Game Of The Year List, 2014
Jan. 11th, 2015 11:57 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
houraipeachSo, barring the inherent awfulness of internet culture surrounding it, 2014 was a goddamn amazing year for video games. There were so many great things this year I'm honestly a bit spoilt for choice! But since it's sort of a thing to do, I'm going to presume you care about my opinions and give you Top Ten Games(that I played) in 2014 List.
#10: Bravely Default
Bravely Default is one of those glorious loveletters to classic RPGs that I just can't seem to get enough of. Had Final Fantasy not gone down the weird noodly-armed Baz Luhrmann-esque rabbit hole it has increasingly disappeared into, it probably would have evolved into something much like this: a nostalgic but also ferociously deconstructionist riff on classic storytelling tropes. It has a few weaknesses, noticeably the grindingly painful endgame, but it's still a valiant effort that proves Square-Enix still has what it takes to make good games.
#9: Dungeonmans
As Dungeons Of Dredmor teaches us, a good roguelike is hard to find. Luckily Dungeonmans has been filling that gap quite nicely, with a slick sense of humor, lots of accessibility for players new to the genre, and a fascinating progression system. It's an iteration of the genre rather than a true jump forward, but it is one of the BEST examples of the form currently on the market. Combine that with an attentive developer who will PERSONALLY ADDRESS gameplay concerns, and you have a real winner.
#8: Terra Battle
Wait, a MOBILE GAME? On MY list? It's more likely than you think. This one kind of blindsided me; after a friend recommended it to me on Twitter, I gave it a 'why not' download, and it promptly became the primary thing that kept me sane during my trip home for the holidays. While it has all the hallmarks of a pay-to-win RPG-lite puzzle game, it counterbalances these issues by being Actually Fun and rarely requiring pay-ins unless you just want to crush the difficulty out of hand. The tactical positioning system, charming art style, and surprisingly good music all contribute to it being an excellent dark-horse candidate.
#7: Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor
This one surprised me. When Shadow of Mordor was first announced, I expected a half-assed Assassin's Creed clone with a Tolkien paint job slapped on. What I got was the best fantasy eugenics simulator ever crafted. With the core of the game being the incredible Nemesis System, which seeds your game-world with randomly-generated orc bosses you can kill, harass, mind-control, and otherwise torment into your own little Middle-Earth murder-themed sitcom, this game has provided far more hours of entertainment than the 10 to 12 hour main story would seem to suggest. I give a solid bonus for the devs include free DLC that lets you play as one of the female NPCs. This is one of those amazing developments in design that's going to inevitably become a standard-bearer for open world games.
#6: inFamous: Second Son & inFamous: First Light
Look, I love superhero games. I love them even more when they've got an anti-authoritarian streak a mile wide, awesome powersets, and happen to be set in the city I live in. Second Son and First Light are at the top of their game, with compelling writing, pitch-perfect gameplay, and some of the coolest goddamn conceits for superpowers I've seen in recent memory. Between summoning video-powered angels to harass criminals and using neon laser beams to snipe jackbooted government thugs while running at light-speed, Sucker Punch has crafted one of my go-to 'fuck around and be awesome' games.
#5: Wolfenstein: The New Order
This is another one that just kinda came out of nowhere and impressed the hell out of me. Eschewing the Nathan Drake-esque antics of Wolfenstein 2009, The New Order takes one of the hoariest, most played-out what-ifs in speculative fiction('what if the Nazis won World War 2') and takes it to its chilling, terrifying logical conclusion, with BJ Blazkowicz as a soft-spoken, oddly poetic Texan lamenting the end of the world he was promised after the war, and exacting his payback for it on every nasty little kraut schmuck he comes across. It's, bizarrely, a much more sentimental game than I anticipated, and has one of the most charming and colorful casts I can even recall in an FPS. Including Jimi Hendrix, who you can drop acid with, which should pretty neatly sum up why you should play this game.
#4: Destiny
I've given this game a lot of praise, and a lot of flack, and let me be clear: Destiny has some Serious Problems with repetition and poor storytelling. But beyond that, there lies the simple fact that I have spent more time playing this game than any other this year. Period. It has problems, yes, but it also has flat-out the best-feeling gameplay of any shooter I've ever touched, combined with extensive character customization, a beautiful gameworld, cool and varied enemies that are a ton of fun to fight, and background lore that is FASCINATING(even if I have to go to Bungie's website to look at it). I can't quite call it a GREAT game, but it is one of my FAVORITE games, and that deserves credit where credit is due.
#3: Endless Legend
Let's be honest, folks. Civilization: Beyond Earth just isn't that good. It has POTENTIAL, but that potential is stuck in a pit that'll take at least 1.5 expansions to climb out of. And why spend money on that, when you could spend it on THIS instead? Far and away the best 4X I've ever played, Endless Legend also gets points for being one of the most approachable, with the most elegant, intuitive UI I've yet seen in this genre. Add in a fascinating quest system, a core ruleset that is robust and potent, factions that are wildly varied and unique, and some of the richest lore ever stuffed into a civ-alike, and there's not much reason NOT to give this game a shot.
#2: Shovel Knight
I've joked frequently that this is the best platforming game of both 2014 and 1994, but honestly, I'm not even sure I'm kidding. It's just flat-out one of the funnest, most charming things I've ever played in my life, and it VERY NEARLY took the top spot. It has a beautiful take on incremental difficulty levels, letting you make any stage as easy or hair-pulling as you like by virtue of breakable checkpoints, and that's kind of emblematic of its fusion of old and new ideas. Had people kept on making games for the NES right up until now, this would be the apex of the form, and it richly deserves its spot here.
#1: Bayonetta 2
Or, as I like to call it, 'the sole reason Shovel Knight is not my game of the year.' Bayonetta 2 is, flat-out, and without any POSSIBLE competition, the single greatest action game ever made in my estimation. And know that I say this without hyperbole, too. Everything in this game is both accessible for new players and yet endlessly deep for veterans, with all the frustrating little quibbles of the previous entry vanished into the aether. It controls like a dream, and despite the constant assault on the senses, it somehow never becomes unmanageable. It keeps every plate spinning perfectly and wonderfully until the very finish, and it's even got a fun plot on top of it. This is Platinum's magnum opus, stem to stern, and it's one of those games worth buying a console JUST to play; as an added bonus, it is also the most badass Christmas story ever told. Do yourself a favor and give it a whirl.
#10: Bravely Default
Bravely Default is one of those glorious loveletters to classic RPGs that I just can't seem to get enough of. Had Final Fantasy not gone down the weird noodly-armed Baz Luhrmann-esque rabbit hole it has increasingly disappeared into, it probably would have evolved into something much like this: a nostalgic but also ferociously deconstructionist riff on classic storytelling tropes. It has a few weaknesses, noticeably the grindingly painful endgame, but it's still a valiant effort that proves Square-Enix still has what it takes to make good games.
#9: Dungeonmans
As Dungeons Of Dredmor teaches us, a good roguelike is hard to find. Luckily Dungeonmans has been filling that gap quite nicely, with a slick sense of humor, lots of accessibility for players new to the genre, and a fascinating progression system. It's an iteration of the genre rather than a true jump forward, but it is one of the BEST examples of the form currently on the market. Combine that with an attentive developer who will PERSONALLY ADDRESS gameplay concerns, and you have a real winner.
#8: Terra Battle
Wait, a MOBILE GAME? On MY list? It's more likely than you think. This one kind of blindsided me; after a friend recommended it to me on Twitter, I gave it a 'why not' download, and it promptly became the primary thing that kept me sane during my trip home for the holidays. While it has all the hallmarks of a pay-to-win RPG-lite puzzle game, it counterbalances these issues by being Actually Fun and rarely requiring pay-ins unless you just want to crush the difficulty out of hand. The tactical positioning system, charming art style, and surprisingly good music all contribute to it being an excellent dark-horse candidate.
#7: Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor
This one surprised me. When Shadow of Mordor was first announced, I expected a half-assed Assassin's Creed clone with a Tolkien paint job slapped on. What I got was the best fantasy eugenics simulator ever crafted. With the core of the game being the incredible Nemesis System, which seeds your game-world with randomly-generated orc bosses you can kill, harass, mind-control, and otherwise torment into your own little Middle-Earth murder-themed sitcom, this game has provided far more hours of entertainment than the 10 to 12 hour main story would seem to suggest. I give a solid bonus for the devs include free DLC that lets you play as one of the female NPCs. This is one of those amazing developments in design that's going to inevitably become a standard-bearer for open world games.
#6: inFamous: Second Son & inFamous: First Light
Look, I love superhero games. I love them even more when they've got an anti-authoritarian streak a mile wide, awesome powersets, and happen to be set in the city I live in. Second Son and First Light are at the top of their game, with compelling writing, pitch-perfect gameplay, and some of the coolest goddamn conceits for superpowers I've seen in recent memory. Between summoning video-powered angels to harass criminals and using neon laser beams to snipe jackbooted government thugs while running at light-speed, Sucker Punch has crafted one of my go-to 'fuck around and be awesome' games.
#5: Wolfenstein: The New Order
This is another one that just kinda came out of nowhere and impressed the hell out of me. Eschewing the Nathan Drake-esque antics of Wolfenstein 2009, The New Order takes one of the hoariest, most played-out what-ifs in speculative fiction('what if the Nazis won World War 2') and takes it to its chilling, terrifying logical conclusion, with BJ Blazkowicz as a soft-spoken, oddly poetic Texan lamenting the end of the world he was promised after the war, and exacting his payback for it on every nasty little kraut schmuck he comes across. It's, bizarrely, a much more sentimental game than I anticipated, and has one of the most charming and colorful casts I can even recall in an FPS. Including Jimi Hendrix, who you can drop acid with, which should pretty neatly sum up why you should play this game.
#4: Destiny
I've given this game a lot of praise, and a lot of flack, and let me be clear: Destiny has some Serious Problems with repetition and poor storytelling. But beyond that, there lies the simple fact that I have spent more time playing this game than any other this year. Period. It has problems, yes, but it also has flat-out the best-feeling gameplay of any shooter I've ever touched, combined with extensive character customization, a beautiful gameworld, cool and varied enemies that are a ton of fun to fight, and background lore that is FASCINATING(even if I have to go to Bungie's website to look at it). I can't quite call it a GREAT game, but it is one of my FAVORITE games, and that deserves credit where credit is due.
#3: Endless Legend
Let's be honest, folks. Civilization: Beyond Earth just isn't that good. It has POTENTIAL, but that potential is stuck in a pit that'll take at least 1.5 expansions to climb out of. And why spend money on that, when you could spend it on THIS instead? Far and away the best 4X I've ever played, Endless Legend also gets points for being one of the most approachable, with the most elegant, intuitive UI I've yet seen in this genre. Add in a fascinating quest system, a core ruleset that is robust and potent, factions that are wildly varied and unique, and some of the richest lore ever stuffed into a civ-alike, and there's not much reason NOT to give this game a shot.
#2: Shovel Knight
I've joked frequently that this is the best platforming game of both 2014 and 1994, but honestly, I'm not even sure I'm kidding. It's just flat-out one of the funnest, most charming things I've ever played in my life, and it VERY NEARLY took the top spot. It has a beautiful take on incremental difficulty levels, letting you make any stage as easy or hair-pulling as you like by virtue of breakable checkpoints, and that's kind of emblematic of its fusion of old and new ideas. Had people kept on making games for the NES right up until now, this would be the apex of the form, and it richly deserves its spot here.
#1: Bayonetta 2
Or, as I like to call it, 'the sole reason Shovel Knight is not my game of the year.' Bayonetta 2 is, flat-out, and without any POSSIBLE competition, the single greatest action game ever made in my estimation. And know that I say this without hyperbole, too. Everything in this game is both accessible for new players and yet endlessly deep for veterans, with all the frustrating little quibbles of the previous entry vanished into the aether. It controls like a dream, and despite the constant assault on the senses, it somehow never becomes unmanageable. It keeps every plate spinning perfectly and wonderfully until the very finish, and it's even got a fun plot on top of it. This is Platinum's magnum opus, stem to stern, and it's one of those games worth buying a console JUST to play; as an added bonus, it is also the most badass Christmas story ever told. Do yourself a favor and give it a whirl.
no subject
Date: 2015-01-12 07:15 am (UTC)Your choices here are largely things I've already heard about, but a personal recommendation from someone I know (and one that isn't automated within a system like Steam) go a long way.
Some of these I already knew I wanted to play, like Infamous Second Son, (I've been hyped over Bayonetta 2 since it was announced, and also fist-shaking at it being a single-console exclusive...and also pretty damn sure I will be able to play it eventually, when I live with a certain pink unicorn and their Wii-U).
Some of these I'd heard were good, but I'll definitely have to give another look at, like Shovel Night or Wolfenstein. Amusingly, only one of these I'm actually playing currently, which is Terra Battle.
Really, there's like only one or two on here I probably still won't eventually play. I've watched enough Destiny and could play it on the PS3 here if I wanted to, but probably won't. The other is Endless Legend. I've played bits of Endless Space, enough to know that I'm not all that good at 4X games. (Sure, that could just be Endless Space being less-good, but I've also not had all the time playing Civilization like friends of mine have.)
Cool stuff, anyway. Thanks for sharing!
no subject
Date: 2015-01-12 08:52 am (UTC)Must've been a -really- good year.