The 10th Hour 10.31.08: The Top 10 Party Games

Posted by Derek Robbins on 10.31.2008

This week 411's Derek Robbins breaks down the top-10 party games of all times. If you want to entertain an audience, these games are surely the way to go!

Hello and welcome to the 10th hour! As always, there are a couple of things that I wish to hit on before I get started, so let's get those out of the way real quick. Onwards! To the tangents!

-So the Phillies won the World Series. So, was there rioting last night or what? I'm waiting for confirmation before I go out and congratulate them outright. Can't blame them. I know for a fact that if the Cubs won the world series, the Chicago fans would be flipping cars as though it were going out of style. Not that I approve of it, but I mean…it happens.

-Little Big Planet is a great game and I look forward to the moment all the online issues are resolved because I can tell that this game is one that will last me a long, long time. If you wanna create giant penis levels with me, add my PSN at Croix22.

-I'm embarrassed to say but I am actually looking forward to the Playstation 3 Naruto game. Not only does it look damn beautiful but it's fun as hell. I doubt I'll be picking it up at launch or anything, but it is now officially on my radar. How crazy is that, eh?

Reader Feedback

Let's see what you had to say about the PS1 games list from last week. There are a lot of different titles that could have very easily been on there, so let's see what you, the reader, had to say about it.

Let's start with professional commenter RavenTazECW

Heh, when went to the Games page to log in to respond, I noticed the preview picture wasn't your #1 game, it was #3. Maybe the higher ups (Ashish?) caught wind of the comments and alleviated the problem.

The reason I look forward to so few games is because I still don't own a next-gen consoles, and it seems likely that I won't be able to afford one until I get my bachelor's degree in accounting and get a job to afford things in another two years. If I have a little extra money nowadays, I try to game a game for cheap on a system I already have, like the PC or PS2.

I need to grab Symphony of the Night off of eBay in the future too. I enjoyed Lament of Innocence for the PS2 (I believe I recommended Leon's Theme from LoI in your top 10 gaming songs earlier this year).

And as the wise philosopher Crash Bandicoot once said... LESS WORK, MORE HOCKEYYYYY!!!! I still make Bandicoot jokes to this day, I liked the mascot. Warped was a good game, and I guess I was one of the few who liked Wrath of Cortex for the PS2.

Only Metal Gear games I've ever played were Metal Gear and Snake's Revenge, the first two NES games. Those games were far too tough for me. The Solid games look good, but I got into the Playstation late (I didn't play PS1 games until I bought a PS2 before I went to college in 2001... yeah, still going, hahaha), so I've missed out on a lot of quality PS1 games. FFIX was my first PS1 game and became one of my favorite ever, and I bought it because I liked the original FF on the NES and I saw the black mage was a part of FFIX. Plus the other characters for FFIX looked cool and I thought the game would be fun (and I was right).

I've never been big on horror games, but I did buy Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. I prefer creepy horror over shock and gore horrors. Unfortunately, though I haven't had time to play it much recently, it did freeze on me early in the game. That's what I get for buying it used, but GameStop had it in stock and I had to go for it since they hadn't had it in for a couple years prior to it.

Even though my Mets are long gone, I live next to Tampa Bay and have been a fan of the Rays since they started playing in 1998. I went to games 2 and 7 of the ALCS against the damn Red Sox, and I went to game 1 of the World Series. Game 1 was the first game I went to all year that the Rays lost in, so my good luck streak is gone. At least they won tonight to even up there series.

Wow, maybe you should stop rooting for teams. Those pesky Rays put up about no fight in the world series. Against the Phillies. It's not like the Phillies were a bad team, but I would not say they were better than Tampa Bay. Oh well! Just, er, don't ever root for my Cubs eh? I would hate for them to go through another heart breaking collapse.

You don't own a next-gen console eh? I wouldn't recommend getting one for a little while. Though there are some pretty awesome games for your perusal, as a whole this game feels pretty barren as far as "great" games is concerned. Then again, people were probably saying the same about the last generation at this point in its life-span. Now that generation is remembered as one of the best.

Your favorite horror game ever is a good one. Eternal Darkness is arguably one of the best games from the last generation and one of my top-favorite games of all time. Honestly, if I were to make a top-50 it would certainly be in the upper-25. It just has such an interesting feel…you won't really experience anything quite like it from the horror genre.

ALSO, PLAY METAL GEAR SOLID!

Triple J makes a case for Final Fantasy VII

FFVII was one of the defining games of that generation.

It was also one of the games that really pushed the PS1 ahead of it's competition.

FVII would have been a N64 game had Nintendo used cd instead of cartridge.

Final Fantasy VII certainly aided the Playstation in the sense that it helped legitimize it as a threat to Nintendo. Pretty much everyone I knew who owned a Playstation owned FF VII – it was just a console seller. A big part of that would be the advertising campaign. For whatever reason, people stuck to the game and your legions of JRPG players that you see today were born.

I think that it's a good thing that FF VII was released on the PS1 for a couple of reasons. First, I'm not sure the PSX would have taken right off until the release of Metal Gear Solid and two, the experience that it had would not have been the same on the N64. The CGs would have been impossible, there would have been less orchestrated music…it just wouldn't have been the same.

FF VII was great for the PS1.

Mike lists games that I did not mention:

These are the games I played most that you didn't mention.
Rival Schools
Twisted Metal 2
Cool Boarders 2
Tenchu
Gex

Rival Schools – A fantastic 3D fighter. There is not a negative word that I can say about it. This game and Project Justice are among my favorite fighters ever. Just not good enough to make this list, sadly.

Twisted Metal 2 – A fun game, but not even close to being in the top-10.

Cool Boarders 2: Outside of Snowboard Kids 2, it's my FAVORITE snowboarding game of all time.

Tenchu – Not for me. I don't really like the Tenchu franchise. The first couple are definitely good though.

Gex – Sucks.

Mostly good stuff you have here.

Heel Heat talks Chrono Cross

I thought what hurt Chrono Cross the most was the massive amount of characters. Most of the characters were either uninteresting, useless or were NPCs in any other JRPG. I think they should've concentrated on maybe nine or ten characters for stronger character development, and so everyone could have double and triple techs with everyone else instead of once in awhile finding a combination among certain characters. That's something I really missed from Chrono Trigger which I thought should be a "series" staple.

Otherwise, it had a great soundtrack, above average story (I thought there was a bit too much standing around while NPCs explain metaphysical events to you instead of just ripping through time like in Trigger), good battle system outside of the lack of techs relative to the number of characters, and I think did a pretty good job of making references to Trigger.

That is certainly Chrono Cross's BIG weak spot. It has a ton of characters, but most of them are not built off on. You don't really know about ¾ of your roster and it's hard to identify with characters when you know shit about them. I mean, other than the fact that Grecko is apparently a wrestling priest…what else do we know about him? Nothing. Chrono Cross DOES go in depth on a couple of characters, such as Harle and Kid, and those are interesting but they really could have done more.

As for the positives, you're right on the mark. CC has arguably one of the top-10 best soundtracks of all time, a pretty good story for a video game, a different battle system (Alrigth! No ATB!), and the references are good. They don't really make the game any better but it certainly appeals to the inner-Chrono Trigger fanboy.

Accusations are made towards me, regarding my BREAKING OF MOLD. fgsdsfdgsdfg makes them.

I think at this point, Final Fantasy 7 is regarded as so good that everyone just omits it from their lists or something. Like, its a staple of lists like this, so everyone tries to "break the mold" and just keep it off the list. Dumb.

I just go with my opinion. I don't factor what other people think into my opinion. I actually was thinking about how I made a pretty un-controversial list. Then I went to bed and went: "SHIT! Final Fantasy VII!" Well, you know, it's a really good game but I prefer the last of the PS1 Final Fantasies to it greatly. It's just how I feel, sorry.

Christopher Warrior with the Mother 3 love:

Derek, please, please, please do a review for Mother 3. I would really like to hear your in-depth thoughts.

Me?

3.5/4, no doubt. It was great. Great characters, same Earthbound atmosphere and a pretty cool story that went places many RPGs fear to tread. My only complaint is this: in preparing for Mother 3, I played through Earthbound yet again; and then when playing through Mother 3, I really missed Earthbound. That shouldn't have happened. (For instance, I wasn't longing for Super Mario 64 while playing Mario Galaxy, because Galaxy was just that good to me. Sunshine, on the other hand, made me want to play Mario 64 over again.)

I'm firing up Mother 3 again, very soon; to be honest, I can't wait to play it again. Regardless of my criticism, I loved it.

Last note: didn't care for the ending, but it didn't matter; every thing that led to it was just so friggin epic. Truly a story that was more about the journey than the destination.

I'll ask Ramon if I can do a review for Mother 3, I'm just not sure whether he would be cool with me doing a review for a game that only is available to people via download and is of questionable legality. I mean, you know, Nintendo is aware of it…I'll see what he thinks though. It's something I really want to do.

As for me, I think as far as story goes? Without a doubt, it's better than Earthbound's story. If you know me, and if you've ever read this column before you'll know that's quite high praise. My only complaint about Mother 3 really is that it doesn't have the same charm that Earthbound has. I mostly think this is because Mother 3 is a much darker game as a whole, and a lot of EB's innocence is lost. That's not a big deal though, because it more than makes up for it.

As for the ending, I loved it. I like how it leaves things open. It doesn't come out and say THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS…that's what I expect from my Mother. If you asked me right now, at THIS second, I would tell you that I think Mother 3 is better than Earthbound. We'll see how long this opinion holds though. After all, Earthbound was a long-reigning "Number 1 game of all time" for me.

Ryan to my defense!

Derek, I generally hate it when people chime in with "OMG WTF WHERE IS *insert game* YOUR LIST BLOWS *game* IS THE BEST GAME EVER U SUX", but the lack of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 is criminal... Thinking about it, both 2 and 3 were brilliant (I'm pretty sure 3 got near 100% scores from major outlets back in the day), and even if you don't like the skate game genre they spawned, you can't go past the licensed soundtrack for THPS2. Best. Soundtrack. Ever.

Although, massive props for the inclusions of silent hill and crash 3, and EPIC props for mentioning Digimon World

THPS 2 was a fabulous game with a fabulous soundtrack, but I'm not sure it deserved to be on this list. It certainly was one of my favorite games on the PSX and started a three-year tradition of me getting Tony Hawk games for Christmas. It's sad that the tradition had to end, but any THPS beyond 4 was just…not my bag, baby.

As for Digimon World, dude…that game is one that if you play with a guide on "Digivolution" you'll absolutely love. It's one that reviewers panned, but if you know what you're doing it's simply fabulous. I'm glad you liked it. It was actually my original number 10 game but I decided not to include it because, really, that would have gotten so much shit. Sorry, Digimon, Digital Monsters, Digimon are THE champions.

SmokaJoka with a quick hit:

I hope you don't get paid to do these lists

The answer to this question would make you cry.

ShinGetterPrime is last but not least

while i understand there's no FFVII (i liked FF IX over that as well anyway), i can't believe there's no Gran Turismo 1 or 2. this was the definite system seller.

Man, I have to be honest…I do not like Gran Turismo. It's nice that it's a realistic racer, but it gets to the point where it's just too simmy and not fun. I mean, I could see how gear heads could like it, but as a guy who plays games it just gets kind of dull. Also, I just don't like the racing genre. I could see it being on someone else's list, but it couldn't be on mine. That's why I couldn't do a top-10 racing game list very well either, I just don't appreciate the genre.



Top ten best party-games

Now originally I was going to do something like "Top-10 Scariest Games" because, after all, it is going to be Halloween the day this column goes up. Convenient timing? Sure. Then a couple of things stopped me – first, I just did a list that very well could have included two entries on this list and I'd hate writing about them again so soon…and second? I'm at an age where the average person could care less about being scared…they care about the parties! So in honor of that, I have broken down the top-10 party games. These aren't necessarily the best games on their own merits, but are quite fun when you get together and play with a lot of people. From two-players to way more, these games are guaranteed fun when you entertain guests.

Keep note, since a lot of franchises don't have one stand out game...I tend to rank a lot of these franchises as one whole unit. So yeah, before you ask, that's why there are so many franchise labels.

Even by my standards where I hate everything…these games are fun to play with other people. Obviously, games I have not played are not included. After all, what right do I have to rank something I've not tried before? Let's get this shit started.

Also please note, I kept two-player fighters off of this list because, unless you have some sort of fight loving group of buddies…it's just not as fun to watch a couple of people play Street Fighter. Again, these games aren't necessarily the best games, but they are quite a blast to play with other people in your company.

10-) Dance Dance Revolution - What makes DDR such a great game to play with your friends is accessibility. For people that have a lot of time, they have a super intense heavy mode. To master every song takes a ton of practice and can absorb months of your time. This is good for those of us who play a lot of games. We are used to practicing one game for long periods of time to improve our skills. Not everyone is, after all…games are for losers! So it's good for those people that you have a light mode that's accessible. As long as you are relatively coordinated, you can handle this…and odds are have a good time.

That's not saying much though, every game in the history of the universe has different difficulty settings. Why, I might as well go play something like Gungrave if I wanted shockingly different modes of play. No, what makes DDR different is that each player can choose a difficulty level to play on. Usually when you're playing a cooperative game, you set one universal difficulty. Play a TMNT game and 100% of the time if the difficulty is set on Hard, everyone will be playing hard. In this game, you can have yourself, you super hardcore rhythm gamer, on the heavy difficulty while you have your slightly more casual friend play on light mode. It may not seem like much, but it can get a lot of people involved with the action.

The thing about DDR is that it's pretty appealing to a non-gamer, and before the release of the Nintendo Wii it was one of those games that a non-gamer could play. When you see someone stomping their feet to a rhythm, it's a lot more approachable than a game where you mash buttons and kill someone. I figure you would have a lot more luck getting a non-gamer onto a dance mad than you would onto a control pad.

Plus, that's not even the best part about DDR with a load of people. It's always funny to watch the one guy who thinks that he is super badass play DDR. You can just tell by his stance that he is one hardcore guy. The problem with this? Man, he looks like such a goof playing it. You see his legs flailing, his body contorting…watching people play DDR is almost more fun than playing it. You want to know some first hand accounts of my play? "Derek, you look like a gorilla on that pad!" "JESUS Christ Derek, are you trying to stomp a hole through my floor?" Come on, you know you wanna say that kind of shit. Plus, once I fell. Yes, I was dancing and I fell and everyone laugh. We all know that mockery is one thing…that can bring us all together.

DDR is a good choice to entertain loads because it's simply an easily accessible title that most can sucker some enjoyment out of. It may not be the best party game out there, it may not even be the best rhythm game…but the ability to watch someone look like a complete jackass cannot be under-estimated. It's a blast.



9-) N64 THQ Wrestling titles - This is an awfully broad entry, but let's be honest here…if you've played a single THQ wrestler on the N64 you probably know what I am talking about. They are not the most in depth grapplers. You won't find a moveset that rivals Firepro's insane list…but you will find a certain simplicity that makes the titles simply a blast to play. It's very easy to "hate on" wrestling, but I've seen guys who can't stand wrestling get into these games. They're very accessible.

Probably my favorite mode to play with others would be the battle royal mode from WCW/nWo revenge. You can set the number of entrants to 40. You can only have four people in the ring at a time, but the second you eliminate someone another wrestler comes out in your stead. Usually, in games such as Smackdown v. Raw, you would have to select the new wrestler manually but in this game you just automatically take over the new entrant. This provides for some awfully quick action and even though the match bills 40 people it won't last you too long. It's also nice that elimations are simple. You get someone on the ropes, you hit them, they fall out. Simple. This would not work for a more "realistic" wrestling title, but for arcadey titles, as you would see on the N64, it works pretty well.

You also never know what can happen. AS THEY CAN SAY, ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN IN THE WWF You can get some truly bizarre wrestlers to controls, you know, the ones that you normally wouldn't use of your own free will. Let's say you start the match as DDP and find yourself eliminated like ten guys in. You could get someone you've heard of, like say…Raven…but you could also get someone you would never in a million years use. Like Maya Inca Boy. It allows for some crazy winners, people that you'd never actually select yourself to win…and it adds a bit of randomness to the mix.

Of course, the battle royal mode isn't the only thing you can tinker with. Simply playing normal matches – such as tag teams or hardcore style matches – is quite enjoyable. It's certainly much more fun to play a tag match with another human as opposed to with a computer. Of course, match variety is something you'll find in most every wrestling game ever, but the simplicity of the N64 grapplers allows you to pick up and play after years of NOT playing…and can lead to hours of fun.

You can also create wrestlers with other people…which is a surprising blast. You can make absolutely absurd versions of yourself or your friends and show them off. It may not seem like much, but it's an absolute laugh riot if you're with the right group of people. I mean, you know, if you're of the proper age your sense of humor could be clouded with certain liquids which would only enhance the experience.

N64 wrestling titles aren't much fun to play alone these days. Yeah, you can have fun with games like No Mercy or Wrestlemania 2000 without the aid of others, but if you want to have a blast you'll go to the multiplayer. If you haven't tried any of these games in a while, just pull one out some day and try it again with a couple of friends. There will be hours of enjoyment ahead of you.



8-) Mario Kart franchise - I am not a fan of racing games. For the most part, the more realistic games sort of run together. I can't really tell the difference between like Gran Turismo or Project Gotham unless I go check the gameplay modes or something. That's not to say there is no difference, I'm just not a racing guy…but having said that, Mario Kart has always been a game that I can squeeze some enjoyment out of.

Like the other two games that I have mentioned so far, Mario Kart is a pretty simplistic title for a variety of players to play. I mean, obviously, some people are going to be better at it than others but compared to other racing titles there is a relatively low learning curve. You can pick it up and have a relatively good idea as to what you're doing. No, you won't be lapping people on 50 cc just yet, but it's not like you're going to get your ass kicked either. This low learning curve allows for easy pick-up-and-play access among your non-gaming friends.

Now the chief complaint about Mario Kart is that it's sort of a luck based game. This is fair, because often times the most skilled racer won't win due to an un-luckily placed blue-koopa shell. I think the most skilled racer will definitely win the majority of the time, but…that's kind of what helps in the party situation. I know when I play a game where I'm at some sort of obvious disadvantage…I get tired easily. When I try to play something like Street Fighter Alpha 3 online (via GGPO) I get tired quickly because I keep getting my ASS KICKED. Losing all the time causes problems…but because Mario Kart is partially luck based, sometimes the worst player in your party can win a game. This will encourage them to keep playing…you most likely won't have someone who is obviously miserable this way.

I consider myself pretty good at Mario Kart. In the online mode, last time I played (which is admittedly a while ago), I had a ranking around 9000. Not bad. Even then, I found that every once in a while I would have an absolutely horrible race. Nothing would go my way, a billion items will hit me…something bad is going to happen, but that is the charm of Mario Kart.

Mario Kart is a fun weapons-based kart racer. Often times the end result of your race is totally luck based…but sometimes you absolutely need that to keep everyone entertained. I'm not saying every game should be like that, good lord would that get old quick…but there's a place for it and I think that Mario Kart does it well.



7-) Bomberman Franchise - Bomberman is kind of an iconic character, but I find that people often forget about his existence. Like when Super Smash Brothers Brawl was coming out, a lot of people thought up third party characters that they would really like to see in the game. You would get people to list Sonic or Cloud or even Megaman but usually you would not see the little bomberman. I always found that kind of weird, because like Smash Brothers…I find Bomberman to be absolutely synonymous with multiplayer gaming.

Basically what happens in Bomberman is you're pitted in a relatively small level against other bombers with the task of being the last one alive. You essentially want to blow everyone to smithereens. What makes this game so playable among groups of people is that it is, surprise, very easy to pick up and play. All that you really need to do to succeed is think a little bit about where you're going and where you're placing your bombs and the explosion radius of said bombs. Once you know that, it's off to the races!

What makes Bomberman so compelling is that it doesn't really try to be anything too complicated. You're just trying to kill the other players on screen. There are power ups, of course, but even with those it doesn't give muck up the game. It's just a simple fun experience, there's not much else to say about it. If you're looking for the best one, in my opinion it's the Bomberman for the Sega Saturn. A very good game that has a good number of maps and allows for a lot of players. Of course, that's only if you aim to entertain people physically there. Your best bet for Bomberman action today is probably on the X-Box Live with Bomberman LIVE. Highspeed online play whenever you want? Very much appreciated.

Your friends will love you for playing this game, believe me.



6-) Worms Armageddon - I've always sort of considered the worms franchise to be more of a cult gamer affair. I mean, yeah, they have their fans but the gaming populace in general isn't privy to those little buggers…well…that really ought to change. The Worms franchise offers deceptively simple strategy gameplay that most everyone can enjoy. On top of that, you can have a lot of player. Sure, you have to pass the controller around…but due to its turn based nature a LOT of people can play…and it's kind of nice that way.

Worms Armageddon allows you to pit four teams of worms against each other. The number of worms that each team consists of is up to you (I forget, I think the max is 6?). What's handy is that when you're making a team to play as, you can customize everything about them (other than their looks. They're worms!). You can change their names, their weapons of choice, the sounds they make as they battle. So if you wanted to make a team named THE GINYU FORCE whose weapon of choice was the holy hand grenade, you could do that. Make them have real thick Scottish accents for all I care.

So you take these created teams and pit them on a battle field. What you do, one worm at a time, is inch along the path and pull out your various weapons to do battle with. These can range from a bazooka to an old lady. It's pretty goofy and meant to be silly. What you want to do is strategically eliminate a worm so that the team he is on will cause you as little harm as possible. You have to think about your moves, the most effective ways of taking someone out, or you will lose.

What makes this so fun to play in a group is the talk that goes on during the game. You'll have people begging for mercy, people wanting to join in an alliance with you, and people out to simply end your team before anyone else gets a chance to lose. Essentially, there will be a lot of plea bargaining and chatter…but it's those things that really make this game stand out. After all, nothing warms the heart like the idea of worms named Major Glory and Krunk teaming up with worms under the alias of Captain America and the Hulk.

I don't want to say that Worms is like a videogame version of Risk, it's really not…but you'll find yourself going through a lot of the same conversations in between turns. It makes for a memorable experience among friends and I would whole-heartedly encourage anyone who has the ability to play or purchase this game do so. It requires only one controller and can supply the entire group with fun for the night.



5-) Wario Ware (GCN/WII) - The Wario Ware franchise is all about being quick witted. You need to react to what you see on the screen quickly or you will lose. This sort of frenetic experience is pretty handy among a group of gamers. Each game you play in Wario Ware lasts about five-to-eight seconds so in order for you to come out on top you have to stay on your toes.

I'm not sure I would have put the original Wario Ware on this list though. It's a great game, but I honestly had a lot more fun with the GBA version than I did the Gamecube version. Something about that game just couldn't be replicated with multiplayer, in my eyes. Wario Ware for the wii though, this game is a simple hoot to play with others and I can easily explain why.

As mentioned with DDR, you really can't underestimate how fun it is to watch someone behave like a jackass. With the wii's wario ware, the game encourages you, the player, to do a number of wacky things with the controller. These range from holding the controller on the end of your nose to letting it drop out of your hand. It's some wacky stuff, and if you're not prepared…you'll most assuredly lose. The most entertaining thing about the game though is watching others around you flail aimlessly, trying to get their body in position to make it to the next stage.

My only complaint is that…I would really like to see a co-operative mode in the game. Something where you can take your characters and play through the single player stuff together. Maybe you can share four lives amongst yourselves and every time one of you fails at a game, you get docked a life? Or how about they create a whole new batch of two player games requiring quick cooperation? It seems like kind of a hassle, but if done properly it could be a pretty fun thing.

It's pretty hard to nit-pick a game like Wario Ware. If you play it, you know exactly what you're getting into…and honestly, it's hard not to have fun with a title like that. It's simple, it requires quick and precise decision making, and it's fun. It may not be the best game out there, but it is certainly one of the most fun games to play…and perhaps to watch.



4-) Rock Band 1/2 - Let's say that you hang out with a group of gamers. You know, you guys are pretty rad. I mean, you're fucking HARDCORE. There's always one of you though, and I mean ALWAYS, that when you poll the group about what they want to do…they'll say play Rock Band. Does it get on your nerves? Hell yes it does. I mean, Rock Band is a great game but it's not something you play all the time…is it? Honestly, I kind of sympathize with Rock Band all the time guy. The game is DAMN good and a blast to play with a lot of people.

Admit it, at one time or another you've dreamed of making it big with a band. You want the press, the fame, the ladies…but that sort of dream is most likely out of grasp. I mean, you're a fat ass white dude you're cool and all, but the big time? Please. Rock Band aims to at least act like you can achieve that dream by giving you the ability to work with three other people in a, well, band. There is one person on the drums, one vocalist, and one for both the lead and bass guitars. The thing is, you have to work together as a band in order to beat the song. If one of you fails, it's on one of your other bandmates to bring you back. So you truly have to work as a team.

The ultimate killer of the rhythm genre is the soundtrack though. Yeah, there are some games that are fun single player with a bad soundtrack…but multiplayer? You know your friends will bitch about it. I mean, just try to get someone to rock out on the "Campfire Melodies" in Donkey Konga. You'll just get exasperated sighs as they wail away on the bongos. Luckily that is not a problem with Rock Band. The soundtrack is a fairly large one. If you're playing the second Rock Band and have carried your songs over to that game, you have over 500 at your disposal. I don't care what kind of music fan you are, given a choice of 500 songs there will be at least one that you enjoy. So there really is something for everyone who plays Rock Band.

By the way, this game also implements the "play on whatever difficulty" feature that DDR has. So you can have your guitarist play on hard and your drummer play on easy. This may not seem like a big deal, since a lot of the time when you play Rock Band you'll be playing with the same group of people multiple times so you'll be in the same skill range, but if you have one band member that isn't quite up to par with the rest of them, it won't kill you. This is good, especially for the super difficult songs.

Rock Band is a great game to play pretty much any night of the week. You get a group of friends together, you can rock out for hours. I mean, sure, you may just play "Still Alive" a billion times but like…you're still super badass rock stars, ain'tcha? Also, bonus points for the exclusive signed Beatles deal. I can't fucking wait to sing through some of their songs on Rock Band.



3-) Perfect Dark/Goldeneye/Halo - Basically…shooters! I don't think one really outright blows the others out of the park so I decided to group these together. This was mostly to create list diversity…as you can see, a lot of the games on this list are grouped together. It's hard to choose just one from franchises that are largely the same. These are not the same games…but it's pretty hard to choose just one.

Anyhow, look, I defy you to play a shooter with a group of people and not have any fun. It is damn near impossible and you would have to essentially be some sort of…heartless soul not to at least. As much as I bag on Halo, and if you think I don't you really haven't read the 10th hour for very long, one of the most fun times I've had with a game is the very first time I played 16-player Halo CE. There was shouting everywhere, people acting like jackasses…it was just a very good time. I would say that if you haven't tried a 16-player Halo LAN that you have not lived.

Of course, to give credit only to Halo would be to dismiss its console forefathers, the games that really legitimized the shooter as a genre that could survive on consoles. Goldeneye, for instance, combined addictive arcade-style shooting with memorable level design and characters. I mean, sure, most of you are probably familiar with the Bond villains…but looking back on it, I associate Oddjob more with Goldeneye 64 than I do with the movie he appeared in, Goldfinger. I mean, shit, he was SO SHORT. You had to aim low to get him? Fuck that. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck FUCK YOU ODDJOB (Beat that, Mr. Ogre. I'm taking the F-bomb streak back to the 10th hour).

Perfect Dark, on the other hand, pretty much does everything that Bond does…except it adds a few more things. Now on top of the addictive four-player action, you also have the ability to fight against several bots (a feature that I think should be in more shooters) and create your own characters. These characters tend to be absolutely absurd. For instance, my friends and I (when I lived in Colorado) created a bunch of Bill Clinton-looking guys with female bodies. We made a special group for them, the pink team, which we called the "Crazy Cleavage Clintons". It's that sort of thing that you remember for long periods of time.

The shooter genre is certainly not among my favorites. Honestly, it's probably the one genre I bitch about the most on the 10th hour. I DO HATE EVERYTHING THAT EVERYONE ELSE LOVES AFTER ALL. That said, as far as multiplayer action is concerned…shooters are among the most fun games there are. After all, if you can't have fun shooting the shit out of your friends, how can you have fun?



2-) Mario Party 2 - Mario Party has got to be one of the worst aging franchises ever. Maybe it's just because I loved playing the N64 titles, but for whatever reason it seems that the newest Mario Party games simply can't compare. They take the "ANYONE CAN WIN" idea way too far and in almost any game the lead is not safe, even at the last turn.

Essentially what Mario Party is, is a board game. You take control of one of four characters and move them around a game board. After everyone's turn you play a minigame, the winner of the game gets some coins. You can use these coins to buy a star – which you encounter through moving across the game field – and the person with the most stars at the end of the game wins. Of course, it's not quite that simple. In several of the Mario Parties, there are ways to transfer those stars to a different user or even lose them all together. It's kind of a shame, but…I think at least the N64 games aren't plagued by the curse of being overly reliant on luck. I mean obviously luck is still involved, but not TOO much. Still though, I had to choose just one for this list…

Mario Party 2, after all these years, is still my most preferred Mario Party. Is there still luck involved? Hell yes there is. You roll a dice and move around a board where shit can go down, something unlucky is bound to happen…but compared to today, it's pretty tame. It actually took skill to win, and much like Mario Kart, every once in a while the less skilled player would pull off a victory.

What makes Mario Party 2 my most preferred of the series is that it tones down on the joystick tilting games that were popular in the first game. Are some still there? Yes. In the first one though, it seemed like EVERY OTHER GAME involved furiously rotating the joystick. This would either make your palms bleed or give you a wicked blister on one of your fingers. Neither were ideal. The problem with the third game, my second favorite in the series, would have to be the game guy spaces. You would land on a space, lose all your coins, and be forced to play a game. If you won? You get a multiple of your coins back but if you lose? None of them back. It could literally change a game and it was not wanted.

What makes Mario Party 2 stick out in my mind is that with each level you play, your characters take on new outfits. You won't be playing in Mario's classic duds in every stage you go through…there will be different outfits. This is just a tiny, tiny touch that may not be the best thing about the game…but when I think back on it, it's one of the things that I remember best.

There were three new types of mini-game introduced: the Battle mini-game, the Item mini-game, and the Duel mini-game. Each of them became staples of the series, but considering each game later on had stupid shit added to them…they kind of lost their flare. In my opinion, Mario Party 2 is one of the few games in the franchise that really has no overly apparent fault. It makes it the best one, and the one I would recommend you pull out and play with your friends. It has aged well.



1-) Smash Brothers Franchise - This is the ultimate "party" game for a reason. You're taking a lot of characters that even casual gamers are familiar with and pitting them against each other. Nintendo's finest coming together and duking it out was, surprisingly, not expected to be a hit in America. The original Smash Brothers was not a game Nintendo expected to sell all that well (I'm not sure WHY, who wouldn't want to pit Mario against Link?), but it did…so here we are today where Smash Brothers Brawl is one of the most popular games on the Nintendo Wii. There is a good reason why – it's damn good.

Smash Brothers is a fighting game where your main goal is to not take out an energy bar (ala Street Fighter), but knock the opponent off the stage. The more you damage someone, the father they go flying when you hit them. So obviously as the fight goes on, your opponent will be easier to KO. Aiding your fight is an assortment of items. These are pretty much just in place to even the playing field. Smash Brothers, despite popular belief, does indeed take skill…and if you have items on, every once in a while an un-skilled player can beat a skilled player. This will almost never happen with items off, so keep that in mind…especially if you play with a casual friend.

Smash Brothers appeal to the casual audience is very easy to see. Unlike the more "hardcore" fighters out there, the majority of Smash Brothers roster consists of very well known characters. I've said this before on the 10th hour, but even my grandmother knows who Mario is. These are characters very accessible to your average person and they are more apt to get into the game because of them. Not only that, but Smash Brothers also is a very, very easy fighter to learn. It does take a while to master – the tournament scene is filled with people who master the various ins-and-outs of the game – but when you're just starting out, the game is very easy to just pick-up-and-play.

This is a big deal, the ability to pick-up-and-play. As you know, I'm a huge fan of Street Fighter. Just about every week I refer to the fourth Street Fighter as the game of the century (2000-2100). This is because, well, it IS. The difference between that kind of game and this, is that an entire moveset is made obvious to the user. Practically every character has the same basic moves map. Obviously each one controls differently and you need to know when to use specific moves, but the moves are sensationally easy to pull off. Simply pressing the button in one direction and pressing another button will pull of a move. To someone who doesn't play a lot of fighters, pressing up+B to do an uppercut is a lot easier than Forward-down-down+right+A.

The game can get quite cluttered at times, but once you get used to the pace you'll be having fun for hours. Smash Brothers is one of my favorite franchises ever because it is a deceptively simple game. It plays easily, but there is much more to it than meets the eye. A game that is easy to play with a group of people that have never played it before…but also a game that can be mastered and played at an in depth competitive level. Fun times all around!



Well, that's it for this week. As always, you can e-mail me at [e-mail] or simply comment down below. Again, even though sometimes the comments are a bit negative, I really appreciate the words you have to give me because I believe they help to make me a better writer of sorts. Thank you! Also, if you wanna play some LBP with me, the screen name is Croix22.

Before I go though, let's check some links from around 411mania's game zone. Sadly, again, I'm running short on time…so it's abbreviated links time again! YEAH!

Theo Fraser writes The Nintendophiles

Vincent Chiucchi writes The Hall of Shame

I write B3yond the Report

Jordan Williams writes The Working Title. I'm also going to drink that drink just to show you who is boss, bwah ha ha.

Chris Vicari writes the PC Spotlight

Ty Huston writes the Classic Flashback

Chris Evans writes the PC-Centric Extravaganza

The Curryman writes The Checkpoint

Drew writes Coming Attractions

Rod Oracheski writes Achievement Unlocked

Vincent Chiuchhi writes The Select and Start News Report

Joe Roche writes The Full Circle 360 news report

AJ and Mike Minotti voice the Exploding Barrel Podcast

Well, that's it. I'm out.

'til the crossroads