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

(+) Yeah! (+)

#1





Years of release: 2014-2015 (PC early access), 2015 (PC), 2016 (PS4/Vita/iOS), 2017 (XB1), 2018 (Switch), 2017 (Amplified DLC)
Beaten?: haha

Hi, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Paratroopa and I am mostly known for playing Crypt of the NecroDancer. My name, or at least my online handle, is listed in the credits of this game as a beta tester. I wound up in this situation by making the best impulse purchase I've ever made in my entire life.

Most of the games on my list I either heard of because of their general prestige, or otherwise through word of mouth from someone I know. Breath of the Wild is a goddamn Zelda game, for instance. Dels has the impressive distinction of having being the one to introduce me to my #3, #4, #5, AND #6 games on this list (good job Dels). FTL and Darkest Dungeon were known to me because they had a lot of good press among indie games. The list goes on. Every game was either recommended or at least suggested by a friend, or had come out to rave reviews that couldn't be ignored.

There is one game on this list. One. ONLY ONE. That I purchased completely on a whim because I saw it on the Steam store, with no recommendations from any friends, without having heard a single peep of hype from anywhere on the internet, only having seen the store page and the trailer. It's this one. It's Crypt of the NecroDancer.

I bought it in early December 2014, because Steam recommended it to me (good job Steam), and it was a little bit on sale because it was in early access, and I was like, hey, why not, I'll take a chance. It's a roguelike, love those, and it's a rhythm game, love those too, seems like a good concept, game looks fun, let's give it a chance, maybe it'll be good. I then basically fell down a randomly-generated rabbit hole for the next six months.

Crypt of the NecroDancer is, indeed, a rhythm roguelike. You're in a dungeon, you can move in four directions on the grid, and every step you take has to be on the beat of the music. Going in a direction attacks an enemy if one is in your range, otherwise you move. Enemies will try to attack you immediately after you move. Weapons, armor, and various items increase your capabilities. The dungeons are randomized every time, split into themed zones, each with their own unique set of enemies. You have only one life, and if you die, you have to start over. That's about all there is to it! The rhythm element is a brilliant addition, as not only is it fun to tap along to the beat of the song, but it also forces the pace of the game, requiring you to make a decision every beat of the music of what you want to do. The game didn't originally start as a rhythm game, but rather as just a game where you had a time limit to move - but the designer, Ryan Clark, eventually realized it played a lot like a rhythm game so that became his concept. And now here we are.

According to my achievement stats, I beat zone 1 on 12/3/14, and zone 3 on 12/10/14 - there were only three zones at the time. I beat All Zones mode for the first time ten days later, on 12/20/14. I'm kind of surprised it took even that long, despite the fact that the first all zones clear is a pretty big accomplishment - I remember playing this game a lot the first time I picked it up. I was instantly hooked. The gameplay mechanics are fun and addictive - every time I died, starting over with a new dungeon to see what I could do this time was never disheartening and always exciting. I wanted to keep on going, unlocking every item and just figuring out how everything worked. Victories were always rewarding, and deaths always felt fair and never like a frustrating setback.

Pretty soon Dels and I started playing daily challenges, in which you play a seeded dungeon every day and compete with every other player to try to set the highest score on a single attempt. We got pretty good at it, and I know we both set some pretty good scores back in those days. For a while doing the daily challenge was kind of a ritual that we'd do. I was interested in challenging myself further, though, so I went looking at Speedrunslive to see if anyone was racing this - they were. Two racers named Rat and DJC. I watched them play for a while and really wasn't sure that I would be able to compete, but they were enthusiastic about inviting me in and told me to get involved in CONDOR, or the Crypt of the Necrodancer Online Racing... league. I did.

I sucked, at first, but this was yet another leap of faith that would pay dividends. Racing this game is extremely fun; playing this game fast really amplifies the difficulty of every little choice you have to make, forcing you to forgo more items and take bigger risks as you wander into increasingly crowded rooms, spending as little time fighting as you get to the exit. We used to do these unseeded, but now we do them seeded; both players play the same random dungeon, and each player competes to complete it the fastest. This has greatly improved racing and made it really interesting to see how different players approach the same seed. And while there are some items that are better, stronger, or faster than others, it never feels like a run of this game is "good" or "bad," merely "different" - you're not pulling the slot machine every time hoping for the one magical run, but rather, every run simply offers different options and challenges. So, I got more into speedrunning this game as well as scorerunning.

I continued to play through the early access period in early 2015. This was back at a time when early access was still kind of a dirty word - I think it still is, but at the time 'early access' really felt synanimous with unfinished games and doomed projects that never seemed like they would ever see the light of day. Necrodancer changed my mind on this. I'm so glad I got to see this game develop during early access - every week brought new changes, added items and content, and it was always exciting to see a new patch come out that would add new stuff to the game. I only wish I had gotten into it earlier! The early access phase didn't take too long, and the devs pushed content out on a tight schedule and had a very clear deadline in mind for when they wanted to release the full game. And, impressively, Ryan Clark really listened to players' input on what should be changed in the game - a ton of player suggestions got directly implemented into the game, almost always for the better. The community in early access was really dedicated to playing and mastering the game and coming up with suggestions to make it better, and I think the interaction between players and devs here really improved the game.
<cite>Paratroopa1 posted [p:933452810] in Para's top... [t:78297413]...</cite> <quote>#1 Years of release: 2014-2015 (PC early access), 2015 (PC), 2016 (PS4/Vita/iOS), 2017 (XB1), 2018 (Switch), 2017 (Amplified DLC) Beaten?: haha Hi, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Paratroopa and I am mostly known for playing Crypt of the NecroDancer. My name, or at least my online handle, is listed in the credits of this game as a beta tester. I wound up in this situation by making the best impulse purchase I've ever made in my entire life. Most of the games on my list I either heard of because of their general prestige, or otherwise through word of mouth from someone I know. Breath of the Wild is a goddamn Zelda game, for instance. Dels has the impressive distinction of having being the one to introduce me to my #3, #4, #5, AND #6 games on this list (good job Dels). FTL and Darkest Dungeon were known to me because they had a lot of good press among indie games. The list goes on. Every game was either recommended or at least suggested by a friend, or had come out to rave reviews that couldn't be ignored. There is one game on this list. One. ONLY ONE. That I purchased completely on a whim because I saw it on the Steam store, with no recommendations from any friends, without having heard a single peep of hype from anywhere on the internet, only having seen the store page and the trailer. It's this one. It's Crypt of the NecroDancer. I bought it in early December 2014, because Steam recommended it to me (good job Steam), and it was a little bit on sale because it was in early access, and I was like, hey, why not, I'll take a chance. It's a roguelike, love those, and it's a rhythm game, love those too, seems like a good concept, game looks fun, let's give it a chance, maybe it'll be good. I then basically fell down a randomly-generated rabbit hole for the next six months. Crypt of the NecroDancer is, indeed, a rhythm roguelike. You're in a dungeon, you can move in four directions on the grid, and every step you take has to be on the beat of the music. Going in a direction attacks an enemy if one is in your range, otherwise you move. Enemies will try to attack you immediately after you move. Weapons, armor, and various items increase your capabilities. The dungeons are randomized every time, split into themed zones, each with their own unique set of enemies. You have only one life, and if you die, you have to start over. That's about all there is to it! The rhythm element is a brilliant addition, as not only is it fun to tap along to the beat of the song, but it also forces the pace of the game, requiring you to make a decision every beat of the music of what you want to do. The game didn't originally start as a rhythm game, but rather as just a game where you had a time limit to move - but the designer, Ryan Clark, eventually realized it played a lot like a rhythm game so that became his concept. And now here we are. According to my achievement stats, I beat zone 1 on 12/3/14, and zone 3 on 12/10/14 - there were only three zones at the time. I beat All Zones mode for the first time ten days later, on 12/20/14. I'm kind of surprised it took even that long, despite the fact that the first all zones clear is a pretty big accomplishment - I remember playing this game a lot the first time I picked it up. I was instantly hooked. The gameplay mechanics are fun and addictive - every time I died, starting over with a new dungeon to see what I could do this time was never disheartening and always exciting. I wanted to keep on going, unlocking every item and just figuring out how everything worked. Victories were always rewarding, and deaths always felt fair and never like a frustrating setback. Pretty soon Dels and I started playing daily challenges, in which you play a seeded dungeon every day and compete with every other player to try to set the highest score on a single attempt. We got pretty good at it, and I know we both set some pretty good scores back in those days. For a while doing the daily challenge was kind of a ritual that we'd do. I was interested in challenging myself further, though, so I went looking at Speedrunslive to see if anyone was racing this - they were. Two racers named Rat and DJC. I watched them play for a while and really wasn't sure that I would be able to compete, but they were enthusiastic about inviting me in and told me to get involved in CONDOR, or the Crypt of the Necrodancer Online Racing... league. I did. I sucked, at first, but this was yet another leap of faith that would pay dividends. Racing this game is extremely fun; playing this game fast really amplifies the difficulty of every little choice you have to make, forcing you to forgo more items and take bigger risks as you wander into increasingly crowded rooms, spending as little time fighting as you get to the exit. We used to do these unseeded, but now we do them seeded; both players play the same random dungeon, and each player competes to complete it the fastest. This has greatly improved racing and made it really interesting to see how different players approach the same seed. And while there are some items that are better, stronger, or faster than others, it never feels like a run of this game is "good" or "bad," merely "different" - you're not pulling the slot machine every time hoping for the one magical run, but rather, every run simply offers different options and challenges. So, I got more into speedrunning this game as well as scorerunning. I continued to play through the early access period in early 2015. This was back at a time when early access was still kind of a dirty word - I think it still is, but at the time 'early access' really felt synanimous with unfinished games and doomed projects that never seemed like they would ever see the light of day. Necrodancer changed my mind on this. I'm so glad I got to see this game develop during early access - every week brought new changes, added items and content, and it was always exciting to see a new patch come out that would add new stuff to the game. I only wish I had gotten into it earlier! The early access phase didn't take too long, and the devs pushed content out on a tight schedule and had a very clear deadline in mind for when they wanted to release the full game. And, impressively, Ryan Clark really listened to players' input on what should be changed in the game - a ton of player suggestions got directly implemented into the game, almost always for the better. The community in early access was really dedicated to playing and mastering the game and coming up with suggestions to make it better, and I think the interaction between players and devs here really improved the game.</quote>

Sometime probably in February of 2015, there was a topic of discussion that started happening on the game's forum about whether or not to remove the Shrine of Rhythm from the game. This was a controversial 'upgrade' that could be found randomly in dungeons that removed every eighth beat from the game, forcing the player to pause, and if they moved on that beat or missed any other beat in the song they would instantly die. But in return, they would get a gold multiplier, so the shrine was required for maximizing a score run. At first I hated this shrine, but assuming that I would simply have to get used to it, I started taking it, and I started learning how to play this game with as much discipline as I could muster. Eventually, I mastered it, and I was able to play runs with shrine of rhythm without dying very often at all. But, naturally, my original reasons for hating the Shrine of Rhythm really were correct, and it was discussed what should be done with it. Even knowing that doing away with it was probably the right thing, I made a fairly impassioned devil's advocate defense in favor of it, because learning how to master it had improved my experience with the game quite a bit. It was ultimately completely reworked; however, my involvement in this discussion and my enthusiasm for making suggestions about the game must have caught the dev team's attention, because I was invited on for the beta test of the final release.

I was under orders not to talk about it at the time, which killed me, since I so badly wanted to tell Dels that I had access to zone 4 and the final build of the game before everyone else, but I had to wait and play coy like I wasn't doing that. It was one hell of a privilege to be involved though; a couple of the bugfixes/changes I suggested made it into the final game, and it was just fun as hell to get to see the final parts of the game before everyone else, and see them develop. Around this time I got more involved with the community, along with a lot of its big players at the time who are mostly still around today.

Ever since then I've been at least semi-active in the community and I've done a lot of racing over the years, and eventually got... sorta good, not really great, but I've had a few decent wins to my name, and I eventually won an event as part of a team and even made some money as a runner-up one time (CONDOR for its first few years was quite flush with prize money, as the devs donated it to us to help grow the community - that was super nice of them). Between 25 dollars here, 33 dollars in Cadence of Hyrule, and 20 dollars in Pokemon Puzzle Challenge, my official gaming earnings comes to 78 dollars! I felt like bragging about that. I'm more proud of just having been here at the start of this community, though - I was running this game even before Spootybiscuit, who would eventually go on to become the most talented player of this game.

I watched along with the rest of the Necrodancer discord as Spooty accomplished beating the game with the hardest character, Coda, at AGDQ 2016 - most of us weren't sure he could even pull it off, and it stands to me as one of the most impressive feats anyone has ever accomplished in a GDQ run. This led to a race of Necrodancer happening between Spooty and Mudjoe2 (another top runner) at SGDQ 2016, and that was what led me to finally make the pilgrimage there. There were about 10-11 of us at that event from the Necrodancer community, and meeting them was like meeting old friends. We then proceeded to spend the entire week playing Ultimate Chicken Horse (see entry #38). This was one of the most memorable weeks of my life. It's staggering to think that I've made actual real life friends playing this game.

There was a lot of hype when this game had its DLC come out, and then again when Cadence of Hyrule was released, and that's kept the community pretty active. I've kind of taken a step back from it now as I feel like I've done about all I can do with this game - but CONDOR season 9 is starting up soon, so back I go getting dragged into this yet again, starting the 20's off right with more Necrodancer. This game's pretty much a core part of my identity at this point, really. I was lucky to pick it up when I did - best decision I ever made. This game didn't have to be as good as it was, but everything just fits so perfectly. Addictive gameplay, polished visuals, creative monsters and items, and the music - jeez, I didn't talk about the music much, but this game could have sucked if not for a brilliant soundtrack by Danny Baranowsky. I wasn't really the hugest fan of his prior work in Binding of Isaac and Super Meat Boy but the evolution of his style was really impressive in this game, and he stepped up and delivered a soundtrack that was thoughtfully composed to match the style of this game.

All that, though, and it's probably the fact that I just got so deep into the community and speedrunning the game and all that that it's really a slam dunk for my game of the decade. I got a little burnt out on this game but I think I'll pretty much always come back to it; I never really get tired of it. It's pretty much perfectly suited to my skills and my tastes and I have about as much history with it as I'll ever have with any other game (despite it only being the game I logged the 2nd most playtime with this decade - Slay the Spire is a few hundred hours ahead somehow).

That was a bit of a ramble. I knew that this would be the hardest write-up to do and it's probably the messiest but that seems appropriate enough. There's so much I could go on about in the design of this game or anecdotes about my history with it that I wouldn't be able to shut up for a while but I think that covers it. It's the most transformative gaming experience of the decade for me and one of my favorites all time.

Whew! I guess that wraps it up. I expected that whole project to be a lot shorter, but I ended up really getting into it when I talked about my biggest faves, and finding the words to write about some of my most sentimental favorites was tough, but it was a good exercise. Thanks for reading, I really appreciate the engagement and kind comments - like I said, I mostly did this list for myself, because I feel kinda compelled to make lists and write about them, but it's nice to know that others take interest in this sort of thing. I figured this list might be unique enough to be worth reading, even if it's just one guy's opinion on some games that he likes.

I guess that's it. Not too much else to add. I'll probably do this again in 10 years so see you then. Until then, I guess I need to find some other list project to keep me occupied. Getting this one off my chest was a huge relief and I'm so glad I was able to do it.

List recap:

1. Crypt of the NecroDancer
2. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
3. Undertale
4. The Witness
5. SpyParty
6. CrossCode
7. Mega Man 10
8. Darkest Dungeon
9. FTL: Faster Than Light
10. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Spirit of Justice
11. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective
12. Night in the Woods
13. Rhythm Heaven Fever
14. Slay The Spire
15. Baba Is You
16. Virtue's Last Reward
17. The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
18. Super Mario Maker
19. Jackbox Party Packs 1-6
20. Cadence of Hyrule
21. Portal 2
22. Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling
23. Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
24. Miles Edgeworth: Ace Attorney Investigations 2 - Prosecutor's Path
25. Mass Effect 2
26. Sid Meier's Civilization V
27. Animal Crossing: New Leaf
28. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
29. Freedom Planet
30. Cuphead
31. Elsinore
32. Celeste
33. Life Is Strange
34. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies
35. Puzzle & Dragons
36. Grim Dawn
37. WarioWare D.I.Y.
38. Ultimate Chicken Horse
39. Lovers In a Dangerous Spacetime
40. Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair
41. Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
42. Dead Cells
43. Shovel Knight
44. The Fool And His Money
45. Mega Man Unlimited
46. Pikmin 3
47. Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
48. Kid Icarus: Uprising
49. Into The Breach
50. A Hat In Time
51. Catherine
52. Kero Blaster
53. Divinity: Original Sin
54. Bastion
55. Another Metroid 2 Remake
56. Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask
57. Armello
58. The Stanley Parable
59. Mario Tennis Aces
60. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
61. Monolith
62. Fire Emblem: Awakening
63. Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon
64. Yoku's Island Express
65. Super Mario 3D World
66. Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze
67. Downwell
68. Her Story
69. Xenoblade Chronicles
70. StreetPass Mii Plaza
71. Crawl
72. Rock Band 3
73. Starbound
74. Terraria
75. Untitled Goose Game
76. 20XX
77. Super Mario 3D Land
78. OneShot
79. Gone Home
80. Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
81. Game & Wario
82. Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
83. Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes
84. VVVVVV
85. Pokemon Sun/Moon
86. Zero Time Dilemma
87. Tricky Towers
88. Hammerwatch
89. Beat Saber
90. Firewatch
91. Papers, Please
92. Torchlight II
93. Overcooked!
94. TIS-100
95. The Binding of Isaac
96. Pushmo
97. SpeedRunners
98. Last Window: The Secret of Cape West
99. 868-HACK
100. Caves of Qud
(Games that I forgot to include: Kirby's Epic Yarn, Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors)

Good list, Para.

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Interesting read. Thanks for doing this.
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Breath of the Wild is so good that even I'm a big fan of it!

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Thanks for the list, para.

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Necrodancer is hella fun. I'm not good enough to beat it but I had fun trying.

Thanks for sharing your list with us, it was a good read.

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Great write ups and great taste in games well done sir

Honorable mention codenames *nods*

Loved the necro dancer write up

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Excellent list. Wish FTL and Necrodancer would get physical releases.

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i'll get around to necrodancing my heart away someday

...someday

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Naye745 posted...

i'll get around to necrodancing my heart away someday

...someday

It's a good game! Although as a rhythm game it's quite simple, but I still think the flow feels very good even if the rhythm pattern is as basic as possible

Fastbreak posted...

Honorable mention codenames *nods*

Loved the necro dancer write up

Codenames goes into my "it's a board game, so I'm not including it here" category. There was at least one other thing like that that was a board game that I played a lot in video game/digital format but I can't remember what it was at the moment, but I just decided not to include board games

Playing codenames online is very fun though

dominion.isotropic.org?

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Also true but there's one more example I think, it's just slipping my mind. Maybe I WAS thinking of codenames tbh

Yay awesome list. BotW is too good. How is the sequel gonna live up to it.

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Paratroopa1 posted...

Also true but there's one more example I think, it's just slipping my mind. Maybe I WAS thinking of codenames tbh

Was it Board Game Online?

also play Persona 5 imo

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I really enjoyed reading this. Your write-ups are excellent at explaining why each game deserved to be on the list. Im excited for any future projects you do!

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Haha, thanks! I think some people I talked to were surprised that I was able to commit to writing about 100 games I liked in just this decade, but surprisingly enough, to me most of all, I'm kinda enthusiastic about a lot of different games and all the little things in them, so it wasn't too hard to run the list up to 100.

Having now played Obra Dinn a bit (it's really good) and A Short Hike (short, but intensely wholesome and sweet) I'm only regretting that I wasn't able to play MORE games this decade, like, now I can get around to Mario Odyssey, and AI Somnium Files I still really want to play, and ugggh too many good games

I think it would be fun to do a list like this for my all-time favorite games, but I'm not sure what to do now that I've exhausted my talking points for all the 2010's games. Maybe I just need to write like, "top 100 games from 1980-2009" (I don't think any of my favorites predate 1980)

Also now I'm realizing that I probably need to save the writeups on this list and I'm trying to figure out the best way to do that. hmm

Google doc

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I mean more of a problem of like, oh no, this is a lot of copying and pasting I need to do

I guess I'll do it later while watching some youtube videos or something

for the topics where i liked the feedback, i liked just saving the whole page as html
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Paratroopa1 posted...

I mean more of a problem of like, oh no, this is a lot of copying and pasting I need to do

I guess I'll do it later while watching some youtube videos or something

You probably want to just save the web pages. As a bonus, you keep the replies to your topic as well.
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That is much easier, true

I would suggest starting in doc next time though. You never know when game faqs will die on you and you lose your post. And you put a lot of care into your write ups

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Paratroopa1 posted...

Maybe I just need to write like, "top 100 games from 1980-2009" (I don't think any of my favorites predate 1980)

I'd read it!

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Paratroopa1 posted...

Also now I'm realizing that I probably need to save the writeups on this list and I'm trying to figure out the best way to do that. hmm

Log faqs will automatically archive it

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Also I support a similar list for other decades

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Nelson_Mandela posted...

Also I support a similar list for other decades

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I sometimes wonder just how different my favorite games of all time would be from just the last decade...

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Solid write ups, even if I haven't played most of the games on here.

I've been doing my own countdown of the decade's best on Instagram, using only story pics to show what # my games are (mainly cause I have no time to do writeups)

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Woof, finally finished reading.

Para.

Why aren't we bester friends?

We share good tastes.

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Just bumping this for now still need to archive it

I have archived this now, but I'm going to save it one last time just in case there's anyone I still want to show it to that I can't think of right now. I don't think so though; I think this has run its course

Again, thanks to everyone for reading this list and enjoying it, I've gotten a lot of really nice comments about it. I might do another sometime because writing about my favorite hobby is fun

i played The Witness in parallel with a friend and it was a great experience. it's probably the most fair and immersive puzzle game. it has a beautiful production value, too.

it gets a little bit of that adventure game/myst aesthetic without any of the bullshit. the ability to just wander to a different part of the island and make progress when you're stuck is wonderful.

i never went for any of the difficult stuff that i would consider to be "postgame" because i wasn't prepared for that level of intensity. the "main" stuff was perfect.

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great list, and thanks for making it

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