Board 8 > Para's top 100 games of the decade, 2010-2019

(+) Yeah! (+)

Unwound Future was really good!

I started The Last Spectre but didn't get far into it before moving on to other things. Need to get back into it.

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#55





Years of release: 2016 (PC)
Beaten?: No, but I should've

Oh, man. How embarrassing is it for Nintendo that this game exists? You know it has to be really annoying for them, given that they came out with Samus Returns a few year later, and I could almost swear it's SOLELY to spite AM2R. Maybe they already had the idea to do it before AM2R but I kind of doubt it. I haven't played Samus Returns yet, maybe it's good! But regardless, when I think of the definitive Metroid 2 remake, I always think of this first. I'll probably never think of Samus Returns first.

I really like the original Metroid 2, despite the fact that is somewhat maligned as a black sheep of the family. It's a little bit annoying to play, with a claustrophobically-zoomed in camera and a non-euclidean map space resulting in really having no idea where the fuck you are at any given time, but damn if I don't love the eerie, creepy atmosphere this old game boy game has. I unironically love the soundtrack to Metroid 2, which mostly consists of the catchy overworld theme, the incredibly bizarre chozo ruins theme, and a lot of weird sound effect ambiance by the same guy who brought you Wario Land 4. But it's definitely a game that could really use a proper remake, in the style of Zero Mission for Metroid 1. It's a game that aged even more poorly than Metroid 1 did (I love Metroid 1 by the way) and a fresh coat of paint and a modernization of style could do it some good.

And so, AM2R did. I absolutely love projects like this that are just a singular person's vision, put together as a labor of love, and given how long AM2R was in development it must have been a labor indeed. It was worth it - the care that went into making this really shines in every aspect. You really couldn't tell it's not an official Metroid game; if there's anything that gives it away, I don't know what it is. Samus looks and controls exactly as she does in Zero Mission and the like, and all the enemies and tilesets look like they're straight out of something Nintendo would make, if not better. It's pretty much exactly what you want, and that's why it must be annoying for Nintendo - I don't think anything they even could make would top this.

I've been saying for a while now that Nintendo should hire people like AM2R's dev and just outsource their franchises to them on the cheap. There's clearly still hunger for classic revivals of old Nintendo games, and it would have made a lot of sense for AM2R to basically be released as an official product. This way Nintendo doesn't have to worry about appeasing fans of their legacy franchises every few years. God, just throw the F-Zero franchise to the people who made Fast Racing NEO or something, poor F-Zero fans really need a break. At least we are getting some Metroid games out of Nintendo every five years or so - who knows when Metroid Prime 4 will come out - but for me nothing beats a classic Metroid like this one.

#54





Years of release: 2011 (PC/360), 2015 (PS4/Vita), 2016 (XB1), 2018 (Switch) (always with the Switch being late to the party)
Beaten?: Yes

Wow, it feels like this one was a really long time ago. This is another one of those indie games that just feels like it came out of an earlier age, back when people were starting to wake up to the fact that indie games were A Thing That Exists Now.

This one still really holds up though. It's pretty as hell and it plays like a dream; it's clever and unique enough that I could have been convinced that it came out yesterday, not ten years ago. It's an isometric hack-and-slash sort of game, but it's elevated by its colorful world and the infamously-awesome narration that goes on in the background as you explore it. It's a visual tour de force; seeing all of the ground just sort of burst into view as you walk never gets old to watch, and every frame looks like some kind of crazy painting.

The game's fun too. The different selection of weapons you can use are all really fun and remarkably balanced - I spent a lot of time deciding which weapon combinations I wanted to take to any given level, and I never really wound up having a particular favorite or go-to setup, everything kind of has its pros and cons. Gradually building up the town and acquiring all these upgrades - as well as extra difficulty modifiers - is extremely satisfying too, that plus the plot gives the game a really satisfying sense of progression that keeps pushing it along. It's a game with plenty of content, but it's short enough to not overstay its welcome.

I've replayed this game once and I think I could probably go back and replay it again now since it's been a while. I'd consider speedrunning it, but the speedrun of this game looks hard as fuck, there's so much tech and precise execution that I just don't think I'd be able to keep up. I also need to get around to playing Supergiant's followup games, Transistor and Pyre, both of which I've heard are fantastic. Like I said, I tried to play Pyre, but it didn't work out.

It's been like eight years and I still have that "I'll dig my hole, you build a wall" song stuck in my head.

Heyo Armello, I've also gravitated to cute animal characters so woo. And you'll get a game one of these days I swear!

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And play Pyre the moment you can with your computer/whatever console it's on that you have situation because it's by far my favorite of the Supergiant games (might be in the minority on that but whatever I just love the visual novel aspect of it so much and the sportsball is really fun)

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#53





Years of release: 2014 (PC, original), 2015 (PC/PS4/XB1, enhanced edition)
Beaten?: No, I got about halfway

One of my bigger misses this decade is that I didn't get around to playing Divinity: Original Sin II, which I've heard is an absolutely spectacular sequel; but, not knowing anything about that one, the original one holds up really well for me, and it's one of my favorite RPGs of the decade.

I think what stood out to me most is that this game kind of captures the feel of what it's like to play a pen-and-paper RPG in video game form more than most other games I've played. Not just the game's skills, but also things in the environment, objects laying around, etc. can combo together in unexpected ways, and that adds a sort of emergent property to strategizing fights in this game. I haven't played many RPGs that allow you to just pick up an explosive barrel from across the room, put it in your inventory, and then set it down next to you before starting a fight! Just in general, I'm surprised by how often this game sort of lets you do whatever you want and break the rules; you don't need keys if you can just break down the door, or teleport into the room. You don't need to negotiate with an NPC if you just feel like killing them instead. Every quest gives you a lot of different options and it's fun to see what you can get away with.

The tactical aspect of combat is fantastic, too. More than most RPGs, playing this one and deciding what spells to cast when, who to attack and how, it feels almost more like a puzzle, and it's a challenging puzzle, so figuring out whatever advantages you can is a big deal. I love to play this one co-op, too, even though it's a turn-based game, because figuring out the puzzle together with a friend is a really fun time.

It's been a while since I've played this, so I don't have a lot of thoughts on it, but I did really enjoy the hell out of it, and I wish I had beaten it. I played quite a few hours in it with two different friends but both campaigns fizzled out about halfway through the game, haha, so I've never seen the ending, but I really ought to go back and play it sometime. And then play the sequel! See, I don't ALWAYS hate long, sprawling WRPGs.

Bane_Of_Despair posted...

And play Pyre the moment you can with your computer/whatever console it's on that you have situation because it's by far my favorite of the Supergiant games (might be in the minority on that but whatever I just love the visual novel aspect of it so much and the sportsball is really fun)

Yeah, I tried to play Pyre on my computer and it just wasn't having it, it couldn't run it properly. I might try again sometime but if it doesn't work I'll have to resort to waiting until I have a new PC. Oh well.

Pyre is my favorite Supergiant game (of the first three, haven't tried the new one), it's really good.

Playing Co-Op Divinity Original Sin was extremely fun. My compatriot handled most of the talky bits while I went around robbing the entire town before selling everything back to them.

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Tag

Yep, pyre is my favourite as well. But it's obviously the most unique/ different, so icould understand being turned off

Some great characters, art, and magic basketball


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The magic basketball concept interests me a great deal, I think the idea of "a sports game, but it's not really sports, it just kind of evokes the same concepts as sports" is an underutilized game design concept

I am enjoying this list.

if I ever made a list Unwound Future would likely be in my top 5

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#52





Years of release: 2014 (PC), 2015 (expansion), 2017 (PS4), 2018 (Switch)
Beaten?: Yes

There is extremely little of importance that I could really say about Kero Blaster. It's nothing groundbreaking - it is a little run-and-gun platformer about a frog. It's fantastic. It's Pixel's 'followup' of sorts to his much more famous game, Cave Story, and I think Kero Blaster got a little overlooked, for some reason. I actually remember that this wasn't originally on Steam, but I just bought it directly off his website or something like that, I think; maybe that had something to do with this game's relative obscurity? I'm not sure. It's not as much of a classic as Cave Story, but it lays claim to being just as good.

It ditches the Metroidvania-lite aspects and goes straight for a level-based Contra sort of style, which I think works. I've speedrun this - it's great fun. The level design's solid; the boss fights are great. As par for the course for Daisuke Amaya's stuff, though, the art style is extremely charming and the music is catchy as all fuck, which really brings the whole thing together. It still blows my mind that both Cave Story and this game are the sole creation of just a single person; how can that much talent possibly be concentrated in a single person? It's not fair. This game looks great, sounds great, and plays great. I dunno how he pulls it off. Maybe the fact that it's just one dev is why the whole game feels so cohesive, being that it's just one person's unique artistic vision.

I haven't played the 'updated' version of this game but I hear that it definitely adds a lot. It's funny how many of these games I've listed so far have gone on to add more content after I already played and finished them, haha - this isn't the last one on the list either. But I liked Kero Blaster enough as it was anyway. It's a short little romp but it's a damn solid platformer oozing with charm, and that's enough to earn my attention.

#51





Years of release: 2011 (PS3/360), 2019 (PC/PS4 remake)
Beaten?: Yes

This is the one PS3 game on my list! In most cases, not owning a PS3 or PS4, I haven't really played too many games on either console, but in this one case, my friends and I did a full playthrough of Catherine while I was staying at their house for a few weeks, so this is kind of a weird outlier. But it's both a story game AND a puzzle game! So it's like, right up my alley, even though I hilariously have precious little experience with other Atlus games.

Playing this one with a friends probably elevated it way higher in my mind than it would have been if I just played it alone. The story segments were really entertaining to play with friends, debating over what texts we should send out and what choices we should select as we climbed the tower; my one female friend in the group wanted us to go 'good', but the men in the group all decided, almost as a joke, to go full neutral; we eventually succeeded in getting the neutral ending, and we all fucking marked out when it resulted in VINCENT GOING TO SPACE. We all high fived and yelled TRUE NEUTRAL!!! I don't know if my other friend has forgiven us for this.

Passing the controller around among 5 people was a fun way to play the game too - every time someone LOVE IS OVERed, the controller would go around and someone else would take a shot at it. The puzzle gameplay here felt surprisingly deep and engaging considering I expected this to mostly be a little visual novelly story adventure. I like box-pushing puzzles, and figuring out the most efficient way to climb each tower was really satisfying, and our group of friends cheering each other on made it extra fun. Some of the later levels are really hard and puzzle like, which made solving them as a group great. Plus, this way I never got burnt out on actually playing the game, since most of the time someone else would be having a go at it. I really like playing through games pass-the-controller style like this for this reason.

I haven't played the remake yet, which I've heard added some interesting content. There's been some controversy swirling around the game which has made me a bit hesitant - the original game wasn't great about handling a trans character, and the remake kind of fixed some issues but might have introduced some others? I'll have to play it for myself to judge I guess, but I'm willing to hear it out. I don't really want to get into all of that here, I just thought it was worth mentioning.

I don't know that either Divinity OS is all that long...I'm pretty sure if I played solo I could complete them rather quickly but I am always tempted to play with others(Which does make it a lot more fun) and the way the game is setup that just makes simple tasks take a long time. I've had a lot of fun with both games but also never finished either one.

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Catherine is weird. Ended up liking that game for the opposite reasons I figured I would going in - came for the story concept, stayed for the puzzle action gameplay. I ended up thinking the plot was dumb but can still hear EDGE! clear as day.

Your personal experience playing it with friends sounds awesome though, don't think I've had a game where me an a bunch of friends played it all at the same time while switching off.

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Now that I'm halfway through, a couple of things. First, I feel like such an idiot, because I probably curated this list over the last 4 months or so, and yet in the last week, I wound up discovering THREE 2010 games that I forgot to include. I already mentioned Unwound Future, but I'm going to cover these two now as well. It's too late to put them on the list, but oh well!

Oops I Fucked Up #1



Years of release: 2010 (Wii), 2019 (3DS)
Beaten?: Yes
Should've ranked: In the 70's or 80's

I just knew there was going to be at least one DS or Wii game that escaped my notice! For 3DS, PC, etc I have activity metrics and such to help me not miss anything, but I don't have anything like that for DS and Wii games, and it's really easy for me to forget which ones count for this decade and which ones don't. Unfortunately, this one actually DID come out in 2010, even though it feels like it was a year or two before that.

I love Kirby's Epic Yarn. I don't think there's any Kirby games on my decade list, sadly, but Kirby is still a great series nontheless; the games are just plain fun, even if they're not meant to be uber-challenging. Epic Yarn really is in a cuteness class of its own though - I love the yarn style and the adorable piano soundtrack. I like the gameplay too - this is one of the rare Kirby games that lacks copy powers and while I wouldn't say the game is better off for it, there's something nice about this being kind of a return to Kirby sucking things up (or in this case, grabbing them with yarn) and throwing them at enemies.

Oops I Fucked Up #2



Years of release: 2009 (DS, Japan), 2010 (DS, NA), 2017 (PC/PS4/Vita)
Beaten?: Yes
Should've ranked: In the 40's

Oh god, what a fucking idiot. I facepalmed so hard when I realized this game came out in 2010 in my country; I had always had this marked down as a 2009 game, aka not a game of this decade, but that was only in Japan. I can't write it off as a 2009 game, because there is another game on this list coming up that has a 2009 Japanese release date, so I just plain fucked up. I could've combined it with VLR as "The Nonary Games" later on my list (spoilers, VLR made the cut in my top 50, that should be really plainly obvious though) but the two games are too different and distinct for that to make any sense. This should absolutely be on my games of the decade list but I failed to account for it for some reason.

999 is great. I played it pretty much solely on the recommendation of Board 8, after they didn't steer me wrong with Phoenix Wright; you guys didn't steer me wrong here either. For all of its pseudo-philosophical bullshit and absolutely bizarre plot and sometimes frustrating gameplay mechanics, 999 is definitely one hell of a ride, a visual novel mystery experience unlike anything I've previously experienced, and I was hooked from beginning to end. There's a lot of great moments in this one that are worth the price of admission.

Before I continue, I just wanted to give a few quick hits for all of the games that I had seriously considered on this list but eventually cut. It's not a completely exhaustive list - if I sat here talking about every game I played this decade that I liked we'd be here all day. These are just the most notable ones.

Rogue Legacy - This game was the last cut off of my list. Not quite a 'pure' roguelite, but still scratches the same itch of throwing disposable characters into a randomly generated dungeon. I didn't like that you don't find a lot of upgrades for your current run inside, but bringing a lot of stuff back to upgrade your next character is pretty fun, and there's a simple sort of joy in building yourself up until you're powerful enough to win. Fun speedgame that I'd be inclined to pick up every now and then.

Wargroove - This game was the second-to-last cut off my list. I haven't really gotten that far into it, but I'd like to get back to it. It's a spiritual successor to Advance Wars, and it's... kind of successful! There's a lot of really good Nintendo polish throughout, in the UI and the visual and character designs and such, but the game plays even slower than the Advance Wars games do, and I think that sluggishness holds me back a little. Apparently, I've been told, the single player campaign isn't great and the multiplayer is where it's at, but I haven't felt compelled to play all the way through the single player campaign yet. I will DEFINITELY go back to this game eventually and see if I can 'figure it out' more. Caesar is best boy.

Nidhogg - This game was the third-to-last cut off my list. Always love a good couch multiplayer game, and I love the tournament structure that you can set up in this one. Watching two people battle it out while everyone else cheers them on is really fun. I think, unfortunately, this game struggles a bit with the fact that games can go on for way too long - it's easily possible for both players to stalemate and fail to make any sort of progress against each other, which makes this game drag on more than a competitive game should. Still, I really love the concept and it's great fun.

Lethal League - Really fun little fighting game where you have to try to bat a ball at each other to KO your opponent. Love the concept here, it's simple and fast and anyone can pick up and play it and have a good time. Has been a staple of couch multiplayer play. If you try to pick Latch I WILL FIGHT YOU FOR HIM.

Mega Man 11 - It's good, but it's not quite great and I don't know why. I think the level design here is really good, and the modernization of Mega Man was ultimately successful - I love that all the enemies still have that goofy huge-eye design that they always do, and it looks great in modern 2.5D graphics. I think what holds me back here is that I can't remember a single song from this game's soundtrack, and for a Mega Man game that's a huge dealbreaker - I also felt like the later levels of this game felt rushed. Again, it's good, but it's not great. It's better than Mighty No 9, at least. Mighty No 9 will not be appearing on this list.

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked - I wasn't sure if I should even include this game on the list, since the original was before 2010, but I only played the 3DS remake which was after, and it added a lot of content. Fun tactics/RPG game with cool monster raising mechanics - I never beat it, couldn't beat the final boss, haha. Pretty strong game, but a bad soundtrack holds it back for me.

Doki Doki Literature Club - Well, this sure was a thing. You're probably familiar with the game, and I don't need to say any more. Or you're not, in which case I refuse to say anything more. It's good.

Antichamber - Once this game starts being about like, puzzles where you use a gun to shoot blocks at stuff, it kind of loses its edge. The best part of this game is just the crazy dimension-warping mechanics, where you can turn around and retrace your steps and discover that you aren't in the same place as you were before, and how objects can look different from different angles. It totally breaks the rules of how basic 3D game logic is supposed to work, and that's one hell of a trip.

Pac-Man Championship Edition DX - Even though I've never been a huge fan of Pac-Man, I played this one because some people swear by it, and I really like it! It really takes the basic concept of Pac-Man and makes something new and fresh out of it - this plays so much faster and exciting that I can hardly imagine playing a normal game of Pac-Man afterwards.

Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver - I didn't forget about it! This one came out in 2010 too, and I really liked it - I love the Johto region, I love that you can have Pokemon follow you, I think this game had the absolute best minigames too. And the Pokewalker! How could I forget the Pokewalker, that thing was awesome and I really miss it. Overall I think it's one of the best Pokemon games they ever made, but I have a problem going back to older gens like this - gen 1 and 2 Pokemon are retro enough that they just feel different, but gen 4 is in a really awkward zone where it's not quite modern but not quite different enough. I ultimately cut it off of this list in favor of Sun and Moon, which I prefer.

Picross e - Not exactly groundbreaking, but the Picross e series for the 3DS were a staple of my 'I need to kill some fucking time let me play a nice, easy puzzle game' time. I love Picross puzzles, and some of the new modes they added into later games, like Mega Picross, really added a lot of challenge.

Splatoon - I only played a little bit of the original Splatoon and I haven't touched the sequel at all. They're really good though - I see why people rave about them. I just don't really play online games that much nowadays, it always makes me feel like I'm missing out so I just don't bother. This one still deserves an honorable mention though, because the concept is a real winner and it's fun to play even barely knowing how.

Shantae and the Pirate's Curse - The Shantae games are never quite as good as I'm hoping, but this is still a fun little Metroidvania-ish adventure, even if it's kind of light on content or challenge - and DAMN does it have an incredible soundtrack. That's the only reason I'm listing it here really, it's one of my favorite game soundtracks of the decade. That guy, Virt, he knows what he's doing.

Pokemon Go - Finally, this game is just built to be an honorable menton. To me, Pokemon Go feels less like a game, and more like a fun outdoors activity. I don't mean that to sound like I'm gatekeeping what counts as a "real game" or anything like that, I'm just completely disengaged with this as a game, and more

You know, I never really realized why I dont like Devil Survivor 1 as highly as I want to (considering I love a lot about it) until you made me realize I'd been repressing how bad some of that music was. Thanks, I guess?

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KamikazePotato posted...

You know, I never really realized why I dont like Devil Survivor 1 as highly as I want to (considering I love a lot about it) until you made me realize I'd been repressing how bad some of that music was. Thanks, I guess?

you're welcome?

KamikazePotato posted...

You know, I never really realized why I dont like Devil Survivor 1 as highly as I want to (considering I love a lot about it) until you made me realize I'd been repressing how bad some of that music was.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZceekooDGo&t=33s
WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT'S SUPER REPETITIVE AND ANNOYING I DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT

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MrSmartGuy posted...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZceekooDGo&t=33s
WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT'S SUPER REPETITIVE AND ANNOYING I DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT

yep, this exact song is the one I was thinking of

meanwhile Devil Survivor 2 loses out hard on characters/plot compared to 1, but at least has a few pretty quality songs

Enjoying the list. Really enjoyed the Keep Talking review. Liked the Link's Awakening mention, thank you for reminding me of nostalgia

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Devil Survivor 2 is one of the most I've ever disappointed in a video game, but I will admit it didn't have this as its main battle theme:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oy-2BmuqkFE

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Devil Survivor 2 has some great boss themes tbqh.

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Was busy all day today but I'll probably do some more of these tomorrow during football

Holy fuck, wait Heart Gold and Soul Silver came out in 2010!??

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I realized I missed another 2010 game lol but it's borderline enough that I'll just honorable mention it when talking about another related game

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

wait Heart Gold and Soul Silver came out in 2010!??

Famously dropped on the day of Bowser/Charizard during the 2010 Character Battle...!

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#50




Years of release: 2017 (PC/PS4/XB1), 2019 (Switch), I remember there was a beta version earlier than that but I don't remember when
Beaten?: Currently playing!

My god, is this just what video games are now? Small teams of plucky developers do what it took much larger studios to do 20 years ago, and they do it better? We live in really awesome times for gaming when humble little games like A Hat In Time exist that put an entire genre of video games on notice - in this case, the 3D collectathon platformer of the 90's.

I'm only about halfway through the game so far so I can't quite fully judge the whole thing, therefore ranking this game was really tough. Its peaks have been high and its valleys have been low. The best levels in this game so far have been like transcendantly good and the worst levels have felt unfinished. It's very weird!

Just take act 2, for instance, the bird movie world. The first level is an inspired sneaking level through an active movie studio; getting written up fines for knocking over set pieces and causing a general ruckus, while it doesn't amount to anything, is funny, gives the level a lot of personality and surprise, and the level is fun to play. The murder mystery on the train is incredibly long and involved with a cool sepia aesthetic and hilarious crows that interrogate you for your internet passwords; it's so fleshed out that it's amazing that it's just a single level. The speedrun level on the train is short, but it's pure platforming goodness that's fun from start to finish. And the parade level in the city is ingenious; having to keep moving while a parade following you keeps threatening to crash into you and fireworks are going off everywhere around you is a great concept, and the level is legitimately challenging to beat.

And then, on the other hand, this world also contains two levels that are completely useless; one where you have to run around the city building your 'brand' as a movie star with the fans, but there's basically nothing to it, no challenges or surprises at all, just going to locations and watching your fan total increase. And the final level is like they forgot to make a level - an incredibly long level of exploring a warehouse where there's nothing going on but I kept getting lost among stacks and stacks of boxes anyway. Completely dull, but the boss fight at the end was good.

A Hat In Time keeps being like this for me. There are so many moments here that are well thought out and full of charm, and then there's levels that just don't feel fully baked. But I'm choosing to focus on the good over the bad here, because most of what I've played has been good so far - levels with inventive mechanics and cute characters and lots of interesting surprises. Most of the time, it really puts the 3D platformers of old to shame - this one plays faster and has more variety and is just all around more polished. I will keep playing, and I expect good things about 80% of the time. At its heights this is like a top 20 game.

Nidhogg's really good but yeah if two people stalemate it can go on and on. I had a match with a friend that was around 25 minutes, most of that in the starting room.

That's why we have a house rule that the boomerang modifier is always on, it seems to reduce stalemates.

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#49





Years of release: 2018 (PC/Switch)
Beaten?: Yes

It took me a year before I ended up finally picking this one up, despite the fact that it's clearly up my alley, and I don't really know what I was worried about. I just never felt like I was in the mood for picking up a strategy game like this, and when I had watched brief gameplay videos of it I had made it out in my head to seem a lot more complicated than it really was. When I actually picked it up and played it, I found that it was a lot more simple and accessible than I expected, and unfortunately, a bit less robust. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out whether or not I liked it or hated it. I ultimately fell on the side of liking it, as 50 hours of playtime attests to.

Into the Breach has a little bit of an Advance Wars-like appeal to it but I guess I'd compare it more to something like XCom? It's a turn-based strategy game in which you control a team of three mechs that jump through a time warp to try to save earth from invading bug aliens before everything's destroyed. You warp into various maps, depending the cities and yourselves from the bugs, trying to protect particular objectives for a set number of turns, usually 4. The gimmick is that the bugs always telegraph their attack patterns, allowing you to respond to what they're about to do - you have all the time in the world to coordinate your mech's three attacks so that they neutralize the incoming threats as efficiently as possible. The game is VERY focused on positional tactics, not just doing damage, and the most fun ways to win involve putting the enemies in front of each other so that they attack each other.

I should probably move onto hard mode, because normal mode started out pretty easy and has become more or less trivial - once you get good at thinking about the best ways to move your enemies around the map, you can make the best out of very nearly any situation, outside of the rare times that you manage to set yourself up for failure or you get yourself overwhelmed. I keep playing normal mode because I keep wanting to unlock these dumb achievements though.

My frustrations with the game mostly boiled down to some finicky RNG elements - 'time pods', which are basically random treasure chests you sometimes get, are incredibly important resources but sometimes they randomly have an extra weapon or pilot in them and sometimes they don't, which is frustrating, because there aren't enough rewards in this game to ultimately get compensated for rolling bad luck once in a while. I got over it though, as I got better at the game. To the extent that now the game doesn't feel like it has enough variance. It doesn't feel very much like your crew changes over the run - what you start with is pretty much what you get, you'll sometimes pick up some interesting new weaponry but it doesn't always work really well with your setup, or you don't have enough energy to power it. Compared to other roguelike-y games, which I guess this is, this one just doesn't have a lot of variance, I think to its detriment - you never feel like you're like, trying to just 'make it work' with what you get, you have a nearly complete plan of what to do from the outset. Some runs can get pretty repetitive as a result.

But the pros outweigh the cons here, I just happen to be in a complain-y mood about this game I guess. Sometimes that happens when I get further along in my list, because I just like the game so much. The game design here is incredibly sharp and polished, this game feels a bit like a board game with how well calibrated all of the math is, every move you take in this game will feel perfectly deliberate and like it has a purpose, and small mistakes can really hurt you. All of the tactical choices you have to make here are extremely fun, every level kind of plays out like a puzzle - most given turns have a way to get out of them without taking any damage to the city (more important than not taking mech damage, since that repairs, but city damage doesn't), and it can be really satisfying when you see the puzzle-like answer to pushing the enemies around in such a way to avoid disaster. This game can go south pretty quickly if you're not vigilant which makes solid play feel satisfying.

Once I get some of these achievements I want to get I'll start playing on hard and see if that's a little more satisfying than normal, but I think in general this'll be a game I come back to every now and then when I want something to play without too much involvement. It's a good "I feel like having something to look at while watching a youtube video" kind of game, and that's a pretty high compliment! I need those types of games. But I sort of doubt it has hundreds of hours of replayability in it, so it falls short of the higher tiers of my list.

KamikazePotato posted...

Devil Survivor 2 is one of the most I've ever disappointed in a video game, but I will admit it didn't have this as its main battle theme:

Whoa now, don't be dissing my Aggressive Tune. That song bangs.

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The secret squad you unlock for getting all achievements is disappointing so dont let that prevent you from just playing on Hard if you want.

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#48





Years of release: 2012 (3DS)
Beaten?: Yes

Man, remember this game? I remember when it felt like this game was going to be a big revival for the franchise that would lead to sequels, but now it's 2020 and we still have not gotten a followup to this game. Nothing on Wii U, nothing on Switch. I haven't seen people talk much about it as a major game of the decade, either. It's a damn shame, because this game still stacks up to me as one of the best third-person action games out there.

This game isn't even my style, at all. I normally don't play a lot of fast-paced, character-action games - for whatever reason that I can't really explain to you, this type of game is just not my game. I don't like to be running about in 3D worlds fighting stuff while dodge-rolling everywhere. But this game totally won me over, just through style alone. It's a legitimately funny game with bizarre enemy designs that make me smile every time I see them, the action is thrilling but forgiving enough for someone kind of bad at the game like me, and the weapon crafting is really fun to tinker with and adds a lot to the game.

I wish the controls were a little easier to handle, which is why the game doesn't rank higher on my list. I don't know what could have been done to make it easier, since the whole issue of being able to aim with the touchscreen while also controlling a bunch of things means that no matter what you're going to have to hold the 3DS like a particularly overworked crab. It might have been unavoidable, but despite having reasonably-sized and reasonably non-arthritic hands I had a fair bit of trouble playing this game, and I wish I didn't. It did kind of hold me back from wanting to play this game a whole lot and especially from speedrunning it. But, eh, on the other hand, it allows you to have a pretty free range of motion while also being able to aim wherever the hell you want, so that's a plus. Once you've got your hands in the exact position they need to be to hit all the necessary buttons, it plays well.

Seriously, it's malpractice that we haven't gotten another one of these since. I guess Sakurai is too busy with Smash, which is the closest thing we've gotten to a Kid Icarus sequel. Still, this one holds up, and it's probably the closest to flawless we could get anyway without some kind of major controls overhaul. I'm worried this franchise has gotten thrown right back into the same limbo that F-Zero went to in the mid-00's though.

#47





Years of release: 2012 (3DS, Japan), 2014 (3DS, NA/AU/EU)
Beaten?: Yes

The biggest flaw of the Professor Layton series, if there is one, is that the mystery plots aren't very exciting, and there isn't a lot of satisfaction to be gotten out of the meager investigating the player has to do before Layton just solves the entire mystery for you. The biggest flaw of the Ace Attorney series, if there is one, is that the game doesn't really challenge the player's brain too terribly often, and anytime the series offers some sort of puzzly thing during an investigation it's always kind of lame (see: the vase in 1-5). Each series excels at what the other lacks; the perfect ingredients for a crossover.

The result is the best Layton game and not the best Ace Attorney game, but really good overall. AA's penchance for drama and intrigue really adds a lot to the Layton formula; this game's plot is, in my opinion, vastly more exciting than any of the Layton games aside from maybe Unwound Future, and while this game mostly plays like a Layton game throughout, you can really tell in the moments when the AA influences take over in character design and plot intrigue, because frankly, Layton's never really taken those parts too seriously. The Layton puzzles are a nice addition to the AA formula, though, really breaking up the action nicely and giving this game a lot of variety.

And, of course, it's just really fun to see Layton and Luke team up with Phoenix and Maya. I don't see a lot of crossovers that excite me like this one does; I mean, Smash is great and all, but there's something really fun about seeing two kind-of-niche properties that you like mashed up into a really unexpected crossover that nontheless complement each other really well. The fact that this game even exists at all is a treat.

It's not ranked higher because the game's final act kind of drops the ball; it's really long and mostly just an overcomplicated explanation of a dumb Layton plot, and Phoenix feels like he almost completely takes a backseat during it. But the game's third trial is just as good as the best the Ace Attorney series has to offer - in fact, it elevates itself to one of the best cases in the series, in my opinion, and that's no exaggeration. So this game's got some highs and some lows. Overall, it doesn't have quite as much content or do anything really as mindblowing as the best Ace Attorney games, and the Layton puzzles are a fair deal easier than the puzzles in other Layton games, most of these kind of feel like puzzles they cut from other games. But it's two of my favorite series - or, well, one of my favorite series and another series I really like - masked up together and what's not to love about that?

L-3 is so good. Layton/PW is a mixed bag in a lot of ways, but I still enjoyed the experience and it motivated me to try out the Layton series.

also I watched the original trailer for this game not too long ago and I'm kinda sad we didn't get that game instead...!

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Kid Icarus Uprising is so good. Definitely a shame there's no sequel, though I'm not sure I trust a sequel to replicate the things that made Uprising stand out.

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I tried playing Uprising, but honestly the controls were kind of awkward to me. It hurt my hands after a while with the way I had to hold the 3DS.

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#46





Years of release: 2013 (Wii U)
Beaten?: Yes

For some people, it's Super Mario 3D World. For others, it's Xenoblade Chronicles X, or The Wonderful 101, both of which are games I have not played. But for me, the crown jewel of Wii U games that have not been ported to or received a meaningful replacement on the Switch is Pikmin 3.

It's a shame (I feel like this is becoming a cliche in my writing) because I think being doomed to the Wii U left this one as an overlooked and underrated gem, but it might be the best game in the series, and it's a good series! The original Pikmin was one of the first three games I owned on the GC, along with Luigi's Mansion and SSBM, and it was definitely the biggest surprise for me, with its beautiful, lush world and engaging, challenging tactics. The sequel was good, though I wasn't really that huge a fan of the dungeon-delving compared to doing stuff on the overworld.

Pikmin 3 finds a nice balance here - there's more linear puzzle-solving kind of areas here than in the original Pikmin, but they're mostly set outside or at least in indoor areas that don't look too samey. The level design here is great - the placement of every enemy and obstacle feels very deliberately thought out and the levels are the right mix of challenging to figure out and easy to get lost in without being too wildly intimidating. The boss fights in this game are by far the best in the series too, I used to find them frustrating in the previous games but here the difficulty feels tuned just right, and guiding my Pikmin to the places they need to be feels more intuitive than it used to be. Rock Pikmin and Winged Pikmin are both extremely nice additions to the game, better than the previous unique Pikmin we got. Having three playable characters that you can switch between is a great gameplay addition as well, really opens up your options for how to approach any given level. How do you divide up your parties and what tasks do you have them do? Makes it a lot easier to set some Pikmin to do something and then multitask with another character. So many great additions to the series here that both improve the game's strategic space while also improving its quality of life.

I'm worried that this one may be consigned to the Wii U forever, since the gamepad is a pretty big part of the game, although I think it's possible to work around it. I hope they do, because this one deserves to be lifted out of Wii U purgatory (I love the Wii U, to be honest, but it is what it is). I kinda suspect that this game will remain one of the best reasons to pick up a cheap used Wii U though.

#45





Years of release: 2013 (PC)
Beaten?: Yes

Another fangame! This has been a good decade for fangames, as the bar of entry to game dev has gotten lower, the ability to replicate games from the 80's and 90's has gotten significantly easier with the use of modern game design tools, and the desire to do so has largely become the domain of small-time devs who grew up loving these games and want to see them done right. I'm all in favor of this.

The greatest compliment I can give Mega Man Unlimited is that, much like AM2R earlier on my list, I frequently just straight up forget that it's not an official game, and internally I sort of think of it as being canon even though it isn't. (I ranked this game higher than AM2R mostly because I'm a bigger Mega Man fan by the way, ha.) It's pretty damn close to something that the Capcom team would have made! Especially at the time they made MM9/MM10.

This game gets a lot of stuff right. The visuals look authentically Mega Man, especially the enemy design, which captures that goofy big-eyes look well, and all the new enemies here are arguably even more clever than real Mega Man games. The game controls exactly like you would expect a Mega Man game to. The level themes are all clever; the weapons are all extremely useful. Even the music, with a few exceptions that were clearly written by a different person (I think they got replaced at some point?), really holds up on its own against other Mega Man soundtracks, and possibly even excels, I think.

The only knock I have to give this game is that I think it's trying just a little too hard. Even for me, an experienced Mega Man veteran, this game is quite a mountain to climb; the levels in this game are long and sometimes full of finicky instadeath traps, and there's almost never a chance to take a breather as every room of this game is chock full of challenge. I really have to psych myself up and take an advil or two before I play this game because it kind of gives me a headache. It's hard. It's not quite SO unfair as to be unplayable though - it's still within acceptable difficulty range for a game like this, but it's definitely on the outer range.

It's a fairly minor quibble. This is a really ambitious and well executed project, and I think it says a lot that this game has been featured not just once, but twice at GDQ, which is warranted, because it's a really good speed game. I don't know if there are any other Mega Man fan games that outclass it - I saw that Rock & Roll one the other day and I didn't get around to playing it during this decade, but maybe I should pick that one up too since it looked pretty professional. I'll bet it's better than Mighty No 9 at minimum.

The next game on my list is one I would be surprised if a single other person here has ever played (aside from one person who I know has).

#44





Years of release: 2012 (PC)
Beaten?: No, and I doubt I ever will

I really, REALLY wish the rest of my list was as interesting as this. Frankly, aside from a few oddball picks on this list, MOST of it I think encompasses pretty average tastes; it's a pretty standard list of Nintendo and popular indie titles released in the last ten years. But once in a while, I'll stumble across, and fall in love with, something really strange, and I wish I did it more often.

The Fool And His Money is probably the most obscure game on this list by a rather wide margin. A sequel to the Mac puzzle game from... I want to say 1987, The Fool's Errand (another obscure game I happen to have played and loved), TFAHM is perhaps the most difficult puzzle game I've ever played, and if you want to buy it, you won't find it on Steam or any other digital storefront - you need to go to Cliff Johnson's personal website and send him an email saying you want to buy it for like 30 bucks. I have no regrets about doing so - Cliff Johnson is exactly the sort of outsider game dev who I want to support. (I recommend signing up for his email list of terrible jokes and other weird stuff just for the experience of having done so.)

This game is extremely weird in a way I can't really describe to you. It's gaming outsider art at its finest; a game of nearly impossible word puzzles and mysterious Tarot card inspired challenges with an odd artstyle and even odder prose, all of which builds up to one big meta-puzzle that I have not yet solved. I don't think I ever will. Some of the puzzles in this game are barely solvable; others are absolute hell. I hope you really like word puzzles, like, a lot. I've gotten about 75% of the way through, and I haven't felt compelled to look up the answers or anything - I want to solve every puzzle on my own, if I can, because it feels rewarding to finally crack a puzzle I've spent over an hour on. If I don't solve every puzzle, and I never beat the game, I think I'm prepared to accept that. Not all games need to be beaten, especially not puzzle games. Perhaps I will come back to this one and solve some of the puzzles that have stumped me to this day. Perhaps I won't, and I will always have this personal little mountain left unclimbed to my dying day. Either way, it is mystifying and fascinating, to have my own personal puzzle hell taunting me. Damn you, Cliff Johnson.

I can't recommend it to everyone. I don't know if I can recommend it to anyone. But if there is one little weird corner of gaming history that I would like to introduce you to, in a bid to make my gaming taste seem WAY more interesting than it actually is, it's this. It's extremely creative and an impressive labor of love - he worked on this game for years and years, and it should have been a game of the 00's instead of a game of the 10's. Even among all of the retro aesthetics of this list this one feels like a really weird throwback, but I'm glad Cliff Johnson finished his insane magnum opus, and my life will never be the same for it.

I think I liked Pikmin 1 and 2's rough edges, because 3 was definitely a better playing/more intuitive game but I didn't like it nearly as much.

Never heard of The Fool and His Money but it sounds interesting.

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#43





Years of release: 2014 (PC/3DS/Wii U), 2015 (PS3/PS4/XB1/Vita/...Amazon Fire TV? Huh???), 2017 (Switch). I don't have years on the DLC, too lazy
Beaten?: Yes

God, I'm old.

I mean, yeah, okay, I'm 31, I'm still young, kvetching about my age can wait another ten years or so. But these damn kids are out here all over my lawn with their Minecrafts and Fortnites and what have you. I don't understand these things! I mean, I probably would understand these things if I wasn't a stubborn old man and I tried to play and understand them properly. The truth is though that not understand the big new things that kids are into have been a thing for me for even longer than this. I am a proud child of the 90's. I was 6 when Donkey Kong Country came out and became a huge cultural phenomenon, and nowadays that's as bog-standard a 2D platformer as you can find. That's the tradition I was born and raised in, and the move towards big cinematic FPS experiences has never caught on with me.

Shovel Knight makes this list almost more out of appreciation for what it is than anything else - a solid game in its own right, but also a pitch-perfect retro pastiche. What I like so much about it is that it's not merely the sort of faux retro thing that either leans too hard on nostalgia or just lazily uses a pixel art style without being able to accurately capture the era of gamign it's trying to ape. It feels like an accurately captured snapshot of an alternate future, one in which we never got the Playstation or the N64 and we kept making games that looked like NES games and had NES game sensibilities forever while still evolving what it *meant* to look like an NES game and feel like an NES game. It's not quite an NES-styled game; it uses too many colors and particle effects and it makes a few design choices an NES game might not, but it still manages to capture the "aesthetic" while carving out an artistic niche of its own.

The game is not through and through spectacular, but it's solid enough. If you're going to borrow a mechanic from old NES games, the pogo-sticking from Zelda II/DuckTales is most definitely one of the best you could have borrowed - downstabbing stuff never gets old, and it helps with the fact that Shovel Knight's default attack is otherwise a little underwhelming, as are most of his special movies. It's otherwise a well-executed platformer with strong boss fights, really lovely NES visuals, and an excellent soundtrack. It isn't the first time I've sung Jake 'virt' Kaufman's praises, but I think he composed this soundtrack entirely in Famitracker, and the man is basically a wizard - some of this stuff is more complicated than anything I've ever heard made with the NES's sound chip, lots of thick textures and weird progressions. All of this adds up to one of the most memorable retro pastiches of the decade.

I have only played the original and the Plague Knight campaigns - I haven't played the more recent ones. The Plague Knight campaign was ok, and I was surprised that they added some interesting story stuff to it, but it wasn't enough to really keep me coming back. But I've heard good things about the more recent content updates, so I should probably pick them up again sometime.

The Specter Knight and King Knight campaigns are really good. I'd definitely recommend both!

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#42





Years of release: 2017-2018 (PC early access), 2018-present (PC/PS4/XB1/Switch)
Beaten?: Yes, up to 4 BC

I am of the opinion that roguelikes, and other games of that nature (like this one), live two lives; one during the first 50 hours of play, and one from the 50th hour of gameplay onwards. Good roguelikes are great for the first 50 hours - GREAT roguelikes are great after the first 50 hours. Dead Cells is a good roguelike.

The first ten hours or so of this game are truly transcendant, and I believe that corresponds strongly to this game having such a great critic response, since that's the most you'll need to play to be convinced of its worth. And I mean, it's high on my list for a reason - my first 10 hours with this game were TRULY excellent. This game is a tour de force of exciting action, great visuals, and fun randomness and discovery. I can scarcely think of a game that controls as responsively or as fun as this one; I'm typically not a fan of this sort of action game but in this case I adore this game. Running and jumping and attacking all feel so fluid and that alone is a huge selling point; it doesn't take much for this game to make you feel like a combat expert, and the game just sort of naturally expects you to speedrun it, which I'm more than happy to take it up on. Discovering all these new weapons and upgrades feels great, and you get into that fun feedback loop of gathering cells to purchase new weapons and upgrades with, which you use to gather cells with - it's always addictive to unlock a whole shitload of shit in a roguelike.

After some time though, this game started to lose a little bit of its luster for me for a couple of reasons. Now, keep in mind that I haven't played this game in a while, and apparently they're still doing pretty regular content updates, which confuses me - is this game still in early access or not? It's confusing to me because at the time of me sort of exhausting this game, it had been "released", but the game still felt incomplete. It felt like there needed to be more areas, and definitely more boss fights - at least one major area didn't have its own boss last time I played, which was really bizarre. I also found the weapon selection to be lacking - a lot of weapons are just too slow and unwieldy to ever be useful in this fast-paced game, and almost everything paled in comparison to Ice Shard, a medium-ranged weapon that comes out with no windup and no delay, hits things in a very broad arc, slows down what it hits, and does reasonable damage, especially if it crits something covered in oil. In general, it feels like tactics weapons are really the bread and butter here as opposed to brutality or survival weapons. Also, since the mutations you get aren't random, I had a strong tendency to pick the same ones and ignore ones I didn't like, which sort of discourages experimentation. All in all, I wound up bored of this game faster than I got bored of other roguelikes and other procedurally-generated games higher on this list.

Maybe these issues were fixed in updates to the game, I haven't played it in maybe 9 months or so? Something like that. I hate to focus on the stuff I didn't like, that just tends to dominate the conversation with this game since I really DID like it so much, but I didn't LOVE it. It's hard not to recommend this game for the first 50 hours though, which is still plenty of time to enjoy the hell out of a game before I feel like it's spent. For me, the honeymoon with this game was AMAZING, but the marriage fell apart after a while.

this list makes me wish i had bothered to play more than just the first 3 layton games

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#41



and...

#40



Years of release: 2010 (DR1 - PSP, Japan) 2012 (DR2 - PSP, Japan), 2013 (Vita, Japan), 2014 (Vita, NA/EU), 2016 (PC), 2017 (PS4)
Beaten?: Yes

It is very appropriate, for a game series that talks about hope and despair so much, that Danganronpa should be a series for me that is completely defined by my love/hate relationship with it. I have never loved/hated a game as much as Danganronpa, ever. It is the master of mixed bags, the king of conflicted feelings.

Where do I even start with it. Do I talk about the annoying characters that are impossible to take seriously or care about, who frequently have no impact on the plot? Do I talk about the writing that is more frequently cringe-worthy than it is funny, with awful anime cliches galore? Do I talk about the completely nonsense plot where nothing anyone does makes sense and barely wraps up competently? Do I talk about the frustrating minigames that do more to break up the action in a bad way than they do to provide variety? Do I talk about how disappointing most of the murder plots are compared to Ace Attorney? Do I talk about how much I hate Monokuma?

Or... do I talk about the good? Do I talk about the great premise of people trapped in a place where they have to kill each other to escape, which hooked me immediately? Do I talk about the bright, almost psychadelic visuals and energetic soundtrack, which provide this game an undeniable sense of style? Do I talk about the wonderfully-delivered voice acting performances, which make said annoying characters tolerable and almost funny at times? Do I talk about the few times some of the characters really break through and make me interested in them, or the few times that the plot really had me hooked on finding out what the mystery was? Do I talk about how undeniably clever some of the murder plots are, occasionally even rivaling Ace Attorney in ingenuity? Do I talk about how, despite all of this game's bizarre flaws and frustrations, how I was hooked from beginning to end and wanted to see the story through no matter what, and how fun it is to play with a friend, laughing at all the game's funny shit and stupid shit alike, discussing the murder plots and coming up with crackpot theories for what's going to happen?

I guess, at the end of the day, I'm choosing "hope."

Both of the first two Danganronpas are pretty close in quality, for me. I think DR2 has the far better cast and the highest peak, with the game's penultimate chapter rivaling the very best moments that even Ace Attorney has to offer, but I do like the school environment of the first Danganronpa more, and I think the first Danganronpa had more exciting and fun twists and a more satisfying mystery to unravel all the way, since you have no idea what's going on, whereas in DR2 you have more of an idea since it's no longer as novel. Overall I do prefer DR2 just a bit, but I felt like it would make sense to rank these and talk about them together, since they're roughly the same and there isn't much more I could talk about with one over the other.

Even if there's a lot of terrible writing and missed potential all over the place here, these games were stil one hell of a wild ride, and even very good games in this genre are something I can't overlook given their rarity and novelty. I've spent lots of time talking about and thinking about Danganronpa ever since playing them and, for better or worse, they're some of the most impactful gaming experiences I've had in the last few years.

Naye745 posted...

this list makes me wish i had bothered to play more than just the first 3 layton games

The later Layton games are good too! I'm done ranking them on this list, but Last Specter and Azran Legacy are both worth playing as well. Of course, you really know what to expect with the Layton games. None of them are like, more amazingly good than the others. They're perfectly consistent.