Top 10 Games of 2016
I did this list a few months ago, decided to finally put it on here.
List items
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Holy shit man let’s talk about how great Doom actually is. It took so damn long to get this game, and it was well worth the wait. SO worth it that I think it’s the best game that came out in 2016, and I didn’t think I would be saying that a year ago. I’m in the process of going back and playing through the campaign again, after not touching this game for six months, but honestly after playing every game this year, it’s the one that just kept coming to mind. Even after playing some of the other great shooters of the year, such as Overwatch and Titanfall 2, Doom is what I kept coming back to in terms of the overall package. Doom is nothing but reminiscent of the original two games, but with a 2016 flair. In fact, it’s even more of a Doom sequel than Doom 3, which is also a great game, but has more of a survival horror vibe. It’s the fast, fluid, and tight-as-hell controls that make this a masterclass in first-person-shooter design. One of my favorite aspects of Doom over other releases of not only this year, but probably this entire generation thus far is how the music is front and center in this game. The rip-roaring soundtrack is so good from beginning to end, and it just screams metal as you rip through demon after demon. Doom harkens back to when I was in grade school going to a buddy’s house and playing the original game on the Sega 32x (and later PC) and being both mesmerized and terrified at the same time. It was such a unique and different experience from anything I had played up to that point, and a lot of that was just Mario and Zelda. Even John Carmack should be proud of how this game turned out, considering he had nothing to do with it. Add to the excellent single-player campaign the multiplayer which I actually really enjoy in this game, and I’m someone who isn’t as into multiplayer in games as I use to be. It reminds me of the fast and fluid multiplayer shooters I grew up playing online: Quake III Arena and Unreal Tournament. The added “Snapmap” mode is also a welcome bonus, especially for those that didn’t get this game on PC but want to have the fun of playing modded levels. Hell I just played through The first level of the original Halo: Combat Evolved in the Doom engine. That’s really rad. Betheseda Softworks has been killing it this generation with bringing back classic franchises from the 90s. They did Wolfenstein justice, they are working on what I hope is a great revival of Quake, and I am beyond pumped for the revival of Prey, which was one of the most underrated games of the Xbox 360 generation, and one that you probably didn’t play. There wasn’t a better shooter in 2016, hell, there wasn’t a better game in 2016.
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I actually debated making this my number one game of the year, but there’s one game that edged it out slightly. Let’s start with the best part of the game off the bat: they finally fixed the wonky shooting that’s always plagued this series. Never has shooting felt better in an Uncharted game. This is also the best written game Naughty Dog has ever produced, even better than yes, The Last of Us. This is the final Nathan Drake adventure, and that ending was just so damn perfect it captures everything I love about the character. The introduction of Drake’s long lost brother Sam was a nice addition too, and while there is a twist with him, I was happy that it didn’t go the way I thought it would. This is also the best-looking game I’ve played at this point in my life, and the first Uncharted I’ve actually wanted to go back and play through a second time. Usually by the end of these games I’m happy I played it and enjoyed the story, but I’m always burned out because of the controls. Thankfully that isn’t the case with A Thief’s End. A fitting end for Nathan Drake and a great Playstation franchise.
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Probably the single greatest multiplayer co-op experience in 2016, and a true age old tale of an indie game being better than some of the big-budget 2016 releases, I really have nothing bad to say about Overcooked (other than the final stage being a bit needlessly hard). I can’t remember a better split-screen co-op experience, at least this generation. And there’s a damn Racoon-in-a-wheel-chair and he’s my hero in this game. The levels get progressively more challenging without getting to the point that you want to rip your hair out (except maybe that final level, but that’s still the dog’s fault). Overcooked is a shining example that some of 2016’s best wasn’t in a $60 release, but a digital (now physical as well) $15 purchase. Do yourself a favor and go buy it.
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Leave it to Blizzard to once again dominate a different genre of gaming. Overwatch is a weird one because it wasn’t on my radar at all. Every time that I saw a preview or trailer for it I simply wrote it off as some stupid new MOBA game because that’s what it looked like to me. Then the hype for this game got real, and it was universally praised as one of the best things to happen in gaming this year, and I have to say, it totally is and it does deserve all of the praise it’s getting. Great map design, excellent character design and character’s you care about seeing backstory for (Blizzard has done an excellent job of releasing “Pixar Quality” short films revolving around each character from this game) and the great post release support that you would expect from the makers of Diablo and Warcraft. And a game with no season pass’s, that’s unheard of in today’s day and age. Sure, you can go down the hole of buying loot boxes for cosmetic items, but I find it more fun to just play and unlock those. Easily the best team based online game this side of Team Fortress.
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There hasn’t been a Telltale series game on any of my lists since the original Walking Dead game back in 2012, which redefined story telling in video games. It’s painfully obvious that this would make my list because of my absurd love for all things Batman, but Telltale not only gets the character right, but they’ve seemingly have been given more leeway to mess with the fiction than anything else I’ve experienced between film and comics and even other games recently. Hell, they even created an original new villain for this game that didn’t turn out to be a cop out (I’m looking at you, Arkham Knight). In fact, this Batman game delivered more for me than Rocksteady’s conclusion last year, which is really saying something. I don’t want to go into details here regarding different characters because this is a game that can easily be spoiled and if you haven’t played it yet do yourself a favor and go play this game. My only gripe with Telltale’s latest is that their absurdly out of date engine looks more aged then every before, and caused massive issues while playing this game (I played it on Xbox One). Now that I’ve played season one on Xbox One, I’ll be stuck with this franchise there, but it made such an impact on how poorly optimized these games are that in the future I’ll be switching all Telltale game’s to their PC versions, where I could only hope they run somewhat better. And man, just when I thought I was tired of every single iteration of Batman having to stick the Joker in there somewhere, they did something new and original with him here. I’m excited to see what they come up with for a second season of this franchise, and I can’t wait to play it (hopefully it is sooner rather than later). Excellent storytelling, amazing writing, and a phenomenal job in voice work all around, Batman: The Telltale Series excels far above my expectations. Even if you seem burned out on Telltale games (I know I am), this is one that shines above some of the more recent offerings by the company, even the recent Game of Thrones series as well. Worth every minute of your time, especially if you are a Batman fan.
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Taking everything that was great about the original Titanfall and then upping the ante with easily one of the best single-player shooter campaigns of recent memory, Titanfall 2 really etched a name for itself in a year crammed with excellent shooters (One of which that charts just a tad higher than this one on my list). That level that everyone is talking about (The time-travel level) is easily one of the most original designs in a shooter in quite some time, and that’s all I’ll share about that level because you really owe it to yourself to give this campaign a shot. My only gripe with the campaign is the Metal Gear like boss’s they introduce and do nothing with story-wise. And the multiplayer is just as good, if not better, then the original game. Fantastic sequel.
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I love the Souls franchise, and even though last year’s Bloodbourne is still my favorite game from this team, Dark Souls 3 was just a great melting pot of everything that makes these games great. It took me a few of these games to finally understand that these are essentially 3D versions of Symphony of the Night, just with the difficulty level ramped up to 11. And while the final boss of this game is somewhat of a gigantic letdown in terms of difficulty, every other boss was something to truly behold. It felt like a fitting end for Dark Souls, should From Software choose to make this the final game with the Dark Souls name. While the original Dark Souls will always be my favorite in this franchise, and Bloodbourne my favorite “Souls-like game”, Dark Souls 3 was a good cap on the first half of 2016.
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Thank God we’ve finally gotten a proper sequel/revival to Harvest Moon, made by one dude who clearly loves that franchise. I’ll argue Stardew Valley is the most impressive release on my list this year, simply because it’s the most complete feeling game and it was made by again, one guy. One guy with a passion. I dumped a few hours into this on PC earlier this year with the promise of (I’ll come back to it when it comes out on console), and so thankfully it finally it did last week, and I’ve been enjoying it even more on my Xbox One now. And while the mechanics of the game go much deeper than any Harvest Moon I’ve ever played, I can’t help but have a smile on my face when I play this game. From the retro look and style of the game, to the excellent music. Maybe it’s the guy who has played 400 hours of Minecraft in me, but Stardew Valley is a breath of fresh air in a year that was mostly dominated by excellent shooters and excessive hyper violent games.
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: The long-awaited installment in the long-running RPG franchise, XV marks the first truly good game in this franchise since what, X? Actually Type-0 was a pretty cool game, but not part of the core franchise sadly. What makes XV a breath of fresh air from previous installments is just how different it is. And what it lacks in cohesive story-telling it makes up for in gameplay and open world exploration. In fact I don’t even care for protagonist Noctis all that much, he’s like a mix of every stubborn Final Fantasy protagonist, but with too much teenage angst for my taste. Ignus though, he’s my guy. Such a cool character, making all those sweet and savory looking dishes. I enjoy the “four bros hanging out car trip 2016 simulator” aspect of this game. The combat sees a welcome change of pace from previous installments, and while Final Fantasy VII will always have the best combat of any numbered game in this franchise, I like the future of this new combat. And this will probably be the last new entry in this franchise for the foreseeable future thanks to Square Enix finally pulling the trigger on that VII remake, I for one look forward to seeing this game through to the end (Yes at the time of this writing I haven’t actually finished this game, and I’m at the 30-hour mark and taking my sweet time with it). A great RPG, and that’s something we don’t get enough of.
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A few days ago, I was ready to crown Dead Rising 4 as my game of the year. I’ve been pumped for this game since it was announced earlier this year at E3, and even more pumped to return to playing as Frank West in the town that started it all, Willamete. And while I thoroughly enjoyed Dead Rising 4 from beginning to (not really the end) end, there are just a few things that keep me from putting it higher on my list than I would like to. Now I’m not one of those people that are so crushed on the idea of removing the game’s timer that I was ready to write this game off. Hell, Dead Rising 3 pretty much got rid of that timer anyways. I’ve even gone along with the new look and voice of Frank West here, and I must say, this new guy does an outstanding job of playing Frank West in this game. He’s older, and he’s just that much more of an asshole than the original incarnation of the character, and I love every minute of it. However, and this is a Capcom issue, but why the hell in 2016 are we cutting the ending of the game and making it mandatory pay to play downloadable content? Dead Rising 4 starts out with probably the single greatest intro of any game I played this year, but the fact that the final Case from this game was cut to make it DLC is just flat out disgusting. Add to that the removal of campaign co-op for no apparent reason other than “we wanted to tell Frank’s story in a single-player setting”, and I just must knock it down on my list quite a bit. Still, despite these short comings, I enjoyed the hell out of my time with Dead Rising 4. And while I know Capcom is confident that they will do more with this franchise in the future, I just don’t see the sales numbers for this game skyrocketing to the point of that becoming a reality. Either way, I was glad I got to play another round as Frank West.
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