Quarterlies 2021! The Qt3 forum readers’ choice for best game of 2021 is …

OLD WORLD

This forum has been around a long time, and one of its fundamental precepts has been that it is run by a guy with eclectic tastes constantly being told he is wrong by a bunch of people with different eclectic tastes. This year, the unthinkable has happened and the two are in harmony. The only one who could have done such a thing is Civ4 designer @SorenJohnson, who has brought the polarized sides together with a unifying work of explorminating excellence.

But man, you wouldn’t have thought so from the comments. I have been trying to quote all the #1 votes for the winning game each year while doing these writeups, but last year there were so few comments from #1 voters that I just did everybody. This year, it was like the voters who liked Old World just posted “Old World. 'Nuff said.” In fact, after a while, every time I saw a #1 vote for the game, I mentally appended “'Nuff said” to it. So here are all the comments I could find about Old World from people who voted for it in any place from 1-5.

If Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous or especially Wildermyth had won, we we would have had two pages of paragraph-long comments. Just look at them. I guess that’s the difference between people who play an RPG or “a warm hug of a game,*” and people who want you to please go away because they are optimizing their city layout.

Speaking of those two games, those were the #2 and #3 games this year. For a while there, it looked like it was gonna be Wildermyth all the way, but Old World just kept getting votes and votes, and last Tuesday it was:

Tuesday-1-18

Then on Wednesday, just two days before voting closed, it was:

Wednesday 1-19

But then more votes happened, and here we are. Next year, you will be able to vote for Old World AGAIN as it will be coming out for a new platform this Q2.

Last year’s flight sim showing seems to have been an aberration, and there are no wargames in the top 5, either.

As mentioned in the voting thread, @Razgon is the summation of the Qt3 hivemind, choosing four of the top five games in his list.

Below is the breakdown in votes for the top ten, and below that is a linky to clicky to take you to the full voting tally spreadsheet. Again, thanks to @arrendek for making my job so ridiculously easy.

Top10-2021

Here is the original voting thread, for reference.

*I loved this description.

Commentiarus belowus.

Reserved for, I dunno. Something.

Old World is still an Epic exclusive, right? I’d be interested to see how well Epic’s campaign is doing, and how many of the top slots are filled with games that are Epic exclusives.

ps well done Old World!

I haven’t played any of these voted on top 10 games, the forum is obviously wrong. :)

I think I may be the most out of step with the forum overall, having only shared a vote with a single other person (Tim James and I dug Vampire Survivors) and actually having the number 2 title as my least favorite game 😅

I’m basically the anti-@Razgon, a dark mirror of his impeccable taste.

Sadly yes. Hopefully it’ll do well when it’s able to reach a broader audiience.

On an unrelated note, I suspect if I’d had time this year to play Wrath of the Righteous it would have won. As it was I couldn’t include it on my list despite having Kickstarted it.

I think that’s one of the closest votes we’ve had on this topic! Just 12 points separating the top 3.

Dang, I forgot to vote. Not that it would have mattered much, but I am surprised that my second place game got zero votes, and my first place (by a massive margin) only 4.

oh well.

I bet Wildermyth split the RPG vote, because otherwise WotR probably would’ve won.

Old World (on Steam) is my most anticipated game of… 2022?

Haha , yeah its in my top 5 next year for sure!

Tell me more

I also voted for and said things about Old World, but Brooski didn’t include my comments, so for the sake of posterity vanity, here they are:

Surely just releasing on Steam shouldn’t count as a new platform. It’s still just on PCs! Or is it coming out for consoles? I couldn’t find any info on that.

Metroid Dread, Mario 3D World: Bowser’s Fury, Old World, not sure. there is a fourth 2021 release I played.

But Nintendo just isn’t something most people here play so they miss out on the absolutely hilarious joy of playing Mario 3D world 4 player with the fammily.

Once again Qt3 voting has chosen the correct winner.

Ack! Sorry about that, @Kolbex. I’ll edit the post.

EDIT: Edited! Although I see why I missed it the first time - you had your comments below your list, Which is totally fine. My bad.

Well, er, you see … it was kind of a joke. Sort of!

The simple fact of having kids at the right age would definitely tend to change one’s gaming landscape, I’m sure. I’ll get there in a few years.

I mean, I can only speak for myself, but if I actually find time to play it and enjoy it I’m definitely treating it as a 2022 release since, for my purposes, it is. Doesn’t mean anyone else will, though it looks like I may not be alone…

You could vote for it in the Actualies, then, but for the Super Official Voting Rules of the Quarterlies I will knit my brows sternly and say it shouldn’t be permitted!

I feel that way about a lot of the definitive editions that get voted for. In the end, though, it doesn’t really matter because you need a critical mass of voters to have an impact and it’s very clear that Old World is “past peak” on this forum even if I suspect it may find a broader audience when it gets a winder release in the larger gaming community.