01] Iconoclasts

It’s hard to overstate how much of my mental real estate this game has taken up this year. I played it so early on and it continues to bounce around in my brain. The world is so beautiful and the events often ugly, hopeful and understanding but also worldly and aware of the crushing structures of power. The characters and motivations at play have an authenticity that touched me in a way I never would have expected from the game where the girl carries the big wrench. The puzzles, levels, and bosses all feel sprung from this whole cloth, no seams, and left an indelible imprint on my year.

02] Return of the Obra Dinn

I can’t really imagine a better detective game than this. Smarter people than me have described how the specific contrivances of the setup allow for more genuine deduction than any Sherlock or L.A. Noire of the world. No witnesses to talk to, no evidence to collect. You’re going purely on what you can see and sometimes hear and just piecing it together in an incredibly satisfying way. Beyond any individual puzzle, just coming up with a structure that facilitates the kind of thinking Obra Dinn demands is an incredible feat.

03] FAR: Lone Sails

There’s a tactile satisfaction to this game that separates it from the Limbos or whatever of the world [also separated by the fact it doesn’t kill you with traps constantly but whatever]. You manually operate all the ship’s systems. You collect fuel and stack it up in a convenient spot. You could just keep spare fuel or other useful things on the hooks in the ship that can hold items; I kept the mailbox from my home and some other baubles from the journey. That was my choice, ultimately meaningless, but personal for me. The ship becomes a friend in a way, as well as a home, and a tool, and I’m the captain.

04] Full Metal Furies

A truly co-operative brawler full of clever ideas, both in terms of combat mechanics and story sort of puzzly bits. I haven’t played this single-player much admittedly, but if you can get even one friend to play through this with you I’d say it would show how impactful a co-op experience the game can be. The classes are well-differentiated and fun, and there’s a whole meta layer to put your heads together on and figure out. Even the devs consider it a failure based on sales, so clearly we are doomed.

05] Octahedron

Just a glorious game to go through, smashing every single light bulb and grabbing every trinket. There’s a fun rave atmosphere with levels that stay smart and fresh the entire time, always making new kinds of demands of you. Once I started this game I didn’t stop till there was nothing left. Well, besides time attack and no death runs. I’m not that crazy.

06] Tetris Effect

It’s hard to even blurb this given Tetris feels like such a known quantity. It’s Tetris but affecting instead of just great and fun. I don’t have access to VR, but I don’t think it’s necessary to be impressed.

07] Hitman 2

It’s interesting to see Hitman without the season structure of the first game. In general having everything available at once made me progress faster and not explore AS much, although they do what they can to suggest you try more kinds of runs and grind the level. It’s still the great new Hitman formula, though. Tons of funny and novel ways to go about the missions with unlocks that expand your possibilities even further. The final level in particular, where the elite of the world gather to figure out protections against the climate change that they caused, is truly spectacular both in terms of concept and design. That’s a literal thing happening right now, if not in as cartoonish fashion at an evil island. But maybe even also at an evil island.

08] Monster Hunter: World

I have tried to get into Monster Hunter before and failed because it was an impossible slog. Even with a friend, it was just a mess in past attempts. They finally made a game I could play, one I found such immense satisfaction in when I finally brought down that damn unicorn motherfucker and could carve it up. Prepping for a hunt, struggling to deal with these behemoths, and coming home with a sack full of horns is a great loop, even if the way they dealt with online is still very stupid.

09] The Messenger

The “twist” of this game seems fairly overblown. The music change is neat in particular but it’s certainly not crazy to me. But it’s such a tight feeling game, one that I ended up getting all the power seals in [are power seals the collectible name? whatever] because it feels so good to just play. Meta game stories can often be abrasive, but this didn’t bother me so, points for that too I guess.

10] The Missing: J.J. Macfield and the Island of Memories

Swery has all the heart in the world, and apparently a lot of the insight. The basic gameplay is truly grimmer than most edgelord games would dare to be, yet it’s done for empathetic reasons, a letter of understanding to the struggling. “Did you find what you were looking for?” lingers with me now.