Games of the Year

[asim0v Profile]

I know plenty of you out there play other games than Minecraft. Since GOTY lists are starting to show up, figured I'd start a thread. What are your games of the year and why? Please avoid spoilers! Your list can be in order or not, whichever you prefer. One last thing: this is the best games you played this year, which doesn't necessarily mean they were released this year.

• Gone Home
  It's difficult to say much about this one without getting into spoilers. Best experienced knowing as little as possible about the story going into it. It's a short game at about 2 hours but worth it IMO. Pick it up on a Steam sale if the $20 price tag makes you squeamish.
• BioShock Infinite
  Taking the series to new heights, Infinite is a very good genre game. Then it bends in on itself like a moebius strip. The story is decent but it's really the characters that are the draw for this game. It's a rare thing in gaming to have a sidekick that isn't in the way; even rarer to have one you feel an emotional connection with, but Infinite manages to do it and do it well.
• The Walking Dead (Season 1)
  But that was 2012, not 2013! Shut up! I just got around to playing it this year. And I pre-ordered season 2 before I was even done with episode 2 of season 1. I'm sure this list will be amended to include season 2 just as soon as it's released and I can play it. Your choices in TWD have weight and they have consequences. Oh, they also have a time limit, so be quick about it! TWD does the ever-so-rare thing in gaming of actually giving you choices that have an impact. Choices in season 1 will carry over into season 2. Whether your the white knight, thief, liar, or somewhere in-between, you're stuck at the end of the world -with zombies. As dangerous as the "walkers" are, it's the people you need to look out for. Keep your wits about you and never get trapped!
• The Wolf Among Us
  Bigby Wolf (get it?) is the law in Fabletown, an area in New York where all the exiled fables live. Through the use of magic, they live undetected from the mundanes. But when a fable gets out of line or causes trouble, it's up to the Big Bad Wolf to keep the peace. In many ways, this is the successor to Telltale's The Walking Dead. They seem to have learned from past mistakes in TWD and refined the formula this time around. Whether you're the jaded prick or sympathetic shoulder, remember that you're the Big Bad Wolf - the others sure do. Like TWD, the game is episodic. Currently only episode 1 is available, but I was so engrossed after that one episode that I've been dying to get more. This game is based on the comic series of the same name and I'm told it borrows some from the first story arc of the comics. Either way, it's gorgeous, has an engaging story, and characters you can't help but love, and hate... and love again.
• Poker Night [at the Inventory] 2
  Ever wanted to play poker with Brock Sampson from The Venture Bros, Claptrap from the Borderland games, Ash from Army of Darkness, and Sam from Sam & Max? Still not sold? GlaDOS is the dealer. Still not sold? Then you have no soul. But there was a 76.452% chance of that anyway. In all honestly, I shouldn't like this game as much as I do, but I just can't help it. The banter between the characters is nothing short of amazing. This is my go-to game when I have some time to kill and can't get too involved with a story driven game.
• Grand Theft Auto 5
  It's Grand Theft Auto, do I need to say more? Ever wanted to star in a heist movie? How about a heist movie where you play all of the parts? Imagine Eddie Murphy as everyone in Heat. Just let that sink in for a moment. Moving on, you plan and execute heists, swapping between characters as necessary. Rather than being cumbersome and annoying, this mechanic works quite well, allowing you to take on multiple roles during a heist. The story is so-so, but some of the characters are the best written and voice acted in all of video game history. Trevor is even on my list of favorite characters of all time from any form of fiction. Don't feel like robbing people? How about some tennis? Not your thing? How about golf or yoga? There is so much to do in this world that you'll never experience it all. But you will keep coming back because the world is that great.

Honorable Mention

• Starbound
  It doesn't do the game justice to call it "Terraria in space," but the comparison is undeniable. You are able to travel between worlds that are procedurally generated. This game is an honorable mention instead of on the actual list because it hasn't officially launched yet. It's in early beta stages on Steam Early Access, so there is plenty that isn't finished or even implemented yet. And character wipes can and do happen. Nevertheless, it's a good game. Very much actively developed. Updates are happening seemingly daily right now. The animals on plants can be odd. The dinosaur looking thing crossed with a lion is passive unless attacked. The cuddly pink teddybear crossed with a rabbit will eat your face if it sees you. Have I mentioned that the game is still very early beta? That's very important.
• Feed The Beast Direwolf20 1.6.4
  Ok, it's not technically a game but a mod pack for Minecraft. Still, the new Direwolf20 pack is great!
• Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon
  Remember the 80s? Everything was neon and ninja and awesome. This stand-alone game is all of that. Don't go looking for deep story or complex characters here. It's pure 80s and holy cow does it pull it off. Only reason it's an honorable mention instead of the big boy list is I haven't gotten enough time to play it with all the other games so I can't quite comment on how well it holds up all the way through.

[VanDerProtofsky Profile]

A nice list of recommendations - I especially want to play Bioshock: Infinite as I am a longtime fan of the series. Interesting about Far Cry 3 BD; I have not heard of it before but I do love my 80's. I have always believed GTA:VC was the best 80's game I have tried but I will have to try that one, thank you.

Most of the games I discovered this year have been thanks to the Humble Bundle. Problem is, I have gotten so many and only played a small percentage, mostly only for brief moments.

• Skyrim
  This year was the first time I played Skyrim, by which now had all its expansions out and has a GOTY edition out (called "Legendary"). My main motivation for getting around to it was finding various modding guides on Reddit. I have been a long time fan of the Elder Scrolls series and the amount of modding people have been doing to Skyrim is crazy.My mod list is 150~ strong. The base game itself is great - the immersive narration, story and gameplay roles I have come to love and enjoy of the ES series. But this game, subjectively, just cannot be played without at least some of these mods, either for bugfixing reasons or just because they add so much more to the gameplay.
  
  If ever you want to try Skyrim, I would advise taking the time to follow this modding guide (may result in up to 16GB of downloads, some mods may conflict and cause crashing on low/mid-end systems).
  
• Batman: Arkham Asylum
  I built my first PC this summer and got this game in a WB humble bundle. This game really pushed my GFX card to the limit. It is aesthetically beautiful and the gameplay is great too. I found Joker's voice acting and character to be brilliant and the game is packed with Batman lore, referencing many villains and characters from comics and games gone by. The combat system is (literally) kickass and provides various inventive and fun ways of dispatching enemies. The only thing I cared little about was the story - the endgame could have been a bit more interesting.
  
• F.E.A.R. 3
  I played through this entire game on co-op. It is great fun. Supposed to be scary, but when you are playing co-op it is difficult not to laugh at the other soiling their pants and other silly moments. One character relies on the use of weapons for combat, the other is a ghost (the brother of the "protagonist", although both seem to be anti-heroes to the whole story) who can take over the bodies of enemies. The graphics are also quite high-end and the story is interesting too, if not narrated just a little too dramatically.
  
• FEZ
  I found this to be a very beautiful and delightful game to play. The retro graphics are gorgeous and the main mind-bending gameplay element was a nice surprise to discover (will not spoil it). Using said element makes this game a fun puzzle platformer to try and complete over a vast world of inter-connected levels. However, a lot of the game requires cryptography-related puzzle solving. If that floats your boat (e.g. you enjoy decoding one alien alphabet to another) you will enjoy this game and all the secrets it holds. Else, like me, you would perhaps prefer to just use a walkthrough for these difficult parts. Most memorable were the various themes of levels and the music (spoilers).

Honorable mentions go to:

• Tomb Raider (2013)
  Only played this briefly as I have always enjoyed Tomb Raider. I am enjoying the story a lot, which is completely different from previous Tomb Raider games. This is about Lara Croft's beginnings, a complete newbie to the survival and tomb raiding game. They have shown this beautifully through the cutscenes and the graphics. The intro itself was disappointing, taken straight from the game trailer. The gameplay itself has more survival elements (the need to eat food, etc) but I have yet to fully explore these. Did I mention how beautiful the graphics are?
  
• Cookie Clicker
  It is perhaps best if you experience this on your own.

[asim0v Profile]

Well, Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon isn't 80s in the way Grand Theft Auto Vice City was 80s. Just watch the official game trailer and you'll understand.

And I love FEZ! Only reason it didn't make my list is I played it on the 360 when it was released last year, though I didn't finish it for various reasons (time and a game-breaking bug). I picked it up on Steam when it came to PC. I'll have to go back and play it again.

Completely forgot about Tomb Raider! I have this really bad habit of starting great games and just never finishing because I've started another great game. Tomb Raider is one such game. I will definitely go back and play it through, and I thoroughly enjoyed everything I've seen thus far.

[VanDerProtofsky Profile]

Oh dear, I was not expecting *that* kind of 80's. That is very interesting, haha. Definitely on my wishlist now (along with Far Cry 3 itself, which I have yet to play). Agreed with starting games - Skyrim was the worst attention and time sink for me. I would start a game and then think "I feel like playing more Skyrim."

Incidentally after posting in this thread, I was gifted Bioshock Infinite. Downloading it (groan, another 15GB on a 2MBit/s) and looking forward to playing it

[PosterAnonymous Profile]

A 2013 Retrospective, eh?

Alright, let's do this...

:clears throat and puts on his smoking jacket:

As I sit here, nursing the first of my two hot cocoas spiked with peppermint schnapps, I find myself looking back at this fine mess of a year... Thinking of the highs (Ha! More ToucanPimp images!) and lows (the destruction of my GIF thread!) and the games that saw me through it all. There were no clear winners and only one or two losers, so I shall simply discuss the handful of games I played and my thoughts on them. There will be spoilers on some of them, so you have been warned.

Starmade
Not as popular as Starbound, but an interesting "Minecraft in Space" concept. I especially enjoyed being able to visually cloak and radar jam your vessel - Sneaky sneaky!

Portal 2
Shut up. I have almost 30 games in my backlog to play.

Good, but not as good as the first Portal. Definitely had me laughing frequently.

Mass Effect 3: Citadel DLC
A great last hurrah for the fans, but a bit of a rip-off at $15 plus the initial cost of the game. Cost aside, it was very nice to see everyone one last time.

Mass Effect 3: The Rest of That Steaming Turd
The title says it all. BioWare will not be seeing a single release day dollar from me again until they release 3 great games in a row.

IN. A. ROW.

Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep
It might be my old, schnapps-addled brain talking here, but how the [bleep] does this game series get MORE confusing with every new entry?? The first game had a simple story that I could fairly easily describe in a couple of paragraphs. Now there's freaking Unversed and Nobodies and Heartless and Dark Keyblade Masters and Light Keyblade Masters (NOT to be confused with the X-Blade even though they're pronounced the exact same way and I only know it's different because I had to turn the freaking subtitles on OH and the "X" isn't an "X", it's a FANCY "X" that has a little squiggly line I'm too lazy to find with Windows's Character Map)... Da bleep happened to this series??

That said, the gameplay was pretty good overall and I'm glad I finally had a reason to dust off my PSP. I'm surprised the battery still holds a charge!

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
This game started out great - Action, adventure, interesting characters, pretty environments with tons of detail, good story...

Until they brought in the Zombie Spanish Conquistadors.

You heard me: Spanish. Conquistador. Zombies.

When I read that the next game had abominable (bless you, Chrome spell-check) snowmen who were aliens or something I promptly removed both titles from my shelf and returned them to the GameStop from whence they came. I like my peanut butter. I like my chocolate. Don't mix them or I'm out.

Kingdom Hearts 1.5 ReMix
I'm actually playing the first game now. So far: Nice. I've learned my lesson and will no longer judge video quality based upon YouTube uploads. It looks significantly better in-person on a 52" 1080p set.

Gone Home
Should have been "Gone Fishin'" for as uninteresting as it was... I'm sorry, but I didn't find it as compelling as asim0v and others have. Here's the only spoiler I'll give: The game is WYSIWYG. No twist, hints of something more sinister that doesn't pay off, etc. Blehhhhhh! At least in Real Bass Fishin' there's some suspense - Will I catch that Rainbow Trout or will it be another lame Catfish? I can't wait to find out!

Galaga
Best bar ever! It's a bar AND an arcade! I played the hell outta some Galaga... Until the machine broke.

Zaxxon
Aforementioned bar. Game is hard, but fun.

Nintendo PlaySelect: Friday, the 13th
Aforementioned bar. Awesome classic game! Good times!

I think that's it for now... My mugs runneth empty... AWAY!

[VanDerProtofsky Profile]

Galaga
Best bar ever! It's a bar AND an arcade! I played the hell outta some Galaga... Until the machine broke.

Galaga machine's broke? Just take it to the next level. Galaga dating sim!

[abigail Profile]

very short, but the interweaving of the events across a back and forth time line makes me want to put Beyond two Souls on honourable mentions (like i said, short)
another timed button game it plays very simple but the elements of the story and the supernaturally-close to this world (and the well-used suspense and lighter story pats on top of each other) makes me want to encourage you guys to rent it. (can we still rent video games? oh yeah, netflix does that).

only because i could finish the game in less than a weekend and want to replay it for all the endings. i hope there's a sequel. (honourable mention i think is not going too far, and a game should stand where it is without dlc)

my only complaint isnt even related to the game, it is because of the game. there is a free app to control the game instead of the ps3 controller. or have a second player use a phone to control the other main character. WHY CANT I DO THIS WITH OTHER GAMES?!?!? especially now that the ps4 is out and everyone only has one controller for one reason or another (stock *cough* no restocking).
wouldn't that be cool to have a DnD like experience where the DM has his phone or tablet like the wiiU totally did NOT do, (or any game where its everyone versus the computer/game master/dungeon master) to control what other people can't see and make a great 3 vs 1 or even 4 vs 1 experience???

Starbound and one or two ouya games look good too for the list. though some of the best ouya games are multi-console

[asim0v Profile]

Beyond Two Souls has been on my radar for a little while. I just don't have a PS3. Eventually I will get one to play all the PS3 exclusives that haven't come to PC or the 360... like The Last of Us.

[abigail Profile]

Last of Us, i have been putting off starting. but after catching bits of my husband playing it that defintely goes on the awards list. holy cow man