The Xbox 360, when you think about it, has one of the most extensive libraries of video games not only of this console generation, but since two scientists decided to bounce an electronic ball back and forth using an oscilloscope, giving birth to the medium as we know it. While it’s always best to try and get your hands on the latest and greatest stuff that developers, publishers and retailers are more than happy to shove down our throats with all the restraint of a mental patient, it doesn’t hurt to check out a few titles that have since comes, gone and had the hell played out of them already. After all, there are more than a few ways to get your hands on a new game, but as I’m always prone to remind anyone who will listen, it isn’t so dreadful to look back at the greats that have come before the hits you’re probably playing, or looking forward to playing, right now.
10. Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena: For a game that originally premiered on the original Xbox and was updated with better graphics along with a sequel that feels more meatier than most of the packed on DLC many gamers will feel all too familiar with, it still boggles my mind why this title didn’t sell better when it was released. The graphics and controls were top notch and the violence was on par, if not exceeding, that of what we’ve come to expect from hit first person shooters like Medal of Honor, Call of Duty and Battlefield. So, I can only wonder, why the hate for Riddick? Nevertheless, for everything the game was, and wasn’t, it was a solid action title that really delivered on what it promised without leaving gamers feeling suspicious that they may have been tricked into being oversold.
9. Bad Company: Despite Red Faction on the PS2 being the first game to really explore the concept of altering level terrain and structures to suit a particular play style, Bad Company brought it to the masses in ridiculously well-executed fashion. Regardless of how competent the FPS elements of the game are, which are solid as a rock and better than a many contemporary titles of the same genre, it was always about seeing just how much of an area you could destroy. Whether it was punching a whole through a wall with a 40mm grenade round or tearing a city apart in a tank – Bad Company took level destruction to a plane of existence that many developers only dreamed of, but were unable to execute for one reason or another.
8. Fable 2: The original Fable on the Xbox promised us a world where we could have endless possibilities of being a hero. Where we would be wrought with battle scars, rent from owned properties and illegitimate children running around trying to discern why we saw fit to leave them with a daddy issue or two for abandoning them. Well, ever the eloquent twister of words, Peter Molyneux completely sold us on believing that where is original opus let us all down, the sequel would not. It would be everything we dreamed it was, complete with rainbows, sunshine, puppies and fountains of chocolate. Despite being none of these things, it was still a relatively well-designed RPG that streamlined a lot of the genre, which had only served to scare away the less hardcore since someone thought it’d be a brilliant idea to create a dungeon using only pen and paper. And although we were again promised everything, up to and including the kitchen sink, with Fable 3, I still have a feeling that Fable 2 will be more prone to go down in history as the game that really solidified the series in the psyche of the gaming community.
This feature top 10 list continues on the next page, please click below to see our next couple choices for the top 10 games that won't break the bank.
