March 2011: Financial Threshold (Crimson) Red

November certainly snuck up on us quickly. It was a scant few months ago that the industry decided to throw not two or three worthy titles at our wallet, but four or five. Unbelievably, the end of Q1 2011 is even more tempting than last November, thanks largely to the release of the first mass market 3D hardware, Nintendo’s 3DS.

Nintendo’s glassless system doesn’t come till the absolute end of the month. Giving gamers plenty of time to get their fix on traditionally depthed entertainment. Myself, I’ve already pre-ordered five of the titles on my purchased list. For the math challenged, that’s every single title. I hadn’t originally planned on pre-ordering Pokemon, but Amazon’s deal was too sweet to ignore.

It’s going to be a busy month.

Purchased:

• Rift (March 1) – I actually pre-ordered the Collector’s Edition and subsidized it with six months of playtime months ago. I have been writing about Rift over on LoreHound.com since last week’s Head Start began. So, yeah, purchased.
• Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II – Retribution (March 1) – Perhaps the most annoying title to type ever. Relic Entertainment’s second stand-alone expansion for Dawn of War II is bringing a dizzying amount of change to the RTS franchise. A new race (Imperial Guard), playable campaigns for all races, changes to The Last Stand and even some base-building elements added to multiplayer have been unleashed upon us.
• Pokemon Black & White (March 6) – I have a Pokemon blanket (for the ferrets), Pokemon stuffed animals, a Pokemon mousepad and every single core handheld Pokemon title made (and some spin-offs). I’m a bit of a fan.
• Super Mario All-Stars: Limited Edition (March 13) – I begged for this for Christmas and my birthday. Santa sent me new windows for my house instead and no one loves me enough to realize that my birthday is a few weeks later. I secured a pre-order to make sure I didn’t miss out on the reprint, which has already proven to be a collectible.
• Nintendo 3DS Blue (March 27) – Why Blue? Because you got Black, didn’t you? Yea. Now I’m different, original even. Like millions of others…
• Super Monkey Ball 3DS (March 27) – I don’t see 3DS’s launch lineup as all that impressive, evidenced by picking up a third-party title at launch for a Nintendo piece of hardware (gasp!). It’s not that the first-party games are inadequate. There’s just no top-tier product – Zeldas, Metroid, Marios, Star Foxes – coming that interests me. I do adore the brain-twisting fun of the Super Monkey Ball franchise.

Likely:

• Homefront (March 15) – Terrible timing. THQ should have released Homefront last month or hold it for the slow summer months. I’ll just overlook it until then.
• Crysis 2 (March 22) – This’ll be used to test my upcoming gaming PC.
• Pilotwings Resort (March 27) – Super Monkey Ball titles are usually quite challenging, with extra stages to be unlocked on top of that. I expect nothing less from Super Monkey Ball 3DS. However, there’s little to be excited about the first few weeks of 3DS’s life. Meaning, I expect to head back to the store to pick-up Nintendo’s second-tier titles.

Sorry:

• Dragon Age 2 (March – I attempted to play Dragon Age after the New Year. Seriously. It’s installed and everything. I just never actually launched the game. Couple that with poor initial reception of Dragon Age 2 – mainly demo impressions – and it’s an easy pass until I complete the original, and see a nice discount.
• LEGO Star Wars III: The Clone Wars (March 22)- I get that it’s quirky fun, but still can’t bring myself to actually purchase any of these LEGO titles. Batman almost had me.