by mento
Adjusted GOTY lists are something I'm experimenting with. It is impossible for me, both in terms of time and monetary resources, to play every game that piques my interest in a given year. I cannot get the spread that something like Giant Bomb can, with its staff of seven people (give or take a Rorie), and so my GOTY lists tend to suffer from the limitation as a result. Usually, I play just enough new games that year to fill out a list of ten, though I'd much prefer a surplus that I could judiciously whittle down.
So instead, what I'll start doing is create GOTY lists that also cumulatively apply the subsequent year's playing history, and the year after that, and so on. As I catch up with my backlog, I should get a clearer picture of what games resonated with me most that year, irrespective of when I actually got around to playing them.
2015 was a strong year for RPGs, which made it a strong year for me also, with the likes of Bloodborne, Pillars of Eternity, The Witcher 3, and Undertale. MGSV and Yakuza 5 also, if we're talking edge cases. The only games left from this year that I'm still itching to play are two Trails games and a few scattered Indies. Won't be long before this ranked list is as complete as it's ever going to get.
My original 2015 GOTY list is here. Other Adjusted GOTY lists can be found here (2013), here (2014), here (2016), here (2017), and here (2018).
| GOTYs | (Adjusted) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 |
| 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
| 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 |
[*UP TO DATE* as of January 2021.]
Showing 1-10 of 64 items
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: 4 2017 rank: 4 2018 rank: 3 2019 rank: 3 2020 rank: 1 I mean, it figures the one Souls game made in 2015 would be high up on here somewhere. Bloodborne represents something more exciting than the usual dragons and mimics of the Souls brand, however; a successful transplant of the Souls formula into another setting. A fairly adjacent setting, mind, but one that still stands distinct alongside the Demon's and the Darks. The combat focus on aggression and being relentless to keep your health in check, the emphasis on its versatile shapeshifting weapons and the wonderful ludonarrative device that is "insight", as much a curse as it is a boon, might even elevate the game above the rest. Even as a high fantasy fan, I much preferred Bloodborne's dark gothic world plagued by terrors known and unknown.
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: N/A 2017 rank: N/A 2018 rank: N/A 2019 rank: N/A 2020 rank: 2 It took a while to happen, but I finally bit the bullet on continuing the Trails series so I could catch up to the recent Cold Steel entries. I won't be playing those any time soon, but Trails in the Sky is proving to be a series I'm happy to luxuriate in for now. In addition to the first game's keen sense of worldbuilding and characterization, SC vastly improves the combat system by starting off on a higher level with more complexity - think Baldur's Gate 2 to Baldur's Gate 1 - and hitting you with a great variety of tough fights that need some prep and tactical wherewithal to overcome. The story also escalates here, introducing more of the villains behind the scenes of the first game, and just a generally more confident continuation all round. If this is the calibre of game in store for the rest of the Trails series, I clearly should've paid more attention to it way back when.
2015 rank: 1 2016 rank: 1 2017 rank: 1 2018 rank: 1 2019 rank: 1 2020 rank: 3 (See the 2015 GOTY list for more details.) Not just a nostalgic throwback to the Infinity Engine era, Pillars of Eternity feels like a fresh new start for the CRPG genre and I can't wait to see what comes of it.
2015 rank: 2 2016 rank: 2 2017 rank: 2 2018 rank: 2 2019 rank: 2 2020 rank: 4 (See the 2015 GOTY list for more details.) Sadly, it doesn't seem we're due for any more enhancements to Super Mario Maker's level creation studio. Everyone's kind of moved on. I am still hoping for an enhanced remake/sequel for Switch, however. No-one expected this game to be as effective as it is for cajoling out the inner-Miyamoto in all of us.
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: 3 2017 rank: 3 2018 rank: 4 2019 rank: 4 2020 rank: 5 What I find remarkable about MGSV is that it's actually a game I enjoyed playing. That sounds like damning it with faint praise, but I struggled my way through every earlier MGS episode through some kind of single-minded dogged pursuit of whatever it was Hideo Kojima had to say about war or nanomanchines or soldiers that shoot bees out of their mouths. The amount of substance in this game is truly outstanding, and it's really quite odd that a Japanese studio managed to create the best open-world game when there are so many of the damn things being made in the west year after year. Just wish the circumstances behind its development weren't quite so strained. Art through adversity, I guess.
2015 rank: 3 2016 rank: 5 2017 rank: 5 2018 rank: 5 2019 rank: 5 2020 rank: 6 (See the 2015 GOTY list for more details.) While it has a slow start and a lot of the surprises don't work quite as well on a second playthrough, Undertale has a special place in my heart for not only flipping JRPG conventions on their heads - not the first game to do that - but to do so with an underlying message of compassion and an emotional intelligence rarely seen in video games of its type. It also still has the best damn soundtrack of 2015, unquestioned, even out of all the additional 2015 games I've played since.
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: N/A 2017 rank: N/A 2018 rank: 6 2019 rank: 6 2020 rank: 7 I was very impressed with the huge amount of varied content of Yakuza 5, to the extent that each character's chapter felt like a whole game, but that immense size also worked against it in a few regards. Like how many of the riffs on other games - Saejima's Big Game Hunting, in particular - wore out their welcome while trying to 100% the game. A bit of a bloat, but everything that raises Yakuza to godlike status is still hitting their marks here.
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: 6 2017 rank: 6 2018 rank: 7 2019 rank: 7 2020 rank: 8 It's enough of an accomplishment to create a game that someone could feasibly play for hundreds of hours and still not see everything, but more so to do that with content that remains narratively and mechanically engrossing right up to the end. Chances are, if you're dropping that kind of time into a game, you're not doing so for the story. I realize the game's combat isn't everyone's phial of Enhanced Swallow, but it was enough to carry me through the game; playing it on the hardest difficulty, which forced me to tactically rely on potions and witcher Signs a lot more, definitely helped in that regard. The best part is that I still have those well-rated DLC campaigns to play if I ever feel the itch to witch again.
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: N/A 2017 rank: 7 2018 rank: 8 2019 rank: 8 2020 rank: 9 While most of the underlying mechanics are similar to the first Xenoblade Chronicles, barring a mech or two, the feel and tone of Xenoblade X is a lot different, opting for a more overtly sci-fi take on the new open-world JRPG paradigm that Monolith perfected on their first try. While it doesn't quite stack up to its predecessor, X is just as packed with brilliant ideas from the high-concept plot down to dozens of little quality-of-life features, and presents a story and world I was actually invested enough in to pay attention to, rather than faffing off and completing side-quests for 50 hours. Even so, the inevitable open-world wandering off was made even more compelling with a new system wherein every hexagon on the open-world map had a specific goal attached to it, from fighting a tough enemy to finding a specific treasure chest to it being the destination of some side-quest you picked up back in the hub city of New Los Angeles. It was a great spin on the usual Ubisoft "icon barf" maps that kept you guessing and encouraged thorough exploration. And hell, I even liked the eccentric soundtrack: some of the best Japanese rapping in a close approximation of English since Persona 3.
2015 rank: N/A 2016 rank: N/A 2017 rank: 8 2018 rank: 9 2019 rank: 9 2020 rank: 10 Zestiria felt a bit like a step down from the excellent Xillia, with a cast that wasn't quite as fun and an interconnected node-based open-world that felt pretty familiar. However, Zestiria's new combat system was fairly engrossing once I'd gotten the hang of it - automatically recharging stamina bars were far more convenient than using regular combos and items to recover the same stat - and Tales once again came up with another great conceit for its setting, in this case immortal spiritual beings that most humans couldn't see but were able to feel their presence through acts of largesse, similar to angels. Even when you have an average entry in the Tales series like this one, it's evident when playing them that very few active JRPG franchises can match Bamco's anime adventures for quality consistency.
