"fun" games on 360

[miffy495]

A spin off from what this thread was turning into.

Thunderpeel is on the hunt for games that are "fun" on the 360. Here's what we're working with:

And that's what I meant... To me, Guitar Hero 2 is the first "fun" game on the 360, that's a) really good (there's less serious games on the 360 that aren't worth the time) and just concerned with entertainment without tense, violent situations.

If there's more top-quality "fun" games for the 360 I don't know about, then please let me know! I'm so tired of "realism".

And here's the list we've compiled so far (in the order they popped up in the thread):

Lego Star Wars

Earth Defense Force

Rockstar Table Tennis

Viva Pinata

Blue Dragon

Lost Odyssey

Kameo

Virtua Tennis 3

Full-Auto

Points of contention? Additions to the list? I'll start stuff off with a reply to twmac's post from the last thread.

Kameo

Yeah, didn't mention this one because people like to slag it as yet more evidence that Rare has gone downhill, but I still really like the game. Also wasn't sure if it fit into the definition of "fun games" that we're working with, given that it's all about beating on ogre-things. Still, consider this one seconded. If not under "fun," than at least under "worth playing."

Full-Auto

Now this one didn't even cross my mind. I'd been kind of interested in it, but had heard nothing but a chorus of "mehs" from everyone I know who'd played it. I wouldn't mind hearing some more details on it, as it's really cheap now and if it's worth a play, why the hell not?

[Marek]

From what I've heard, Crackdown might also fall into the "fun" game category (fun is a terrible label but I know what you guys mean).

Especially once you're able to jump on top of (or over) buildings and do extreme stuff like that.

[Wrestlevania]

From what I've heard, Crackdown might also fall into the "fun" game category (fun is a terrible label but I know what you guys mean).

Especially once you're able to jump on top of (or over) buildings and do extreme stuff like that.

Oh absolutely, but I didn't include it in the original thread because there was a definite "anything but more running around with guns!" sentiment.

Crackdown is a brilliant game, especially in co-op--eljay and I have been having a blast with it. I was going to write a (much needed) blog post about this, because it's so much fun to just wander around the world and mess about with it.

For example, the other night eljay and I were on our way to kill a boss who's secreted inside a mountain cave. eljay knew a shortcut which required us to shimmy along a tiny overhang where the Pacific City circular (4 lane superhighway) emerges from said mountain. As we started out in the centre of the city, we ran around for a bit before I highjacked a car. As we couldn't get up onto the motorway easily - and eljay's character was significantly beefier than mine, eljay simply picked the car up - with me inside - and jumped up to the motorway. Then he jumped in the passenger seat and we sped off up the wrong side of the motorway, dodging oncoming traffic and generally causing mayhem without even firing a shot.

Once we got around to the secret entrance of mountain hide-out, I swerved the car across three lanes of the motorway and we jumped out. The ensuing carnage as the traffic emerged from the tunnel at highspeed - and from around a blind bend - was simply brilliant; NPC drivers trying to swerve to avoid the sudden obstacle in the road, failing and hitting it head on. The pile-up was incredible, especially when some really big trucks came ploughing into, and subsequently over the already-burning wreckage was hilarious. Some of the later vehicles even jumped so high off the wreckage that they flew clear of the safety barrier and down into the sea below.

And that was just 20 minutes of us fucking around without even firing a shot. The mess we created once some gang members crashed into the carnage was a whole other story.

I can't recommend this game enough. Even in single player it's brilliant fun as the difficulty curve is very good, and the fun you can have (as Miffy's mentioned in the past) just jumping around finding all the collectibles is pretty much limitless. And then there's the Achievements which, for example, reward you for climbing to the top of the tallest building in the game, then again for successfully base-jumping into the water below.

NB: I've not been playing Crackdown in the last couple of weeks, because I'm focussing on getting Gears done and out the way. Then I'll be back to Crackdown indefinitely.

[miffy495]

Agreed, Crackdown is amazing. I also left it out for the same reasons though. Guns and explosions everywhere and grittiness abound, despite it all being in an outrageous way. One of my favorite experiences was doing a race circuit in the agency truck cab for the hell of it and realizing that once you hit a certain speed, any car you collide with will instanly explode. Barrelling along a highway running a race in oncoming traffic with explosions going off everywhere was crazy fun.

Also, anytime you start tallying up enough kills on a rampage to have the narrator say "Amazing!" is a good run.

[Wrestlevania]

What's the consensus on Ninety-Nine Nights?

After a few hours of play, you start to base entire level strategies on what's coming next, and in that sense there's a real rhythm to combat and orb harvesting - always saving these devastating attacks for those tricky sections where you'd otherwise end up swamped. Needless to say, the feeling of becoming this all-conquering war machine becomes surprisingly addictive. It's like the inherently simple combat at the core of the game becomes as unimportant as a side-scrolling shooter being all about hammering a fire button. As simple as much of the game is, and as much of a level-grinding exercise as it can be, the key moments near the end of each character's story arcs always seem to make it worth seeing through.

N3 definitely sounds like it might scratch my Near-Mindlessly Bashing Stuff Over the Head Until It Falls Over (or NMBSOHUIFO for short) itch on 360, in a way that the Dead Rising demo didn't quite (personally speaking).

Forgive my ignorance if this was already covered last year on Thumbs, but I wasn't interested in Xbox 360 gaming so much then. And it's always nice to know how people feel once the dust's settled.

[miffy495]

It seems to me like one of those situations where all the reviewers bashed it and a whole lot of players really dug it. Haven't tried it myself (aside from the unimpressive demo) but it is from Q? so it can't be all bad. I'm personally waiting for the price to go below $30 before I check it out. It's at about $35 now, so I may be tempted sooner or later anyway.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Cool! I like the idea of this thread, thanks for starting it!

Some thoughts, though: I'm sure there's plenty of crap, average and just plain "fun" games on the XBox 360, but when 360 games cost so much I don't think they're worth picking up unless they're damned good. Maybe it's just me, but frankly I don't even want to bother spending time playing anything unless it's damned good.

Likewise, when I can pick up the PC version of Lego Star Wars II for £9.99, there's no way I'm going to spend the required £24.99 to play it on the 360. It just seems like a rather pointless waste to do that, to me.

Just my 2c.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Here's Metacritic's opinion of the current list:

Earth Defense Force 2017: 71 - "Mixed reviews"

Rockstar Table Tennis: 81 - "Generally favourable"

Viva Pinata: 84 - "Generally favourable"

Blue Dragon: 89 - "Generally favourable" (maybe I should pick this one up! .. Except it's not released until October!)

Lost Odyssey: NOT RELEASED

Kameo: 79 - "Generally favourable"

Virtua Tennis 3: 80 - "Generally favourable" (getting close to simulation territory?)

Full-Auto...... Should this really be here? If so, why not Burnout? Nah...

aaaaaaaaand.... our current champ...

Guitar Hero 2: 93 "Universal acclaim"!

I know I probably shouldn't be judging solely from reviews, but I don't think I want to play anything under 84, unless it's something pick-up/put-downable like Virtua Tennis 3... Is that really bad?

[brkl]

Ahah, I was looking at console games at a store earlier today, mostly Wii games, and noticed that the new TMNT game for 360 costs 76€. 76€!

I almost picked up a Wii (there were five Wiis just sitting there!), but they didn't have Twilight Princess.

[Wrestlevania]

I'm personally waiting for the price [of N3] to go below $30 before I check it out. It's at about $35 now, so I may be tempted sooner or later anyway.

It's just become available here in the UK for the equivalent of $28 US, so that's what piqued my interest. I've completely blown my "funny money" budget this month already though...

[miffy495]

Well, that's just over $30 for me, which means that the stores will crank it to around $40 as they're still operating under the assumption that the US-Canadian exchange rate is what it was about 10 years ago. Give it another $10 and I'll be set.

[oerhört]

Lego Star Wars is shit. It isn't "fun" just because the animation is brilliant, you know. People need to open their eyes a bit.

I liked Table Tennis and Virtua Tennis 3, and obviously Guitar Hero II is a worthy game. Tony Hawk's American Wasteland is very non-violent, easy fun as well, even though it looks like a PS2 game. Tony Hawk's Project 8 would have been non-violent, excellent fun if it weren't for the godawful framerate.

Of course, then there's a healthy line-up of Live Arcade titles such as Geometry Wars, Marble Blast Ultra, Texas Hold'em and Doom, which are all ace.

I know I probably shouldn't be judging solely from reviews, but I don't think I want to play anything under 84, unless it's something pick-up/put-downable like Virtua Tennis 3... Is that really bad?

I think so. You can't trust reviewers in general. There's too much stupidity and lousy argumenting going around, and too much attention paid to all the wrong things. Therefore, the relevancy of sites such as GameRankings and Metacritic is questionable at best.

[DanJW]

Lego Star Wars is great - playing co-op. Playing by yourself it may well be plain and monotonous.

[Aussie Ben]

Does Beautiful Katamari Farmacy count? That's coming out for the 360...

It's not out yet though, so it might not count, I suppose.

[Wrestlevania]

Does Beautiful Katamari Farmacy count? That's coming out for the 360...

It's not out yet though, so it might not count, I suppose.

It might, depending on how well Namco handle the project without its original designer. I suppose it should count, in the sense that it demonstrates that a company is willing to release a very high profile "fun" title on the platform in the future.

I'd like to see more platform-exclusive titles (I know, I know) on this list though, so I'll add Amped 3. Ordered it a couple Friday's ago for less than a tenner delivered and it finally arrived on Saturday. I've played it for about 3-4 hours over the weekend and it's great fun. It suffers from what most early 360 titles did though, being that it hands Achievements out like candy; 100 points for just a couple of hours work seems excessive to me, especially as 50 of those came from just selecting my snowmobile to ride around on...

It's also worth noting, however, that the in-game humour is genuinely funny. Which is a very rare thing indeed.

Amped 3 is shaping up to be a great fun game. My only gripe would be its slopes seem very short when compared to SSX3's halcyon "whole mountain" rides. Its saving graces in this respect (humour aside) would be the visual sophistication of it tricks, the greater variety of challenges (especially the whackier stuff like "biggest hospital bill" runs and the ludicrous film stunts), plus it's more realistic. Aaand there's a track building tool as well, where you can setup courses from the numerous props (such as ramps, crates, etc.) that you've been awarded for completing certain types of challenges.

[miffy495]

I was thinking about getting Amped for a while there, but then there was something of a glut of new games that I wanted to play and I forgot about it. Thanks for reminding me. I'll have to pick that up when I have some spare cash in a month or so.

[twmac]

Miffy, Thunderpeel = Full Auto is dirt cheap at the moment, also it is better balanced than the recent Burnout Revenge for 360. Okay, in a way it is more over the top. But one thing that I complain about a lot that FA doesn't suffer from is being unfair. On all of the Burnout games I've played (as well as a few other racing games) I've found the AI cheap, but I've gotten more than half way through the game and the AI in FA really do seem to be pretty indiscriminate over who they shoot instead of always gunning for you. I actually wrote a long, rambling, spam email to peeps that I worked with about Full Auto; it is one of those games (like Burnouts) that you just pick up for a bit get a few medals, put down and play something a little more substantial. The rewind feature also makes for a few less screaming bouts at the TV too.

Miffy, Wrestlevania = N3... I wanted to like this game so much, but it suffers from really poor balancing. One minute you'll be cleaving through thousands of guys effortlessly, the next you'll come face-to-face with a boss who drains your life in seconds. Forcing you to restart the level, collecting all the same power ups, only to encounter another boss 30 minutes into a level and get killed, which forces you to do the level again. What was fun a couple of times becomes a chore. The graphics are pretty stunning, but the camera angles are bad. Also I found the achievement list really uninventive for a game where you can rack up 2-3 thousand hit combos. I bought it for 24 dollars cdn, used. I'm glad I didn't pay aymore than that.

[Aussie Ben]

I have a copy of Bullet Witch sitting on my desk in front of me. I still haven't played it. And I got it for free from Xbox.com. For writing a review about Crackdown. Even the fact that it has people that are nothing but gigantic brain heads with skinny bodies can't make me shake off that apathy. The cover has a lot of black on it and the woman looks like she's some kind of Goth chick, so I'm guessing it's trying to go for a 'serious' 'post-apocalyptic' 'adventure'.

On looking at the back of the box:

"2013 AD. HUMANITY HANGS ON THE VERGE OF EXTINCTION..."

All signs point to yes.

[DanJW]

Ah Bullet Witch. It's big and it's stupid. It is generally cheesy/serious in tone, but the enemies are often comical - not just the floating brain guys who hum to themselves but also one liners spoken by the regular cannon-fodder - like shouting "mummy!" as they get blown apart.

Also there is a boss that is some kind of gigantic dragon/whale that you fight while runing about on top of a passenger jet in-flight during a storm, while also fighting off its giant eyeball minions. This tells you most of what you need to know about the game.

I particularly enjoyed summoning a tornado and watching it rip apart the buildings and other scenery. Also summoning a flock of ravens to peck out the eyes of my enemies.

Like I said, big and stupid.

[Aussie Ben]

Also there is a boss that is some kind of gigantic dragon/whale that you fight while runing about on top of a passenger jet in-flight during a storm, while also fighting off its giant eyeball minions.

SOLD :tup:

[Wrestlevania]

I was intrigued with Bullet Witch, just because the title suggested something a little different and quirky. I've since heard a lot of people slag it off, but it may be that they've missed the point of the game.

If the control system's robust enough, it sounds like it could be a fun game to play.

[twmac]

Bullet Witch is pretty awful. There are a couple of moments of wonder (watching a meteorite descend on to a city) mixed in with extended periods of mediocrity.

Avoid this game unless you can get it for cheap/free. The worst part is that my friend bought it because there was a hot girl on the cover. Idiot.

[Wrestlevania]

The worst part is that my friend bought it because there was a hot girl on the cover. Idiot.

What's bad about that? Sounds like justice to me...

[twmac]

Well, I'd previously thought he had some taste when it came to games

But, yes, a lesson learned and an expensive one at that.

[Wrestlevania]

*bump*

So I've just been into town on my lunchbreak, to that den of gaming eniquity known as Computer Exchange. Wherein, I traded Rainbow Six Vegas 2 - which turned out to be pretty pants - for Burnout Paradise. (I've had a few friends on Live hassling me to get it and join in, even though I didn't really like the demo all that much.)

But the reason I'm resurrecting this thread is that I spotted a pristine copy of Earth Defence Force 2017 for sale also! Luckily, I'd also brought Test Drive Unlimited with me as well, just in case of such emergencies, and so snatched EDF up as well.

And the difference in cash for both of these--with the trade ins? A whiffling three of your new English pounds; quite a steal, I'm sure you'll agree. Really looking forward to playing EDF at long last!