On 1/24/2024 9:01 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

It occurs to me that we never did a "Best Of 2024" list. That's sort
of a traditional requirement that you have to do when a new year
begins. Well, as it remains January so I guess we can sneak it in
still.

I'm going to assume you meant 2023 and have changed the subject to such.

These are always so tough to figure.

Here's my list. Feel free to make your own categories.

Best Of 2024: Cyberpunk 2077 ---------------------------------------------------------------
What really needs be said. Is it the /best/ game ever?
No, I don't think so. But it is a solidly made game,
visually gorgeous, wonderfully true to the source material.
Its buggy launch notwithstanding, "Cyberpunk 2077" has
redeemed itself over the years, and fans of the open-world
shooter genre (GTA clones) do themselves a disservice if
they don't play this one.

I played it before but it's really Cyberpunk 2077 2.0, however it's
still got bugs that were while not game breaking, one sort of breaks
your character, still waiting for them to fix the 'cyberware slot
upgrades stop dropping before they should' bug, which stops progress of
your character which hurts real bad. I do have one character affected
by that, which is of course the one I wanted to play. Yes you can cheat
your way past it but that way lies ruining the game by making yourself
powerful with no effort.

If they had fixed that, I would give it to them. But really it was much
the same game I played in a previous year. Maybe they'll fix it and it
will be the best 'new' game of 2024 for real. But I will give it.

Justisaur's
Best DLC I played: Cyberpunk 2077 2.0: Phantom Liberty ---------------------------------------------------------------

Where do I start with this. It takes dystopia to eleven, Escape from
New York, meets ocean's eleven meets GTA, meets Cyberpunk. It's insane
how much is packed in this little tiny area. I love it! Perhaps also
best DLC I've ever played. It deserves a couple more play-throughs at
least, after patches or mods fix the issues I was having.

And then on to your category:

Justisaur's
Best Game I played in 2023: The Witcher 3 ---------------------------------------------------------------

The characters were great, it was fun, and it basically had no flaws
that annoyed me like others did. It felt like a perfect game, just
lacking a little je ne sais quoi that would put it over the top to sweep
the categories. I can't seem to bring myself to replay it though, and I
really want to play that one farie or whatever DLC (I started NG+ so I
have to get through the game with either that or a new play and get back
to where I can go to the DLC... I think)

Most Fun: God of War (2018) ---------------------------------------------------------------

Alright, alright, I still have a few days of PS+ left and it's on there.
Tried it last night, it's awesome so far! It appears pretty cheap, so
I'll probably pick it up on PC as playing it on PS+ likely looks worse,
though I might keep on with the PS+ to play the spider man game since
it's far more expensive and supposedly short.

This is a difficult category, because it covers games that won in other categories. I'm going to take a left turn here though. This could
easily go to Baldur's Gate 3 or The Witcher 3. A lot of 3's this year.
I'll instead make a left turn:

Justisaur's
Most Fun: Void Scrappers ---------------------------------------------------------------

Short, left me wanting more, cheap, fun, indy. Basically asteroids meets Vampire Survivors (reverse bullet hell.) Not really anything more to say
about it.

Speaking of Indy

Justisaur's
Best Indy game: Ring Runners: Flight of the Sages ---------------------------------------------------------------

Similar to the above, but a lot meatier than the above, not like vampire survivors. It's a more complete game, including multiplayer. It
includes a good bit of weird funny humor. There's lots more to do even
after the main campaign in the old 'see how far I can get' way of
asteroids. Also wins most bang for your buck.


Justisaur's
Best feel good 'cute' indy game: Wandersong ---------------------------------------------------------------

A feel good simple side scrolling game where you sing to do 'combat' A
fun little story.

Most Surprising: Ghostwire Tokyo

Also need to try that.

Justisaur's
Most Surprising: Balder's Gate 3 ---------------------------------------------------------------

How did a turn based isometric actual D&D* RPG in this day and age get
to be this good? I thought I was done with those (other than the odd
very old school like Zorbus and Dungeon Robber.) With online
multiplayer capabilities?!?! This game is better than the best live DM
I've ever played with as far as NPC characters, quest, adventures and
set-piece combats. Truly unbelievable!

Yes it's so annoying with path-finding bugs, an insane amount of junk inventory, bad UI to deal with that junk, horribly unbalanced combat, a
couple of slog areas, and so far so frequent updates that break the mods
that fix some of that. The game wears on after the first third, though
they're working on that as well. I didn't even finish it. I can't wait
for the mod breaking patches to cool off, or them to fix those issues,
so I can really sink my teeth into it.

I think this may turn into my game of the decade eventually. I can only imagine it if it gets to the point of NWN where you have people making
their own campaigns for it. It's not quite at best game I played this
year yet due to the glaring flaws though, but it's by far the most
surprising game I've played perhaps ever.

It might be 'best game that came out in 2023 that I played though.

* D&D - Modern D&D which is IMHO is deeply mechanically flawed, but
perhaps serviceable with a really good DM.

Most Disappointing: Last Call BBS ---------------------------------------------------------------

Justisaur's
Most Disappointing: Everspace 2. ---------------------------------------------------------------

Too many annoying bad cartoon cut-scenes. It feels too... I don't
know... gamified. They added a bunch of dumb puzzle garbage to do. The
space battles didn't feel at all challenging. It just feels like 1/10th
the game Everspace was by adding a bunch of extraneous junk.

It's probably much more approachable for casual players, which will
probably net them better ratings and more sales. As a sequel it's the
worst I've seen in a over a decade if you don't count movies, maybe even
if you do.

Because I Have To: American Truck Simulator: Kansas

I don't think I have a 'Because I Have To:' If I had to, I'd probably go
with

Justisaur's
Because I Have to: Dark Souls: Remastered (Now smoother and
goes down easier) ---------------------------------------------------------------

It holds up if anything better than Prepare to Die edition, other than
the lack of people to co-op with and the graphics actually look worse to
me than PtD. The added fully directional movement and smoother control
really help, though they do make the game feel (mostly) easier. Yes, I
didn't complete it, I could have, but I wanted to cut the tail off
Kalameet, and it seems impossible without co-op to distract it due to
changes in graphics engine and unlocking 60fps.


And lastly because you didn't have this:

Justisaur's
Best game released in 2023: Baldur's Gate 3 ---------------------------------------------------------------

Sweeping away 2 awards! Of course there's no actual competition as it's
the only thing I can remember that I played that was released last year.

--
-Justisaur

ø-ø
(\_/)\
`-'\ `--.___,
¶¬'\( ,_.-'
\\
^'

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)