2010 AG Awards: Best Downloadable Title

Feature from Nat - Monday, 13 December 2010 @ 9:02am

The 2010 AG Awards #1: Best Downloadable title

This award is for the best downloadable title that was release in 2010, be it DLC for an existing game; titles purchased off digital services such as Xbox Live Arcade and the Playstation Network; as well as the App Store, which has continued its unrepentant expansion over the course of the year.

The AG Nominations:

Although I do not own one, I am forever pinching my workmates iPhone to play Fruit Ninja. It’s just perfect to kill some time while waiting for reports to run or to have a crack at during smoko. If I was a regular public transport patron and owned an iPhone, purchasing this would have been an easy decision. Let’s not also forget the fact that it’s home grown. Seeing how our government don’t want to support them too much doesn’t mean we shouldn’t.

Cav's 2010 Downloadable game of the year - A worthy contender

Without question this should go to the fantastic Costume Quest, which I’ve already reviewed in glowing praise. There’s not much I can say about that I haven’t already covered, but it’s undoubtedly the most intelligent and entertaining game I played this year – downloadable or otherwise. You should buy it, both to encourage such development from teams like Double Fine and just… to enjoy it. COME ON!

With its combination of quirky charm and classic Tim Schafer humour, Costume Quest is easily one of the best downloadable titles of 2010

In a year where digital releases were almost on par with retail for quality and length, a discernible winner is hard to crown. Puzzle Quest 2, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, Limbo and Pac-man Championship Edition DX may all be worthy competitors; but Team Meat’s Super Meat Boy Eeges them out overall. Combining pixel-perfect platforming with controller-hurling frustration, Super Meat Boy walks the fine line between enjoyable and masochistic better than any game I can remember this side of Big Rigs. The quantity of levels is unparalleled and slightly scary, whilst the sense of accomplishment for completion of a single level is euphoric. A worthy contender for Game of the Year overall, Super Meat Boy is by far my favourite downloadable title title of 2010.

Use Super Meat Boy as target practice for your controller

I love my old school arcade games, so I usually get worries when I hear that they're going to re-release the games again with the HD upgrade treatment. However for Pac-Man, it's an absolutely amazing job by all concerned. The latest Pac-Man game is amazing from the get-go. It's got everything you want in a sweet Pac Man game - awesome addictive gameplay, a sweet bumpin' soundtrack and plenty of leaderboards to compete with all your mates that will show hours and hours of replayability. Buy it now, thank me later!t

Going old school but adding a spoon of crazy

Yes I'm about to go here. In a world where having ambient noise as a soundtrack is sublime. The monochrome art style is considered to be gorgeous. And optical illusions are perceived as puzzles which can bend your mind. These are just a few of the items you need to apparently make an award winning game. Where some titles are trying to push boundaries by encapsulating the player within its world using fantastic art design, in-depth story telling, or engaging gameplay, Limbo goes backwards taking the simplistic route somehow earning itself high praise. This over-hyped 2 hour game isn't worth the $20 it's going for, instead pick up something one of my other colleagues here has suggested. Either one of those titles is a much more fulfilling experience.

Cupcakes - better looking, longer lasting, more enjoyable and cheaper