”) almost every ‘new’ game in December will actually be a platform port of a game that has already been available on another platform for a month or more. This kind of rampant porting and multi-platforming is dreadfully uninteresting, both from a journalistic and consumerist perspective.
Thanks to the tiny number of releases, large portion of compilations, and lack of compelling exclusives, December looks to be the least embiggening month for backlogs in recent memory. While I will end up playing “Far Cry 3,” thanks to Chris’ insistence that it should be one of our MeltedJoystick co-op games, I certainly won’t be buying it. It’s just as well, though, as the Steam Autumn Sale and the generosity of my friends saw my backlog embiggen by 6 Indie games and a long-time-coming copy of “The Last Remnant.”
Backlog Embiggened: +0
Comments
Jonzor - wrote on 12/01/12 at 01:02 PM CT
I'm giving Far Cry 3 a good, long look, too. I REALLY enjoyed the Crysis games set in the jungle, I would anticipate some similarities in Far Cry 3.
Chris Kavan - wrote on 11/30/12 at 07:55 PM CT
Look for my Walking Dead review this weekend - it is quite good and recommended to anyone, whether you like zombies as much as me or not. Far Cry 3 should be fun - though I may hold off just a bit to see if it creeps down in price.
