Games

I really loved:

• Sea of Stars
• Roboquest
• Spider-Man 2
• Dredge
• Lies of P
• Remnant 2

I really DIDN’T love:

• Rollerdrome
• Starfield
• Hogwarts Legacy

I think there were some middling games and some really great games this year, and even the ones I didn’t enjoy were just not for me, as opposed to actively being bad games. I’m not going to board the hyperbole train and say it’s the best year for games ever, but I think it was very strong and had a lot of variety which is good for everyone. Looking forward to 2024 when I get to play everyone else’s favorites in this thread :)

Best:

Factorio - The factory must grow.

Vampire Survivors - They keep releasing new content, and I keep devouring it. This game is even more addicting than Cracktorio.

The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog - Best April Fools joke this year, and a solid light visual novel in its own right. This was a pleasant surprise.

Remnant II - My choice for Game of the Year this year. TotK let me down, and while BG3 is solidly in the #2 spot I don't really vibe with it. Remnant II is an excellent sequel that builds on the strengths while fixing the weaknesses of its predecessor. It's a hell of a game that still manages to stand out in a year stacked with great titles.

Note: I didn't play AC6 or the new Street Fighter, so I've got no opinion on how they match up.

Worst:

Keywe - A puzzle game where you play as Kiwi birds managing a post office in Australia. Not my thing, but my sister likes it and wanted to play the multiplayer with me. We played online and holy hell this game's netcode is broken. We kept desyncing mid-puzzle and then whoever was hosting would have to finish the puzzle while the other stood and watched because they couldn't see the actual gamestate. It's probably a fine game as a solo or local play experience, but it left a sour impression.

I've played many games this year. The highlighting are:

• Fallout 3 - I forgot how fun this game is. Especially the exploration;
• Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings - good game as well;
• Dead Rising - a truly hard game, that is also fun. Zombies!
• Dead Space (2008) - still an awesome game!
• Star Wars: The Force Unleashed - the game is fun with the graphics and Force powers. Even though most boss fights are lame;
• Silent Hill 2 - still awesome!
• The Callisto Protocol - pretty good game! Surprised me how good it is;
• Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 - what a garbage game. Bad boss fights just to pad the game out.

Baldur's Gate 3 was the best I played this year. There might be recency bias, but I genuinely think it's one of the best games I've ever played. Persona 5 Royal isn't super far behind, was also great.

Worst game I finished was Starfield. Did not see that coming. Worst overall was Vambrace: Cold Soul. Incredibly gorgeous game with a complete disaster of a core gameplay loop.

Best game i played this year was Alan Wake 2, though I can imagine it's probably not for everyone. The Marvelesque "homework" you're recommended to do before playing to catch all the references and understand the interconnected lore might seem daunting, but the world and narrative Remedy has built continues to impress me. A lot has been said already about how Remedy has been pushing innovation and mixed media, but I'll also add how impressed I am with the level of writing in general. Not only is the narrative mind bending, but all the characters are compelling and distinctive and all the different styles employed are nailed perfectly and mesh surprisingly well, from the Noir-caricature Alex Casey monologues to the goofy Koskela brothers TV ads.

The worst game I played this year was Ghost of Tsushima. Okay hear me out. The game is beautiful, well optimised and the combat is solid and satisfying. The game is just roughly twice as long as it should be considering what it is. The story is only okay at best, but suffers from a consistently dour and overly serious tone which really starts to drag as time goes on. The only bit of comic relief is Kenji, and he is barely around. On top of this the quest design is 90% "talk to person, move to area, kill the enemies there, go back and talk again". Main story missions overly rely on walk-and-talk and/or ride-horse-and-talk. There are a handful of missions with more to it than that and those are good, but there just isn't enough variation to sustain interest over the playtime (especially if you're attempting to do everything and thus have to chase down the Ubisoft level open world stuff). After about 10h playtime I was loving the game, but by the third act I was thoroughly worn out and bored.

Best:

• Baldur's Gate 3
• Against the Storm
• Dave the Diver
• Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew - I usually hate tactical strategy games, but this one's good. The quicksave/reload feature makes it pretty fun to experiment and goof around.
• Dead Cells (I'm behind)
• Grounded
• Tears of the Kingdom

Mediocre

• Dredge - It was a unique experience, but I never really understood the fear/consequences despite fully finishing it.
• Armored Core 6 - The balance in this series always ruins them, even though I try to love them every time. Being forced into a specific build takes the fun out of customization.

I guess I avoided the worst games this year!

The games that caught my attention the most were Payday: The Heist, Crusader Kings III (essentially a live service), and Hollow Knight. Honorary mention: Lovely Planet, it pushed me right to my limits, any little bit harder and I wouldn‘t have been able to get full stars. I did play some Zelda but it didn‘t blow me away.

The worst games, hmm. For sure Magicka, CTDs en masse, absolutely unplayable. DiRT 5 was a huge disappointment to me, driving felt terrible and somehow it looked worse than GRID 2019 with cars that could’ve been toy cars. An HDR spectacle though for sure.

The best that are not replays:

1. Bloodborne. I'm glad i finally got to play it, because holy hell it is good. Orphan of kos can f**k off tho, definitely the one of hardest bosses in any game i've ever played.

2. Yakuza 0. Super happy i liked as much as i did, since i bought 0 thru 7 before even playing a yakuza game, stupid i know.

Can't really think of any other games that wow'd me.

Edit:

I also played the ps3 ratchet and clank games and come on, they're ratchet and clank, what's not to like.

Also played resident evil remake, which got me into og re2 and 3.

"Bad" games:

1. Metro 2033. It's not a bad game, i just ran into alot of bugs that hampered my enjoyment.

2. White knight chronicles1/2. From the boring ass story to the giant maps that are cancer to traverse, i really didn't enjoy it.

That's about all the "bad" games i can think of, especially since i don't go looking for them.

Best: path of exile Worst : path of exile Shout out to kingdoms of amular rereckoning and stray.

Going to second Midnight Suns. I'm a big XCOM fan, and while there were a lot of differences, it still scratched that same multi-genre itch.

I also played (in no specific order):

Hitman - World of Assassination - A whole hell of a lot of game in one package. Definitely the highlight of the series if it is your type of game.

Horizon Burning Shores - A worthwhile reason to go back to Horizon Forbidden West, though it was over sooner than I'd like. I'd feel better about the length if it was easier to miss the story, but anyone who goes from Forbidden West to the next game without playing Burning Shores might be caught off guard by the new character. (And I'mma be mad if they don't bring back the new character!)

Death Stranding: Director's Cut - Another YMMV game that will suck you in if you like good progression mechanics and don't mind a slightly slower pace. And Hideo Kojima being Hideo Kojima.

Crisis Core - FFVII Reunion - You know the old school parenting style of making your kid smoke a pack of cigarettes so they want to wretch every time they catch a whiff of them? I accidentally did that to myself with JRPGs during the PS1 era. I thought maybe Crisis Core could coast by on nostalgia factor because I was able to enjoy FFVII Remake. Crisis Core was a big stinker though. The story hits every bad JRPG/anime trope you can think of (fucking Genesis... WOOF), and the quest design seems designed to embrace pointless backtracking and tedium.

Cyberpunk 2077 Phantom Liberty - I will argue until I'm blue in the face that while the PS4 and Xbox Series Whatever was a shitshow, the PC launch of CP2077 in 2020 was only a bit rocky. All the praises that people have been singing about the game since 2.0 and Phantom Liberty? They're praising the same elements that have made the game great since Day 1. It's just not sandwiched between T-poses and occasional CTDs any more. PC veterans who lived through rough launches of great games (like Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines or, hell, Witcher 3!) were right at home. The Phantom Liberty Expansion was a great excuse to revisit Night City and remember why I fell in love with the game three years ago.

Slay the Spire - Because I'm going to hit A20 and kill the Heart with Silent eventually, goddammit.

Baldur's Gate 3 - Because best $50 I spent in 2020.

No Man's Sky - I waited until this year to pick up NMS and this was another one that sucked me in for a solid couple months. Hello Games has sunk years into making this game a great bang for your buck if you like exploration and building.

The best I played this year

• Cataclysm Dark Days Ahead with the Sky Islands mod Absolutely best survival game I have ever played by a long mile. There is just so much time and love behind this game.

• Deep Rock Galactic A flawless game

• Halo Infinite multiplayer it is actually good now!

• Battlebit So good to have a battlefield not owned and ruined by EA

Best : BG3

Empyrion (you love sandbox games with endless content with very little guidance? Try it, I'm on HWS RE server and after 260h I'm still just scratching the surface)

Marvel Midnight Suns (top notch on many levels)

Chrono Ark (one of the best roguelite deck builders for me)

The scroll of Taiwu (perfect cultivation sandbox RPG, official translation should come in 2024)

Worst : Not much.. I just don't understand why I can't get into Thea 2. It's supposed to kinda be my dream game. Yet, I'm always bored after 30 min.

Shoutout to Archmage Rises. It has a long way to go but it could possibly be my GOTY 2024.

Best: System Shock: turns out the 90s darling gal can still run with the best of them in 2023 thanks to Nightdive's excellent remake. Citadel Station was a real blast to explore. It almost made me disappointed to see how little gaming has advanced since that time, I'd have expected to view the remake as a relic of a simpler time. Instead I played something way more fun than the typical hand-holdy shooters of today.

Cyberpunk 2077: Update 2.0 made this a real videogame. I absolutely hated playing Cyberpunk 2077 when it released, so much that I refunded it. The combat felt awful and floaty, the RPG systems felt stupid and poorly thought out, and don't even get me started on the bugs. 2.0 is the reason to buy the game again, and with modding support already available I have a feeling this game is going to grow the kinda legs of Witcher 3 and Skyrim. CD-Projekt Red managed a real miracle. Oh, and the DLC is pretty rad too.

Warframe: There's been a lotta new content added to Warframe this year, and it's all been pretty good! I was a little worried about the game considering the change in leadership, but Rebecca Ford knows what the players want and seems really skilled at walking the fine line that makes a grind enjoyable. If you've never played, and have always wanted to play a mass murderer in space with magic powers, I'd recommend hopping in.

Worst:

Elden Ring: Miyazaki please where is the DLC. It's been two years, I just want to play through a new poison swamp.

Elden Ring and Stardew Valley ate a decent chunk of 2023 for me. And are both amazing games in their own right. Totally different, though.

I didn't play anything really bad this past year, but I did bounce off Crosscode pretty hard after expecting to love it given I'm a sucker for early JRPGs and the 8 and 16 bit eras in general. It's a well made game, just overlong and featuring some tedious and frustrating mechanics.

Cocoon - short with no dialog but really enjoyed the puzzles

The Talos Principle 2 - great puzzles and well done story. Really enjoyed it.

Far - Lone Sales - the start wasn’t super intuitive but didn’t take long. Short, no dialog. Ok puzzles. Fair enough especially on sale

Dave the Diver - Really good. Didn’t finish since I played it enough that it didn’t drive me anymore. That’s not the games fault since I tend to do that and rarely play longer games much with my schedule.

I expect you to die 2 - short and alright. Loved the first one, second wasn’t as good but not bad either

Stray - I really enjoyed this one. Fantastic world setting and ambiance even though it’s too short for some people’s taste I found it to be really good.

Gorogoa - Really weird and really good. I love deeper narratives revealed over time and this one hit me like Rime

You know, I'm thinking I'm either not playing enough games, or getting "too old" because most of the stuff I remember playing is either old or, ahem, adults only.

This year was the year I finally fully played Star Wars Dark Forces. Would've been a great game at the time, playing nowadays would be just for curiosity, really.

I played Fallout 4 a bunch, especially once I discovered how to get infinite enemies/gear/money by building settlement traps to catch Gunners. Silly loop, but I had lots of fun coming up with new ways to blow them up shortly after stepping out of the traps.

Super Smash Bros Ultimate is still the best fighting game I've played this year.

Phantasy Star 1 for the Sega Master System is the worst I've played this year. I don't think it'd be much fun even back in 1989, because it mixes typical jrpg with first person dungeon crawling and the latter is awful. Feels like the purpose of the game was selling strategy guides and/or magazines with walkthroughs.

I played a bunch of the new releases and some older indies.

Best (in no particular order)

1. Tears of the kingdom - Game was very good. I can’t imagine going back and playing breath if the wild after this, it improves on pretty much all the gameplay in that game.
2. Armored Core 6 - This was very fun, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I played through it 4 times to get all the endings (i messed up a choice when trying to get the third ending and had to play through a fourth time).
3. Starfield - This was really fun for awhile when it originally released. It has some issues, but I really like it.
4. Factorio - I got super into this during this summer. It’s the best factory game.
5. Sanabi - Indie released last month. It’s incredibly fun with a touching story. It’s an action platformer where you swing around the levels with a chain arm.
6. Omori - As a game this is just alright, but it has probably the saddest plot of any game I’ve played.
7. Signalis - Survival horror indie game that’s like resident evil crossed with dead space, complete with cool eldritch horror vibes.
8. Library of Ruina - Intense deckbuilding game with an interesting setting. There are a lot of strategies to build decks around that are super viable.
9. Cassette Beasts - Fantastic indie Pokemon type game that is miles better than anything gamefreak has pushed out lately. Has interesting battle mechanics, a great soundtrack, and a cool throwback art style.

Worst

1. Shadow of war - couldn’t get into it. I played the first one when it released, but I just couldn’t get into this one.
2. Spelunky - I got this one in a bundle a long time ago and decided to boot it up. I couldn’t really get into it and only did a few runs.
3. Spyro Trilogy - I don’t know why I finished the first two. I don’t think Spyro’s gameplay has aged super well.
4. Outward - I want to get into this, but the game is frustratingly difficult. I feel like if I play it some more I’ll get it and it’ll be fun, but I don’t like playing to get to that point.

Mario Party 3 on switch still holds up and the mini games are challenging enough on Super Hard.

Tears of the Kingdom. The best fights were when I went to Ganon with 3 hearts and no gloom healing but still. The game was difficult and I still haven't gotten all the shrines. Getting all the light roots brings back the heavy exploration that you got in Breath of the Wild in the over world. Of course the over world was the only world.

I played the remake of Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life and it's pretty good. It lacks a lot of gameplay when you compare it to Stardew Valley. But the family aspect was compelling. The game is a challenge tho but I like that.

Worst: Starfield (2023).

Best: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998).

Maybe I'm biased.

Best:

• Cyberpunk 2077 (1.6) My first open world AAA game, I really enjoyed it and even though I was a total noob the gunplay and missions were very doable. The lore in everything made the immersion so deep too. Great soundtrack too!

• Slay The Princess I really liked the writing and art. It really feels like a full experience, the voice acting is on point too (I loved The Voice Of The Smitten!!)

• Deltarune (chapter 2) I loved Chapter 1 and Undertale, and this new chapter did not disappoint either. Didn't had the time to play it yet until now

Worst:

• Warzone 2.0 Made me realise those more realistic shooters weren't for me at all. Had only played more cartoonish shooters before (Fortnite, Valorant etc)

• Hitman 3 Hitman is on its own really fun, but I just couldn't seem to find the solutions. I got stuck at the Bangkok mission.

Favourites, not really ordered

• Street Fighter 6 - Really really good fighting game, definitely a recommend if you want to play one.
• Baldurs Gate 3 - It is BG3, what more needs to be said?
• Octopath Traveler 2 - It is more of the first, but more refined and better at tying the characters together.
• Dead Space Remake - If you like the original, you should really play this, it is incredible.
• Remnant 2 - Great game, a good refinement of the first remnant, and fantastic in co-op.
• Last Epoch - I really like the leveling systems(Character and also Skills). Not perfect, but fun and chaotic.
• Crab Champions - Crab goes BRRR. Not many games I go out of my way to 100% but this games feels incredible to play.
• Spiderman & Miles Morales - Finally pick up on the cheap, if you enjoy the Batman Arkham formula, these two are fantastic. Miles Morales definitely feels like a large DLC though.
• Driftwood - Longboarding Sloth, super chilled out and relaxing. Just enjoy carving down the hills on sticks of butter.
• Lumines - The best game on the PSP, and still love it(picked up for cheap with Tetris, but prefer Lumines)

The not so good.

• Ghost Runner 2 - I want to like this more, I loved the first game, but the wide open levels and bike traversal just don't feel good or fun.
• Diablo 4 - Play Last Epoch instead, D4 feels boring and bland and uninspired after finishing the story.
• Blasphemous - Didnt click with me, the combat felt good and the movement was good, but never stuck with it, will probably try again at some point.
• Hyper Light Drifter - I have tried a few times, and I keep bouncing off it.
• Ori and the Blind Forest - I also want to like this game, but bounced off it again.

While Street Fighter 6 is my Favourite game of the the year, Baldurs Gate 3 is definitely the GOTY. I would strongly recommend any game from the favourites list. I haven't played any really bad games this year, Diablo 4 is probably the worst I have played, do not recommend it. Unlike the other games which I would be tempted to suggest under certain circumstances.

Best - Armored Core 6 Worst - Bloody Spell

Best:

Tears of the Kingdom: what else is there to say about this game that hasn't already been said? It improves on Breath of the Wild in just about every conceivable way. The only real downside to me is that it raises the bar so high for the next new Zelda title that it may not be possible for it to reach that height.

I can't really think of a game I played that would be considered "bad" this year so I don't really have a Worst, but just making a post acknowledging that TotK was hands down the best.

That said, I didn't really play too many new games this year in general, so here is what I did play: Fire Emblem Engage, Persona 5 Royal, Pokemon Ultra Sun, Fire Emblem Echoes, Lunistice, Symphony of War, Super Mario RPG Remake.

If I had to give out a Worst among that list it would probably be Symphony of War because it doesn't really have the polish of the others, it's an inexpensive indie title and it shows, but I can't definitively declare it the Worst because just about all the other games it's compared to above are from big studios and that's not fair to it, pretty much an apples-to-oranges comparison.

Best

Red Dead Redemption 2 (for like the sixth time)

ACC (a racing game that is not new but still holds up)

Super Mario Bros. Wonder

Worst

AC Mirage (liked the setting but that was about it)

Best this year, I think would be Astal Ascent as I love the gameplay loop and how it feels.

Worst this year is undoubtly Endless Dungeon. Released in a beta crappy state and doesn't seem fully realised.

Wwaste of money that one.

Best: Ghost of Tsushima

Worst: Overcooked 2

Best: Just Cause 4

Worst: Returnal