Game of the Year 2017

So, 2017 was a pretty good year for games. I think a couple of other people might have figured that out as well. Nintendo had a bit of a renaissance (along with many other Japanese developers), many less anticipated titles turned out far better than expected and the tide of intriguing indie titles seemed endless.

The interesting thing about 2017 was that all of the games were flawed to some extent. You can pick plenty of holes in just about any hypothetical game of the year contender, especially given the relatively high quality of the ‘top shelf’ titles. This combined with a stacked list of options based on taste and genre preferences makes it a fun year to write a list, even if I’ve left it a little late. So here’s my list. I like writing lists. A couple of caveats first:

1. I don’t own a Switch and I haven’t played a single minute of Super Mario Odyssey. I haven’t played enough Zelda, Splatoon, Mario Kart and so on to include on here either. Consider this a Nintendo-less game of the year list.

2. This is all totally unscientific and based on gut feel. These things are more fun that way regardless (especially when you can look back in a couple of years and look down at yourself – I’m looking at you, 2015 self who contributed to Fallout 4 being named game of the year on a friend’s podcast).

Before we get into the meat of it, I’m doing the cowardly thing and stretching out my list. Here are a few games worth mentioning that I couldn’t quite squeeze into the top 5.

Honourable Mentions

Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus

The new Wolfenstein suffers from weirdly slippery controls, gunplay that lacks weight and a not particularly diverse set of weaponry. If you were being charitable you’d call the gunplay serviceable. But man, that story is bonkers, balancing the ridiculous and the serious far better than the original while ramping up the stakes. The characters are fantastic (how did they turn BJ Blazkowicz of all people into an interesting character?), the vision of Nazi-occupied America is an alternate history buff’s wet dream and the pacing is pitch perfect. The only downside is that it suffers from middle chapter syndrome a bit, but by the sounds of it the sales were good enough that we’re guaranteed a finale. Thinking of where they’ll take the story next is bloody enticing.

Gorogoa

Gorogoa was the most unique thing I played in 2017. It’s ostensibly a puzzle game but it doesn’t play like any puzzle game I’ve seen before. It’s a one-man labour of love and you can tell, with everything operating in perfect harmony to deliver a quirky, somewhat frustrating but ultimately satisfying experience. There’s some lovely imagery in here and solving the puzzles utilising the movement of picture frames and image manipulation (of a sort) gives the kind of “a-ha!” moments I play puzzle games for. It’s a little pricey for the length but recommended if it sounds like it’d be up your alley.

Life is Strange: Before the Storm

It could be very clunky at times, but to be honest that just meant that they’d really captured the spirit of Life is Strange. Before the Storm was far better than it had any right to be and probably ended up a more consistent product than the original series by the end of it. It worked well as a self-contained story as well as adding new weight and depth to the original game – you can’t ask a lot more from a prequel.

What Remains of Edith Finch

The super inconsistent, kind of a technical mess on the PS4 and awkwardly paced Edith Finch was also an undeniably touching, clever and original experience. It’s a two-hour game that says all it wants to in the allotted time and I have a lot of respect for that. The cannery sequence - with its fantastic twin control system and visual representation of a fraying mental state – led to it squeezing in here more than anything.

Uncharted: The Lost Legacy

Uncharted 4 was close to the perfect send-off for the series. While having some issues with length and pacing it wrapped up Nathan Drake’s story in a very satisfying way…so it’s understandable people weren’t super keen on the idea of a spin-off. The formula has worn a little thin over time, but The Lost Legacy is an admirable effort at refreshing the franchise. Chloe and Nadine are genuinely interesting characters, with outstanding voice acting and some great banter enhancing well-woven arcs and a buddy cop dynamic. The story is brisk, lighter on combat than many past games and tackles some new things for the franchise with the large open world segment. In many ways, it feels like a throwback to the first game with its slightly more contained story and shorter campaign. Unsurprisingly it looks ridiculously good too (India is a great setting).

The Top Five

There’s a sense that time helped some of these games more than others. Things that frustrated me at the time have often been brushed aside in favour of the good points, whereas other titles have lost a little of their magic for me. So while it might not match up with review scores or other past personal opinions, I’m confident with these five games and the order of them. I’m getting close to being a month overdue so I’d want to be.

5. Night in the Woods

I loved spending time with these characters. Night in the Woods is such a good representation of suburban monotony, from the pointless barb-slinging contests with friends to the general malaise when it comes to thinking of the future. The story is a combination of a thoughtful examination of mental illness and an almost compelling mystery, which I think it pulls off by the skin of its teeth. The writing really stands out in the dialogue rather than the overarching narrative though, with some actual laugh out loud stuff (very rare for a video game), poignant late-night conversations, disdainful looks at anything resembling a structured lifestyle, awkward morning chats with your parents and a very nosy and ineffective town committee. You skip responsibilities to do nothing of note. You play in a band that isn’t shitty but isn’t particularly good either. You smash stuff and steal stuff and regret it later on. You waste time playing a punishing roguelike. And, sometimes, you even feel a bit bored. For a game starring cats, foxes, bears, alligators and mice it’s weirdly true to life and affecting. Gregg rulz ok.

4. Nier: Automata

I’m still torn on Nier, but as time passes I’m looking back on more and more of it fondly. The structure, despite being a bit daft, forces you to hone in on the motivations and feelings of 2B and 9S, as well as taking in little details and touches you would have missed on a single playthrough. It’s a fun action RPG, but really it’s a very human story that doesn’t involve humans. It’s a game that feels incredibly personal despite the weight of the studios behind it. I’m convinced that anyone who sees it all the way through will find things to appreciate about it. Deeply too. For me, it was Pascal and the robot village – characters who were just learning to exist, often in a terribly misguided and childlike way, led by a de facto leader who is wise by comparison but mostly just wants them to be allowed to live.

Soundtrack of the year too.

3. Pyre

I think I have a bit of a backwards opinion on Supergiant’s stuff. Every game they’ve released has been more compelling than the last to me. Pyre is such a well-executed game – everything in it feels exactly like what they set out to do without any compromises. It’s a very different beast to Bastion and Transistor but shares the quirks and devotion that made them both strong titles. Pyre is dripping with personality, both in the diverse cast of characters and in the vivid, fantastical landscapes of the Avernum-esque Downside.

The things Pyre succeeds at the most are things that you wouldn’t expect. The combat system is a slick, fast-paced NBA Jam/fantasy pong hybrid with surprising complexity. You feel empathy for your opposition. Losing doesn’t stop the game and may actually be the better outcome in some cases. It makes choice mechanics meaningful again!

A lot of games I played around the same time as Pyre have completely dissipated from my memory, but Pyre sticks fast. There’s just so much love and craftsmanship in there.

2. Horizon: Zero Dawn

This one takes the 2017 version of the Doom award, aka the 'I thought this would be awful but I was terribly wrong and boy am I glad about that' award. I expected a cookie cutter, Ubisoft-lite open world game with some cool monsters at best. What we got was something that iterated on the Western open-world formula. Rather than pushing it forward like Zelda seemed to do, this game just enhanced, streamlined and polished the hell out of a familiar style of game, wrapping it in a truly intriguing and layered story told through two separate, intertwining paths. There's a myriad of interesting personal stories in here, with themes of environmentalism, technophobia, tradition, misguided ambition and contrasting selfishness and utilitarianism throughout. It helps that the game plays well too, with slick elemental bow/trap combat, weighty animations and fluid movement. Returning to the theme of personal opinion changing over time, I think Horizon has been undervalued by many in end of year lists. It's a fantastic, ambitious game that just about pulls off everything it goes for. 

1. Prey

While the botched marketing of Prey is one of the sadder stories of 2017, the game itself is a stunning piece of work from Arkane, modern doyens and torch carriers of the immersive sim. Most of the reason it lands here is because of the immersion part of the genre label too - I was so drawn into life on Talos I and the world they'd created. This is game design at its most intelligent, with player agency given the utmost importance, enabling intuitive methods of problem-solving that are sorely missing in many modern titles. The retro-future art style is excellent and the game innovates (such as with the GLOO gun for traversal and usage of mimic powers to access seemingly inaccessible areas) as well as nods, lovingly, to System Shock. The impact of the story seems highly subjective, but it really worked for me, thanks in no small part to the excellent voice acting and well-paced revelations.

I think we're going to be in for a bit of a drought with big budget immersive sims in the near future. Outside of the System Shock remake, there's not a lot on the horizon, with Deus Ex on pause and staff changes/a mooted online direction for Arkane in the near future. I get it. They're not always an easy sell. But when crafted by those who throw caution to the wind in terms of sales - and truly understand what the genre can offer a player - the experience is still as unparalleled as it was when 0451 games first began gaining steam from the likes of System Shock and Thief to the seminal (industry wide) Deus Ex. Prey made me feel like I did when I was first discovering the worlds of those titles, and despite some really, really grating load times (time heals all wounds unless you're stuck on a load screen) that's why it's my game of the year for 2017.