Namco Bandai is my choice.
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Namco Bandai is my choice.
Would that have anything to do with Tekken?
And Galaga Legions and Pacman Championship Edition and Pacman Championship Edition DX and Katamari and Soul Calibur and Dark Souls and Time Crisis.
I can't say I ever think about naming a favorite publisher since most are so inconsistent. I have a few Worst Publishers Ever* but that's more for business practices than games.
*EA and Microsoft
That is a hard one. None stand out and I give MS a bonus for their non-game contributions.
I almost DO want to go with MS because I think the above plus the Gears trilogy, PGR4 (still IMO the best racer of the gen, save maybe Hot Pursuit) and others. Everyone gets on them for lack of NEW games but if I take the whole generation, I'm inclined to give them a tiny nod.
But I won't vote yet. Honestly I'm looking at them and EA.
Since it looks like Atlus isn't getting added to the list, I'm probably going to have to go with Beth. Bugs aside, between two Elder Scrolls games and the rebirth of Fallout, I spent more time playing their games than any other this gen.
This is a tough one. I think I'll give it to Ubisoft, for the breadth and sheer number of games that I enjoyed this generation. While Take Two has some excellent games, there's not much to their lineup beyond the Firaxis stuff, the open-world Rockstar stuff, and the BioShock series. The same goes for Bethesda - absolute king of RPGs this generation, but not a single other worthwhile genre. Ubisfot, on the other hand, has everything. From Open world games (Assassin's Creed, FarCry 2) to platformers (Rayman Origins, Prince of Persia) to military shooters (Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six) to strategy games (Anno series, HoMM, From Dust) to flight sims IL2 Sturmovik, Hawx), to even racing games (Trackmania 2), Ubisoft does it all - and does it well.
XSEED is at the top of my list now. Bringing Ys 7, TitS, and Felghana over to PSP was great. The best part? When they got onto Steam and brought over Felghana & Origin. I'm looking forward to more Falcom PC games from them.
Sega published After Burner Climax (took them long enough but we got it), House of the Dead 4 & HotD 4 Special (ditto), LA Machineguns, Ghost Squad, Out Run 2 original & SP.
Namco did Time Crisis 4, Razing Storm, and the Ridge Racers (6 & 7 on console, and the import-only PSP RR2).
Square Enix... not for the main Final Fantasy series, but rather Nier, FFVII Crisis Core, and The 3rd Birthday.
Bethesda for Skyrim, Rage, and likely the upcoming Doom 4 (please don't be like Doom 3... I'm wanting essentially a Doom 64 sequel with modern graphics).
Cave has done some great work with upgrading their games for 360 ports. Before they call it a day on the 360, we need an Ibara/Kuro double pack and of course SDOJ.
2K let me down with Duke Nukem Forever; too bad it turned into "Call of Duke". I would have SNK on my list if they'd give us something more than KOF. There are plenty of cool franchises that deserve a revisit like Neo Turfmasters, Top Hunter, Pulstar/Blazing Star, Viewpoint, etc. Capcom hasn't impressed me much outside of SSFIV Arcade Edition... but if they do a new DarkStalkers I may check it out. Capcom vs SNK 3 is something I would have liked at one time, but I'm afraid now that they'd fuck it up with power gems. TBH, I'd probably have given MM9 a chance if the graphics were like the 16 or 32 bit versions.
I think from a publishing standpoint Microsoft should get some consideration for the awesome stuff they put out around a game. Halo always gets very cool live action trailers and neat viral marketing stuff and awesome special edition packages (Well, Reach and 3 got special editions). Alan Wake had an awesome webseries and the SE of that game had a cool book and an overall awesome package.
I chose EA simply for my love of the Battlefield series. The NHL series as well.