Best of 2019
2019 started rough for me and ended up being one hell of a year, but it at least had a few positives in there somewhere and once again let me dive into the escapism of games.
I played a lot of games that didn't release this year, especially in those first couple of months, and went through a solid month of playing nothing at all, yet I somehow ended up with about 14 titles on my initial list so I clearly have no idea what goes on with my time.
My two main thoughts for the year:
- Music! I felt 2017 was the strongest year for game music in a long while, but 2019 arrived with a vengeance. So many times this year I finished a game and immediately hunted for the soundtrack, it's been fantastic.
- I played two wildly different games with Greg Chun-voiced protagonists that dealt with the topic of dementia back to back. Like, 2 in a year would be weird enough, but back to back? (they're both on this list)
I will avoid explicit spoilers, but tonal stuff can't be helped.
Shoutouts
Games that I enjoyed a bunch this year that either didn’t come out in 2019, weren’t exactly ‘new’, or I wasn’t able to put much time into before making this list:
Tales of Vesperia: Definitive Edition
"Elephant in the Room" Award
I haven’t been able to play this yet, and I’m fairly sure it would’ve been up there on my list, but somebody convinced me that I should play the two Crossbell games before taking this on and seeing as the good fan-translation is being released "soon"…well, I will continue to show restraint.
Joint No. 11: Link's Awakening | WorldEnd Syndrome
It’s a very strange world where these two games are seen together on a list, let alone share a position, but that’s just how 2019 has ended up.
Link’s Awakening is a beautiful recreation of the Gameboy game, with some delightfully remixed music and animations that made me remember how much I hold that original in high regard. It’s obtuse and finicky in all the ways early 90s design could be, but playing the remake brought forth some deeply hidden knowledge within my 10-year old self and it was satisfying to always have this vague intuition of what to do next turn out to be correct.
Well, ignoring the fact I had to google how to actually damage one of the phases of the final boss…
Soundtrack highlight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Usa4iG1Lhqw – Tal Tal Heights (endgame version)
WorldEnd Syndrome was a combination of needing to spend some store credit, and remembering how great Steins;Gate is, leading me to scratch the Visual Novel itch and check this one out.
It’s nowhere near Steins;Gate (not much is), but WorldEnd Syndrome has a very neat premise, some strong character writing and a satisfying payoff – even if it takes way too long to get there.
It’s a shame the supernatural elements of the plot are focused at the very beginning and end of the game, as the in-between is full of the usual harem-anime tropes, including excuses to have each of the main women in a swimsuit at least once and the most eye rolling plot contrivances to have girls literally fall into the protagonists lap.
If you can stomach/ignore the most egregious of those scenes, I found some of the plot beats genuinely heart-warming and the overall presentation (which had some of the more impressive backgrounds I’ve seen in this style of game) was great, soundtrack included.
In the end it left me a little emotionally drained afterwards, which for a Visual Novel is a compliment.
Soundtrack highlight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6o8ynnWGy8 – Main Theme
No. 10: Astral Chain
Astral Chain is a weird one, as I can reel off a list of things that I really, really enjoyed about the game yet I somehow came out of the other end of it feeling that it was solid, but not spectacular.
The visual aesthetic is stellar, from the overall design of the world through the characters, legions and enemy designs and the combat was snappy and varied enough to keep me having fun through the 26 hours I took to beat it.
The story didn’t quite get there as a whole but it’s propped up by a few excellent characters (Marie being a highlight) and a wonderful soundtrack from Satoshi Igarashi, varying from electronica, to acoustic chill-out, to a big dollop of video game metal in the boss fights – which is always something that’s going to score points with me.
All in all, Astral Chain is stylish, cheesy (oh those opening and ending themes!) and a fun time spent having your enslaved demon pal fight monsters while you pick up litter, save cats and look for toilet paper. Did I mention Astral Chain is a weird one?
Soundtrack highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEH9fcAEZ6k – Task Force Neuron
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlcZmA7aEJc – Fragments of Hope
No. 9: Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
It's been a long road for Bloodstained, and as someone who has never really had quite the same reverence for Symphony of the Night as my friends, or most other metroidvanias really, everything I saw of the game really didn't generate much interest for me.
Up until release I honestly thought we were on for another Mighty No. 9 situation and had planned to give it a miss, but the reviews convinced me otherwise and I'm glad I gave it a shot, because it's amazing that Bloodstained came together in the way it did to go from 'an homage to one of those games' to 'an excellent one of those games'.
It's a fun, quality Castlevania-in-all-but-name and for every subtle reference to SotN you find one that's about as subtle as a brick, but it's just so damn enjoyable. And there's so much stuff, like far too much stuff! There's a crafting system, cooking, ability upgrade system (with two ways to upgrade), weapon techniques, cosmetic armour, haircuts, lightsabers, skills that can stop time and that's barely scratching the surface.
There's a story in there too, which is endearing in a way much like watching a school play and the kids wrote all their own character scenes, where you can’t help but laugh at what bonkers thing is going to happen next but they’re having so much fun you’re happy to roll with it.
The soundtrack hits that same Castlevania tone as well, which is unsurprising as Michiru Yamane is the main source, hitting those sweet Violin & Guitar combinations that remind me of the Ys series.
Bloodstained the game is a pure, distilled version of IGA the man.
A man who wears his cowboy hat & whip with an honest joy, making him all the more endearing.
Soundtrack highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vg8damWdjR0 – Gears of Fortune
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WBrkm-zGm8 – Silent Howling
No. 8: Pokémon Sword
Beyond all the internet furore about the National Dex, animations and how Gamefreak devours cute puppies, as this latest mainline Pokémon game released I just wanted a fun romp around the UK with my Pokébuddies and also to beat the everliving snot out of all the trainers with the magnificent specimen above.
I’m happy to report I got what I wanted.
While a few of the complaints prior to release were overblown, it's quite easy to tell there was a lot of time pressure in getting this out on time. Some of the environments are a bit sparse, the towns in the back half of the game are barely populated (Spikemuth and Ballonlea in particular, with the latter being a huge shame because it's so darn pretty) and the story was completely non existent, even for a series that's aimed at kids.
In counter to that though, there are so many amazing little touches dotted throughout the game you can tell there was still a lot of care put in to it. The gym battles are the most atmospheric in the franchise, with crowds chanting along with the music when down to the last Pokémon and there are moments like when your character comes out of the registration place and there's a crowd of NPCs that appear cheering you on. Little things like that made me smile on my journey of Koffing vs The World, and I can imagine any kid playing it feeling the same.
So many of the character designs are fantastic, with Piers & Marnie being standouts, the former channeling the most ridiculous hairstyle that I would kill for to somehow make work in real life. Outside of those, the localisation has an obscene amount of fun with the 'British' dialogue and the game easily has my favourite soundtrack of the most recent entries (that Gym Battle Theme in particular is quality).
I had a lot of fun with Pokémon Sword, found the wild area great and really appreciated all of the quality-of-life touches they added for oldies like me.
Sure, it could’ve been bigger and better, but I enjoyed what we got. Plus the main villains told me to "jog on, mate", so what else could I really ask for?
Soundtrack highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcV6xVukj60 - Gym Leader Battle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HVNcmQd6RY - Battle! (Battle Tower Trainer)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0HuqoKre3Y - Hop Battle Theme
No. 7: Cadence of Hyrule: Crypt of the NecroDancer Featuring The Legend of Zelda
Mashing together one of my favourite roguelike/rhythm games with one of my favourite game series was something I was definitely not expecting to see, probably garnering my biggest "oh hell yes" reaction to a game announcement this year. On top of that, knowing Zelda music has no end of catchy melodies that work brilliantly with this style of game, and hearing that Danny B was composing, only heightened my anticipation.
By the time I had finished downloading it my expectations were absurdly high, and Cadence managed to get pretty darn close to meeting them.
For a game like this, the quality of the soundtrack was always going to drive my enjoyment of it and on that front it delivers wholeheartedly. The Death Mountain & Gerudo Valley remixes had me immediately searching for a way to buy the OST and the shifting between combat + peaceful versions of the tracks set up a really satisfying structure to the game of alternating between being amped up in combat and relaxed while exploring. Even the tutorial music is amazing, mashing up Crypt's first level music with the iconic Zelda theme.
Outside of the music, the world and artwork does a great job of carving it's own identity as a LttP-style Zelda game. You can tell there's a lot of care gone into the little things with the world, and also subtle mechanical features like a clever decision to remove the beat-pacing when all enemies are defeated. Options to remove the beat timer completely are great for those who didn't put a lot of time into Crypt like myself.
Maybe I hadn't quite switched my mind over from Crypt's roguelike background to a one-and-done playthrough, but I initially felt a tiny bit bummed out on the length, though in part because I wanted to just keep playing. Those expectations and how you basically become an absolute powerhouse past the initial difficulty curve (I think I died maybe 2 times in total), were the only major negatives I could really come up with.
Cadence is a fantastic advocate for Nintendo to lend out their IPs to studios like this, and if we can get more quality on this level in the future I'll be extremely happy.
Soundtrack highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfapwlTYlRc - Kakariko Crypt/Tutorial
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwSW_RhNFH8 - Lost Woods (Combat)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHciXAVWUnQ - Death Mountain (Combat)
If you like Zelda music, listen to the entire thing.
No. 6: Judgment
Talking about Judgment is always going to end up with the inevitable comparisons to the Yakuza series, and as much I love the ludicrous plot twists and hijinks of those games, the (slightly) more grounded tone of Judgment's main story really hooked me.
Ok sure you can still beat the hell out of the guy wearing only a fig leaf, cosplay as a vampire, and parkour your way across the city chasing a dude's wig but...well, you know what I mean.
Before going into the anything else, I wanted to highlight the localisation because it's worth singling out. I debated for a quite a while before starting whether to choose the English dub, having been so familiar playing Yakuza with the original voices and it fitting more with the setting. In the end I went with the English voices and after a little bit of getting my head around it I never looked back, with nothing ever feeling particularly stilted, which is always difficult in games that handle a ton of honorifics and how much of the Japanese culture is baked in.
Part of that was also helped by the Voice work being exceptional, especially Fred Tatasciore as Hamura, who definitely contributed to my increasing desire to punch that guy in the face the more I had to deal with him.
When I wasn't trying to punch that guy in the face, I enjoyed how the city is well-realised and provides a great backdrop for running around doing your detective stuff or helping a myriad of people find cats, sort out their relationship problems and win book publishing deals via logic puzzles in the side quests.
The combat comes over from Yakuza, remains competent and just about doesn't wear out it's welcome - even if I had more than enough of the Keihin gang and their forced battles by the time the end of the game rolled around.
Some of the tailing and chase sequences are a little overused, especially in the sidequests, but the Phoenix Wright-style scouring the environment was a neat addition, and lead me to playing my own determined mini game of finding every freakin' cat that kept meowing during those scenes, which made me feel triumphant when a trophy popped up in the last one for finding them all.
Judgment probably has fewer dramatic set pieces than each of the Yakuza titles, but what it lacks in quantity it more than makes up for with it's pacing & build up, making those scenes really hit. The game does a great job building up the mystery, not just with the core thread of the murders, but with the drip-feeding of character traits that makes the payoffs much more effective.
One of my favourite scenes came after hours and hours of stories, whispers and quiet buildup about 'The Mole' . Despite being central to the plot as it's developing, they're never seen directly and even the most sadistic antagonist you encounter up to that point is actively frightened of them. When they do finally appear, it's in one of the most intense scenes I've played this year and the game is great at making you feel complete, pure menace.
There's one character in that scene that mirrored my reaction perfectly..."Oh fuck".
I had a great time playing Judgment and only stopped shy of the platinum due to lack of time for it's most hardcore side quests. The story wraps up well and even though I was satisifed how it all ended, I'll be right there if they ever make a sequel.
Soundtrack Highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBcLs8EozCc - 13 Λ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcM-v-o4N4o - Penumbra
No. 5: Control
Full disclosure, I am good friends with one of the Senior Game Designers at Remedy, and as handsome and lovely as I told him he was, he still didn't give me a free copy of the game - so you can take any of my following bias with that in mind...
Where Judgment had a solid world design with strong set pieces, Control has solid set pieces (with an amazing one in particular) but takes the environment and world design to another level. No other game on my list, barring my number 1 for slightly different reasons, led me to scavenge for every single piece of background and flavour text purely because of my own curiousity.
The modern day Twin Peaks/Paranormal concept is intriguing enough on it's own, with the idea of a secret bureau dedicated to cataloguing and investigating all these bizarre items, but what makes Control striking to me is how it manages to apply a set of rules to all this otherworldly activity that still sounds very believable.
Mundane yet everyday things like petty office politics, bickering over budgets and internal pranks make the world retain it's plausibility even though it all has a supernatural edge, because everyone who has worked in an office knows that even in this world with it's portals, parasitic mold and cursed objects it is 100% assured there'd be that one jackass berating the maintainence team to find where his executive bathroom went after the building layout shifted again because he is a Manager.
Control's world building is in some ways similar to Mass Effect and the Witcher, where they create believable worlds by having you interact with their environments indirectly, having a set of things happen all around you through codexes/npc conversations/the environment where it just feels like it's 'right'.
The live action videos were another huge part of that, and I found myself looking forward to finding a new Dr. Darling clip whenever I explored a new area. Piecing together what goes on with him and his lab assistants was arguably more interesting to me than the main plot, such is how interesting he is as a character.
Overall the core story is engaging and even though I fell off a little bit towards the end, the game does a good job of explaining what the heck happened with the director and how the hiss came to be. That said, some of the moment to moment sequences were much stronger, in particular the Ashtray Maze, which had just the right does of cheesiness, music and adrenaline to have me going "fuck yeah!" after I finished it.
I found the combat oddly difficult to begin with, which became easier once I wrapped my head around the lack of cover and unlocked some of the abilities, plus some optional bosses became frustrating due to the checkpointing as well, but man if it wasn't fun to blast into the air and float around the room, raining down chunks of debris onto the Hiss below.
Control is creepy, curious and mystifying where I found myself enraptured by the entire setting of The Oldest House. I don't go back to very many games after I've finished them, but I'll be right back there for any DLC they put out.
Soundtrack Highlights:
Control has a very unsettling and soundtrack to go along with the themes of the game, so it's hard to choose a standalone track as a 'good' one to listen to, beyond a specific theme being a massive spoiler, which you should definitely experience in context.
No. 4: Dai Gyakuten Saiban / The Great Ace Attorney
"But wait", I hear you say, "Dai Gyakuten Saiban: Naruhodou Ryuunosuke no Bouken came out in 2016!". Well first of all, you have excellent Japanese pronunciation, but secondly this one is never getting an official English release, but an extremely high-quality fan translation was released this year by Scarlet Study (https://scarletstudy.gq/) which joins a very small group of fan projects that a) are incredibly good and b) actually got released.
Also, it's my list so I can do what I want.
I've played every Ace Attorney title up until this point, barring this game's sequel, and DGS is high up there as one of my favourites. It has all the traditional strengths of the series, with an array of superb characters, humour, revelatory plot twists and enough plot threads just to keep you guessing up until the twist dawns on you usually right before it happens.
The supporting cast is strong and up there with the original trilogy, despite not having the luxury of multiple game appearances to get attached to them. Holmes is a quirky, delightful character who provides much of the humour without ever overstepping too far into complete wackiness, and Barok van Zieks is an genuinely threatening prosecutor with arguably the best 'bench slam' animation of them all. If slamming your boot down onto the bench in front of you isn't the biggest Prosecutor Power Move I don't know what is.
Despite the eccentricity of those two, my favourite character by far ended up being Susato who right now might even be one of my favourite characters in the series. Her intelligence and composed demeanor is a great counterpart to Ryuunosuke's jitteriness (in a reversal to most of the other assistants), she repeatedly stands up for her beliefs and becomes a strong female character in one of the more hostile settings these games have had.
The development of her relationship with Ryuunosuke is well-written and touching and the 'thing' in the final case only made me more interested in where her storyline ends up.
The new gameplay feature this time around is the Joint Reasoning mechanic, which is both stylish (with some joint pirouetting ) and clever, not to mention hilarious as Holmes comes up with his increasingly baffling 'Great Deductions' to an often confused witness. All this is accompanied by one of the gems of the soundtrack, a jaunty violin theme as you go back and forward with the detective correcting and amending his theories.
Speaking of the music, The Great Ace Attorney continues the series tradition of having a wonderful soundtrack, carrying on with the more orchestral oomph used in the Layton crossover game and using a lot of violins, flutes and brass instruments which work very well in matching with the different setting.
I briefly mentioned the pirouetting, but the animations (following from the Layton crossover) are again top notch with Sōseki's manic posing being a consistent favourite and the scene transitions + presentation overall are a step up.
For the story, each of the cases are solid, both in their self contained plots and their references to the overarching narrative that finally comes together nicely by the end of it. I'm always happy when I figure out a twist just barely before it happens, and the game blended it's pacing and my natural obliviousness pretty well.
The worst part is that the post credits scene ends hinting towards a greater conspiracy, which is apparently wrapped up in the sequel and will completely drive me mad until I can play it, though if it's a choice between waiting for Scarlet Study to decide to work on that, or learn Japanese myself, I'm more than happy to choose the former.
Soundtrack Highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smtc8Sucfm8 - Sherlock Holmes ~ Great Detective of the Foggy Town
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSc8DjFr6M8 - Joint Reasoning (TYPE B)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4r2AE6CKe0 - Trial in Disorder
No. 3: Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Due to never really clicking with SRPGs until my later life I am admittedly a more recent fan of Fire Emblem, starting with Awakening and then eventually working my way backwards, but the whole 'Harry Potter Time Management' style of Three Houses really appealed to me and I doubt it's going to leave the cartridge slot of my Switch in the near future.
The monastery sections with their teaching schedules, daily life and activities were exactly what I needed to break up the feeling of constant battles in the previous games, and I had a great deal of fun chatting to my students and preparing before leading them into battle at the end of the month. Adding the life-sim aspect to Fire Emblem seems like a no brainer in retrospect, giving you a really good feeling of actually helping this bunch of kids progress and learn while simultaneously getting you attached to each of them.
Making the class system a lot more flexible both gave me freedom to mold my squad into my preferred set-up, and yet also multiply my usual Fire Emblem anxiety of "ok here's my end goal so I need to train this, then this, then that". Even if I am a coward and have the kids lean into their suggested classes, I appreciate the option to make the 15-year old girl into a fist fighting menace.
While the series has always had pretty good music, this time around they've really outdone themselves with the soundtrack. The battle themes are striking and grand, the monastery theme is wistful and relaxing, the music around Sothis has this kinda of ethereal charm, and even the little touches like the school bell chime being the original Fire Emblem theme really makes the whole thing a joy to listen to.
My main criticism of the game weirdly enough is that it's maybe too ambitious, and it's quite obvious there were some cuts made for time. Things such as the overall plot, despite being actually quite clever in the way it splits up information between all the routes, ends up a little fractured with the information you do know, especially depending which route you chose.
Even now, 95 hours in, I can't feel like I can give a qualified verdict on the overall 'story' as I'm only just coming to the end of the Golden Deer route (after finishing Edelgard's). I still found the end of the Black Eagles route enjoyable, but if you are the type of person who doesn't like unanswered questions then you'll need to do them all.
While having a silent protagonist is a choice which I feel lets down the main narrative and character interactions with Byleth, especially coming off the back of Echoes having two of the best main character performances, the supporting cast very much makes up for it.
The character writing + interactions are excellent and infinitely more fleshed out than the mishmash of personalities in Fates, thanks to the impressive voice acting helping this greatly with a lot of my joy found in the support conversations between the students.
Those little interactions like Raphael helping Flayn to improve her battle cry and Bernie bringing out Hubert's softer side provide a lot of depth, and even with a massive cast I found myself liking the vast, vast majority of them.
I could probably spend a paragraph on nearly everyone, but Raphael is an absolute treasure, Petra is honest and kind, Seteth is genuinely caring underneath a hard-ass exterior and if anyone hurts precious Marianne again there'll be hell to pay.
Three Houses is an ambitious Fire Emblem game with a decent plot, an excellent soundtrack, made me care a lot about it's characters and it's my favourite of the series so far.
PS. Edelgard did nothing wrong.
Soundtrack highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHut5jj4sxI - Fodlan Winds (Rain)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE4P5XVWfy0 - Blue Skies and a Battle (Rain)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPrxg_hqBCo - Chasing Daybreak (Rain)
No. 2: AI: The Somnium Files
I'm always going to give Uchikoshi games a look, after the clever timeline-hopping shenanigans of 9 Hours, 9 Persons, 9 Doors, but I wasn't expecting to like this one as much as I did.
The gameplay moves away slightly from his past work, replacing the logic challenges with a sort of adventure game style of puzzle, with a time challenge. These puzzles consist of you delving into the psyche of various people to get information from them, ala a detective version of Psychonauts, but are primarily there as fleshed out visual flavour and provide a neat backdrop of something to do between the story scenes, aside from two I speak about a bit later on.
The story itself is an engaging mystery, with some very satisfying "ohhh now I get it" twists without it ever descending too far into the technobabble seen in the Zero Escape series and as much as I love those games, the more straight-forward Sci Fi vibe of AI: The Somnium Files works to it's benefit, allowing more focus on the characters and their personalities.
That's not to say there isn't some science to be explained, and there's even a knowing nod to anyone who played the Zero Escape series with a fun little fake out, but I appreciated giving my brain a rest from figuring out parallel universes again.
Even though there are no major swings into time travel and shocking twists this time around, the game does do a good job at playing with your expectations enough to keep the intrigue up and it kept me invested the whole way through.
One thing that does return, this time in a much more overt manner, is the slapstick humour and while it never veers into fanservice territory the hard swing from serious, tense shootout to 'using a porno mag to give you bullet time through the power of sheer horniness' can be a little jarring if you weren't familiar with this kind of tonal shift.
Still, those scenes are few & far between and don't detract from the grander plot, which includes some incredibly touching character moments once again brought to life by some fantastic voice acting. The game tackles some heavy themes, including dementia, parental abuse and trauma, yet manages to handle them with a lot of grace and does a great job of getting you to care about its cast.
I bawled my eyes out twice playing through this, in no small part to the writing and performances from Corina Boettger and Philece Sampler in their respective endings. The way those two specific puzzles work with the plot are where the game is at it's strongest too, marrying the visual aesthetics a lot more closely with the concept of going inside their minds.
After my 25 hours or so, I feel it's Uchikoshi's most well-rounded game so far and impressed me enough that it may knock off 999 as my favourite of his. It didn't have the "oh shiiiiit" moments of that game, but there's something to be said for a fun mystery, strong characters and an ending that wraps up nicely.
It's also yet another game on my list with a strong soundtrack, doing a great job of setting the mood across the various threads of the story and in the different psyches of people.
Soundtrack highlights:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPT55-5AMvw - kokkAI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wS0HZcUurhY - syuurAI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zzi0P8ZdiSk - tekitAI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRwcub26LKs - Armed Insurgents
No. 1: Outer Wilds
I'm not sure if it's possible for me to deep dive into why I love this game so much without talking about specific moments, revelations or discoveries and robbing you of the best part of it, experiencing it first hand.
Because that is the game; A journey powered by the purest form of discovery and exploration, without any major hand holding or 'video game' incentives like XP or equipment. There's no motivation to explore the universe outside of your own curiosity and desire to find out the thing that's set-up in the opening section of the game - what exactly happened to this past civilization, the Nomai?
Games that are freeform in how you progress need to have a suitable hook to drive you forward, to keep searching out what it wants you to find. Outer Wilds balances its distribution of information brilliantly, having you maybe come across some writings that lead you to a new area or contain knowledge to operate a piece of machinery on another planet, giving you "Oh so now I wonder what happens if I do this!", sending you off to your next location.
But it's still freeform, there's no main quest line or defined order you need to see the vast majority of the story in. At any time you can jet off to a different planet and pick up a different trail there, and the game will eventually connect it all up by the end. It's almost like a jigsaw puzzle, where you can start anywhere and find pieces that connect to your current one, or decide you'll look for a completely different piece on the other side of the picture and build it up from the other side.
There's no primary 'route' to get through the game, but from the experiences of people I've spoken to who've played it, even though they found things at different times to me (or things I completely missed!) it all sounded very natural.
Without going into detail on the overall story, one of things I really enjoyed was the quality of the writing and how it takes your initial thoughts of what's going on and then makes you reevaluate them every time you find something that doesn't quite fit with your assumptions.
The game does a wonderful job of subverting expectations, you'll come across something that gives you a theory, then something else slightly changes it so you adapt the theory, then another bit of data supports it, and then one bit completely nullifies it into a "holy shit, it's actually this". It's such a cool feeling.
The quality of the writing really drove me along, and I found myself caring about all these specific Nomai, despite them being long gone, purely due to the strength of the personalities that came through in the texts they left behind. There's a moment in the game that hit me really emotionally for someone my character had never once interacted with.
It's not just the good writing that makes the exploration interesting, each of the planets are crafted in different ways like the one where a black hole slowly rips pieces of it apart, the twin bodies who funnel sand between them and a creepy tangle of vines and fog. Each one deliberately is set-up to explore, with plenty of passages and jumps to hidden shortcuts, and I even started taking notes about specific landmarks to prepare for my next expedition, making me feel like a proper adventurer.
I know I can bang on about good soundtracks but while Outer Wilds has some solid individual tracks, it has some atmospheric themes that really nail the mood, especially in a certain scene towards the end and the most lovely & apt use of a leitmotif that I can remember in recent memory.
This thing is long enough already, and I could go on for an age if I talked about all the moments I loved, but if you've even got the slightest interest in playing it you're better off knowing as little as possible.
Soundtrack Highlight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0NWCrn5l5A - Main Title