The year 2011 has come and gone, and what a year it was. It was pretty major for us. It kicked off with the release of the Killer Wireless-N 1102 and 1103, which have been some of the best received products we’ve ever put out. While that was pretty major, in 2011 the Bigfoot Networks team and technology was picked up by Qualcomm Atheros, giving us a new home and a ton of new possibilities on the horizon. We’re expecting 2012 to be one amazing year, too.
2011 was also a great year for gaming. We saw some excellent online gaming titles come out for the PC. Portal 2 had a wonderful co-op mode, Battlefield 3‘s multiplayer was excellent as usual, The Old Republic ended the year with a bang, and those are only a handful of some of the great games we saw. 2012 isn’t looking to disappoint either. Here’s a sample of some of the online games you can expect to find, both major names as well as a few potential gems in the making that you might not have heard of before:
Aliens: Colonial Marines
In space, no one can hear you scream. However, over voice chat we can. Luckily, as Amnesia videos on YouTube have proven, listening to our friends as they’re gripped in sheer terror is actually very amusing. So, we’re still entirely good with a new Aliens game coming out that will feature some multiplayer co-op – even if it means our friends will also hear us shrieking in terror, too. Gearbox is also including some competitive multiplayer modes.
ARMA 3
If the likes of Battlefield and Call of Duty aren’t realistic enough for your tastes, the ARMA series has a long history of giving gamers like you something closer to the feel of being in a war (minus all the horror of it). The military simulator series’ latest installment will be coming out this summer.
Borderlands 2
Borderlands was both well received and all sorts of fun when played online with friends. When we heard Gearbox was coming out with a sequel, we weren’t surprised, but we sure were delighted. The very co-op friendly Action RPG/FPS hybrid will release at the end of July.
Brothers in Arms: Furious 4
Having basically nothing to do with the Brothers in Arms series beyond taking place during World War 2, the next game will feature plenty of cartoonish violence inflicted upon terrible Nazi villains. With prior games being realistic and emotionally-driven, the upcoming arcade shooter hasn’t sat well with many fans of the series, but taken for what it is, it looks like it could be a very fun way to spend some time with friends. Additionally, Gearbox has stated that fans will get future games in the same spirit as the prior ones.
Call of Duty 9
It’ll have another name when it gets closer to launch, and we don’t actually know much of anything about the next Call of Duty game. However, you can pretty much set your watch by CoD releases, so we know it is happening. We fully expect plenty of the existing multiplayer modes will make a return, which should please fans of the series.
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
Counter-Strike and Counter-Strike: Source are among the most played and popular online games of all time. They’re also two of the most major eSports titles in the world. We anticipate that CS:GO will follow the same trend, and it will be interesting to see how the competitive scene reacts to the final product. While currently in a closed beta phase, it will be opening up to everyone in early 2012.
Diablo 3
To call the Diablo series “big” is something of an understatement. While the franchise hasn’t seen a new title in over a decade, the series has never lost its immense fanbase, and there is plenty of hype around the next Hack and Slash RPG from Blizzard. It has been in a closed beta test for quite a while now, but everyone will be able to finally take the controls of the long, long, long awaited sequel early this year.
Dota 2
Valve has easily two of the biggest competitive titles coming out this year. CS:GO was one of them, but Dota 2 has already had a million dollar tournament last year while it was still in beta. While technically not the first MOBA, DotA was what put the genre on the map and until recently, most games like it have been referred to as DotA clones for a good reason. While the game is effectively a direct update of the existing DotA mod for WarCraft 3, the updated graphics look beautiful and it is coming packed in with new features, including a truly impressive spectator mode.
Fallout Online
The winner of “Most Controversial Release” this year is easily Fallout Online. Actually, we don’t even know if this one will be coming out this year or not, but Interplay just settled with Bethesda over the rights to the Fallout setting. We have no idea what the details of that settlement actually are, which is one of the reasons we don’t even know if we’ll see the game this year or ever, but their website is still up and that is usually a good sign. The idea of exploring Fallout in an MMO setting keeps us hopeful.
Gotham City Impostors
Crazy imposter Batmen and Joker gang members take to the streets of Gotham City to shoot each other up in this team-based multiplayer-only FPS. What’s not to love? This one is coming out real soon, on January 10th.
Guild Wars 2
The sequel to an already popular online game, Guild Wars 2 looks to redefine the Guild Wars franchise in quite a few ways. Featuring a persistent online world, it is looking to be more of a true MMO this time around. It is packing in a number of very interesting features, including dynamic quests, more active combat, structured PvP, and massive World vs World 3-way PvP. As far as the hype-meter is concerned, this is 2012′s The Old Republic and we expect it to be a huge hit.
Mass Effect 3
The conclusion of the Mass Effect trilogy from BioWare is a pretty big thing on its own. While we’re very much interested in digging into the main storyline to see what happens to Commander Shepard and friends, the fact that players will be able to team up together in co-op missions makes this entry even more interesting. We’re also happy we have an excuse to talk about Mass Effect now.
Max Payne 3
We aren’t sure how bullet time, which is one of the things Max Payne games are famous for, would work in a multiplayer mode, but we’re curious to find out. Like Mass Effect 3, the two prior games in this series didn’t have multiplayer either, but it will this time around. The developers claim that the maps and modes will dynamically change during gameplay, which is interesting. They’re also including ranking and clan systems.
MechWarrior Online
2012 is a really, really good year for nostalgia trips if you played a lot of PC games in the 90s. MechWarrior was a beloved series of games set in the BattleTech universe in which you stomped around in giant robots that were armed to the teeth as massive walking fortresses. They were delightful games, as you can imagine. While we won’t really be seeing a game like the old ones, we will be getting a rather nice looking F2P online game that really wants to capture the spirit of them.
Miner Wars
Descent reborn.
What? You need more than that? Sigh. Fine. Miner Wars is a 6DoF (Six Degrees of Freedom) space sim. If you didn’t know what Descent was, you probably have no idea what that actually means. That is pretty reasonable given that it isn’t exactly a common genre. Basically, it is a more accurate simulation of space, where you can move forward and backward, up and down, left and right, and rotate in any direction. While initially this is often extremely disorienting for players, it makes for some pretty amazing gameplay when done well. The game is being created by an independent studio and is slated to launch early this year.
Neverwinter
Neverwinter is a new title set within the popular Dungeons & Dragons setting of Forgotten Realms, and centered around the city of Neverwinter itself. This one is being developed by Cryptic, although they’ve since been acquired by Perfect World Entertainment, and will be coming out as a F2P MMO.
Rainbow 6: Patriots
The Rainbow 6 series has been running for a long time now as one of the many Tom Clancy franchises in gaming. The tactical, squad based shooter was a breath of fresh air when it first came out, and there are still not many other games made in the same style. Patriots will most likely allow for some of the same multiplayer and co-op options we’ve seen in the series before.
Scrolls
No, it isn’t an Elder Scrolls game, but rather the next title coming from the studio that gave us MineCraft. Unlike Mojang’s first title, this one is a Strategy/RPG game that blends elements from collectable card games and tabletop games.
StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm
It is a big year for Blizzard. Not only is Diablo 3 finally coming out and World of WarCraft – probably, though not officially dated yet – getting another expansion, but Heart of the Swarm is coming out, too. Featuring another full-sized campaign, graphical updates, and plenty of unit changes, the next installment in the StarCraft II trilogy is set to come out this year. StarCraft, of course, is a rather popular series both among gamers world-wide and in eSports. I mean, we even have our own StarCraft II team.
Syndicate
Syndicate probably wins as the second most controversial game of the year, even if it is in a tight race with Brothers in Arms: Furious 4. This is mainly because it is the sequel of an isometric tactical shooter series from the mid ’90s that is being released as an FPS, and you know how fans can (often understandably) be. That said, regardless of how you feel about the reimagining, it looks like it will be shipping with a rather competent and exciting looking co-op mode.
TERA
Technically TERA has been out for quite a while now, but just not in the Western world. En Masse Entertainment and Frogster have been busily working on bringing the title into new markets with some pretty major work to it. The combat in this game is worth note and separates it from most fantasy based MMOs. Players can actively dodge attacks, are required to actually aim spells, and over all, the game plays much more like an action-oriented title as opposed to a traditional RPG. We’ve played it a bit at tradeshows before, and it was actually quite fun.
The Secret World
Funcom is behind another one of the major MMO releases of this year, The Secret World. This classless MMO is set in a more modern setting with players belonging the various shadowy factions that explore the, well, secret world of magic, myths, horror, and conspiracy that exists beyond the knowledge of the general population.
Torchlight II
Finally, Torchlight with multiplayer. The original Diablo-like was well received by fans, but with one major complain: Torchlight didn’t’ have a multiplayer mode. All is forgiven now with the upcoming launch of the sequel that will let players explore randomly generated dungeons with their friends in a quest for honor, glory, and massive piles of wonderful loot.
Tribes: Ascend
As part of ’90s Gaming Nostalgia Tour 2012, a new Tribes game is coming out! Okay, okay, Tribes 2 came out in 2001 and Vengeance was in ’04, but some of us were diehard fans of the original 1998 game. Tribes: Ascend attempts to revisit what made the old games such a blast: high-speed, high-flying, and high-skill shooters. Currently in a beta that is honestly not hard to get into, the official release will be early this year.
No doubt we’re missing games, and plenty from the great independent developers out there. Know of any titles that we’ve blatantly missed? You can let us know in the comments. While you’re there, feel free let us know what games you’re most looking forward to in 2012.
Pingback: The seven most worth looking forward RPG games in 2011 | ExtremeConsoleDownloads