Game of the Year 2017 Day Five: Best, Worst, Cast, and Capture

It's been an incredible year for games. You wouldn't know it from this top 10 list though.

Hooray, Night In The Woods wins one of the main categories!

And given how prevalent PUBG seems to be in these lists, maybe it's time to give that game a shot.

So the most obvious choice is number 1

(not to discredit or throw shade at Pubg, I just thought the arguments from the other staff would have been able to dethrone it)

HUGELY surprised though to see that Zelda was able to dethrone Nier and take number 2 (terrific game, just didn’t seem like one a good half of the staff had enthusiasm for)

But yakuza 0 doesn’t even get number 10, but dream daddy does, good grief,

It’s just for all the praise yakuza got during all these audio recordings from the majority of the staff for its good aspects and even feeling like to play the game due to the praise while dream daddy’s only fighters were really Abby and Vinny while Dan and Jeff absolutely hated it, it’s surprising,

(and destiny on top of wolfenstein is surprising as well, as they dedicated a whole category for moments in wolfenstein, but I guess the gameplay of destiny won over it)

But at the end of the day, it’s their list, and my hang ups aside it’s a solid list

@dastardry: I have yet to listen to the discussion yet, but based on the staff's top 10 lists, it doesn't look like Destiny 2 is a pity slot pick. It's one of the most consistent picks among the staff's lists, and most of them have enjoyed the game (at varying degrees but still enjoyed). Unlike with the first Destiny, I believe Brad was the only one championing that game. It would have been surprising if Destiny 2 didn't make this list. Granted I still need to listen to how this goes down.

*EDIT: Welp I'm an idiot lol, I somehow first read number 6 as Destiny 2, but it was 5, so disregard what I said haha

Anyone getting salty over their pick for game of the year must not have watched a single one of the murder island streams, or the quick look for PUBG (its a 3 hour stream featuring basically the whole staff AND friends of the site).

Seriously, its not my game of the year, but all the complaints I'm seeing are "Oh they are just on the hype band-wagon". As if. PUBG produced more hours of content this year collectively then any other game. And do remember, they make content based not just on what gets clicks, but on what they, the members of GB enjoy doing. That a game they enjoyed playing so much gets GotY should come as absolutely no surprise what so ever.

The salt in this thread is really something.

PubG is a fine choice. It will probably be as influential as Modern Warfare was back in the day.

That said, I don't like it, and would not place it in my top 20.

But it's a fine, fine choice, and a great list.

Hope this doesn't come across rude, but Abby saying Dream Daddy does something new compared to other visual Novels sounds like a lie. With her constant hate of anime looking designs idk how she even played other visual novels, or failed to mention the other very popular game in the same year/genre Doki Doki panic. Like I would to hear more examples in what Dream Daddy did better than most notable games in the genre. I can understand falling in love with a game in a genre you don't play, but calling it better than everything in this genre is very rude. Personally feel the deconstruction of the visual novel formula in Doki Doki panic and the surprise twist was way more interesting than the safe route Dream Daddy took this year.

The salt is real:)

Wait... there are people on here that thinks PUBG is worse than Andromeda? lmaooooooooooooooooo

Also, this is GB's Game of the Year. Not Polygon's or Waypoint's or whatever. You can disagree, but this is still their fave.

The honest surprise for me was Nier. I really thought this would not crack the top 10. Hypothetically, if Nier wasn't in their top 10, I'm not gonna go ballistic about it; I'll laugh and move on.

Dream Daddy did not do anything new

ME:A getting "worst game" is crazy to me, with all the garbage out there. Maybe it'll be clearer when I listen to the podcast, but O_O

I mean, it's their list so ultimately my opinion doesn't matter. It's just weird to see a game that reviewed for 2 stars out of 5 be called the worst game of the year.

Maybe it's just Brad's Worst Game?

Persona 5 was robbed I'm burning this site to the ground!!!

BOO!! BOO!!

Just remember folks, just because something is "new" to you it doesn't mean that it's never been done before.

The natural game winning goty. There's other games I prefer but PUBG is a good choice, especially considering the industry influence that it already has.

Glad to see you guys continue to reward mediocrity and disgusting business practices. I get its y'all list but destiny 2 being on there is real gross

@negimafreak101: I have to agree with everything you said. Dream Daddy does NOTHING new while Doki Doki Literature Club is an entire genre flip. Saying Dream Daddy does something never been done before can only come from someone who doesn’t play many or any visual novels.

I couldn't wait and had to spoil myself on today's results before diving into the deliberations. I wish Yakuza 0 and Divinity 2 got more love during this year's awards but it is what it is.

Thanks to Giantbomb for another year of entertainment!

This is my favorite GB time of year. I didn't even play Nier, and I'm sure it's a great game, but the impending fallout is gonna be great!

Wow, if you bumped down PUBG below Cuphead, the top 5 here are exactly my list. PUBG would definitely be higher for me, but I don't have a PC and only started playing on Xbox a couple weeks ago.

Great list! Love seeing Nier that high, awesome that something so weird could be appreciated by so many people. Also fully expected Jeff to knock Zelda further down the list, he never seemed to like it that much (for some reason that I'll never understand).

I've only listened to the first 2 days of podcasts and I could already tell that Horizon wasn't going to make the list.

It's a shame. Horizon is my personal GOTY, but it had the misfortune of releasing alongside a Zelda game that everyone went nuts for and it being a game that you can't really put down and come back to later.

For as much as Horizon does crib from the Ubisoft open world game template, I enjoyed it's combat far more than any other open world game. I liked tripping and tying down the robots, targeting specific parts, and the various elemental effects. I liked it better than gun-centric shooting in first person open world games, and better than the combo and counter (aka "Batman") style combat in Assassin's Creed and similar games.

The game that bugs me the most being on the list in it's place is Destiny 2. I thought it was such a blah game that doesn't feel any different from the first level to the last. Even in a genre where the gameplay is kind of intrinsically repetitive, Destiny 2 was one of the most repetitive feeling shooters I've played in ages. The first hour of that game feels identical to every hour after it. Literally the only notable difference is that sometimes you shoot enemies in their glowy stomach instead of their glowy head.

It's stunning to listen to all the debate on the podcast, nitpicking every esoteric merit the games lower on the list have, to then give GOTY to a storyless, buggy, loot crate, troll-ridden, early access game like PUBG. 2017 was one the best years ever for games and I'm floored the staff snubbed masterpieces like Mario Odyssey for the latest bandwagon.

I guess the first award of 2018 should be "Sorry Alex, Fire Pro Should Have Been Eligible For Best Surprise After All"

The argument, to me, from both Abby and Vinny, was that Dream Daddy made them have a newfound respect and interest in the genre. It bridged a gap that was there before, for whatever reason. It made two people uninterested in VNs very interested in this VN and potentially, by extension, others. That, to them, is a "new thing" (I feel like they both outright stated this in the 10th and final attempt by Dan to have it stricken from the list).

Man, folks sure are salty about PUBG. I suppose if fit, finish and polish is super important to you, I can understand it. But I had a hell of a lot of fun with that game this year, jank and all. Also, cool to see Dream Daddy on the list. Not really my thing but it seems like a cool thing that deserved the recognition. One of the creators did an interview on Tone Control and she seemed like a great person.

As somebody who orbits around the top 5% of the leaderboards in PUBG, hacking has been so prevalent in games it makes me sick. Nevertheless, I’ve sunk so much time with friends and in solo and I keep coming back to it. I wouldn’t call it my GOTY personally because bluehole is garbage and the game runs like a dumpster fire, but I’m content that they put it there. Doesn’t really matter anyways. Not like there’s 5 stars attached to it. Flawed rough gem.

While I think it's dumb that PUBG won, I'm just glad that Breath of the Wild wasn't game of the year. Super overrated and my personal biggest disappointment of 2017.

#notmyzelda (that's how the kids meme these days right?)

Fuck yeah! i'm glad pubg won!

@ricko23 said:

Is this a copypasta because if not...what?? This article just a brief recap, if you want to hear about the deliberations and their gameplay experiences, you should I dunno, listen to the 25 fucking hours of deliberation podcasts they released? Your ignorance is just absurd.

Honestly I have no idea why it's on this list, since I hadn't heard a peep about it during the year from them besides a quicklook.

"It's their list," as usual, but I'm a little disappointed a site that often was one of the few that held games' feet to the fire for being plagued by bugs, performance issues, and some of the most prevalent cheating in an online game in recent memory would give PUBG its overall award. I understand having fun with a game, but at the end of the day it feels like the same people who have knocked so many games over the years like Fallout 4, Mortal Kombat 9, Far Cry 3 lost a little something in my eyes in excusing all the issues that game has.

It's not salt tbh. It's the fact that the game rushing to 1.0 status just so it could claim some awards when it's been plagued by so many issues was a dirty and transparent move, and if Bluehole was EA, I expect a lot more people would be up in arms about it.

I keep reminding myself it's a staff list and opinions differ and all that, and then I remember PUBG won in a year in which Nier, Zelda, Mario, and Yakuza 0 released and I get unreasonably angry again.

Internet Dan FTW!!!

Wouldn't of picked PUBG as GOTY, but it's hard to argue since this game will probably change online shooters. Mass Effect beating Bubsy for worst game really shows how awful Andromeda was and how we may not see a new ME for at least a few years, if ever again.

Man, P5 got ethered, and I’m not surprised. No one sounded up on it all.

Did they stop putting the top 10 in order?

I think PUBG is an alright game. I also think it is a buggy mess that, much like Mario Maker, is really boring if you don't have anyone to enjoy it with.

That being said, I can see why it is Giant Bombs game of the year. Everyone on the staff loved it or at least enjoyed. Much like Mario Maker, some of the best videos from this year were PUBG. While it might be objectively the best game of the year(if such a thing even exists) and it isn't the top game on many of the staff's personal list, it is important to remember that the category is best game to GB in general, and for GB and the GB community, it clearly was the best game.

Word. PUBG is cool and all, but it seems to have cultivated a huge blindspot for itself.

Ugh I love Abby but she is terrible at forming arguments both for and against games. Dream Daddy does not deserve to be on this list over Yakuza and P5 and her only arguments were "it's so good!" and it does things different in a genre she's admitted to never playing.

It's about arguing harder not arguing smarter. And Abby was the hardest of them all... Except for Brad when it comes to all things Destiny.

@mike: I think most people are just going to be happy to see NieR that high. I was. I totally expected it to get dropped entirely or get one of the honorary 7th-10th place spots.

The two games that are starting all the discussion are PUBG and Dream Daddy.

Nope.

All for sexy picks and bringing attention to lesser known games but 2017 was dominated hard by Breath of the Wild and Mario Odyssey to such an extent where both should have been excluded from the list and crowned as runaway champs.

They are among the best games of all time let alone 2017.

And Steamworld Dig 2 deserves a spot. Well ahead of most of these. Impeccable design and smashing fun.

@flasaltine: doom is dead and forgotten, hitman is eternal