It feels like an off year for games in some respects. A lot of games were very solid this year, but even the best ones this year couldn't stick their landing. None quite reached the heights of the past few years. A few console bests and all-time greats have come along since the Switch hit the market. Between Breath of the Wild, DOOM, and the Hitmen, we have seen some of the new Best Games. In that respect, none of the games I played this year ever felt like the 2019 runaway favorite. Except maybe one of them.

But 2019 gave us a stable, varied crop games that really pulled people in a lot of different directions for so many different reasons, whether they were decent/just or otherwise. While Triple A continues to politically sanitize their nakedly hoo-rah military shooters and iterate on their monetization techniques to diminishing returns, it feels like the Gamer Middle Class is growing. It feels like that b-game/double A/Triple I/Kickstarter tier is becoming a real thing again. As Microsoft continues to merge its Xbox brand with PC and with every publisher on the planet wanting a piece of that Switch action, those $20-40 dollar tier of games will have more chances to get in more hands than ever before. Steam and Epic are fighting. Epic is giving developers more money than any other distributor would dare. If anything, games feels more democratic in 2019.

There were a lot of exciting ideas in games that didn’t quite come together. It felt like everything had a gigantic But attached to it, only in the bad way with just the one “T.” Maybe the tech is finally hitting the ceiling this generation. I’m excited to see whatever it is they come up with next, but I think if I cling to my PC and Switch for dear life, I’ll be just fine. We won’t achieve our true potential until Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony are all putting games out on the same platforms, which is why Project xCloud or Google Stadia are ever gonna be the answer for me. Platforms and publishers will fall but the games, my friends? The games remain the same. Don’t hate the games. Don’t ever hate the games.

Now… onto this year’s Best Letdowns!

Bummers, 2019

The Division 2

I was so ready to find love in the hopeless place that is drab, always online multiplayer military shooters. Most of those games don’t allow you to throw hats at inanimate objects to possess them or take drugs that make your enemies edible, so I typically steer clear of that sorta fare. In 2019, I was finally willing to give one an honest shot. I picked The Division 2 out of a figurative hat. Maybe like a real dope, snapback, figurative Charlotte Hornets lid.

The Division 2 is so mechanically sound yet so dreadfully boring. Ubisoft’s decision to yank out any sort of political agenda from this game’s narrative is in and of itself cowardly, but ultimately forgivable. Choosing modern day Washington D.C. as backdrop for the whole shebang is even more cowardly, but so long as there’s even a minimal effort of competent, compelling narrative to shove me along, I’ll be fine. This game is so embarrassingly toothless that it can’t even muster up a conflict let alone a motivation. There is no sense of who these people are, why they do the things they do, who they’re fighting, why they’re fighting or what happens when they win/lose.

Storytelling in video games has gotten a lot better over the last decade, but so many major titles struggle to tell a coherent, memorable tale. The big failures in those spaces are not only more memorable, but often more admirable. This felt like a new low for inoffensiveness. It was like chewing a damp rag.

The Division 2 feels polished beyond the point of recognition. Everything runs great and feels good and tight and responsive. The AI is probably some of the smartest and toughest I can recall from recent years. But when no one has a name or a face or a voice and every gun is just letters and numbers jammed together and the world is so void of personality, scars, flaws or scrapes, I’d rather play something with some bugs and some beauty than something so shiny and flat.

But I’d still like to pitch a sequel. Here, try this one on for size: What if the real Division…is politics? Sorry, did I just blow your mind? Find out in The Division 3’s new and exclusive multiplayer mode where you get to play as both sides.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

There was a time when you could’ve said to me “fork over $60 and we’ll give you a brand new Symphony of the Night game by the guy who made Symphony of the Night.” That time was 2014 and I damn sure laid my money down and backed the Kickstarter. Come 2019 when this game launched for $40 as a miserable little pile of bugs, I realized I chose…poorly.

I don’t think Bloodstained is a bad game, but it was certainly a broken one on Switch. It was nearly unplayable at its June launch until its eventual October update made meaningful steps forward yet still left a lot of work to be done. That sour taste has stuck around and pushed me off of this one until the PC version is both cheap and complete.

Last year’s 8-bit prequel Curse of the Moon was a clever, quick twist on the OG Castlevania formula that played wonderfully with all the tropes afforded to it by its spiritual forefather. I’m not excited about an indie Metroidvania the same way I was five years ago, but Ritual of the Night seems to approach the Metroidvania era of Castlevania with a similar flare. The core structure of Metroidvania remains the same, but tweaks and tricks are Jenga’d into the games framework and used to explore every nook and cranny of a castle designed by the leading architect in post-modern Castlevanianism and He of Sword and Whip, Koji Igarashi. It’s a shame about all those termites in the Switch port.

Sayonara Wild Hearts

The idea of a pop album as a video game is immediately fascinating. What does the term “album” mean and how would one reconfigure or reinterpret the inherent structural differences between the two mediums of Game and Album? What would Disintegration be as a video game? Incredible? Absolutely. But how? How do you turn a song into a level? How much interaction can the player have with the game/album before it just becomes a video game soundtrack? Wherever the answers to these questions are, I could not find them in Sayonara Wild Hearts, a pop album video game that isn’t remarkable in either regard.

This game has no shortage of style. Shiny, dance-happy synth serves as your music while iPod commercial silhouettes race around and battle to the beat. It’s not a rhythm game. It’s not a racing game. It’s not an action game. It’s an auto runner where you collect stuff that doesn’t really matter and trip on a few quick time events.

There are few concepts more exciting to me than merging an album with a video game. I love both of those things more than almost anything. And this game failed to get even a spark out of me. The music, while fun and bright is mostly forgettable fluff that doesn’t rise to the heights of its inspirations.

Trials Rising

When a series gets too far off track, its often demanded or expected of them to go back to basics. “We’ve heard your feedback. We made this one for the fans.” I think the problem with a series like Trials going back to basics is that Trials is very, very basic. They needed more of a hook here. It’s good and cool and fun because it’s Trials, but I’ve played a lot of Trials. The umpteenth Trials game needs to be more than back to basics.

Travis Strikes Again

Why have you forsaken me, Suda 51? I carry a torch for Travis Touchdown for this damn long and this is the thanks I get?

This game was mildly fun for like a level or two, and then like 20 more levels happened and holy shit what a drag. Some fun story beats and that Suda 51 sense of humor I’m still a reluctant sucker for, but this game was agonizing to play. For a game that worships Jeff Minter as hard as this one does, it should really be more fun.

Unrendered Verdicts & Incomplete Grades

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

This game’s opening salvo is the most gripping intro level since the 2016 masterpiece DOOM. It leans hard on some pretty linear canned action sequences for that first chapter but developer Respawn has such a knack for fluid movement and high wire traversal that it still feels exciting. These folks might know the ins and outs of an Xbox controller better than anyone. Their affinity for and skill at telling stories about dorks and their robot buddies gives me hope that I’ll enjoy this game once I get to dig deeper into it, but I’m just so tired of all these Star Wars right now.

Remnant: From the Ashes

If this were a game by any other title, I might’ve tried to play it. Maybe next year.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses

National Lampoon’s Anime House. Is that a joke?

After Party

I like booze and I like The Devil, so I hope to get to this one despite the mixed reception.

Outer Wilds

I bounced off this one a good four or five times before throwing in the towel for the year. Will the hype eat this one alive? Will I love it? Hate it? Ever even play it again? Tune in to fuck off.

Best Multiplayer, 2019

Tetris 99

Though 2018’s Tetris Effect is a high watermark for one of the most important franchises in game history, its hippy dippy, Live Laugh Love attitude robbed us of any sort of competitive multiplayer for the puzzle-based new age feelings simulator. The excitement and elation of raining garbage on your friend and destroying them in a round of Tetris seemed too out of touch with the game’s core philosophy of unity and togetherness and T-Spins and whathaveyou.

Hot on its heels was Tetris 99, a tense and ruthless battle to the death. What seemed to start as a lame message board joke (“100 TETRIMNOS FALL OUT OF AN AIRPLANE LULZ”) done came true and got good. AND I WON. LIKE FOUR TIMES. I had to wait until they made a Tetris one, but I finally won a Fortnite-like. I have only myself to thank. Long live the Tetrisaince. Bow down all hail Tetris.

Forza Horizon 4: The Eliminator

This is the first battle royale game I’ve played where I don’t feel like a coward. In PUBG or Apex Legends, I am constantly running for cover and trying/failing to mask my inadequacies from my teammates. In The Eliminator, I’m as subtle as Soy Bomb. I’m swerving all over the countryside like a drunk mall Santa with a stolen golf cart bashing my Al Czervik car horn and begging any Mini Cooper in shouting distance to FUCKING FIGHT ME. It rules.

Every one of the 72 players starts with a Mini Cooper and either searches for loot drops or beats another player in a head-to-head race to upgrade their whip. I think it comes down to one big race as the field gets smaller, but I’ve only gotten as high as 8^th place. There’s room to improve the core structure of the mode. Challenging other racers doesn’t feel very smooth and it hurts the overall pacing of the match. I think with solid support this whole car battle royale thing could be my new favorite thing.

Most importantly, in a video game landscape utterly devoid of major arcade racing games, Forza Horizon 4 continues to be as close as it gets to playing a new Burnout game. For that I am grateful.

Heave Ho

A goofy, gassy four player local co-op game that requires skill, concentration, and your friends to not be assholes and fart bomb you to your death. You will laugh and yell and snap at your asshole friends. It is a delightful time with some soda and chips.

Best Music, 2019

Wattam

Keita Takahashi and the best music department in games returns for another collection of songs from the wholly singular genre that is Keita Takahashi music. Wattam’s spirit is softer and more curious than that of Katamari Damacy, which often felt anarchic. The game’s music reflects that in a way that makes it less vibrant but more cohesive. I hope Takahashi and his entire music team never stop chipping away at the walls of sound.

The Division 2

Loopy, polyphonoic synths layered over industrial percussion prove for a striking background to what is otherwise a totally sterile third-person military shooter. I didn’t expect to find dreamy, atmospheric goth-rock under the Tom Clancy banner but I’m glad I did.

LSD Dream Emulator/LSD Revamped by Osamu Sato

Clicky-clacky, bleepy-bloopy PS1 era Redbook audio fully revamped on three discs of wax with remixes and more. A worthy celebration for an obscure Japanese Playstation era oddity. Loopy drums and trippy synth ticks/tocks make for good space out and tinker with your toys jams. Lo-fi chill electronica to Tetris to.

Celeste Farewell

The third and final soundtrack for Celeste cements this whole Celeste enterprise as one of the best things in games this past decade. Lena Raine’s work on this series has been astounding, as has the work of her collaborators on the b-sides/remixes. Farewell is a shorter, more focused piece than the first soundtrack, but it still has its share of surprises. The elevator muzak finale is perhaps its finest.

Best Super Mario Making, 2019

This game was never going to have the earth-shattering impact that its predecessor had, but this is still a video game where you can make your own Super Mario levels, you know? It’s a very literal dream come true. Here is the best Mario Making I did in 2019.

Nakatomi: GRC-SQ7-TDG

This subtle, tasteful homage to a certain late 20^th century action film offers up a modern retelling of a regular, blue collar fella shooting his way up and down a skyscraper. You’ll never guess who portrays Alan Rickman’s Hans Gruber in this daring reinterpretation.

Mt. Whiteclaw: WCG-XH2-BRG

As a legion of lifeless, immigrant plumbers lie beneath his feet, one man looks upon the piles of working men’s corpses and smiles. His name is Smit69. He is the only one of the 109 challengers to scale the peak of Mt. Whiteclaw. May he drill his name into the mountain’s snowy face with his hot, steamy piss.

Campfire Kansas: 0B2-T8X-S9G

The Get Up Kids’ generously lent out the title of their fan favorite On A Wire cut “Campfire Kansas” for this twisty, turny woodland tale featuring branching paths and secrets galore. Get up, kids! This one is something to write home about.

This n That

Lonely Mountains: Downhill

“ARE WE LIVING IN THE GOLDEN ERA OF SUPERFLIGHT-LIKES!?” shouts James Kujawa to a stunned crowd of no one.

There’s a touch of Trials at work here that feels just right. The checkpoints are a bit ruthless but they inspired me to experiment with shortcuts or shave off some corners here and there.

It’s unfortunate how much of the game is gated off at the jump. You’re forced to replay the first level a few times before unlocking the second which turns out to be pretty damn similar to the first one. Fortunately, the gameplay is so fun and snappy that it’s hard to put down. It feels like each run is fine tuning a speedrun. The tracks leave lots of room to make touch ups here and there for optimum run times, and we all know how much those rock.

A Short Hike

A Short Hike is a simple, meditative experience that lasts as long as its title suggests. Little old bluebird you takes a cute, curious little jaunt through the park to find cell reception and get out of your own head. Go outside. Go be friendly. There is no grand climax or reward. The hike is the reward. You get to glide down the mountain at the end in a fun little bit of business, and that’s about it. It’s just nice, you know? I just think it’s neat.

We Met In May

A very brief, very cute mini-game collection about a couple’s first few dates. Fucking obnoxious who needs it go play Galaga ya fuckin’ ingrates.

Manifold Garden

This game’s biggest moment is learning that each platform exists in infinite, symmetrical space. If you fall off a platform, you can land on that exact same platform directly below you or keep falling infinitely into the great beyond. Somehow, there is always a breathless brace for impact every time I hit the platform below. Otherwise it’s a pretty straightforward environmental physics puzzler. Hell of a looker, though.

Baba is You

A good puzzle game turns you from a fucking genius to an absolute dipshit in the blink of an eye. Baba is You is a good puzzle game. It’s weird, it’s funny, and it has a rewind button. It tells you everything it possibly can without giving you the solution. It does so much with so little. Wrap a simple mechanic (“push”) around some impeccable level design and boom: you are Baba is You.

Katana Zero

Think Hotline Miami but sidescrolling instead of top-down. That’s pretty much it, but it’s done well. Hyperviolence and psychiatry has been done before (and that’s only two of the many post-modern action/sci-fi tropes at play), but Katana Zero stays exciting and weird throughout. That murder puzzle action game gimmick works, dammit.

Top of the Pops

Control

There were times I really hated playing this game. When the combat really clicked, it felt like a dream. Juggling powers with weapons and shields has such a nice flow to it when you can pull it off. But a lot of the time, combat just felt messy and began to really drag down the pace of a mystery I was really into.

There were points in that game where I flat out thought I was playing it wrong. I was getting owned mercilessly by low level jobbers on the regular. I didn’t understand. After about 30 attempts from all different angles, it finally just kinda clicked. It felt wrong. It felt frustrating. It felt unrewarding. By the time the payoff hit, I was so beat that it just washed right over me. All that fun, weird intrigue around the fringes of this game ended up being the best part. Everything else got in the way.

But holy shit what a world Remedy built here. This perfect balance of mid 90s cynicism towards the shadow government mixed with their specific brand of supernatural sci-fi is endlessly fascinating. I never could quite tell the story Control was trying to tell, but I wanted eat up every word, redacted or otherwise. Imagine the worlds you could create just within the game’s Oldest House. When a game or tv show can find a place to confidently proclaim to its audience its intention to steer the ship anywhere it damn well pleases, that game or tv show is in the most exciting spot it will ever be in. Control lives in that moment. It is a game about the very study of endless possibilities.

Ape Out

Ape Out is joyous, brutal blast of blood and jazz. Get this: You (as Ape) are tasked with getting out (as in Out). Ape Out bangs, booms, and pows its way through four LPs worth of pure primate adrenaline. This game just kinda shouts “GO!” at you and then shuts up and lets the jazz drums do the talking. It’s that sort of thing I always fall hard for; a simple mechanic refined to a tee with a heaping helping of wild style right on top. The arcade mode update lets you shoot for high scores with all your Friday night Ape Out buddies. This post-modern deconstruction of Donkey Kong Jr. begs for a sequel called Ape Shit.

Astroneer

I lost whole days to this game when it finally hit 1.0 this year. I think this is the game I wanted out of No Man’s Sky. I didn’t want the universe, I just wanted my half. That and to ride my space tractor along its vast plains while I listen to lo-fi chill beats to plow and mine to. I love the Lego-ish look. I love modular fashion that everything snaps and clicks together. I loved just taking the space tractor out for a space drive to gather space junk to build my space farm. It was a simpler time back then. We called it “February.”

I don’t know if I’ll ever figure out what Astroneer is really about, but 70ish hours in, I don’t think it matters any more. Space tractor is life. No before, no after.

Kind Words

A game where you can write letters to strangers asking for or offering help. A seemingly positive, wholesome corner of the internet that seems to have escaped the dooming shadow of evil that is Online. Also a game where a maildeer makes you mixtapes.

Kind Words seems like a big risk. It allows players to share their most vulnerable, worrisome thoughts to a random mass of strangers. Developers take the care to offer links and resources to players, but one would think that some very hurtful things might slip through the cracks. According to developers, the community has been remarkably positive, with less than 3% of total letters getting flagged for any sort impropriety.

A game willing to take this big of a risk on earnestness is inspiring. That it has successfully fended off an army of toxic trolls with an insatiable appetite, even more so. This is a game that could theoretically be used for so many things but is actually being used to bring people together and to help them feel less isolated. This is why video games are good.

Runner-up

The Outer Worlds

It’s fun to watch this game tick. It’s meticulously detailed. It allows so much room for your character to grow or shrink or swerve or what the fuck ever. It feels like that even if you don’t quite understand everything that’s going on in that world, you always have a good sense of who you are and how you will handle a situation. All compliments of a snappy, earnest script brought to life with some ship shape voice acting performances.

I think it’s the detail put into the script and how it expands as your character’s lie/cheat/steal/etc. attributes rise is really what makes this game better than whatever Bethesda Studios is cooking up these days or even has in the past. Please for the love of god more 25hr breezy funky space romps. Or westerns or grindhouse or whatever. Just have fun with it.

I don’t like every character here, but I know every character here. The tone always feels right. Off kilter, but true. The “tell my mom I’m dead” quest is a screwball riot. It’s bizarre, funny, and can take several turns.

The exposition dump as an ending was a real fucking bummer. Slideshow endings are always the hardest dickpunch, but I loved the rest of this game so much.

DOOM of the Year

Mortal Kombat 11

This is the first MK game that feels good to play. Injustice 2 felt a million times better than any Netherealms game before it, but this followup feels even snappier. Fatalities more glorious than ever, a batshit crazy story mode, and The Redemption of Johnny Cage. A tale for the ages.

This game dares to be so goofy and self-referential and then tries to pivot to earnest, heartfelt storytelling all while brains are getting sliced open and eaten and does it all gracefully. Mortal Kombat is video games. And now, I finally enjoy playing it. I finally get to experience all this cyborg ninja martial arts splatter house trash without being a fucking trainwreck at it. I am overjoyed. Bow down all hail 2019’s DOOM of the Year, Mortal Kombat 11.