3. Stormrise: Sega, let’s just get this out of the way. I don’t care if a game looks gorgeous – if it doesn’t play well, at the end of the day I’m going to be exponentially pissed off. How exponentially? Well, that depends on how much you try to sell me terrible game features and mechanics, tout them as revolutionary and then sit back while they fall flat on their face. Elevation matters in your strategy game? Oh, that’s kind of cool. It takes place in a post-apocalyptic environment? Okay, a little cliché, but I might be able to get behind that. Cool, somewhat unique factions and units? Now we’re talking. Hey, this might seem genuinely awesome...wait...it controls like crap? Damn it Sega, why do you have to break my heart like that?! Taking a significant amount of inspiration from Gears of War and EndWar doesn’t necessarily make your game great, Sega. It just makes it come off as kitschy and soulless. But hey, you seem to be doing fine. So, how’s that Sonic thing working out for you?
2. Starcraft (on consoles): If you want to take something that was near-perfect on the PC and terrible on a console – look no further than Starcraft. Designed from the ground up by Blizzard, it became one of the greatest RTS games in the last two decades of video game history, replete with the first part of Starcraft 2 releasing just this week. But, move all that greatness to a console and what happens? Disappointment. I understand that since Starcraft arrived on the Nintendo 64 a lot has changed. Consoles are closer to PCs than they have ever been previously. You can hook a mouse and keyboard into your PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 making it a classy doppelganger. But the sad fact of the matter remains – this was a dark move on the part of the Blizzard and should have remained on the PC where it belonged. On the other hand though, for every absolutely terrible commercial the game spawned, it did spawn one that was pretty hilarious.
1. Supreme Commander 2: Published by Square Enix, this was the follow-up to that game a few places up in the list. Why does it earn the number one spot? Because Gas Powered Games not only failed to learn from their previous lesson of bringing a strategy game to the 360, they made the story and gameplay all the more contrived. Taking everything that made the first game great and injecting it with an absolutely ridiculous story about how all of a sudden everyone just wanted to go back to war is one of the most asinine narrative moves I’ve seen in the history of video games and I’ve seen my fair share of bad stories. While I’ll never be absolutely sure as to who okayed the production of this game or why, it is always going to linger there as a black mark on the both GPG and Square Enix. In no small words, this mess should’ve been aborted before it could see the light of day.
So, what are your favorite strategy games and which ones do you think we missed? Do you think these sorts of games are always going to be consistently off and wrong on the Xbox 360 or are the notable exceptions enough to keep developers trying again in the hopes of hitting it big? Go ahead and hit up the forums and let us know. In the meantime, keep your eyes on PlanetXbox360 for the greatest news, reviews and features about your favorite Microsoft console.
