I feel like I at least tried most of the big games that came out this year but I've got very little time for gaming lately so I had to be extremely picky with what I chose to actually play through. Here's a short chronological list of games that really stood out to me this year.

Broken Age

Give it up for Double Fine. They really knocked this one out of the park for me. It was fun to just spend a bit of time in this world with great characters and interesting environments. Really looking forward to the second half.

Threes!

There's a good chance I played more Threes this year than any other game. I usually don't even play a full game in one sitting but just make a few moves here and there whenever I have a couple seconds while waiting in lines, elevators, etc. Just the perfect phone game.

Mario Kart 8

I didn't play this too much, but what I did play was incredibly enjoyable. I carried my WiiU down to L.A. when I visited and playing this game with a few friends was probably the best local multiplayer experience I've had in years.

Shovel Knight

What a perfect little throwback game. I loved everything about this game. This year's Rogue Legacy =]

Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

Okay. This one is a bit weird because I didn't really enjoy PLAYING the game as much as I was all over the story and character interactions. I played this skipping as many puzzles as I could just to eat up the plot. I love the PW series and am a bit luke warm on Layton but putting them together was brilliant.

Roundabout

I'm not above being jazzed about being in a game. I enjoyed the gameplay and really enjoyed the purposely stupid story in this game. I'm also equal parts proud and horrified by my acting. It's good fun =P

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor

This was a surprise. I didn't expect to ever want to play another game with Batman combat but I powered through this one. It has its share of problems but the newness of the nemesis system and solid fighting mechanics made this one fun to play.

This War of Mine

This game is soul crushing but an amazing thing to experience. It has the emotional payoff of Papers, Please while providing fun and interesting gameplay. I haven't finished it yet and if I fail to make it, I may never play it again but the one play through I'm currently playing is enough to firmly plant this on my list of games this year.

There have been other games this year that I enjoyed but these are the ones that stand out for whatever reason. I don't even think they're the "best" games I've played this year, just the most memorable. Pretty much, they're the ones I'd recommend to my friends =] So here we are friends. Check out these winners if you haven't yet~