It's January 4th 2014. The most recent game I played was World of Warcraft. I was not punctual, this list was put together without any text but I felt for my own posterity that I needed to record my feelings from 2013.
Enjoy, or don't.
I ain't no gendarmes.
I had a singular experience with The Last of Us. I feel lucky to have ran through this game the way I did. Every step, every moment felt more intense and costly than the last. I find it Incredible that two years running the most extraordinary attachment has occurred to a game that by all accounts is another zombie game. For me The Last of Us was -in every second- far more than that. An absoloute triumph. It will take me years to process but right now, since the second the credits rolled. The Last of Us feels like the best experience I've ever had with a game.
I had a dream, the other night.
Low lands,
Low lands away, me john
Nothing feels like the world of Black Flag. If this is even a faint taste of what is to come in the new generation of home console hardware, then haul away those anchors me trumps!
The effect the character swapping vignettes had on the story of this game was, for me; Nothing short of profound. It's one of those mechanics that is so good it seems positively insane that no one had done it before now. Couple that with the single most technically impressive open world I've ever seen and a deeply affecting dose of that Californian flavour I've so come to love during my time here. Well, even Trevor couldn't make me feel bad about this one.
I bought a 3DS XL for this game on the strength of fourteen minutes of Patricks quick look. It fast became one of the best investments I'd ever made. All you need to know is this. I have not finished Fire Emblem: Awakening because I (disgustingly) factory reset my console at about 85 hours in. I've just started playing it again and it still made it to number four on my list. It's that good.
Glory to Arstotzka.
Next.
This is the one. This Fighter more than any other I've played save maybe for the arcade version of The Last Bronx, feels right. This is everything I want out of a fighting game. I bought my first ever Arcade stick just for it. I know KOFXIII isn't exactly a 2013 game, but the Steam Edition didn't release until this year and I'll be damned if that isn't the best way to play it. The feeling of the execution, the art style. The technical excellence of its presentation. This is what I felt like I was playing the first time I found a Street Fighter II Cabinet in my youth. There is no better recent 2D fighter. Cheers SNKP
Click on door number 430. You won't regret it. Or perhaps you are already regretting it because you are reading this list entry rather than sitting at your computer terminal pressing buttons.
Disco secrets forever.
Holy shit. The first time I drank in the presentaion of Kentucky Route Zero was as eye opening as the first time I opened a Mike Mignola comic. As though there was a way of imagining the world that had never occurred to me before. As an aspiring artist myself, if I ever work on a game I can only hope it is as visually meritous as Kentucky Route Zero. I need to play through the chapters I have again now that my mind has gotten used to how beautiful I think it is. Because the way this game is written deserves the most rapt attention I can muster.
Speaking of writing. I loved the Hyper Trousers gag SO MUCH that Gun Point immediately went on my GOTY list before I'd even finished the first level. I could say that is more due to the poor games I played this year but that would be a bald faced lie. Gunpoint is stupendous.
I can't believe how many games I am putting on this list that I haven't finished. Volgarr seemed utterly simple at first. An overly difficult combat platformer with a hard on for the Genesis era. It was only after I had hopelessly replayed the first level nearly sixty times that I realised how much depth is hidden behind what -at first- feels like a kind of stodgy move-set. Once you get comfortable with the mechanics, comfortable enough to be confident in the face of whatever snakes, lizard men and spiders it throws at you, playing Volgarr is like unlocking a new game mode. except you unlocked it inside your own mind and body. Which is really the best place for all progression.
Rise Warrior.
It's the superior title. Dark Souls is tremendous. But this here, Demon's Souls is the better game. The purity of it's intention blew my mind. Dark Souls has been corrupted ever so slightly by the unchecked rampant surprise that was the response to Demon's Souls. Watching Vinny play through Dark Souls damn near forced me to turn back and make sure. Just check once and for all that my mind wasn't wrought with weakness for thinking that Demons' Souls is the better of the two. I now stand firm in my convictions. Demon's Souls remains king.
