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SvennoJ on 14 November 2023
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HoloDust said:

This one is the one that I remember oh so well - and not in a good way.
Fallout 3 launched and, while enjoyable and fairly solid RPG, it was a pretty shoddy Fallout game. FO1/2 are some of my all-time favourites, and it was painful to see what Bethesda did with the IP.

But there were some other good sequels/"sequels" - Fable II, Tomb Raider Underworld, Mario Kart Wii, LEGO: Indiana Jones and LEGO: Batman.

Also start of plenty of great new IPs - Mirror's Edge, Left4Dead, Little Big Planet, Dead Space, Mount & Blade.

Two games stood out for me that year - SPORE, another Will Wright's life simulation game, taking you all the way from single cell organism to galactic civilization with what is, basically, five games in one tied all together (though the last, galactic, being a bit overwhelming), While I like most of his games, I consider SPORE to be in his top 3, along with SimCity and Sims. This one is my favourite from that year.

The other one was Braid - not only it was a superb puzzle platformer with fantastic aesthetics, but it is, arguably, THE game the started the whole indie revolution, so my vote goes to Other: Braid.

Spore was a polarizing game, many, myself included, expected so much more of it. The first game was basically (the excellent) Flow copied, then you make your main character style(s) in what didn't feel like evolution at all. I don't remember if it mattered much what you made, I tried some different designs, didn't seem to matter. I found the simulation part of Sim Earth and Sim Life more interesting at the time. A character editor rather than a simulation in Spore.
Turning it into distinct games was also not what I expected, a more Civilization style progression would have been better, organically changing gears instead of distinct ages. It was still a good game, but paled in replayability compared SimCity and Sims.

Braid was awesome. Dunno if it started the indie revolution, certainly popularized Indie games. I would sooner attribute that to Geometry Wars in 2003 starting of XBox Live Arcade. Not indie itself (from the makers of the PGR series) but it started the interest in smaller games, which opened the door for indies on consoles.

Yeah Fallout 3 lost a lot of the series identity. It gained it back in atmosphere but I rather consider Fallout 3 a reboot of the series instead of a continuation. From Fallout 3 and onwards it's a very different series compared to the first two games.

It's an odd year, a lot of good sequels and interesting new games. Yet those new games wouldn't go on to make great sequels themselves. LBP2, Mirrors Edge Catalyst, L4D2, Dead Space 2, Valkyria Chronicles 2, all weren't as good as the originals. Or maybe I was just getting increasingly tired of all the sequels.