The Best Games Of 2017

henke on 14/12/2017 at 18:28

It's the most magical time of the year! That's right, it's time to make LISTS OF THE BEST GAMES! :D

[CENTER][video=youtube;xcyWoleEbVY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcyWoleEbVY[/video][/CENTER]

My Top 15 of 2017

15. Little Nightmares, by Tarsier Studios

A physics platformer with good puzzles and nicely done horror tropes that was well worth playing through. It’s like an off-brand Inside.

14. Robo Recall, by Epic Games

Epic’s shoot em up was a nice introduction to touch-controlled VR gaming. Packs a lot of complexity, cool ideas, and room for experimentation into it’s gunfights.

13. Strafe, by Pixel Titans

Turned out to be more of a first-person Teleglitch than old-school Quake, which upset a lot of people. Me, I had a lot of fun with it.

12. Conductor, by Overflow

An overlooked little VR gem, in which you ride a locomotive through a dark forrest and occasionally stop to do physics-puzzle and clear the path ahead. An atmospheric and fun little game.

11. Road Redemption, by Pixel Dash Studios/EQ Games

An action packed arcade racer with a lot of nifty ideas and a permadeath campaign-structure that’ll have you coming back until you’ve beaten it.

10. Freeways, by Justin Smith

Takes one aspect of city-builder games, namely transportation, and hyper-focuses on it, resulting in some very fun and addictive gameplay.

9. Night In The Woods, by Infinite Fall

An adventure game that’s light on the puzzling and heavy on the sass. Effortlessly charming, cool, and heartwarming. This is a game you play not for a challenge, but rather just to hang out with the characters in it.

8. Hollow Knight, by Team Cherry

A wonderful metroidvania that’ll pull you deep into it’s world.

7. Ultrawings, by Bit Planet Games

A VR flying game that’s just the right mix of arcade and simulation. The touch-based input is a novel idea that works beautifully, and each of the airplanes is unique and fun in it’s own way.

6. Rain World, by Videocult

Is a strong contender to Zelda and Prey for most real-feeling and complex gameworld of the year. The inhabitants of this world are the main feature here. Their unpredictable AI and procedural animation grants them a wildness not seen in many videogame characters. The harsh conditions and un-explained systems of it’s gameworld also grants it a realness that more accommodating and handholdey gameworlds lack. Rain World feels like a real place, and it is terrifying.

5. Super Mario Odyssey, by Nintendo

A game that's been designed to be a pure joy and make you smile from ear to ear. This game right here, is a good time.

4. Lone Echo, by Ready At Dawn

I like games where you’re basically just a working joe, and this is very much that. The combination of a great narrative, immersive gameplay and an innovative new locomotion-system makes this a game that really shows the full potential of VR.

3. Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun, by Mimimi Productions
(Technically a super-late 2016 release, but c’mon.)

Fantastic stealth-tactics game with great characters and story. Thoroughly engrossed me for the couple of weeks I played through it.

2. Zelda: Breath of the Wild, by Nintendo

A great open-world adventure that does "the hero's journey" very well. You constantly feel like you're improving, preparing for a great showdown. It manages to feel dangerous, while somehow never being too difficult, and it's systems allow for out-of-the-box thinking.

1. Prey, by Arkane

I played Zelda quite shortly after Prey, and it’s surprising how much my top 2 games of this year feel similar, gameplay-wise, while being completely different in their story and gameworlds. They both allow for lots of experimentation and novel approaches to problem-solving. But whereas Zelda's narrative is a rather simplistic thing, Prey offers complex characters, tough choices, and a narrative that pulled me in and kept me hooked until the end. It's the best immerisive sim since Deus Ex.

Honorable mentions
Star Trek: Bridge Crew
Horizon Zero Dawn
Snake Pass
Gravity Rush 2
Spintires: Mudrunner
Kôna

I played a bunch of games this year. Perhaps even more than usual since I picked up a couple new gaming systems in the form of Oculus Rift and Nintendo Switch. I just did the math and apparently I finished 28 games this year. I would've finished more if I had but the time!

Still to play
Mario+Rabbids, Golf Story, Heat Signature, Darkwood, Assassin’s Creed: Origins, Nioh, Rime, Hellblade, What Remains Of Edith Finch, Nier Automata, Persona 5, Yakuza 0

Our previous Best Games Of The Year lists
(http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=147367) 2016 | (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=146083) 2015 | (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=144820) 2014 | (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=142865) 2013 | (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=140656) 2012 | (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=137856) 2011 | (http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=134184) 2010

Now then, what were your favourite games of the year?

WingedKagouti on 14/12/2017 at 18:41

Not entirely sure about several of the games I've played this year whether they came out this year. But of the ones I'm sure of, the following 5 definitely belong in my Top 10:

Dead Cells
Shantae: Half-Genie Hero
Tekken 7
BlazBlue Centralfiction
Sonic Forces

There are games on my radar that came out this year, that I haven't played yet but want to such as NieR:Automata, SteamWorld Dig 2, Hand of Fate 2, Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice and Pyre.

Renault on 14/12/2017 at 19:48

Nice vid, henke. Is that actually you in action, or stock footage?

Jason Moyer on 14/12/2017 at 20:09

Prey
Death Of The Outsider
Tacoma
Rez Infinite
Cuphead

I think that's all I've played that came out this year and they were all great.

zajazd on 14/12/2017 at 20:31

Quote Posted by henke

List of 15 games

Who are those games?
ok ok, I know the last two..

Renault on 14/12/2017 at 20:58

How about #5? I know it's an obscure title by an up and coming developer by the name of NINTENDO.

Jason Moyer on 14/12/2017 at 21:18

You've been zajazd'd.

Aja on 14/12/2017 at 23:20

I think Mario and Zelda are the only two 2017 games I played in 2017, and they are both excellent. Good list, though, henke. I'll try to check out some of your recommendations.

henke on 15/12/2017 at 04:26

Oh yeah, Aja, you should at least give Prey a go. Like I said, it actually feels very similar to Zelda, in how it gives you a lot of freedom to tackle problems at your own pace, and in your own way.

Quote Posted by Brethren

Nice vid, henke. Is that actually you in action, or stock footage?

Thanks!

I've been using progressively less and less of my own footage for these videos over the years. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WWqUy8NiqY) 2015 it was all my own footage, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzbAk2ES0YI) 2016 it was a somewhat even mix of my footage and trailers, and this year only Night in the Woods and Freeways was my footage, the rest is from trailers. I don't care about showing off my gamerskillz or anything, the main thing I love about making these is trying to match my favourite videogame music of the year to different games and seeing what fits, or at least clashes in an interesting way.

icemann on 15/12/2017 at 08:10

I've not played many of 2017's releases. But of what I've played:

1. Zelda BOTW - I absolutely loved this. I don't know if I'd ever play it again due to the MASSIVE time investment required, but it was an absolute blast. Best Zelda since A Link to the Past, and then some. Best Zelda game of all time easily.

2. Prey - This game somehow captures that feeling you get when playing System Shock 2, and it does it WAY BETTER than Bioshock ever did. Ending is meh, rest is excellent. I'd have loved to have seen more games in this reboot of the franchise, but that definitely isn't happening.

3. Battle Chasers: Nightwar - Not a perfect game. You need to farm XP too much, and even then you get your ass handed to you A LOT around the middle section of the game. Then it all gets easy. I've yet to finish this game off (sitting on about 75% done, I think). Combat despite the difficult spikes and drops is still fun, developing up your characters via skill point spending is fun, story is half half, fishing is fun, music - half half. A good game if you love JRPGs (which I do).

4. Watch Dogs 2 DLCs - My list of 2017 release plays is quite small this year so this made it in there. Doesn't add a whole lot of new content as it's all over really quick (2 hours if that even), but it's ok.

I don't have a 5th spot so I'm going to add in an extra category:

Best Non 2017 game played this year:

Tex Murphy: Tesla Effect - Best FMV game EVER. This game is fantastic, has great acting, top notch graphics and excellent music. It's a trip into a parallel universe where FMV games never died, and I absolutely loved it. Really fun game.