2016 was a really great year for video games which meant it was another year for me to blow my money on a bunch of games I didn’t necessarily need to play, or on hardware I didn’t necessarily need to have. Yeah, I bought a Vive. Yeah, I didn’t use it very much. I still think the technology is amazing and I will spend more time with it (hopefully) in the coming weeks now that I’ve finished up most of the games I wanted to finish this year, but MAN, it was really hard to take the time to set up the Vive and use it in my much too small of a room, when I could just turn on the PS4 or click on a game on Steam and instantly have fun. It’s silly, and me being lazy, but taking the 5-10 minutes to set the Vive up and get a game running felt like too much work. Besides the VR craze (or lack thereof?) there were two other major themes to gaming this year. First Person Shooters are “back” and are damn good fun again, and all the games everyone thought were going to be absolute garbage turned out to be some of the best games of the year. Four of the games on my top 10 this year were games I thought were going to be terrible and/or I had little to no interest in. They certainly proved me wrong. I think I write this every year, but this year was the toughest for me to pick my favorite game. Usually the choice is obvious, or comes down to 2 games battling for the top spot. 2015 was The Witcher 3 by a landslide, Diablo 3 Reaper of Souls was an amazingly fun time in a surprisingly poor year for games in 2014, The Last of Us and Bioshock Infinite were clear front runners in 2013…and so on. I was incredibly surprised at the overall quality in games this year. I could make a game of the year argument for pretty much every single game on my top 10. So, while it’s nice to have that one big obvious game of the year winner, 2016 showed me it’s even better to have a plethora of really amazing games to choose from. But before we get into that, I have a lot of other games I’d like to talk about.

A few “Old” Games I played this Year

Helldivers

I played this in four player co-op with three of my friends just a few nights ago on a complete whim (damn you steam sales!). While I don’t think the game itself is very fun, my friends and I had a blast murdering each other, whether it be by accident or not. It was especially hilarious when we would decide to not kill each other in order to get 3 stars on a mission, and then within one minute kill each other on accident. Sometimes you just fall off the back of a bike and get run over. Or you accidentally get caught in someone’s cross-hairs. Or you get a Mech dropped on your head. It’s dangerous spreading democracy!

Dark Souls 1 and 2

I played each of these for a little bit as part of my “Souls game crisis" I had this year. I love Dark Souls 2, so I’m interested to see the improvements from Scholars of the First Sin update. So far, it looks very nice. I’ve actually never finished Dark Souls 1, which is something I’m working my way towards, but let me tell you, Dark Souls 1 is HARD. I think it’s the hardest game in the series, just based on me replaying the first 3 hours or so. No teleporting bonfires, the animations feel slower, drinking estus takes an eternity, and the capra demon is still an asshole.

Starcraft 2 Legacy of the Void

While my love of playing Starcraft 2 competitively has officially died, I truly enjoyed the Nova side ops campaign and the CO-OP mode this year. The vast improvements they have made to co-op since the expansions release in 2015 is incredible. It’s a really awesome game mode I’ve put a ton of time into. I also appreciate Blizzard beginning to add DLC like announcers, portrait packs to support tournaments, and unit skins. Of course, a lot of it feels like it’s far too late, but for those of us still playing Starcraft all of the additions to the game have been awesome.

Invisible Inc.

I hadn’t heard a thing about Invisible Inc. until Austin Walker made his passionate argument for it on Giantbomb’s 2015 game of the year deliberation. I absolutely love turn based tactical games, so I bought it on a Steam sale thanks to Austin’s recommendation. I instantly liked all the ideas and gameplay elements, especially that the game forces you to make tough choices in just about everything you do. Unfortunately, it seems that I was always making the wrong choices. I love difficult games, but Invisible Inc. seemed to be unbeatable for me. I don’t think I ever got past the 4^th level. It seemed no matter what choices I made or how I approached the map, I would get caught, one of my agents would get downed, and then I would have to book it to the exit or be forced to fight. Eventually, I would lose all my characters and have to restart. I spent a few hours trying to understand the game and figure out what I was doing wrong but nothing seemed to work. So, while I can see why someone would love this game, it was far too difficult for me.

My VR Experience

The Vanishing of Ethan Carter VR

I always wanted to play this game and when I saw it was being released on VR I figured that would be the best platform to give it a shot. Nope. The resolution on the headset made the game seem fuzzy and unclear. The environments looked muddy, the distant landscape was blurry, and playing without the teleport feature made me feel nauseous. While there seems to be an interesting story in this game, the current VR version is not the place to experience it.

The Lab

The Lab is really cool and a perfect opener to showcase the ability of VR to new users. It has a good variety of quick, unique experiences that I enjoyed messing around with. My brother and I got addicted to taking turns shooting arrows, repeatedly smacking the controllers off the wall because I decided to buy a Vive with no real room to put it. I would have spent more time with this if I had the true amount of space needed for room scale VR.

theBlu

theBlu was probably my favorite VR thing this year, even though it’s incredibly overpriced and only lasts for about 20 minutes. Even still, I think it’s a great introduction to VR, especially for people who don’t play games. Graphically it looks amazing, and the interaction you have with the various marine life is fun. I also found it to be quite relaxing, just sitting on the floor of my room and staring at the bottom of the ocean.

Job Simulator

I like throwing things in VR. Job Simulator has a lot of fun things to throw. It’s also funny and works well in a smaller space.

Tilt Brush

Tilt Brush is probably one of the best things the Vive has to offer in terms of what would feel like a full product. Even just using it in my small room space, it was pretty entertaining to draw various lines and make horrible creations with my very poor art skills. I can imagine using this thing at room scale, especially if you are an artist, can be quite thrilling. If anything, Tilt Brush feels like a product that proves VR works for things other than games.

Games that Disappointed Me

Dishonored 2

The E3 gameplay demo of Dishonored 2 had me convinced that it would be my game of the year. I loved the original Dishonored, and everything I saw of the sequel had me convinced it would be a bigger, better version of the original game. Yet as I played it, it just felt like more of the same, despite the new playable character and the new powers. A lot of the missions felt uninspired. Free roaming around an open area of a city felt interesting and exciting in the original game, but with the sequel I was expecting there to be more. Yet, many missions are very derivative of the first game. Of course, every level had its good moments, but I feel like I’ve already forgotten the ins and outs of the majority of them. Even the time shifting level ended up feeling underwhelming. Still fun, but forgettable. Also, the story was even worse than the first game. I didn’t care at all about what was going on with the characters, and everything fell into a predictable place by the end. I like what they did with new game plus (you get to reset your powers and Emily gets Corvo’s powers and vice versa) but I would have really appreciated that feature when I beat the game two months ago. There is nothing else in games like the world of Dishonored, but everything about this sequel fell flat for me in a way I did not expect.

Stardew Valley

I probably shouldn’t call this section “Games that Disappointed Me” because really Dishonored 2 was the only game that let me down this year. With Stardew Valley, and other games on this list, its more that I just didn’t like the game, and had no expectations going in that I would like it/them. Stardew Valley received a ton of hype when it launched, gathering astronomically high user reviews on Steam and getting nothing but the utmost praise from Dan Ryckert. While I enjoyed sim/farming type games as a kid, as I’ve gotten older my patience for them has run inexplicably thin. Yet, the fast paced “one more day” nature of Stardew Valley made me think it could be the type of game that would keep me up late into the night, waiting for that next crop to grow. Instead, I felt overwhelmed, then completely bored. I would spend my time chopping down trees, watering crops, and then barely have time to go into town. I would spend some time fighting monsters in the cave and then not have time to work on my farm. Hearing more about the game, I understand that “not having time” is not a big deal and that the game goes infinitely if you want it too, but while playing it I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being rushed through everything I wanted to do. Instead of being able to take my time I had to pay attention to a clock. It didn’t help that I found the gameplay itself uninteresting. Maybe I didn’t give the game enough of a chance, but I went from overwhelmed to annoyed to bored over the span of a few hours.

Madden 17

Madden 2002 was the last great Madden. From 2003-2005 2K delivered some of the very best football games in history. As far as I’m concerned, NFL 2K5 is the best sports game in history. So once EA bought up the NFL license and I was forced to play Madden I realized I liked nothing the "new" Madden was trying to do. I hadn’t played a Madden game for any serious length of time since 2007. So this year, since I love to waste money on games, I decided to buy Madden. I still don’t like Madden. The game feels slow and plodding, running the football means you want the final score to be 10-7 because you won’t move the football but will eat minutes off the clock, and the AI seems to swap between stupidly easy to Pro Madden player hard in-between every play. The Madden cards, which used to be outrageously fun to collect, are now monetized and split into so many different variations and packs and rarities that I feel like I’m in a card store looking at Upperdeck boxes. I know people love drafting teams and competing online, but I just want to play a solid, fun season of franchise against the AI. Madden just doesn’t do it for me. But I’ll probably buy it again in a few years, just to remember I don’t like Madden.

Pokemon Go

The Pokemon Go hype was insane. People at work spent hours talking about it, going down into the lobby to take breaks and catch Pokemon at the food court. My girlfriend, who has no interest in games, downloaded it and was catching Pokemon in her house. All this hype got me into playing and tricked me for about a week that the game was really cool. Then I realized there was no trading, no battling with friends, the servers hardly worked, it absolutely demolishes your phone’s battery, and that if I didn’t stop staring at my phone while walking down the street I was going to be robbed. I know many people at my work who still play the game, who aren’t really interested in actual video games. I guess that’s how most of the mobile games make their money. It’s certainly a fun idea, but Pokemon Go is not a good game.

Games I Didn’t Get to Play Yet

Oxenfree

This game was this year’s Invisible Inc for me. I had either paid no attention to it, or somehow hadn’t heard a word about it until this game of the year season. It sounds super interesting, so I grabbed a copy from the Steam Sale and look forward to playing it in 2017.

Bound

Bound looks like a game that could have broken my top 10 this year. Everything about it looks entirely original and the core concept seems very cool. I’m always up to try new types of games with unique stories, so I can’t wait to play Bound. It’s the one game this year I regret not playing before the year ended.

Salt & Sanctuary

I got really obsessed with Dark Souls the last few months so I decided I should play this. If there isn’t going to be anymore Souls games, I’m glad another developer is going to pick up where From left off. Also, 2D side scrolling Dark Souls seems like a neat idea.

Telltale’s Batman

I haven’t fully played a Telltale series since The Walking Dead season 1, but I love Batman and I have heard good things about this. I’m still unsure if I will give it a go though.

Watch Dogs 2

To be fair, I have played about 3 hours of Watch Dogs 2, but not nearly enough to fairly judge it. So far, I like the world and the goofy nature of the game, but wasn’t too impressed with any of the gameplay I’ve experienced so far. Unfortunately, this game may fall into the pile of “paid full price for it and then hardly played it”.

Games that didn’t make the top 10

Grim Dawn

A fun, old school ARPG from the makers of Titan Quest. For anyone who is tired of Diablo 3, I recommend this game. While I don’t think the core loop or the loot is as good as Diablo 3 or Torchlight 2 it was a fun game nonetheless.

The Division

The story/mission aspect of this game is just meh. What I really enjoyed was the multiplayer. A very novel idea that felt rewarding and intense. I especially loved how you can hear other player’s mics when you get close to them. To hear someone about to betray you is hilarious, and always being forced to wonder if that friendly player who joined up with you is about to kill you always made for exciting gameplay. It felt like something new that the genre desperately needed. While it wasn’t enough to make my list, it was certainly worth the time I spent betraying people for mostly useless loot.

Gears of War 4

I had a ton of fun returning to Gears of War. For me, it was a real “return” because I hadn’t fully played a Gears game since the original. I did the entire campaign in co-op and had a blast, I shot some people in multiplayer, and had a ton of fun beating Horde mode on Hard when people would finally choose to stay in the game rather than grab their XP and leave. Gears of War is still really fun to play. The only negative thing I could say about it is that it’s pretty much still same old Gears, which was fine for me.

No Man’s Sky

I really, really like No Man’s Sky. Somehow, despite all the outposts, aliens, and animals looking similar, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of anticipation and eagerness when I landed on a new planet. It was always fun to find a planet I really liked too, and just spend a few hours running around to see how crazy it could get. I took more screenshots playing this game than I ever have with any game, and I enjoyed the generic loop of upgrading my suit, gun and ship even though it was incredibly disappointing to find out you can get everything to max level by staying on one planet. Normally I’m not into survival games, so I think how light and easy going No Man’s Sky is with its crafting and survival mechanics really helped me focus on exploration and giving things I found really dumb names. I think the best compliment I can give the game is it feels like nothing I’ve ever played before. Flying between planets and landing on them without any loading screens brought about feelings of adventure that I haven’t felt in any other game. With all that being said, the receptiveness eventually got to me and once the fall game season got into full swing my frustrations turned into boredom and I quit playing. I still want to try the Foundation update to see how good the base building is and if I can get a freighter ship. I was certainly disappointed in No Man’s Sky, but I still think there is a great time to be had with the game. Hopefully one day Hello Games or some other developer can bring everyone’s dreams of what No Man’s Sky could have been to life.

Clash Royale

It’s possible to get to Arena 8 without spending any money. It only took me 4 months of playing almost every day to do so. I would not recommend it. Clash Royale is the best and worst mobile game I’ve ever played. It has a horrible addicting quality to it and a frustrating amount of pay-to-win players. However, I can’t deny how genius the simple but highly strategic gameplay is and how satisfying it always was to beat those players you know dumped a ton of money into the game. After roughly 6 months of playing at least one match almost every day, I was finally able to break its horrible spell on me. Shout out to people in the Giantbomb.com clan, thanks for all the card donations!

The Witcher 3 Blood and Wine

The Witcher 3 is one of my all-time favorite games. It won my game of the year last year. From world building, to dialogue, to storytelling, to enemy design, the Witcher 3 is best in class in everything that makes an RPG great. If you have not played the Hearts of Stone expansion, do yourself a favor and play it now. It’s easily the best RPG questline I’ve ever played and some of the best single player content I’ve ever experienced in a video game. With that being said, yes, I am also really enjoying Blood and Wine. Unfortunately, new games sidetracked me away from my Witching and I haven’t finished it yet. I like the new zone, the quests are unique, and the story seems like it’s going places, although it doesn’t quite have its hooks in me yet. I’ve spent roughly twenty hours in the expansion and still have a ton to see. I’m actually happy I still have more to play because the Witcher 3 is so great.

The Witness

The Witness is a work of genius. To be able to create so many intricate and creative puzzles out of such a simple concept is an amazing achievement. If anyone told me this was their game of the year, or the greatest puzzle game they had ever played, I wouldn’t even think to question it. This game had me addicted for hours, just baffled by how difficult it was and by how smart it made me feel when I solved puzzles that seemed near impossible. But for some reason, around the 20 hour mark with five of the areas completed, I just stopped playing the game. I’m not sure if it was because of pure frustration with some of the tougher puzzles, the lack of story or of any narrative hooks that I thought were interesting, or just me being bad at the game. Whatever it was, The Witness ended up fading into the background as the year went on, and despite me staring at it in my Steam library and thinking about starting it up, I just never did. But even though I was frustrated with the game and some areas proved to be too challenging I still see the game as a masterpiece, just not a masterpiece I can appreciate as well as others.

Inside

I never really understood why Limbo was loved by so many people. The puzzles were pretty standard for the most part, the environments got worse as the game went on, and the story didn’t do anything special. I enjoyed Inside much more than I enjoyed Limbo, but I still had similar feelings as I did playing Limbo. The puzzles feel like boring busy work. Some of them are certainly better than others, but most of them are obvious how to solve and just require you to do physics puzzles and push boxes around. While some of the added mechanics were cool and much appreciated, I still didn’t feel like the game got as challenging as it should have. With that being said, I think the story, the environment, and some of the sequences leading up to the end of the game are amazing, and in some cases shocking. Not as shocking as the last 10 minutes of the game however. Damn, what an incredible moment. I could list at least 10 amazing moments in games this year, and the end of this game would be right there at the top. I liked it so much it almost made my top 10 despite my dislike of the actual gameplay.

Darkest Dungeon

I absolutely love Darkest Dungeon. I actually purchased it in 2015, played it in early access, and then still came back to it this year and played it even more, which is something I never do. I generally avoid early access games because I feel like if I play a game in early development too much, by the time the final release comes I will be burnt out and not care. Not in Darkest Dungeon’s case. I love turn based tactics games, and a 2D version of one of those would already be enough to get me interested. This game feels like a side scrolling XCOM. The mechanics are deep and satisfying, and skill and smart decision making are absolutely necessary to keep your party members alive. I loved following each of my character’s narratives as they grew more powerful, I loved dealing with the various mental status effects, and really enjoyed the overall insane difficulty of the game. It always felt challenging, your characters always felt unsafe, and defeating a mission always felt rewarding. The bosses were a joy because each of them had unique mechanics that would often force me to change up my party and typical strategy. I also loved the narration and the entire Lovecraftian aesthetic (thanks to Bloodborne). Everything about the game screamed “one more mission!” at me.

Then I got to the Darkest Dungeon, the final Dungeon of the game. Now, I previously had no problem with the grindy aspect of this game. Sure, you had to level up lots of characters, and yes you often replayed very similar mission in order to get items and become more powerful, yet I enjoyed the game so much I didn’t care. However, after hours of grinding and being intimately familiar with the game, I expected the final dungeon to go fairly well. Sure, I would lose some warriors, but their sacrifice would result in my victory. I was absolutely shocked when my entire party of best heroes, two of which had survived since the very first mission, had gone completely insane or died half way through the dungeon. By the time I made it to the boss my party was in shambles. I tried a few other heroes and different party combinations and continued to get slaughtered, losing the majority of my best items and fighters. Was it game over? No, I could have grinded up more heroes and continued the onslaught, but I was just so upset at the sheer amount of difficulty the last dungeon presented, combined with the hours upon hours of forced grinding that I just turned the game off and never finished it. If you want to make your game insanely hard, I’m all for it. But if you want to also force the player to grind for hours and hours to even maybe have a chance at winning, then I think the game only suffers. Could I have just played poorly in the that final dungeon? Absolutely. But since I had conquered everything else in the game, seeing such a difficulty spike in a game that was already incredibly difficulty was not appreciated, and soured me enough to drop the game from my list.

World of Warcraft Legion

World of Warcraft is my favorite game of all time. The few years I spent playing vanilla and The Burning Crusade are some of the best times I’ve ever had playing a video game. The game felt challenging, rewarding, and became a great social space for me, my real-life friends and our guildmates. Running the Karazhan raid was my absolute favorite thing to do in the game. Yet after The Burning Crusade ended I canceled my account and hadn’t played since. When I saw this year’s expansion was going to bring back Illidan and the Burning Legion I thought, why not give it a shot? And then, as if Blizzard new exactly what I wanted, they introduced a new version of Karazhan! LANing with my friends and figuring out how to take down Karazhan bosses felt like old times. I also really enjoy the Mythic + system as it provides challenging end game content for someone like me who doesn’t want to get involved in a raiding guild. I certainly had some really fun times playing WoW with my friends this year.

But I don’t think the game is very good, especially compared to the Burning Crusade. Comparing the two is an entire blog post on its own, so I’ll try to keep it short. The free to play-like send your “followers” out on missions is a terrible mechanic and is only made worse by the fact that they time gate your very important class quests through this system. The entire attunement process for the Arcway and Court of Stars dungeons is also time gated by reputation and long, boring quest lines. The artifact weapon system is cool in theory, but if you want to switch specs or classes you get way behind everyone else because to be able to level your weapon at an efficient rate you once again get time gated by research that increases your artifact power gains. It also ruins the uniqueness of weapons, as everyone has the same weapon, with the same skills. The skill tree in the weapons don’t require any real choices as you unlock every skill eventually. The legendaries are random and are completely imbalanced between being necessary and being absolute garbage. And worst of all, the Destiny-like item level just makes people care about a number on your stat sheet rather than the actual gear you have or how good you are at the game. I’ll stop now.

Now for the top 10:

10. Firewatch

I think the most important part of Firewatch is that it’s a game about real people in the real world. For the most part, everything that happens in Firewatch could really happen. There’s no magical powers, no monsters or aliens. It’s about characters with real human emotions fighting through real life problems. What really impressed me the most about the game was how interested I stayed in the story despite not liking the main character, Henry. I think Henry isn’t a very good guy. A lot of the way he acts, the choices he makes, especially in his background story, made me think he’s not a very dependable person. He comes across as selfish, and as Alex put it, in some ways cowardly. I appreciated that the game doesn’t force these feelings on you, either. You get presented with the facts about Henry and you get to witness what he does and says throughout the game. You can make up your mind about him from there. Still, I found it cool that I was playing as a character that I didn’t like, someone who doesn’t feel like a hero or like a person someone would want to grow up to be. There’s no fantasy power trip, Henry is just an average adult. And as the game moves on and you learn more about Henry, you can in some ways start to empathize with him, maybe even understand him, which I think speaks volumes about the quality of the writing in Firewatch. Henry and Delilah feel like real people. The dialogue feels natural.

I also love the setting of the game. Its original, and that originality pays off. I never even thought about how fire watching used to be a much-needed job in the summers before technology has become what it is today. The game showed me a piece of the world that doesn’t exist anymore (at least not in the same way) and it was cool to see it. The game is also gorgeous and really brings to life that hot summer 1980’s vibe I’ve only seen in movies. It felt bright and inviting, and for a moment made me imagine what it would be like to get away from technology and just live out in the woods for a few days.

It’s a shame that the story goes a bit off the rails, even it did have its intense moments. I just felt like they added a little too much drama for drama’s sake, though there are some good story beats behind all the craziness. I also liked the ending because it summed up one of my favorite themes in the game; the mystery of something is often better than the truth. It certainly wasn’t perfect, but I appreciated the originality of the experience and will eagerly await Campo Santo’s next game.

9. Hitman

If this list was my favorite game to watch being played this year, then Hitman would win hands down. I think this game is one of the rare cases where I actually enjoyed watching a game more than playing it. Watching Brad and Dan fumble through the various levels was some of the most entertaining videos on the site this year. The game itself is hilarious and I can see how having a friend or two around to enjoy its stupidity can make the game ten times better. Playing by myself however was less of an exciting experience. Hitman feels like two games to me. One where you follow the opportunities and watch as the most ludicrous of assassinations gets pulled off, and one where you fumble around without any guidance and usually just kill your target by throwing a knife in their head. Both are satisfying in their own way, and some of the kills the opportunity leads you too are absolutely incredibly. Yet, I never felt like I became a master Hitman player. On my own I would stumble around to an eventual boring kill, and following the opportunities sometimes felt like I wasn’t even playing a game. Still, the amount of content in this game is staggering and if you want to test your Hitman skills, there are plenty of challenges to do so. And while some of the maps are better than others, each one of them brought their own unique take on the formula that I think switched up the gameplay in some interesting ways. Getting complete mastery on each level is very satisfying, and I think the elusive target system is one of the best designed gameplay ideas in any game this year. They are difficult, but when I would pull them off I felt like I actually knew how to play Hitman.

Most importantly, the game is stupid and silly and the developers know it. They feed into it and create ridiculous scenarios around the wackiness of the world. In some ways, I enjoyed Hitman more for its comedy than its actual gameplay. There is really no other game like Hitman, which is all the more reason to play it.

8. XCOM 2

It seems like a lot of people were upset or disappointed by XCOM 2 this year, which felt like a surprise to me. It was more XCOM, which is awesome! New enemies, new utility items, new map layouts, new weapons, new character customization. Overall, it felt like a solid package worthy of the “2” in the title. The biggest change to the game that I saw most people complaining about is that many of the missions are timed. You only have a certain amount of turns to complete a mission which completely changes the strategy from the first game. Rather than creeping forward and using overwatch on every soldier, XCOM 2 forces you to run forward and make more aggressive decisions. Does the game fuck you over sometimes because of it? Of course it does. But this is also the same game where you can miss a 95% shotgun shot with the target standing right in front of you. I think having timed missions forced me to become a better XCOM player. I had to choose skills for my squad that I normally wouldn’t and play less with snipers and more with shotgunners. I absolutely loved using the sword. If it weren’t for the bugs that forced me to restart some missions, this game could have been higher on my list. Even still, it's the sequel to my 2012 game of the year and I think it lives up to everything I wanted it to be. I had a blast playing through the campaign and got stuck in that “one more mission” loop for hours on end. More XCOM is always welcome.

7. Overwatch

I’m still astounded with the unanimous praise Overwatch has received from all types of gamers. This game seems to have transcended to the Battlefield and Call of Duty levels of popularity in a matter of months. Yes, it’s a Blizzard game, so why am I so surprised? Well, the game is quite difficult, for starters. The good players are really damn good. The bad players can be pretty damn bad. While all the characters are incredibly designed, playing most of them well is no easy task. When one team is far better than the other the matches often aren’t close. This is why I’m so shocked to hear that so many people who don’t like competitive games or who don’t get into the FPS genre love this game. “It’s so player friendly!” everyone seems to say. Unfortunately, Overwatch often frustrates me as much as I have fun with it. It has a MOBA level quality to it, where toxic teammates ruin games, players refuse to play roles the team needs, people play heroes they suck as in competitive…really the player base makes this game worse for me. I love the core concept, I love the teamwork aspect (when people actually work as a team) I love the characters, the emotes, the sprays, repeatedly spamming the dumb voice lines (Can’t Stop Won’t Stop!) and I love the way the game feels to play. Each hero controls differently and has their own qualities that can make playing each match a completely different experience. And I certainly had a blast playing with my friends. I just think I take the game too seriously and since I’m not very good at the game myself, it just bothers me more when people don’t work as team, get abusive in chat, and just make it their every goal to ruin the game for everyone else. Still, of all the games on this list it’s the one I played the most this year. I just need to learn to let go of my stupid competitive nature and just focus on having fun. Also, Zenyatta is the best.

6. Dark Souls III

I almost never finished Dark Souls III. I put it down roughly halfway through the game and didn’t pick it back up until roughly 6 months later. Why did I stop playing it? I have no damn idea. Dark Souls III is another Souls game, so that instantly makes it amazing. For some reason, this one hooked me the most out of any past “SoulsBorne” game. I liked it so much that I beat it twice, which is something I very rarely ever do with any game. I did my first playthrough as Dexterity which was really hard, and my second playthrough as Pyromancy which was much easier and super fun! I always play these games as melee, so it was a great experience to try out a completely different playstyle. Dark Souls III also caused me to have what I am calling a “Souls game crisis.” Once I finished the game I realized it may very well be the last SoulsBorne game we ever get, and thus I went spiraling down a dark but wonderful souls hole. I started watching hours of lore videos. I began listening to a podcast entirely about the SoulsBorne games. I watched various speedruns. I read strategy guides. I tried some PvP. I bought Scholar of the First Sin on PC and am replaying Dark Souls I. No other game this year got me as obsessed with its world and its lore. Also, Dark Souls still just plays better than most single player games. It’s smarter, better designed, and has a style unlike anything else. Do I think Dark Souls III is the best of the bunch? I honestly can’t say. It has some of my favorite bosses ever in the series (some of them talk!) and the way they mishmash pieces of all the games together (even Bloodborne, at least to me) was really cool. I honestly can’t really pinpoint why I got so hooked to this game evern more so than the others. Perhaps it was the first Dark Souls game in the new generation, and the graphics, framerate, and controls all feel great. Also, a lot of the quality of life improvements make the entire game a much smoother experience. Sure, it’s just more Dark Souls. But I would play a Dark Souls IV right now if I could.

5. DOOM

DOOM is the best first person shooter campaign I have ever played, without question. There are so many things it does right. No reloading, vertical level design, smartly hidden secrets, powerful feeling weapons, great movement speed, and a hilarious story all wrapped up into a gore-filled demon slaying package of excellence. And while playing the game is amazing, the story beats and “lore” surrounding the DOOM Slayer are absolutely hilarious and fantastic. As I listened to this deep generic demon voice boom out of the prophecy of the mighty DOOM Slayer sent to massacre the demons I burst out laughing at the audacity of the game. Were they actually doing this!? And is it actually working!? The way everything works in DOOM can't really be explained. The way the DOOM slayer is the most stereotypical meathead silent protagonist, but is actually incredibly awesome because he punches and breaks everything he’s not supposed to for seemingly no reason…I just don’t understand how they got any of it to work and work so damn well. My only complaint is doing a second playthrough requires you to find the keys to all the doors and find all the secrets again, and I’m just not up for that. Which is a shame, because the score attack mode they added in a few months ago is rad. Shooting guns in that game is just the best. I was so enamored with the game once I had finished it, I wrote this lengthy blog post about why DOOM is a better shooter campaign than every other shooter campaign. You can read that here if you would like. DOOM is great!

4. Uncharted 4: A Thief's End

I love the Jak and Daxter series, and The Last of Us is one of my favorite games of all time. The Uncharted series on the other hand has always felt like I was missing something. I enjoyed the games, but I never felt like they were game of the year material (Arkham Asylum is a much better game than Uncharted 2). So, when Naughty Dog announced Uncharted 4 I was extremely disappointed. Wasn’t Nathan Drake’s story finished? Also, was it really that great of a story to begin with? I didn’t care about this game at all, only to laugh at the fact that Troy Baker would be playing Nathan Drake’s (Nolan North) older brother Sam. I didn’t think this game would be anything more than the previous games. I am happy to say I was wrong. Not only is Uncharted 4 hands down the best Uncharted game, it’s a really damn good game all on its own. What makes it so much better than the previous games? The story is incredible. Rather than focusing on the fantastic, the treasure, and the ridiculousness of every situation Drake puts himself in, they chose to focus on him as a character. They focus on his relationship with his wife, Elena. They dig into his past, his relationship with his brother. They focus on his flaws as a person, his issues. They show that Nathan Drake isn’t some perfect hero, he’s kind of an asshole. They really build the relationship with his brother Sam from the ground up, making you feel like you have known their story since the first game. They make you care about the characters and what happens to them. They even finally manage to bring in a crew of really great villains. For once none of it was about the adventure or the treasure, it was about the characters, and about how far Nathan Drake would go to just get another treasure seeking high.

To top it all off, the game looks better than most PC games, has some absolutely outstanding action sequences, and finally adds some creativity to the gameplay through the use of better stealth mechanics and traversal through the environments. While I still wasn’t in love with the gameplay side of things, it’s easily the best Uncharted has ever been in that aspect as well. Naughty Dog just does everything right. The voice acting, the facial capture, the explosions, and the soundtrack were all best in class. What a phenomenal game. Now I’m even more excited about The Last of Us 2. If Naughty Dog can make the 4^th game in a series the best game, what can they do with the sequel to one of my favorite games of all time?

3. The Last Guardian

Of the 4 games I loved this year that I thought would be terrible (Hitman, DOOM, Uncharted 4) The Last Guardian was the one I thought would be the biggest pile of shit. I had no hope for this game whatsoever. How could anyone, after its eternity in development? Yet, I feel like I would now be comfortable saying The Last Guardian is one of the greatest achievements in game development. Is it a game everyone will love? Absolutely not. Is it a flawless game? Not even close. Is it a game that exceeded all of my impossibly low expectations, and then continued to surprise me as it got better and better? Yes. The Last Guardian is a great game. How is it so good? Well, the design of the creature Trico is incredible. The way Trico behaves makes it feel like a real animal. It moves so realistically and behaves with such life that I grew very attached to the creature. It also looks incredible and the movement of such a large creature in such large and astounding environments is really something to behold. Trico feels integral to the game, a complete and necessary part of it. It’s not a gimmick, or a tacked-on addition that gets in the way. Every puzzle feels like the boy and Trico need each other, that they couldn’t survive the journey without the other. The game also does an excellent job of balancing the puzzle solving with relationship building between the boy and Trico. Petting Trico is an integral part of the game and is used very well. Taking care of Trico feels like something you want to do, rather than a boring chore. This game is not kind at all. Trico gets hurt in some very vicious ways and the game makes you want to protect it, despite the boy’s small size. And when you heal its wounds, or help it in battle you feel tremendous, as if you the player are building a relationship with this virtual creature. It’s truly unlike anything I’ve seen or felt in a game before.

What may be even more impressive about the game however, is that it out does Uncharted in many of its big action sequences. I went into this game expecting a quirky, quiet puzzle game. But as you get further along, the game is filled with harrowing action sequences, giant leaps of faith, collapsing towers, and anxiety driven battle scenes. There are more breath taking moments in this game than I can remember. There is just a shear beauty to the way the animation of the boy and Trico work together during these scenes that absolutely shocked me. And the story is crazy! It actually goes places that I would have never expected! And the last thirty minutes is really something else, just a pure rush of panic and emotions.

This game easily could have been my game of the year if it weren’t for the framerate and the controls. The framerate really hurts the game, especially when Trico runs into a big open area and decides to roar Jurassic park style and the wind is blowing his feathers and the sun is shining on the grass…and the frames drop to about 10 and the gorgeous scene is ruined. Even more unfortunate is my struggle with the controls throughout the entire game. While commanding Trico was fine, getting the boy to do what I wanted was a pain too many times. Getting him to leap to the ground off Trico was always a struggle. Climbing things could often result in disaster, either because having the jump button on triangle and the drop button on X is a terrible idea, or because the boy just wouldn’t let go of things. Or climb when I wanted him to. It grew frustrating over the 12 or so hours I spent with the game. Even still it was some of the best 12 hours of entertainment for me this year. The Last Guardian is unlike any other game out there and is an incredible achievement for such a joked about game. Trico is the best.

2. Abzu

After the amazing game that is Journey, I had high hopes for Abzu. I’m happy to say it delivered on all my expectations and may be even better than Journey. The first noticeable thing Abzu does well is it finds a balance between the big, flashy, breath-taking moments and the quiet zen-like areas. Being able to just meditate on a statue and watch the various sea life swim around and interact was calming and also an enjoyable way to break up the game. I always made sure to fully explore every area and take my time just looking at everything the game had to show me. And what a look this game has. The colors of Abzu jump between bright and happy and dark and mysterious. Everything blends together naturally and manages to keep a fairly realistic look when it comes to the marine life. The entire look of the game is just an impressive display of animation, motion, lighting, and color. And once again, Austin Wintory composes a perfect soundtrack to fit every moment in the game. And there are so many amazing moments.

An easy “moment of the year” candidate for me is the first time I grabbed onto a fish and realized you could ride it to the surface and then have it jump out of the water with you. The controls feel so elegant in all aspects of the game, but the diving in and out of the water is truly special. And so much of the control and the “action” of this game is perfect. I’m not sure any of the moments are as shocking as the infamous sand-slide in Journey, but I think as a whole Abzu brings a much greater and much better looking experience overall.

Another reason I’m so in love with Abzu is my fascination with sharks. Ever since I was a little kid I’ve always thought sharks are the coolest animal. I know they are dangerous, I know they can’t be your friend, but there is something about them that I just think is rad. Abzu has the best use of sharks in any game ever and it somehow manages to build a very open ended but interesting story with a shark. The last twenty minutes of Abzu is one of the best things I’ve ever played. I got emotional over some of the moments at the end of the game. The entire thing is so bright and colorful and filled with heart and joy. The entire sequence gave me an unparalleled sense of freedom, which I think is exactly what it was trying to do. The final minutes were an absolute joy to partake in and certainly felt like nothing I had experienced in a game before. And despite all the excitement and sensory overload the game brings, it still manages to be a calm, soothing experience. I urge anyone who is a fan of Journey, or anyone who likes short, focused experiences to play Abzu. It’s literally the only game this year I have no complaints or issues with. It did everything it tried to do perfectly.

1. Titanfall 2

My favorite line from this year’s Giant Bomb Game of the Year deliberations was when Jeff said “You are all making a huge mistake” when Titanfall 2 did not win best multiplayer. Titanfall 2 is the best competitive/multiplayer shooter I have ever played. It’s better than any Battlefield, Call of Duty, Counterstrike, Overwatch, or anything else. It’s absolutely incredible. But first, the campaign. I wasn’t expecting much more than a serviceable Call of Duty-like set of missions when I booted the game up. And at first it seemed fairly standard. The movement and control was quick, sharp, and snappy. The guns felt good to shoot. The robot seemed nice enough. But then the creativity starts to shine, with some really intricate and wide open levels full of twisting platforms, and enemies scattered above and below. The platforming is even better than DOOM’s because the movement just feels so perfect and they create some very manageable but challenging platforming sequences. I loved running through the planet building factory and was having a fun time. I was starting to love BT, as he felt like my own Iron Giant.

Then something weird started to happen where it seemed like flashes of the past were appearing in the present. The game makes some mention of what could be wrong, but I pressed forward thinking it was just a quick story bit. Eventually, you get a button prompt that says press “L1 to time travel.” I remember thinking, “what the fuck is this game? Did they do the Dishonored 2 thing!?” I hit the button. “Holy shit they did the Dishonored thing!” And yes Dishonored 2 wasn’t even out yet, but I was so excited for that game my brain instantly connected the two. And after Dishonored 2 did come out, all I could think was “Titanfall 2 did this mechanic 100 times better”. That entire mission is right up there with DOOM for me in terms of best first person shooter campaign moments ever. What else is great about the campaign? The boss fights are really cool how they introduce them like cartoon super villains, and how each one of them uses a different Titan. Also, BT was one of my favorite characters of the year and his greatness culminated in the amazing “Sere Kit” moment of this game. The entire cut scene before this is a really solid and emotional story bit. They get you to feel like you lost your friend and like you are in a lot of trouble. Then BT hands you the kit and I thought “Shit, that’s the smart pistol!” And then I proceeded to wall run and headshot every single person standing between me and the mission. It felt like sweet revenge for BT and it was awesome. And to have you run through hordes of enemies while parkouring around to finally get outside and hear “Prepare for Titanfall!” as a new Titan plummets from the sky is simply fantastic. Plug in BT and get ready to fuck shit up. What an amazing moment.

Now, about the multiplayer. There’s so much it does that other shooters don’t. First, is the movement. It’s unmatched in any other shooter, period. The way you have complete control over wall-running, double jumping and sliding your way around the environments at ludicrous speed gives the game a frantic and yet incredibly skillful feeling. All of the guns are fun to shoot and each of the classes allows you to have a different strategy. I never use shotguns or snipers in these sorts of shooters, but Titanfall 2 gets me to try every weapon. For the record, I think Stim is the best class because of the importance of getting in and out of battle quickly, but each one of them is viable depending on your playstyle. Then there is the Titans. The Titan gameplay is leagues better than it was in Titanfall 1, and that’s saying something. There is such great balance between the Titans, with each one of them having strengths and weaknesses that make them better or worse in certain situations (at least Tone is manageable now). The Titan battles feel skillful and fast. And they are all fun to use. At first I was a Tone player, but then I had a blast sword chopping as Ronin, and now I’ve been laser-beaming as Ion and lighting fools on fire as Scorch. Scorch is great! The skins are great! The prime titans are great! Dropping your Titan out of the goddamn sky onto an enemy Titan who thought he was about to kill you is great! And maybe the best part of the entire game is that there is no competitive mode. There is no “mmr” or ranking system. Stats don’t matter and I don’t particularly care about them. I seriously just play the game to have fun. What a novel idea. Of course, I think my love for the game does come from the fact that I’m very good at the game. I had a 32 pilot kill-6 titan kill game of attrition the other day and it felt pretty damn good. Certainly, the game is not without fault, but any issues it has pale in comparison to the amount of fun I’ve had playing it. I’m currenty G5 and don’t plan on stopping any time soon. Game of the Year!