It’s difficult to choose one because there have been so many great releases this year. I’ll start by automatically disqualifying sequels that might otherwise be in the running:
Astro Bot (PS5)
Exceeded expectations in every way.
Dragon’s Dogma 2 (PS5)
This game may not really need to exist, but I certainly enjoyed it.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree (PS5)
Yes, I count this as a sequel.
Silent Hill 2 (PS5)
I don’t know how this managed to turn out as good as it did. It’s no replacement for the original but I like it.
SteamWorld Heist 2 (Steam)
I’m glad they released this before getting out of game development; it’s excellent.
World of Goo 2 (not on Steam but here)
Don’t miss this if you liked the first game at all; it’s fun and creative.
Factorio: Space Age will probably need to be listed here as well when I get around to it. Of those I’m left with, these are my honorable mentions:
Animal Well (Steam)
I enjoyed this one a lot, even if most of what it does isn’t terribly innovative.
Balatro (Steam)
Addictive game along the lines of Monster Train but stripped down to the essence of the formula.
Cape Hideous (Steam)
A brief experience that’s barely a game but I highly recommend it.
Isles of Sea and Sky (Steam)
If you like block-pushing puzzle games, don’t miss this one.
Mouthole (Steam)
A standout among weird little indie games.
Nine Sols (Steam)
I haven’t reached the end because I found the combat exhausting. Maybe I will rank it higher when I try again on easy mode.
Indika (Steam)
In a year with fewer great releases, this would have definitely been a finalist.
Stellar Blade (PS5)
This wasn’t on my radar but a friend lent it to me. I wasn’t sure about it at first but it grew on me (and sometimes annoyed me). I can’t deny it’s an impressive work.
Still Wakes the Deep (Steam)
I played this a week after posting my list and I had to add it. Nice and intense, with great imagery and accents. This team has come a long way since Dear Esther and Korsakovia.
UFO 50 (Steam)
Can I disqualify this by calling it a sequel to Action 52? It kind of feels wrong not making it a finalist but if the idea is to choose just one game then what can I do?
Unicorn Overlord (PS5)
It had been a while since I last played a game in this genre. 13 Sentinels is still my favorite of their games but I like this one a lot.
Okay, now I’ve narrowed it down to three. Here are the two runners-up:
Anthology of the Killer (Steam)
This doesn’t feel like a 2024 game because I played most of the chapters as they were released, but the last one and the compilation were in 2024 so it qualifies. It’s overflowing with creativity.
Judero (Steam)
What a great game. The stop-motion graphics, the voices, the writing–and some of the music is astoundingly good.
If I’m not allowed to make it a three-way tie, I guess my game of the year is this one:
Extreme Evolution: Drive to Divinity (Steam)
This was released very early in the year and I played it immediately upon release, and I still think about it a lot. It’s not for everyone but it’s definitely for me. It manages to have a sort of abstract emotional depth that transcends anything I can concretely point to (aside from one scene involving holding hands). I wrote a little more about it in another thread.
1000xResist – do NOT play this while sick I had to put it down after about an hour because it was making me feel worse. I hope to play it when I am feeling better.
Fields of Mistria – do play this while sick It is an absolute gem and a real treat for anyone who loves Harvest Moon, Stardew Valley, and the type of farming sim that goes deep with unlockables and variation. It very accurately recognizes what makes those games great and has a ton of depth and progression. If you like incrementally unlocking stuff and getting rewards it totally scratches that itch. The cast are all quite likable and the dating element is front and center in the marketing, curious to see how that goes. After only 3 hours of Fields of Mistria, it’s is going in my top 10 for sure, possibly even top 5 if it keeps it up!
i’d be curious if those that bounced off 1000xResist would have eventually vibed with it. i think it’s a very rewarding narrative that requires you to stick with it. perhaps “withholding a lot of explanation till much later” is a cheap trick but i found it effective. “efficient” rather than cheap? i guess there’s no getting around somebody not vibing with the look/presentation. i grew to love how austere the graphics are and how they serve the overall presentation. i grew to enjoy the friction of exploring the funhouse maze of the main hub (and how it gently tests your memory of it and subverts what you know) . i think i stuck with it because of how striking the weird visuals were early on and the gradual reveal of more and more scifi cool stuff.
just to address the hypothesis: sticking with it made it worse for me bc the issue isn’t that it was withholding or complex, it was that it surrounded a pretty mild story about immigration and cultural dislocation with a lot fal’cie crystarium etc kind of made up rules stuff. So the narrative experience at least for me was a process of seeing how the game would calvinball things next. That this was all in service of like I said a sort of ok if certainly well-meaning immigration story wore on me as things kept going.
I say the above realizing that this kind of narrative really works for some people and they like that neon genesis stuff. Just a matter of opinion. I certainly appreciate the game doing its thing in an assertive and uncompromising way though I’m not hating to be clear good for the developers they clearly worked hard and in earnest
i half mean that because as i said if you can’t chill with the scifi gobbledygook you aren’t gonna have a good time. but the specifics of the story (school/parents/plague) are to me secondary to the other thematic stuff (space weirdos, language, genetic & memetic inheritance, that kind of thing). but under the scifi costuming i think it deals with those big complicated things more earnestly and directly than, say, MGS2. i don’t think it’s entirely fair to call it metaphorical or allegorical or whatever those words mean to anyone coz it kind of manages both at once i think?
i dunno i’m rambling but game is cool and although it’s long i think it keeps rewarding those who enjoy and stay with it all the way to the end.
there’s a lot to admire about the game, I really mean that not damning with faint praise. There is also, however, a lot of overwritten sci fi dialogue with piano music behind it
The sci fi worked so much better for me than the immigrant stuff. Partially because I don’t think it really had much new to say about the experience, and partially because it was kinda vaguely anti-communist in a way I’m not sure I endorse, and certainly didn’t find compelling.
I think a lot of immigration centric media in the wake of Everything Everywhere has kind of turned into just, be nice to your mom. Which, sure I guess but what else.
I loved the game!
Let’s all discuss how we feel about Hong Kong rejoining china
I’m of course being a little glib but from what I remember is it not Iris being ashamed of her heritage and trying to remove herself from it to the point of being mean to her friends and parents and then self isolating?
the diaspora and immigrations stuff I thought was a bit cliched although I don’t doubt it was sincerely felt by the authors. I think the fact that it’s cliched yet sincerely felt is possibly one of the reasons that melodramatic sci fi edifice was built from it
that’s a thing that happens, yeah, but the takeaway isn’t a simple call for empathy
I think the sci-fi of it all works for this thematic beat in particular because it allows for a fairly mundane diasporic experience to become the center of the universe, and the cloning stuff gives literal meat to echoes of genetic memory and even more distance to the longing for a place you’ve never been
totally get why this game wouldn’t work for some people but it isn’t warmed over ideas about diasporic identity with a sci-fi veneer, the way those two things come together is why it’s works imo
yeah I mean what you describe is what the game is directly aiming for. Going to hit for some people and will seem unconvincing to others. Hope I don’t come across as telling people theyre wrong for liking it!
For sure - sorry if that spoiled something, it felt kind of slight so maybe I was a bit too fast and loose
Also re: above I agree with your point but I guess where I wasn’t making myself the most clear is I’m mostly discussing purely the family flashbacks more than what iris ends up doing once she’s underground
Anyway I really liked this game it’s on my list and don’t want to come off as some sort of hater
Yes. This and other experiences derived follow more or less the same trend, but the sci-fi shakes up the formula quite a bit because I feel the game experiments a lot with the abstraction of spaces (maybe this isn’t something new, but the way that they do I feel is quite cool).
I finished playing 1000timesResist yesterday. I belong in the camp of really enjoying this game.
Regarding the writing. I personally hate it when people tell me ‘but that’s the point!’ with something I don’t enjoy but the esoteric nature of the writing kind of is the point and is addressed somewhat later on in the story. My understanding is that the culture in the game is centered around the poetry and drawings of a child - and their scholars put a lot of work into finding meaning in bad poetry. Obviously if you don’t vibe with it it’s fine, but as others have alluded to the cinematography, music, and voice acting does a lot to elevate this game.
In terms of it being a cliche immigration story/generations trauma I suppose this one just resonated with me. I just felt myself reflecting on my parents (leaving Chile during Pinochet) or childhood growing up in a poorer area where I went to school with a lot of kids (loads of kids from Vietnam, Lebanon, or former Yugoslavian states) who moved to Australia for similar reasons. It probably says more about me not thinking about these things more often then I should.
I also respect that whilst it’s a sci-fi setting it’s dealing somewhat with the Hong Kong Protest and the Pandemic. Is it as effective as something like Detention I don’t know. But again it resonated with me because I was one super isolated dude during the pandemic and I like things that deal with real life events.
My crappy writing isn’t doing this game justice but I think it’s worth checking out and I’m glad it was recommended to me on the forums. I do want to check out Indika so I hope I can play that by the end of the year + I might give Before the Green Moon a try because it sounds really rad.
I had to put it down after about an hour because it was making me feel worse. I hope to play it when I am feeling better.
It is an absolute gem and a real treat for anyone who loves Harvest Moon, Stardew Valley, and the type of farming sim that goes deep with unlockables and variation. It very accurately recognizes what makes those games great and has a ton of depth and progression. If you like incrementally unlocking stuff and getting rewards it totally scratches that itch. The cast are all quite likable and the dating element is front and center in the marketing, curious to see how that goes. After only 3 hours of Fields of Mistria, it’s is going in my top 10 for sure, possibly even top 5 if it keeps it up!