Xboxist

Which Xbox 360 Games Could Flop in 2009?

The Xbox 360 continues to extend its lead over the competing Playstation 3, thanks to an outstanding lineup of games and new online services. But as we saw this past year with Wii Music, sometimes even the strongest athlete can take a false step and trip up. Perhaps the biggest let down on the Xbox 360 in 2008 was Too Human, which failed to deliver the fun despite being heavily hyped by its developer, Silicon Knights. As Microsoft and third party developers try to wow us with hot new games for the console in the coming year, which ones are at risk of leaving us disappointed? We present three titles that have made out “watch list” of potential flops heading into 2009.

Halo Wars
A very intriguing project that has been in development for a good long while. On paper everything looks like a recipe for success: Combine one part Halo with one part Ensemble Studios strategy and presto! A sure-fire RTS game. There are a couple of potential pitfalls we see with this project, however. First of all, Ensemble has relied on its basic resource-gathering strategy formula for nigh on a decade, and players are getting a little bit burned out on the whole idea. Secondly, the developer promises that it has crafted a special control scheme that it toiled on for at least 6 months. What this tells us is that designing an RTS for a console controller is very difficult, and may not have produced workable results. For a better approach, see Tom Clancy’s voice-controlled Endwar.

GTA DLC
Admittedly, the first trailer for The Lost and Damned sent tingles of excitement up our spines. Rockstar has a way with storytelling that sucks us right in to its gritty, crime-ridden worlds. However, if the overall tone on fan message boards is anything to go by, people are getting a little bit tired of the narrative approach taken in GTA IV, and they long for something a little bit different. In the Lost and the Damned, players will take up the role of Johnny Klebitz, an outlaw biker that featured briefly in the main storyline. Playing through a handful of new story missions as a secondary character may not be enough to entice those with short attention spans back to the mean streets of New York Liberty City.

Resident Evil 5
Just kidding, this one is going to be awesome.

Alan Wake
We are worried about this Microsoft exclusive title for the same reason we are worried about Heavy Rain. When titles are in development for so long, with so little information revealed to a curious public, it often means that the developers themselves are having trouble articulating exactly where the game is going. Part Silent Hill, part sandbox game, and part adventure, Alan Wake is a project that could be collapsing under its own ambitious scale. So far in the scant video and screenshots we have seen, the visuals look functional but not awe-inspiring. We will have to wait for more information before we can deem this game a success or a half-baked experiment like Alone in the Dark.

Do you have your own flop prediction? Discuss it in our Xbox 360 forums.

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