Playlist (December 2017) (Patreon)

Hello everybody. Above is your playlist video for December, and below is a text version if you'd rather read than watch!

Something a bit different for you this month. I haven’t played anything new in December I don’t think, so what I’m going to do is talk about my 10 favourite games of 2017.

I’ve played a lot of games this year - not everything, I still need to get to a few games - but I’ve played enough to recommend some terrific games from the past 12 months. So let’s just get right into it, shall we?

The Sexy Brutale

Let's start with The Sexy Brutale. This is a weird, puzzle-y, murder mystery game with a whole Groundhog Day thing where time resets at the end of the day. And you’ll use this endless time loop to foil a bunch of murders.

You’ll need to sneak around this hotel, and figure out how the guests died. Who did it, when they did it, how they did it, and so on. And then figure out how you’re going to stop it - maybe swapping a bullet for a blank or trapping the murderer in a cupboard. 

So it’s kind of like a reverse Hitman. Only, there’s only ever one solution to each murder - more like a point and click adventure. And also you can’t ever directly interfere - you’re not allowed to be in the same room as another human so you’ll only ever be able to meddle and cause mischief from behind the scenes. 

The game is comparable to a bunch of Japanese titles like Ghost Trick, and apparently some PS2 game called Gregory Horror Show is very similar - not sure, never played it. But The Sexy Brutale stands out because it’s got a vibe all of its own. It’s got weird bobble head people and a dollhouse hotel and catchy music. 

Anyway, I liked this game a lot. It’s quite simple, and kinda easy. But it’s such a clever idea and really just had my attention until the story wrapped up. Easily recommended. 

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Hoo boy. Zelda. So, I think Zelda strikes this really interesting balance between old and new. It’s old because it takes after the earliest Zelda games, in that it’s defiantly non linear, and massively open to exploration and discovery. 

Just like Zelda 1 - and very much unlike the more recent Zelda games - Breath of the Wild lets you loose in a giant fantasy kingdom and asks you to create your own path. So you can tackle dungeons out of order. You can skip dungeons entirely if you like. You can go find shrines or do sidequests or just see what’s over the next mountain. It’s a real adventure, and I loved that freeform experience. 

But it’s also strikingly modern, in that Zelda’s got crazy physics-driven powers and really sharp enemy AI, allowing for unique solutions to puzzles, crazy chain reaction surprises, and mischievous uses of the environment like setting fire to grass to create an updraft so you can fly up high and rain arrows down from the sky. 

It comes together for a super wild game that just had me enraptured for a good long week - in a non-stop barrage of surprise discoveries, hilarious anecdotal battles, and - oh man - I really like the dungeons. they’re small, yes, and they all look the same. But I thought they were great fun. Looking forward to discussing them. 

Hollow Knight

Yowza! This game is really really good. Like, holy moly where did this thing come from?

So it’s a Metroidvania. You know, you collect power-ups to unlock new areas. But the game’s biggest influence is undoubtedly Dark Souls. And I don’t just mean it’s hard. But it is. Not too hard. But it’s tricky!

But what it really takes from Dark Souls, the first one I mean, is this surprising feeling that the world just keeps going in every direction you push. You’ll constantly be finding hidden nooks and crannies that, in any other Metroidvania would just lead to a small secret but in Hollow Knight it opens up to some entirely new area with fresh enemies, bosses, challenges, and more. 

It also just feels great to control. The boss fights are brilliant because everything’s tight, precise, and if you mess up it’s always your fault. You didn’t dodge, counter, or escape. And if you died, you probably didn’t take that opportunity to heal midway through the fight. And if you;re struggling, maybe try a different badge or just explore in a different direction and see if you can find some handy secrets. 

I also love the way the map works. Whenever you enter a new area you’re completely blind. Then when you get the map it’s just a piece of crap drawing. And it takes real effort to turn it into something usable. And in the end you get a nice mix of classic where-the-hell am I of like Metroid 1 and 2, but then “oh there I am” of Super Metroid, all in the same game. 

It’s brill. 

Snake Pass

Okay, so I know Snake Pass is a divisive game. But it just did it for me, boys and girls. It’s a very new and unique idea and beyond that it was executed incredibly well in my opinion. 

So it’s a game about being a snake, obviously, and it’s about manipulating your snakey body to slither up poles, coil around bamboo, and generally just climb and traverse barmy vertical obstacle courses. 

Learning how to use the snake is a challenge but it’s very rewarding. Once you’ve got the skills to tackle the game’s challenges it’s really fun and feels great. There’s this great connection between you and the snake, as you have such fine control over its every movement. I found myself gripping the controller like I was gonna break it during some of the more tense sections. 

And it really makes you think about things in an interesting way because the only enemy in the game is your own body. That big tail might make for a handy ally when you’re climbing but it’s also working against you as it;s this heavy, gravity-affected appendage that you must account for all the time. Makes for an interesting balancing act. Literally, I guess. 

Anyway. Don’t be fooled by the cartoony art and everything. This isn’t exactly a 3D platformer like Mario and Crash. Instead, look at it like a demanding climbing simulator and make sure you bring your A game. 

Prey

Prey’s innovations are found in the little details. In the broad strokes, we’ve seen this game before - you know, it’s an immersive sim with guns and powers. It’s a space station with dead bodies and audio diaries. It’s a sci-fi game with aliens and space walking. 

And all that is good and well executed - but the real gems are in the details. Like, the new power that lets you mimic almost any object in the game, so you can turn into a banana and slide through a gap. Or the awesome gloo gun, which is a multipurpose weapon, tool, and even platforming assistance. 

The level design’s great, too. Most of these games are split up into distinct levels but Prey is a single interconnected location that lets you weave your way through the game, and take your own path through the game’s missions. Maybe you’ll focus on the main story, or you’ll head off in a different direction and find out more about the crew, or finish a few sidequests to unlock new neuromod powers. 

You’ve also got things like, the more powers you install the more alien you become, which can make turrets turn on you. And the weapon spiral, which is just a lovely bit of user interface design. 

All in all, this is a game made by smart designers and it comes together pretty darn well. I definitely enjoyed my time with this one. 

Statik

Quick detour into some VR games now. Statik is a really smart game that looked at how you play VR games and modelled its entire design around that. So, in real life you’re sat down and holding a PlayStation controller - and in the game, you’re strapped to a chair and your hands are trapped inside a box.

This box is a weird puzzle cube, where every button on the PS4 controller is linked to something on the box, so there’s a really tactile playfulness there as you squeeze triggers, flick analogue sticks, and push buttons, just to see what everything does. And then you get into the actual puzzle solving, with some genuinely good little conundrums. 

There are all sorts of different puzzles, which I don’t really want to spoil. So I’ll just say that they use almost every aspect of the controller for different things. And once you’ve done all that, there are even some co-op puzzles where one player uses their phone to provide clues. 

All in all, it’s one of the best VR games I’ve played this year. 

Superhot VR

But really, that honour has to go to Superhot VR. This is a completely new game - not just a camera mod for the original Superhot - but it of course retains the classic “time only moves when you do” mechanic.  

Which, it turns out, is perfect for VR and makes you feel like a crazy super hero as you pluck bullets out of mid-air, throw katanas across the room, deflect bullets with frying pans, and all sorts of other mad tricks. 

You have complete control of your character giving you way more options than a typical shooter. Outside of movement, that is, happily the game doesn’t mess with locomotion. And, I dunno, it’s just incredibly immersive and enjoyable. I’ve played some great VR stuff this year like Resident Evil 7 and Lone Echo, but this is the one to beat. 

Cuphead

Okay, back in the real world. And we’re with the run and gun gem, Cuphead. A game inspired by 30s animation and 90s video games, which come together for something very fresh. 

Now, I gotta take a moment to admire the sheer artistry on display here. Not only is it a marvel of time and dedication to hand draw all these frames of animation - but the pictures themselves are just beautiful. The bosses are all imaginative, characterful, colourful, and larger than life, which means just getting through the game and seeing these weirdo enemies is part of the charm. 

And I feared that would be all Cuphead had to offer. With all the time spent on art, I assumed the gameplay would suffer. But nope - it’s also a great game, a retro throwback to hard as nails shooters, with a cool parry mechanic, really considered boss attacks, and battles that so rarely trundle into unfairness.

It’s a challenge, yes, but one that I was happy to keep plugging away at - and made me very satisfied when I finally pushed through and won. 

Uncharted: The Lost Legacy

I really liked Uncharted: The Lost Legacy. You know, it’s weird: Uncharted games go against pretty much everything I value in games like expressive mechanics, systemic gameplay, high levels of agency, and so on - but I just can’t get enough of this goofy series.

Though, I didn’t think much of Uncharted 4. It had lots of improvement in terms of gameplay with generally better combat, stealth, climbing, and even new stuff like the grapple hook and the car. But I found it to be too serious and po-faced, which really affected the pacing of the game which turned a rollercoaster ride into something with a lot of walking and talking. 

Which is why I loved Lost Legacy, which has all the gameplay improvements of 4 but a sense of fun, silliness, and rocket-powered pacing that we haven’t seen since uncharted 2. 

So this game stars Chloe and Nadine, and they have a great and interesting relationship which is well explored throughout the game. And it manages to pack loads and loads in to just 6 or 7 hours of gameplay, giving the game a non-stop sensation of changing gameplay just as soon as what you’re currently doing gets boring. 

I also loved the western ghats levels I showed off in my recent video, which finally gave Uncharted some proper exploration and treasure hunting. All in all, a great experience. I really like this idea of DLC that basically just gives you a nice 6 hour version of last year’s bloated 20 hour game!

Super Mario Odyssey

And finally. This list hasn’t been in any kind of order but I thought I would leave my actual favourite game of 2017 to the very end. It is, of course, the incredible Super Mario odyssey. 

Yeah! What a video game. 

I mean, lemme just start with the controls and everything. Mario has always been fun to move around but odyssey is leaps and bounds beyond his other stuff. And it’s all thanks to that cap, which unlocks an incredibly versatile set of moves that makes getting around the levels just so much fun. 

Then you’ve got the capture mechanic, which opens up all these really clever bits of gameplay. The pokio bird and the tropical wiggler and the gushen, it’s all fab. 

Then you’ve got the focus on exploration and playing around. You poke and prod at the level. Look around corners and investigate tunnels. And you’re rewarded constantly. It’s like the world’s greatest Easter egg hunt. 

And, the levels are great too. There’s the towering vertical playground of steam gardens, the absolutely ridiculous new Donk City, a low poly level, and many more besides. And they’re all completely original ideas, but peppered with Mario throwbacks that appeal to a big nerd like me. 

The game has also inspired a great speed running community, both for people looking to finish the game fast and finish with weird conditions like no jumping, and using as few capture target as possible. It’s a game that just lets you play it how you want. Though, I wish there was a bit more hardcore platforming stuff in there to really show off Mario’s new moveset. DLC, perhaps?

Okay there we have it. Thanks for checking out the playlists in 2017. I hope you’ve enjoyed them. I’m pretty happy with how they’re going so I’ll keep the same formula in the new year, and see you in January with the first recommendations of 2018! 

Thank you so much for your support, and I’ll see you soon!