This happens every year, but September through December are easily the months where the most games (and also the most anticipated games) come out. We're now into October and we haven't even scratched the surface of games coming out.
We’ll start with the rest of October:
Black and White 2 (PC out now): hope a demo is coming so I don't need to spend $$$ on it if it sucks.
Blitz: The League (Xbox/PS2 10/17): I'm thinking this is going to be the old Blitz style of play with more story behind it. Have a feeling this will be a fun game for a few days and then things will die out.
F.E.A.R. (PC 10/18): the demo was a lot of fun, although I am hearing the game only takes 10 hours to beat and when you put that amount of time up against a game like FarCry I think I may hold off from buying it.
Shadow of the Colossus (PS2 10/18): this is an easy pickup even with the camera problems that every review has talked about. This game is from the team that did ICO and they have a firm grasp on how to make innovative games that make you actually feel as if you're living the experience.
Jak X: Combat Racing (PS2 10/18): this one is a tough one considering it is a combat racing game instead of a platformer like the rest of the series.
Quake IV (PC 10/18) (Xbox 360 11/22): the game looks purty, but I wonder if this will be too much like Doom III for its own good (scripted attacks, enclosed dark spaces, etc.). I have a feeling this may not be as big of a hit as id or Activision is hoping.
Age of Empires III (PC 10/18): I was not too high on this game in a previous blog entry and I have to say if I had to make a choice between this and an RTS coming out the week after, I will probably pick the latter. The GUI alone turned me off in the demo, but if Ensemble shrank it a bit things could be looking up.
Tony Hawk's American Wasteland (Xbox/PS2/Cube 10/18) (Xbox 360 11/22): not really interested in this game whether it is more open ended than the Underground games or not. This series continues to sell for Neversoft and Activision, so they're going to continue to pump them out; no doubt about that!
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (PSP 10/24): quite possibly the game that will sell a lot of PSP systems this holiday. I only question whether the series has stretched itself too thin or not. I was not very high on San Andreas, but this one goes back to Liberty City. I don't have a PSP though and I don't think even this is enough to entice me to buy one.
Ratchet: Deadlocked (PS2 10/25) - this game should be interesting. I think the single-player section will be great as always, but I also think the online play for this game is going to explode more than it did for the last Ratchet game.
Resident Evil 4 (PS2 10/25): I still consider the GC version as one of the best games to come out this year and it will be interesting to see how well the game translates to PS2. We’ll find out late this month.
Battlefield 2: Modern Combat (Xbox/PS2 10/25): I played a bit of this early on in the beta test on PS2 and though it was pretty good. However this is not a replacement for the PC game if you have it.
Call of Duty 2 (PC 10/25) (Xbox 360 11/22): Day 1 purchase, no questions asked. The first game was phenomenal and the demo for this game is same. I will pick this up for PC simply because it is cheaper than the 360 version and I still feel the PC will have better controls.
Civilization IV (PC 10/25): This is the other RTS I was talking about. Much like Age of Empires III I will probably wait for reviews. Both games have a problem for me in the fact that there are way too many games coming out and not enough money to go around.
Soul Calibur III (PS2 10/25): One of my favorite fighting game series, yet I won’t be picking this one up. It just seems too soon since the last one and having this as PS2 only seems a little odd after the last one went out on all systems. Namco will have a tough time selling this with all the other games coming out around the same time.
Spartan: Total Warrior (Xbox/PS2/GC 10/25): Sega bought up the people behind the Total War series and this is the first game to come out after that purchase. I’m not too interested, but Rome: Total War was an excellent RTS game; this game is more action based and more along the lines of the Dynasty Warriors series from Koei.
City of Villians (PC 10/30): Rounding out the month of October is the sequel to one of the best MMORPGs to come out before World of Warcraft descended and became king. It is nice of NCSoft to allow you to play both this and City of Heroes with just one $15.99 a month fee.