Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Not, I must clarify, the only or even best 20 reasons, but simply 20 of all the many, many reasons. There’s been some talk by both friends and strangers that 2009 hasn’t been a year to shout YES! GAMES! in quite the way the last couple have been. I beg to differ. It’s been an extraordinary year, though granted it’s often been necessary to look further than the best-sellers chart. We’re only just entering blockbuster silly season, and already we’ve seen and done countless amazing things in 2009. By which I don’t mean simply “amazing games”, but instead “amazing moments in games.” Here are just a few of them…
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So this is the new year. Do you feel any different? When thinking about what 2009 holds, I want to think slightly beyond the many exciting games we’re looking forward to and get a bit more thematic. On what journey should gaming take us in the following year?

2008, despite containing a ton of great games, felt a bit of a filler year in terms of progress. 2007 felt so huge probably purely thanks to Portal, and the impact that had on our expectations of gaming. But did it have an impact on last year? I’m not sure it did, beyond a few games making references to it (World of Goo Sacred 2 to name the first that springs to mind). Will the last year of the decade see us beginning to define what the twenty-teens will be about?

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