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I was mildly anticipating this game's release based on what little I actually heard of it, but when it got a tepid response, especially from Giant Bomb itself, I backed off.
Thankfully, I gave it a chance when it went on sale on PSN, and I wanted to run through some notable releases before the end of the year solely for this list's purpose.
My expectations were surpassed to say the least.
It's the most gorgeous looking game I've played all year with its dreamy watercolor art style. The soundtrack tugs at the right heartstrings with its stirring battle themes and melancholic keys. Although the narrative has its flaws in its hit-or-miss dialogue, the backbone of the Germanic fairy tale structure along with the hidden B story in the Confessions collectibles enraptured my imagination.
But it wouldn't be GOTY material if it didn't have such an engaging combat system that a good number of people dismissed because of the misleading difficulty settings pre-patch.
Having played it on Expert initially, almost every encounter was a life-or-death situation, that I had to micromanage equipping Oculi, switching party members, choosing skill trees, timing my attacks, and deciding to either heal my party or delay enemies with Igniculus.
I was hooked throughout the entire 12-14 hours I spent on the game, tracking down every Confession with the sole intent to figure out what was really going on, and cleaning up every sidequest to show Umbra that Aurora is truly deserving of the crown on her head.
I can only describe my experience of the game as magical, and recommend the game to anyone who enjoys the visual dynamic splendor unique to the medium and its capacity to captivate with solid systems.
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One of the biggest surprises for me this year. A video game that tackles the one big war that not a lot of popular fiction ever bother to cover, and it does so with a cartoony aesthetic that somehow actually elevates the subject to something more than if it were just another hyper realistic depiction?
And where the act of taking a man's life actually has such a powerful impact?
It's sad, funny, touching, horrifying, enlightening and heartrending.
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Should have been up for the Best Styyyyyyyyle Awards! The neon noir design is killer, and Bigby and Snow are just so darn likable that both elements come together to make for a fascinating murder mystery, even if it dragged in EPISODE FOUR.
Lots of great moments spread throughout the season, too, and the way I acted as Bigby throughout the game made the final segment work perfectly in hitting all the ranges of my emotions. I tried to play nice, but sometimes I just had to let the wolf out, and I both loved and hated myself for it.
Definitely should be played in one or two sittings, and I'm looking forward to more stories in this seedy and totally ridiculous universe of bad men and even badder women.
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Count me in the minority that believes Season Two is still a pretty good season of Telltale's TWD. Not as strong as the first game mainly because of the weaker cast, but playing as Clementine, and seeing her grow with the decisions she had to make, I still loved it. The big villain definitely could have been used better, but I think the major returning character from S1 had a compelling story arc that carried the last half to a teary conclusion for my choices.
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Pure joy. Would be higher on this list if I got to play more of it. Not gonna bother with the online aspect of it, as the purity of local multiplayer is exactly what made me love this game so much despite having only played it a grand total of two times, both in party settings.
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So much has been said about this game, that I don't think it'd be very interesting to read it all repeated. I'm a masochist, basically. Thankfully, I stopped playing it right before the first expansion came out due to more gravely insulting design choices, and I haven't touched it since.
...but maybe I'll go back to it once all the expansions are out and they've decided on a simpler leveling path.
Maybe.
Fuck Destiny.
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Can't really say it any better than Jeff, Alex and Vinny. It sounds awesome, it looks awesome, and it plays awesome. Spent what I thought would be short breaks that turned into two hour long sessions trying to finish missions and top my high score.
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What the fuck, am I right?
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Didn't experience the supposedly horrid vanilla Diablo III pre-Loot 2.0, and I just dove into this version with my girlfriend. Had a great time just messing up hordes of demons as a "cool" and "electric" Wizard while the SO mowed them down as a Monk, taking turns checking out our loot and recommending the best ones to one another.
It plays incredibly well on consoles, with only the occasional framerate hitches on my PS3, and the online party system was pretty good with how dynamic it was.
Maybe wouldn't have cracked my top 10 without having played all of it with the GF, but I did, and here it is.
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Like most of the GB crew, I've never gotten into any CCGs. I understood Magic: The Gathering, but I didn't build any decks or play with friends. Yet Hearthstone was accessible enough that I found myself playing match after match after match, first, against the AI, and subsequently, against real competition - humans.
I would actually admit that I'm not even close to being decent, but my ego is telling me my poor win-loss ratio is because I haven't put any money nor as much time into the game as most players. Still, I had a lot of thrilling matches nevertheless, that the element of luck made all the more exciting.
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Barely finished this game just to have it mentioned here on my list, and I played it through a haze of cigarette smoke, a migraine, a debilitating cold and a cough that just won't go away. Perfect way to play this bleak look into a Norse-inspired mythological world.
While the combat certainly isn't perfect, I actually found it enjoyable enough with what strategy is required to win them while minimizing losses. Maybe I just suck at this particular game, but it took a while for me to really understand the flow of battle so a lot of them were won with only a couple of my units alive, barely breathing.
It added to the overall sense of dread and despair that I felt for the other half of the game, making the best decisions I could with the dire circumstances. I think the only problem I had with that aspect is that the limited production values left me a bit cold with some of the choices I made, as there were no faces for me to truly sympathize with.
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Never was into 2D platformers, and it took some training through save states just for me to be able to finish the original Super Mario Bros. legit (still haven't finished 3 and World without save states though!). So I don't even have the nostalgia for this genre, yet Shovel Knight entertained me with its on-point retro visuals, tight mechanics and surprisingly endearing story.
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Only played the very first Hitman game, which was great for its setups, but was simply too restrictive. I will definitely play the rest of the games in the series (when they actually get really good), but Hitman Go is doing it for me in bite-sized portions. Considering its made for mobile, there are just enough options for the game to feel freeing without being overwhelming. Love the look of it, too.
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Interactive fiction at its finest! I'm still smack dab in the middle of my adventure, and I'm not confident I can win the wager for my master, but damn am I enjoying all the dialogue, exposition, and even the micromanagement, if not for some quibbling usability complaints. Steampunk is actually fresh again with 80 Days.
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Uber late into the party, and I'm ashamed to admit I played way more of 2048 first before this one. But just a couple of games into this, the original just blows all the clones out of the water. Aesthetics with actual heart put into them that works, and a design philosophy that's infinitely more challenging and rewarding.
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