2015 Game of the Year: Day 4

Welcome to the penultimate day of my award lists. I hope you have been enjoying reading through all of these categories. Today, we take a journey through the year's "Best" Lines of dialogue, stare in awe of the Biggest Trainwrecks, ask a variety of things to Please Stop or Take a Break, and then end on a lighter note of which game was the Most Fun to Watch.

Best line(s):

• "Tonight Gehrman joins the hunt"-Gehrman in Bloodborne
• "Go fuck your selfie"- Victoria in Life is Strange
• "I just vaped some dank OG bud..."-Hayden in Life is Strange
• "Hoonage for days, son"- Manu in Need For Speed
• "Oh, did you not hear me? Was your sluttiness too loud?"- Emily in Until Dawn
• “At least I can think. 4.0 bitch, honor roll. Suck on that when you’re trying to sleep your way into a job.”- Emily in Until Dawn
• "Understand the palm of my hand, bitch"- Emily in Until Dawn
• "You were looking at your phone, you dip!? What are you tweeting!? Hashtag there's a freaking ghost after us?!"- Ashley in Until Dawn
• "You smell wonderful at a funeral"- Geralt in The Witcher 3
• "What the sandwich fuck is this?"- Whoreson Junior in The Witcher 3

Honorable Mentions:

"Go fuck your selfie"- Victoria in Life is Strange: This line has come to personify what makes this game "unique".

Emily vs. Jessica- Until Dawn: This conversation is filled with some great burns from both sides.

Runners up:

"I just vaped some dank OG bud..."-Hayden in Life is Strange: Words cannot explain this line. Thankfully there is video.

"Tonight, Gehrman joins the hunt"-Gehrman in Bloodborne: While this category is mostly silly, this line is actually incredibly badass in the context. When choosing to refuse his offer at the end of Bloodborne, the wheelchair bound hunter drops this line before completely wrecking the player in one of the game’s hardest boss fights.

Winner:

"Understand the palm of my hand, bitch"- Emily in Until Dawn: Emily is the deliverer of some fantastic one liners in Until Dawn, but none match this masterpiece of dialogue. I'm going to use this line at any and all chances that I get.

Biggest Trainwreck:

• Hideo Kojima vs. Konami Situation/Konami in general
• PC version of Batman Arkham Knight
• Rocket League launch servers
• Street Fighter V beta
• Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5
• Ubisoft E3 Press Conference

"Honorable" Mention:

Rocket League launch servers: As much as I adore this game, the issues with the servers at launch could have been a death sentence one of the best surprises of the year before it got going. It is a good thing that they got them working relatively quickly because the multiplayer of Rocket League is some of the most fun I’ve had all year.

"Runners up":

Ubisoft E3 Press Conference: Ubisoft’s E3 press conference is usually one of the most entertaining parts of the “E3 day 0” but for all the wrong reasons. This year was especially hilarious because of the back-to-back-to-back moments of the Jacob Frye cosplayer stopping just short of outright saying he was paid to be there, while host Aisha Tyler tried to “make a meme” followed by the Just Dance Executive Producer seemingly forgetting where he was mid-conversation, immediately followed by Jason Derulo's time filling musical performance that the crowd could not care any less about (starts at 32min, 45 sec if the link doesn't work, but even if it doesn't the whole video is gold). Throw that on top of the usual forced jokes and hysterically bad team chat demos, you have one of the most hard to watch things of the year. But it was bookended by a new South Park game and a fantastic trailer for Ghost Recon Wildlands so it wasn’t completely bad.

Hideo Kojima vs. Konami: For a while now Konami has been gaining notoriety for some pretty terrible reasons. The particulars of the first half of this saga can be found here, but since then things only got weirder. There were revelations of the terrible working conditions, Kojima's name was taken out of any promotional material for MGSV, Konami prevented him from attending The Game Awards earlier this month, and finally there was a strange back and forth regarding the creator's "vacation". This story does have a happy ending as Konami will be moving in their own direction, while Kojima has partnered with Sony to create a new game.

Winner:

PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight: The PC version of Batman started as trainwreck then caught fire multiple times. From running poorly on many machines more powerful than either console, to graphical features that weren't even included in the PC version, this thing has been on fire since release. It was the first major game to be slammed by Steam's refund policy and was actually pulled from sale for a few months. Even worse than this, when it did go back up it wasn't fixed. I have no idea what went wrong with this version of the game, but somebody screwed up in a major way.

Please Stop/Take a break:

• Assassin’s Creed
• "Choice based" games where choices don't matter/telltale formula
• Dark Souls/souls games
• Fan bases asking for unnecessary sequels
• Konami
• Playing to empty nostalgia with reboots
• Pointless open world games
• Telltale games

“Honorable” Mentions:

Assassin's Creed- If this series continues with its current trend, 2016's game will be a disaster much like, then 2017's will be good. Even though I think Black Flag is a cheap knock off of Sid Meier's Pirates, it is still far better than 3 (a gunshot to the foot would be better then AC 3 so that's not saying a whole lot). AC Syndicate is a great return to form following the disappointing Unity. Given this trend, I think it would be best for all if Assassin's Creed took next year off.

“Runners up”:

Fan bases asking for unnecessary sequels: I'm usually not one to tell people what to do, but the amount of people asking for sequels to games that quite frankly don't need them is concerning. Fans of The Last of Us, Life is Strange, and many other games continue asking for follow ups to these games. I fully understand the want for more of something that you enjoy, but there is also a lot to be said about things that just exist as they are. One good example of this would be Telltale's The Walking Dead. Season one was one of the most groundbreaking games of the past generation, but season two couldn't live up to the first and left fans somewhat disappointed (I haven't played season 2 but general reception has spoken for it). I feel this is exactly what would happen if any of these games got the sequels the fans want. A new Last of Us with Joel and Ellie would potentially undermine the phenomenal story of the game, while a game set in that universe with different characters would miss what makes The Last of Us such an incredible game. I would love nothing more than to spend some more time with Max and Chloe, but following up on Life is Strange with these two characters would be treading already worn ground (it would also force a cannon ending that would alienate almost half of the fan base) . A "Season Two" with out these two would be forced to come up with a new twist, because having a new cast with the same ideas would feel like a cheap ploy. There is something to be said about games that are powerful enough to gain passionate fan bases, but there is even more to be said about a thing that can come along, say what it has to say, then simply exists as it is.

Telltale games: Does this even need an explanation? Since they revolutionized video game storytelling with The Walking Dead: Season One, Telltale has been on a warpath to get their hands on any brand with letters in it. A second season of The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Borderlands, Minecraft, Batman, all coming not even four years after their landmark game. Some games are coming dangerously close to being overexposed, but Telltale's have reached it.

“Winner”:

Dark Souls: These games are in danger of being run into the ground in the worst way. With Dark Souls 2, Bloodborne, and Dark Souls 3 all being released in subsequent years, each one brings this type of game ever closer to overexposure. On top of that all of the Souls games, except Bloodborne, are nearly identical. They all have the same boring fantasy setting, the same mechanics, most of the same bosses (seriously find one of these games where you don’t fight at least 5+ dragons or knights), and have the exact same aesthetic barring a few specific areas. Either take a break for a few years, or come up with new settings and ideas like in Bloodborne. If not, one of the most unique sets of games will find themselves in the same boat as every other yearly release. Earlier I brought up Telltale games and I would like to make this comparison. If Telltale is John Cena, the Souls games are Roman Reigns. Both of those comparisons are true in more ways than one.

Most Fun to Watch:

(Aka the let's play award)

• Besiege
• Contradiction: Spot the Liar
• Duck Game
• The Escapists
• Keep talking and nobody explodes
• Kirby and the Rainbow Curse
• Ultimate Chicken Horse

Runners up:

Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes: This game brings back couch co-op in a great way. In this game, someone must defuse a bomb but the instructions can only be found in the manual. There can be one person, or many, reading through the booklet and the back and forth situations that come from the intense communication lend themselves to viewers in a big way. As the bombs become more complex the situations become even more entertaining.

Ultimate Chicken Horse: This game has a fascinating concept. You must prevent your opponents from reaching the objective while ensuring that you can still make it. This leads to many scenarios where putting an object in a place just to screw someone over, may also hurt you in the process. Watching this game being played is a fantastic experience, because I'm not the one straining friendships because of some sadistic item placement.

Winner:

Contradiction: Spot the Liar: The main bias of this category is that a heavy emphasis is placed on the the people playing. This game essentially takes this award by being the focus of some of the best Giant Bomb content of the year. The Quick Look of this game is incredible, but the fun really doesn't start until the supplemental follow up video. The subsequent G-Beast Playdates are some of the best premium videos of the year. I don't know if I would have enjoyed playing this game, but I damn sure enjoyed watching Alex, Austin, and Vinny play through it.

And With that Day 4 comes to a close.

Tomorrow... Day 5. The big day finally arrives. My Top 10 Games of the Year.