The Top 10 Most Anticipated Games for the 2014/2015 Video Game Season

01. Destiny (9 September Activision)

We've now reached the Number One slot - the game that is the most widely anticipated title for the season (so far). And we must remark that, based upon the E3 presentation, the information that was shared at PAX, and the information that has since been shared in private briefings and videos, there is genuinely good reason for that high level of anticipation.

For the vast majority of the gaming press the first inkling that they had that Destiny was actually something special happened at Sony's E3 2013 press conference and presentation. Actually it would be far more accurate to call it the pre-E3 press conference and presentation since it took place the day before E3 kicked off officially. That noted, the presentation was sufficient to communicate just how unique and important the game will be to the new season.

What the game is, in a nutshell, is an online multi-player first-person shooter that includes elements of the traditional single-player FPS and RPG but also offers a mixed fusion of multi-player FPS and TPS. Yeah, that seems to cover the bed with a lot more blanket than we need, but it is also pretty accurate.

Set in the sub-genre of the 'mythic science fiction' type open world adventure game, Destiny provides the player with an adventure that feels like a fusion of Halo and Call of Duty - but a Halo that lacks the humor and silly factor, and a Call of Duty that features futuristic weapons in an earth-bound battlefield that sees humanity facing extinction at the hands of a hostile alien power.

Actually that is a pretty important point - traditionally the position of the scientific community has long been the belief that when alien life is encountered it will be a mutually beneficial sharing of culture and knowledge, an attitude that explains bonehead moves like putting directions to the earth as well as biological and cultural information about humanity on probes that were then dispatched to the far reaches of the galaxy.

In Destiny the alien presence that responds didn't come to share, it came to take. The scientists didn't plan on being food.

With its events set seven hundred years into the future, the post-apocalyptic setting follows a very long and prosperous period of peace, exploration, and technological advancement that is known as the Golden Age of Technology.

A beneficial alien presence known as 'The Traveler' arrives and helps humanity reach for the stars - which it does with great success, building a far-flung network of colonies. Just when things are looking great an unknown calamity strikes, causing the human colonies to vanish and earth to be decimated.

Following the collapse it is discovered that the destruction of the earth's colonies was an event that was not an accident, but the actions of a hostile alien civilization. What is worse, they were not satisfied with simply removing the human colonies and occupying them, they have their eyes set on Earth itself.

The Traveler - the sole friendly alien - hovers above the last surviving human city on Earth, its presence meant to ensure that the Guardians who defend the city at least have a chance to succeed in protecting the remnants of what was once human society.

The player as protagonist takes on the role of a Guardian - and their mission is to revive The Traveler, protect the city, and learn why the hostile aliens did what they did. Now based on Earth's own moon, the hostile aliens have made serious inroads into conquering the Earth.

That is the premise - but the important elements have more to do with a combination of the quality of the game, and the plans that Bungie has for it, which have been likened to an empire not unlike that of the Halo game series.

Thanks to legal documents that were disclosed as the result of a lawsuit that, though unrelated to Destiny, caused its existence and its planned scope to be made public long before Bungie wanted, we now have a much better view of the game, its future, and the intentions behind it, and it is all good.

Destiny is, without question, one of the most intense combat romps we have experienced at any E3 - and while it definitely has a Halo-like feel to it, particularly in terms of the weapons, like the tug that is felt on your ankles while standing in surf that has an undercurrent, there are elements to the game that tug at you even with as brief an exposure as we had.

During a series of briefings and several demo offerings over the course of the past three years we found a confusing mix of emotions and strange familiarity.

It wasn't until we learned who some of the voice talent was that the explanation for those odd feelings of familiarity we couldn't possibly feel made sense... One being the very distinctive voice of Peter Dinklage - who voices Ghost in the demo - and who needs no introduction.

Of course it sounded oddly familiar! Ghost is your guide and narrator, and while they selected Dinklage well before the explosion of Game of Thrones on HBO, it was still a brilliant choice.

Thanks in no small part to our hands-on experience as well as the very generous video releases by Bungie, as well as the unauthorized sharing that resulted from the semi-private public beta test that concluded in late July, the gamer community has a pretty good idea of just what game play in this fusion title actually means.

It is not an MMO, but it is also not, strictly speaking, the typical FPS. The multi-player online aspect certainly flavored our impression of the game, but it also helped confuse it as well. Eventually we realized why: this is something new!

Honorable Mention

Thanks to the nature of the whole Top 10 format for articles is to present the Top 10, we get that. And we have. The problem is even when we address the games that the gamer community is looking forward to, there is often an exception that needs to be factored into the equation - and in this case, the exception happens to be a major release from last year - GTA V.

Grand Theft Auto V for Xbox One (Rock Star)

The massive, open-world, single-player games that make up the GTA series number among the most popular and best-loved games pretty much ever. By the time GTA V arrived the wizards behind the games had finally gotten their kit together - and that includes a much keener understanding of what the players want in terms of multi-player game play.

While the previous games in the series began to feature limited multi-player modes, those modes were largely so limited that by the time the dust settled a month after their release, the multi-player sides were all but dead. The same, thankfully, can not be said about GTA V.

For the most recent entry in the series, the wizards behind the game series opted for a full-blown MMO style stand-alone game. Well, no, it really wasn't stand-alone in the literal sense because you could only obtain it by purchasing GTA V - but that makes a certain sense, considering that stand-alone game or not, MMO-style game or not, GTA Online is still the multi-player side of GTA V, and as such it should be attached.

With its own dedicated support team, GTA V Online has maintained an active and challenging content expansion program that continues to keep the player base involved and satisfied - so its release on the next gen of console is not simply something that was unexpected, it is enough to cause gamers who have already bought and played GTA V to do so again for their new console.

While the anticipation is not on the same level as the ten games above, it is considerable and worthy of honorable mention. Thanks to a premature listing on UK game store GAME's website we know that the next gen version of GTA V for Xbox One and PS4 is tentatively set for 1 November 2014 - can we wait?

Conclusions

Our Top Ten Most Anticipated Games for the 2014/2015 Game Season was drawn from informal research among the SuperCheats community and the gamers who orbit in the groups that the bullpen plays in. Did we get it right? Did we miss some? Only you can tell us that!

If you feel like there should have been a game - or games - on the list that are not here, the best way for you to share that wisdom is to take advantage of the comments system below, and share your own list of what you consider the Top 10.

If there is a game on the list that you feel does not qualify to be there tell us that - but be sure to tell us why it should not be there too, since that is pretty important information. We welcome your response and your opinion, so please feel invited to reply to this article by sharing what you feel and think. We'll be glad you did!

Posted: 1st Sep 2014 by CMBF
Tags: Destiny, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, destiny, 2014 2015 games