2D: Super Mario World. It just plays smooth af. Pretty close to a perfect videogame.
3D: Rayman 2. Platformers usually have a colorful and happy world. Rayman might still be colorful, but it stands out because it’s kinda grim. Gameplay wise… I should replay it, because I’m not actually sure anymore. I think all 3D platformers of this time could be a little bit janky. I remember there were some frustrating parts, at least for a kid.
RDR2 is one of the best story games ever. It’s one of probably 3 or 4 I would call masterpiece, and it legit made me cry. I connected with the characters, I felt the pain of the gang falling apart, I felt fear and pity for dutch, it was just amazing. RDR2 is one of those few games where you can say "sure, it has amazing gameplay, the side games are fun, and it plays great, but I don’t play it because it’s one of the most fun games to play, I play for the story "
Watching Dutch slowly descend into paranoia and separate himself from Arthur (primarily due to Micah’s manipulation) was a wonderful bit of environmental storytelling. It was a B-plot that was running in the background whenever you return to the gang campsite… But Arthur only really begins to see it after it is too late for him to stop. Because by the time Arthur realizes what is happening, Dutch has already firmly made up his mind about Arthur, and Arthur has already started trying to get out of the life. And Arthur having doubts only serves to cement Dutch’s paranoia.
It was amazing storytelling. It was never about saint Denis, or the heists, it was about the little things you overheard in camp, the gang itself. Truly a amasterpiece
It seems like a game that has quite a lot going for it, the gameplay looks pretty cool, I like the art direction, and performance and visuals actually seem to be quite polished at launch. However, I just know I’ll get tired of it, as it is another game that prioritizes being big, with tons of repetitive content, too big of a world, and somehow too many protagonists, which seemingly brings down both the overall gameplay and story.
It’s fine that there are games like this that cater to people who want large, expansive worlds to immerse themselves in, but I do get a bit disappointed that “every” single player AAA game is like this. There are many other games for me to play, so it is not like I’m starving for games, but it feels like I miss out on a ton of games I could potentially have liked if the direction was slightly different
I feel ya, AC games are a bit full regardless of which way they go. They just never locked down the best aspects. Early AC only needed tweaks to parkour, combat and bug fixes but the new ones went so far rpg that I cant even bother. Just too big
I play almost every genre (minimal interest in sports games, admittedly), and my favorite changes all the time. But in general, here are some of my all-time top games:
Final Fantasy Tactics
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel (people who think BL2 is better than TPS are wrong)
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel (people who think BL2 is better than TPS are wrong)
Are you Australian by chance? I have a lot of complaints about TPS, but then after watching some taskmaster Australia I had a theory; I wonder if there is some fundamental difference in preferred pacing that causes those to fall flat for other audiences? In dialog, humor, events, etc.
Transport Tycoon was fantastic and thanks to OpenTTD I still play it from time to time.
Gothic 2 is by far the best Action RPG of all time. Witcher 3 comes close, but still fails to surpass it in so many places.
Banished always gets me with it’s atmosphere. It feels cozy but at the same time you are close to complete annihilation. Oxygen not included hits the same mark, but also has a distinctive art style and humor to it which I love.
Stanley Parable (and it’s Deluxe edition) never fails to make me laugh. But it can get tedious sometimes…
Six of these so far, and considering how happy they make me, I don’t expect I’ll slow down any time soon! Just glad people find these as interesting to read as I do writing them!
For me, Elden Ring. I enjoy open world exploration and collecting-heavy games, and I also enjoy soulslikes for the strategic combat and variety of options. So ER was like two of my favorite ice cream flavors combined into one delicious meal.
My nostalgia faves are still The Longest Journey and Grim Fandango. My love of stories told with games started here. I do need to think about what my all time favorites are, though. That's a big question.
oh man, The Longest Journey has been on my todo list for eternities. Ages ago I was being a pixel-peeping-perfectionist and I hated the aliasing on the character models - but now that ScummVM does the game perfectly I really have no reason to wait… but… here we are.
Since the game is dear to you, how about some motivational sales pitch for it? Why should I drop everything else and go play the game right now? :D
One thing I really loved about it was even though the character models were as weird looking as you'd expect from the era, the backgrounds were beautiful and when i played it years later with more modern sensibilities, I still was fond of them. The story took advantage of the fact that the main character was an artist, so there were a number of colorful or visually interesting segments.
The whole experience felt so vast, and even not being a child any more (which can make stories seem vast because of your own imagination), there still feels like there's a lot to both worlds. And history to characters, just out of view.
It also lives up pretty well to its name. There's a lot of it. A lot of lore and locations and puzzles. Some of the puzzles are obtuse to the extreme, and silly. There's one that's almost legendarily bad, so it has that bit of history if you're interested lol.
It's tough to say what's nostalgia and what's my preference and what's genuinely great. You'd probably have to play it to find out!
the character models were as weird looking as you’d expect from the era
Oh sure! Love the lowpoly/pre-rendered backgrounds aesthetic. The aliasing thing I mentioned earlier is just a “petpeeve” of mine, I can’t stand the jagged edges / lack of antialiasing. The rough pixel edges of the modes look so out of place when the pre-rendered backgrounds are so smoothly antialiased.
Though, there’s an argument to be made that when playing in modern high resolution, the character models are a lot sharper than the upscaled/blurry backgrounds :D
Some of the puzzles are obtuse to the extreme, and silly. There’s one that’s almost legendarily bad, so it has that bit of history if you’re interested lol.
I guess same goes for pretty much every point&click adventure game, sometimes you just need to be in the same “headspace” as the puzzle designer to get it, otherwise you just don’t.
But, sure I’m down for some history of a bad puzzle! I love obscure tidbits of old games.
And yet they’ll grip that game right out of your library whenever they want to. The world that people complain about is the world they go wrong with. Once the fuckery started, that’s when I stopped giving these companies money. I haven’t bought a video game for probably decades.
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