My Top 10 Games of 2015
By MikeLemmer 2 Comments
My finances for 2015 have been slimmer than ever, preventing me from not only buying an Xbone or PS4, but also from buying most of the great AAA $60 titles that were released. Instead, a lot of my entertainment this year came from Indie games, Good Old Games, and games I previously bought on Early Access that are just now coming out of beta. As much as I would like to have spent enough time & money playing games to make a more comprehensive list, not starving was a higher priority.
However, first I would like the acknowledge the old classics that sated me enough to avoid spending (more) money on entertainment:
Honorable Mentions of Great Games I Spent Copious Amounts of Time Playing This Year That Were Released Years Ago So They Don't Count Towards GotY
- League of Legends
- Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor
- Zeus: Master of Olympus
- Anno 1701
- Sid Meier's Pirates!
- Endless Legend
And now, onto the list of my favorite 10 games released this year:
It's a rhythm roguelike where you have to react to enemies at 2-3 beats/turns per second. I never thought a game could merge turn-based strategy with real-time reflexes like it does. The kicking soundtrack doesn't hurt, either.
The best sports game I've played in years. Compared to the lofty perspectives of FIFA and Madden, Rocket League is the pickup game of ball in the alley that motivated kids to become pros in the first place. It captures the spirit of the sport.
The act of getting to a moon just means setting a waypoint in other games. In this one, it means learning basic physics and trying a dozen different rocket builds. Kerbal restores the grandeur of space by making it hard to get there in the first place. It also provides lots of ways to get there (and even more ways to fail spectacularly).
If Crypt of the Necrodancer made a typically turn-based genre real-time, then Invisible Inc. made stealth, a typically real-time genre, turn-based. Each turn, you have an infinite amount of time to realize just how screwed you are, regret the decisions that led you to this predicament, and try a desperate ploy to get out of the mess. Consistently nail-biting.
6. Cradle
Cradle's a weird mishmash of involuntary transhumanism, Buddhist mythology, and Mongolian landscapes where half the plot is written on notes scattered around the hut you start in. Although the actual gameplay is middling at best and the ending stumbles, the setting's seared into my mind.
This game finally convinced me to buy a Wii U, and I quickly got lost in the casual game design loop of "come up with idea, try to polish it, see how the public likes it". It attaches a 30-year tradition of platforming and fanmade Hells onto an appealing level editor that almost requires no instructions to use. I've made levels in other games before, but they were never Mario levels.
This was the part where I finally understood what everyone was talking about. MH4U is an MMO cut down to just the boss fights, an RPG that demands preparation, a Dark Souls game focused on cooperative play. It also had the best final boss fight of the year for me, a grueling 20-minute brawl that left me collapsed in my chair, catching my breath as the credits rolled.
3. Rebel Galaxy
A visceral showcase of what we want space to be. When you enter warp, your ship's engines rev up a moment before exploding off the starting line. When you slide next to an enemy ship and unload everything you have, the screen fills with beams and blasts. This is a Space Western. The classic Westerns were about conveying a place that had faded into memory. This is about conveying a place we want to travel to.
In this game, a growing population isn't adding money to the coffers. It's adding powder to a keg. It solves citybuilders' issues with endgame difficulty by making your entire populace try to subvert your will at every opportunity, from smuggling in booze to killing snitches to digging escape tunnels. Even when it's stable, it's not stable; if you tried to leave it on overnight to build up funds, you would come back to mass riots and half your prison on fire. Its view of population as "numerous individuals stuck in the same place who don't always get along" is probably the most realistic simulation of human society I've seen in a while, it makes an inmate shanking a snitch to death look cute, and it provokes a bit of thought on some sobering topics.
1. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
I've never played an MGS game before. I picked this up after hearing a lot of people who normally don't play MGS recommend it. I'm glad I did. Here's why: MGSV is one of the least pretentious AAA games I've ever played.
Sure, the MGS plot takes itself super-seriously. You know what? A lot of games do. Gears of War, Assassin's Creed, Far Cry, GTA, Crysis, the Doom sequels, Homefront, etc. But MGS knows it's a game, and it's meant to be fun, and it doesn't have its head so far up its own ass to deny you some stupid fun. Like shoving a guard off a cliff with an inflatable decoy. Or spinning out a vehicle with a well-placed crap. Or knocking out a boss with a parachuting crate. Or getting a soldier's sanity questioned when he reports a walking cardboard box. Or completely subverting how it expects you to tackle a mission. It is perfectly willing to let you do whatever dumb, impulsive idea you have, and odds are you can successfully pull it off.
In short, thank you, Kojima, for not giving a damn about insisting we pull off an objective a certain way for "maximum dramatic effect". For not taking yourself too seriously. And for making Snake scream "ROCKET PUNCH" when he shoots his robotic fist.