The Chick’s Monthly Top 10 Update: March 2012

What a month for gaming!  How often do you get to play two titles that rank among the best you’ve played in your entire life in a single month?  And they came from a couple unexpected sources: PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Indie Games.  Also, this was the month that gamers officially proved they are every bit as ignorant as the media makes them out to be, but more on that later.

“Luke, you turned off your targeting system!”

First, the good stuff.  We Are Cubes is the new #1 game on the Xbox Live Indie Games All-Time Top 10 here at Indie Gamer Chick.  Who saw that coming?  Certainly not I.  The funny thing is, after a couple of hours, it wasn’t even up for debate.  I actually agonized for weeks over whether Escape Goat had dethroned Dead Pixels.  It was one of the toughest calls I’ve made since starting my site.  We Are Cubes was so amazing that it made the decision easy on me.  It truly represents the potential of XBLIG better than any game that has come before it.

Joining it on the list are two crotchety old timers who probably don’t need the attention.  But, this isn’t one of those Academy Award type of deals where the old timers win more as a tribute, based in no way on the merit of their latest project.  Miner Dig Deep and Cthulhu Saves the World are on because they’re among the ten best games I’ve ever played on the Xbox Live Indie Game platform.  It’s that simple.  But, if you insist on this being an Oscar-type of deal, just play some sad music for the games that departed from the list this month.  Try this on.

Gone is Blocks That Matter, Orbitron: Revolution, and TIC: Part One.  TIC wasn’t really due to fall off the list, but it’s been nine months since the game was released and it’s been five months since they updated fans of the first when they can expect part two, or if they can expect it at all.  My good buddy and former Dreamcast rival (no joke, small world huh?) Dave Voyles tells me they’re alive and well and shopping TIC around for a publisher.  Which is all well and good, but making an episodic game and then leaving fans hanging leaves a bad taste in my mouth.  I am sympathetic to the fact that the guys at Red Candy Games are in college and don’t have time to build games, but that means they probably shouldn’t have done an episodic game.  That’s how I feel about it.  If Part Two hits and is up to the standards of the first, I’ll lump it together with Part One and it will make the leaderboard.

I’ll give a special shout-out to Bug Ball, which was set to make the leaderboard, but then three other contenders hit and it’s spot was lost.  With proper online tweaks, it still has a shot at it.

I don’t have a non-XBLIG top 10, but if I did, Journey on PlayStation Network would have almost certainly rose to the top of the mountain.  What a truly wonderful experience that game was.  It moved me to tears.  What more can I say that I already didn’t?

In closing, to all you people who whined about the Mass Effect 3 ending to the point where you threatened a lawsuit.. A LAWSUIT.. all I can say is this: wow.  When did gamers get such an obnoxious sense of entitlement about them?  Needless to say, you can’t sue because you find an ending unsatisfactory, unless that ending involves a loved one and medical malpractice.  Nor does the FCC give a flying fuck. All you did was provide them with water cooler fodder.  Really, what do you think they were going to do?  Storm EA’s offices, cuff everyone who works for Bioware, ship their mothers off to Gitmo, and shoot their dogs?  No, they don’t care, and they’re laughing at you, because you’re just that funny.

Wait, that’s all I get? Where’s my lawyer’s number at? I have got to call CNN on this one.

If you could successfully sue over a bad ending, don’t you think that would have happened by now?  And that extends to other forms of entertainment.  Just imagine the dialog.

“Did Darth fucking Vader just scream NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO?  Get the lawyers!”

“Wait, so St. Elsewhere was all a dream?  NO, IT CAN’T BE!  I’LL SUE!!”

“The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen?  THAT’S IT?  Fuck that, I’ll see you in Court, Jesus!”

“A sled?  A FUCKING SLED?  They’ll rue the day they thought up that shit!”

Buying anything doesn’t entitle you to satisfaction, unless it specifically says in advertisements or packaging “satisfaction guaranteed.”  If some overzealous producer says “we guarantee fans will be happy with this” guess what?  That doesn’t count.  If you can actually find a judge who will say otherwise, there will be a dozen appellate court judges who can’t stand that mother fucker and will eagerly strike down anything he or she says.  So don’t waste the court’s time with this shit.  And don’t waste the FCC’s either.  One, they don’t care, and two, they’re busy making sure Janet Jackson’s nipple never slips out at the Superbowl again.