Best Games of 2015

Best Wii U Game - 10 games
Kirby and the Rainbow Curse
Mario Tennis Ultra Smash
Xenoblade Chronicles X - WINNER
Yoshi's Woolly World
Mario Party 10
Splatoon - RUNNER UP
Super Mario Maker - THIRD PLACE
Fatal Frame: Maiden of the Black Water
Rodea the Sky Soldier
Devil's Third

The Wii U had a very...eclectic year I would say. Yoshi ended up in a pleasant retread of Kirby's Epic Yarn and had some solid standard platforming but otherwise a lot of this stuff is something outside the norm. Mario Party 10 and Devil's Third are the only straight up bad games in the bunch that I played (well, I haven't played Devil's Third as of right now but I don't think that matters on making that judgment call) and Rodea's just mediocre (the Wii version comes with the Wii U version and is far superior, play that if you want). Mario Tennis Ultra Smash is saved by online play that works nicely, Kirby gets one of the most gorgeous games ever and I had quite a bit of fun with it as well.

As for the top games, Mario Maker gets edged out by Splatoon as I have more fun watching Mario Maker than playing through Expert challenges and I had tons of fun with Splatoon online. It's rare that I ever want to explore enormous open worlds in games but Xenoblade X ended up with by far the most interesting world I've seen in gaming. An incredible game throughout. Sure the story could be a bit more of a focus but I'm willing to let Takahashi take a step away from his usual symbolism and strong story focus for something a bit more light. Great stuff all over.


Best PS4 Game - 42 games
Resident Evil HD Remastered
Saints Row 4 + Gat Out of Hell
Dying Light
Grim Fandango Remastered
Life is Strange - RUNNER UP
Dead or Alive 5 Last Round
The Order 1886
Resident Evil: Revelations 2
DmC: Definitive Edition
Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number
Battlefield Hardline
Final Fantasy Type-0 HD
Bloodborne - THIRD PLACE
Axiom Verge
Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin
Mortal Kombat X
Omega Quintet
Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD
Project Cars
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - WINNER
Batman: Arkham Knight
Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition
BlazBlue Chrono Phantasma Extend
Godzilla
God of War 3 Remastered
Onechanbara Z2 Chaos
Until Dawn
Metal Gear Solid V: Phantom Pain
Nobunaga's Ambition: Sphere of Influence
Tearaway Unfolded
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 5
Disgaea 5
Transformers: Devastation
Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection
Dragon Quest Heroes: The World Tree's Woe and the Blight Below
Talos Principle
Tales of Zestiria
Adventure Time: Finn & Jake Investigations
Need For Speed
Snoopy's Grand Adventure
Fallout 4

The scary part of the PS4's lineup is that 2016's lineup looks 10x stronger. It might also surprise you but it's actually harder to choose favorites out of this than you'd expect. Yeah, Bloodborne and Witcher 3 are excellent games but Life is Strange came out of nowhere and pretty much took best adventure game crown by storm. Lots of remasters and re-releases but mostly of excellent titles. You even have a good number of surprises with Until Dawn, Transformers: Devastation and Onechanbara Z2 Chaos (which has NO BUSINESS being as fun as it is).

As far as bad games go, Godzilla is right there but I have a real soft spot for kaiju movies so that hit me in the right places. Arkham Knight ended up a total dud as far as I'm concerned. Batmobile focus did nothing but take away from the design of the city and the game's puzzles. Boss fights were absolutely dreadful. Order 1886 also hits with a big thud at the bottom due to having what appears to be an interesting premise only to then funnel you through like 3 hours of easy combat and a whole bunch of insulting QTEs, including a final "boss" that still has the same QTE tutorials as the first one you do (it's copied directly from earlier encounters). All that said, Tony Hawk 5 takes the crown of worst by virtue of being insulting to a once-great series. A master class in how not to make a game through and through.

Best Xbone Game - 12 games
Ori and the Blind Forest
Call of Duty Black Ops 3
Forza Horizon 2 Presents Fast & Furious
Assassin's Creed Chronicles: China
Rare Replay - RUNNER UP
Gears of War: Ultimate Edition
Castle Crashers Remastered
Forza Motorsport 6
Rock Band 4 - THIRD PLACE
Guitar Hero Live
Halo 5: Guardians
Rise of the Tomb Raider - WINNER

A very thin year for the Xbone all things considered. There's very little to set it apart from the PS4 overall and it's going to lose what I consider its best game to PC and PS4 within the next year so...yeah. Rare Replay is an unbeatable proposition for money vs content. An excellent collection of games for a very low price. Rock Band 1-3 were my most-played games on 360 period and the only reason RB4 hasn't gone higher is the rather clunky instrument implementation (updating drum drivers...) and the lack of features. It's getting there though.

Ori is a gorgeous game that I think way more people need to play but I'm rather bothered by its save system. Halo 5 just hits so many negative spots for me. Warden Eternal fights are some of the worst encounter design I've seen in a long time.

Rise of the Tomb Raider really does just stand head-and-shoulders above the rest. The first in the reboot series was already a great game but here we see an almost perfect fleshing-out of every idea. Bigger, better, more thoughtful, more fun. Buy it on PC, buy it on PS4 when it comes to those. Just play it because it's really good.

As for the Xbone itself, I think I'd be pretty disappointed with owning it if they hadn't added backwards compatibility and the continued support from Games With Gold. Sure I only have 12 games up there but my Xbone has 70 something games sitting on it that I could revisit too.


Best 3DS game - 21 games
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate
Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask 3D - THIRD PLACE
Code Name STEAM
Box Boy!
Etrian Mystery Dungeon
Xenoblade Chronicles 3D - WINNER
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker
Stretchmo
Puzzle & Dragons Z + Super Mario Edition
Lord of Magna: Maiden Heaven
Little Battlers eXperience
Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai DX
Chibi-Robo: Zip Lash!
Legend of Legacy
Dragon Ball Z: Extreme Butoden
Gravity Falls: Legend of the Gnome Gemulets
Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes
Yo-Kai Watch
Rodea the Sky Soldier
Stella Glow - RUNNER UP
Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon

Xenoblade winning is kind of unfair but whatever. It really is that good of a game. 2nd and 3rd places are harder to pick by virtue of Stretchmo and Box Boy existing. If you haven't played a game in the Pushmo/Crashmo/Stretchmo series, please for the love of god do so because they're some of the best puzzle games I've ever played.

Stella Glow was very surprising. It's imageepoch's final game and they actually managed to make a really really good game this time, beating out every other game they've made. It's essentially a Luminous Arc game (strategy RPG where you date elemental witches) but the story has many good twists and turns and the characterization is strong. Excellent music round out the package

I shouldn't have to explain Majora's Mask. I will say that Tri Force Heroes got WAY too much flak though. You had so many people complaining that "no one asked for it" or it wasn't "epic Zelda" and that's all a bunch of garbage. Plenty of people wanted a revisit of Four Swords and for good reason. Bite-sized Zelda puzzle dungeons are really really fun. Single player's a little clunky but it's easy to get a live group going since it's both online and single cart local multiplayer.

Little Battlers shouldn't be underestimated. I liked it a lot more than Yo-Kai Watch and was very surprised by the completely insane story and fun robot combat.

Not a bad year for the 3DS but it's in its waning years so no problemo.


Best Vita Game - 8 games
Criminal Girls: Invite Only
Hyperdevotion Noire: Goddess Black Heart
Oreshika: Tainted Bloodlines - THIRD PLACE
Ar No Surge Plus: Ode to an Unborn Star - WINNER
Steins;Gate
Danganronpa Another Episode: Ultra Despair Girls - RUNNER UP
Persona 4 Dancing All Night
Superbeat XONIC
Breach & Clear

In terms of new titles for this year, the Vita is...rough. I mean, the Vita's been in rough shape for a while but still. I've just run out of patience for nearly every dungeon crawler RPG that comes out for it and man, there are just way way too many or just not nearly enough traditional styled ones. Oreshika is neither so it earns a nice spot towards the top. Interesting art style, interesting mechanics that feel a bit like a SaGa game in places, give it a strong push. No one noticed it though.

Danganronpa AE ends up in second place due to actually disturbing content in many places and some really great character moments. It does feel like the series is spinning its wheels but it was worth it to see the kid characters in this and their motivations.

So why does Ar No Surge win? You haven't even heard of it? Well, it's a prequel of sorts to the Ar Tonelico series and while it has some rough translation spots, the game just has an extremely well done story and phenomenal music. Battle system's kind of neat as well and the visual novel type parts are strong.

So why not Steins;Gate, the actual visual novel? Too long. That might sound funny but I just didn't enjoy reading through the first...half of the game I guess?

Criminal Girls is an awful game, don't play it.

Best PC Game - 5 games
Pillars of Eternity - RUNNER UP
Wolfenstein: The Old Blood - THIRD PLACE
Mad Max
Undertale - WINNER
Mushihimesama

It's kind of clear that I just don't game that much on PC. For the first half of the year I was sitting on a PC that was starting to overheat from any kind of demanding game and it was just so loud I didn't want to use it. That's all changed now and I'm sitting on an absolute beast so I'll probably start using it for actual gaming again. Despite the small number of games, they were all extremely good.

I almost don't want to give this to Undertale. It has a very thorough exploration of social expectations as well as some very neat toying with the concept of using the actual vessel for the game as something the game understands but that said, it also falls short of really hitting home why doing that is so important. I think one of the major problems is that the fanbase itself has basically spoiled 90% of its surprises. By the time I had played it only a few weeks after release, I already knew the ending path names and thus I could already guess a very very large chunk of what it would do. There was nothing for it to pull at and many of its bigger moments are just standard RPG twists. The execution of the neutral ending mixed with its music is done nearly pitch-perfect though.

The other problem is that I strongly dislike making things unfinished just to make your fanbase scrutinize your game for "lore" that doesn't even exist. The Five Nights at Freddy's games have this all over the place, the Souls games often have this and it's just frustrating because there's no actual extra storytelling, it's just some loose ends left in such a way that people who get into it will try to connect it to anything they can.

A lot of complaining for what I do think is a very good game though. I mean, I have an Undertale shirt. Obviously I like it. Ahuhuhu~~

Pillars of Eternity is the old school CRPG revival you've been looking for. Don't have to explain too much beyond that. Tough as nails.

Wolfenstein: The Old Blood is just a continuation of what was already an excellent FPS. New Order was a breath of fresh air compared to its contemporaries and that still holds true with its standalone expansion.


Addendum: I haven't finished Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky Second Chapter but it would most assuredly be at the top of either best PC or best Vita game (even though it's a PSP game). I also don't have a best PS3 game category but I can tell you it's a draw between Trails of Cold Steel and Yakuza 5. Both incredible games. Also keep in mind this was just for games released in the US in 2015. Plenty of other games were played left over from 2014 and some other stuff as well. The PC list would be much bigger if I included older stuff. I also didn't include titles where I felt I hadn't played enough to make an opinion on them one way or another.

Actually comes out to 98 games. Remember, 2016 looks BETTER. WTF

Best Games of 2015
Xenoblade Chronicles X - WINNER
Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - THIRD PLACE
Rise of the Tomb Raider - RUNNER UP
Xenoblade Chronicles 3D
Ar No Surge Plus

Witcher 3 might beat out Rise of the Tomb Raider if I played it on this PC. Performance could be spotty in places on PS4 leading to some extra clunky combat and I think playing it on a beast PC would be very favorable for it. Xenoblade X just wins based on being my favorite open world ever.