VideoGame_Discussion

I thought 2023 was a very strong year for gaming. A number of releases I haven't played yet, but at the moment my top 5 are

5. Coffee Golf - A mobile game that is a combination of Wordle and Golf, Coffee Golf gives you a quick 5 hole course to play every day. This is golf reduced to it's most simple form, but I find the game excellent and play every single day. They recently added online multiplayer as well. Hoping this game does well so that it gets more updates.

4. Tchia - For some reason I just loved this game. The movement was fun, possessing animals was satisfying, and the story and gameplay did a number of unexpected things that put a smile on my face. I walked away happy after every play session. Definitely had some weak points, but the vibes were immaculate.

3. Alan Wake 2 - Alan Wake 2 isn't a super great video game, but it is a super cool video game. It's tone and direction were interesting enough for me to push past the at times underwhelming gameplay. Dropping this down to easy made it much more fun.

2. Baldur's Gate 3 - Truly an unbelievable game. A great story, a memorable cast of characters, and engaging gameplay. Was a very close race between this and TOTK but ultimately all of the bugs I experienced put it right below the number 1 spot.

1. Tears of the Kingdom - This is my favorite switch game. The building mechanic totally changed the game for me and I loved exploring the new zones. The gripes I had with BOTW were addressed in TOTK and I was just generally in awe for most of my playtime.

1) Baldur's Gate 3- This year was one of my favorites in gaming, and a big part of that was that some of my favorite series came through with great new entries. Larian's Divinity Original Sin 2 was the first game that rivaled my nostalgic memories of Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 and the Icewind Dale games, etc. When I found out that they were developing BG3, I was really excited. I somehow managed to wait until it was fully released to play it even though the early access version tempted me, and I actually had access to it, as I pre-ordered this on PC as soon as I could. This game was everything I wanted it to be. The graphics are nice, the story is great, the voice acting is perfect, and the gameplay is fun and varied. There are so many possibilities. I remember going up to a squirrel with an animal talking skill and negotiating passage through its territory (which came out of nowhere). Moments like that tell you something about how detailed this game is. I don't see anything rivaling it for a long time. I even pre-ordered the physical European deluxe version on PS5 and look forward to playing this again there.

2) Marvel's Midnight Suns- This one caught me by surprise. When done well, I really enjoy superhero games, but many of them aren't great. This was unique in that it used a turn-based card battle system, and the gameplay is just a ton of fun. It's one of the few games I platinumed and didn't sell, because I'm taking my time with the DLC trophies. Some of them (because of glitches) will probably require me to start a new game, and I'm probably going to do it, because this game is so fun.

3) The Light Brigade- I love roguelikes, and this is a roguelike done right in VR with interesting upgrades and some great boss fights. It made me think. There's some jankiness, and it's not perfect, but it's really satisfying when you figure out how to get through. This was one of the toughest platinums I ever earned.

4) Marvel's Spider-Man 2- It takes all of the great parts from the previous Spider-Man games and improves on all of them. The story was really solid, and the gameplay was excellent. This was better than I expected it to be.

5) Diablo IV- I've always loved Diablo games. There's a lot of grind to this, and I'll be revisiting it next year to work on the platinum, because it was just too much for me last year with all the great games coming out, but I enjoyed my playthrough of this.

Honorable Mentions: Hogwarts Legacy, Horizon: Call of the Mountain, Final Fantasy XVI

As a fan of both coffee and golf, need to look into this Coffee Golf lol.

BloodPuppetX wrote:

You should! It's both great and free.

I still haven't played FF16, Tears of the Kingdom, Spider-Man 2, Alan Wake and a few other games so I really haven't played enough games to have a top 5, but here is my top 3 as things stand:

1. Baldur's Gate 3 - I've spent 400+ hours with this game. Got so obsessed with it that I've had to delete it from my PS5 so I don't just keep playing it over and over again. It's one of the best games I have ever played and the first 10/10 game for me in quite a while. It deserves all the love it is getting.

2. Octopath Traveler II - It's award season in the gaming industry and it's legitimately heartbreaking to see that this game hasn't received any nods. Not even for its OST which is truly special. This is one of the best JRPGs I have ever played. It's also one of the best sequels of all time because it takes everything established by the first game and pretty much perfects it. If you are a fan of the 16 bit era JRPGs this is a must play. It's that special.

3. Hogwarts Legacy - This game is a dream if you're a fan of the Harry Potter series. It's far from perfect because it suffers from some of the issues most open world games suffer from, but it captures the magic of that world so perfectly and I loved every second I spent with it. It's an example of how easy it is to print money with you take a beloved IP and build a great game around it. Hope we get a sequel soon.

@BloodPuppetX I love VNs so I'll have to look up Paranormasight. Never heard of it.

@bumsplikity Bought the physical copy of Tchia day 1, but it has just been sitting on my shelf for months. Need to get around to it because it looks awesome!

@Bleed_DukeBlue I think about Midnight Suns all the time. I wish it had more story content so I had an excuse to boot it up again, but I've beaten all the DLC already. What a game! I still haven't played a few of the heavy hitters from 2022 (God of War, Horizon. Elden Ring etc), but Midnight Suns was easily my favorite game of 2022. It was my obsession this time last year.

Trust me, Paranormasight is great! No physical though. Here's the Steam page:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2106840/PARANOR...

Reviewed well with critics as well.

Oh yeah Midnight Suns was/is excellent. It's a huge shame that it sold so poorly as it's extremely cool. I think the Marvel License actually did that game a disservice, as it probably turned off a lot of the deck-building game players while also disappointing the casual marvel fans.

Super Mario Wonder is my GOTY. I loved the world and gameplay but story not so much but it didn't need a complex one. There were plenty of remakes I enjoyed but everything else was either decent or okay. My most hated game I played has to be Gollum due to the terrible gameplay.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is my GotY, but I really haven't played enough of the 2023 releases I've bought. It's very likely RE4 Remake would've been my GotY, but I won't allow myself to play it until I get a PSVR2 in a few weeks. Of the 2023 releases I did play though, SMB Wonder has gotta be it. I was hooked for the short time it lasts.

From what I played this year, my favorites were probably RE4make and Sea of Stars.

My list:

#5 Duke Nukem 1 & 2 Remastered (Evercade)
Being smoothed out and wide-screen made this even better than the DOS original years ago.

#4 Kirby's Return to Dreamland Deluxe (Switch)
A great port of one of the Wii's best games. Loses a point because you need to play multiplayer to use mighty King Dedede

#3 Street Fighter 6 (PS5)
You know, the series really is still that good all these years later.

#2 A Pig's Quest (C64)
Great game made even more incredible by the fact that it runs on the Commodore 64.

#1 Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection (Switch)
10 of these games in one cart are you freaking kidding me? Heck yes!

Some honorable mentions:
Mario Wonder (it's great)
Fashion Dreamer (FASHION)
WRC23 (might have made the actual top 5 list if I got around to putting some real time into it)

5. Zelda TotK
4. Lords of the Fallen 2023
3. Spiderman 2
2. Armored Core VI
1. BG3

Honorable mention: Lies of P; Mario Wonder

Wow, looking back at my list, I only completed one game that even came out this year, so I guess it's my 2023 game of the year by default:

Final Fantasy XVI

I played a bunch of games that came out last year: Pokemon Scarlet, Callisto Protocol, Plague Tale Requiem, Goat Sim 3 (lol).
That's just the way of it for me anymore, most things just aren't day 1'ers for me. I'll wait for the price drops.
I have a feeling Baldur's Gate 3 would have been my GotY, but I've held off for the physical release.

I only played 2 new games this year:

1) The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom
2) Super Mario Wonder

I'm sure once I get to them, Hogwarts Legacy and Spider-Man 2 would be up there, and Resident Evil 4 remake.

While BG3 is truly something special, I haven’t finished it yet.

Tears of the Kingdom will forever be a special game for me. It was such a great game and I had an amazing time playing and getting into it with my son :)

So for me ToTK is my GOTY with BG3 being a very close second and might even overtake it once I finish it

Honorable mentions definitely go to Octopath 2 and Mario Wonder

This has been such a great year for games. Here are a handful of universally praised games that I haven't tried yet:

Baldur's Gate 3 - I don't know if this is my type of game. I refuse to pay $60-$70 for a digital game if I don't know for certain that I'm going to like it.
Alan Wake 2 - Same as BG3.
Diablo IV
Fire Emblem Engage
Hogwart's Legacy - This is one of my next games. My son got it for Christmas, so once he's done I'll get started.
Street Fighter 6 - I really want to play this game.


My top 5:

#5 Super Mario Bros Wonder
Ultimately, it fell a bit flat for me. I didn't love this as much as everyone else seemed to. I think it had to do with the lack of difficulty. I still love me some Mario, but I think Mario Maker might have ruined me for mainstream 2D Mario games. I need some more of a challenge. The other issue was that the levels were made with the wonder seed in mind, so if you didn't activate it, they were seriously boring and easy.

#4 Metroid Prime Remastered
Metroid Prime is one of my favorite games of all time, and this was a perfect remake/remaster. It's amazing how great this game looks considering it's age.The only thing keeping it off #1 on my list was that it is a 20+ year old game.

#3 Spiderman 2
I'm currently playing through this, but boy do I love this game. I loved the first one and MM. So far, this surpasses those in every way.

#2 Pikmin 4
I started out pretty skeptical, but by the end, I was so hooked. I played to nearly 100% (I think I didn't get the top score on 1 or 2 of the trials). I can't wait to replay this one eventually.

#1 Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom
It's hard to overstate how much I loved this game. I put in over 200 hours and loved every second of it. This improved on Breath of the Wild in every way. The puzzles were so much fun with the new mechanics. Everything about this game was awesome.

Honorable Mentions
Advance Wars 1 & 2 - I love Advance Wars but was a little idisappointed with the remakes

Sea of Stars - Fun, retro style RPG that I spent a good deal of time with, but ultimately got bored and stopped playing towards the end. Maybe I'll finish it one day.

Dead Space Remake - I loved this game. I almost put it on my list over Mario

Inscription - I know it's not a 2023 game, but I never heard of it and knew nothing about it before starting it only last week. If you have never played, give it a try (it's on sale for $10 or free on Game Pass or PS+ right now). Act 1 was amazing. Acts 2 and 3 were definitely not at the same level.

My GOTY is probably Pikmin 4. They really made a triumphant comeback with the series, without losing much of what made the first three games distinct.

I love Kirby’s Return to Dream Land, so I have mixed feelings on Deluxe. I felt the Wii version nailed everything it tried to do and provided the proper amount of content for a playthrough. Deluxe adds significantly more to the pot, to the point of being daunting to complete. It’s a super high-res glow-up (even if I liked the old art style fine) with plenty of smart QoL changes, so it’s still awesome. But there are just as many changes that I feel were a step backwards, like using the weird KatFL Dedede design or making a certain twist super obvious when it previously wasn’t. I definitely recommend it for being an excellent way to play KRtDL, but I hesitate to call it GOTY.

Super Mario RPG was fantastic as well. I trust the developers to handle any RPG remake at this point. Seriously, give them EarthBound or Golden Sun.

Those are the games I immediately think of when discussing the notable releases I played this year. There might be something else as well… hmm…

SupremeSarna wrote:

RIGHT? DEDEDE IS NOT A WEIRD NECKLESS BLUE BLOB


If you have played pretty much any other kirby games it was pretty obvious though. It stops being a plot twist after the 2nd or 3rd time.

benstylus wrote:

Kirby’s villains are typically cut and dry, being revealed early on and then being an essential foe in the endgame (occasionally being supplanted by a bigger threat). There have only been two main “traitor” villains in the series to date. The previous one, Marx, was a conspicuous guy who appears for like ten seconds before sending you on your rigged journey and subsequently revealing his villainy. KRtDL’s traitor, on the other hand, is consistently a polite and helpful friend to Kirby’s group—he even gives you prizes for playing his sub-games. He subtly moves his scheme along without breaking character until the opportune moment.

The Wii version held to this personality flawlessly while Deluxe changed one of his lines to make him extremely suspicious. I wish they hadn’t; the new line does a disservice to his cunning character.

Heavyd814life wrote:

It's a great game but in general I just don't expect jrpgs to win awards.

The optional super boss is one of SE's best yet. That was a very fun puzzle to solve.

So much I still need to play from this year as well. Mario Wonder is one I will love, but I'm cheap and that Nintendo tax is keeping me away for now.

I didn't play any of the biggest hitters yet but for this year's releases that I did play here's my top games

5 - Space for the Unbound - great little indie game with a cool story

4 - Dredge - it's the other fishing game this year with horror elements

3 - FFXVI - crazy boss battles the game

2 - Octopath Traveler II - gorgeous game with so much cool content

1 - Sea of Stars - Kickstarted this and didn't even care that it came out free on PS+. Great Crono Trigger throwback.

Honorable mentions: Hogwarts Legacy, Diablo 4, Tchia, Jedi, and everything on Switch: I know you are awesome just don't have one.


Apparently I like RPGs heh. Just got Armor Core 6, Cocoon, Venba, Jusant for Christmas so I'll be a bit behind on those. Still need to get Baldur's Gate, Talos Principle 2, Lies of P and finally start the Allan Wake series. Yay games!

It's a port of an older game, but my favorite game of the year is definitely:

Arcade Archives: Mystic Warriors

Sunset Riders is one of my favorite games, and to finally get a console port of the spiritual successor to it is amazing.

incubus421 wrote:

Turns out I beat the Dead Space remake before the new year, so it now takes its place as my GotY over FFXVI. Even if I had played more games that came out this year, I'm certain Dead Space would be near the top.