''London 2012: The Official Video Game'' is the official
Olympic video game of the
2012 Summer Olympics
The 2012 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012) was an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...
in
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
. It was published by
Sega
is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game and entertainment company headquartered in Shinagawa, Tokyo. Its international branches, Sega of America and Sega Europe, are headquartered in Irvine, California and London, r ...
and developed by
Sega Studios Australia, making this the first Olympics title to be developed in-house by Sega. The
iOS
iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...
and
Android versions were developed and published by NEOWIZ.
It is also the second official video game based on the 2012 Olympics, the other being ''
Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games
is a 2011 fictional crossover, crossover sports game, sports and party game developed by Sega Japan. It was published by Nintendo in Japan and Korea and by Sega elsewhere. As the third instalment in the ''Mario & Sonic'' series, it was released ...
''.
The game features 37 countries, and 31 events. New disciplines included 10m Synchronised Platform Diving, Trampoline, Beach Volleyball and Keirin.
The game features an online mode for players wishing to compete with other challengers worldwide. The "national pride" is a ranking system in the online mode, where the players have the possibility to collect medals for their favourite country.
It is compatible with
PlayStation Move
is a motion game controller developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Initially released in 2010 for use with the PlayStation 3 home video game console, its compatibility was later expanded to its successor, the PlayStation 4 in 2013, its Pla ...
and Xbox
Kinect
Kinect is a line of motion sensing input devices produced by Microsoft and first released in 2010. The devices generally contain RGB cameras, and infrared projectors and detectors that map depth through either structured light or time of flig ...
for certain events in the party mode.
''London 2012'' is the first Olympics video game to include cooperative events in the local multiplayer mode.
Disciplines
These events are in the game:
The game therefore includes 8 of the events from the decathlon (only missing pole vault and 1500 metres).
Nations represented
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Reception
''London 2012'' received "mixed or average reviews" on all platforms according to the
review aggregation
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...
website
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
.
Chris Schilling of
IGN
''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
said of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions that "Sega's celebration of the year's biggest sporting event is better than you might expect." In his opinion, the events of both versions would not hold up too well in the long term, but that is not really what an Olympics game is about. He praised the online and offline multiplayer mode.
The German PC game magazine ''
GameStar
''GameStar'' is a monthly-released PC gaming magazine in Germany. It is the best-selling German-language magazine focused on PC gaming and it also hosts the largest video gaming-related portal in the German-speaking internet.
Content
The pri ...
'' criticized the gameplay, because it is almost impossible to play it with the mouse and the keyboard, so the player is forced to get a gamepad to play ''London 2012''. They also mentioned that the gameplay of the events would not be different from each other and that the
AI of the computer opponents is not balanced.
''The Digital Fix'' gave the PS3 version seven out of ten and said it was "a fine example of an Olympics type game. The presentation is excellent, the events are more varied than you might expect and the subtleties of controls mean you'll have a wonderful time as you begin any experience with the game." ''
Metro
Metro, short for metropolitan, may refer to:
Geography
* Metro (city), a city in Indonesia
* A metropolitan area, the populated region including and surrounding an urban center
Public transport
* Rapid transit, a passenger railway in an urba ...
'' gave the Xbox 360 version a similar score of seven out of ten and said it was "Not just an Olympics tie-in but a proper sports game, with the majority of events finding a good balance between realism and enjoyment."
However, ''
Digital Spy
Digital Spy (DS) is a British-based entertainment, television and film website and brand and is the largest digital property at Hearst UK. Since its launch in 1999, Digital Spy has focused on entertainment news related to television programmes, ...
'' gave the same console version three stars out of five and said, "There are lots of events that can be enjoyed time and time again, although far less than the 46 advertised. Motion controls add very little, but do at least offer new ways to experience the game, alongside a plethora of game modes. While London 2012: The Game may fall short of Gold, it's certainly deserving of a respectable Bronze."
The game held the top spot of the UK All Format chart for three weeks following its release. It reached number 9 in the PS3 PAL downloads chart. As of May 2013, the game has sold 680,000 copies in the US and Europe.
References
External links
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{{s-end
2012 video games
2012 Summer Olympics
Android (operating system) games
Cycling video games
IOS games
Kinect games
Multiplayer and single-player video games
Multiple-sport video games
Summer Olympic video games
PlayStation 3 games
PlayStation Move-compatible games
Sega video games
Table tennis video games
Video games developed in Australia
Video games set in 2012
Video games set in London
Video games using Havok
Volleyball video games
Water sports video games
Windows games
Xbox 360 games