Yeah, it's late. Nearly too late I'd say to post a blog about last year's games, but not everything had been played yet. After putting together a small video of my top five favorite games, the Steam holiday sale kicked off and brought me a bunch of new games to play. These games were fantastic and deserved to be added to a list of the top games of the year. So here I am once again to tell about not five, but ten of the greatest games of the year since passed. I'm not sure exactly how much detail I'll go into per game, but just in case I'll put a spoiler warning here for anyone who might be a bit gun shy.
10. Team Fortress 2
Sure, the game debuted in 2007 as a part of the Orange Box. Over the course of the past five years, Team Fortress 2 is nearly unrecognizable compared to its humble beginnings. Valve has consistently delivered new content to the game, including new maps, weapons, and even new game types. When TF 2 launched it had two major game types and one map with a spin on control points. Now it boasts eight, all amazingly fun. Yes, the introduction of hats went on to become a great joke between naysayers and even some players of TF 2, but in the end the trading system was a beta for what has now become a way for Steam users to trade things beyond TF 2 items. TF 2 is one of the few games I can still return to years later and have a great time with friends or in a server of strangers.
9. Lone Survivor
I love horror games. The problem is that ever since this generation, great horror games have been few and far between. Leave it to the indie/small developer scene to bring us what's missing. Last year we had Amnesia, this year we have Hide, Slender, and games like Lone Survivor. Inspired greatly by Silent Hill, Lone Survivor follows a guy who wakes up in a post-apocalyptic world. His only goal is to connect with a group of survivors on the other side of the apartment building. But as you travel, things don't seem right. Your character's mental state is called into question several times. Is he imagining everything? Is it a dream? Is he just crazy? You need food and sleep to survive and without them things will only get worse. Soon you'll start holding conversations with a toy cat and dude who only ever wears a box on his head. Lone Survivor gives you everything you want from a horror game: great psychological scares, great gameplay, and a fantastic score.
8. Persona 4: Arena
I haven't played P4 Golden on the Vita yet. It's the one reason I want a Vita and Persona 4: Arena helped push me towards that. A sequel to the original Persona 4, the game takes place a few months later. Teddy has suddenly disappeared and the Midnight Channel has returned. When you reenter Teddy is no longer himself as he forces you to compete in a nasty tournament against your friends. The game is chock full of text, while fights themselves are few and far between. The can get tiresome occasionally, but when you finally get a battle the action is insane. The fighting system is complicated, but balanced. The art style is amazing and the anime cutscenes are gorgeous. Persona 4: Arena is easily one of the best fighting games of the year.
7. Halo 4
I remembered long ago when the first Halo came out on PC. I adored that game, but the magic seemed lost in future games. Opinions of Halo 4 made it seem like 343 Industries had figured out a way to bring that magic back. And for the most part, they did. While Halo 4 suffered from an awful villain and repeating itself one too many times, the game was a joy to play. I also really enjoyed the emphasis on Cortana and Chief's relationship, as well as Cortana's failing mental health. Sure the ending felt a bit "Wrath of Khan"-ish to me (meaning I expect Halo 5 to be "Search of Spock"), but it hit the right emotional cords.
6. XCOM: Enemy Unknown
I'm a big fan of turn-based strategy games. The problem with that is that there aren't many good ones around anymore. Welcome XCOM: Enemy Unknown. The base and resource management, on top of creating and nurturing your own soldiers, helped you spin your own narrative. Seeing a soldier you spent hours and hours on go down in the field of battle is heartbreaking. At the same time there's nothing more thrilling than watching your sniper get that shot that would otherwise cost you several lives, or even the mission. XCOM is the perfect game for letting the player create their own stories.
5. Borderlands 2
For the longest time, Borderlands 2 was my most anticipated game of the year. I'd loved the first game and couldn't wait to see how Gearbox would expand on the gameplay and story. I wasn't disappointed. The main story was longer and more fulfilling, there were new classes, new areas, and new guns. So many new guns. Not only that, the co-op was better than ever before. Killing things alongside people has never been more fun. Thankfully Gearbox has continued to support the game with awesome DLC and doesn't look to be stopping any time soon.
4. FTL: Faster Than Light
A simple little Kickstarter game, FTL's quaint art style is deceiving. Underneath the sprite-like art and amazing chiptune soundtrack is a game of depth. The game is brutal in how precise you must be and how one wrong move can cost you everything. FTL is a game that loves nothing more than to kick you while you're down. The best part though? When it's done, all you'll want to do is keep playing.
3. Sleeping Dogs
Yet another game I bought from the Steam sale, Sleeping Dogs was an unexpected bright light in my otherwise drab holiday. Sleeping Dogs' open world Hong Kong is a breath of fresh air. The game is filled with tons to do and it does nearly all of it flawlessly. Not only does the game look great, but it plays amazingly. Frankly it has the best driving controls I've seen in any game. Nothing is more fun than driving on your motorcycle in Hong Kong while it's raining, blasting your radio. Sometimes it's the simple things that count the most.
2. Hotline Miami
Hotline Miami tapped into the part of my brain that would love to give in those thoughts. Yeah, those thoughts. Never in a game have I enjoyed killing so much. Whether that was the intended message or not, Hotline Miami was a game I could not stop playing. It's try-die-try formula was addictive and completing an entire level, leaving untold amounts of carnage in your wake is the most satisfied I've felt in a game. With a superb soundtrack and a great art style that combined just oozed with the feeling of drugs and blood, Hotline Miami was one of those games that made you feel happy. And while you questioned it in the beginning, by the end you didn't even care.
1. The Walking Dead
Hotline Miami made me feel happy in a way I didn't think was possible in games. The Walking Dead brought out every other emotion. From hatred to sadness, the Walking Dead loved nothing more than to pull my emotional chain. I did all I could to protect Clementine and befriend Kenny. By the end, Kenny was my best friend and when he was gone I felt something. I felt loss. Kenny had been the one constant throughout the entirety of the Walking Dead. He was the guy I could count on to protect me if I needed it. Losing him was hard, but that was nothing compared to having to leave Clementine. She wasn't leaving me, I was leaving her, and the game made sure I felt terrible about it. It was unavoidable, nothing to do, except say goodbye. Something like that has never been so hard to do in a video game.
Many people suffered from awful framerates and even worse save glitches. That wasn't me. I had a perfect experience all the way through to the bitter end. There was nothing more than me sitting in front of my PC, feeling awful. Yet at the same time, it felt amazing. I couldn't believe that game had brought out these kind of emotions in me. I can only hope that the rest of the industry learns something from the Walking Dead and can bring the same emotional weight to their games.
