Best of 2008 Awards: Best Music Game

Zestful Contemplation’s Best of 2008 Awards

Just in time for 2008 to be a thing of the past, it’s Zestful Contemplation’s Best of 2008 Awards.  I’m not pretending to make my awards comprehensive or unbiased or any of that other pretentious crap.  The fact that these awards reflect my own personal experiences, tastes, and dislikes is exactly the point.  I haven’t played every game that came out this year and I’m not going to consider a boatload of titles I never played.  But I did play a huge number of games this year, and these choices reflect my personal tastes and thoughts about the games I spent time with in 2008. Best Music Game Contenders:

• Audiosurf

• Rock Band 2

I’m just going to be honest here.  Audiosurf was really original and a lot of fun, but when it comes to the best music or rhythm game of the entire year, there was only one real contender. Music games have become remarkably popular in the last number of years, and so marketing teams around the world made sure that we saw more than enough of them to go around in 2008.  The Guitar Hero franchise alone could have provided enough entries to fill the entire genre. You’ll notice Guitar Hero: World Tour isn’t even on my list of candidates.  The old girl just hasn’t been the same since she started sleeping around with Neversoft.  What can I say?  Blatantly ripping off most of Rock Band’s ideas but not doing them as well doesn’t help either.  Neither does a lackluster track list. I could go on, but I digress. What more can I really say about Rock Band?  RB2 was a game of refinements, not revolutions.  It may be the same basic game as the first one, but the changes and additions that have been made are greatly needed and appreciated.  It also has a downloadable content scheme going that I’m sure every publisher in the industry envies (and one that I wish more developers would learn from).  I’ve probably never logged so many hours (or so much money…) into a game as I have into Rock Band across its two iterations.  Few games can match the sheer awesomeness of the multiplayer experience this game provides with a good group of friends (a category you just might see reappear soon enough).  It’s the best plastic instrument experience out there, and I don’t see it getting old anytime soon, which with my short attention span is pretty damn impressive. Way to go Harmonix.  Keep up the good work.