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L33T_HAXOR

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Best Games of 2014

My main GOTY list is below.

In the spoiler tag, some other awards and notes.

Best Looking Games

  1. NaissanceE
  2. The Banner Saga
  3. Dragon Age
  4. Pix the Cat
  5. Never Alone
  6. Never Ending Nightmares
  7. This War of Mine

Games I wish I'd played

  • Divinity - Original Sin
  • DKC - Tropical Freeze
  • Bayonetta 2
  • Far Cry 4

Games I wish I liked more than I actually do

  • Fract OSC -- I'M SO CONFUSED!! Its been a long time since a game made me feel this dumb. Maybe someday I'll have the time and patience for it.
  • Dungeon of the Endless -- Its a very well-made Rogue-like Strategy hybrid, but I would rather put my time into FTL or my actual game of the year.
  • Insurgency -- Connection issues have kept me from properly enjoying this niche multiplayer shooter. (Remember those? Remember when there was a weird, awesome new Half-Life mod every month or two?) Also I'm fucking terrible at it even when I have a good connection. But it seems fascinating... A lot of unique ideas, and its actually getting a pretty solid community! That just never happens to smaller multiplayer games any more.
  • Never Ending Nightmares -- I love the look and the atmosphere, and appreciate the game's message. But I spent 90% of the game just walking to the right... Also, for better or worse the game didn't really scare me.
  • Hohokum -- In theory I love the idea and the look of this, but in practice it just doesn't hold my interest.

Best games I played this year, from previous years

  1. Dark Souls
  2. XCom - Enemy Unknown
  3. Fez
  4. Zelda - A Link Between Worlds
  5. Fallout 1 (replay)
  6. Red Dead Redemption
  7. Saints Row - The Third
  8. Guacamelee
  9. Gunpoint
  10. FTL

LATE EDIT: Its 2018 and I've played a lot more 2014 games since then. Just for kicks, this would be my updated list:

  1. Shadowrun: Dragonfall
  2. This War of Mine
  3. The Talos Principle
  4. The Walking Dead - Season Two
  5. The Banner Saga
  6. Neo Scavenger
  7. Shadow of Mordor
  8. CODAW
  9. Desert Golfing
  10. Shovel Knight

List items

  • This game has just impressed me on so many levels. It reminds me of FTL in a weird way, at least it seems to scratch that same itch. You're managing a small group and things seem to be going fine, then all of a sudden you get blindsided by bad luck and PermaDeath. The big difference being that in FTL you would just watch your spaceship blow up -- In TWoM, you watch your group descend into a slow spiral of starvation and suicide! Or you can just restart which is what I usually did. But there's something strangely rewarding about sticking it out to the bitter end with your crew.

    One of the other things that sticks out to me: On my average playthrough I would kill between 0-3 NPCs. I honestly don't think I've ever played a game like that - I'm either kiling hundreds of people or I'm playing a non-violent graphic adventure game of some sort. But combat is SO risky in this game. Not just because you're risking PermaDeath, but the moral consequences will weigh on your characters if they succeed in murder (or thievery for that matter). The murdering character may be weighed down with guilt or depression. Or one of the other characters may disapprove and leave your party. The game communicates the value & fragility of a human life extremely well, but doesn't use any cutscenes or voice-acting to create this sort of drama. Its all done through game mechanics and flavor text.

    I could go on about the intuitive interface, the tense stealth situations (which steals a lot from Mark of the Ninja, and steals it well), the brilliant crafting system, etc, but I think I made my point. This game HAS to be my Game of the Year for 2014.

  • I wasn't even gonna play this game. I was having some problems with my save from Season One and I didn't really like the "400 Days" DLC, I thought I was done.

    Then my friend happened to mention a certain spoiler, which made me say "Oh fuck, now I guess I have to make time to play this game, holy shit"

    Long story short -- There have been a handful of games in my life that had a big emotional impact on me. FF6, ICO, Season One of TWD. But I'm pretty sure this is the first time a game gave me straight-up flashbacks to my childhood! This game hit me like a freight train. This was huge for me.

  • The first thing you notice is how beautiful this game is. The artwork is incredible, especially given the relatively small Kickstarter budget for this game.

    But what stuck with me is the strong writing. In a world where so much of the entertainment we consume is always trying to "dial it up to 11" in a desperate pathetic attempt to keep our attention, "The Banner Saga" just tells its story confidently, maturely and with restraint. Over the course of the story, the characters started to feel real to me. The world is well-crafted and interesting. The plot-line has plenty of stretches of smaller, down-to-earth character drama and that really helps to give the big epic moments much more weight. The Banner Saga never tries too hard which is incredibly refreshing.

    Mixed in with the story and art is a big, meaty stew of tactical battles, RPG progression, caravan management and moral (I guess) choice. These aren't perfect but they were satisfying and just complex enough for the roughly 10-hour campaign without being overwhelming.

  • Great combat, good stealth, great graphics and DAT NEMESIS SYSTEM. Its not perfect, you get overleveled very quickly, and the story is lousy, BUT DAT NEMESIS SYSTEM

  • This is the 2nd COD game I've played and the first where I bothered to play the campaign. I think its really good.

  • There have been many nostalgia-fest throwback games in the last few years, but this is definitely one of the best. A huge amount of love and craft went into making everything just right, and it shows. I just found out there's DLC coming! I'm hyped.

  • This game was going to be much higher on the list, until I got to the final chapter which REALLY dampened my enthusiasm. It ranks up there with Mass Effect 3 and Seinfeld when it comes to disappointing endings.

    But everything leading up to the last chapter... My God. Most of the reviews for this game were luke-warm because of the jumping puzzles, but you know what? The jumping puzzles aren't the thing that made me almost quit. It was the sudden feelings of disorientation and claustrophobia in the chapter "Deeper into Madness". The game does a ton of interesting things with lighting and architecture... I think I came close to having genuine vertigo in one section. That just never happens to me. Playing this with the lights out and my headphones on was super-intense.

    Though it should be noted, if you have any major issues with epilepsy you should steer clear.

    (Also worth noting, they've patched in extra checkpoints since launch. So you'll have an easier time than those who reviewed the game did.)

    (They also patched in Oculus Rift support, BUT THAT'S FUCKING CRAZY!! I THINK IT MIGHT ACTUALLY KILL YOU! BE CAREFUL!)

  • Playing this game was such a weird experience... I was really into it for about 20 hours, and restarted it three times. I was experimenting with the character and party creation, trying to get a handle on this fairly complex and opaque system. Then at some point I felt like I'd cracked the code and created a good party. And then my interest just fell off a cliff. I realized I'd be spending the next 50 hours just absent-mindedly clicking through combat and that didn't interest me.

    I probably walked into this game with the wrong expectations. I thought this game was going to basically be Fallout 1 with four party members. Its really not that... Fallout was all about exploring the world and playing in the sandbox. There was also some combat but it wasn't the focus. Wasteland 2 is 90% combat. It really didn't feel sandboxy to me at all. There's a story but it doesn't compel me the way Fallout does. There's a lot of writing but I don't think its particularly good.

    Still, figuring out this game's systems was super compelling to me for 20 hours before I decided I'd had my fill. Not many games can do that for me.

  • Does the game have problems? Yes.

    Is Aiden Pearce a shitty character? Yes.

    Does the storyline clash horribly with the open-world gameplay? Does that make the overly self-serious and edgy storyline seem utterly ridiculous, arguably worse than the story of Just Cause 2? Yes.

    But I'm okay with that. Because of the multiplayer. Because I can invade someone else's single-player game to try and hack them and the most incredible ridiculous nonsense winds up happening. This game had me reaching for the PS4 Share button constantly. I'll link to a few of those videos in the comments below.

    Best multiplayer of the year, no doubt in my mind. I also thought the rest of the game was pretty good, besides the story. And Aiden. Remember "Poochy the Dog" from the Simpsons? Aiden is 2014's Poochy the Dog. Make him go away. Let me play as someone else, anyone else. I kind of liked Jordy Chin, maybe I could play as Jordy?

  • The first full-price PS4 game that I really liked. Impressive graphics, pretty good story, fun gameplay, but its a little too short.

  • I'm only ten hours in and its entirely possible that my opinion of the game will drop like a rock after I put more time into it. But for now I'm comfortable with it here.

    Its just a huge, beautiful world to explore with a pretty good storyline and characters that are really growing on me. I don't particularly like the combat but its good enough as part of this overall package.

    12/28/14 EDIT: OK, I'm moving this from #2 to #6. The high points are really high but I've come close to quitting multiple times now. The game is just too big for its own good.

    12/30 EDIT: And now I have actually quit for the time being and moved it down further to... #11. At first I thought the production values and story were enough to make up for the lousy gameplay. But I no longer think that's the case. The game is just kind of uneven.

  • From here on down these are in no particular order.

    Picked this up on a whim and was shocked at how much I enjoyed it. A great little puzzle game, plus it got me to go play Hitman Blood Money (which is pretty good for a 2006 game!)

  • Great mobile puzzle game with a great look. Not super challenging, but that's probably for the best. You should check out the DLC too. I know times are tough, but I think you can afford the two dollars for this DLC bro.

  • My first Trials game. I think its really good and it looks great on my new PC.

  • Man, if this had come out on the NES when I was like eight-years-old, me and my brother would have been playing this non-stop. Unfortunately its kind of hard for me to find anyone to play this game with nowadays, but the 3-4 times I've played with people have been great.

  • Not perfect by any means, but this game has a lot of heart. Its a lot like Limbo, but I think I enjoyed this game more. It has co-op too. Maybe play it with your kid or your significant other? Should be a good time.

  • What Shovel Knight does for the NES platformer and Mega Man, Freedom Planet tries to do for Genesis-era Sonic games. It does a pretty good job of that... I haven't played a ton of recent Sonic games, but I'm pretty sure that this is better than the ones I've played. It wasn't until the 3rd level that it really clicked for me, I started to notice there was real craftsmanship in the level design and I realized that I really did miss those old Sonic games.

    Its no Shovel Knight... SK knows EXACTLY what game its trying to be and a ton of care was put into making everything just right. Freedom Planet has a nonsensical storyline told with frankly awful voice-acting. It doesn't need either. The old Sonic games sometimes had a little storytelling when you moved from one zone to the next. Just enough to add some context. Less is more when it comes to platformer storylines. Its too bad Freedom Planet didn't understand that.
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