2009: Better Late than Never

2009:

Game of the Year:

Punch-Out!!

Oh man, I’d almost forgotten about this whole decade in review thing I was “working” on. I guess normally it should feel odd to post some nostalgic write up about a year that ended not long ago but so much hot shit went down in 2009 that it isn’t the case here. First off, here are the previous posts in this series if any you missed them and/or really give a shit about my gaming habits over the past 10 years:

2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000

So 2009 kicked off looking like a real ball breaker. I don’t want to dwell too much but let’s just say that a lot of personal shit went down in those opening months and I wasn’t necessarily in the best place in my life. Thank Miyamoto it all turned around pretty damn quick. Of the numerous great things that happened to me in 2009 the definite highlight was meeting and falling in love with my girlfriend (who is totally awesome and stuff)- and even if none of the other amazing shit that happened aside from that had never transpired, last year would still hold its own as one of the best years of my life. Got a tear in your eye yet? Well wipe it away and keep reading.

By the end of the year I’d received a solid Watchmen movie, met and yapped it up with Stephen Malkmus, saw Daniel Tosh perform in S.F., finally made my way to an absolutely amazing trip to Disneyland, had one of the best Halloweens ever, and then the damn Yankees won the world series. Good shit, right? Oh! And Nintendo released some video games that made me happy when I played them.

Punch-Out!! was a game than any Nintendo fanboy had wanted an update to since Ace of Base was dominating the pop charts. I think that I’ve spent more collective time playing 1994’s Super Punch-Out!! than any other game in my life. It’s sort of The ‘burbs of video games for me: not the best game/movie ever made but probably my favorite. Anyway, I was definitely concerned when I found out that the dev team behind those lame Mario Strikers Charged games was handling the sequel (seriously, Mario and soccer are apparently like water and oil or something), but shit, they just nailed everything that I love about the series:

Amazingly simplistic yet challenging opponent patterns to memorize?

Check.

Excellent graphics and ridiculously over the top presentation?

Check.

Absurd racial stereotypes?

Oh yeah.

Punch-Out!! for Wii does the series proud and while I still prefer the old SNES entry, I can’t deny that this game probably couldn’t have been made any better. Nice job, boys.

Later that year Nintendo released New Super Mario Bros. (Should I put another period after that?) A throwback to jumpman’s old sidescrolling days and man, that was a lot of fun too. Christmas turned out to be one of the best in years thanks in no small part to that game but also The Beatles Rock Band that said awesome girlfriend hooked me up with (along with John Lennon’s Rickenbacker plastic guitar toy that goes for a shitload of money now on ebay so that’s a real solid done for me on her part).

I guess 2009 started and ended much the way the decade did: Kinda shitty turned into fucking amazing. But so far the 20teens have been showing a lot of promise too. Within one year there’s been a sequel to Super Mario Galaxy, a new take on Metroid coming up, some awesome 3D portable announcement, a new Donkey Kong Country game on the way and no plans for a sequel to Super Mario Bros. The Movie. If the big N keeps this up, us fanboys won’t have anything to complain about for a long time to come.

Aside from their shitty online service.

Oh, and the lame Wii memory system.

Then there’s the lack of HD support.

Some more Virtual Console games would be nice.

Can you guys put the damn WaveBird back into production? The classic controller blows for N64 games.

Also, that Wii speak thing kind of sucks. How many games actually use that?

I guess the waggle thing is getting a little old too.

Eh, fuck it. I’m gonna go play some Punch-Out!!

Runner Up:

New Super Mario Bros.