11. MARIO AND LUIGI: BOWSER’S INSIDE STORY (DS)
Alpha Dream’s crown jewel to their excellent trio of Mario RPG games for Nintendo handhelds, Bowser’s Inside Story was possibly one of the best games released last year. It featured compelling gameplay, an excellent if bizarre story, a great script, witty dialog, and it featured several variations on already existing gameplay concepts.
This last pertained to, to many people’s surprise, QTEs as well, which were utilized mainly in the Bowser sections of the game. From using Bowser’s special powers, to the all touch screen boss battles, to using ‘one’ of Bowser’s many minions, this game relied on QTEs by the dozen. And you know what the great thing was? We didn’t mind it in the slightest. For us, it was just a case of one of the greatest DS games of all time being further enhanced.
10. ROBERT LUDLUM’S THE BOURNE CONSPIRACY (XBOX 360, PS3)
Robert Ludlum’s The Bourne Conspiracy has the honor of being one of the few tie in games that actually do justice to their source material and end up being great games in their own regard. It also has the dubious honor of having been given the cold shoulder by largely pretty much everyone.
Which kind of sucks, if you think about it. The Bourne Conspiracy was an awesome game, translating the fervent, fast paced action of the Bourne movies perfectly to the video game format. Of course, considering that the action of the Bourne movies seems almost tailor made for QTEs, Bourne Conspiracy included them in spades, and on the whole did such an awesome job of integrating them into its overall gameplay that you never even really realized that there was any break or transition.
