Bear in mind that these are just what I read, saw, heard and played in 2008, not necessarily what came out in 2008.

Books

I’ve keept tap of all the books I’ve read in 2008 on my LibraryThing account and have up until now read 60 books in 2008. That might sound like a lot but some of these where movie screenplays and graphic novels and they read a lot faster than regular books. But still 60 books is quite a number.

Best book of 2008: Hands down it gotta be Michael Chabon‘s perfect (and I mean perfect) The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay. It’s been a long time since I’ve laughed so much, cried so hard and became so angry from reading a book. A true masterpiece.

Best comic of 2008: Again, a no-brainer for me; Brian Vaughan’s intelligent take on politics and superheroes Ex Machina.

Biggest waste of time in 2008: Lee Child’s Killing Floor came recommended to me from a bookstore clerk. Remind me never to take advice from him again. What a waste of good paper.

Movies

This was the year when I took my son to the movies for the first time, so in more than one way it was a very special year. He picked the movie; the new feature length Lucky Luke and it was such a success that the following four weekends afterwards we went to the cinema again to watch Lucky Luke again and Carsten & Gittes Filmbalade.

But all in all, I watched 99 movies either in the cinema or on DVD… and the award goes to… (couldn’t help it, sorry).

Best movie of 2008: Paul Thomas Anderson’s tour-de-force There Will Be Blood. It was grotesquely overlooked at the Oscars this year, even though Daniel Day-Lewis managed to grab the Best Actor award, I seriously think that in the years and decades to come we’ll look back a Anderson’s movie and give it the masterpiece status it deserves.

Biggest “What the fuck?!?”-moment of 2008: Halfway through the semi-funny Hancock, the movie completely changes into something it wasn’t suppose to be. Avoid this movie like the plague. All the funny scenes are in the trailer and that is only a couple of minutes long, so watch that instead.

Music

According to Last.fm my music taste didn’t change so much this year. But there are a couple of albums that I want to single out nonetheless.

Best album of 2008: Ryan Adams’ Gold. Barebones, simple melodic classic rock that just kicks ass. I can listen to this all day and still find nuances in it that I’ve somehow missed before.

Best jazz albums of 2008 that just keeps getting better: Also know as the BJAO08TJKGB Award. Ballads by John Coltrane and Kind of Blue by Miles David have, again, been on heavy rotation this year. Timeless albums that just keeps on giving.

Games

This was also the year when I finally shelled out for a Xbox 360 and I must say that I’m more than impressed with the system. The New Xbox Experience also added a modern and very nice interface.

Most fun game of 2008: That got to be Fable II. Extreme freedom, fun side quests, lush world to explore and nice rewards for being evil. What’s not to like?

Most awesome game of 2008: Grand Theft Auto 4. That game is just huge. HUGE I tell you. And the characters a great, the story is superb and very mature of a game. The size of this game and the content within it is just mindboggling. Kudos to Rockstar for setting the bar high again.

Biggest disappointment of 2008: Halo 3. What the fuck was all the hype about? I mean the game is extremely linear, the FPS aspect are “classic” (and that is not a compliment) and the story is just terrible and seems like it’s written by a 10-year old. The multiplayer is alright, but the singleplayer portion of the game was a huge disappointment.

The End

So there you have it, 2008 in review. What a year it’s been and I seriously hope that 2009 will offer just as many fine moments as this one did.

Here’s looking at you 2008.

And now with Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is out and looking great, so it might very well get me to buy one.

But what is the world happened to Ghost Recon: Advance Warfighter (or GRAW as they call it)? On Xbox 360 i a superb game according to GameSpot.com. They gave it a 9.2 score and ends their review with:

If you like shooters or action games, and you own an Xbox 360, Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter is a must-own for your library. A solid and challenging campaign and a unique, online-co-op mode combine with an unmatched presentation in what is arguably the best game yet on the Xbox 360. Even those who don’t necessarily like shooters may want to at least try the game out, as GRAW represents the best of what a tactical shooter can offer and can serve as a useful graphical benchmark to judge other games on the console by.

(also see the MetaCritic rating)

That sounds like a pretty good game to me, right?

But then read GameSpot.com’s review of the PS2 version of the same game (they gave it a 4.4 score, and again the MetaCritic rating):

Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter for the PlayStation 2 makes too many compromises in the gameplay design for us to recommend it to anyone. Tiny levels that feel more like a series of corridors than a true city, excessive graphical slowdowns, and neutered multiplayer options are just a few of the reasons to avoid this game.

That sound like a very bad game, right?

So what is it? It bears the exact same name, so it must be similar in some way, but after reading the reviews I have some very strong doubts about that. Ubisoft (the publishers) have, as many other publishers do, before handed the development of different version of the same game to different development houses around the world. But the different versions of the games have always had some similarity and only minor hardware specific differences.

But in this case something very serious seems to have gone wrong.