2023 Community Game of the Year

Not a bother but yeah, caught your list. It’s hard to miss. (Incidentally, you folks need to learn to snip stuff out when you quote, just sayin’ ^^)
I tally the votes before I post my reply so it’s happened before that my text response is incomplete. It’s because I’m focusing on the spreadsheet.

Thanks! I figured that might be the case, but thought it might be worth checking just in case.

Yeah, every year I actually agonize about that, for whatever it's worth -- but then I find myself dissatisfied with the way it affects the presentation and formatting of my screenshots and I selfishly just post it open. But yeah, definitely NOT a post I ever intend to have someone quote in full.

This is such a shorter, better review than my soliloquy on DAVE. Perfect.

My quick top 10:

1. Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom
2. Baldur's Gate 3
3. Magic: The Gathering Arena
4. Dead Cells: Castlevania DLC
5. Marvel's Midnight Suns
6. Cobalt Core
7. Starfield
8. Lego: Fortnite
9. Tina Tina's Wonderlands
10.Walkabout Mini Golf

I love this thread! Thanks for making this happen again, StayGold and Eleima! Such a great opportunity to browse through all the libraries and review what the year was like in gaming.

I did not play many of the big games this year, including Baldur's Gate 3, although BG3 was my most wanted game for this year but 100+ hour games just don't fit well into my schedule anymore. I also have to admit that it turns everything into a coinflip

I'll save it for retirement in 20 years or so.

Comparing to last year I apparently only played 15 or 16 games eligible for my top ten this year - down from 40. 26 if I count games like Baldur's Gate that I just installed and maybe started 2 or 3 times to take a look.
Still shows that I've spent way less time gaming compared to last year. 

Anyway, here's my top 10:

1. DoDonPachi Blissfull Death Re:incarnation

GOTY for me, even though I'm awful at it. But it is a lot of fun, and you can just throw in a quick round or two after work. Apparently it's also considered by many to be the pinnacle of Cave and I might agree, at least I like it more than Ketsui or Mushihimesama.

2. Gravity Circuit

If you dug Mega Man back in the 8-bit days, you should do yourself a favor and check this one out. It's outstanding, and in contrast to modern games, it doesn't hurt if you take a break from playing it for a couple of weeks.

3. Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Played this in preparation for SM2 (which is another one of the games I only booted up maybe twice so far) and finished it almost in one sitting. I wish more AAA games would fit this size!

4. Quake II Remaster

Played this coop (original campaign) and started playing the new content, and aside from the nostalgia, I think it even holds up today. I didn't even remember it being so challenging in the last third, but maybe I'm just getting old. After playing it I played it again in RTX. Intending to play it again in coop in 2024.

5. Immortals of Aveum

It's a classic single-player FPS with great graphics. Twenty years ago this would have been a must-play for everyone; nowadays, it's very niche but a lot of fun if you miss games like this. Sad that it probably didn't sell well enough to justify more developers making more game like this.

6. Hogwarts Legacy

The only game that I kept getting back to over a couple of months to finish it. And I'm not even a fan of the franchise. But the world is astonishing, and it's fun to keep flying around on your broom.

7. Mario Wonder

It's been probably twenty years since I finished a Mario game, and this one made me do it. It didn't feel like it broke new ground that the Raymans and Celestes haven't broken yet, but it was very entertaining.

8. Horizon Chase 2

The mobile game I kept getting back to. Runs on everything: iPhone, iPad, AppleTV, Macbook. Think Outrun or Lotus Turbo Challenge. Nice break from the more modern racing games like Forza Horizon and Gran Turismo I still play once in a while when I feel like taking the racing wheel for a spin.

9. Pinball M

I like pinball. I like horror. Day one purchase, and since I can't put FX3 and FX on here because I think they did not come out this year, they deserve a spot on the list.

10. Diablo 4

Had fun playing the campaign in coop. Lost interest during season 1. 

Altogether, I guess I enjoyed 2022's games much more than 2023's. Nothing this year came close to a Marvel Midnight Suns or God of War, although I guess DoDonPachi easily beats Final Vendetta in the arcade category. But then again, I didn't really try to get into BG3 or Spider-Man 2.

Short list for easier copy & paste:
1. DoDonPachi Blissfull Death Re:incarnation
2. Gravity Circuit
3. Spider-Man: Miles Morales
4. Quake II Rerelease
5. Immortals of Aveum
6. Hogwarts Legacy
7. Mario Wonder
8. Horizon Chase 2
9. Pinball M
10. Diablo 4

Haha, glad to hear it. I'm a sucker for the old arcade style, more straightforward kind of games now that I find less and less time to play and usually rather would read a book or watch a movie or TV show than multiple choice dialogues and cutscenes in a game.

So I'm always looking out for these retro style games (or in the case of DDP ports). And fortunately, many indie developers seem to focus me as their target audience with their shmups, beat'em ups and boomer shooters!

Will do!

10. Robocop: Rogue City

This shouldn't be as good as it is - especially given that you're playing a walking turret - but somehow they make it work. It helps that it looks phenomenal for a low budget game and the destruction you wreak is exquisite.

9. Turbo Overkill

Kind of the polar opposite to Robocop - you move greased lightning, sliding all over the place and dicing enemies with your chainsaw leg(s). And then you're off on a vehicle segment, pilot a mech, or grapple hook your way across space battle. It's an insane amount of variety for a game with one full-time dev.

8. Sifu

The most exhausting game I've played this year. Hard as nails, every session makes me sweat, but it's so satisfying and cinematic when you walk into a room an wreck everything perfectly.

7. Resident Evil 4: Remake

Remaking RE4 seemed like a very bad idea, but they pulled it off and made a game that's just as good as the original, but with its own flavour.

6. Amnesia: The Bunker

A real return to form for the series. It's basically Alien: Isolation in a WWI bunker, and I love every horrible, stress-inducing moment of it.

5. Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty

It was also my first time really playing through main game - I petered out after the first act on previous attempts, waiting for patches, there was always some big change coming. But Phantom Liberty is the best of the game distilled into one area. The gigs are more involved, and Dogtown is the best designed district in the game, and the main quest is a pretty crackerjack spy thriller.

4. Lunacid

For my money, the best From Soft homage of the year. (Sorry Lies of P.) Also, some of the best vibes of the year. A dungeon crawling throwback to King's Field, the exploration and soundtrack are impeccable, and it has the weird quirks that makes you feel like there's always another secret around the next corner.

3. Armored Core 6

A.k.a PS2 game of the year. It feels great to play, the scale on display is outstanding, but at its core it's a very stripped down, lean action game, and it's great.

2. Alan Wake 2

Remedy just make me happy. It's so fun to see games at this scale being allowed to be this weird and idiosyncratic.

1. Baldur’s Gate 3

What am I gonna do, not stick with Mama K for my number one?

Just the quick list:

4. Astral Ascent
3. Octopath Traveler 2
2. Super Mario Bros Wonder
1. Tears of the Kingdom

Waited to the last second just to make sure I felt confident in my choices.

Quick list

Slightly longer thoughts

A good gaming year made very good by a game I started in December & have been drawn back to every time I turn on the PS5. I've enjoyed my time with my top 10 this year.

Outside of gaming I lost my dear old granny back in September, she was 90 when she passed away. The one gaming memory that I associate with her was when I was playing the remaster of Final Fantasy 12 (I lived with her at the time). The title screen comes up, the music kicks in, I had the volume up a good bit, she obviously hears the music comes into my room & says "what's that son?" I tell her the name of the game & she says "that music is really good". That little interaction has always stuck with me. She was an amazing woman.

Without further ado here's my top ten games of 2023!

Number 10
Super Mario Wonder

I should love this game but I only like it, sometimes a lot, sometimes only just enough.

The change to the animations is what really attracted me in the first place, Mario grabbing his hat going through a pipe, the expression on his face as he's jumping or doing countless other things, it's glorious.

The wonder seeds changing a level the way they do is very creative. It really can throw something completely different at you, even change your perspective. The badges change up the game more than the actual power ups like Elephant or the one were you shoot out bubbles that trap small enemies inside them.

Mario Wonder it's very well designed but I can't put my finger on why I don't like it more. Is it they change things up so often that it doesn't really feel as cohesive as it could be I'm not sure.

I feel like I've given this a decent shot but at the same time I don't feel like I've truly given this it's due. I've a lot more of the game to go, I need to go back & play through some of the those crazy looking scenarios that were in the trailer.

Number 9
Blasphemous 2

A nice surprise, another Metroidvania in the bag for 2023! Blasphemous 2 has grotesque beings, solid gameplay, an alluring art style that is laced heavily in religion with its churches, chapels, worshipers & symbols a major theme of the game

The 3 weapons of the game being linked into accessing different areas based on their own unique abilities was a good touch. The bosses are very well thought out, challenging, multiple phases, visually they are something else, think religious left field horror in their design.

My biggest ding is the design of the areas themselves, it feels less organic, more gamey with placement of platforms, the structure of the levels & how it flows going through them. Its not always the case but it feels a touch repetitive because of it. Still I've enjoyed my time with Blasphemous 2 in 2023.

Number 8
Vampire Survivors

A game I thought that looked atrocious in it's visuals but everybody was raving about the addictive gameplay loop. I tried it at a friend's house & was immediately hooked into the auto attack, layering up skills as you level up gameplay.

When you are firing on all cylinders in VS it's a sight to behold, you literally have attacks going off all over the place. You feel indestructible. It does get a tad boring at this point though, you've so much killing power that nothing can touch you until that grim reaper comes, takes you out & you complete the level.

It's very basic in its design of the maps but the gameplay is so fun that you'll be playing one more game again & again.

I think there's a new sub genre here & if someone can flesh the design out, add a little bit more player agency, they could be onto something truly special.

Number 7
Cocoon

A puzzle game where Orbs are worlds that can be carried around, set down & jumped into, whilst your in a completely different world. The puzzles themselves are well thought out for the most part, its a clever game with stunning architecture on a consistent basis. The orbs all have different properties that are best finding out for yourself.

The boss fights are visually something else, not too challenging but you appreciate the craft that has went into designing them.

The sound design is perhaps the best of the year, the alien architecture is so stark, the feeling of actually pressing levers or opening doors is better than it has any right to feel.

The only reason this isn't much higher is there's nothing on the level of Inside (some of the devs previous game) with the puzzles, they are smart, thoughtful but rarely are you blown away.

Number 6
Marvels Spiderman 2

I was fairly hyped over Spiderman 2 coming to PS5, I thought it would be getting a major upgrade over the previous two titles that would blow them out of the water with the building blocks already in place plus the focus on it being PS5 only. I think in some ways it really impressed me but it ultimately felt a really polished, better looking version of the last two games.

The high points, the speed of traversal is immense, the added manual swinging puts you even more in control when you take the assist down to 0 in the options. The web wings add serious speed & are extremely fun to use. The instantaneous fast travel or switching between Miles & Peter is just something else. There are some great set piece style missions littered throughout the campaign.

I really enjoyed the story up until Peter

then it's not as enjoyable. I do really dig Miles as a character though, he's definitely the best thing about the game. They did a decent job with Kraven but he never truly felt that huge threat that was put across in the first trailer. The late game stuff had some really cool moments but it still didn't land as hard as the Doc Ock stuff from Spiderman 2018. The final encounter of the game is kick ass though, what a crazy amount of tech chops that thing is.

The side missions are all pretty fun if not super engaging. The combat is more fleshed out with the new venom powers but I still did get that burn out feeling about 60-70% into the game. I think reusing the same map really amplified that. I know there are a couple of big new areas but they are never really utilized properly.

The stealth sections with MJ were so bland with how bad the placement of enemies were. They were literally placed to be easily snuck up behind & knocked out, there was no challenge, no tactics needed at all. I also felt this but to a far lesser degree with some of the missions with Peter & Miles. You'd enter a big warehouse & the enemies are just too conveniently placed to get stealth takedowns.

I just feel Insomniac played it safe. I want them to be bold, take risks & really switch things up for Spiderman 3. Very good game overall but just not GOTY material for me. I hope that changes with Wolverine.

Number 5
Sea Of Stars

I was initially really hot on the Sea Of Stars demo, was in for the full game on Day one. I played about 7 hours & wasn't quite feeling the pull to drive forward in the story like that demo had me feeling. I put the game down for a couple of months then came back. The story started to go places, the locations get even better, some of the puzzles are creative & break up the combat encounters.

I'm a stickler for timed button press attacks in turn based RPG's, Squall's Gunblade in Final Fantasy VIII was the first time I really remember doing that & have adored it ever since. Sea Of Stars has this with every character, its that little bit of extra engagement & skill the game needs. Timing those button presses to attack or defend is simply satisfying.

The music in the game is also killer, restricting themselves to the synth 16 bit sounds of the games it was inspired by. The little piece of music when you rest is just glorious.

I'm still only about a third of the way through but Sea Of Stars is charming as hell. All those little climbing, swimming, balancing animations add so much flair & an extra layer to exploration, I think those were a really smart addition. Such a great journey so far.

Number 4
Diablo 4

I wanted a return to the art style of Diablo 2, I wanted visceral gameplay that was addictive, skills that were a visual treat, a dark, grimey world that was stunning to look at & quest givers that give that bit of extra place to the world.

I got all that & was very happy with my time with Diablo 4. It's a bit too by the book in terms of it's structure, the level scaling of enemies meant you couldn't go back to the starting area & just wreck crowds of monsters. I spread my time across 3 characters, doing the same dungeons multiple times in those starting areas so I've a lot of the game still to play.

In the time I have spent each class is unique to play, the choices from the huge skill tree invite you to try different combinations. This is incentivised even further when weapons add a point or two to certain skills. I'm a sucker for blitzing through enemies & feeling powerful, skills popping off & monsters limbs for that matter too. It's a bloodbath in the best possible way.

I've really enjoyed playing with Higgledy & our skills syncing up, his Barb pulling enemies into my poison trap, or one of his skills that draws aggro towards him & away from me. It's loads of fun. I'll definitely be playing more in the coming months.

Number 3
Grime - Tinge Of Terror

Time to step things up. Just for reference my top 3 are way ahead of the rest of my top 10.

A browse of PS Plus Extra in December brought up a contender for the upper echelons of my GOTY list. A slow prodding, hard hitting Souls like Metroidvania (it's becoming a running joke how much these games show up on my GOTY lists) that has a sprawling map filled with secrets & rock hard bosses to overcome.

Grime feels like a game that wants you to go explore its fascinating world at your own leisure. There's very little hand holding here bar a few tutorials at the start explaining its unique mechanics.

You play as a sort of creature that is a vessel with a black hole as a head. The devs have built one of the major mechanics of the game around this - called absorb. You can press R1 at just the right time to parry or absorb & deflect back enemy attacks via this black hole sitting atop your body. You can destroy enemies with it & get traits which are anything from doing 20% more damage to an enemy's back to healing a small percentage of your health every time you get the parrying window right. There is even a trait that gives you the ability to walk slowly which I thought would be useless until it wasn't

So this absorb ability can be used to throw projectiles like spears back at enemies or against bosses you can take good chunks of health off them. It genuinely is rewarding when you start to nail the timing for the different enemy creatures within any area.

The currency, much like 'Souls' in a From Software game is called Mass. The great thing about Grime is you don't lose them upon death so you go back to the last Surrogate (bonfire) & usually they are placed very close to the boss encounters which makes dying a lot less punishing.

The other cool mechanic Grime has is 'Ardor' points. These points are gained by using absorb (parrying) when enemies attack. Basically the more Ardor points you earn the more currency (mass) you will get off each enemy. Though if you get hit you get Ardor points taken off you.

The world in Grime feels huge, there are massive areas absolutely buried in the depths of the games sprawling map. It has an almost Celeste type quality where new areas bring about fresh mechanics or traversal puzzles. One such is in Carven Palace where one of the abilities you get essentially can manoeuvre platforms (that you need to ride on) around parts of the palace complete with obstacles or hazards in the way.

There are hidden rooms & secret locations all over the place. There's a location called the Nerveroot which is a monstrosity of a place deep underground. There are huge monsters tentacles in the background, there are threads all over the place that are what you'd imagine nerves to look like. It's very creepy. One of the hidden rooms here took a good amount of skill to get into. I'll explain.

You get a boost ability which turns you into a small mass that can pass through tiny gaps. I see a tiny gap, boost into it, immediately start free falling, I fall to the bottom smash into pieces, lose a chunk of health & respawn right outside the gap. I noticed on the way down there was another tiny gap but you have to time it perfectly as your falling so quickly. I try 3-4 more times before I get it but there's another tunnel where I free fall & again have to time the boost to perfection. I eventually get it with a sliver of health left & am rewarded with an item.

When playing Grime it really feels like your going on a journey in a weird world. There are rock characters in the Unformed Desert who are doing art class & painting on stones in the background. There are mishaped rock characters that are in awe of your perfect shape. When you get to the world pillar you see tons of servants in the background all doing their own thing. You can run into bosses who will only fight you if you hit them.

The lore of the world is very well written, the dialogue of characters is top notch too. The music is on the money for adding to the atmosphere of each area. It can be ominous tones or subtle & sparse depending on where you are.

There are tons of weapons from twin bow axes to a lance like needle. Each with their own damage & speed ratings. There's a stamina bar (force) so that you can't spam attacks or boost endlessly. It's just a supremely crafted game.

I'm about 20 hours in & it feels like there's still quite a bit to go but I've been playing this non stop over the last few weeks. Easily jumped into my top 3 in 2023, it was neck & neck with my runner up for GOTY.

Number 2
Teslagrad 2

This is easily the most overlooked game this year, I don't think I've seen a single person that has played it on any gaming podcast I've listened to or on this very forum. A superb 2D puzzle platformer with bags of creativity owing to it's environmental puzzles with magnets taking centre stage, as well as brilliant environmental storytelling.

I do love a simple premise, you play a young girl called Lumina who's airship crashes in a harsh, remote land to the north called Wyrmheim. You are then pursed by Vikings across this land, using your electromagnetic powers to solve puzzles, defeat bosses & get yourself home.

This is another Metroidvania but it feels wholly different because of the Scandinavian setting & the physics based gameplay. The creativity on show is so impressive across this journey & one of the abilities Lumina gets along the way is the most kickass, fun thing to use in recent memory. I don't want to spoil it because it completely changes how you play when you get it.

The criminal thing about Teslagrad 2 is that it's over in 4 or 5 hours, it's far too short & because it's so good, you feel like your accustomed to the abilities & want the journey to continue. Even saying that this game has stayed with me all year. I'd love for more people to play this, the visuals & sound design deserve a special mention too, outstanding.

Number 1
Rogue Legacy 2

By far & away my GOTY 2023, Rogue Legacy 2 is a Rogue Lite that has an exceptional gameplay loop with controls that are honed to perfection, a stunning cartoon art style, a progression system that stirs your gaming appetite into having "one more run". The kicker - I didn't like the first game at all back in the day.

It was the website Push Square who put me on notice with it's 9/10 review that prompted me to give the game a go. The good thing was RL2 was on PS Plus Extra so I downloaded the game & it wasn't long before I could see what all the fuss was about.

It's hard to nail down the secret sauce of this game past the outstanding Hollow Knight style impeccable controls, it's eye catching art style that is a world away from the original & it's alluring Dead Cells (but much better) like level design. If I had to put my finger on it I would say the variety across the board at a really high level of quality is just unbelievable.

The amount of different character classes - each a heir to the last - is stupidly impressive. Their class weapons all feel wholly unique. A Dragon Lancer has a Lance that drives you forward like a witch on a broomstick towards enemies. A Chef has a pan that not only smacks foes around the head but actively send their projectiles back in their direction.

My favourite class the Ronan has a Katana that attacks in four diagonal directions, the attacks can go through walls, once mastered it's devastating. Your jumping into the air & hitting enemies that would normally be out of reach, mastering the distance you need to be before your blade strikes.

This brings me onto critical hits, the higher damage attacks that have specific requirements. The katana you need to hit an enemy with the very end of your blade. The rangers bow see's you having to time the release of your arrow to correlate with a visual cue. The assassin's dual blades always critical at the end of a 3 hit combo. There are other weapons that require a dash attack, it's mostly very skill based & to see those yellow numbers pop up is very satisfying.

There are special 'fabled' weapons that can be found within the game, A Thor like hammer that can be thrown into walls, pulses out thunder to damage anyone nearby. It can then be recalled with a button press, if it hits any enemies on its path back towards you it deals even higher damage. The devs have went so into the details with the weapons.

There's even a surf board that essentially lets you surf across the ground/terrain driving into enemies, as long as you don't get hit you can keep surfing. It's such a neat way to traverse & if you do it long enough there's a cool little music track that starts playing. The other fabled weapons are just as insane & interesting to use.

The personality traits that accompany a lot of the characters are back from the first game. On the character selection before you begin a run a lot of the more negative traits (like no invincibility window or meat hurts you instead of healing) come with a higher percentage gold boost, which can can go from 10 gold per enemy defeated to multiple times that.

There are other traits like 'colorblind' (the world is colorless) or 'clumsy' (everything you touch breaks) one of the best to get is 'compulsive horder' (all relics are twin relics when possible).

Which brings me onto relics. These relics found throughout the world can buff your character in unexpected ways. 'Hermes Boots' let's you walk on static spikes without getting damaged, 'Nerdy Glasses' remove all visual impairments (like Colorblind), 'Serquets Stinger' adds poison damage over time to each attack. The full list of relics are so creative & getting certain combos can really turn a run on its head in a positive way.

The relics all stack but you can only acquire so many as each relic costs a percentage of resolve, it's a brilliant system because of the way it eventually negatively interacts with your health pool.

You start with around 240% resolve & each relic can take anything from 10%-100% from that pool, dependent on the rarity. Once your character's resolve gets below 100% it takes the equivalent percentage off your health. So if you start on 1000 health, your resolve gets to 50% you'll be down to 500. It really creates some tough choices when you're already below 100% resolve & you get to a room that has a really useful relic but your health will plummet if you take it.

The real hook alongside the majestic gameplay is the manor you build up with the gold acquired from each run. Each part of the manor can permanently buff different stats like strength, dexterity, increase your health, allow you to get a higher percentage of gold on each run, increase the number of heirs to select at the start of each run, you can unlock new characters etc

You feel yourself getting more powerful as you build the manor up, enemies start to go down quicker, you can take more hits, there are more ways to heal. It's compelling just to keep this going as you progress further into the 6 different biomes, all rated on a risk scale from 1 star (easiest) to 5 star (toughest).

The biomes themselves are visually stunning, the starting area Citadel Argartha is castle style area, you have the snowy compact Kerguelen Plains, the magic filled Stygian Study, they all have their unique traits & enemies. There are traps, puzzles, secrets that are hidden by subtle cracks in the walls/floors that only using your magic abilities can gain entry to.

The bosses are fantastic, very Souls like in their difficulty but once mastered & when you get enough stats upgraded they can be conquered no problem.

Did I mention Rogue Legacy 2 is also a Metroidvania, you can get 'Heirlooms' that assist you even further on your journey. Discovering these for yourself is always the best way.

Another thing I love is how interactive the environmental furniture is in the background you can destroy bookcases, barrels, lanterns & they all have a chance of containing gold. It's such a small thing but it really makes the levels feel more alive.

I feel like I've just described the game but I can't put across how compelling RL2 has been for me in 2023, 178 hours played, on new game +5, countless other games left by the wayside (Final Fantasy 16 & Armored Core 6 to name a couple) because I enjoy this gameplay loop & world so much. It excels in everything - platforming, combat, interesting choices, diversity of classes, awe inspiring bosses, feeling of progression - even the story when you look into all the pieces of lore is very cleverly put together.

The only ding against it is eventually the gold cost for upgrades to the manor start to become stupidly high where it really slows down how quick your building up your stats. Still this doesn't happen for a long enough time, at the start you'll be upgrading the manor left & right.

I know I didn't play Baldur's Gate 3 this year, didn't try Alan Wake 2 & bounced of Zelda Tears Of The Kingdom a bit, still I'd be amazed if any of them caught my attention like RL2. Elden Ring blew away the competition in 2022 & in 2023 RL2 has done the same. 

Quick list

Whoops, looks like I can just get this in under the wire. Here's my top 10; for me this was basically the year of the PSVR 2 launch, so these are very much going to be games that a minority have played, and many were actually released previously on other platforms.

1. Vampire: The Masquerade - Justice
Probably my favorite game series of all time is the Dishonored series, and this is an unabashed Dishonored-alike, but in VR! Clearly made by a small team, and I’m afraid it’s one of the buggier games I’ve played (with the caveat that Sony VR cert is notoriously - and frustratingly, for devs - strict, so a buggy PSVR 2 game is probably far less buggy than one on other platforms), but unlike the majority of VR games, this is a full-fledged game, with a decent story, good writing, good voice acting, levels that afford many different approaches, and a skill tree that provides a variety of gameplay choices. This was the VR game I didn’t realize I needed, and I loved the experience. I’m definitely first in line for a sequel (which is hinted at in the final scene), but I hope Fast Travel Games fixes the still-outstanding bugs in the PSVR 2 version first so other players can enjoy it even more than I did (which would be a lot).

2. The Invisible Hours
Prior to the launch of the PSVR 2, I swept through my backlog of PSVR 1 games that I’d either not played or played and then got distracted by the New Shiny®. This was in the latter category, and I’m so glad I went back to it. The Invisible Hours is essentially a murder-mystery play in VR, featuring Nikola Tesla, Thomas Edison, Sarah Bernhardt, and a number of other characters. You’re essentially a ghost who can watch but not interact, and you can rewind and fast-forward time, which allows you to follow individual characters as they talk, conspire, gossip, meet up and wander the island estate the game’s set in. The writing’s remarkably good, and the performances are up the the writing. I found the whole thing to be a really gripping experience, and cunningly designed in how they keep you from finding out the story of the inciting incident until the very end. I played this early in the year and immediately knew it would be one of my top games of 2023.

3. The Game Which Shall Not Be Named (but you can probably figure it out)
My memory is discussion of this game has been…discouraged…due to the author of the books it is based on’s jackassery. Totally get that, and I've certainly not posted about this in Games You've Just Finished because of that. For my own part, I debated whether it was worth playing for quite some time, but wound up picking up a used copy at a steep discount, figuring that kept any of my money from going to royalties. In an ideal world, we’d be able to pay the developers and not the original author, because wow the world-building in this game is incredible! The main area it’s set in is incredibly, magically alive, full of thousands of tiny captivating details. I don’t even like the books the games based on, or the movies the game cribs its visual style from, but I had a tremendous amount of fun spending many hours in this world.

4. Red Matter 2
This is a case study in how VR can really elevate a game. Both it and its prequel are good-but-not-great adventure games, but being able to really be in their worlds in VR is astonishing. And it’s an incredible technical showcase for the PSVR 2 - easily the most detailed, graphically gobsmacking thing I’ve seen on the platform, with great physical interactions made better by the controller and headset’s haptics, and good sound design. And the icing on the cake is the developers remastered the first game for PSVR 2, which looked great on the PSVR 1 but takes a huge leap up when played on its successor.

5. Moss Book 2
Moss was easily one of my favorite games on PSVR 1, a charming, delightful platform/combat/puzzler with animation that brilliantly conveys character. I’d held off on picking up the sequel for the PSVR 1, so that I could buy it on PSVR 2 along with the upgraded version of the original. Both look and run fantastically on PSVR 2, and the sequel basically doubles down and expands everything that made the first so good. I gather Polyarc is currently working on a multiplayer game, which I have no interest in at all, but if they come back to the series for a Moss 3 I’ll be delighted to hand over a fistful of cash.

6. Horizon: Call Of The Mountain
This is the headliner launch game for PSVR 2, and it’s a stunner, with vast draw distances that elicit gasps. Sadly, a lot of people were disappointed with it, because they expected Horizon-but-in-VR, and it’s not that: it’s a mountain climbing game, punctuated with puzzles and occasional combat arenas. Which as far as I was concerned was fantastic - I loved the first Horizon game, but hated the bloated, overstuffed sequel, so I was delighted to have a different type of game in the same universe. I had a ball with the climbing, the collectible hunting, the archery, the puzzles, the spectacular vistas, the stomach-dropping leaps across chasms, and I tolerated the occasional bits of forced combat so that I could get on with the rest of the game.

7. Kena: Bridge Of Spirits
A fun throwback to the era of character action platformers, but with visuals and animation (from a new studio whose previous work has been in commercial animation) that’s state of the art. There’s nothing terribly deep here, but it’s a fun and gorgeous ride. When it started getting positive reviews I’d earmarked it as something to pick up on sale, and in fact wound up playing it via PS+, which certainly justified the cost of the subscription that month (an increasing rarity, I’m afraid).

8. The Quarry
Supermassive games are I’m afraid a guilty pleasure of mine. None of them has really been as good as the first one, Until Dawn, but I still enjoy their story-driven choose-your-own adventure cheesefests. This one is clearly trying to recapture the vibes of Until Dawn, with a similar teens-at-camp vibe, but my suspicion is that some of the people who did that first one left and they’ve never been able to get similarly talented creatives to helm the subsequent games. I would put this one in the middle of the pack - better than Man of Medan and Little Hope, not as good as House of Ashes.

And, while I'm at it, some games that I think are notable, but honestly get struck from my list of "Top Games" because...well, in the end I didn't really enjoy them. They don't count, but I just had to get it off my chest.

Ghostwire Tokyo
Here we start getting into “I should learn to quit sooner” territory. When the initial trailers for this game came out, it looked gorgeous and strange, an urban surreal horror rooted in Japanese folklore. Once the game came out, though, reviews were pretty unanimous that it was frustratingly dull. But when it showed up on PS+, I wanted to give it a try for myself. Reviews were right - many of this game’s elements could make for a better game, but as it is it’s just a string of tedious grind fetch quests with some interesting visuals. According to my PS5’s stats I only spent 27 hours playing this, but honestly it feels like I wasted 80 hours of my life that could have been better spent almost anywhere else.

Cyberpunk 2077
Picked this up for $5 at the nadir of its reputation, and sat on it for two years. By the time I booted it up, it actually ran pretty well on the PS5, and the world of Night City is really impressive. As a game - it’s not really for me. I always prefer to play stealthily, with minimal violence, and that’s clearly not a place the designers have their heart in. I managed to cobble together a certain amount of stealth and remote-takeout tactics, and spent quite a bit of time wandering around the world of the game taking out gang hideouts, amassing credits via a vendor exploit (which seems like something someone in that world would do), until the Liberty City update removed all the upgrades and skills I’d acquired and seemed to nerf what little of the stealth techniques I’d figured out, at which point I quit and uninstalled the game. If CD Project Red were to make a Deus Ex game in this universe I’d be all over it, but in the end this game and I weren’t a great fit. Still…a bargain at $5!

Gran Turismo 7
This is one of the generally-acclaimed gems of the PSVR 2 library - the full Gran Turismo 7, with all races playable in VR! I’d never actually played a GT game, because I’m much more of an arcade racer fan, a la the original Burnouts. But I picked this up on sale and gave it a shot. Wow, am I not a fan of racing sims, and the particular snooze fest that Grand Turismo games are. I want to crash into cars, take property-destroying shortcuts and crazy jumps, not be forced to listen to the history of individual car companies’ product lines while enervated smooth jazz plays in the background. I didn’t even find the VR racing all that interesting, which puts me in a decided minority - there’s no shortage of footage of people trying it out for the first time, being astonished by what VR brings to a game they’ve already played a huge amount.

Resident Evil Village
Until RE 4 remake got patched with VR support, this was many people’s favorite PSVR 2 game. It’s the full Resident Evil 8, but with very well-done VR controls, and hoo boy does all that RE art design look fantastic in VR with PSVR 2’s OLED screens. Unfortunately, though…it’s still a Resident Evil game, and after playing a good 12 hours of this and the first few hours of RE 4 VR, I’m forced to come to the conclusion that I just don’t like RE games. The stories are just so dumb, and while I enjoyed the horror of RE 7 on PSVR 1, these later installments are much more action oriented, and my reaction to that ranges from disinterest to outright dislike.

A Plague Tale: Requiem
The first game in this series, A Plague Tale: Innocence, was my sleeper hit of its year. I loved the writing, the characters, the graphics, the performances and the stealth gameplay so very much it was very easy for me to overlook the occasional jank and what I found to be an incredibly frustrating final boss fight. It’s a game from a smaller team that’s punching way above its weight, so I was impressed and appreciative of what the team managed to accomplish. And all of that is even more impressive in the sequel - the graphics are astounding, the writing’s even more assured, I think the performances deliver the writing even better, there are new characters that are really well done…but still I wound up really disliking the game, and it left a real distaste in my mouth for the third iteration hinted at in the final moments. I found the stealth sections far more frustrating, with areas that were much harder to read re: pathways and ambushes, and enemies that were clearly being nudged by the game to look for you wherever you happened to be even though they hadn’t spotted you. Compared to the first game, I died over and over and over in the sequel, and didn’t enjoy it at all.

And the story…I’m sorry, it’s just misery porn. I’m more okay than the average person with tragedies, downers, and stories of lost causes worth fighting for, but the brutality and futility being heaped on these two children is way past my breaking point. I think Grave Of The Fireflies, an anime about two children trying* to survive in the aftermath of Hiroshima is a masterpiece, and a vital and important story that tells us about how difficult the world can be and how important it is for us to look out for the people around us. But Requiem is a fantasy about how the writers made the characters suffer so you would suffer watching them. Blech.

*and (spoilers) failing

2023 was one of the best years in gaming, and beanman101283 puts three all timers on his list: Death Stranding, Dragon's Dogma, and Prey. What a year.

Teslagrad 2 sounds goooooooood.

THE LINE MUST BE DRAWN HERE!

Well, that's certainly a damn shame, because both Moss games are some of the best VR has to offer, and the sequel's even better than the first. Do yourself a favor and pick it up sometime; maybe there will be enough of a long tail for them to eventually get back to it.