This was a great year for strategy games. While most were just excellent expansions we saw a few new faces. A great strategy game will have a fantastically balanced gameplay economy and an intuitive interface. A great story and memorable characters are a plus but are usually rare in traditional strategy games.
Fire Emblem: Awakening
Fire Emblem is Nintendo’s TBS pride and joy. Awakening pushed itself up and over PC heavyweights due to a fantastic battle system, and an amazing story. The combat was so addictive and fun and full of deep strategy that you couldn’t put the game down. Most of the other strategy games are ones we have seen before and are just better than their predecessor. Awakening is a whole new monster and one of the top 10 best games on 3DS.
The Halo series is probably one of the most repetitive and unchanging series I have ever played. The first three were pretty good, and Reach and ODST made me fall asleep. With Bungie out of the picture and 343 Industries in the captain’s chair, I figured Halo may have some great new changes. I was half right. The single-player campaign is pretty fun and is as tough as nails. The new weapons are awesome to shoot, and there are new enemies for once that are different. The story is convoluted and confusing, but hardcore fans may be able to follow it okay.
The mechanics are pretty much the same as in previous Halo games. There are no iron sights; the game is fast-paced with high jumping and fast sprinting. There’s still no cover system, which is a shame, and the game is damn hard. I felt the story was a bit random, and the environments felt the same way. One minute I’m shooting the same tired Covenant, then these machines type aliens, then mutated Covenant, then regular Covenant. There were some vehicle sections, and I was riding a giant vehicle. The game just felt all over the place, but it was fun, at least.
The story is really confusing and never makes much sense. Something about Cortana being infected and a giant being called the Didact trying to destroy everything. It’s nothing fancy or sophisticated, but you can’t expect much from an FPS. At least the game just feels tighter, a bit heavier, and less floaty than other Halos. I felt the weapons had weight to them, and the sheer variety had me switching them up all the time for different situations. I did find that there were repetitive scenarios throughout the whole game, like jumping into stations to hit a button at the top and running back down to get to the next one. This scenario repeated often throughout the whole game and felt archaic and overly simple.
While the structured campaign felt old and tired, multiplayer is still the best part of Halo. The constantly updated match types make you come back for more all the time. The game feels faster-paced and just more fluid and balanced than any previous Halo game. Customization is deep for your avatar; there are many levels to climb, and the unlocks are sweet and rewarding. After you beat the Halo campaign just once, I doubt you will ever go back because of how forgettable and repetitive it feels. I honestly think at this point, Halo should just continue as a multiplayer-only game and maybe jump on board with PC.
The few little tweaks here and there help the game become more balanced overall. The lack of dual-wielding makes the game feel more raw and “hardcore.” The various adjustments in damage from each weapon and the increased damage for melee attacks are nice. I also love how great the game looks. This is the best-looking Xbox 360 game out, and the voice acting and animations are so lifelike. However, the Xbox 360 doesn’t have the same processing power as the PS3, so you won’t see The Last of Us-quality textures and lighting effects. There are some ugly textures in Halo 4, and they really show sometimes. Surprisingly, there weren’t any slowdowns or glitches that plagued other Halo games.
Overall, Halo 4 is a great final opus for the 360, but it isn’t the revolutionary new Halo like everyone thought. The campaign is repetitive, extremely difficult, and confusing; the story is so-so, but the multiplayer is where the meat of the game is.
2013 wasn’t the strongest year for fighters but at least we didn’t see any more Capcom redos. It was a mixed bag this year due to there being no heavyweight fighters like Mortal Kombat or Street Fighter. The best fighter usually has a memorable roster and great fighting mechanics that stick with you and are a natural feeling. A good online component is a must as well.
Injustice is probably the best superhero fighter ever created. The Mortal Kombat team took their amazing engine from the last MK game and injected DC awesomeness into it. The controls were fluid, it had a surprising amount of unknown characters and the game was packed with content. While it wasn’t flawless and had some issues, it’s still the best fighter this year hands down.
2013 was a slow year for puzzlers. A great puzzle game has unique gameplay that infuses puzzle solving, sometimes a great story, and unique graphics. Sometimes they can also have some action thrown in or platforming even. Puzzle games have to have their core being puzzle solving, and they have to be clever and solvable with using just your brain.
Gunpoint
Gunpoint is extremely fun and unique and is easily the best puzzle game this year. Using action to solve puzzles and giving us a great story on top of that the writing is sharp, the hacking is great, and the atmosphere sucks you in. What kind of puzzle game does that? Nonsense Portal.
Shooters are some of the most hated games in the industry right now. They don’t change, they don’t push themselves, and they are also some of the best selling games ever. Shooters can offer amazing stories, great action, graphics, and some of the best multiplayer you will ever see. 2013 wasn’t a great year for shooters and for once Call of Duty isn’t on the list.
Last Light is not just a solid shooter, it has a memorable and dreadful atmosphere that just absorbs you and sucks you in. The story isn’t exactly memorable, but the journey is. The guns are raw and fun to shoot and the enemies are extremely deadly. The fixed stealth mechanics are solid and fun. The game actually tried to do something different. SHOCK!
Post-apocalyptic games always try to focus on a mass group of people or the devastation itself. The Last of Us focuses on two people, Joel and Ellie, as they travel across the US to find a cure for the biological outbreak that’s destroyed the planet. The journey is of decent length, and you really get to love Joel and Ellie, and they become amazing characters that you don’t want to separate from.
The Last of Us is full of emotion and amazing production values. It’s the best-looking game to grace the PS3 and is a great entry for the final lap of the console’s lifecycle. The combat is a mix of action and stealth. You can sneak around enemies and grab them from behind and either shiv them or strangle them. Shivs aren’t easy to come by; you must craft them, and they can break. Strangling takes about 10 seconds to do and is a slow way to kill someone. Make sure no one else is around, or you will be spotted. You don’t just fight humans in this game; clickers are some of the scariest monsters since Dead Space’s Necromorphs. The sounds that were used are incredibly scary and original. These creepy creatures can hear you even if you crouch. You must slowly crouch around them, and you can only kill them with shivs. Hunters and runners are also hard to fight, but runners can’t be snuck upon; you must fight them. Bloaters are like tanks from Left 4 Dead—huge enemies that are hard to take down. These enemies are interesting to fight, but they are the only ones in the game, so it can get repetitive after a while.
Repetition sets in other things, like each encounter feeling the exact same way. It’s just room after room for zombies or humans to fight. I wanted more cinematic events, which were kind of sparse. Crafting and collecting parts help make the game a bit more interesting. You can craft melee weapons, Molotov, shivs, medkits, and smoke bombs. You can craft in the middle of combat, which is nice, but weapon upgrade stations are rare. There are only about a dozen in the whole game, and you need to save up a lot of your parts to upgrade weapons. You can add gun slots and even increase clip capacity on one-shot weapons, which is nice. There’s actually a good variety of weapons, and they all feel useful in different situations. I found myself using all of them one way or another often.
The game is very linear but feels like an adventure. You go through various areas in the US, from Boston to Utah, and the game just oozes a stylized atmosphere. You really feel like you’re being pulled into this destroyed world, and it just feels so compelling. Despite combat, though there isn’t much to the game, there are no puzzles or anything else that’s very challenging. Just pushing Ellie across pallets in water, moving ladders, etc. The combat is downright frustrating since clickers can kill you in one hit, and the stealth is a bit iffy. Sometimes it felt like the AI was flawed and got me killed. I also ran into a few glitches.
The story itself is the best part of the game. Bringing Ellie across the country and the hardships these two go through is just something else. I don’t want to spoil anything, but you get to play both characters, and Ellie is just a strong character. A little girl who curses, kills people, and wipes out an entire gang on her own? It’s nothing like I have ever seen, and it shows Naughty Dog has the guts to do this.
The game itself looks amazing. The textures are at such high resolution, the animations and models look great, and the lighting is fantastic. It really shows just how much more powerful the PS3 is than the Xbox 360. 360 exclusives like Gears of War 3 and Halo 4 have some pretty ugly textures, and the lighting doesn’t look too hot. The Last of Us looks like a PC game, and it blew my mind, which is rare for current-generation consoles these days. There are a few eye sores, but you really have to hunt for them if only every developer put this much effort into their games.
Overall, The Last of Us is one of the best games of this generation and the best PS3 game this year. Joel and Ellie are highly memorable characters, and their journey is frightening and enlightening. The combat can feel repetitive towards the end and can be downright difficult and frustrating, not to mention constantly being lost due to a lack of direction. Despite these flaws, this is one fantastic journey that every PS3 gamer should endure.
Castlevania has struggled for years in the 3D department. Lords of Shadow was the first solid Castlevania that was in 3D and did the series justice. Some hardcore fans shame the game, but I think it is one of the best action games of this generation. Mirror of Fate brings that same awesomeness to the 3DS with great combat and solid platforming.
You play as four protagonists throughout the whole game. Simon, Alucard, Gabriel, and Trevor. The game has simple 2D platforming with jumping and swinging, but the combat is solid enough. You have two attack buttons and a special power button. The special powers vary from axes (CV1, anyone?) to passive powers like being invincible for a short time or turning into a werewolf (Alucard). The combat is punchy and powerful and feels great. However, the game is incredibly hard. It requires a lot of skill and mastering the combat to get through the game because it can just get downright tough, but it’s beatable. Apart from the combat, you are mainly solving puzzles and finding secrets.
Puzzles involve pushing and pulling objects into the right places, flipping switches in sequential order, and sometimes even labyrinthine mazes. The map is very useful since you can place notes, and it will tell you if there’s a secret or something useful nearby. Upgrading health and magic seems like a standard affair, but you have to find these chests and make an effort; they aren’t handed to you. There was some annoying backtracking, which felt a bit cheap, and the fast travel system is nearly useless since you never know which level you will end up in. I did get lost a few times, and the puzzles can be real head-scratchers, but platforming fans shouldn’t struggle too much.
The story is pretty short, and there’s no reason to really come back. People who have never played Lords of Shadow won’t really get the story since the ending is extremely sad. The graphics are amazing, and these are the best 3D effects I have seen on the 3DS thus far. They pop out and just make the whole game come to life. I honestly didn’t see much that wasn’t in 3D in some way.
Overall, Mirror of Fate is a solid yet difficult platformer that will make any Castlevania or platformer fan happy. The story is interesting, the 3D effects are amazing, and the combat is solid. Just be prepared for some backtracking and short game time.
2013 was light on good RPGs. While most were traditional JRPGs they somehow shined more than usual this year. The year was flooded with free to play MMOs on PC, but none really stood out and made a huge impact. A great RPG consists of a memorable story, characters, and fun combat.
Some may say that Ni no Kuni was too traditional, but what’s wrong with doing something traditional right? It may have been a bit grind-heavy, but the infusion of Studio Ghibli’s anime magic with Level 5’s JRPG expertise was a guaranteed masterpiece. The story was memorable, the characters were great, and the combat wasn’t your average JRPG mix being real-time in battle. It stood out among the other traditional RPGs due to its beautiful creative scope and deep gameplay.
I call this year The Return of the Platformer because there were so many solid platforming games this year including mobile devices. There were a lot of solid sequels and brand new IPs that just rocked. Platformers have always been one of the oldest and most recognized genres in gaming. The best ones usually offer a unique twist on platforming, have solid and responsive controls, and interesting and unique gameplay changes that make the game feel addictive.
Puppeteer
I know big shock right? While everyone’s raving about Super Mario 3D World there’s this little guy in the corner of the PlayStation section a store collecting dust. Puppeteer is the most innovative platformer this year and maybe the most in the past several years. Instead of being a typical 8 or 16-bit retread it using a unique puppeteering gameplay concept. It has a funny and witty story along with great voice acting and loveable characters. I would play this over a new Mario any day.
Flying down the track at 150 MPH or escaping the cops. Racing games have always been about precision and speed. This year saw some great racing games, however, many were just the same thing we have seen before just done really well. For the first time, mobile games are finally reaching console quality and Real Racing 3 really took the mobile industry by storm earlier this year.
Need for Speed Rivals
Once again Need for Speed is at the top of the racing podium. It had amazing visuals along with fast-paced and fun racing that out beat everything this year. It may be similar to Hot Pursuit, but the open world and additional changes just put it at the top of the microtransaction heavy racers this year.
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Clearly you have been blocking everything you or haven't played the game at all. Maybe pay attention to the story…