Xalavier Nelson Jr. is a BAFTA nominated writer and the creative director of Strange Scaffold, who you may know this year thanks to El Paso, Elsewhere.

I try to expose myself to as many games as I can, past and present, all in the hopes of not just understanding the games themselves, but their developers. Every video game I play is a chance to connect with the human beings--and creative ideas--that spawned them.

However, the disturbing trend I'm finding over the past few years is the idea of... game-shaped objects. Projects that offer me no avenue of connection outside of roughly resembling the feature list of something I've liked before. They're perfectly competent, horribly adequate experiences, and the recent idea of a 7/10 being well-built but boring has taken me by surprise. I'm used to 7/10 being the score for a game that stretches a little further than it should; games with playability issues that nonetheless tackle deeply interesting mechanical or narrative concepts.

I mourn the games that benefit from rough edges, and seek them out, because cutting my hands on those edges gives me experiences I literally can't find anywhere else. Under the lofty heights of 10/10 lie a world of possibilities they ironically cannot touch, so without further ado, these are my favorite 7/10s that I had a chance to play this year.

Clash: Artifacts of Chaos (2023)

The latest project from ACE Team - one of my favorite developers - Clash: Artifacts of Chaos takes their experience with brawling and uses it to give life to a new, psychedelic open-world adventure. Battles operate on ritualistic rules determined through a strangely extensive board game that takes place before the punchy, customizable third-person combat. You can find small exploits organically, and go on entire self-driven adventures pulling treasure from places you aren't technically strong enough to tackle yet. Death transforms you into an effigy of yourself--and becoming this effigy is the only way to progress through several key areas, by weaving through terrifying branches that would otherwise wrench off your skin.

Clash isn't just the quiet sequel to the Zeno Clash series: it's a vibrant, violent indie take on Lone Wolf and Cub that encourages you to strain against its limitations.

Saints Row (2022)

A rough launch, inaccurate marketing, and attempting to satisfy a fanbase that fell in love with roughly 4 separate ideas of what Saints Rowis on a fundamental level doomed the Saints Row reboot. I don't think it's hyperbole to say that games is worse for its reputational destruction.

Even though the developer, Volition, an entity with a 30 year history, is now closed as of 2023, this thing clearly had love put into it. Just look at how more than a year of patching and optimizing--even adding content to the game world for free--followed its launch.

Is Saints Row an open-world project filled with icons? Yes. Are there still some bugs? Sure. But the THOUGHTFUL structure of the game, where every activity does provide some meaningful benefit to your wider journey or a unique, characterful interaction down the line, continues to compel. It has consistently funny and heartfelt writing that unifies the identity of the series, given the number of disparate and flawed masterpieces that came before it. And, perhaps most importantly, it's the rare open-world game that doesn't seem like it only starts getting fun after you've sunk 8 hours into a tech tree. From the first strains of the late capitalism Starship Trooper-inspired opening, it's a sincere, joyful nugget of an experience, and one of my favorite playgrounds in years.

Beat Down: Fists of Vengeance (2005)

With its much-vaunted "World Tour" mode, Street Fighter 6 is copying the homework of a game Capcom actually developed nearly 2 decades beforehand. Beat Down: Fists of Vengeance is a open-world brawling RPG where nearly every named thug is recruitable. These characters systemically react to the narrative state of the world, as well as the other companions you've recruited. There's a disguise mechanic that reveals a pair of juicy booty shorts will make fellow criminals temporarily overlook your presence, but make the cops furious. If you want such attention, and you're confident in the strength of your fists? That notice is yours for the taking.

Beat Down is messy. I'm finding the pickpocketing mechanic impossible to use. But, it feels fantastic to play, and it's interesting, and it suggests a future for the 3D brawler that never got followed.

If we're lucky, the challenge it sets forward by existing will indeed be answered sooner than later.

Robocop: Rogue City (2023)

I didn't want Robocop: Rogue City on this list originally. I think it deserves an 8 or a 9! But, I acknowledge that it's what a lot of people would think about for a 7/10 video game. It commits to weirdly large ideas, including an open, explorable hub. It doesn't care so much about challenge as about making every step feel like Robocop--and it turns out, being Robocop isn't actually all that hard. It's a game with distinct edges... and if those edges were gone, the game would actually fall apart in the process. So, the developer, Teyon, wisely makes something deeply impressive with the box they've been given.

Committing to a fantasy for better and worse, and delivering an amibitious project on a budget, is something Teyon has been doing since Terminator: Resistance. It's not a surprise that I'm excited to see whatever they choose to turn their attention to next.

HONORABLE MENTION

Rogue Trip: Vacation 2012 (1998)

The team behind Twisted Metal 1 and Twisted Metal 2, finding themselves no longer able to work on their own franchise, made a new kind of vehicular combat game that built on all their prior experience and technology. Their new direction?

Ska.

Instead of a dark fantasy about a cursed demolition derby with an unexpected prize, Rogue Trip features a satirical post-apocalyptic setting. You can play as a decomposing Elvis impersonator, among other grotesque caricatures. New mechanics were rooted in everything from Crazy Taxi to capture-the-flag modes taking PC games of the time by storm. And, the entire soundtrack is composed of licensed ska bangers that still fill Spotify playlists today.

This is an honorable mention not because it's weird and doesn't quite work, but because everything about it works--the world simply wasn't strong enough to recognize it when it mattered. It had a full ska soundtrack. In the face of Rogue Trip, we are all made cowards and charlatans.

God forgive us.

I don't know how I wasn't aware of Rogue Trip: Vacation 2012 before today. Thank you so much for bringing this to my attention (and love the concept of this list!)

What a great idea for a list. So many games I didn't know about or had totally forgotten about.

I love the concept 'game-shaped object', that perfectly sums up some of the disappointing experiences I've had over the past few years. In fact, this whole list spoke to some intangible property of certain games that I've never been able to put into words - Xalavier is one hell of a writer!!

Lists like this are why I'm so glad the guest lists are back for giant bomb this year.

He must've played a different Saints Row than me.

I knew this was gonna be a good read when it opened with Clash. The PSX was a big part of my childhood, and almost every game I played there felt like this interpretation of a 7/10 game, or at least they do in my memory. I gotta find find Rogue Trip and try it out sometime.

Rogue Trip sounds like a fucking masterpiece to be honest. Gonna have to see about hunting down a copy through perfectly legitimate means, I assure you.

Great list idea! These games need more love in this day and age where +8/10 is the benchmark for any game worth your time.

Glad to hear someone else have something positive to say about Saints Row 2022. I played it throughout the latter half of this year. I'm not into the writing, and the sound design is busted (At least on PS5), but I honestly had a great time with the video game itself. With the aforementioned sound and writing problems, it was my go-to "Podcast game." It's an all-around fun experience, and Santo Ileso is a unique and underrated open world to explore.

Xalavier comes through once again 🙏 Motherfucking Beat Down. If you haven't yet, you should also look into the similarly named, but totally different weird game, Breakdown. Messy controls aside, I think you'll really appreciate the vibe.

I played Saints Row reboot after most of the bugs were fixed thanks to PS Plus. The best I can describe it is "Meh". It wasn't bad, but it was that good either. It was a decent sandbox game I needed, since it been years since I played one after GTA V. The gameplay is good enough to keep you distracted if you have nothing better to do. And the story got predictable real fast. The twist in the end I saw a mile away. And the lack of music overall in the radio stations left much to be desired, especially since they did a much better job in the older games.

With that said, the huge backlash was not justified, since it was mostly not even about the game and its performance, but a bunch of online racist whining about the game being too woke because of the main cast. Even though the Saints Row games always had a diverse cast, and you could play the lead character as anything you created. I went with the default design, however.

That cast had deeper problems than that. Incredibly flat and boring with maybe one mission where they open up a little. They don't really make good on them being affiliated with the opposing gangs, either.

There are directions you can see that story going and they just don't commit or flesh it out enough. I did like the city, or at least the parts that weren't empty.

Currently free today on EGS, for those interested.

Beat Down is really underappreciated.

Hell yeah, sick list! El Paso, Elsewhere really resonated with me, one of my favorites of '23. Glad Strange Scaffold is around and creating such a specific yet eclectic mix of games.