Christmassy games/parts of games.

[Glebe]

DC Universe Online has a bit of a seasonal theme going on at the mo, been thinking (rather sadly) about Christmas-themed games, or at least areas of games with a festive flavour to them. So far, I can only think of the this place in Final Fantasy VII and Batman: Arkham Origins (love the Joker hotel parts in particular), which is really pathetic, there must be loads of games... so over to you.

[biggytitbo]

There's a great level in Hitman Blood Money set at a Christmas party where you can murder people dressed as Santa. And the 2016 reboot has a bonus level where you have to kill the two thieves from Home Alone, which features a fun cameo by Santa.

[The Boston Crab]

That FF7 place is so wonderful and I'd totally forgotten about it! Thanks. I adore the music, too. Christ, I love that game.

[popcorn]

Played this every Christmas for a decade. Magic mate.

[Consignia]

Pretty sure every Yakuza game is set at or around Christmas.

[Emotional Support Peacock]

Diddy Kong Racing isn't a Christmas game per se, but it does feature a lot of Christmas themed imagery and music on a particular set of tracks. Like most games with themed worlds, Diddy Kong Racing has a snow world, called Snowflake Mountain. Snowflake Mountain consists of four tracks, and instead of simply being a snow themed area, there is also a big Christmas vibe. Most of the trees featured on these tracks have colored lights on them, the starting line posts are candy canes, and the music has a distinct Christmas sound to it. Even some of the more generic wintery imagery evokes Christmas because the surrounding elements are very Christmas-like.

(I copied and pasted that from elsewhere because I said what I wanted to say far better than I could have said it)

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

James Pond 2: Robocod Takes place at Father Christmas' factory.

[Thursday]

Pretty sure every Yakuza game is set at or around Christmas.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGhxaJFStWI

[Harpo Speaks]

Diddy Kong Racing isn't a Christmas game per se, but it does feature a lot of Christmas themed imagery and music on a particular set of tracks.

The music on Walrus Cove is a particular favourite there.

[Replies From View]

[Twed]

Love that FF7 bit. Cosssssyyyyy.

There was that lovely chapter in Bully set around Christmas:



I wish the post-game could have been set to that season.

[Glebe]

Surely there's been a game where you play Santa delivering prezzies or summit?

[biggytitbo]

[Consignia]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGhxaJFStWI

Ha, I was literally thinking of that moment.

[ASFTSN]

This batshit mental level of steampunky side scrolling arcade shooter Boogie Wings:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2o-qpHRSKc

[Ferris]

The original Worms on DOS had Christmas themed maps. Mariokarts has a number of festive levels. That's about all I can think of at the mo.

[Space ghost]

Moley Christmas

[Jerzy Bondov]

STario's Christmas

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZrgwIK8Siw

[St_Eddie]

Played this every Christmas for a decade. Magic mate.

Ah, I came here to post that.  It's got to be the greatest Christmas themed game of all time, I reckon.  Other than that, Shenmue is set during the festive period.

[Neomod]

World of Tanks has gone again for the toys under the tree battles this year.



Does it still snow in GTA V online?

[Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth]

Lemmings had a MIDI version of Little Town of Bethlehem on an otherwise non Christmassy level.
https://youtu.be/sHvQpBawLEQ

[Mister Six]

The Swing version of Overcooked 2 has just launched some Christmas levels. They're absurdly hard.

[St_Eddie]

Lemmings had a MIDI version of Little Town of Bethlehem on an otherwise non Christmassy level.
https://youtu.be/sHvQpBawLEQ

Little known fact; during a slump in his career. Ennio Morricone took over soundtrack duties for Lemmings under a pseudonym.  If you pay extra special attention and listen very, very carefully, sometimes you can hear his signature style coming through.

[Twed]

An actual fact about the Lemmings music is that it's by Tim Wright/CoLD SToRAGE, who did a lot of recognizable work (the Wipeout music that didn't come from big name artists, for instance).

[Twed]

https://www.retrogamer.net/profiles/developer/tim-wright/

The soundtrack to Lemmings was a big hit. Can you tell us about the work you did on Lemmings in reworking Brian Johnston's work?
Lemmings was a firefighting project. I got a call from Steve Riding, a producer at Psygnosis, asking me if I could help them with a problem. They had just received a build of Lemmings and much of the music was covers of famous tunes, for example the theme from Batman. I was tasked with creating around 14 new tunes that should be jaunty versions of well-known folk tunes, or remixes of music from other Psygnosis games. Basically, anything that wasn't going to land them in hot water.

A few years later, after Lemmings had shipped millions of copies on umpteen platforms, Psygnosis was contacted by the copyright holder of 'O Little Town of Bethlehem' aggrieved at not getting any royalties for the use of their melody in one of my tracks. Yes... the one thing I was told to avoid I fell foul of, and by the time this happened I was actually employed by Psygnosis too, so I was quite worried how they would take it. Thankfully, Ian Hetherington was fine about it, and they ended up paying a modest fee for its use. Ironically, the song fell out of copyright a few years later!

Imagine being the copyright holder of O Little Town Of Bethlehem and pursuing Lemmings. Just imagine being that.

Later in that interview he mentions pretty much hating techno at first:

In desperation I was dragged out to a club to experience the kind of music they wanted first hand. At first I couldn't fathom why anyone would want to stand in a club listening to tracks that seemed to go on forever with only slight changes here and there, and the occasional breakdown. But after an hour or so I got it... it was like an epiphany! It's only when you're on the dance floor with the bass pounding that you truly get 'into' the music and completely understand it.

[St_Eddie]

An actual fact about the Lemmings music is that it's by Tim Wright/CoLD SToRAGE, who did a lot of recognizable work (the Wipeout music that didn't come from big name artists, for instance).

A quick perusal of the Wikipedia entry for Tim Wright (Welsh musician) does indeed show some very notable works.  It's a shame that the second half of his output seems to mostly devolve into mobile gaming, the eater of many a great gaming talent.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Shenmue. Worked really well given not much else changed around town in Dobuita.

There's a certain drabness and limp forced jollity to municipal provincial decoration they really captured.

[bgmnts]

Surely there's been a game where you play Santa delivering prezzies or summit?

You'd think someone could just chuck some Santa and sleigh sprites on Paperboy.

[Twed]

Santa driving his sleigh through a horrible tarmaced street crunching as he goes and lobbing presents through house windows every day of the week is wonderfully bleak.

[St_Eddie]

Santa driving his sleigh through a horrible tarmaced street crunching as he goes and lobbing presents through house windows every day of the week is wonderfully bleak.

Legend Gary's Annual Xmas Jape is his "best one yet".