First, here are the games I played and most enjoyed this year that actually made their debut in 2015:
Batman: Arkham Knight (PS4)
Surprisingly, in a year where I played through Fallout New Vegas once and Fallout 3 twice, Batman: Arkham Knight took the greatest amount of my time of any game. And on a PS4 I don’t own, no less.
I’ve been a fan of the Batman Arkham series by Rocksteady for several years, and in preparation for Arkham Knight I finally got around to collecting all the Riddler trophies in Arkham City after a couple years of playing the game on and off. Then when I had the opportunity to start a save of the new game on a friend’s console, I accomplished the same feat — 100% completion of the game — over the course of only a few weeks. I then almost immediately started playing the game again on New Game+, because I love this game so dang much. So dang much.
In my opinion, everything about Batman: Arkham City was executed near perfectly. Rocksteady took the formula from City, already one of my favorite games ever, and expanded the world, the gameplay, the lore, and the visuals, all without making the game feel bloated, empty, or cheap. The city felt huge, cohesive, never repetitive — it felt real. The graphics were, expectedly, a big step up from that of the game’s predecessors, and yet for this installment the developers were able to infuse a greater attention to detail into the already dense, beautiful world of the Arkham games.
And the Batmobile — oh goodness, the Batmobile. The nonsensical monstrosity that, honestly, I could see being a separate game unto itself. While I know some people found the Batmobile combat missions to be repetitive or out-of-place, I loved pretty much every second I was driving that beast of a machine. The drone fights were fast-paced and exhilirating, with just the right balance of twitch-action and strategy. Racing across the city streets, barreling through almost anything in my way, chasing down the next villain on my to-do list, then ejecting into a glide that sends me soaring over the sparkling-wet rooftops of Gotham… it’s that sort of experience that made Arkham Knight feel almost euphoric at times.
To top it all off, this installment had without a doubt the best story of any of the Arkham games, and some of the more unique setpieces— like the opening first-person sequence and others like it, or anything involving the expectedly brilliant Mark Hamill — brought a greater sense of surprise and narrative weight than any example from the previous installments. Additionally, jumping between missions usually felt sensible in a story context, and from a gameplay standpoint there were enough side missions at any one time that I felt I could never possibly get bored.
Basically, I love this game. (Sorry, PC gamers, you are missing out.)
Undertale (PC)
Everybody has heard of Undertale. You’ve probably seen fan art of it on like four different websites by now, and you weren’t even looking for it. Maybe you’re annoyed to death about it, with friends and strangers alike telling you to play it. I agree with them, but I’m not going to try to convince you. Instead, I’m just going to relay to you how I felt when playing Undertale, without spoilers, in the hopes that upon playing it you might feel some of the same things.
Undertale, as you’ve probably already heard, is an indie RPG where you don’t have to kill a single thing in the whole game. And as gimmicky as it sounds, developer Toby Fox has taken the concept so much further than what it sounds like on the surface, to a place of ingenuity and emotional complexity. Never have I played a game where I felt like my decisions as a player had more impact — not just on the narrative of the game, but on my own experience of it. Upon completing my initial Pacifist Run (which is most definitely how you should play the game at first), I felt proud. I felt happy — both for myself and for the fictional friends I had made. Where Undertale succeeds the most, in my opinion, is in creating a world where doing what’s right is often not easy, but it is always an option. There’s never the typical “moral dilemma” scenario of having to choose the lesser of two evils — there is right, and there is wrong. The difficulty comes not in making your choice, but in actually executing the decision. You might want to act kindly towards someone you randomly encounter in the world, but don’t know how to help them. It’s often not clear whether an action will harm or aid another character. In this way, as well as the more obvious and traditional way, Undertale is about exploration.
And what’s more fun to explore than a mysterious, exciting new world, densely populated with unique, interesting, sometimes funny, other times sad characters? A world full of stories, both in plain view and lurking quietly in the shadows, both slapping you in the face and hiding in darkened corners? The world of Undertale is a fascinating place, and its exploration has extended beyond merely playing the game. There are mysteries yet to be solved, and probably stories yet to be revealed.
Buy this game. Then play it. Then buy the soundtrack, because the music is awesome.
Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist (PC)
Created by Crows Crows Crows, the new game studio from The Stanley Parable designer William Pugh, Dr. Langeskov is another game that is best experienced knowing as little as possible going in. And it’s free! So go play it! It’s clever and short and funny! Don’t worry about me, I’ll wait!
This is the kind of indie game I wish we had more of. Witty, visually unique, heavily self-aware, and daring enough to go beyond the indie tropes of horror/tragedy stories, pixel or low-poly art, and parody which often come off as derivative at best and lazy at worst. (That’s not intended as a jab at all games with those characteristics, just as an appreciation of games that try to break from the norm and be truly unique.) There are so many small details hidden in this game that make it prime for second and third playthroughs (both of which I partook in), like jokes you almost have to actively look for in order to find. Plus, from the lush sound design to the beautifully lit environments and unique visual style, Dr. Langeskov feels incredibly polished from top to bottom — and thoroughly enjoyable from beginning to end. These guys basically already have my money for whenever their next project is released.
And then, here are the games that have been in my backlog for some time, which I only recently got around to playing:
Fallout 3 (2008, PC)
This game marked my first time exploring the Fallout universe in earnest, having tried playing it once before but losing interest fairly early on. (The fact that I didn’t really know how to play didn’t help.) And yet here I am now, two Fallout 3 playthroughs later, calling it one of my most memorable and cherished gaming experiences. Despite seeing the same stiff animations and hearing the same several voice actors over and over again, I found myself enraptured by the world of the Capital Wasteland, with its wonderful and quirky characters, its labyrinth of interweaving stories and hidden mysteries, the complete freedom it offered me. Every part of the game beckons you in several directions, all of them often equally enticing.
What kind of character do you want to be — a wandering hero helping wherever they are needed, a murderous psychopath obsessed with amassing power, or simply a son searching desperately for his lost father? The choice is purely up to you, and because practically every character and situation responds to your life choices, Fallout 3 is rife with replay value.
What is Fallout 3? It’s a darkly comedic adventure where curiosity and exploration are their own reward.
The Last Of Us (2013, PS3)
It wasn’t until mid-2014 that I finally caught up with the previous generation of consoles and bought myself a used PS3, along with the first two Uncharted games. While I generally don’t care for extensive use of cutscenes in games, which translate to long periods of me sitting with a controller in my hand and not doing anything, developer Naughty Dog always seems to know when it’s okay — and to top things off, they clearly have a really talented group of filmmakers working on them, because I am always enraptured and rarely ever bored. I found the Uncharted trilogy (or, I guess it’s actually a quadrilogy now) to be incredibly entertaining, and by the second installment they had elevated Nathan Drake’s adventures from the interactive equivalent of a fun summer blockbuster to something breathtakingly beautiful, well written, and consistently interesting.
Then came The Last Of Us. With it, Naughty Dog took the formula it had essentially perfected with the Uncharted series and tweaked it for a more serious, dramatic experience, focusing on stealth and survival more than combat and platforming. Additionally, the motion-capture/voice performers were given a script that allowed them to really show their acting prowess. Add in a beautifully subtle score by Gustavo Santaolalla, gorgeous visuals, and some amazing environmental storytelling, and you get one of the most nuanced, emotional, and narratively complex experiences in gaming. The Last Of Us is definitely not a thoroughly “happy” experience, but it was certainly a thoroughly enjoyable one, and one that shines as a beacon of what video games can aspire to — greatness.
(Sidenote: Once you’ve played The Last Of Us, I’d highly recommend watching the excellent feature-length documentary on the making of the game, which you can find for free here.)
Return of the Obra Dinn (PC, 2014 development build demo)
From Lucas Pope, creator of the acclaimed 2013 border-crossing simulator Papers, Please, comes a drastically different but potentially just as brilliant interactive experience. While technically just an early, short demo for a game still in development, Return of the Obra Dinn has enough polish and unique ideas that I think everyone should be paying attention to it. I won’t say much about it here, partly because it’s far too early to pass judgment on this game, and partly because I don’t want to spoil what makes it so great — figuring it out for yourself is a big part of the fun and the wonder.
With a uniquely beautiful aesthetic, an unconventional way of conveying narrative to the player, and what looks to be a rollicking ocean-bound adventure story, Return of the Obra Dinn is an experience I would recommend to anyone, especially fans of mystery-solving. Play the very-early very-short version now on itch.io, or wait until the full game is released, hopefully sometime in the near future.
To The Moon (2011, PC)
To The Moon is one of the most beautiful and emotional gaming experiences I’ve ever had.
From the fantastic soundtrack, to the lightly sci-fi fairytale story, to the simple-yet-challenging puzzles that punctuate the gaps between narrative peaks, to the sometimes-funny, sometimes-heartbreaking, always-endearing journey of the game’s varied and unique characters, everything about Kan Gao’s point-and-click RPG mystery makes my heart swell. While the low-res graphics and the somewhat clunky movement controls almost turned me off at the beginning, the narrative was intriguing enough that I decided to continue — and in the end, I’m so so so glad that I did.
Unfortunately, I don’t want to say much more for fear of spoiling this game for anyone, but suffice it to say that I believe you’ll find it to be a worthwhile experience.
Other games I played, aka Honorable Mentions:
- The Beginner’s Guide (PC) — The other short indie experiment from a Stanley Parable co-creator, Davey Wreden’s next venture is a unique and interesting storytelling experience that nevertheless left a bad taste in my mouth. There is a lot I could say here about my experience playing The Beginner’s Guide, but in short — it pulled me in from the very beginning, got me invested, then sent me into a spiral of anger and depression. That may say more about me and where I was in my life when I played it, but this game — and more specifically, the way it presents its story — still feels like a betrayal to me. I want to give it credit for being so utterly unique and creative, but ultimately the game felt like a manipulative, cheap experience, albeit one with a lot of admirable ambition.
- Emily Is Away (PC) — A fascinating look at the evolution of a relationship over a few years’ time, told entirely through a Windows XP-esque aesthetic and a chat messenger window. I enjoyed it, but the game played with a choose-your-own-adventure mechanic where all your decisions actually lead to the same ending, which disappointed me.
- Fallout 4 (XB1) — There are already mountains of opinions about this game online, so I’ll keep it (relatively) short: love the visuals, love the combat, love Nick Valentine. Character animation is better than in past games but still needs a lot of work. Wasn’t a fan of the story or of the abbreviated dialogue system. Wish that the player character wasn’t voiced — the actors did a great job, but it really took away from the narrative immersion for me. My series favorite is still Fallout 3.
- Hot Date (PC) — A fun little experiment with a pretty ingenious dialogue system.
