Lurker > Paratroopa1

(By the way, Tricky Towers was the lone "PS4" game on this list lol. The only PS3 game on this list is actually a real PS3 game)

Mega Man 2 has my favorite soundtrack of any video game ever, and I sometimes find myself at a loss to explain just how important a factor that is to me

Oh boy. The next two games on my list are real doozies to talk about, so I think I'll tackle that tomorrow since it got really late here. I'm sort of past the point on this list where I run out of things to say about the games (though I do reiterate that I REALLY LIKED every game I put on this list), so I'll probably be talking a little more at length about them from now on. But I'll continue it tomorrow.

#87





Years of release: 2016 (PC/PS4), 2017 (XB1), 2018 (Switch)
Beaten?: I was pretty good at it

I've played this game exactly once in my entire life, and about ten of you know exactly when that was - it was one year ago, at Shad's house, for Extra Life. Despite having limited experience with this game overall, I'm... kind of a little obsessed with it? I still think about it from time to time and I want to play it again, just picked it up on sale on Steam so I'll be able to.

It's a stacking tetronimos game, but unlike Tetris, it has physics, and you have to keep your tower from toppling over as you build it as high as you can - there's other game modes but that was the main one I remember playing. The physics and the necessity of building your tower high without it falling over gives this game a really great combination of long-term planning, short-term tactics, and precise execution that makes mastering it a multi-faceted task, and it means you can win either by playing smart or by playing well. Do you play aggressively and try to stack your tower high super fast, hoping to outpace everyone else? Do you play conservatively and build a steadier tower, expecting the others to falter by going too fast? The correct answer is probably somewhere in the middle, but it's a tricky balancing act trying to figure out just how fast you should push it.

The mode where you have to set down as many blocks as you can in a limited area is really cool too, love the puzzle solving aspects of it. Yeah, this one's a real heavyweight in the falling-blocks-puzzle genre imo, and I'm really looking forward to getting the opportunity to play it with other people again someday. Even though I only had maybe an hour with it - less than I spent playing any other game on this list - it left a big enough impression on me to include it on this list.

#88





Years of release: 2013 (PC), 2017 (XB1/PS4)
Beaten?: Yes

I think it's exceptionally funny that this game is almost right next to Firewatch on my list, yet Firewatch and Hammerwatch are thoroughly unrelated games that have absolutely nothing to do with each other and nothing in common. Weird.

I'm just trying to think of ways to fill this space because I don't have an exceptional amount to say about Hammerwatch (something that's going to cease being true the further I get down the list). Hammerwatch is a little Gauntlet-like hack-and-slash, it's nothing special, but I found it greatly appealing all the same - it scratched that itch of just wanting to go on a dungeon-exploring adventure with a friend, killing some monsters, finding some treasure, getting some cool powerups, nothing too heavy or fascinating here, I just had a great fucking time with it and that's pretty much the most I have to say on that matter! I'd say bring a friend or don't bother with it at all, playing it single player would probably be a little dull, but as a co-op game, it gets the job done.

I haven't played the sequel, Heroes of Hammerwatch, but I'm sure it's probably fun.

#89





Years of release: 2018 (PC/PS4 early access), 2019 (PC/PS4)
Beaten?: I did some expert songs

"Oh, I get it now." That's one of the first things I remember thinking when playing Beat Saber.

See, VR and I have had sort of a checkered past. I have a couple of friends who have VR stuff, and they've gotten me to check it out, and like, VR is a very cool technology and it's really interesting to experience, but I have a hard time really grasping it, both its function, and how it could be used to make good games. I'm not sure what it is. I always have a hard time looking through the VR goggles and focusing on objects properly - everything always kind of feels slightly out of focus and hard to look at in a way that I don't really know how to communicate, and I tend to find myself a little bit disoriented playing it. I've played some pretty neat little things on VR but most of them kind of amount to like, I dunno, glorified tech demos. I'm sure there's some really good shit on VR that I haven't gotten around to, it's just not what I played.

Then I played Beat Saber. "Oh, I get it now."

I totally forgot to put rhythm games under 'stuff that's on this list.' There's a few of 'em. You have two lightsabers and you swing them at blocks coming at you in time with the music. That's Beat Saber. It plays great. This is a game that really utilizes that three-dimensional space that VR offers really well - suddenly, the fact that you have to move your body around, swinging your sabers through blocks, juking this way and that to avoid incoming walls, it just suddenly made sense to me how VR could provide a really engaging gaming experience. It didn't even give me that much of a headache to look at - I was able to follow the action really easily, and I feel like I was able to take on some decently hard songs after a couple hours of practice, though I couldn't play for too long because damn, this game gives you a workout. I need it. I'm fat and out of shape as hell.

The soundtrack is kind of... not my thing, and as of my playing it I wasn't too clear on how to get more songs or make my own which was a little disappointing though I know custom songs are possible. Still, if I had a VR headset, I'd probably be really into playing a little bit of this every day. It just feels good to play. The visuals of swinging your sabers through blocks and the sound effect it makes when you do it just has such a great kinetic feel to it, and it's a great example of what VR can do, even though it's a really simple one. I'm on board with the whole idea now.

#90





Years of release: 2016 (PC/XB1/PS4), 2018 (Switch)
Beaten?: Yes

Would you believe me if I said that I've always kind of dreamed of being a fire lookout? I've always just sort of wanted to get the fuck out of the city and go into the middle of nowhere for a while. I think I have the sort of quiet, melancholic personality that someone would need to be a fire lookout - I'd be able to sit there for a while, alone with my thoughts, looking for fires. I could go outside and do some birdwatching. I fucking love birdwatching. I also love the internet, and I don't think they have the internet out there, so I think I'd make a shitty fire lookout because I wouldn't be able to deal with that. Plus I'm probably not rugged enough to live in the wilderness for months.

I just really love the outdoors. We go on vacation in central Oregon every summer and god I just love it out there - the sun, the mountains, the rivers, the towering pines, the high deserts. This game takes place in Wyoming but it still really reminds me of the long nature walks I take out there - it really feels like home to me. This game is absolutely gorgeous, and any game that can really properly capture the sheer joy of being outdoors, in the wilderness, on a hot summer day, is a game that I want to exist in basically forever, especially when it's freezing cold and dark outside and seasonal depression is kicking me right in the ass.

I also love walking simulators so this is a game that speaks directly to me.

This game is a story about a fire lookout named Henry, his companion on the radio Delilah, and a bunch of weird shit that happens to them one summer that doesn't properly resolve in the game's third act. Ah, fuck. Real shame about that because the first 75% is awfully good and has so much going for it! All of the dialog between Henry and Delilah is well acted and really charming, carrying the whole game by itself - I wanted to keep playing just to get to the next part where the two of them would chat. You get a lot of different dialog options here, and the branches are pretty impressive, or at least I think they are, I only played the game once. You can get deep into Henry's issues with his wife back home, if you want to, or you can just... completely not bring up that huge plot point ever, if you want to, and whichever choice you make, it comes back up in conversations later when you don't expect it. It's really well done. All the while, I wouldn't say this game has like, puzzles per se, but there's something really relaxing about hiking through the forests, looking for your next objective, periodically checking your old-fashioned map to see where you're going. Again, this game is gorgeous, and just taking in the scenery alone is worth the price of admission.

So yeah sort of a damn shame that the whole game falls apart at the end because it introduces a bunch of really cool intrigue that it just doesn't follow up on and leaves like half the plot threads hanging in a kind of downer ending. Whoops oh well. Maybe I just didn't 'get' the ending but it seemed like kind of a letdown. Still, I kind of want to replay this game again soon anyway, just so I can return to Shoshone National Forest.

Sometimes the images I grab off of google are too big and it makes me sad

#91





Years of release: 2013 (PC), 2014 (iOS)... 2017 (Vita)???? what the fuck, this game had a VITA PORT? FOUR YEARS LATER? WHY?
Beaten?: Glory to Arstotzka

Here's an extremely cool game that I have a hard time getting into because it's depressing and kinda bums me out. I said it before but I don't really like games that are kind of bleak and depressing, and this one doesn't put you in the most fun role to play and it gets me thinking about real life people and politics and man, I'm just trying to play video games.

But, putting the bummer aspects of this game aside, given that I already have games like TIS-100 on this list, you know that I am ABSOLUTELY 100% enough of a dullard to enjoy a game about processing documentation. It's really sort of a great concept and whoever thought of it was a genius. Looking at peoples' passports and trying to figure out what's wrong with them - or if nothing is wrong with them at all - has this kind of "spot the difference" sort of appeal but with like way more layers to it, all while you're under an intentionally-vague time crunch and dealing with an intentionally-frustrating lack of desk space, making managing your information challenging and vital.

All the while, the game is sneakily sliding in little story and worldbuilding elements when you're not expecting it - all of the little choices that this game throws at you in the middle of looking at passports add a ton of tension, and it's both fun and nervewracking as hell. This game really makes you feel like you're actually in the position of this poor border official, and the ensuing moral dilemmas are some of the crunchiest gaming has to offer. A little too much, actually - this game left me feeling a little bit ragged after playing it, thanks to the aforementioned bummerness. I dunno if I'm super eager to replay it, but it deserves every single accolade it received.

Sometimes the images I grab off of google are too small and it makes me sad

#92





Years of release: 2012 (PC), 2019 (XB1/PS4/Switch) (huh, really?)
Beaten?: Yes

Oh god, can I find the words to write about this one besides "it's steampunk-fantasy Diablo 2?" That's exactly what it is. You are now completely familiar with Torchlight II.

It's good. I'd probably say it's about as good as Diablo 2, to be honest! I've always liked Diablo 2, though I wouldn't say I've ever been in love with it as some have - I'm kind of a Diablo 1 guy myself, even though that game is old and shitty it was really my jam back in the day and I love it despite that. Diablo 2 was too good and not old and shitty enough for my tastes. Ah, shit, I'm talking about Diablo, not Torchlight. Fuck, para, bring it back. Uhhh. Torchlight.

Yeah. Torchlight 1 was an alright game but Torchlight II (mixing my roman and my arabic numerals here because saying Torchlight I seems really weird) really gave it a nice layer of polish and made it not royally suck in the endgame, so that's good! Sometimes I'm a sucker for a good ol' point-and-click hack-and-slash where you click on an enemy until it dies, rinse and repeat, pick up a bunch of loot, spend a lot of time looking at magical items that aren't better than your current stuff, sell them for like 200 gold, go back and click on a bunch more enemies until they die, yeah I'm here for that shit 100%. It's relaxing as hell and my idiot brain gets a dopamine hit whenever I find a magic item with a color of text that is more unusual than the usual color of text that items have. Look, I don't have to explain this to YOU guys, you all know the exact shit I'm talking about. Torchlight II is basically a drug fix for someone looking for a followup to Diablo... 2? II. That's a roman numeral one too. it's 5:45 am and my writeups are getting really silly so I'm going to keep going because it's funny

#93





Years of release: 2016 (PC/PS4/XB1), 2017 (Switch)
Beaten?: Nah

Have I mentioned that I really, really love couch co-op games? That's not a rhetorical question. I can't actually remember if I mentioned that I love couch co-op. Uh, I do though.

Co-op and team games have a really cool design space I think - when you're playing a game by yourself, you can always sharpen all of the little tasks that go into getting better at the game and perfect your skill, but when you add a second person into the mix and suddenly cooperation and communication become key elements of play, a lot of inefficiencies get introduced to the system, and two people maximizing their skill together is exponentially more difficult than a single person maximizing theirs. This is especially true when it's a game where one person CAN'T do everything alone - some games like Contra just sort of slam a second player character in there in a game intended for one player, but some games really demand that both players do their job in order to advance. Communication in a game is a skill that has a lot of complexity to it, and there's a lot of potential different ways to solve the problem, and truly mastering it requires a ton of work, which really opens up the number of different ways any given co-op game can play out; co-op play always tends to be very emergent in the number of unexpected ways that something can go wrong. So they're great! Plus, playing anything with a friend is just sort of automatically fun.

None of this is to say that Overcooked is a truly transcendent game, I just felt like waxing on about co-op games for a bit because I don't have anything else to say. It's a good game with a cool concept - you get food orders that require you to do a bunch of different tasks, and you and up to three friends have to figure out how to most effectively divvy up those tasks to get them done as quickly as possible. There's a lot going on, and just the ability alone to pick up objects and put them down really opens up the number of potential ways you can solve any given problem. Lots of different ways to maximize your workflow. There's something really fun about figuring out with the other person you're playing with and getting into a rhythm. It's simple to play and satisfying to sort-of-master. Sometimes I like simple shit like that.

#94





Years released: 2015 (PC)
Beaten?: Unbelievably, I got pretty far

(Oh shit, everyone's leaving.)

WAIT. WAIT COME BACK PLEASE. I SWEAR THIS ISN'T AS BORING AS IT SOUNDS.

This is a game about coding. NO GET BACK HERE.

Okay, so, Zachtronics games are almost universally beyond my ken. I wouldn't be able to figure out SpaceChem if my life depended on it, and taking even one glance at Opus Magnum makes my head spin. But TIS-100 I can actually kinda jive with. It's hard as hell, but I can do it.

I haven't played this one in a while so I kind of forget the premise a little bit, but basically this game presents you with a made-up and inefficient programming language, and you need to utilize it to figure out how to solve a bunch of basic programming challenges in as few steps as possible.

I've always kind of liked coding, even though I'm not good at it - figuring out how to make something work, how to take a variable and carry it through multiple processing steps and have it spit out the number you want at the end, how to store it somewhere while a bunch of other processes all run and call that variable, it's always felt like a puzzle game to me. A puzzle game that I suck at. TIS-100 really captures that essence for me without cursing me with the proposition of actually having to something productive. Video games are awesome.

I've done enough coding in my life to know that this really is like coding. It's probably the closest I'll ever get in my life to like, actually trying to write something in assembly language. I think if you've never coded before, this game would be a pretty good primer to the sorts of thought processes you need to have to code something efficiently - or at least it's the closest approximation that exists, but really, you should probably just learn C++ instead of picking up TIS-100, learning C++ is easier. This shit is hell, and it is probably the driest video game I've ever played or even ever heard of, like Desert Bus levels of dry, but wow it's really satisfying to play it and actually figure out how to put together something that works.

It's been a while since I've played it and I have no idea if I could go back. Somehow, at one point, I knew how to play this game, and I've ejected all memory of how to play it straight out of my brain. Attempting to play it again feels like such a herculean task that I might as well just learn how to actual-code. I can't believe me from 5 years ago was this smart. I feel like putting this game on this list will make me seem a lot more interesting and cool than I actually am. Wow look at this hipster who plays a fucking game about programming a shitty computer. The games on this list are going to get a lot more normie from here on out sorry.

#95





Years of release: 2011 (PC), and then it was ported to every system and there were a million expansions forever
Beaten?: Thoroughly, not the expansions though

Uh. To be completely honest with you, I'm not even sure I like Binding of Isaac all that much. It's mostly as a result of the game's aesthetic. I don't like to say this about peoples' artstyles, but I really don't like Binding of Isaac's artstyle, nor do I vibe with its bleak, nihilistic tone. Playing a small, naked child who wanders through pooped-filled dungeons crying tear-bullets at gross, festering monsters isn't really my idea of a fun time and it kind of seems like a bizarre joke that went a little too far and accidentally became a really good game. I wouldn't say I'm offended by it, but it's really unpleasant; I actually realize looking back on it that playing this game wasn't really doing awesome things to my mental state, like it left me feeling a little empty inside playing it. Basically, it's pessimistic and gross and that's kind of the opposite of my deal.

It's a shame that the novelty of the game's theme wears thin after about an hour, because the game ITSELF does not wear thin until way, way after that. I can't deny that I got a good 60-70 hours out of this one, plumbing dungeon after dungeon, looking for secrets and wondering with awe what the next weird item I was going to find was going to do. It's not a particularly balanced game, but that doesn't really matter to me because this isn't one I bother speedrunning - I just take what I get, try to figure out the most broken items as best I can, and enjoy pulling that Roguelite slot machine hoping for the run that'll take me to the end. There's a lot of content here, every run plays completely differently, and replayability is high on this one. It does eventually get a bit old, but it takes a while. There's just so much shit to unlock here. Sometimes literal shit. Ugh, BoI is gross.

This was one of the earliest of the fledgling "Roguelite" genre and I think the first one that I really dove headfirst into (Spelunky was earlier, but man, I just couldn't get into Spelunky, despite the fact that people swear by it - I think I'm the problem on that one). Its influence on a whole lineage of indie games is undeniable, including a VERY particular shall-not-be-named one that ranks very high on my list - almost all of the community for THAT game came from the BoI speedrunning community, and I'm one of the few that didn't.

If it was a more appealing game it'd probably rank in the 50's somewhere, but I've really been turned off to it lately. I've just never gone back to it because it's just a game world that I don't want to exist in for long. I think I've officially put it aside for now, but it would be malpractice for me to not acknowledge its influence on my gaming habits this decade.

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

Speedrunners is so so so fun with people of similar skill, but when you get a person who wins every match it starts to get much less so.

Yeah, I can imagine. I only played this with people of similar skill, so that probably contributed greatly. Honestly, almost any multiplayer or co-op game is fun if you play it with someone who's about as good as you.

#96





Years of release: 2011
Beaten?: Mostly

Pushmo is a warm blanket of a puzzle game. It was there for me at an exceptionally boring time in my life - back in 2012 I had a quarter of college in which I had an hour layover nearly every single day, so when I didn't have homework to do (or that I didn't feel like doing) I had to pull out my 3DS and kill some time. I had two go-to favorites during this period of my life - one was the GB game Kirby's Pinball Land, which I somehow wrung like a good 30 hours out of and I don't remember if I ever properly beat it but it was really fun? The other game was Pushmo.

It's a game about pushing blocks. Uh, sort of. It's really more about pulling them? Frankly, I don't know why it's called Pushmo, it should be called Pullmo, but that's neither here nor there. You need to push and pull these blocks in and out to climb them to reach the goal, and that's about it. It sounds and looks simple at the start, which is why it gets really startling later on when the puzzles actually start to become a serious workout. I put a good 30 hours into this in my off periods during school, and I'm pretty sure there were times I dedicated almost my entire time to failing to solve a single puzzle. It's really hard, but it never feels too frustrating, since it's so easy to understand. There's only so many ways to proceed, and if you keep trying different things eventually you'll have a breakthrough and figure out the way you need to climb to the exit.

I enjoyed the followup Crashmo as well, never played Pushmo World because portability was kind of a big draw for me here and I didn't really desperately need more Pushmo puzzles. Damn solid puzzle game though that's threatened to be lost in the shuffle of newer 10's games. Seriously, I had to be as thorough as possible when trying to remember games I've played this decade - the activity log feature on the 3DS is an absolute lifesaver. Thanks activity log!

#97





Years of release: 2013-2016 (PC early access), 2016 (PC), 2017 (XB1, PS4)
Beaten?: I think I won a match once

Not every game on this list is going to be a life-changing, unforgettable experience. Some of the games on this list are SpeedRunners - a good concept, executed extremely well.

I haven't played a whole lot of this but what I've played, I've loved. The best way I can describe this is like Super Meat Boy meets Mario Kart? Fast, floaty platforming with wall jumps galore where the goal is to race far enough ahead in the level that you push your rivals off-screen, KOing them. It's fast, it's intense, playing it for about an hour gives me a headache, and I'm totally here for that. It's definitely one of the couch/online multiplayer games that I'd be most happy to break out on a whim and play - it plays really smoothly and it's hard to imagine not having a good time with it, at least until my eyes have gone permanently wall-eyed because of the stimuli overload.

I don't have much more to say about it! It's good. I want to play more of it.

#98





Years of release: 2010 (DS, Japan/Europe)
Beaten?: Yes

Part of me thinks I included Last Window MOSTLY because I think it's really funny that it just barely slipped in to the games of the decade - this one came out January 14, 2010 in Japan! It's about as old as a game can be while still being a game of the 10's, but so it is. The reason I almost didn't include it isn't because I didn't like it, but um, because I don't remember it. It's been a really long time! Probably longer than any other game on this list. But rummaging through screenshots looking for the dumbest one I could find (oh Kyle, you and your Cool Pop), yeah, I remember how much I liked this game.

This sequel to the delightful little adventure-novel Hotel Dusk, most of what I remember about Last Window is that it's a game about Kyle Hyde being depressed and sitting around his apartment, gabbing at the locals while trying to figure out a mystery about his dad or something? What sets Hotel Dusk and this game apart from others is a really neat art style, some very likeable characters, some really good writing, and Kyle Hyde, the lovable(???) everyman who's probably the most relatable protagonist in one of these games, because he's kind of constantly as sick of everyone's shit as I am, yet he can't help himself but see things to the end anyway. I remember it being a pretty funny game, in a sort of dry way, but I kind of appreciate that unlike a lot of other Japanese visual-novelly games, this one's really subdued and avoids being too stupid. Uh, I think. There were probably stupid things.

I remember that some of the puzzle solving isn't super engaging, and the overall mystery plot is intriguing but not fascinating, but that it's overall a game that's worth remembering better than I actually do because I have really positive feelings about it. I'm pretty sure there's like a thousand memes from this game that I just don't remember now. Fuck, I should just replay it. I think that's on my 2020 to-do list now! This writeup is a trainwreck and I'm moving on to a game that hasn't completely disintegrated itself from my memory banks now, thanks.

#99




Years of release: 2013 (iOS), 2015 (PC), 2017 (expansion)
Beaten?: Yes

Ah, shit, people are going to get the wrong idea about me here after the first two games on this list. Look, I'm not only into roguelike-games that look like weird minimalist garbage, it's not what it looks like!

868-HACK is a roguelikeish little puzzle game where you're a big smiley face and you zap viruses with lasers, while hacking the grid to obtain points and powers. It's a challenging and slightly unforgiving game - this game is one of those that really demands that you figure out the optimal ways to use what you have, and it punishes you for not being precise and error-free. It's remarkably well balanced and open ended how you want to tackle the problem though - you get a lot of different powers to deal with the waves of viruses coming you way and you have to balance figuring out which ones you want to 'purchase' with your limited data siphons, while your data siphons are also what you use to collect resources needed to use those powers. Most of the powers are not flashy - one of them is literally the ability to not move on your turn, which is actually a pretty big deal - but figuring out how to use them right is key.

At the same time, you have to balance all this with also using your hacks to gain points, since this is a score attack game, and you want to get the highest score possible. It's a really tricky balancing act, because the more points you go for, the more likely you are to die. This does kind of make the game hard to find satisfaction with - beating the game is hard enough, but it isn't enough when you want to go for points, and it's hard to say how many points you should really be satisfied with. All in all though it's a really fun little puzzler with a really cool design space that I still come back on occasion, although last time I played it I completely forgot how it even worked.

I didn't get the idea to make a list of 100 games from transcience, but I did get the idea to use images from him. They're very eye-catching and nice. I reserve the right to immediately nuke this post if the images didn't format nicely.

#100




Years of release: 2015-present (PC)
Beaten?: Hell no

Hey, do you wanna REALLY confused? Like, have all your ability to comprehend things fucked up beyond comprehension? Caves of Qud is probably the single most confusing, bizarre, and thoroughly impenetrable game I've ever played. The worldbuilding is completely insane, the visuals are old school as heck, and the game mechanics feels like it requires a college course just to begin to understand properly. I am completely fascinated by this game. It is confounding, and it is beautiful.

This one's a roguelike, and it's as roguelikey as it gets - you get dumped into this world of ASCII-like graphics with basically no idea what to do and you go wherever you like, killing stuff and picking stuff up, having no idea what's going on until eventually something kills you. It's weirder than usual though - there's a lot of bizarre shit in the game that doesn't make sense, and isn't really intended to make sense until you just go along with it and understand how the world works, like some kind of weird foreign language. I couldn't even really begin to explain it to you. I still don't really get what doing the water ritual at the beginning does or why it's good to increase my reputation with any one group.

I haven't gotten very far in this, but I'd really, really like to come back to this one and figure it out someday. The world is incredibly engrossing - even with these lo-fi graphics, the presentation here somehow gets across a bizarre, alien sort of beauty, and the music in this game is great - it's all weird, surreal soundscapes that completely envelop you and pull you into the world. I've listened to the music more than I've played the game at this point, it's really well done. That alone is a selling point enough for me, but I also get the sense that there is a lot of content and a lot of challenge to be had here, if I just take the time to really sit down and learn this shit. I'm not kidding when I say this game is hard to understand - if you want to be more confused than you've ever been in your life give this one a shot. It's still in early access, but it's been around for a while and I'm not carrying it over to the 20's.

FINALLY, TWO GAMES THAT I DECIDED NOT TO INCLUDE ON THIS LIST FOR SPECIFIC REASONS

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (Switch)

Link's Awakening is my favorite game of all time, but this isn't a top 100 games of all time. The remake of this game for Switch is new enough to put it on my list if I so chose, but I decided to leave it off because I didn't know how to rank it. Technically, it's still the same Link's Awakening I know and love, which should mean it's my #1 favorite game of the decade, but really, it wasn't actually one of my favorite experiences of the decade. But ranking it lower on the list just felt wrong, so I didn't do it and talked about it here. I love the the way they handled the artstyle, the music, and just about every other aspect of remaking this game. I do wish they added a little bit more for fans like me who've played the game a hundred times already and want some new secrets or easter eggs to find, but I'm still satisfied with this game existing in 2019 and being available for the vast swaths of Zelda fans who never got a chance at this back in 1993. Great game, but I'm leaving it off the list.

Zelda 1 Randomizer, Zelda 2 Randomizer, Pokemon Randomizer, Super Mario Bros 3 Randomizer, etc.

Realistically speaking, Zelda 1 Randomizer might well be my favorite gaming experience of the decade, or at least really close. The 10's have been the decade of the randomizer, starting with Pokemon Randomizer somewhere around 2011 I think? The whole concept of taking these old games and shuffling all of the data in them to generate new levels and to put every enemy and item in a brand new location has completely breathed new life into a ton of games that I have loved for years, turning each game into its own little roguelike of sorts - having to learn each seed as you go, exploring and experimenting, testing your abilities on the fly in brand new situations that never existed in the original game. I'm someone who doesn't really enjoy speedrunning games where it becomes about really rote memorization and super-precise optimization of every little thing, so randomizers have been big for me, as I specialize in general knowledge, on-the-fly planning, and figuring out what to do in new situations. Zelda 1 Randomizer has in particular really been an addiction for me though, as the levels lend themselves so well to being rearranged and feeling like a new experience every game, and I've made a little bit of a name for myself speedrunning it. I think the randomizer communities will only continue to grow as the randomizers themselves get more robust and awesome, and I look forward to playing them into the 2020's. I kept them off the list because, well, they aren't really entirely new games, and there's something depressing about listing Zelda 1 Randomizer as one of my favorite games of the decade when it's a thing that generates romhacks for a game from 1987. I have enough actually new games that I liked.

OKAY THE LIST STARTS NOW

(YOU CAN START READING AGAIN)

Criteria for making the list:

- Only games released from 2010-2019. I went by release date in the US if there was one, release date in original country if otherwise, I'm pretty sure. If I fucked up somewhere and a game really came out in 2009, WHOOPS

- Early access and otherwise unfinished games I took on a case by case basis. In most cases, I just counted them as being games of the 10's, because I've already played them pretty exhaustively and they're mostly finished. There are a couple I banked for the 20's though. (Hi, Noita, I look forward to checking you out in 2020)

- I didn't finish most of these, but I played or experienced them enough to be able to talk about them.

- No ports. Full remakes ok. Again, case by case basis.

- Visual novels are games. The only type of game I could think of that I didn't consider appropriate for this list was video games that are reproductions of board games - those would go on a list of board games.

- I REALLY LIKED every game on this list a lot. I feel that's worth mentioning - I didn't have to stretch myself thin to get to 100. I had to cut some games I really enjoyed.

Uhh I think that's it.

PARA'S TOP WHATEVER GAMES THAT HE REALLY WISHED HE PLAYED BUT DIDN'T GET AROUND TO FOR VARIOUS REASONS

Super Mario Odyssey
Return of the Obra Dinn
Pyre
Transistor
What Remains of Edith Finch
The Talos Principle
Ori and the Blind Forest
Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom
AI: The Somnium Files
Outer Wilds
Disco Elysium

Fuck. I'm really still upset about not getting around to SMO - see, the thing is, we OWN the game, but at some point, it got lost by a 10 year old in a couch cushion somewhere or something, and it has yet to turn up. SOMEDAY I'll play it. Based on what I've heard it would probably be in the top 20 of my list, if not higher. But it is 2020, and I did not play Super Mario Odyssey in the 10's, and I cannot go back in time and prevent the game from being lost inside a couch cushion.

I just bought Obra Dinn. I'll get to it in 2020. I did not get to it in 2019.

I tried to play Pyre. It has a talking dog with a moustache, so I wanted to. My computer did not want to. So I didn't. That is the story of me trying to play Pyre.

Everything else I did not get to for no particular reason at all, aside from the last three because I don't own them, but I've heard really good things and I think they might be up my alley.

(TL;DR: I'M A FUCKING NINTENDO SHILL AND I HATE STUFF THAT'S NOT AN INDIE GAME AND IS TOO COMPLICATED AND INVOLVED FOR MY STUPID BRAIN)

(WARNING, TOO MANY WORDS INCOMING, SKIP THIS PART, IT WAS A MISTAKE)

Few things before I get rolling on this thing:

About me. I am the epitome of what you would get if you plucked someone straight out of 1995, dumped them into 2020, and told them to figure out their gaming tastes in a world that left them behind 25 years ago. I largely gravitate to Nintendo, the gaming company of my childhood, and weird indie shit that I can buy for 5 dollars on Steam.

I do not own a PS3, PS4, or Xbox One. Whoops! I realize that this means there's a lot of really, really good games that I simply have not played, and I regret that greatly. I just don't really have the money to put into getting a PS4 right now, and even if I did, I'd also have to have the money to buy games for it, and based on what I know my gaming habits to be, it doesn't seem like a great investment. Maybe next decade I will be more on top of things, but for now, representation from these consoles will be low.

This does mean, as a general rule, I don't really "do" your typical AAA titles. Aside from the fact that they tend to cost 60 dollars, I don't really know why this is. I think that the huge, epic adventures and dark, realistically modeled worlds just don't really interest me much - I don't manage to maintain the attention span for them, and they don't really absorb me into their worlds. I have exceptions, but they're few and far between.

Two examples of major releases this decade that I just didn't vibe with, and didn't show up on my list - Dark Souls and Skyrim. I really wanted to like Dark Souls, and I really admire so many things about the game's design; I like the way the world is designed, I like how challenging it is, I like the blend of combat and RPG elements. Were I writing an article for the internet about the best games of the 10's, Dark Souls is on it. But I just didn't really like it on a personal level - the cold atmosphere and muted colors of the world were a turnoff, and the character-action style of gameplay just wasn't really my thing, I couldn't beat one of the bosses early on and I gave up. Same for Skyrim - I really tried to like it, I loved the idea of having this open world adventure where I could go all sorts of places, but I just couldn't really get hooked on it, and I couldn't tell you why. This should give you a kind of idea of the games I tend to avoid - the Fallouts, Assassin's Creeds, and Grand Theft Autos of the world do not appear on this list. Again, there are exceptions.

Anyway, that's just basically a bunch of words to excuse why I didn't play a lot of the most popular games this decade and instead played some weird indie shit. Like, just so we're clear, here's the distribution of games based on the console I most played them on:

PC: 60
3DS: 17
Switch: 6
Wii U: 5
DS: 3
Wii: 2
Xbox 360: 2
Vita: 2
Android: 1
PS3: 1
PS4: 1

lol

(I really wish I could have added 'Arcade' to this list, but the two arcade games I liked enough to add to this list, Jubeat and The Bishi*Bashi (look it up), both came out in Japan in 2009. Damnit.)

Stuff that's well-represented on this list:

- Games that are cute and colorful. I really like cute shit. The more fun and optimistic the game's tone, and the more colorful and stylized its visuals, the more likely I am to be drawn into it. The vast majority of games on my list are vibrant and pleasant - I like to come out of a game feeling warm inside instead of feeling like I need a shower.

- Puzzle/strategy games. Good lord, I played a lot of puzzle games I really loved in the 2010's! I had no idea I liked puzzle games that much, but there were a hell of a lot of really good ones.

- Story games. Although visual novels and highly narrative adventure games have been around for a long time, I feel like the 10's have broken a lot of new ground in ways to tell interesting stories. I don't care if a game has minimal gameplay - as long as it uses its medium in a interesting way to show me something cool, whatever it is, I'm here for it.

- Platformers. I love a good platformer. I have since the 80's. My love of platformers will never die.

- Roguelites. If I am known for anything, this is probably the thing I'm known for I guess? I like games that have a good challenge, and I love games that change every time you play them for a good dose of replayability. This genre has basically come into existence in this decade, and I find that losing your entire run if you die really ups the stakes, which encourages good play.

- RPGs, sort of? Weird ones though. I don't really play the big 'prestige' JRPGs like your FF's and KH's. I played a bit of DQXI but didn't get far enough into it to make a judgment. There's a couple of Tales games I should have played but didn't get around to. There's still some RPGish things on this list though.

- Nintendo. I mean, it's not by accident. I've loved Nintendo's franchises since I was a kid, and they're the one prestige game publisher that still frequently produces the kind of stuff that I like.

- Couch co-op/multiplayer. Love playing stuff with friends, especially when it's the same room. This tends to lend itself to a lot of memorable gaming experiences.

- Retro shit. Take me back to 1995. I want to live there.

- Games with soundtracks that absolutely rip. I will keep coming back to a game for music alone.

Stuff that's not well-represented on this list:

- Games that are dark and bleak. There's a few on the list, but for the most part I don't really go for this - it doesn't really keep me in the mood to keep playing.

- Games with realistic, non-stylized visuals. Just not super interested. Again, I'm a 1995 kid here, I have sort of a set idea in my head of what a game "looks" like, fair or not, and the more realistic a game gets, the less I tend to get absorbed it.

- Prestige AAA franchises, unless it's Nintendo. Like I stated above, I just don't really do 'em. Even if they're on PC, my PC is kind of garbage so I can't run them anyway. I really wanted to play The Witcher 3 since it's on sale for cheap right now, but I don't have enough RAM.

- Character-action, fighting, racing, real-time strategy. Just some genres that usually fall out of my purview. It's cool if they're your bag!

- FPSes. I actually like FPSes, but I haven't played that many this year that made the cut.

- Online games, especially MMOs. To say that I don't have the time for them would be a lie, it's more like I don't have the attention span and the emotional energy for t

(TL;DR: Felt like making a list; not super important to me if anyone finds it interesting, but I figure some people like reading about games other people like; I'm mostly doing it for my own sake, and you're welcome to come along with me)

At the end of 2009, I was at probably the lowest point in my gaming career. 2008-2009 had been a dark period for me; the current generation of consoles felt like they were leaving me behind, the indie revolution had not gotten fully underway, and I was starting to wonder if I was starting to outgrow gaming a bit, or if they were outgrowing me, somehow. There were still a few things I looked forward to playing but they were growing fewer and further between.

My fears turned out to be for nothing. The 2010's have been an incredible decade for me; they completely revitalized my interest in the current state of games, and have possibly been my favorite decade of games ever. I played hundreds of games, and deeply enjoyed well more than 100 of them. So I am writing a list! It's a list of my 100 favorite games released from 2010-2019 that I played during the years of 2010-2019.

Please understand that I am not creating this list because I think my opinions are terribly interesting or that anyone should put much stock into them. Quite otherwise! I'm burdened with the knowledge that there's like, millions of games released this decade that I might possibly have enjoyed, if only I set time aside for them, or worse, if only I knew about them. This list is not even remotely a definitive attempt to crown the best 100 games of the decade - it isn't even definitive *for myself*, because I know I missed playing some games that definitely would have made this list, and if I write this list a couple years in the future it will look different as I add 10's games to it, or complete ones that are already on it that I haven't finished yet.

This list is two things:

1) A comprehensive list of my favorite 100 gaming experiences, of games released during the 10's, that I played during the 10's. Now that it is January 1, 2020, I have decided to completely cut this list off. It is done; no games I play after this shall be eligible. If I don't set this stipulation, then I'd never finish the list. What's done is done now - if I didn't play the game during the 10's, it ain't on this list, whether or not the reason I didn't play the game is stupid or not. This will do away with the paralysis I have of creating a list when I feel like there's good games I haven't played that I need to play before I can make my list.

2) A cry for help. I am afflicted with list-making disorder, as are many of you here. I have a demon inside of me, and this demon is absolutely obsessed with taking groups of things it has seen and ranking them in an orderly fashion from 1 to whenever it gets tired. I sometimes write these lists only for myself, out of sheer boredom. I am going to share this one so that I'm no longer shouting into the void; while I don't think my list is particularly fascinating, I feel like I have enough friends and acquaintances here who will give it a look over and help share the burden of my list madness by giving me an audience.

Basically, I thought it'd be fun to talk about my favorite games of the last ten years, so here I am. Talk about them with me! I encourage everyone to do this. Making lists and talking about them is a fun activity. I might be fucking crazy and haunted by a list demon.

How long do I have to get this in, I still need a few days to play some new games I bought

I think unplanned murders might lead to more interesting crime circumstances as the killer is forced to improvise and take more drastic actions. We get some more planned murders later in the series and they're just as wacky though so idk

Upon reflection, probably the best thing I can say about Obama is that he's so closely scrutinized that if he happened to be a really shitty person behind the scenes, we would all know about it by now, so he probably is a relatively decent person

This is the other problem I have with admiring people, we all only have parasocial relationships with our leaders and cultural icons, it's extremely difficult to trust them and their virtues knowing that so many of them are doomed to disappoint us in the end when we discover that they aren't as nice as the faces they put on for the public

Again, this doesn't mean that every public figure is an asshole, just that it's hard to keep expectations too high for any particular human being. Most of us are flawed to one degree or another, the truly saintly among us are rare, and they don't typically become President

red13n posted...

Keep in mind a lot of people are really lacking in good role models. Not everyone has a great family or access to a good support system. So for a lot of people what they see in public or on TV or whatever is all they have.

Believe me, I'm aware - I'm not really mad at people who picked Obama, they could have done so much worse, their pick at least doesn't reveal anything unflattering about their own character

The reason I can't think of who my most admired person is I think revolves around the fact that the qualities I find most admirable in people are the ones that lead me to not know their names. In modern society, merely having the ability to gain popularity on a national stage usually involves some serious character defects that would lead a person to even WANT that and to pursue it. That's not to say that there are no good people working in the highest offices and occupying the largest platforms, but there's an anti-correlation, because humility is my most admired attribute.

It's really a sign of how desensitized I am that the words that immediately drew my eye were KARATE PIZZA RESTAURANT

red13n posted...

I think part of the problem you are having with this is you are thinking too low scale on shared persons people could admire. Unless you are going to go towards athletes(Who honestly, are really not good role models), there isn't a lot of people that could get mass-admiration on a national level.

I'm aware of this mind you and I believe Jakyl is too, it's that for both Jakyl and I our thoughts immediately don't go to "the president" when we think of admirable qualities, and we find it a bit of an unfortunate cultural byproduct that most people do

red13n posted...

I mean, he also gets more spotlight than anyone because President of the United States is basically the highest outreach platform you could reach.

Who exactly are you hoping people admire?

The most admirable people to me are those whose hard work and sacrifices create more good for others than for themselves, and those who set good examples for how to be a good person in their daily lives, even when the cameras aren't on them

Mind you, I understand why the people with the largest platforms get the most votes here, all of the great nobodies in our world won't get votes for the simple reason that they aren't well known enough to have vote consolidation. But I think people who pick a President are deeply lacking in imagination and would do well to find better role models

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

Hes tried a lot of times, the only time hes been reticent was when his non-failure of a son was dying.

Yeah but that still counts for something in my book, it was a genuine display of caring more about grieving for his son than aspiring to power. If a loss in the family humbles him then that's a good thing, I can't imagine Donald Trump would stop campaigning if Eric got run over by a bus one day

LIGHTNING GANT is probably my favorite sprite in the entire series

red13n posted...

Look, Trump kind of ruins it, but do you not think, in an ideal world, the President should be someone we can admire?

Well, it's the other way around - the person we admire most is the one who should rise to the position of President, not the President being the one who should rise to the position of person we admire most

Although, even that's not really true - I don't really ascribe to this worldview that the President need be the all-encompassing most important person in the country, they just need to be the person who is most well-suited to leadership at the highest position, which isn't quite the same thing. Some people have the skills for that, others don't

The problem with being President is that I admire people who DON'T aspire to be President

I've said this before, but Biden's seeming reticence to throw his hat into the ring is probably the one quality of his that I find the most intriguing

Jakyl25 posted...

For you its probably Russell Wilson

oh dear god no, incredible QB, but as a person I find him honestly miserable

Marshawn Lynch is more my speed in dudes I admire

I mean, I can come up with reasons people admire Obama, but I can also come up with reasons people admire Trump

"Not being a pure trash fire of a president" is, I guess, a good enough reason, considering he's the only one in my lifetime

I'm not even sure who my most admired person would be. I don't spend a lot of time admiring other human beings

I feel like I'd need someone to pitch some really good answers at me

Make some safety saves coming up.

Did I beat this topic if I use rewinds/save states to go back to before I knew about it

I'm looking up the games on your list that I haven't heard of because based on the ones I have heard of you have really interesting taste

YAAAAAAY someone else who played Elsinore. It's really good!

The insinuation that the democratic party has as much of a racism problem as the republican party is frankly embarrassing, and I think you're better than that

Anagram posted...

Yeah, I know, but I was still amazed. I know later games still use the same basic sprite stuff, dont they?

For the most part every game has the same basic sprite style but I think every game that chronologically came after 1-5 has some kind of heavy quote-unquote "fancy" visual effect in it

DoomTheGyarados posted...

Yeah he is a little bit. Just not enough to be great lol

Still not my preferred candidate, it just puts me a little bit at ease on the idea of a republican lovefest from Biden because I now suspect more that he doesn't really mean it

Anagram posted...

- Did did that glove fall out of the locker the first time I watched the video? Because I could swear it didnt and it was added the second time.

It did. They didn't pull something cheap on you like editing the footage, I promise.

The security video is probably my favorite part of 1-5, maybe one of my favorite parts of the whole series. It's just a really satisfying piece of evidence to look over.

Anagram posted...

- The most shocking thing in the entire game is that someone animated human figures moving in this security footage.

This is one of those "2001 vs 2005" things I was referring to. You're playing a DS game now, whereas you were previously playing a GBA game

Weirdly enough, Biden saying he'd consider a unity ticket in a 4D chess way almost makes me trust him more - his comments about reaching across the aisle to work with republicans have made me feel really uneasy, but I don't believe for a second that he's so friendly with republicans that he'd ACTUALLY consider bringing one on as his VP, so it makes me feel slightly more confident that he'd just playing the game.

Naye745 posted...

man, i really want to get into slay the spire but i'm hesitant because it's a rabbit hole i'm not sure i'm willing to go hundreds of hours into right now lol

Well, you can get enjoyment out of playing it for like 5 hours too, unless you just mean you won't have the willpower to not play it for 500