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spilledmilkfactory

I spent all day playing Titanfall and uploaded my first GB review in forever

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GotY 2014

Alas! Alack! The time has come yet again for Game of the Year celebrations. I'ma keep this one short and sweet for you guys.

2014? Yeah, that was a pretty junk year for video games.

Say whatever you want about transition years and new consoles. One year after the launch of the Xbox 360, we had Gears of War, Oblivion, and Dead Rising. A year after the PS3 hit shelves, we had played Uncharted, Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, Warhawk, and Heavenly Sword.

The year after a new console launch is always rough, but I'd argue it's never been this rough for a major system. The PS4 in particular had not a single exclusive of interest to me aside from InFamous, and that ended up being a disappointment. The Xbox One and Wii U fared much better with several strong exclusives apiece, but the traditionally strong third-party titles that typically flesh out a year were extra scarce in 2014.

Ubisoft's games all seemed to launch broken, and prioritized an abundance of boring side missions over substantial and fun story content. EA's year was oddly sparse, their sports games and Dragon Age left to mop up the year with Battlefield pushed into 2015. Activision put out a stronger Call of Duty than they've made in years, but Destiny was by all accounts a disappointment and fell flat for me.

Here's to hoping that 2015 continues to see strong showings from Microsoft and Nintendo, but other companies will have to seriously re-prioritize in order to hold my interest going into the next holiday. So far, I'm not convinced that'll be the case.

Okay, so that wasn't short. But it sure was sweet. Here are my top ten games of 2014, otherwise known as Ten of the Eleven Games I Actually Liked in 2014. Sorry, Valiant Hearts.

List items

  • Super Smash Bros. Melee might be my favorite game of all time, but this generation's Smash gives it a run for its money. Rebalanced Smash Attacks feel much more fair than they did in the misguided Brawl, and the roster has been expanded with characters that I actually care about. Robin, Shulk, Villager, and Lucinia are all characters that I've come to love over the last few years, and the fact that they're actually fun to play makes this Smash a real treat. The return of Dr. Mario is another bonus for me (I've always preferred him to Mario or Luigi). Other intelligent design choices, like splitting Samus and Zero-Suit Samus into two separate characters, help right the ship after Bawl blew the series just slightly off course.

    I could go on and on gushing over the things I love about the new Smash. The stages are an eclectic blend of the series' best and some choice new locales, the items feel more varied and balanced than ever before, and there are tons of modes to play when you tire of your basic Stock and Time battles. Hell, even the amiibo integration is pretty cool.

    I couldn't have hoped for a stronger Smash sequel, and the fact that this entry released on two platforms only ensures that I'll be devoting even more of my life to this beast of a game. Godspeed, Nintendo and Sora. You've made one of the strongest games I've played in the decade since Melee.

  • Speaking of incredible Wii U games...

    I don't know if I can think of an action game more manic, fluid, or fun than Bayonetta 2. It certainly gives my favorites from past years a run for their money, and serves to remind that developers can still create incredible setpieces on the Wii U's weaker hardware. The fluid, ultra-precise combat of Bayonetta 2 is merely the tip of a manic, borderline insane iceberg.

    Like Smash, Bayonetta 2 is bloated to bursting with content. New characters unlock upon beating the game for the first time, as do new shop items and costumes, and you'll unlock dozens of multiplayer missions just by playing through the campaign. Once you've had your fill of the game, the original Bayonetta comes for free with boxed copies, just because.

    I cannot recommend Bayonetta 2 highly enough. It's one hell of a thrill ride, with the depth and the humor to keep me coming back for more each time I thought I was done.

  • Forza Horizon 2 is some of the purest fun I had with a game in 2014. At every turn (har), it seemed like Playground Games made the choice that most empowered the player, a design tactic that's all too rare in modern gaming. Whether I was plowing through a vineyard in a Lambo or tearing up the asphalt in a tricked-out classic (okay, the balance leans about 90% towards the former), I was having a blast with Horizon. The massive car catalogue, superb handling, and bevvy of online modes make this one racer that won't be leaving my rotation for a long time to come.

  • Dragon Age: Inquisition is another game that's not lacking for depth. Perhaps my biggest surprise of the year, Inquisition rights the wrongs of both of its predecessors while crafting an immersive and gargantuan world to explore. I think I've spent about half of my playtime in Inquisition reading lore, and I've actively enjoyed it. The fiction is so deep (you can read about the discovery of Elfroot, its origins in modern medicine, and its practical uses in one entry, and it's just a common healing item) that I couldn't help being absorbed by it. It's not mandatory to enjoy the game, but I like a world I can get lost in.

    From a gameplay standpoint, Inquisition brings back character customization and party interplay from the first game, and melds it with faster pacing, more precise control, and a more satisfying set of abilities to give your characters.

    BioWare's back, baby.

  • As far as Halo games go, The Master Chief Collection might be at the bottom of the pile. It launched in such laughably broken condition that it was barely even playable, a real shock given that all four of these games included were impeccably polished when they launched, some of them over a freaking DECADE ago. Just yesterday (December 10th), six Master Chief Collection Achievements popped that I had earned on November 15th. I wasn't even playing the game at the time - I was playing Dragon Age.

    It's absurd how badly this collection was put together.

    Even so, take three of the best shooters of all time and their pretty-okay sequel, pack them into one game, and remaster two of them with gorgeous graphics, and you're gonna have a good time. I had a blast playing through the first three campaigns again in splitscreen, and some of the best multiplayer maps and modes in gaming history are contained within this humble disc. It's not the glorious collection that Master Chief deserves, but the Halo series was one of the most influential ever for a reason, and it's been a treat to rediscover that.

  • This refers to the Apocalypse Edition of Dead Rising 3, which launched on Steam earlier this year. Dead Rising 3 on Xbox One is still a heck of a time too, but that came out last year.

    Dead Rising 3 embraces the absurdity and stupidity inherent in video games, and it's one of the best games of this or last year because of it. Carving through zombies with a ridiculous array of weapons has always been fun, but this entry ups the ante with combo vehicles and a fully open world. Navigation could be a pain thanks to some not-so-strategically placed roadblocks, but it wasn't enough to mar the sheer, stupid delight I took in slaughtering tens of thousands of zombies with a flaming scythe.

  • Transistor painted its world in beautifully minimalist fashion, scattering just enough information across its campaign to let your imagination run away with the rest. In that way, it's sort of the anti-Dragon Age, although its pause-and-play combat seems to have taken a cue or two from BioWare's epic series. Getting up behind enemies and messing up their day with a series of powerful combo moves was all the more satisfying due to the methodical nature of the combat; you had to really plan out your moves and your loadouts if you wanted to take full advantage of Transistor's gameplay, but the game's many intricacies were largely left to you to discover. It was a bold move, but one that paid off handsomely in my opinion.

  • There's not much more pure than a classic platformer done well, and that's what Nintendo delivered with Kirby: Triple Deluxe. Eating enemies and spitting them out is still lots of fun, but this time Kirby's repertoire was expanded with the ability to travel in and out of the background. It's a mechanic that's been used in other platformers, but Kirby put it to use best with creative levels that required interplay between the foreground and the background to succeed. The game became surprisingly challenging as it wore on, and some great moments were tucked away behind the collectable challenges.

  • Mario Kart 8 is one of those games that's as frustrating as it is fun. Get in first place, and navigating the game's meticulously designed curves and traps is a blast as you try to fend off all comers. Fall below second, and the game for some reason deems it appropriate to dump every red, blue, and green shell on your head in what can only be read as a concentrated effort to drag you as far away from first as possible before you cross that finish line. Yeah, it's not rare to engage in a screaming match with your TV when you play Mario Kart.

    But that's nothing new. What is new are the beautiful graphics, that awesome trumpet-box item, and some truly fantastic new courses. The character roster was a disappointment, but that's being remedied by DLC, which also adds new courses. That Excitebike level might be the best thing in the entire game.

    In the moment, it can be hard to decide whether you love or hate Mario Kart 8. In the aftermath, though, it's easy to see how much fun the game really is, especially with four players.

  • For one of Microsoft's biggest holiday exclusives, Sunset Overdrive could've been a lot stronger. The mission design became tedious, redundant, and boring by the time the credits rolled, and the game's obnoxious humor often fell flat even if it did deliver a chuckle or two at its best.

    But when your core mechanic - grinding, flipping, and bouncing across Sunset City, in this case - is this much fun, you can get away with a lot. I loved the momentum that spawned from the game's mechanics, and Insomniac's typically wacky weapons paired well with the action. Great character customization was a nice little cherry on top.
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