The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai

We're going to need more dish soap.

Source // MobyGames

There have been some strange titles on this 1001 list, hasn't there? Titles that don't give anything away, titles that don't seem to make sense in English, and titles like The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai.

I always mistook it for The Dead Dishwasher Samurai, which is also somewhat accurate to who the main character of this game is: A dishwasher who was dead but has come back to life with flashbacks of being a samurai. At least, I think that's right. There's a lot more going on than that.

To find out what's what, we'll just have to let the hacking and the slashing commence.

Race Pro

Actually not a working title.

Source // Giant Bomb

Growing up, my idea of a racing simulator was Gran Turismo, but as this 1001 has taught me, there's a much deeper world of race sims out there, and they've got solid ground on which to drive their arguments for being better simulators.

Some of the notable highlights I've been introduced to are GT Legends for some old school authenticity, and GTR 2 for a more modern track day outing, both powering their way to the PC from SimBin Studios, and both getting me to consider putting more time and effort into unlocking their content through their respective career modes.

At some point in the late 2000s, when the consoles got beefier and the potential to make more money elsewhere was mighty tempting, it was time for the PC racing simulators to come into the living room and show players what they were missing by only playing Gran Turismo or Forza Motorsport. What were Xbox 360 gamers missing? Race Pro.

Yeah, its name hardly inspires, does it? It's what under the hood that counts, though, right?

Forza Motorsport 3

Where Dreams are Driven

Source // Giant Bomb

I must confess that all these racing games have really started to blur into each other as I jump around history looking for my next fix of rubber-wheeled metal boxes waiting to be hurled around tracks of all kinds, real or imagined.

I've done the DiRT series beginning with 3 and ending with 2, which we'll get to very soon. Once I learned that Race Driver: Grid used that engine, or a version of it, I was absorbed in that. Then I had the great fortune of having bought Grid 2 at some point in the past, so got to enjoy that 2013 game for the first time in 2021. Chuck in the first Project Cars and I honestly couldn't tell you what was actually going on in 2009 when Forza Motorsport 3 was released.

The best comparison I can make is, of course, to Gran Turismo, which at the time was honestly making Gran Turismo 5, no, really, we won't delay it again, here's Gran Turismo on the PSP while you wait. So racing games looked pretty good, okay. That's a start.

As mentioned previously, I've come to the Forza series very late and through board gaming. Spoilers: They're the things that you find on the back of cars. Actual spoilers: I'm probably going to spend the afternoon playing some more Forza Motorsport 3.

Ninja Gaiden II

Slow down there, Ryu. You'll cut someone's arm off.

Source // Moby Games

When I said that Ninja Gaiden Black killed ninja games for me (what a bastard), I didn't think it would literally kill ninja games for me, but it did. Sat next to it in the DVD case was Ninja Gaiden II for the Xbox 360, the new and improved (again?) sequel to Ninja Gaiden. Not a v1.5, but a v2.0.

With poor Internet, playing games offline has been basically all I can do, so it's a good job I've got hundreds ready to go, physically, digitally, even those made of cardboard. I am all set for having no Internet and playing Ninja Gaiden II.

But it has been killed before it even left that DVD case...

Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2

Retro Evolved Harder?

Source // Microsoft

I played Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved and had a mix of ups and downs before concluding that it was entertaining for the short while I spent playing it, but had no real intentions of ever putting more time or effort into it. For what reward? A higher score? More colours?

I didn't see the point, but would a more colourful sequel in the form of Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 make me think again?

Gears of War 2

"I have a rendezvous with Death"

Source // Xbox

When all you know is war, I guess it's inevitable that the war won't stop. When all you are is an impossibly proportioned man fueled by diesel and wearing parts of a car for protection, you probably don't get up to much else other than shooting things. It's a good job Gears of War 2 exists to keep the guys employed, is what I'm getting at, because I've no idea what they'd do without it.

Marcus Fenix and the gang return in a sequel supposedly bigger and badder than the first outing, the game that effectively unleashed cover-shooters into the world. What form will the chest-high walls take in this game? What horrors will we willingly march into for the sake of mankind's survival? Just how gruff can we shout this line of dialogue?

Let's time our reloads right and kick down the door to find out.

Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts

SAVING CONTENT. PLEASE DON'T TURN OFF YOUR CONSOLE.

Source // MobyGames

I played Banjo-Kazooie and liked it more than Super Mario 64. I played Banjo-Tooie and was bored out of my mind, almost angry that it was something I had to play. After a long, long wait, fans of the series would finally see a third entry, on the Xbox 360 of all things.

But Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts isn't just an HD version of a Banjo title. It isn't just a third-person hunt for collectables. It's something much, much different.

I've left the series alone, content with having nothing to do with it. I'm certainly in no rush to return to the Nintendo 64 anytime soon, but I did make a note of the Rare Replay ports being a possibility, and now there's this modern Banjo-Kazooie to show me what I've missed out on. Is Nuts & Bolts going to be the Banjo-Kazooie game to finally get me on board with the series?

Buckle up and we'll find out.

SAVING CONTENT. PLEASE DON'T TURN OFF YOUR CONSOLE.

Carcassonne

Tiles. Not cards, tiles.

Source // Microsoft

It's no surprise that I like video games. I wouldn't be going through this many of them if I didn't. I've grown up with video games, I've not really stopped playing video games, I get a lot of my entertainment from video games.

But my other big passion is gaming on the tabletop. It was once in the form of mass-market board games, then of pencil and paper RPGs, and then, a few years ago, mostly thanks to P2 (though I will admit I took the ball and didn't so much run with it, but outright blast it off to space), board and card games.

They're big business these days, we're quite defensive about them, we will fight you on your incorrect opinions - it's very much like video gaming, actually. Give it twenty years and we'll all look back with a different set of eyes and appreciate some of them a little more, though The Mind can piss right off.

That's another topic for another day because we're talking about a video game version of Carcassonne, which, according to P2, is the absolute best you can get from a board game. She's wrong, but not by much, and it's the Xbox Live Arcade that plays host to this version.

Grab your Meeples. Yes, the things that look like fat people. Just pick them up already and let's get tiling.

Hexic 2

More like hectic?

Source // Xbox

What do you do when the creator of Tetris has a new game? You put it on the hard drive of every Xbox 360 in the land. What do you do when there's a sequel? You slap it on Xbox Live with multiplayer support, because if there's anything that puzzle gamers like, it's competitive puzzling.

I've never heard of Hexic 2. I've rarely ventured onto Xbox Live. But there's a demo of Hexic 2 and it needs to be played, if only to show me what on Earth it is.

Forza Motorsport 2

Get your motor running... Head out on the test track...

Source // MobyGames

The 1001 list is taking us from one console-exclusive racer to another next, as we wash away the mud and get out the turtle wax for the Xbox's competitor to Gran Turismo, Forza Motorsport 2.

As you might imagine, being locked to the PlayStation - through choice, might I add - I was very much on Team Turismo, and it'd be a long time before I was even in a position to see first hand what the Forza series offered players. Quite a lot is the answer, and often before Gran Turismo offered the same things.

Thanks to board gaming, of all things, I've been getting more familiar with the Forza Motorsport series, and this first release on the Xbox 360 is where we're kicking off, described as 'more of the first game, but better'. Excellent.

Where are my keys?

Crackdown

"Skills for kills, Agent. Skills for kills."

Source // MobyGames

If Gran Theft Auto Online has taught us anything, it's that sandboxes full of criminals and vigilantes don't need stories to be successful. In fact, all those cutscenes and running to mission start icons and endless conversations with every character under the sun just get in the way.

So Crackdown drops you into a sandbox full of criminals as a super-cop on a mission, but dispenses with basically all the explanation and all of the cutscenes and just tells you "these bad guys need to go, and we don't care how."

And there are a lot of bad guys in town...

Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation

Heh. Bogies.

Source // MobyGames

From one flight sim to another, rather different one. Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation is the sixth mainline entry to the Ace Combat series, a series I first encountered way back on the PlayStation in the mid-90s.

This Xbox 360 exclusive entry... wait a minute... Isn't Ace Combat all about the PlayStation? I mean, I've not touched the series since the first game, but I thought it stayed faithful to the Sony line of consoles. Huh. I guess they all branch out at some point.

Console exclusivity. Who needs it? Who wants it? You want it? Really?

Lumines Live!

We'll do it live!

Source // Moby Games

Lumines II was a firm favourite of mine on the PSP, but a simple game like this can be put on anything, and the next place that it was found was on the Xbox 360 in the shape of Lumines Live!

What could a console offer a game like Lumines? More importantly, what could a digital marketplace offer it...?

Project Gotham Racing 3

Screaming Kudos!

Source // Moby Games

There are a great many series of racing games. Some I'm not really interested in, and some I never had the chance to play, being exclusive to a platform I didn't own. One such game is Project Gotham Racing 3, a game with a weird name on a new system, the Xbox 360, that I didn't want.

As a release game at the start of the next generation of consoles, PGR3 would be raising the bar, and I had to double-check that this was indeed an Xbox 360 game that I was playing next for the 1001 list. It feels too early, somehow. Surely there can't be hundreds of games from the seventh generation to keep us going. How many sequels will we be playing?

A question for another time, for we've got some street racing to do. Legally, this time.

Dead or Alive 4

Dead or Alive Phwoar, amiright, lads?

Source // MobyGames

Everyone has a favourite fighter, and you should all know by now that mine is Tekken. I want to like other fighters, and some have come close, but they've never quite made the Tekken series redundant. There's comfort in the chunky combat it offers, though I have found myself enjoying other fighting games thanks to this 1001 list.

The question is simple: Can Dead or Alive 4 make an impression?