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beard_of_zeus

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2021 4665 38 34
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Best of 2023

The main theme this year seems to be genuinely unique gameplay mechanics or novel combinations of existing concepts and genres.

I'm realizing I kinda snubbed Nintendo this year. I did play Super Mario Bros Wonder, which was pretty cool and weird and just fun, but it just felt like a solid 2D Mario at the end of the day.

Tears of the Kingdom I dabbled with for a while; the building stuff is novel, but feels pretty shallow. It seemed like you never needed to do much beyond a few straightforward kinds of builds in the open world (some of the more focused shrine puzzles are neat though). I hope they go back to more traditional Zelda games, but I'm not holding my breath, especially with how much most folks love these recent entries. I miss when there were actually interesting dungeons and bosses...

Pikmin 4 would probably be number 11 on my list though, I enjoyed that quite a bit, especially as a long time fan of the series. It has the same satisfying gameplay loop, but added enough neat wrinkles to the formula (like Oatchi!) to feel new.

Stuff from this year I want to play but didn't get around to yet:

  • Resident Evil 4 remake
  • Like a Dragon Gaiden (Especially with Infinite Wealth out early next year!)
  • Armored Core 6
  • Alan Wake 2
  • Cocoon
  • Spider Man 2
  • Sea of Stars

List items

  • Incredible game with an amazing artstyle, the rhythm/action combat hybrid totally works well and is truly unique. It's the sort of thing that if it wasn't tuned exactly right would make the game pretty unfun to play. There's a fun cast of characters and the story is pretty fun, with a lot of physical comedy in the cutscenes that comes across well. This was an early 2023 game that I thought about all year.

  • Another out of nowhere game that really floored me. Fantastic artstyle, surprisingly emotional story that gutpunched me a few times with some sharp writing to boot. The motorcycle platformer + gunplay mechanics were something that I hadn't seen before, but feels great and can be pretty thrilling. One of my favorite soundtracks as well.

  • I think every one of Mimimi's games (only 3 total, but still) has shown up on my GOTY lists, so clearly I'm biased. They do a very niche genre of isometric stealth action game extremely well. I was genuinely gutted when I saw the studio was closing down after this game, but it's a hell of a send off for them.

  • Just a stellar puzzle game with that slight weirdness that Enhance brings to the proceedings.

  • This is what I wanted Heaven's Vault to be, I think it nails the language translation-based puzzles in a way that makes them satisfying to solve. Loved the art style and how all the different civilizations you meet are portrayed in distinct ways. The cultures and languages feel very organic with how the different groups of people live, even down to things like how the grammatical syntax of the languages differs between cultures.

  • This does some really cool stuff for a visual novel with the way scenes are framed and you can pan the camera through them (which sometimes even is part of the gameplay). There's some cool sound design and visual effects as well. The central story and mystery is quite compelling and I loved all the characters and art. Square just keeps putting out these great but odd mid-tier games with barely any fanfare.

  • This is the first time I have spent 100 hrs+ on a single game in quite a long while, this is just a really well made JRPG. It slightly improves on a lot of stuff across the board from the original game. It definitely doesn't feel padded at all despite the length, there's just a lot of content, even in the main storylines + the final post-game stretch. I was compelled to play the whole way through, it's pretty easy to jump around and explore the world due to all the nice quality of life features.

  • Just some stellar writing here and a ton of legitimately impactful choices over the course of a story that explores concepts like womanhood, community, queerness, friendship, loneliness, the whole gamut. Getting to design and use your own tarot cards is definitely a new gameplay mechanic I have not come across before either. And there's some additional gameplay changes that happen in the back half of the game that were genuinely surprising as well.

  • Cosmic horror fishing game is a fun new surprise, but it works well. The gameplay loop is quite addicting, and going out at night with your boat is genuinely pretty scary.

  • Just a really strong puzzle game with a ton of ideas that basically all work well. I was impressed with the frequency of new ideas and concepts, and I definitely wanted more after finishing the game.
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