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1. SoulCalibur VI Game of the year by far for me, it hits the spot so well. Been playing this nonstop with friends for the past month and a half, it's been like the good ol' days, have not been this into a fighting game in a long time. They just nailed it, so addictive, I could pretty much play this nonstop, especially local. I don't even have Playstation Plus. Masterpiece, also Ivy is the best. There are always things to try, to learn, so many variables to mess around with when playing with somebody, local versus mode in SoulCalibur VI is pretty much a perfect game to me. 2. Red Dead Redemption 2 About four weeks of playing this a ton more days than not, great great game. I love Rockstar's style of games, I like Hauser's writing, and Arthur is a really well done character. The world is fun to explore, running into weirdos etc, blasting fools, learning a thing or two along the way. Really impressed me all around, thumbs up. 3. Yakuza Kiwami 2 I've played more of Yakuza than anything else this year, so much great stuff. While 0 is my fav of the bunch, I weigh stuff released this year a little higher on the list, but more on that later. Kiwami 2 is my fav right after 0, though they're all close, this game continued a great thing, keeping a similar formula fresh after hundreds of hours of it. Though I shouldn't be surprised, this game was even better than I expected being a remake. Has a really well done story, Kiryu is one of my favorite characters ever, just a joy to play. And the combat and running around is all so well done, fun side quests too, overall just a tad better than Yakuza 6 on the same engine. 4. Yakuza 6 But I did love Yakuza 6, really great game. I did play about a third of the other notable dad game released around then (will get back to that, good stuff), this one kept me glued to it a bit more however. Because it's freakin' Kiryu, and he's back at it, compelling story, fun, clever writing, smooth combat. And even more than previous Yakuza games, this one is a gourmet eating simulator. Since that helps with leveling up too, so just running around beating up fools, getting good grub, helping people, what more do you need. 5. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Now this would be game of the year 2017 for me, but I did beat it and play more than half of it around February this year. My goal was to beat the game by the day it came out a year later, March 3rd, and I did beat it right on that day. Not that I rushed it or anything, it took me well over 200 hours. A lot of fun, not many games can make just traveling around and exploring fun for that long, but this game kept my interest, captivating stuff. Really well done example of the open world genre. That said, I wouldn't mind if the next one was a tad smaller, with quicker travel, but for this one I did not mind taking such a long time. Longest game I've ever played (on the Wii-U clock it was well over 250 hours), and also one of the best. 6. Yakuza 0 Much like BOTW, this is one I started in early 2017, loved, played nonstop for a few weeks, but then put it on the backlog for about a year before jumping back in. Another one of the longest games, over 140 hours for me, and I didn't even quite complete the Cabaret and Billionaire side bosses. But a pleasure to play this for so long, one of the best games ever. Introduced me to the series, and to Kiryu especially who is such a terrific character, props to Majima as well, Kiryu is just the man in my book. A great mix of action RPG, open city exploring, side quests, crime story fun, anime/manga and John Woo style honor, Kenshiro style burning manliness (gotta play FoTNS), manly tears, and stoic epicness. Also the combat rules, and the humor is top notch. Masterpiece right there. 7. Yakuza Kiwami A fourth Yakuza write up, you drat right. Played an endless amount of Yakuza this year, also played Kiryu's opening chapter of Yakuza 5 (about 20 hours), and this game too is fairly long. But that it kept me coming back goes to show the series is terrific and addictive. Was very cool to see what happened next with Kiryu, and also where the series began, and more excellent combat, though a bit grindy at times. Felt a bit more gritty and oldschool, like you could feel the PS2 roots of it, I can see why it wasn't quite as popular as 0, but for me it's right up there, really really cool game. Well worthwhile to anybody interested in kicking rear end and honorable excellence on the streets. 8. Dragon Quest XI Great game, love the series and had been hoping for something like this since DQ 8 back in 2005. I'm only about halfway through it, maybe forty hours in, it's currently in that backlog spot I seem to put these really long games I love in of late. But I'll get back to it soon. Even what I've played is one of the more fun and well done RPGs I've played in years. Likable cast, fun world, fun turn based combat, lot of nice little touches, very cool. 9. Mega Man 11 Mega Man is back! It's fun, it's forgiving with lots of things to mess with, can buy Beat uses to pull you out of pits, but it's still classic NES inspired platformer action with all the madness you'd expect. Well done, smooth feel, and hits that classic nostalgia buzz real well. 10. Ion Maiden Really well done retro shooter, some of my favorite style of game. It only has a preview campaign so far, which is about an hour, but that's the equivalent of maybe four oldschool shooter levels combined, enough to know it rules. On an updated version of the Duke Nukem 3D engine (build/eduke32), I love that style of map design where you have a few areas and directions to explore for keys and objectives, but it's still relatively tight and focused. And the combat is great. Lot of potential for the full release.
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Dec 3, 2018 23:52
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| # ¿ May 18, 2024 06:56 |
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Jerusalem posted:
I love Hitman Absolution, it's one of those four of five games I'll always be chiming in to defend a bit I guess. As a big stealth fan, and I do dig the series, to me it was a masterpiece. Like a mix of MGS4 and Hitman, and fun to see Hitman taken out of the formula a bit, while still having some sections that did adhere to the classic formula along the way. And the narrative was pretty cool and fun, call me crazy. I don't see how it's the Nadir of the series, it's way better than the first Hitman by most standards, and I think Contracts as well. Gets a lot of flack for trying something different. Agreed on the RDR2 love though, and not to say I disagree on new Hitman love either. And Yakuza 0 rules. Though it does also make the bit about calling Hitman Absolution trashy seem a bit odd. Trashy is good.
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Dec 31, 2018 14:28
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Surely if Kiryu fought nuns with guns we'd forgive him.
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Dec 31, 2018 15:20
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BeanpolePeckerwood posted:This and the Dead Island(2) promotionals are probably the most revoltingly misogynistic pieces of videogame marketing in history, which is saying something because the industry has been loving rife with the stuff for decades. Or it's a nonsensical mish-mash of John Woo and Dario Argento, and isn't hateful in any way. The Hitman one. It's a bit baffling, but anyways, the game doesn't focus on these characters much, and if fighting fetishized characters is hateful, that puts a lot of good games in the crosshairs here. John Wick kills both male and female goons, I think that's a positive. On the weird mish-mash of violence and sexualized women, that's where I give Dario a nod, also John Wick 2 but again, these are both stylized assassin stories with some black comedy etc. They could've just had him fighting some merc goons (which he does in other parts of the game), it's just a weird stylistic idea. I have no reason to think IO is being hateful here, and I think as a bit baffling as their stylistic choice is here, with all the weird stuff you like and post (me too), to me this seems like a pretty benign thing to be revolted by. And in general, to me it's a delightful game, also the only Hitman game that has moved me with the story, the Diane bit was cool and well done I thought, there's a cool woman in the game there.
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Jan 1, 2019 01:05
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Fair enough, I was buggin' a bit there. I should add Smash to my list by the way, I'll replace my #9 with that if that's cool
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Jan 1, 2019 04:10
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BeanpolePeckerwood posted:Hey, it's the New Year, we all need to purge a bit I don't know what to make of this post.
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Jan 1, 2019 11:18
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The higher SoulCalibur VI is, the better luck we have this year. It's kinda like Groundhog Day.
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Jan 1, 2019 22:37
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| # ¿ May 18, 2024 06:56 |
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Excellent countdown, well done Rarity! Nice to see SoulCalibur VI so relatively high, our crew here's soul burns more than other lists I've seen around. EuroGamer's readers for example didn't have it on the top 50, we've got it at 15, I like it. And of course we've got a lot of Yakuza fans over here which is great, that got underrepresented in various places. Great to see 0 get so much love here for 2018. I started 0 when it hit in 2017, and finished it in March 2018, so that's a top tier game across the years there. And nice to see Kiwami 2 so high as well. And a lot of other cool games, glorious stuff folks.
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Jan 3, 2019 00:11
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