I commented in the (now locked) Jaded at E3s AAA showings thread that I agreed with the OP but that part of my lack of excitement was because I had been spoiled over the last year or with so many amazing games and it got me thinking just how much the last 15 months of my gaming life have been overloaded with quality that its insane when I compare it to any previous years.
Let me explain. I never played much Nintendo growing up. I played a lot of SFII and Final Fight on a friends SNES but nothing much else. The N64 completely passed me by. I did own a Gamecube and loved Wind Waker, Sunshine and Prime but wrote off the Wii after trying Wii Sports at a friends.
Anyway early last year someone posted a great deal on a Wii U in the Cheap Arse Gaffer thread. I had no interest at all in one but the deal was so good I went straight out and bought one. What with the small but stellar library of U exclusives, backwards compatibility and the Virtual Console I have played all the following (except Resi4, Prime and WWHD) for the first time ever and loved the shit out of every one of them. Its worth mentioning that I used to be someone who NEVER replayed games, I would just move on to the next experience. Its why I sold my Cube years ago with Wind Waker, Sunshine, Prime, Pikmin, that Star Wars game where you trip up the AT-ATs, Super Monkey Ball 1 & 2 and 2 controllers for £40. What was I thinking? But I digress, back to the games. I could write a whole thread on each one, but that would take far too long so Ill just single out a few that deserve some extra praise.
SNES
Super Metroid
Probably in my top 5 games of all time now. Got 72% of items on first playthrough, immediately played it again and got to 76%. Played it again a week later following a guide to get 100%. You dont need me to wax lyrical about it, you all know already, youve all played it years ago. I hadnt played a 16 bit game since the Megadrive days, so I was astounded to enjoy it as much as I did. The fact that it only cost me 30p is insanity, its an easy £100+ experience.
Super Mario World
I hadnt been a fan of 2D platformers since Ghost n Goblins on the C64. Now I know that I just hadnt played the right ones. Incredible game, but again all of you already know that.
Link to the Past
N64
Super Mario 64
I held off buying this from the Wii shop last year as I anticipated it being available on the Wii U VC soon enough. Despite lasting nearly a year I buckled a couple of weeks ago and got it from the Wii shop and immediately got utterly consumed. 3D world was great, but playing this made me realise how much I missed the triple jump, even if I rarely ever used it. I played nothing else until I finished two back to back 120 star playthroughs. Sooooooo good, even on a crappy Classic Controller. On a sidenote, I had previously seen and been impressed by Siglemics skills at running this game. After playing it I immediately went and watched one of his runs on YT again, and my mind was officially blown.
Wii
Resident Evil 4
One of my favourite ever games, now with better controls. Ill take it.
Metroid Prime Trilogy
I never finished Prime back on the Cube despite loving it. Replaying the first game last year was probably the highlight of the year. Pointer controls are incredible as well, and widescreen to boot.
Donkey Kong Country Returns
Skyward Sword
Pikmin (Wii controls)
Wii U
Super Mario 3D World
Wind Waker HD
Wind Waker on Gamecube was my first Zelda game and I will love it forever. No game had ever given me that sense of grand adventure, and it felt like an interactive epic cartoon with its beautiful visuals. The remaster is quite possibly the best looking game Ive ever seen.
Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze
Mario Kart 8
Toki Tori 2
Ive restarted this puzzle game 3 times now, getting fairly far each time before becoming stumped, leaving it for a bit and just restarting rather than trying to pick up where I left off. I have no qualms about looking at guides for tips usually, but I just cant do it for this game. For those who havent played it, the tutorial is just a still screen showing you what two actions you can take in the game, a whistle and a stomp, and which button you press to perform them. Thats all you are given. From then on you progress and learn through observation and experimentation and each time I made a new discovery, the feeling of accomplishment and understanding was unrivalled and I didnt want to rob myself of that by looking at a guide. I have barely any posts on Miiverse, but I felt compelled to post to the TT2 board not long after buying it
This game is a masterclass in intelligent game design.
Were it not for a week at a friends house a few years ago where I gorged myself on both games Galaxy 1&2 would no doubt be on this list too.
But Nintendo cant take all the credit for my amazing run. Sony get a thumbs up as thanks to PS+ theres been
Rayman Origins
Hotline Miami
My bladder control is exemplary thanks to this game. Plenty of times I was busting for a piss whilst playing, but for some reason wouldnt go until Id cleared that floor. Its surprisingly hard to pull yourself out of that instant restart mentality. Gaming crack?
Guacamelee
Dragons Dogma: Dark Arisen
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
And of course GAF is always a steady stream of information and recommendations, and thanks to this forum and the passion of its members theres also been
Vanquish
I did play the demo on PS3 ages ago and didnt think it was that special. Revisited it with a different mindset with the suggestion to Play it crazy, and omg, what a game. I just wish I was better at it, fighting stylish feels goooood.
Bayonetta (on a 360)
Another GAF favourite, I initially dismissed it as I didnt find the art style very appealing. Had I bothered to put more than half an hour into it I would have found one of the most appealing and enjoyable fighting systems Ive ever known.
God Hand
Fuck me. This game. Id never even heard of it until its name popped up in some action game thread and it was being mentioned alongside the almighty Ninja Gaiden Black, so it was only fair I give it a look. I sucked in the first few hours but it was still amazing. When I could actually get through a stage relatively unscathed it became god-tier.
Dark Souls II
The only game on my list I purchased without any outside influence. Its vastly inferior to Demons and Dark Souls 1, but it still consumed every free hour of my free time after release for a good 80 hours.
Not a bad list if I do say so, many of them legitimate top ten games of all time and Ive been blessed to play them all in such a short period. The crazy thing is, the list has the potential to be even better, as I own but havent started yet
Pikmin 3
REmake
Super Mario Bros 3
And the next games to tackle on my backlog are
NSMBU
Wondeful 101
Xenoblade Chronicles
Majoras Mask (if it ever comes to VC)
And finally, a couple of games that dont make my list that would be slam dunk inclusions for most Gaffers
The Last of Us
I need to do a LTTP thread on this game to really give it the discussion it deserves, but I was really disappointed in this game.
Persona 4 Golden
Im not big on story in my games, maybe that was why I got frustrated with this. It seemed to me that of my actual playtime (I got as far as unlocking Kanji as a playable character), about 20% was actual gameplay. The rest was running about creating Social Links, reading/studying/working, all of which became a drag and were the reason I gave up on it.
Hmm, I just did a post preview and this ended up way longer than expected, so thanks to anyone who made it to the end of this TLDR thread and many thanks to Nintendo, Sony and especially GAF for the richest period in my 30 year gaming career. My only concern is that it may only go downhill from here.
Let me explain. I never played much Nintendo growing up. I played a lot of SFII and Final Fight on a friends SNES but nothing much else. The N64 completely passed me by. I did own a Gamecube and loved Wind Waker, Sunshine and Prime but wrote off the Wii after trying Wii Sports at a friends.
Anyway early last year someone posted a great deal on a Wii U in the Cheap Arse Gaffer thread. I had no interest at all in one but the deal was so good I went straight out and bought one. What with the small but stellar library of U exclusives, backwards compatibility and the Virtual Console I have played all the following (except Resi4, Prime and WWHD) for the first time ever and loved the shit out of every one of them. Its worth mentioning that I used to be someone who NEVER replayed games, I would just move on to the next experience. Its why I sold my Cube years ago with Wind Waker, Sunshine, Prime, Pikmin, that Star Wars game where you trip up the AT-ATs, Super Monkey Ball 1 & 2 and 2 controllers for £40. What was I thinking? But I digress, back to the games. I could write a whole thread on each one, but that would take far too long so Ill just single out a few that deserve some extra praise.
SNES
Super Metroid
Probably in my top 5 games of all time now. Got 72% of items on first playthrough, immediately played it again and got to 76%. Played it again a week later following a guide to get 100%. You dont need me to wax lyrical about it, you all know already, youve all played it years ago. I hadnt played a 16 bit game since the Megadrive days, so I was astounded to enjoy it as much as I did. The fact that it only cost me 30p is insanity, its an easy £100+ experience.
Super Mario World
I hadnt been a fan of 2D platformers since Ghost n Goblins on the C64. Now I know that I just hadnt played the right ones. Incredible game, but again all of you already know that.
Link to the Past
N64
Super Mario 64
I held off buying this from the Wii shop last year as I anticipated it being available on the Wii U VC soon enough. Despite lasting nearly a year I buckled a couple of weeks ago and got it from the Wii shop and immediately got utterly consumed. 3D world was great, but playing this made me realise how much I missed the triple jump, even if I rarely ever used it. I played nothing else until I finished two back to back 120 star playthroughs. Sooooooo good, even on a crappy Classic Controller. On a sidenote, I had previously seen and been impressed by Siglemics skills at running this game. After playing it I immediately went and watched one of his runs on YT again, and my mind was officially blown.
Wii
Resident Evil 4
One of my favourite ever games, now with better controls. Ill take it.
Metroid Prime Trilogy
I never finished Prime back on the Cube despite loving it. Replaying the first game last year was probably the highlight of the year. Pointer controls are incredible as well, and widescreen to boot.
Donkey Kong Country Returns
Skyward Sword
Pikmin (Wii controls)
Wii U
Super Mario 3D World
Wind Waker HD
Wind Waker on Gamecube was my first Zelda game and I will love it forever. No game had ever given me that sense of grand adventure, and it felt like an interactive epic cartoon with its beautiful visuals. The remaster is quite possibly the best looking game Ive ever seen.
Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze
Mario Kart 8
Toki Tori 2
Ive restarted this puzzle game 3 times now, getting fairly far each time before becoming stumped, leaving it for a bit and just restarting rather than trying to pick up where I left off. I have no qualms about looking at guides for tips usually, but I just cant do it for this game. For those who havent played it, the tutorial is just a still screen showing you what two actions you can take in the game, a whistle and a stomp, and which button you press to perform them. Thats all you are given. From then on you progress and learn through observation and experimentation and each time I made a new discovery, the feeling of accomplishment and understanding was unrivalled and I didnt want to rob myself of that by looking at a guide. I have barely any posts on Miiverse, but I felt compelled to post to the TT2 board not long after buying it
This game is a masterclass in intelligent game design.
Were it not for a week at a friends house a few years ago where I gorged myself on both games Galaxy 1&2 would no doubt be on this list too.
But Nintendo cant take all the credit for my amazing run. Sony get a thumbs up as thanks to PS+ theres been
Rayman Origins
Hotline Miami
My bladder control is exemplary thanks to this game. Plenty of times I was busting for a piss whilst playing, but for some reason wouldnt go until Id cleared that floor. Its surprisingly hard to pull yourself out of that instant restart mentality. Gaming crack?
Guacamelee
Dragons Dogma: Dark Arisen
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
And of course GAF is always a steady stream of information and recommendations, and thanks to this forum and the passion of its members theres also been
Vanquish
I did play the demo on PS3 ages ago and didnt think it was that special. Revisited it with a different mindset with the suggestion to Play it crazy, and omg, what a game. I just wish I was better at it, fighting stylish feels goooood.
Bayonetta (on a 360)
Another GAF favourite, I initially dismissed it as I didnt find the art style very appealing. Had I bothered to put more than half an hour into it I would have found one of the most appealing and enjoyable fighting systems Ive ever known.
God Hand
Fuck me. This game. Id never even heard of it until its name popped up in some action game thread and it was being mentioned alongside the almighty Ninja Gaiden Black, so it was only fair I give it a look. I sucked in the first few hours but it was still amazing. When I could actually get through a stage relatively unscathed it became god-tier.
Dark Souls II
The only game on my list I purchased without any outside influence. Its vastly inferior to Demons and Dark Souls 1, but it still consumed every free hour of my free time after release for a good 80 hours.
Not a bad list if I do say so, many of them legitimate top ten games of all time and Ive been blessed to play them all in such a short period. The crazy thing is, the list has the potential to be even better, as I own but havent started yet
Pikmin 3
REmake
Super Mario Bros 3
And the next games to tackle on my backlog are
NSMBU
Wondeful 101
Xenoblade Chronicles
Majoras Mask (if it ever comes to VC)
And finally, a couple of games that dont make my list that would be slam dunk inclusions for most Gaffers
The Last of Us
I need to do a LTTP thread on this game to really give it the discussion it deserves, but I was really disappointed in this game.
Persona 4 Golden
Im not big on story in my games, maybe that was why I got frustrated with this. It seemed to me that of my actual playtime (I got as far as unlocking Kanji as a playable character), about 20% was actual gameplay. The rest was running about creating Social Links, reading/studying/working, all of which became a drag and were the reason I gave up on it.
Hmm, I just did a post preview and this ended up way longer than expected, so thanks to anyone who made it to the end of this TLDR thread and many thanks to Nintendo, Sony and especially GAF for the richest period in my 30 year gaming career. My only concern is that it may only go downhill from here.
