The games I played this year that actually came out this year.
Conan Unconquered- Really should have been labeled early access. This one feels like it needs 2 more layers of polish to become great.
Anno 1800- Gorgeous supply chain management, historical Factorio without the conveyor belts. They got rid of the silly land combat. Just wish they expanded the naval combat beyond 4 units spread out across only 2 tech levels, with 2 of those units not really worth building. Now fix your production surplus readouts!
Slay the Spire- Amusing for a couple hours. Beat it with the sword guy, didn’t feel any compulsion to try the other guy or really play at all anymore.
One Finger Death Punch 2- They made a lot of visual design changes that throw you off (the mob bosses being the most glaring). I never got the zen feeling I did from the first game.
Devil May Cry 5- It’s better than all the “fake” games (DMC2 and DmC), but isn’t nearly as fun as 3 or even 4. I do not understand their obsession with forcing Nero into the series yet again. It’s almost Suda 51 No More Heroes level of trolling the player.
Wishlist:
Sunless Skies- The slow travel and tight fuel economy killed Sunless Sea for me.
World War Z- Missed the boat on the sale, wary of the Mega Store folding and losing all my games. Is their exclusive ever set to expire?
Chasing the extra Ascension difficulty levels gave Slay the Spire a fair amount of additional play time for me. Before that, it seemed like there wasn’t meaningful depth to the systems.
I’m looking forward to playing Cadence of Hyrule at some point this year. “Later” because the business model for videogames tells me they will all be deeply discounted within a year. I have to really want to support the company to pay full price. It might worth it for Brace Yourself Games.
Since July 1 would mark the second half of the year and Samurai Shodown shipped on June 25, that is definitely among the best games of 2019 for me so far. It is a fighting game that honors its roots while being perfectly suited to modern play. I love it.
Apex Legends is a close second. I’ve taken a couple breaks here and there but it keeps me coming back. I love the three man dynamic and it has been a pleasure playing with random Joes and Jolenes on the Internet. Context sensitive R1 pinging is the best online gameplay invention of the last ten years.
Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes is easily right behind these. It’s a man’s life work examined in video game narrative. There are so few true auteurs in this medium. Goichi Suda is one and video games are elevated because of it as he uses trashy people, places, and things to examine himself, gamers, and gaming as a whole.
After those three, I haven’t bought a whole lot yet in 2019 that’s not retro, but I have purchased some Sega Ages releases including Out Run and Virtua Racing that I’ve played a bunch as well as Time Pilot from the Arcade Archives series. I expect to play a lot of newer releases through the fall.
Oh! Not a game, but the 8bitdo M30 controller is the best d-pad and buttons controller made in like 30 years. Definitely deserves recognition.
