Unlike last year I struggled to select my choices for this year. There were a lot of amazing titles and as we set ourselves strict guidelines, choices had to be made. That said, here are my Games of the Year, my Pleasant Surprise, Guilty Pleasure and my Biggest Disappointment.
Game of the Year
Before sitting down to and losing myself in Original Sin 2, Torment: Tides of Numenera sat as king. Both were amazing across the board in what they could offer as well as their stellar presentations. Sadly I went with one title per category and as great as Torment was, Divinity took the crown.
What stood out the most for me was Divinity Original Sin 2’s characters. While you could create your own custom character there were also Origin Characters that come with their own added dialog lines, extra events that may happen and above all of that, these characters already exist in the game. It was awesome that you could chose pre-existing people and play out the story as them instead of someone who would otherwise “not exist” in this world.
From there the rest of the experience is just as amazing as the original. Environmental effects are back and just as useful as before with the ability to light oil patches on fire, electricity water, freeze water or douse anyone or anything on fire. More than these options for combat was the fact that just because everyone was in a party didn’t mean that they were all treated equally. I’m still surprised, and happily, that just because one person pissed off a merchant didn’t mean that the other people couldn’t still keep dealing with them. All of these just made it into a title that stood out above the rest. PY’sReview
|
Platform: |
Genre(s): |
|
Developer(s): |
Mode(s): |
|
Publisher(s): |
Other Platform(s): |
1st runner up
It seems like a lot of my J/RPG adventures started off either with a friend lending them to me or one fateful day at an EB Games and the Atelier series is no exception to the later.
Since that first fateful day with the release of Atelier Iris on the PS2 I have played through each release even if I wasn’t overly fond of the timelines. While Sophie did away with them and Firis brought them back they did so in the best possible way giving you a full year in order to learn as much as possible while making it towards your goal.
The journey was an incredible one. Firis is finally allowed to leave her underground home accompanied by her sister Liane on the bet that if she can’t become an alchemist within the year she is to return and never again discuss leaving for the outside. On that journey you were also no longer subject to always returning to your base of operations as Sophie, Firis’ teacher, gives her a portable lab. This allowed for constant discovery and moving forward with interesting party members and people’s along the way.
It’s rare to finish a large game like this off the bat but I was so absorbed into it that next thing I knew credits were rolling after a couple dozen hours. Better yet? There was a no time limit post story to keep things going. PY’sReview
|
Platform: |
Genre(s): |
|
Developer(s): |
Mode(s): |
|
Publisher(s): |
Other Platform(s): |
2nd runner up
Like the Atelier series, my love for the Ys also started one fateful day at an EB Games. Minimum wage job, not that much money in my bank account, I totally bought the Ark of Napishtim back on the PS2. Since that point I’ve played just about every entry and re-release short of Origins. Guess what I’m hopefully doing this holiday break?
Ys 8: The Lacrimosa of Dana has to be me favorite in the series if for nothing else than it was different. Red haired protagonist Adol? Check. Shipwrecks inbound? Check. Stuck on an island with no other sign of civilization or peoples living there to sell you stuff? That was new and in one of the best ways possible.
This latest entry took a lot of what made the series what it is while simultaneously doing new things. Stuck on this island there’s plenty to explore in order to find materials in order to fortify your settlement to keep those that washed ashore safe. While being out and about you sometimes had to rush back in order to protect that settlement from a horde of incoming monsters in a Tower Defense while also being able to do the reverse. The graphics while never a huge factor in this series were amazing, the soundtrack as always did not disappoint and the new style of scenario just brought it all together. PY’sReview
|
Platform: |
Genre(s): |
|
Developer(s): |
Mode(s): |
|
Publisher(s): |
Other Platform(s): |
Surprise of the Year
Taking one look at Cosmic Star Heroine and my nostalgia could have already told you that I would enjoy it. What that would not be able to tell you however is that this ten to twelve hour experience was more than just enjoyable. It was downright amazing being more than just another tribute to the SNES greats.
Cosmic Star Heroine has a lot going for it before even getting into it being a love letter to older shooled gamers. The music is great, the character designs are amazing I mean come on, they have a robot Freddie Mercury who uses music to fight and to top it off the battle system keeps things interesting from start to finish as you can’t just spam your way from intro to outro. The effort and the love from the developers was clear to see and I’m glad that they are working on getting the Vita version right as well as that this stellar title will be gracing the Nintendo Switch in the new year. PY’sReview
|
Platform: |
Genre(s): |
|
Developer(s): |
Mode(s): |
|
Publisher(s): |
Other Platform(s): |
Biggest Dissapointment
I… I don’t even know where to start. I had been looking forward to Elex since originally hearing about it. A post apocalyptic world with three main factions that look and act differently than one another in an alien world that while having an Earth Dinosaur extinction level event is still moving forward. Add in combat and plenty to explore and it had all the elements to be something incredible. Sadly it was anything but.
While Elex has all of the elements that it needs it sadly just couldn’t put it together. The combat system feels clunky as they add in a Soul’s esque stamina system that just doesn’t fit, enemies regardless of where you are can go from being challenging to outright killing you in a sneeze. Grinding endgame gear in an MMO I think is easier than the amount of grinding that it took to simply wield a new weapon. And while I can generally be lenient on game freezing and crashing… with everything else and HOW OFTEN it happened. Nope.
While I really wanted to love Elex… I just couldn’t. It had all the pieces but none of the execution. PY’sReview
|
Platform: |
Genre(s): |
|
Developer(s): |
Mode(s): |
|
Publisher(s): |
Other Platform(s): |
Guilty Pleasure
This is Nick’s fault. He originally reviewed the first and second with this 2.5 action title thereafter on the Vita. So when they finally made their way to the PS4 he passed them my way allowing me the chance to see what it was all about. Feelings. Lots of feelings and some of the best script writing that I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading and listening to as the voice acting was superb.
Ultra Despair Girls while being an action title more than a Visual Novel has
to be one of the things that I’ve had the most guilty pleasure in experiencing
this year. Shooting Monokumas with a loudspeaker while running around a ruined
Japan as both a schoolgirl and a serial killer psychopath was both hilarious
and satisfying at the same time. Nick’sReview – Vita
PY’sReview – PS4
|
Platform: |
Genre(s): |
|
Developer(s): |
Mode(s): |
|
Publisher(s): |
Other Platform(s): |
Article by: Pierre-Yves
0 comments:
Post a Comment