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The Witness - a masterpiece of puzzle and level design. Nothing in that game is frivolous. Might be a little confusing at first, but if you explore and experime

The Witness - a masterpiece of puzzle and level design. Nothing in that game is frivolous. Might be a little confusing at first, but if you explore and experiment its rules will become clearer to you. The Outer Wilds - a technical masterpiece and a game where you can beat the game very quickly if you know what to do, but you have to put in about 10-15 hours of exploration all across a solar system to gain the knowledge of what you need to do in order to beat it. An excellent creepy, puzzly, and deadly mystery. Persona 5 Royal - The combat can get a little samey in this game, but the style, soundtrack, and world is amazing. Also love how you have to decide what activities you spend your free time on, as you can only do a few at a time. Danganronpa series - Bonkers murder mystery graphic novel that stretches across multiple games with an extremely creative story. Civilization series - masterpiece of 'just one more turn' gameplay. I don't play it too many times in a year, but whenever I do sit down to play it again, I tend to lose a weekend to it. Baba Is You - clever puzzle that requires you to change your thinking entirely to solve its puzzles, as by pushing together and breaking apart pieces of sentences you can change the rules of the level in very surprising ways. Super Mario Odyssey - tons of fun with lots to find and collect, and figuring out for the first time what all you can possess with Cappy and what new creative abilities it grants you is super fun. Zelda: Breath of the Wild - a huge world to explore that just barf a bunch of icons on the map and tells you to go there to do some minigame thing like Ubisoft does. You see something that looks different and interesting in the distance? Go there, and you will likely be rewarded. Also tons of interesting physics puzzles. God of War - great story, feels like you're playing a movie at times, gorgeous visuals, super fluid combat (actually tried going back to breath of the wild after a playthrough of this and BOTW's combat felt pretty boring in comparison), and even some clever puzzles thanks to being able to throw an axe that freezes things that you can recall from anywhere. Into The Breach - Clever tactics game that helped refresh the formula by telling you exactly what the enemy is about to do on their next turn, so it becomes a puzzle in figuring out how to minimize or redirect their targets/movements and/or who needs to be eliminated most this turn. Hades - clever rogue-like game where the story advances between runs, and people react to how far you progressed in that run. and within the run, you're given lots of choices of how to grow and expand your character each level, by choosing from multiple exits that tell you the type of reward you'll get for clearing it, and even the rewards themselves giving you multiple options within each type. I do wish it had a bit more variety in the level structure itself, though, but it's fun enough to play I still managed to sink 20 hours into it, which is probably the most I've ever put into a rogue-like. Nier Automata - amazing soundtrack I listen to in the background all the time (even went to the concert), interesting mash up of ideas and genres and multiple perspectives storytelling together.

hombre_fatal 5y ago
I've been playing Hades the last few weeks. Easily one of the best games in its genre. I just wish the boons weren't mutually exclusive so that you could get more interesting, emergent kits like you can in The Binding of Isaac. With Binding of Isaac, there's always a more ridiculous kit out there which makes it addictive to play again and see what unfolds. You can pick up lasers, bouncing bullets, and homing upgrades, and now you have homing, bouncing, lasers. (The code to make every upgrade synergize with every other upgrade must have been a real feat.) With Hades, you just get to choose between the same few boons that don't stack with each other, so the game never really changes. Your attack causes frost damage or it crits or it pushes enemies away or it reflects projectiles or it weakens enemies, but—dual boons aside—you never get to have fun mixing them together.
pxx 5y ago
I cannot recommend Outer Wilds enough. It is a game-defining game. There's a little caution in the recommendation: some people complain a bit about the controls (they're a bit realistic and therefore unforgiving), and it's playable with keyboard and mouse but a controller makes things a lot easier. A lot of the value in this game comes from discovering things for yourself, and it is easy to get spoiled. If an exploration game (in the true sense of the term--not the "we have a big world and will send you on pointless fetch quests" you see often) where the only inventory you have is your own knowledge sounds anywhere near interesting to you, you should play and also not spoil yourself with reviews that might tell you critical concepts that are best to discover yourself.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
  > and it's playable with keyboard and mouse but a controller makes things a lot easier. I actually disagree with this. There is exactly one way in which a controller is better in Outer Wilds[0] and it isn't, in my opinion, enough better to make up for its shortcomings everywhere else. [0] People who have played the game know where and why, and it doesn't actually help that much.

hombre_fatal 5y ago

I've been playing Hades the last few weeks. Easily one of the best games in its genre. I just wish the boons weren't mutually exclusive so that you could get more interesting, emergent kits like you can in The Binding of Isaac. With Binding of Isaac, there's always a more ridiculous kit out there which makes it addictive to play again and see what unfolds. You can pick up lasers, bouncing bullets, and homing upgrades, and now you have homing, bouncing, lasers. (The code to make every upgrade synergize with every other upgrade must have been a real feat.) With Hades, you just get to choose between the same few boons that don't stack with each other, so the game never really changes. Your attack causes frost damage or it crits or it pushes enemies away or it reflects projectiles or it weakens enemies, but—dual boons aside—you never get to have fun mixing them together.

pxx 5y ago

I cannot recommend Outer Wilds enough. It is a game-defining game. There's a little caution in the recommendation: some people complain a bit about the controls (they're a bit realistic and therefore unforgiving), and it's playable with keyboard and mouse but a controller makes things a lot easier. A lot of the value in this game comes from discovering things for yourself, and it is easy to get spoiled. If an exploration game (in the true sense of the term--not the "we have a big world and will send you on pointless fetch quests" you see often) where the only inventory you have is your own knowledge sounds anywhere near interesting to you, you should play and also not spoil yourself with reviews that might tell you critical concepts that are best to discover yourself.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
> and it's playable with keyboard and mouse but a controller makes things a lot easier. I actually disagree with this. There is exactly one way in which a controller is better in Outer Wilds[0] and it isn't, in my opinion, enough better to make up for its shortcomings everywhere else. [0] People who have played the game know where and why, and it doesn't actually help that much.