Mark's Pick: Giants
 Why
was this surprising? First, it actually came out after being shown
at E3s dating all the way back to when they were held in Bedrock.
That was a nice surprise. Second, Giants is actually quite a lot
of fun to play, which is surprising as hell. Most of the time when
a game slips release date after release date, when you finally get
your hands on it, you feel like you spent your time waiting in the
Doctor’s office. I waited for this? Fifty dollars just to bend
over while the Doc snaps on the rubber gloves? Gee, thanks. But
Giants wasn’t like that, fortunately. The three sides all offer
a different playing experience, Giants really is funny (a rarity
in the all to serious world of computer games), and it’s a
game with superior graphics. I don’t like the lack of a save
and as Tom pointed out in his Shoot
Club, the multiplayer is severely unbalanced, but otherwise
Giants is a delightful surprise.
Tom's Pick: Virtua Tennis
 Mark
reminded me that we're a web site about PC games, so we're supposed
to choose PC games for our Quarterlies. I responded by yelling "You're
not the boss of me!" over and over several times. Besides,
can't you run Dreamcast games on a PC with some sort of emulatory
kind of thing? There. See? Besides, Virtua Tennis was such a surprise
that I routinely forget what platform it runs on. It is a rare game
with a nearly transparent interface. It's a riveting multiplayer
game. In less than five minutes, a novice can sit down and play
against a veteran with a reasonable expectation of being competitive.
Even a guy like me who doesn't know the first thing about tennis
-- a guy who said, "A tennis game? Really? Come on!",
when he was told that it was a must-buy -- can get sucked in. But
what's most suprising is that after playing for a while, you'll
come to realize that it's really just a fancy version of Pong. And
that doesn't detract from it in the least. Okay, no more Dreamcast
games from me. I promise.
The Most Surprising Game
of 2000
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