Three Cheers for the PS3! Part One: Disc-Based Games

PS3LOGOWhenever a new console comes out, there’s a lot of excitement centered around it. That’s why whenever that happens, I like to take a look back and honor that console’s predecessor. So in this two-part blog series, we’re going to take a look at my favorite PS3 disc-based games.

Now, I don’t have a PS4 yet, nor do I plan to get one anytime soon. But that doesn’t mean I have anything against it. It just doesn’t have enough games on it yet that I want to play that would warrant a purchase from me. But I didn’t get a PS3 right away either. In fact, I didn’t even get a PS3 until sometime around late 2009-early 2010, I think. And then I only got it when we replaced the rest of the TVs in the house with flat screen HD ones, and we wanted to have Blu-Ray players to go with them. Well, for fifty bucks more I could get a PS3, so that’s what we did.

The PS3 had a rough start, with its lack of games that interested me and its initial high price tag. But I think it ended up having a stronger finish than the 360. For the longest time, I preferred playing games on my 360 rather than my PS3. But near the end, because of the PS3’s stronger lineup, I tended to play more games on it than the 360. But that doesn’t mean I think one console is better than the other. I just think the PS3 had a weaker start, yet a stronger finish, than the 360 did.

So in this first part of my blog, I’m going to list my favorite disc-based PS3 games. In part two, which I’ll post later on this week, we’ll look at my favorite PSN downloadable titles. One thing to keep in mind when looking at my lists is that there may be some cross platform games. But I’m not going to list them twice. If I played them on the PS3, they’ll go on this list. If I played them on the 360, they’ll go on that list when I write my ‘best of 360’ blogs later on this month. So if you notice a game missing from my list, there’s a chance it might go on the 360 blog. Or I just didn’t play it. Also, this list may seem smaller than my 360 one, but that’s because I haven’t had my PS3 as long. At any rate, with that all out of the way, let’s take a look at my favorite PS3 games!

Dead or Alive 5

I’ve never actually played a DOA game before this one (aside from the awful volleyball titles), so I’m glad I got the opportunity to review this one. I have to admit, if you can look past all the gratuitous cheesecake (which admittedly is hard to do), this DOA game is a pretty solid fighter gameplay-wise. My favorite characters were Tina, Helena, and Christie, and the VF5 guest characters like Sarah Bryant were neat, too. Who were your favorites?

PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale

This was basically Smash Bros. with PlayStation characters, and it didn’t turn out near as well. But it was still fun to play as some of the PlayStation’s most notable classics. It was fun to see Ape Escape and PaRappa return, and stages based on things like Loco Roco were a hoot.

Street Fighter X Tekken

The DLC for this game may have been controversial, but I really only got it because Pac-Man was initially available in the PS3 version.

Dragon’s Crown

This fun 2-D side scrolling beat ‘em up has beautiful graphics and gameplay that’s a mix of Golden Axe, Dungeon Fighter, and Capcom’s D&D brawlers. My favorite character to play as was the Amazon. She’s also ended up being one of my favorite brawler characters period.

Journey Collector’s Edition

I wasn’t really compelled to download each title separately, but put them on a reasonably priced collection and I’ll be glad to get them! While I won’t gush over Journey the way a lot of others would, I’m glad I got to experience it. I actually liked Flower more. Anyone else besides me think the main character in Journey looked like a walking ketchup bottle?

Katamari Forever

They may be all the same, but I like the Katamari games anyway. In Japan, this was called Katamari Tribute, which I think is a much more accurate description as it featured favorite stages and challenges from past Katamari titles. Now the only Katamari games I haven’t played are Touch my Katamari on the Vita and Katamari Amore on the iPad.

Ridge Racer 7

It’s really not much different from Ridge Racer 6, but still a fun arcade racer anyway. I especially liked the title screen, if you know what I mean. Ha ha!

Disney Infinity

While I do prefer Skylanders more, Disney Infinity was still a lot of fun. Glad I got to review it.

Kingdom Hearts HD Remix

I actually haven’t gotten around to playing this one much, but I’m sure it’s a good deal for KH fans anyway. And next year we get Kingdom Hearts 2 HD Remix. Can’t wait for that. I think KH3 is one of the only games on the PS4 that I’d want to get right now, but I bet we won’t see that for a few years.

Ratchet and Clank Series

Since I got my PS3 a bit later, I was able to get the first two R&C Future titles very cheap. Sadly, I haven’t had a chance to play them much. Same goes with the R&C Collection I have. But I’m glad I have them on the PS3, as I think the Ratchet and Clank games were some of the best 3-D platforming during the PS2 generation. No disrespect to Mega Man Legends, but Ratchet & Clank is what a 3-D Mega Man game is supposed to be.

LittleBigPlanet Series

I supposed I should give a mention to the LittleBigPlanet games, too. I never had much of a chance to play them (can’t play ALL the games out there), but my little brother Jeff LOVED them, so they can’t be all bad.

3D Dot Game Heroes

This was actually one of the first games I got for my PS3. It’s a tribute to the first 8-bit Zelda title, and you can even design your own pixel hero. It also poked fun of and made reference to other 8-bit classics such as Mega Man 2 and Dragon Warrior! And it plays so much like NES Zelda that I’m surprised Nintendo didn’t sue! Did you know it was made by the same folks who did the Armored Core games? They even make a few references in this one, too!

Tales of Graces f

This was a typical Tales game with a fun battle system. You could tell it was originally a Wii game, though. I never did finish it all the way through, however. I feel kind of bad because I never got a chance to play Tales of Xillia yet either. But I’ll give it a mention here anyway because I’m sure it’s good, too.

Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch

If I had to pick a number one favorite PS3 title, I’d probably have to say Ni no Kuni. This was a fantastic RPG with a fun gameplay mix of Tales and Pokemon. It also had a great story and neat characters designed by Studio Ghibli. And the graphics and sound were so good that when family passed by when I was playing it, they thought it was a cartoon movie! Sadly, I don’t think I’ve beaten it yet. While it’s a great game, it also suffers from a lot of modern RPG faults, like being way too long and bloated.

And that’s my list of favorite PS3 disc-based games! Let me know what you think of my picks and tell me your favorites, too! Next time we’ll look at my favorite downloadable PSN titles! And later on this month we’ll do the same thing for the Xbox 360! Later! –Cary

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