Best of 2020: Josh's Picks
Christmas time is here, which means three things: Christmas music, drinking eggnog until you get sick (eggnog is the best, come at me), and top-ten lists reflecting on the video games / music / media of the past year. Instead of doing a ranked list, I'm picking my ten favorite games from this year and focusing on what really made them shine. As with last year, these aren't necessarily games that were released in 2020 but rather games that I played for the first time in 2020. Outside of the first three being my top-three, these games are in no particular order.
Most Hilarious / Best Story: Disco Elysium
This tour-de-force of a game is a callback to the CRPGs of old. The basic story is a police procedural that has you roaming around a derelict city searching for clues. The deeper story is about an urban castaway who loses himself in an ocean of drugs, alcohol, and disco. The writing is fantastic and its jokes are laugh-out-loud funny. Within the first ten minutes of playing the game, my extremely-hungover detective was licking spilled rum off of a cafe counter and starting a quest line to convince the cafe manager to turn on the karaoke machine. The masterstroke of the game was turning the typical CRPG stats (strength, intelligence, etc.) into NPCs. These voices in you head would guide you through crime scenes and situations, sometimes forcing you into hilariously bad decisions.
Most Interesting Deaths: Noita
A "cave flyer" platformer mashed up with a falling sandbox simulator with a heavy chaser of roguelike goodness, Noita hit all the right buttons for me. The game's tagline of "every pixel is simulated" undersells the fun of setting fire to a oil pond full of enemies, or fracturing giant ice stalagmites and dropping them on unsuspecting foes. I can't forget to mention the wonderful customizable wand system, which straddles the line between deck-building and programming. The game is gorgeous, imminently replayable, and even a year after I first started I still find myself starting a fresh run into the depths.
Most Chill: A Short Hike
A Short Hike stands as proof that you don't need combat or complicated systems to make a great game. This game follows Claire, a teenage bird-person, as she makes her way to the top of Hawk Peak Trail in search of... better cell phone service. Man, kids these days, I tell you. Really, though, the entire game (including the story) is heartwarming, and flying mechanic is both simple and incredibly effective. This game is distilled joy and easily one of the most memorable games of the year.
Best Combat / Best Twist on the Roguelike Genre: Hades
Supergiant's latest offering follows Zagreus, son of Hades, as he tries escaping from dad's underworld realm and dies repeatedly doing so. The combat is extremely tight and has a great variety due to the different weapons and the different special abilities you receive from random relatives on Olympus. One of the more interesting things about the game is that it weaves a coherent narratives through the many deaths of Zagreus. Each time you fail to escape, you end up back in the Halls of the Dead and you get more of the backstory. Each time you escape successfully, you advance the plot. I love roguelikes, but I never thought I'd see a true narrative experience emerge from anything in that genre.
Best Genremaker: Slay the Spire
Every so often, a game comes along that's influential enough to create its own genre. After Doom, first-person shooters were called "Doom clones" for years until people just started calling them FPSs. While Slay the Spire isn't the first game to combine the elements of deckbuilders and roguelikes, it's by far the most successful and well-known game in the nascent genre. So, by my logic, that makes it the genremaker. Slay the Spire has a lot going for it, with engaging card selection strategies and a heapin' helpin' of the work-with-what-the-RNG-gives-you from its roguelike forebearers. Two big thumbs up on this one, and I'll see if I can get the portmanteau "deck-like" to stick.
Best Art Direction / Least Linear Story: Return of the Obra Dinn
Being an insurance investigator has never been so exciting. You work for a generic London insurance firm, trying to discover why the ship Obra Dinn has returned to port with exactly zero people left alive. To help you with this task, you have a magic compass that lets you see a corpse’s moment of death. The game is done in a fantastic 1-bit style (all pixels are either black or white), and the freeze-frame moment you explore has you piecing together the whos, whats, and whys of each of the entire crew member’s untimely demise. The non-linearaity makes for some interesting storytelling, and the near-complete lack of animation in the game allows each freeze-frame to be incredibly dynamic and action-packed. After playing this game, you’ll really notice how NPCs in other games just stand around like statues.
Most Contemplative: Spiritfarer
In video games, death is typically a penalty. An obstacle to be overcome. This attitude leads players to avoid it at all costs, much as many people try to avoid the topic of death in real life. Of course, death and taxes are the only things guaranteed to us, and sooner or later we all must face the moment the music stops. Spiritfarer takes a look at Stella as she shepherds souls across the Ocean Styx until they reach their final destination. It takes a look at the variety of ways in which people die and how they choose to face their final moments.
Best Retro Experience / Best Soundtrack: Ikenfall
A charming indie title by Chevy Ray, Ikenfall is a tactical RPG that takes place in a Hogwarts-like school of magic. The pixel art is on point, as is the soundtrack that takes you back to the glory days of the SNES. The game's battles all take place along a narrow 12x3 grid, which gives the game an interesting dimensionality when compared to its more two-dimensional tactical brethren. The game's setting has a great sense of adventure, and properly it captures the feeling of wonder you'd expect from a school of magic.
Most Ambitious: Journey
Released nearly a decade ago, Journey follows a nameless (and armless) cloaked figure as they wind their way through a vast and hostile desert. The game tried to explore parts of the emotional spectrum not typically associated with video games, and it was famous for its silent cooperative multiplayer. Although video games have come a long way in the last decade, it's not hard to appreciate the ground that Journey broke as you quietly helped your scarf-friend through the uncaring world.
Best Diablo 2: The Last Epoch
The first time I played Diablo 2, it was magical. I've been chasing that high ever since, but I bounce off of ARPG after ARPG. Its direct sequel, Diablo 3, was enjoyable, but it didn't sink its teeth into me the same way that Diablo 2 did. The Last Epoch is the spiritual successor that I've been waiting for. My biggest complaint about Diablo 2 is that after you hit level 30 and unlock the last skills, you don't get the excitement of learning a new skill. The Last Epoch solves this problem neatly by making each of your skills have its own skill tree. Finding comboes and synergies between these different skills and variants is a game in and of itself. Also, their necromancer class doesn’t start eating dirt at high levels. I rate it 10 out of 10 minions, would play again.