5: Sekiro - One of the best modern works of gothic horror in any medium (yes better than Bloodborne and Souls). A tight central narrative tied into a much deeper lore than is apparent at first glance. Also informed by Buddhist morality, which is pretty cool.

4: Ark - You can shoot a rocket launcher at robots from the back of a Giganotosaurus. What's not to love?

3: Spec Ops: The Line - A controversial game, but one of the only shooters in existence to actually critique the bloody imperialist power fantasy that all modern shooter games inherently are. It spat on Call of Duty and gave the finger to every ooh-rah Marine dipshit who thought they were buying another game to fellate themselves with.

2: Disco Elysium - self explanatory

1: Journey - Less a game and more an interactive therapy tool. Helped bring me out of a major depressive spiral way back when. Play it on mescaline and it becomes a spiritual experience. Also a playable deconstruction of The Hero's Journey story framework, which I just enjoyed aesthetically.

  • RandyLahey [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Total Warhammer 2 - it's like everything the tabletop wishes it could be, with big armies of monsters and ratmen and shit just crashing into each other and big flaming magic skulls wiping out half an army, and they just keep piling more and more stuff into it, and even though it's wonky as hell in so many ways it's just a tonne of fun. Super hyped seeing all the Kislev shit for the third one right now

    Subnautica - it got me through the roughest period in my life, and it's just a beautiful game with tonnes of cool places to explore and things to do, a beautifully realised world, and I love the slow transition from surviving to thriving

    Invisible Inc - I just keep coming back to this one, it's just so incredibly well put-together, and the way it balances risk and reward and tailoring your approach to the circumstances is just chefs-kiss

    Frostpunk - Just the grimmest citybuilder that keeps throwing more and more shit at you just when you thought you were clawing yourself out of catastrophe, it's fantastic if you're into that sort of shit. And even though the number of scenarios is pretty limited, they're all so different and well done

    Endless Legend - Best of the 4x types, a really different approach from the civ games, and the different factions play almost like a totally different game. Also it looks pretty.

    And yeah obviously Disco Elysium too, plus probably some really obvious ones that I missed