This is a list of games that I finished in 2016 (with no regard for their year of release). Normally I'd try and slap some sort of preamble on this but outside of Hockey (Go Pens!) and videogames this year pretty much sucked ass IMO. So onward to the list.
I "finished" this on January 11th. I intend to go back and try to do some of the second story at some point, but I'll probably take some time off for a while because this game was rather exhausting. Normally this is the type of game I'd never even try, but the Giant Bomb Awards convinced me to give it a shot and I'm glad I did.
I think what made this game so special to me is how it brought me back to the days of my NES dominated youth. No matter how often I failed I just wanted to keep playing. Just an awesome game.
End of Year Update: I in fact have not gone back yet. I still plan to though, but I know the skill deterioration is going to make it an extremely rough go at first.
I "finished" this on January 3rd. Still a long ways from 100% on it. I will probably go back to it a bit, but I doubt I'll go for the full completion. This was my first Burnout game and I feel like I had a lot of fun with it.
End of Year Update: I did eventually stop going back to it, but I still loved this game a lot.
I "finished" this on January 11th. Not much to say about this game really. It's fine for what it is. The story is intentionally over the top and managed to get more laughs out of me than I expected it to. Fine game for what it is. May revisit sometime to try and best my scores. Not super likely though.
I finished this on January 26th. I remember when this came out, the original version anyway, I only got to play a few minutes at a friends house during which I got killed by a vending machine. It seemed like it could be cool but I never really got around to it until a few weeks ago. I played the "Source" version. Really impressive game. The first chapter or two I wasn't blown away, but based on when it came out even those were pretty amazing when you look back at it. As the game goes on you get put into some really incredible scenarios that I found gripping. This game pulled me away from Fallout 4 which had started to dominate my time. Awesome game.
I "finished" this on February 4th. While it's (I assume) essentially an appetizer for The Phantom Pain I have immensely enjoyed my time with it. Working on completing the last two bonus missions before moving on.
Update: I went back and completed the last two missions right after adding this to the list. Tremendously funny stuff. This game is definitely cool and I'll be coming back to do score attack stuff for sure. Tremendous "screw around" potential IMO.
End of Year Update: I haven't gone back to do the score attack stuff like I planned, but I have left it installed.
I "finished" this on February 12th. An additional mode, EX mode, unlocked afterward. I will certainly be getting to it very soon.
In the case of this game I watched about 4 or 5 minutes of the Quick Look that Giant Bomb did, which was the only press coverage I came across in regards to this game, and immediately knew I had to buy it. I am so glad that I both acted on that impulse and didn't wait forever to get around to playing it.
Read Only Memories struck chords with me in ways that games haven't done in ages. The character both in their design and personalities appeal to me in a way that hasn't happened since the days of the 16-bit era and the soundtrack is one of the best I've heard in any game. It's so good that I actually purchased the soundtrack. ROM, especially if you are persistent in trying to use items in obviously wrong situations, is also an exceptionally funny game. I spent a good amount of time trying to use a carton of spoiled milk on every single thing I could possibly use it on. Everything about this game really came together amazingly well. Highest recommendation.
Edit: Went back and played the EX mode on 2-13. Just a brief thing, but it was still enjoyable. I guess this game actually has several possible endings. I guess I may need to revisit it sometime.
End of Year Update: Still haven't gotten back to do another play of this, but my memory of it is getting foggier which is a good thing for when that happens.
I "finished" this game on March 28th in couch co-op with a friend. Holy shit is this game awesome - and insanely poor running and glitch-filled as all hell, but the gameplay is so good that it overcomes it. I would have finished this earlier online with another friend, but the online as of this writing is beyond broken. Still worth playing though IMO.
End of Year Update: Still broken and seemingly abandoned by the dev studio.
I "finished" this game, as much as you can finish a fighting game anyway, beating the story mode, on April 9th. To say nothing of anything else, as I haven't really tapped into the depths of the gameplay, I found the story to be incredibly disappointing. Especially in comparison to MK IX. Granted IX had the advantage of pulling from the history of MK while this one had to build a story in the wake of those events, even considering that this was still underwhelming. In the end what do we get? MK Kids Save the World: The Game. Worse yet the writers left almost all the characters people actually give a crap about in limbo ensuring that the story in MK XI will remain crappy in the early going.
End of Year Update: Still extremely unimpressed by this game. Feel like people give this a free pass for its shitty story mode just because MK IX had such a great one.
I "finished" this game, in terms of having seen all the story content to its conclusion, on June 28th.
Without question this is the best game of the generation thus far IMO. It's the first Metal Gear game that I've played through after using Giant Bomb to catch-up on the series lore to this point.
MGSV is an absolute treasure of a videogame. This was a high level stealth action game made for people who enjoy open world gameplay. The sheer depth and variety of ways you can approach scenarios and the way that missions will play out differently because of it strikes at the center of what I want in modern gameplay. More improvisation and a less canned feel to everything. I cannot say enough good things about this game. Consider me absolutely floored.
Of course by now we all know the sad saga of Konami. It's funny that a series renowned for its cinematic touch finally, in its swansong, produced a final chapter that will be best be remembered for how well it plays. An absolute masterwork.
End of Year Update: Did finally uninstall this but I kept going back and back to it for a long time. For sure my 2nd most played game this year.
I "finished" this game, in terms of having cleared normal difficulty, on June 30th.
I feel like this game was the victim of anti-hype. The initial buzz during the Kickstarter campaign was very positive but soon took an ugly turn with people obsessing over delays and things that shouldn't matter, like people running the forums, and some things that should matter, i.e. the company running a Kickstarter for another game before this game was completed. I think it put a very negative spin on this game pre-release that has torpedoed it when it comes to reviews and such. Which is a shame in my opinion, because divorced from the circus surrounding it I feel like this is a good game. The dash mechanic and how it works integrates well into the standard Mega Man formula and I feel the game plays very well. I don't think it's quite as good as Mega Man 9 was, but it's a great game in spite of that. Real tight controls and fun levels.
End of Year Update: Really stunned at how hard the Bomb crew came down on this one. I mean I myself had some odd experiences with this one, the final boss glitching out on me and all, but I liked a lot of things this game was doing. Guess I'm an odd fellow.
I "finished" this game, as much as you can finish a fighting game anyway, on July 1st, the same day that the big story mode DLC hit. I glued myself to my chair and played the whole mode in one go. The story is so much better than the story in MKX that it's shocking. Really cool seeing years of lore that has barely been touched finally paying off in an actual game.
I haven't finished nearly as many games this year as I thought I would, and this game is the major reason for that. Since it's launch I think a modest projection would be at 300 hours of gameplay since. I pre-ordered it on PSN the first day it became available, and we've all seen what happened since.
In spite of the negative reception I feel more than satisfied with this game. I don't buy Street Fighter for its story, I buy MK for that since that's pretty much all MK has going for it. The fact that this eventually had a much better story mode than MK is just a cherry on top. I've had so many epic matches and great moments, and more importantly, reinvigorated my love for fighting games, and proved to myself that I can still play at a high level. I look forward to putting more time into this game for the next several years and it's only going to get better from here on out.
End of Year Update: I see a lot of hatred for the story mode in this game. Really stuns me since the bar for fighting game story modes is ultra low. I'd put it well above the MKX story and outside of MK and this I feel like most other fighters story modes are just tedious or far worse. Again just gonna chalk it up to my strange taste.
I "finished" this game on 7-12-16. I'm a longtime Dragon Ball fan, but a lapsed game fan. The last one of these that I enjoyed in the slightest was Budokai Tenkaichi 3 on the Wii, but, finally, we have another good Dragon Ball game here.
The smartest thing the development team did was get rid of the ridiculous and overly convoluted control scheme from the Raging Blast series and whatever other garbage titles I'm forgetting about that have come out since. This game controls well and has a unique game specific storyline that we haven't been forced to play through a million times already. It's a good game on its own merits that uses the property well. Very happy with this. Will definitely get the sequel when it comes out (at some point).
End of Year Update: I left this thing to wither but I sure did get the sequel.
I "finished" this game on PS4 on 7-21. I bought this game on a PSN sale for something like $3. I thought it was a platformer, but it's actually a Metroidvania. Not a genre I typically like. But this didn't have any obscure puzzles and I really liked how it played. The dungeons were fun and the whole world has a lot of personality to it. I'll definitely look into playing the new game sometime in the future.
End of Year Update: Never did come back to this.
I got my first ending in this game on July 29th. The last game I played in this series was the first Deception on the PSX, so uh, yeah, a lot has changed since then. This one definitely felt like it had a lot more comedy elements to it but still maintained a sufficiently creepy atmosphere. I mean, a game about resurrecting the devil shouldn't have much trouble doing that.
More than anything the things I remember liking about the first game carried over here. Things like the little character profiles about your victims and such. I do wish the story was told more in-engine than in static cut scenes but such is the budgeting of niche games in this era. Still easily worth the time I invested though, and I'll definitely be heading back to check out the other character's story. Might update my impressions if anything of note changes.
End of Year Update: Just sort of lost interest in the idea of coming back to this.
So......... I started this game on January 19th 2014. It uh, took me a while to get around to actually finishing it. I really loved the first two games of the series but this one didn't really do much for me until the second half of the story. Still a decent game, but honestly, I'm just glad to have it out of the way. Will not be coming back to it.
End of Year Update: Thinking about picking up Uncharted 4 when its price bottoms out.
Normally I would mention something about how as much as you can "finish" a fighting game, I have with this one, but the new Shadow Lords mode that was added in is a unique video game experience that stands on its own. I "finished" that in the wee hours of September 28th. My team of Sabre Wolf, Spinal and Jago took down Gargos in the final showdown after stripping him of his powers. Spinal got the kill and Jago never even had to lift a finger.
I've had Killer Instinct since launch, but until Shadow Lords came out I barely touched it. But now, man I just wanna play more Killer Instinct. That mode is awesome and it did a lot to teach me the basics and start establishing familiarity with the game. Great love for KI.
End of Year Update: Sort of dropped off of this game again, but I'm fairly certain I'll hop back in soonish.
Finish Date: October 14th
So, I'm ultra late to the party on this one, but I finally got around to playing through this. The story it tells is something familiar for many people I'm willing to bet. The little details and what we learn, and can ascertain, about the few characters involved really resonated with me. I can understand why this game gets so much praise. Also, for a game with so little sound, the atmosphere the sound sets is amazing.
I "finished" this game, as much as you can finish a fighting game, on October 20th. Not much to say about this one really. It's a typical anime fighter. Competently made. The fighting is simple, but fast and fun.
I "finished" this game, as much as you can finish a fighting game, on November 11th. A real strong sequel. Like the leap from Mega Man to Mega Man 2.
UPDATE: After finishing I continued playing, and on Thanksgiving day I got the platinum trophy for this title. Not gonna say much here, but if you have even an ounce of Dragon Ball fandom in you this is worth owning.
