Argyle's GOTY 2023 Thread!

[argyle]

Edit: It won't let me quote your full post because it says I can't use "media" board codes. Maybe something with the recent changes?

I let DG know, he said he'd get it fixed.

[isthatallyougot]

I let DG know, he said he'd get it fixed.

Cool beans.

I agree with you about SOTN being in a league of its own in the Castlevania series. The soundtrack alone elevates it to great heights for me, but overall, it's simply hard to beat in the genre - from what I've played anyway.

Souldiers sounds really fun to me. I got it in some bundle recently and, being on PC, I guess I'll have the best experience. Neck beards keep winning.





And I ****LOVE**** what I've seen from Evil West. From the tone to the gameplay - it looks like my kind of jam. But I'm too cheap to pick it up now.

[canedaddy]

14. Starfield

Oh man…I have kinda dreaded talking about this one. Where to start? Starfield is…a Bethesda RPG. That tells you most of what you need to know. Talk to NPCs to gather a large list of quests, discover “faction” quests that are often better than the main story, pick up everything that isn’t nailed down, and sidestep the expected Bethesda jank. This is a good game, it really is, but it isn’t a GREAT game. I enjoyed my time with it - I didn’t finish the main storyline (I may go back to it at some point) but I did play through 2 or 3 of the long faction questlines along with quite a few other side quests. I put a lot of time in it. There are high points - the ship construction is neat, some of the storylines (especially the space pirate questline) are really good, and the gunplay is fun if not the best FPS ever.

That's about what I would expect. How does it compare to The Outer Worlds, if you played it? I'm sure the scale is much bigger, but otherwise?

The main issue is, well, space. In something like Fallout or Elder Scrolls, on your way to your current quest goal you’re likely to be sidetracked by a dozen different things, and at the end of the day those “distractions” are what make those games great. You feel like you’re just wandering the countryside & falling into adventures. But since everything is so spread out in Starfield, and traveling from planet to planet (or system to system) is all menu driven, there is very little of that spontaneous discovery.

That is a great insight. Some people seem to love the idea of exploring a vast universe, but I'd rather keep my feet on the ground for this kind of game.

13. Two Point Campus

Back in the early 90s I was primarily a PC game. In those days, my absolute favorite developer was Bullfrog. In my eyes, they could do no wrong. I would go so far as to blind buy one of their games I had never heard of before (Remember pre-internet gaming? Back when you didn’t know months or years in advance that a new game was coming?) and still loved it. One of their last games before their unfortunate demise was Theme Hospital. It was a hospital simulator with a very healthy sense of humor and a very high level of polish. All of the controls, menus, systems, etc. just felt right and were very easy to understand while still having a ton of depth. It was one of those games that you could play for hours and not even realize it. And I assumed it died with them.

Then an indie dev by the name of Two Point Studios came along and made Two Point Hospital, and if you had told me it was Bullfrog that made it I would have believed you. It was the sequel to Theme Hospital we never got, and it was perfect. So how did they follow it up? By taking the same concepts and applying them to running a college - Two Point Campus. It takes everything great about TPH and improves on it while perfectly capturing the humor of college life. I lost hours to this one as well, and will most likely lose a lot more - it’s one of those games that’s evergreen, you can just keep coming back to it. Highly recommended to anyone who likes a good sim.

You are given goals to reach - tuition earned, number of students enrolled, etc. You have to balance everything from providing the classes requested and enough dorms to entertainment for the students and break areas (and time!) for the staff. But the way things are layered on, you never really feel overwhelmed. And when you start getting too comfortable with one campus, a new scenario is opened with a new theme and new challenges. Addictive doesn’t do it justice.

Highly recommended to anyone who enjoys a good sim.

I'm going to check it out. Your tastes are pretty close to mine, but I'm not a sim guy (at least as far as I know!).

[crimson_tide]

Ys IX: Monstrum Nox
I have tried to get into this game twice now and bounced off of it both times - I’m not sure I have a third time in me. Nothing about this game really grabs me, and everything it tries to do I’ve seen done better elsewhere. I think I enjoyed the setup for VIII a lot more than IX as well - the building up your settlement on the deserted island angle, finding survivors and bringing them back, etc. combined with the flashback sequences that were really intriguing. By contrast the city in IX doesn’t do much for me, and neither do the characters I’ve been running into. With RPGs in particular, if they aren’t great then I feel like they aren’t worth my time because they are such a huge investment.

I played Monstrum Nox mostly as something to keep my hands occupied while playing a D&D campaign online with my friends very late at night and I needed SOMETHING to fill the time. The soundtrack was the highlight and did a great job keeping me awake . I also liked the dumb Avengers by way of Hot Topic aesthetic the game had going. I liked the silly horde battles. I liked the very basic, linear progression. I didn't really like anything else. I totally get why you stopped it. I would have probably too but my hands had to be occupied or I was dozing off (I'm in bed around 10 and these D&D sessions started at 9 and ended at like 2am).

Final Fantasy XVI
This is a great linear action game with RPG elements, and a really crappy Final Fantasy game. I got probably a third of the way into it and something else pulled me away - I’ll get back to this one eventually, but I’m not in a huge rush to do so. I mean, it’s a lot of fun. The combat is very well done, and switching between magic types (summons/whatever) is easy and adds some neat twists to combat. The story is even pretty interesting, even if it is set in a very brown/grey world that’s feels more Game of Thrones than Final Fantasy. But that’s the rub, nothing about this game feels like a Final Fantasy. Every once in a while there’s something like, “hey, a Chocobo!”, but you can’t just toss in a few traditional elements and call it a day. Heck, I even read somewhere that they weren’t going to put Chocobos in originally but changed their minds. They should have called this something else and started a new franchise. And they NEED to go back to basics with Final Fantasy. Give me a colorful fantasy world, tech hybrid or FF9 style I don’t care, and bring back the ATB battle system.

One day, Sony will finally convince me that I NEED a PS5 (though Spidey 2 not getting me to bite mean I might not ever and just wait for a Pro or PS6). On that day, I will buy FF16 with it primarily because people say **** like 'it's not an FF, it's more like Asura's Wrath'. I see no problem with that at all. I am not super nostalgic for FF and I like wjen they get weird with it, so I'm looking forward to it. Someday. Not enough to buy a PS5 yet...

Street Fighter VI
I really enjoyed what I played of this one. I made a custom character and was really digging the unique single-player story/adventure mode. I think it just fell victim to PS5 syndrome for me. Have I mentioned that I *hate* the PS5 controller? I do! It’s physically painful to use thanks to the sharp edges they replaced the previous curvy handles with. Why did they do that? I DON’T KNOW! I got SF5 on the PS5 because I think I had some psn store credit at the time, but I wish I had grabbed it for the Xbox instead. I also wish Sony would let me use PS4 controllers for PS5 games - turn off the haptic crap, I hate that too - and just let me use a comfortable controller! *sigh* Yeah, I’ll definitely be playing more of this at some point. I’m going to have to either come to grips - pun fully intended - with the Dual Sense controller, or find a good third party alternative that’s comfortable to me.

I am STILL salty nobody in my household has bought this for me. I am going to wait for the Ultra Hyper EX+ Alpha edition at this point. I ask for it all the time but no one gets it, what the hell? Also, don't they sell fight pad controllers that might solve your PS5 controller issues? I could've sworn I saw them somewhere and they look more ike a DS4 than the PS5 controller. I will post it if I see it again

I'll start with the ranked games next.

Let me take a mintue to discuss genres. Crim has touched on this before - I know he *hates* the term "Metroidvania". I don't like it either. I'm also not a fan of "souls-like" or "rouge-like/lite" - but that's a discussion for later. Not only do I not like the term Metroidvania, but I also don't like how some people misuse it. A 3D third person game where you happen to find items to unlock areas is NOT a "Metroidvania". Neither is a 2D game that has linear progression with minimal or no exploration. IMO, the 2 main things that make a "Metroidvania" are 1) It has to be a 2D sidescroller and 2) It has to be non-linear with a heavy focus on exploration. To that end, I propose a new term that I will try to remember to use going forward: Sidesplorer.

Sidesplorer is a good one. I also like explore em up (because it's dumb) and search action (which I legit think just works, full stop)

12. Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Castlevania Advance Collection Review QOL.jpg

As much as I love the Castlevania franchise, the handheld entries went largely ignored by me when they released. The same goes for Zelda and Metroid, really any of my favorite series that had handheld entries. I’ve just never been much of a handheld guy. I did get into the DS retroactively a few years ago (before my close-up vision went to crap) and managed to play through most of those Castlevania entries, but I wasn’t able to give the GBA games a go. So thankfully Konami released a collection of the GBA games with a few bells & whistles for consoles.

I played Circle of the Moon in ‘22, and was underwhelmed. The map was confusing and the difficulty spiked pretty sharply at points. It didn’t “feel” like an “Iggavania” - and I later discovered that’s because it wasn’t. So Aria of Sorrow was a return to form. This one WAS directed by Igga, and it shows - the map flows in a way CotM’s couldn’t dream of and the difficulty was much smoother. I didn’t necessarily care for the card mechanic, since some of the drops were so rare - there was a LOT of grinding to get some of them, and I know that it wasn’t necessary but…I guess my completionist brain kicked it. I also seem to recall using some of the built-in cheats a couple of times to get past some of the bosses, just because I wanted to move along. So in the end it was a definite improvement over CotM but still not quite up to some of the better DS entries like Portrait of Ruin, and of course nowhere near Symphony - but then again, that’s one of my all-time favorite games so nothing will likely touch that one for me.

Had the same experience with Circle not clicking but having a legit blast with Aria!

11. Souldiers
souldiers-0721-01.jpg

At one point while playing this game I would have told you that it was a lock for my top 10, probably even top 5. And I’m still very conflicted on it. But in the end, I couldn’t justify it. Let me start with the good - firstly, the game is absolutely gorgeous. It has some of the best pixel art I’ve seen, and I was constantly impressed. Absolutely loved the aesthetic. Gameplay is a mix of a sidesplorer and an action RPG. I know, I know - many sidesplorers have RPG elements, but they are VERY prominent in this one. For one, you actually choose a class between Scout, Archer, and Caster at the start and each one plays very differently. I went with the Archer and really enjoyed the ranged attacks and other abilities that class offered. I would say I’d love to replay to try out the other classes, but…well, I’m getting ahead of myself. There’s not only xp & leveling involved in the game, but also skill trees and equipment. So yes, very much an RPG. And all of that stuff is great - the abilities you gain, for the most part, are substantial and feel like you’ve earned something. The skill tree doesn’t fair quite as well - some of the unlocks on it I found to be great helps, while others weren’t even really noticeable.

The game is basically divided into “overworld” traversal and city exploration, where you mainly are either picking up quests, and dungeons. The dungeons are massive and are made up of mazes of rooms and puzzles. Some might say TOO big. Me. I’d say they’re too big. They’re impressive, but they tend to wear on you before you finish them. And often it’s very confusing to figure out where they want you to go next inside of them, let alone how to get there. It’s not a dealbreaker, but it feels like a good movie that could have been great with a little prudent editing.

The difficulty became too much for me around the middle of the second dungeon, but turning it down to “easy” alleviated that issue. Make no mistake, easy isn’t “easy”, I’d say it’s what the standard difficulty should have been and highly recommend that anyone who plays it should just go ahead & start at that setting. Some of the platforming late game gets pretty hard, and there’s no setting that will help that. One timed section in particular in the penultimate dungeon had me pulling my hair out. I actually put the game down at that point for a couple of months before coming back and finally pushing through. Doing so searching online for tips I quickly discovered that EVERYONE hates this section of the game and found it just as frustrating as I did, so I felt better knowing I wasn’t alone.

The game is very long overall - my save says 40 hours. This is one of the issues with wanting to replay it with the other classes, it’s just a very big ask for me.

None of these issues are why the game didn’t make my top 10.

This game was very poorly, sloppily ported and no effort was made after release to fix any of the issues. I first noticed very bad “stuttering” - pausing would be more accurate - when I was playing the Switch version. Just after the first dungeon it became unbearable. The game would freeze for a split second in the middle of the action or while I was trying to make a jump, and it was just enough to mess me up. So I figured, “OK, this is just a bad Switch port” - that happens, tho not usually with 2D games. I sold my Switch copy on eBay & grabbed a PS4 copy from there. And it was BETTER, but it still wasn’t good. The game would still freeze for a split second - not as often, but enough, and it only got worse the further in I played. Also, the game would hard crash WHILE I WAS SAVING. It did this probably 4-5 times throughout the game - hard crash to the dashboard, always while I was saving. The first time it happened, it corrupted the save. You know that little warning about not turning off your system while the game is saving? Yeah...someone should tell this game that. The only thing that saved me was I was able to very quickly download my last cloud save before the corrupted one was uploaded. I still lost a couple of hours of play, but that was better than the alternative (and honestly, I don’t know that I would have started the game over from the beginning for a third time).

I’ve talked a LOT about this game, and that’s because the highs of it are very, very high. I still recommend it if you have the patience for the minor design issues and more irritating technical issues - OR if you play it on PC, where I hear it runs fine. The design issues are blemishes on a fantastic game, annoying but able to be overlooked in light of everything the game does right. Probably the result of the game being mainly made by one guy. But the technical issues are unforgivable IMO, and those are what kept this out of my top 10.

I looked more into this one given your praise but in addition to having technical issues across platforms it seems like the levels are really long which turned me off. I might Steam Deck it for less than $10 or hopefully a good Humble Bundle some day

10. Evil West
Evil-West-Gameplay.jpg

Speaking of flawed games…man, Evil West is a real throwback to the glory days of the PS2. Crazy linear action/adventure games that are short on story and big on over-the-top action? Yes, that’s all here in spades. You are basically a cowboy vampire hunter in a third person shooter with tons of blood & explosions. The game is a blast, and early on it felt perfect - it was challenging but felt like it was giving me the tools I needed to succeed while teaching me to play better. I felt like I was getting better at using the different moves & abilities to combo enemies and come out on top. I was probably 2-3 hours in or so when I hit my first wall: the first real boss.

See, I had fought what I had *thought* at the time was a boss earlier and managed to succeed, so I was unprepared when I came to the first screen-filling boss and got my rear end handed to me. Several times. Finally, I begrudgingly turned the difficulty down & made it through. Gone were my thoughts of the game being “tough but fair” - but I was still having a blast, so no big deal.

As the game went on, it started becoming more of a slog. The game delights in throwing wave after wave of enemies at you in a war of attrition. Not only that, but it combines enemies in groups that are downright evil - no pun intended - their abilities playing off one another to make your life very difficult, and increasingly un-fun. This went on until I believe the next-to-last level where I gave up, finally broken - even the “Story” difficulty setting I was playing on being beyond my meager skills.

There is still a lot of fun here, and I still recommend it in spite of itself to anyone craving that early ‘00s style of gameplay. But I feel like some more playtesting would have probably resulted in a more balanced - and fun - difficulty. One that would have allowed me to actually finish the game.

I want this to be on PS+ or something, I really want to try it!

[argyle]

09. Spider-Man 2

I stalled in posting my list. That was partially because I haven’t felt well, but it was also partially because I don’t know how to approach this one. Spidy 2 is a good game. The combat’s fun, the traversal is fun, the story is serviceable. It being split between the 2 Spidy’s makes it a little disjointed at times, but it’s not too bad. It’s all fun, I had a good time playing it, and then I moved on & mostly forgot about it.

Did you like the first Insomniac Spidy game? Because the problem is, this is basically the same thing. Yeah, there are minor tweaks, and I’m sure if I put them side-by-side it would look better. But from my memory it’s pretty much the same. The city is the same (of course). It’s more of an expansion pack than a new game. Was it good enough to be in the top 10 then? Sure, I think so - but no higher than this.

08. Hogwarts Legacy

Speaking of open-world games that were good but could have done more… I’m not a HUGE Harry Potter fan, but I’ve seen the movies and they’re fun enough. So being able to explore around in that world is a prospect that I’m all for. Some of it works really well - there’s a ton to go around & see, flying around on brooms is fun, and they did a really good job with the magic combat. I think they can flesh out a bit more of it and make a really great sequel.

But it’s not perfect. The story was clearly made to support a morality system that was removed from the game at some point, leaving you with consequences for decisions you didn’t get to make. There’s absolutely no reason NOT to use the “dark arts” magic because nothing you do in the game affects the story one way or the other. There’s also too much backtracking in the missions - a common gripe for open-world games, I know - and the map for the castle is atrocious. It doesn’t help that the layout of the castle makes no logical sense, so it’s also hard to learn your way around it.

So there’s a lot of fun to be had, but also a lot of rough edges. It just barely edges out Spidy because at least it feels original.

07. Grindstone

Now things are starting to get REALLY good. Grindstone is a gem-matching puzzle game with a few interesting twists and a TON of polish and charm that is extremely addictive. You set a path through the baddies matching colors and chaining to different color baddies using special items on the field. Once you have your path set, you commit to it and your guy goes on a murderous rampage through the cute little creatures carving a path of destruction that is hilarious to watch. The longer the chain, the faster & more intense he gets. The game continuously throws new twists into the mix to keep you on your toes, and going for the bonus goals in levels adds a new level of challenge. The game looks amazing, with brightly colored animated graphics that remind me a lot of the show Adventure Time.

There are tons of unlockables, regular special events, daily challenges, and a lot more that I’m probably forgetting that made this a game I kept returning to last year, and will continue to do so this year as well. I played it on the Switch, but it’s out for pretty much everything (including mobile devices), so I very highly recommend this one to anyone who enjoys killing time with a good puzzle game. As someone who’s been a fan of the genre since Tetris, this is easily one of the best.

[isthatallyougot]

I really loved Insomniac's first Spidey, but yeah, I gather it's just 1.1 more or less. But I'm still going to play it sooner or later. When it sees a good steam discount, I'll pick it up. (Still need to pick up and play MM as well.)

As for Hogwarts, I've only seen one or two (I can't remember) of the movies, and only because my ex dragged me to see it. I don't have anything against it necessarily, but I've just never caught that HP fever. That said, I think the game looks amazing from what I've seen, and I'll probably play it one day.

Grindstone is one I've never heard of but it sounds fun. I put it on my steam wish list and if it gets a tempting drop, I'll be tempted.

[canedaddy]

Grindstone looks pretty cool.

Looking forward to the top 6.

[argyle]

06. River City Girls

There is a very, very short list of developers I still trust to give me a good time with a game, enough so that all I really need to know is that they were the ones making it to sell me on it. WayForward is on that list. So I went into River City Girls with high expectations, and I was not let down. I’d describe the game as a beat-em-up with some lite RPG elements. There are a few quests you take up, backtracking through past areas, etc. You level up, learn new moves - the usual. But it’s all done extremely well. The pixel art graphics really shine, as does the chiptunes soundtrack, and the whole package is just a lot of fun. The story is also pretty funny, with the girls rampaging across town to rescue their boyfriends (and a twist ending that I won’t spoil that really makes the whole thing that much better). Definitely recommended for fans of the genre, and I’m looking forward to tackling the sequel this year.

05. Vampire Survivors

When I first heard about this game & saw some screenshots, I scoffed. It looks, to put it kindly, like crap. To hear someone describe it, it sounds incredibly basic. But it was added to Gamepass, and people wouldn’t shut up about it, so what’s the harm in trying it out? That’s the thing about this game - moreso than almost any other game I’ve played, you cannot judge it without playing it for yourself. And don’t just play one short round & think you’ve got it, play a few until it clicks. When it does, odds are you’ll be hooked. I started playing it AGAIN this week, because I was thinking of what I was going to say about it. I was also questioning my position - 5th of the year? Was it really that good?

Yes.

The game is basic on a level that Tetris is basic, where the actual mechanics are simple but the execution adds tons of depth and an insane amount of replayability. There’s constantly more to unlock by completing specific tasks. There’s a crazy amount of strategy in what weapons and accessories you choose to pick up in a run. Much like Dynasty Warriors, killing individual enemies may be a trivial task, but the numbers add up and if you’re also trying to accomplish something while fighting them off, things can get tricky fast.

Once you get fully assimilated into the game you’ll come to realize the extremely basic graphics are part of the gag - the entire game has a very tongue-in-cheek attitude that pokes fun at classic games, especially Castlevania, and never takes itself seriously. Coincidentally, this week a vinyl release of the game’s soundtrack was announced and I realize that I had been playing with the music off. So I turned it back on, and wouldn’t you know it, the music is incredible too.

My advice is that everyone should give it a fair shake. It won’t be for everyone - what game is? - but you may very well end up with a new obsession.

04. F.I.S.T.: Forged In Shadow Torch

FIST is a sidesplorer made by a Chinese developer, and now that you know that you may be thinking it’s another very low budget looking indie game. You’d be wrong. A 2.5D game with an insane amount of polish both on the visual side and in the gameplay, FIST is simply an incredible example of a top-notch sidesplorer.

I don’t know that I have as much to say about this one as some others, but that’s not a reflection of its quality or how much I enjoyed it by any stretch. The fact is, unlike Vampire Survivors this one really does speak for itself - you see the screenshots, watch a trailer, and you’ll get it. All the typical tropes are here - explore, discover new abilities, and those will unlock new areas. Rinse & repeat. Add in a very well done combat system that utilizes different weapons that you can switch between on the fly, a very solid story to pull you along, and again those amazing visuals that keep you wanting to see what’s next.

This is one I’ll be adding to my replay rotation alongside the likes of Bloodstained and Symphony of the Night.

[isthatallyougot]

6, 5 & 4 are all in my backlog and games I'm really interested in. Glad to see they were so much fun!

[canedaddy]

All three of those are appealing.

I wish Vampire Survivors would come to dang PS4.