As the tide of fall releases is finally beginning to recede, I am merrily playing my way through the last few major releases of the year while planning on catching up on some of the game's I've missed (Xcom and Hitman) over the next month before classes start again in January. It worked out that I only have two final exams this semester so I actually have a bit of free time on my hands. It seems like I've been playing a new game every week or two for the past couple of months, and I want to talk about a good number of them, so strap in folks, this could be a long one.

Chivalry: Medieval Warfare - This must be the biggest surprise of the year for me. Chivalry is a kickstarted and greenlit first-person multiplayer Medieval combat game for those who don't know, and it's absolutely awesome. It was half-broken on launch with a bunch of terrible bugs and glitches, but these have been largely ironed out by the developers in patches. Chivalry is easily my favourite multiplayer game of the year; even though I liked mount and blade the combat always felt floaty and impersonal, while Chivalry just nails the weight and feel of swinging a big heavy melee weapon around. I think this is a game everyone should try since it's so utterly different, its fast paced, brutal, in-your-face and incredibly satisfying. If Dark Souls had combat like this on the PC, I would probably have loved it. Going from Chivalry's combat to some of the other games I'm going to talk about *cough AC3 cough* was incredibly difficult.

The Walking Dead - My dislike of the TV show (the first two seasons anyways, 3 is legit) had me totally ignoring this game. Finally the unanimous love being showered upon it got through to me and I picked it up around the time episode 3 came out for 15 dollars. It turned out to be a better written and more interesting story than the one of the TV show (again for the first two seasons at least), with episodes 2 and 3 being of particular awesomeness. I've never been a big player of Adventure games, but I had a great time with The Walking Dead, and look forward to season 2 of the game.

Dishonored - Even though this game fell fairly flat in terms of its plot and characters, the superb gameplay and setting more than saved it. It has been a while since I've played such a polished AAA game at launch, apparently some people had issues with glitchy guard AI, but I had no problems with it. The stealth is very smooth and exciting, while the various deadly tools and abilities you are given makes for some great action. Its maybe a bit too easy on Normal difficulty, but if you turn up the difficulty and turn off some of the player assists, it becomes much more challenging and engrossing. One of the best games of the year for me, highly recommended.

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - My first major disappointment of the fall, Criterion tried to make a mash-up of Burnout: Paradise and their version of Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, and the result was surprisingly mediocre. The singleplayer was short with a wacky car unlock system, the slow motion crash-cam was annoying as hell and triggered way too easily, and the multiplayer encourages you to crash into other players to 'take them down' which again initiates another slow-motion crash cam. The driving mechanics are good and the game looks fantastic, but it has a handful of problems that make is incredibly frustrating and annoying.

Various cheap steam games - Hotline Miami was the first I picked up, it has some solid twitch-action that was brought down by bugs. The highlight of this game is the absolutely stellar soundtrack which is probably one of the best I've ever heard in a game, as well as the crazy atmosphere of a 1980's cocaine-fueled murder spree the game propagates.

Mark of the Ninja is a stealth game with some really good ideas and tight controls, but I'll be damned if the save system didn't ruin it for me. On one level you are required to remain undetected for a minute or so while a door slowly opens and guards and dogs patrol the area. I failed my first attempt, and the game respawned me for some reason in a hiding place right beside a dog and multiple guards. I simply couldn't succeed from this position, so I quit the game. When I restarted the game later on, a huge chunk of my progress through the game had been lost, maybe three levels worth, along with my motivation to finish it, which is a shame because it is solid.

Assassins Creed 3 - at the start of the 2012, this game looked to be one of the best of the year. It failed miserably in most regards, I've never been a huge fan of AC games due to their cumbersome and awkward gameplay, and AC 3 is no different. Only it doesn't play to its few meagre strengths, instead forcing you into broken action sequences. Cities are awful due to the number of redcoats; do anything slightly suspicious and you start a chase with half the loyalist army following you around. The frontier was a bit better, but the hunting was pointless, as was the whole economy, since the combat is already so easy with the basic gear. The stealth is absolutely awful, the story starts well but becomes muddled later on, and Connor isn't much of a leading man. The only two good points are the visuals, which are amazing on the PC, and the naval battles, which are surprisingly fun.

Far Cry 3 - I was one of the 7 people that actually liked Far Cry 2 due to its diagetic HUD, immersive qualities and varied setting, but I wasn't really paying a lot of attention to its sequel. Turns out its one of the best shooters of the year, with great open world design and very solid gameplay. I'm about 10 hours into it, just about to leave the North island, and so far it has been quite good. The AI can sometimes be a bit odd when trying to be sneaky, and the story missions have varied wildly in quality, but the open world and its activities all jive together very well. The randomness of the NPC's and wildlife is very stalker-esque, and the hunting, crafting and exploration aspects are handled very well. I with it had taken the diagetic elements from Far Cry 2 in regards to the map and what not, and I still feel the Savannah is a more interesting setting than a random tropical island, but in every other regard, Far Cry 3 is a better game than its predecessor.

That's pretty much everything I wanted to cover, not that anyone has actually read this far through my ramblings. In a month or so once I've caught up on all of the games I want to play I'll post a 'top games of 2012' blog, expect to see more love for mods than retail releases. I hope you all two of you that read this have a good December.