Well howdy, stranger. I didn’t see you there. In my home. Watching me sit very still as I listen to records and watch wrestling. Don’t do that to people, it’s unsettling. You're giving everyone (me and my dog) the heebie jeebies. In any case, you’re here now, so, just lemme quickly swipe all these Cheez-It crumbs off my chest/couch and… there we go. Kick back, grab a drink, keep these six footlong chili dogs between us and let me take you on a journey to a world beyond time, space, and quarantine, to the splendiferous world of Galaga II!

Are you tired? Overworked? Underfucked? Kids got you down? Wife leave you? Do you struggle to feel love for anything other than your television? We don’t have a pill for that… we have A WHOLE ISLAND FOR IT. Book your next vacation for the sandy shores of Galaga II, a 5-star getaway from reality!

You’ll fall head over hooves for residents. Whether it’s Felicity (a cat named after Keri Russel’s titular character who hates prog rock), Lucy (a pig whose house is decorated like a Lynchian funeral parlor) or Muffy the sheep who loves 90s television and The Cure.

Why, is that Riverdale’s number two redhead Archie Andrews frolicking in one of our spacious backyards? No, idiot, of course not! That’s an N on his sweater and this isn’t Riverdale! He doesn’t wear glasses either!

Take in a match at The Hideout, where residents sit quietly and listen to records or watch wrestling. What else could you possibly want out of life? Here’s Night Cobra, being told his gimmick sucks and that he’s doing the job tonight. Best of luck on your future endeavors, pal!

Chain smoke and play video Mahjong on the arcade boardwalk outside one of our many (two) brick and mortar retail establishments. A boardwalk arcade outside a brick and mortar retailer? In Galaga II, every day feels like The Future.

Tweak on, tweakers. If you need a quick pick me up, feel free to stop by one of our quaint little seaside methlabs to get cookin’! Set sail on crystal blue meth near our crystal blue shores. Just like our local sea life, you’ll be hooked!

You’ll spend dozens upon dozens of hours sinking your heart and soul into a fictional village while the world around you burns to a crisp. Even if you want to leave, you can’t! Nintendo runs the wifi here and they do a really shitty job of it. Besides, you’re under quarantine now. Youin the Galaga II jungle, baby. You gonna die. Coulda been worse. Coulda had a wife and kids. But you know, while you’re stuck here… you could read my List of Video Game Things, 2020. If that’s your bag.

Mortal Kombat 11: Aftermath cast, ranked worst to best

12) Fujin

Fujin sucks, fuck Fujin. Raiden is boring enough. Did he need a more boring little brother? Wind god? Get the fuck outta here.

11) Kotal Kahn

If Shao Kahn is HHH, a relentless and unapologetic conqueror/megaheel, Kotal Kahn is John Cena; a royal, do-gooder asshole who thinks good is good. They both have their place and serve their purpose, it’s just that Kotal’s purpose is so lame. Kotal Kahn is for troops and babies.

10) Kung Lao

Another also-ran. Points for getting absolutely obliterated by Shao Kahn, though. A worthy demise. He doesn't even get a damn picture.

9) Raiden

Listen. Raiden is fine. Thunder is a cool thing, no doubt. But he’s just kinda there. He’s Leonardo. His personality is leadership. He doesn’t party, he doesn’t do machines, and he’s only rude when his eyes glow red. Props to them for cutting Chris Lambert a check, though.

8) Kitana

Kitana is cool. I feel for her. Momma Sindel does her real dirty. She just happens to be a regular, cool lady lost in the shuffle of some real kooky cats, so she doesn’t stick out much.

7) Fire God Liu Kang

I’ll admit that the whole Fire God thing is a major upgrade for Liu Kang, who is effortlessly cool but ultimately less cool than most other Kombatants. He’s good and cool and I trust the sands of time in his hands.

6) Nightwolf

Nightwolf can summon wolf spirits and carries TWO axes. Next question.

5) Kronika

There’s a monotonous evil to Kronika that jives well with her bald, pitch-white visage. Her stern, robotic scolding works well when you consider your ultimate goal is to split her the fuck in half (see: above). She’s a great villain, but not a cool villain. And now, for the folks at home: it’s time to talk to your children about Cool Villains…

4) Sindel

Mother of Kitana, husband of Shao Kahn, bows to no one. She rocks that long white witchy stripe right down the mane and makes Shao Kahn, ruler of Outworld, do her bidding. She’s quick to the cut and also has wiccan summoning type spells. Bend the knee.

3) Sheeva

Sheeva is lady version of Gorro. They both own. Best of luck with her, Johnny Cage.

2) Shang Tsung

Retaining the services of Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, the actor who played Shang Tsung in the 1995 Academy Award Best Picture hopeful Mortal Kombat was crucial to this whole Aftermath enterprise. Tagawa chews the set to pieces and has a blast doing it. That punchable little smirk of his just shines right through the screen. If Shang Tsung had better backup than Fujin and Nightwolf for this little road romp through time and space, I would’ve had a much better time with this expansion. If only publishers Warner Bros had the rights to Jay and Silent Bob. But Tagawa revels in his role as Shang Tsung and puts this game over the top as one of the best fighters in years.

1) Shao Kahn

BUT GODDAMNIT SHAO KAHN AIN’T SHOWING UP TO WORK UNLESS HE’S GOING OVER. A humble servant to Sindel, Shao Kahn is a brooding, growly beast who lives to own and owns to live. He carries a gold sledgehammer and does not give a fuck. His helmet crown is a skull. He also thinks Kotal Kahn is a fucking jobber. Shao Kahn will conquer nations for his woman without even blinking and he’ll savor every moment. Like Akuma, Shao Kahn gets his rocks off to one-on-one Kombat and has more muscles than hairs. KING OF KINGS.

Honorable Ownage: Robocop

They added Robocop to Mortal Kombat 11. They should do this to every video game. Until then, please enjoy these fatalities.

Best 2019 Games of 2020

Super Mario Maker 2

I think Mario’s 35th birthday got me a little nostalgic. I had a pretty hard Mario Maker relapse in 2020 and ended up pouring a couple dozen more hours into making my very first Mario World. There’s just something about this chubby lil’ plumber, man. When I boot up that game, it still feels like magic. It’s the dream fulfilled. This game lets me make my very own Super Mario worlds. I’ve wanted to do that since I was three years old. And now, stinky and loveless at 32, I can!

Eliza

Eliza the game is about Eliza the app. Eliza is a mental health service/AI program that turns the operator into a mental health counselor and allows patients a quick, affordable, and trusted outlet for mental health care. You run therapy sessions with people, navigate the ins and outs of Silicon Valley while trying to balance your personal life, the highlight of which is hanging out with your electronica artist galpal Nora.

Eliza isn’t subtle. The game paints its bad guys pretty dark. The game’s core message is that Silicon Valley is filled with assholes that cannot solve something like the mental health crisis with money/technology.

There are some truly lovable characters here, and much of that is owed to the voice acting. The whole cast is wonderful, but Aily Kei as leading Evelyn is tremendous, having electric chemistry with everyone in her orbit. You should play Eliza.

Islanders

From the makers of 2017’s very neat Superflight comes the self-billed minimalist city builder Islanders. So you get a heavens overhead view of an island, right? Then at the bottom of the screen you have various buildings/structures, like houses, city centers, breweries, fish hatcheries, Teri Hatcheries, the whole megillah. It’s kind of like you’re connecting/overlapping different Venn diagrams, with each building having its own compatible/incompatible radius. So if you stick Building X next to Buildings Y and Z, X might score points for Y, but lose points for Z, dependent on the nature of the building/structure. Shaman aren’t compatible with mansions, city centers shouldn’t be too close to each other, and be sure to build your racetracks near glue factories. Then you just click away at the island and build stuff near (or far from!) other stuff to max out your points to unlock the next island.

And they who build their island best climbs the scoreboard until they are the true Islanders champion. They are the most, chill, mellowed out low-stakes city builder this world has ever known. Because this game’s core loop and cute look is so mesmerizing and relaxing. You just find the biggest number and click it and then the points go up and you click again and click some more and click and click click click click click click...

Dark Pictures: Man of Medan

The Dark Pictures anthology is a great continuation of the formula Supermassive cracked with their cult hit Until Dawn back in 2015. Man of Medan starts as more of a thriller than a straight up horror, but the hot and horny choose-your-own young adult adventure mechanics are still intact. The fun of these games will always be choosing the dumbass option; forcing horny Iceman from the X-Men movies to suckerpunch his captors at every opportunity, making cowardly husband cower like a husband, or letting blonde lady do whatever the hell she wants. Nabbing horror vets Larry Fessenden and Graham Reznick to pen these adventures was a good move, as the two are intimately familiar with the genre’s tropes and how to twist and turn them. I can think of few greater traditions than Supermassive popping out an easy, breezy multiplayer horror game every year.

Regrets, 2020

Dark Pictures: Little Hope

With all that being said, I regret not playing more of this one. The three hours I spent with it was over Zoom with bottle of wine, so I have nothing to report here other than a much needed, laugh-a-minute blackout with my best friends.

Kentucky Route Zero

I regret not having the patience for Kentucky Route Zero. I can’t read a 10hr video game that moves this slow. I can’t do it. Where are the power pellets? Why can’t I eat the ghosts? Where’s the timer? What’s my high score? What’s my age again?

Umurangi Generation

I regret not powering through Umurangi Generation, a game that hated me. Slow, restrictive movement and objectives that really don’t seem to pop when you complete them. My obsession with photo modes helped sell me on this one, as the game’s central mechanic is finely tuning photographs. I just can’t stand playing it. A fascinating world and premise that I wish I loved.

Paper Mario: The Origami King

I wish I would’ve liked this enough to play it more. The battle system was clever at first blush but lost its luster after a few hours. The writing is fitfully funny, winky and self-referential but not over the top annoying. It’s a charming little romp and looks cute as a button but it really loses momentum as the battles wear on.

Ion Fury

I regret buying Ion Fury, formerly known as Ion Maiden until Eddie unleashed the lawyers. And not to be confused with Ion Storm, developers of Daikatana. For some reason I thought the “Duke Nukem BUT A LADY” pitch sounded good. That was in the Before Times. I was somehow even stupider back then.

I think this game sucks ass. It feels like shit on Switch and I couldn’t make it out of the first level. It looked and sounded bad and it was not funny. It launched with un-invertible controls. The unmitigated gall.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2

I regret paying Sonic the Hedgehog 2 for the millionth time. I don’t even think I like this game anymore. What is it about Sonic that still makes my pointy blue ears perk up? Is it all nostalgia? Is it the music? The morbid curiosity? The inexplicable, Ninja Turtle-esque longevity? The answer may surprise you:

Knuckles. It’s Knuckles. My favorite color is red and Knuckles is red so I love Knuckles. I think he’s cool and bad and he can fly and climb. He’s kind of in that Proto-Man or (*fawns*) Akuma tweener category, which makes him that much cooler.

So there’s my secret. I love Knuckles. Nevertheless, I think, I hope, I pray that this is the last time I play Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Until next year.

Old Games, 2020

Gone Home (2013)

A great game with a heaping helping of riot grrrl flare. A love story. A ghost story. A tragedy. A tour through the hurt of 90s alt-indie scene in the pacific northwest. Fullbright’s knack for storytelling was clear from the jump. Their 2013 debut became synonymous with the tag Walking Simulator and was a critical breakout, having since been ported to everything under the sun. I’ve played countless games like Gone Home since it came out seven years ago, but it was nice to finally sit down and see what it was, especially because I had no idea that they threw so many great licensed songs in there. Both this and Tacoma are shining examples of grounded, emotional storytelling in video games.

I hope now that Fullbright has proven time and again that they can draw compelling characters and tell great stories, they make their games more fun to play. More quirky or goofy or… something. Maybe VR should be their next step. Wherever they trek, I’ll follow.

No More Heroes 1 & 2 (2008, 2010)

In 2008, No More Heroes was a great gateway drug to the weird, wild world of Suda 51 for me. It was an M-Rated, Wii exclusive open-world game about some geeky burnout named Travis Touchdown who buys a Technically Not A Lightsaber™ online and gets into the business of hot, grim death.

The gameplay was never this game’s strong suit, and the 12 years since its release have not been kind to the mashy, repetitive combat. The “open world” was totally barren with none of GTA’s zaniness and served as more of an activity menu than a living world (a common review complaint at the time that they ended up taking to heart by removing the open world from the sequel and replacing it with: a menu). Travis’ Tarantino tough guy schtick and overall grossness might test your patience in 2020, but this bizzarro Wick-esque world where anything can happen (and everything does happen in this game’s fourth wall breaking ending) is a lawless, punk rock wasteland of low-brow grime that was just not happening much in 2008. No way is Ubisoft publishing a game this gnarly, dark and weird these days, especially as a Nintendo exclusive.

The 2010 sequel Desperate Struggle doubles down on the weird, but two games worth of this stale combat is just too much to bear. Some of the boss fights are fun curveballs, but they serve mostly as a distraction from the banality of the combat. If you’re playing this game for more than one or two missions, you’re in it for the story. This gross-out exploitation flick staring a lonely, horny dork. The world probably doesn’t need these games right now, but it was nice to find this dark and grimy alleyway in the world of the Nintendo Wii back in last decade. Also, shout outs to Lay the Pipe, the 8-bit puzzle mini game that should be a full NES game.

Return of the Obra Dinn (2018)

My lifelong struggle with adventure games rages on. I want nothing more than to love them deeply but the act of playing them either befuddles me or bores me to tears. Obra Dinn looks unlike any other game out today. Its concept: you are an insurance agent tasked with reconstructing the fate of the large sea vessel the Obra Dinn. You find and chase spirits, cross reference clipboards and sheets and all sorts of homework-y bullshit that I just don’t want to spend my free time doing. A truly alluring world with a bonkers concept that seems poised to be a sci-fi classic. But what if you could, like… win a Lightsaber™ on eBay in it, though?

Shenmue I & II (1999, 2001)

There’s a dull, numbing rhythm to the world of Shenmue that hypnotizes me. It’s Pro Golf-like in that way. I always want to nap during it, but will happily, groggily blink awake while something incredibly mundane happens on screen at an excruciating pace. You got 3rd again in the forklift races. The dock boys politely clap. Have a forklift figurine. Just a few more shifts, then we’ll make like Horatio Sanz and Boat Trip.

These games are like if warm butter tasted nutritious and gross. Drippy, slow and sticky with a slightly gray taste. Uncomfortably damp rather than melty. If I had to play these games myself I don’t think I would last. I couldn’t take this world and take it straight. I was happy to ride shotgun with my designated forklift driver and BFF Arty B. Not only did he have to be the one to hold the controller, he had to listen to me get cranked and cackle at my own one-liners the whole time. Blessed are the Arthurs, for they shall inherit my records.

I cannot tell you that the Shenmue games are good and that you should play them. They’re ambitious games, no doubt. But a game so committed to being dull as shit can only be so interesting. I just cannot break its spell, though.

Burnout Paradise Remastered (2008)

I lost track of how many different versions of Burnout Paradise I’ve got now, but I know this: it’s not enough. I plugged another 50ish hours into this all-time classic when it hit Switch in March. Twelve years on, the goddamn thing still runs. At 60 frames per second, this game was Born to Run on Switch. Thank you.

Sleeping Dogs (2012)

Slick and shiny Hong Kong crime thriller. Broken and goofy in all the right ways; ways that benefit the player. I’ve been trucked and flattened in the middle of the street like Wile E. Coyote only to wind up on the other side unharmed with my sick motorbike still intact. I’ve mowed down enough cops and crooks to afford anything I need. The controls feel slippy slidy here and there, but once again it’s always to the players benefit. It’s a merciful wonkiness. You’ll almost always get lucky on edges and angles.

Deadly Premonition (2010)

If you like drugs, whistling, Twin Peaks, Tommy Wiseau, and wrestling with a controller, I’ve found the game for you. I found it 10 years too late but I’m still very happy I found it.

Doom 64 (1997)

Doom 64 is a fun curiosity but a pretty poor Doom game. Originally developed by Midway, Nightdive Studios put out a faithful but modernized port of the 1997 N64 exclusive that can’t quite shake the shackles of its native console. Doom 64 feels like two separate games with a canyon of quality between them and the second game kicks in way too late. By the time you finish floatily running through blurry, muddy space stations and get to the good stuff (Hell™), the game has already worn out its welcome. Levels are small yet somehow confusing and directionless. The challenge is barely there until the game’s home stretch. The ambient music is absolutely lifeless throughout and feels like an affront to Doom itself.

It’s a perplexing yet noble endeavor making this game playable in 2020, but it’s just not fun to play. The developers at id have often professed their love for Doom 64 in the run-up to Doom Eternal’s release, so there are bits of 64’s lore in Eternal, but none of that really makes it worth playing.

Small Stuff, 2020

Super Mario 35

The only thing that matters about this game is that I won. I won a lot because I’m better at Mario than you. This is not an endorsement of the game, this is not a review, these are all just facts.

Star Wars Squadrons

It turns out that Star Wars feels pretty dope in VR. Flying around in an X-Wing popping off TIE-Intercepters and shit. PEW! POW! BIFF! ZOODLE! LOOK AT ME AUNT BERU, I’M A FRIGGIN’ B-WING OVER HERE!

There isn’t much going on in Squadrons beyond the novelty of flying around in Star Wars ships, but I must admit that it’s quite novel.

Pac-Man Championship Edition de-make

Stranded on a recent Namco archival release of boring NES ports lies Pac-Man Championship Edition, an 8-bit inspired retro-prequel of the XBLA classic by the same name. While slight, including only a 5-minute or 3-minute mode, it’s a fun diversion on an otherwise ho-hum collection. But more importantly than anything, it has a Sound Test screen. God save the Sound Test. It even has some dancy, crunchy chiptunes tucked away that went unused in the final game.

It certainly earns its status as retro de-make throwback. Gone are the slow-mo almost had-em’s and ace in the hole bombs from 2010’s Pac-Man Championship Edition DX, making it harder and therefore more faithful to the game’s fictitious NES roots. The maps are tighter and take less time to complete, there are fewer ghosts, but this somewhat hidden offshoot offers a fun, accurate take on what an alternate universe CEDX for NES might be like.

The Ancient Gods part 1

Doom Eternal’s combat was a massive expansion on the 2016 reboot. It took the run and gun pacing and explosive combo-chaining of the first game and extrapolated those concepts into largescale combat chess puzzles. You’re forced to feed into its resource recycling system while plotting out which demons get owned in which order. While the combat transition in the main campaign is largely successful, the game was far more frustrating far more often than the last one. The various systems often overwhelmed and collapsed in on me at the worst times, leading to me banging my head against certain sequences for hours on end.

Turns out I didn’t know how easy I had it until The Ancient Gods pt. 1 DLC. While only three maps long, Ancient Gods was stunningly punishing on Ultra-Violence. These battles feel like the peak of id’s combat arena design. While the main combat mechanics remain the same, the demon-specific weaknesses and demonic hierarchy feels like a much larger part of the battle puzzle for Doomguy to solve. Aside from one eye-roll of a boss (shoot the flying… haunted steel boxes!), these are the sleekest, hardest maps id has made since the reboot. They might destroy you. They might be too much. But this is what Doom is made of.

Music, 2020

Soundtrack of the Year: Final Fantasy VII Remake

There aren’t many video game songs that tug on my heartstrings as hard as “Tifa’s Theme.” It’s that, “Sheik’s Theme” from Ocarina of Time, and the 8-bit cover of “Hell Song.” There’s a lot of nostalgia tangled up with this soundtrack. The re-arrangements surely shine, but the new tracks sing loudest. The Wall Market dance sequence is a thrill, and any game where you can find unlockable songs out in the wild is a winner. And these picture discs, good Gaia.

Song of the Summer: “Paradise (Stay Forever)” by Epoch from the Paradise Killer soundtrack

I’ll always have a soft spot for theme songs that reference plotlines within the material. Most Bond movies. Lots of Martin Lawrence movies. The lyrics/references in this song won’t make a lick of sense to passerbys who haven’t played the game but that bangin’ ass beat will make fans out of ‘em anyway. Those big, corny synthesized horns. The tropical rhythm. That groovy, plucky bass. This puppy can dance, fella or madam. The soundtrack is filled with bright and shiny citypop funk, but this here track is the only tune with vocals. They soar here, even if the lyrics are mostly mishmashed nonsense from the game’s story that fit the melody.

WKKZ Top 10 Countdown

#10) “Drivin’” by K.K. Slider

Starting off our countdown is the Sunday driving classic “Drivin,” an ode to the open road by none other than touring troubadour K.K. Slider. Drop the top, crank the volume, and make sure to tune in next week to see if “Drivin’” can still hang on!

#9) “Techno-Pop” by K.K. Slider

In the nine slot this week is electronic artist K.K. Slider and his groovy, movey dancehall romp “Techno-Pop.” K.K. has manufactured countless hits in the lab, so stay tuned for more of the mad doctor’s wild experiments on this week’s countdown.

#8) “Jongara” by K.K. Slider

World artist K.K. Slider is the man behind this week’s number eight song, “Jongara,” a plucky guitar trip through the land of the rising sun. This is Slider’s 7,945th time on the countdown but only his 7,945th time in the eight slot. Enjoy!

#7) "DJ" by K.K. Slider

Hold on to your hats, DJ K.K. is in the house. This week’s lucky number seven is K.K. Slider with “DJ.” The international super producer has been spotted on Instagram recently with Englebert Humperdinck and Dan Fogleberg, so here’s to hoping the fruits of that hot collab end up on our countdown soon.

#6) “House” by K.K. Slider

This week’s number six is for the gym rats. The unstoppable beat of K.K. Slider’s “House” is sure to get your heart rate running. Here it is at number six.

#5) "Metal" by K.K. Slider

We’re halfway through this week’s countdown, and still stuck at number five is “Metal” by Birmingham’s K.K. Slider. Make sure you hide this one from the kids, mum and pop pop. Wouldn’t want them to turn out cool! A countdown stalwart, guitar god K.K. Slider will shred ‘til he’s dead. Number fiiiiiiiive…

#4) “Disco” by K.K. Slider

We’re getting ever closer to the top of the pops, but disco is still not dead. That rhythm that goes from your tip to your toes is this week’s number four, “Disco” by K.K. Slider. Stay tuned for the top three songs in vibration nation on this week’s countdown.

#3) “D&B” by K.K. Slider

The kids just can’t get enough of that drum and bass, but will “D&B” ever break through that three spot curse? The same curse that befell “Forgot About Dre” on TRL? K.K. Slider has proven to be an eccentric stalwart in the three spot, but you’ll have to tune in next week to see if he can break through to one or two. Are you having trouble breaking through to the one you love? Stop by this week’s sponsor Cupid’s Playpen to find the perfect lovemaking apparatus for your special someone. Use the offer code “FUXGOOD20” for 20% off your next curbside pickup. Cupid’s Playpen: a place for pervs. We’ll be back after these messages with a big number two.

#2) “Go K.K. Rider” by K.K. Rider

It seems the duel between longform story songs and fusion jazz never ends! This weeks Number Two Dookie Doo is “Go K.K. Rider” by K.K. Rider (no relation). The epic tale of motorcycle mayhem and the decline of western civilization told through the eyes of former stuntman and current outlaw drug runner K.K. Slider is still trading spots with this week’s upcoming number one hit. Stay tuned for this week’s top song on the K.K. Slider Top 10 Countdown.

#1) “Fusion” by K.K. Slider

Here it is, this week’s number one song sweeping the nation from station to station. Jazz fusion legend K.K. Slider wins again with “Fusion.” K.K. recorded this song between sessions with Magma and Chick Corea, playing all the instruments himself. Slider has lived a life, and we’re happy to have him here at number one again for the 7,945th time in a row. Tune in next week to see if literally anyone else ever cracks the top ten on the K.K. Slider Top 10 Countdown on WKKZ FM, THE KOKZ.

Video Games, 2020

10) Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity

This game is mostly the mindless, button mashing marathon you’d expect from a Dynasty Warriors clone with a Hyrulian paintjob, but that doesn’t stop it from being fun. You get to fuck shit up as Zelda, which is cool. Goron hunk Daruk is in it, as is the baddest bitch in Gerudo desert, Urbosa. Are the kids still shipping these days? I’d like to ship Urbosa and Zelda, if I may. Merge them kingdoms, ladies. Who needs Link?

Reimagining Breath of the Wild as Dynasty Warriors turns out to be a fun experiment. BOTW’s elemental attacks/weakness are intact, as are the game’s Sheikah Slate special attacks. The resource hoarding and crafting is still here too, but it feels more superficial and less meaningful this time around. This is still very much a Dynasty Warriors game, but most of the Zelda stuff they layer on top is tasty. There are some cute, weird Star Fox and F-Zero references tucked away here, too.

9) Black Mesa

They finally finished Black Mesa! Maybe someday I’ll finish Black Mesa, too.

8) Yakuza: Like a Dragon

Once upon I time was merely happy to know Sega was bringing this cult favorite to the US. Yakuza’s goofball take on hardboiled crime thriller somehow struck the perfect tone game after game, giving us some of the funniest writing in games over the last decade. Come 2020, we’re drowning in a sea of Yakuza ports, remakes and remasters. As the Ryu Ga Gotoku finally wrapped their seemingly endless victory tour by modernizing and finalizing the Kiryu Kazuma saga, they celebrate 2020 with a series refresh starring rookie lead Ichiban and entirely revamped turn-based combat system a la actual, licensed Dragon Quest ™.

Few open world games are as confident in their script and voice actors as the Yakuza games. At once, it dangerously dances between gritty gangland epic and screwball comedy with grace. There’s always a sweetness to Yakuza that other, more expensive games in the same genre can’t seem to nail down. While dear, sweet Kiryu is gone for now, hopefully dad-joking around and aiding sex-workers in street disputes, Ichiban takes the reins on our trip through Kamurocho.

Like most games, the Yakuza games are too long. I will probably never finish a single one of them. But I’d sure like to, because they’re funnier than any other series going.

7) Fuser

Out of the blue and into the black comes Fuser, the game that makes YOU some douchebag EDM DJ with a pill habit. Fuser lets you mix and mash Today’s Golden Oldies into the perfect nightmare so a bunch of hot, young fuckups can do drugs and screw.

It’s hard to stop playing Fuser. Just drowning in a sea of stems wondering “which song won’t work with the ‘Bodak Yellow’ vocal track?” The answer of course is none. None songs.

The magic of this game is everything it doesn’t show you, how it beat matches and adjust tempo on the fly so some dickhead like me can feel like DJ Shaquille O’Neil. The campaign falls under its own weight near the end when it keeps piling on tip after trick to make your mixes sick. The game’s high-end play seems more complex and far less fun than making silly mashups, but those tools are there if you want to get down to the nuts and bolts of it. At some point if you’re going that far, I feel like you’re better off getting actual music editing software to get your jollies.

This game is at its best when it’s strictly fuckaround shit. I wish there were more songs available and bigger crates so I could just freestyle endlessly. The co-op freestyle is fun, so is watching and voting on other people’s mixes. I just wish there was away to break this game wide open so we could get wet and wild with it. Fuck your DMCA takedown, you hear me Lars Ulrich?

6) Paradise Killer

What happens when the gods fuck up? What happens when Heaven goes wrong? In the 25th rendition of perfection, there’s been a murder. The suspect is in custody, but something doesn’t add up.

Paradise Killer is a first person adventure game laid out in 3-D but told as a choose-yer-own ending text adventure. It’s filled with trans-human gods and goddesses that you can flirt with, fuck and interrogate. The only one up for the job is Lady Love Dies.

The character design here is inspired, blending humans and animals together with high future fashion. The rest of game doesn’t look great, but traversal functions well enough in that jumpy, jagged sort of way the Bethesda games do. This one just has more grace. Yes, it could run a little faster on Switch. And some of the budget/indie constraints definitely get in the way here and there. But the jumping and running around is forgiving in a way that makes all your dumb, risky jumps pay off. Any game without fall damage will always get the nod from me.

This game’s greatest strength is its pacing. You can end it whenever you want, it just depends on how much of the mystery you want to unwrap yourself. It only lasted me five hours, but it turned out I only figured out half of it. That pacing/structure lends itself well to the game’s replayability, something I didn’t think I could say about a text adventure game.

5) Animal Crossing New Horizons

I played this game for far longer than I ever actually enjoyed playing it. I made a cute AF town and dressed my little fella up in all sorts of costumes, but Nintendo always manages to Nintendo something up along the way. The countless quality of life features they could implement but won’t. The unreliable, tedious online functionality. Hope falters that they will ever find the righteous path. But that didn’t stop me from plugging almost 200 hours into it, so who’s the fuckup? Hint: it me.

I love this game, but at some point it became less of a game I play and more of a thing I do, like brushing my teeth or wiping my ass. I would wake up, boot Animal Crossing, go to work, pay my bills, turn the game off, go to work, pay my bills, turn the game back on, rinse, wash, repeat. Can you fall in love with a habit? Is a second life something I really need when I barely even like this first one? I need to figure some shit out. Right after I check my turnip prices.

4) Final Fantasy VII Remake

I wasn’t sure this game would actually ever come out. Like countless reboots or reinterpretations, it seemed destined to disappoint. The impact that Final Fantasy VII had on RPGs is hard to overstate. It sold by the truckload to become the breakout JRPG in North America. One reason is this game’s flavor of mid-90s dark edginess. Cloud is so cool! His sword is so big! Barret swears a lot! Tifa’s bazungas are ginormous!

The nostalgia for that deeply corny sense of cool hung like an anvil over this game, but I think it did a great job of modernizing this cast of characters. Cloud is far less punchable now. Barret is no longer an extended Mr. T riff. We get to see Jesse fully fleshed out in what turns out to be the game’s strongest bit of storytelling. We get some incredibly sweet moments between Wedge and Biggs, making them much more than a tossed off Star Wars reference this time around.

This game reaches for some of the tongue in cheeky, self-referential stuff, but it surprisingly (mostly) lands. The silly, pseudo-immersive quick time events and tedious traversal sequences are recreated here and doubled down on to the point where I think they’re havin’ a laugh on us. “Let’s all unlock the door at the same time, but three times this time!” “Let’s make monkey bar sequences slower!” As far as the winky, self-referential stuff goes, the game’s ending is executed a little wobbly, but it still sets up an exciting future for whichever timeline this series will continue in.

Radical Mention:Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2

The only reason this is number three here is because it feels unfair to other games that this game exists, so it gets handicapped. This game feels like staring into the stupid face of god and doing a wallplant off it. The early Tony Hawk games are some of the best video games of all time. That they are now fully redone on modern consoles with the same feel and same soundtrack (almost) and even more stuff to do makes this package one of the best games you can play. Like ever. Like, man… they really did it. Tony’s back, man. Tony. Developer Vicarious Visions deserves all the belts for this. This should be the remaster all other remasters are judged by. Besides records and wrestling, what else could you want?

Runner-up: Doom Eternal

Doom Eternal didn’t have the element of surprise on its side. The highly anticipated follow-up to 2016’s DOOM would have to carry the weight of not only the franchise’s 20 something year legacy, but the quality standard set by the absolute and unequivocal ownage of one of the greatest games from this generation, DOOM. When DOOM came out, it felt like an underdog. Expectations for the game were low. It spent years in developmental hell, the multiplayer beta was met with shrugs, and Bethesda refused to screen it for critics. You know what kinda shit doesn’t get screened for critics? Eragon. And yet, DOOM owned. It owned so fucking hard. It is unquestionably the best Doom game. It is the best reboot of anything ever. It is a masterpiece. And despite carrying the burden of the Doom franchise and all the expectations that come with it, it managed to come out of nowhere.

Eternal could’ve been just another Doom II; a more-of-same sequel with a little more spice and far worse level design. I think what id did was ask the question “what CAN’T a Doom game be?” and answered with Doom Eternal. This game takes big series risks. Doomguy speaks. Doomguy swims. Doomguy lores way, way too much. Doomguy gets actually called “Doomguy” by name in the game. There is an abundance of 3D platforming in this game. This game breaks Doom Rules with abandoned, to varying degrees of success.

Doom Eternal expands greatly on the series’ lore to the point of oversaturation. It feels like Doomguy is getting way too involved with inter-realm politics. Killing gods and angels is honest work of course, but I you don’t need to tell me why. I also never needed or wanted to know Doomguy’s actual, canonical origin. It’s a little midichlorian-y.

At times, the gameplay falls victim to the same problem of too damn much. Eternal’s systems are a lot. Too many skill/perk trees and a dizzying array of buttons to press during hellfire combat can cause the game fall beneath its own weight. With a mouse and keyboard, I feel like I can’t keep track of which key is which. With a controller, it feels like there aren’t enough buttons. But when that tension meshes just right with the games resource recycling tree (glory kills for health, chainsaws kills for ammo, set them on fire for armor drops), it feels like Hellzapoppin. That’s when the Doom hits, baby.

While I don’t think Doom Eternal is better than DOOM, it’s a far better sequel than Doom II and dared to stretch in ways the 1994 sequel didn’t. It doesn’t always work, but the when the challenge matches the tension matches the chaos and you’re bashing your head against a perfectly balanced encounter, it feels so goddamn good to finally smash your head through it. It’s the Doomslayer way.

DOOM of the Year: Hades

Hades is about rebuilding. It’s not about making things the way they were, but letting things begin again. It’s about letting light in and second chances. It’s about relationships and how foundational they are to a home or community. You don’t necessarily have to be good at Hades for it to be rewarding, you just have to keep playing, keep trying. The game rewards you with story, with love. It feels like you’re always making Hades a better place.

In Breath of the Wild, you can complete a series of quests that eventually lead to you building a town from the ground up, filled with houses and shops and people and everything. It takes a lot of time and there’s countless fetch quests but you get to buy and sell shit there and watch this town that never was now become a part of this game, this world you helped build. What Breath of the Wild did for the “Hero of Time” narrative, what MGSV did for the “Legendary Soldier” narrative by having you take down SEVEN TANKS ON HORSEBACK, was give weight to these tired ass, taken for granted hero worship cheats, where you just talk about how cool these protagonists are by talking about shit they did off screen. Those moments made you feel like the Hero of Time or the Legendary Soldier of the Doomslayer. Hades works every bit of its gameplay mechanics and narrative back into you feeling like you as Zagreus are making literal, actual Hell better. You’re reuniting lovers. You’re repairing fragmented relationships. You’re making the fires of Hell warmer for everybody.

This game’s ultimate work is instantly making me fall in love with lead Gorgon ‘Dusa, the caretaker/bar maiden of Hades. ‘Dusa gets her split tongue tied anytime she’s in the presence of the hot, dark, cut prince Zag, but I was the one who spent the whole game showering her with nectar and Ambrosia. Buying shots for the bartender who is so cute she turns you to stone. Hades: not unrelatable.

Everybody be fuckin’ in this game. Fuckin’ or flirtin’. The games first boss is your ex-girlfriend who is also your domme. You kinda have a thing with your stepbrother, who is Death. Your mom and stepmom maybe sorta have an open thing with your dad? Aphrodite is of course more than happy to sling her thing around. Personally, I think I lean towards Nyx, the whiskey throated mother of Death and Goddess of Darkness. I want an Elvira in the sheets and endless, unwavering destruction in the streets. Simple tastes for a simple mind.

All that would be for naught if Supergiant didn’t nail the progression formula, but they so totally did. Rogue Legacy and Dead Cells are both roguelike classics because they have the adrenaline dosage worked out. Hades has it, too. But Hades has a sense of self-awareness with regards to its genre that is a) not cheeky/embarrassing and b) pushes rouge-like storytelling further than any game before it. The sheer volume of writing in this game is insane, and yet it never felt tiresome or repetitive. I spent dozens of hours and 100+ attempts on my way to the credits and still couldn’t put it down. Hades sets a new standard for this style of game and is easily the best game in Supergiant’s already impressive oeuvre.