Mid-year check up: GOTY so far?

RE2 was incredibly relaxing to me for some reason, and I haven't played Mario Maker 2 yet, but DMC V is hands down the best “Character Action” game I’ve ever played.

Probably DMC 5. I had my issues with the story and some of the bosses but overall it was great game.

I liked Sekiro but i'm feeling a bit of fatigue with From Softwares recent style of games. RE2 & DOA6 were both pretty good too.

Definitely a lighter year so far. It's to be expected though, what with where we are with the current console generation, with new ones most likely not coming til' late 2020. I think the battle so far is obviously between REmake2, DMC5 and Sekiro. It's really close for me, but I think DMC5 was the most impressive. RE engine is insanely impressive and a great follow-up to MT framework, and as amazing as REmake2 is, I think DMC5 showcases it better. It runs so incredibly well on PC, too.

Sekiro was fantastic, but I definitely didn't feel the pull to play it again, and I don't know if I'll end up going back. It absolutely does not have the replayability that the Soulsbourne games do.

I haven't loved any games so far this year, but the game I'm most glad I played was Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes. Despite the middling combat and slow start, the second half of that game is just Suda exploring what's been on his mind recently as a game player and game creator. It's like he made a video game out of his own dream diary. He hasn't had that full creative freedom to write, direct, and design a game since the original No More Heroes 12 years ago.

It's still Resident Evil 2. I'm almost finished with Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night and it's been a really good second, but given a choice between the two I'd pick RE2.

RE2 was mine until Days Gone dropped, I don't see anything but Death Stranding challenging it.

Slow year.

Sekiro so far, probably going to stay that way. I've had ups and downs with Apex, but if it keeps it's current trajectory it has a chance of taking it, they're making some great improvements.

Probably Apex Legends though for whatever reason that doesn't sit well with me, like there's a better pick hiding somewhere. Shoutout to my homie Void Bastards at least. That game's definitely making my top 10.

Satisfactory is my GOAT and it ain't even out yet.

Definatly Apex Legends and it's not even close. Season 2 drops in just a few days and just looks to extend its lead also.

Current top 5:

1. Apex Legends
2. Void Bastards
3. Wargroove
4. Ape Out
5. Gato Roboto

1. Judgment

2. Toejam & Earl: Back in the Groove

As it's the only game released this year that I've played thus far, my vote has to go to Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled. Activision's studios have really been hitting it out of the park with their retro remakes these last few years, and Nitro-Fueled might just be the best one yet.

Of the three 2019 games I've played:

1. Total War: Three Kingdoms

2. Steel Division 2

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3. Imperator: Rome

If we count expansions, it's Civilization VI: Gathering Storm for me. Otherwise it's Ace Combat 7.

Top 2 right now are RE2 and Void Bastards for me.

From what I've played so far it will likely be Resident Evil 2. I've probably played Apex more than anything but truth be told I still wouldn't be comfortable with that in a top spot. I REALLY want to play DMC5 because I know I'll probably love it. Sekiro I'd also like to play though it might not be as big a visual treat on a regular PS4 from what I've heard. I'm extremely curious about Judgement as someone who ended up not liking most of Kiryu's character arc in the Yakuza games. Outer Wilds I definitely want to play though it seems like it won't be out on Steam this year.

@bobobones: I think traditional survival horror games are sort of relaxing if the game isn't scary cuz at the end of the day, they're about exploration and puzzle solving. RE games aren't scary so the old school ones are pretty chill for the most part.

1. Bloodstained - It just controls really well and I got hooked by the crafting. Having never played the Castlevania portable games, the concept of stealing enemy abilities is novel to me. I do wish the overall aesthetic looked less like a visual novel and more like the eldritch horror-looking/sounding final boss...it's weird.
2. Outer Wilds - Could've been number one but the Groundhog Day cycle became tedious at the end...with an endgame puzzle I wasted hours on (Ash Twin core) that I wouldn't have solved in a billion years. Still, it contains the Best Moment I've experienced in a game this year (The Quantum Moon).
3. Sekiro - It kinda peaked during the middle for me (Ashina Castle/Senpou Temple/Sunken Valley) before it started recycling bosses and went all supernatural.

Sekiro by default of being the only new game I've really gotten into this year. It's a great game and probably in my top 3 of Soulsborne games, but it's had very little competition for me.

I've played nine games from that list and while most were ok, none of them have really stayed with me. Hell, if the game I've so far poured most hours into would be my GOTY, it'd be Division 2, which is not something I expected. Even that game's far from great because of some of it's aspects. Fortunately there's a bunch of titles still coming (I'm counting on you the most, Doom Eternal) and I've been having fun with some older games as well, but it certainly hasn't been an amazing year so far for me, when it comes to new titles.

I would say Senran Kagura Burst Re:Newal if I actually played it yet, but I'll just go with Devil May Cry 5 for now.

GOTY: Resident Evil 2 - I have a checkered history with the series and never played the original RE2, but this was a nice surprise. It looks great, controls really well, and has a lot of nods to what made the original REs memorable without feeling outdated. There's a lot in the package, but it breaks into smaller chunks so you don't get as much "content fatigue" playing it.

Biggest Surprise: Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night - Generally, I find Kickstarted games to be pretty subpar at best and outright scams at worst. Especially those ones that are trying to recapture the magic of older popular series. I didn't have high expectations from Bloodstained given what I saw of the art style (which I still don't love), and it just begged the question "why don't you just play SOTN again?" However, the game ended up being really good. I've already sunk 20+ hours into it and will easily get more out of it.

Biggest Disappointment: Sekiro - I was really looking forward to this one, but it was a major letdown. I could write an entire academic paper with the stuff I found wrong with the game design, but for a multitude of reasons this one never clicked with me. It's too stripped down to be a good Soulsbourne game and not stripped down enough to be a satisfying action game. Combine that with boring environments and repetitive boss design, and it's easily the worst time I've had in a video game I can easily remember.

That list is really depressing to me. I’m really hoping the Zelda remake in September is good, or I might not play any single game for more than a few hours this year. Outer Worlds will probably keep me interested for some time, but even if it ships on time, it’s an Obsidian game so the actual playable version might not arrive until after the holidays.

Oh, and Borderlands 3. Fuck Randy P., but that game will be solid.

@forrester90: Hopefully the 1.2 update for Imperator pulls a FF14 and revitalizes the game.

i like 2019 more than 2018 and we still have half a year left

Damn, I hadn't realized so many good to great games had already come out this year, and we're only half way through.

I got some gaming to do...

Resident Evil 2 for sure although I've only played two games on this list. Also, no Void Bastards?

Outer Wilds, with a bullet. Yes, the groundhog day thing got a little tedious, and I didn't love every minute of it (and like everyone else, I had trouble with the Ash Twin core puzzle), but holy shit. That game. Yo, Outer Wilds. OUTER FUCKING WILDS, man.

Out of the ones I've played, The Division 2. It's the one I keep going back to. Almost all of the 'great' games I've played, including The Division 2 have been disappointing to me in some way, but The Division 2 has kept getting updates so whenever I go back after the major updates I enjoy it slightly more, like the addition of neutral lighting and a FOV slider. I still haven't finished all the black tusk stuff (shows how 'done' I was with the game after I beat what story was there), but all the black tusk stuff is pretty decent. I'm almost done with them. I also have to explore a lot more of the DZ stuff. I like the world more and right now it's a game I can play just to relax in by wandering about the world. So, what was kind of a disappointing game to me turns out to be my favorite game this year as it has gotten better over time. The Division 1 is one of, if not my favorite game this generation, so two had a lot to live up to for me. I don't quite have 100 hours in it, but almost. I've only played eight of the games on that poll. The only one I was thinking about playing at one point but didn't and don't necessarily want to now is World War Z. Apex Legends is free and I'm sure for what it is it's great, but I don't really care for online multiplayer focused games so I never installed it and played it.

@forderz: Everybody knows a Paradox game takes 1-2 years to feel comfortable in its own skin :D

I'll go a bit further most disappointing game so far will probably go to : Imperator Rome or Sekiro both left a bad taste in my mounth as for GOTY contenders RE2 / TW: Three Kingdoms seem like solid picks.

Extra: most forgettable game so far: Rage 2 and the Division 2 i played both of those game but totally forgot they came out.

Biggest Surprise: Days gone (it's not as bad as they made it seem although some frame rate issues)

Coolest thing i did in a video game: Killing a Column of German mechanized units with a katyusha rocket thrower in Steel Division 2

I voted for Dota Underlords since Anno wasn't on the list, but I think even despite the fact I have encountered a game breaking bug in the campaign for Anno 1800 it's still probably my favourite so far.

Oh, Dreams is up there too.

So far, MK11. I hope to play Judgement at some point this summer, too...

I haven't played anything new besides Sekiro this year; it did consume me for a month or two though. This is self-centered, but I prefer a lean year like this with one or two games that really speak to me, rather than a year with a bunch of high-profile releases that I end up feeling ambivalent about as was the case with last year.

At the moment it's Three Kingdoms by a mile. I'm hoping to start The Outer Wilds this week and that seems right up my alley so hopefully that'll be up there too.

Out of what I've played so far, I'd say my top three are (in no particular order) Bloodstained, RE2, and Mario Maker 2. I have yet to play some of the other big contenders like Sekiro or Outer Wilds.

I guess that one remake about a remake that's a remake.... When is Doom Eternal coming out again? Seriously though 2019 has been such a drag so far.

I did pick RE2 remake. If FFXIV Shadowbringers was on the list I probably would have picked that just because it's what I'm currently playing.

It's either Resident Evil 2 or Sekiro at this point.

Probably Resident Evil 2, despite my having no desire to return to it after having finished it. Sekiro, I didn't totally love the first time through but find myself poking idly at New Game + so much that it's closing in on being the game I've spent the most time with.

Mortal Kombat 11 is in the conversation, too. It has perhaps my favorite core gameplay of any NetherRealm title, but I have to excuse some frustrating economy choices.

Apex Legends is both the best battle royale game of the litter and the most concrete example that demonstrates how little I like the genre itself. It compelled me to dump an extra forty hours into Titanfall 2 early this year, so I guess that's something.

Not sure I have played a more "fun" video game than DMC V since Doom (2016). My front runner right now.

Game of the Year So Far: It should be MLB The Show 19, they made so many smart improvements to the reward paths and economy in Diamond Dynasty this year that it completely locked me into a mode I thought might have a real short leash after how much I played it the past two years, I play for several hours multiple days a week. It's the perfect podcast game as well! That said, it is essentially the same game I've been playing all summer long for the past four years beyond those improvements, so in an era of games as a service it makes less and less sense to reward sports games for releasing on yearly cycles, especially now that their primary form of revenue is these fantasy card modes rather than the initial point of sale.

So my actual vote went to Apex Legends, which because of its poor reward structure I take long breaks from but whenever I come back to it I have a wonderful time and I typically hate competitive first-person shooters but I can play that game for hours at a time when the itch strikes, and I'm very excited to see how the other two seasons this year play out now that they've learned so much from the first one.

Disappointment of the Year: Sekiro. I was madly in love with this game for the first four or five hours, and I honestly love the combat with regular enemies. I wish there was a lot more of it! I enjoyed the horse knight boss and felt a huge rush of satisfaction when I beat the other bosses I could beat, but I found the game unplayable once I had Lady Butterfly / Ashina Elite / Seven Spears / Snake Eyes in front of me all gating progress in one regard or another. My skill level wasn't increasing and my fights with each were constantly ending at the same point, leading me to believe either my television is too latent or my fingers are too slow, and that's the first time I can remember straight up being unable to finish or progress in a game since I was a child.

I really expected this to be one of if mot my favorite game of 2019 because it was leaning into the aspects of Bloodborne's combat I preferred (the smaller, one-on-one encounters focused on parrying like Gascoigne, Blood-starved Beast and the Hunters). Initially the lack of Bloodborne's RPG elements seemed like a justifiable decision, but once I hit that wall and had no obvious way to get around it, I really came to miss all the ways in which that game would let you take side roads and alternate paths through certain bosses if you just weren't good enough at the fight.

Still Would Like to Play But Haven't: I don't buy games new that often anymore, largely due to the hooks MLB has in my but also just because PSN is so convenient and sales are weekly I find myself willing to wait and spend less on an expensive hobby. Bloodstained seems interesting but I never played Symphony of the Night, I'm still more curious than I ought to be about Days Gone considering what I saw of it here and elsewhere really turned me off, I loved DmC so much that I've been totally ignoring DMC5 as a sort of silent protest, I was very interested in Judgement until Alex revealed it's just another Yakuza game for the most part and I already have Zero and Kiwami in my backlog from PS+, I wish Outer Wilds had any shot at all of coming to PS4, Resident Evil 2 is the game I most want to play but am waiting for a killer deal since I saw Claire's campaign via Abby.

This list made me realize how little I have played this year...

I've only played Apex Legends and Slay the Spire, but Slay the Spire was mostly in early access. I have to get my act together before the end of the year.

Outer Wilds by default at this point, even though I've chilled on it quite a bit after the first half (but damn if it doesn't make a hell of a first impression). This has been a backlog year so far for the most part, since few-to-none of the big new games have piqued my particular interests...I think OW, Baba is You and Division 2 are the only new games I've put any time into. The rest of the year's looking a little better...I'm very excited for The Outer Worlds, Link's Awakening and Pokemon Sword/Shield, and very academically interested in Death Stranding. I also have hope (though likely in vain, based on all the footage I've seen) that Ultimate Alliance 3 will be good.

Haven't gotten to much of the high profile stuff this year (sitting on DMC 5, will get to Sekiro when I'm in the mood) and while RE2 was pretty good, it would have to be...... (drumroll please)

....Etrian Odyssey Nexus! Same great crunchy turn-based combat, but with more variety in terms of environments and party composition options made it easier to see through to the end than the previous games I've played. Shoutouts to the new Samurai Shodown too, don't have much history with SamSho (or SNK fighters in general) but it's been a nice change of pace.

The only 2019 games I have played that are worthwhile are Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2 and Bloodstained so far, wanting to check out Ace Combat and DMC, maybe God Eater. RE2 looks great, but my history with that series exist in a weird spot, it is something I can only appreciate from a distance.

I was eyeing Total War Three Kinddom for a while, but don't think it is likely I will get around to it.

Cant remember the name of for my life, but is that other samurai game (PS3 exclusive?) still coming out this year or did it get pushed to 2020?

Tom Clancy's The Division 2 easily for me. This game improved on the first game in so many ways. I'm certainly not obsessed with playing it as I've barely even beaten the story after being urged to play with friends, but that game is just so damn impressive. Also all the iterating they've done seems fantastic and the new raid seems like it was a huge success. Certainly among Ubisoft's strongest franchises now.

RE2 PS1 was probably my favorite game ever, RE2 Remake...Its up there..It's so good

Embarrassingly I haven't played a single game that has been released this year