“Have you heard of Minecraft?” My little brother asked me as I peered over his shoulder. It was winter 2009, and I honestly had not heard of it before. I gathered from watching him play that it was a peculiar survival-based game, a sim, some sort of creative sandbox-style free-for-all, and I don’t even know what. Yeah, it seemed like a real strange game, but it was intriguing.
By the end of the last decade, most of the video game landscape was dominated by massive, action-packed, AAA titles from the Halo and Zelda franchises, to the massively multiplayer titan that is somehow still kicking, World of Warcraft. Interesting and engaging titles were being released all the time on every conceivable platform, from the fast-paced and visually breathtaking Mirror’s Edge to the quirky and off-kilter Portal, from the atmospheric and occasionally thought-provoking Bioshock to the fantastic and whimsical Super Mario Galaxy. But by and large, most of the PC gaming landscape could be boiled down to hack ‘n’ slash action RPGs like Torchlight, and apart from Nintendo which always did its own thing, console developers had become fixated on multiplayer military shooters like Call of Duty and the gang, and epic RPGs with dialogue trees.
So then along comes this simple sandbox survival game, a humble bit of freeware launched by then-nobody Notch. These two separate concepts were far from new, but together they had spawned a game defined by limitless creativity. Little did anybody know it would kick off an absolutely revolutionary decade in gaming, that saw the medium ascend from a gradually accepted form of mainstream entertainment to one capable of producing art. Minecraft in particular would end up becoming central to the trends in this decade. Most notably, it paved the way for sandbox survival games like Don’t Starve! and Rust, and more horror-oriented entries to the genre like The Forest.
Today, in recognition of the absolutely amazing decade in gaming we have had, I wanted to count through some of the most important games of each year. Maybe we’ll even learn something about the defining trends of the decade along the way.
Here’s how this is going to work: the games on this list didn’t have to be wildly successful or even financially successful at all, but they did have to be well-known. I mean, you can’t have a revolutionary game if it wasn’t influential to the gaming industry at large, right? Remakes and ports of games from the 2000s and 1990s are out – only games that are original to the past decade will do (sorry Halo fans). Also, I am not going to count expansions to World of Warcraft and other games that predated 2010. This is really just an attempt to tell the story of the trends and major releases of the decade.
Strap yourselves in, because this is gonna be a long one.
2010
The decade started humbly enough with an unassuming indie horror game by a small Swedish game company called Frictional Games. This was Amnesia: The Dark Descent.
Before Amnesia, American and Japanese developers were unquestionably dominant in their share of the new release market, at least in the gaming mainstream and slightly farther afield. Not that games were not produced in other countries, but the ones that reached the global market were few in number, and the number of these that achieved notability or even acclaim in the gaming community were even fewer (except for Rare, but well, you know).
Granted, the groundwork for smaller international developers was laid by Flash game websites like Newgrounds and Kongregate, but the release of Amnesia on Steam, Humble Bundle, and other digital stores marked a major turning point for game releases from countries other than the U.S. and Japan. And the title’s timing couldn’t have been more perfect, its release having coincided with the emergence of the Let’s Play phenomenon:
The 2010s are best known as the indie golden era in gaming, and not for nothing. With its unarmed player character, a sanity meter, and puzzle-based exploration mechanics, Amnesia bucked the trend of the action/shooter horror games that were the norm in the genre, and its success was a turning point for indie developers in general, in terms of both greater exposure and a swell of creativity. Amnesia showed that indie titles, and indie titles that dared to be different, could achieve financial success and finally be taken seriously by fans and the industry alike.
As we’ll see over the course of the decade, this proliferation of indie developers and IPs became a strong part of the character of the decade’s trends in gaming. This lower barrier to entry, helped along by distributors like Steam and GOG, has encouraged developers both big and small to push the envelope for not only what games are capable of, but what games can be or what purpose they can serve for the player. Oh, also it was hella scary.
Runner Up
Limbo: Another indie title, Limbo is a moody and simplistic platformer with a mysterious backstory and characters, a dark atmosphere and an ambiguous ending, setting it apart from the usually bright and colorful genre it utilized. It once again demonstrated the potential of indie developers, with proper support and distribution, to push the envelope of what games could do and be. Furthermore, this was among the first in a longstanding 2010s trend of games with simpler and more stylized 2D graphics. It’s also surprisingly challenging, which may have signified another 2010s trend of developers ramping up the difficulty in their games.
Honorable Mentions
Heavy Rain
Fallout: New Vegas
Red Dead Redemption
Super Mario Galaxy 2
Mass Effect 2
2011
The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim was and is a solid game and easily the most enduring of the decade – I almost don’t even need to say any more than that. Even as of this writing, it remains the most current single-player console game in the Elder Scrolls franchise and is still actively played by a large community of people – not only fans but even casual gamers. Hell, I have continued to play it, more than eight years after its release. But Skyrim’s longevity is just one part of the puzzle:
Most gamers, even casual ones, know that modding is hardly a new phenomenon. I remember all sorts of Dungeon Siege and StarCraft mods from my heyday, back in the days of yore: 2003.
But modding has taken off like wildfire in the 2010s, no doubt helped along by easier distribution than ever before, and games that are more mod-supportive than at any time in gaming history. And games like Skyrim, GTA V, and Fallout 4 are replete with wild and creative mods, and those modding communities are still vibrant and active, even for games from the beginning of the decade.
Even beyond that, Skyrim is just a fun open world game with lots to explore, not to mention it is a meme factory even to this day. So hey, hats off to Bethesda for this one. Also, I think it may have also partially set off the open world adventure craze of this decade.
Runner Up
Bastion: This game almost made the top spot for this year, and that’s not without good reason. After all, Bastion came onto the scene with off-kilter humor, a two-dimensional isometric graphical style and level design (not to mention an unconventional setting and storyline for the time), and a multifarious, frenetic hack ‘n’ slash experience that set it apart from the Diablos and Dungeon Sieges of the time. Couple that with a unique and kickass soundtrack and you have yet another indie developer propelled to meteoric success, not to mention a renewed interest in simpler old school graphics and art styles.
Honorable Mentions
Portal 2
Dark Souls
Kerbal Space Program
The Stanley Parable
Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask
2012
This year is the one that kicks off the innovations and trends of the decade in earnest. As great as all of the releases in 2012 were, there is no question in my mind that Journey is the undisputed king of games that year. Sorry Halo 4, but sometimes, gorgeous visuals and a fresh story in an established franchise are no match for simplicity (not to say Halo 4 isn’t incredible and noteworthy in its own right, the great story having totally changed the franchise for me until they did Cortana dirty in Halo 5).
And that was the thing about Journey: elegant simplicity. It didn’t have hours of high-definition cutscenes, a customizable inventory or character, or even any spoken dialogue. Just you, your character, and endless stretches of desert covering the ruins of an ancient civilization. Oh, and sometimes, you might meet another player along the way.
That minimalism is what gave the game its wings. Without a single written word of exposition, Journey told an elaborate story about a desert wanderer traversing the ruins of his people’s ancient city, including the entire story of their rise and fall (see above). Together with its sweeping soundtrack and gorgeous landscapes, it was simply a beautiful game, and it didn’t even require dialogue options, multiple endings, or hyper-realistic graphics.
As with Bastion and Limbo, arguably smaller games with less exposure, here was a major console release that had eschewed cutting edge graphics for a more stylized look – more on that below. Minimalist gameplay became a major trend this decade, with beautiful backgrounds and stories playing out across simplified puzzle platformers and what many have regarded as “walking simulators.”
Runner Up
FTL – Faster Than Light: I am seriously addicted to this game, even until today. You are a star captain of the Galactic Federation, exploring the galaxy in search of scrap to upgrade your ship, human and alien crew members, and powerful weapons so you can reach your home base and defeat the Rebel Flagship.
Arguably, I could say more about this game than Journey, but here was another entry into the genre of 2D games with simple gameplay that was hard to master and a tough-as-nails difficulty level. Also, as a rogue-like, FTL represents another prevailing trend in the 2010s, albeit as a somewhat out of the ordinary take on that genre. In addition to being the decade in which we all waxed nostalgic for the 2D and 2.5D games of our childhood (or more accurately, gamers from the ’80s and ’90s grew up and became developers), another big trend was making games really damn hard (likely as a backlash to the hand-holding and too-easy gameplay of a lot of 2000s games), which naturally implied reviving the rogue-like genre. Anyway, the rogue-like elements made FTL damn hard but damn fun.
Honorable Mentions
Borderlands 2
Dishonored
Castle Crashers
Halo 4
Xenoblade Chronicles
2013
Before I go any further, I did want to mention the MOBA genre, since I didn’t feature any representative games. Throughout the decade and even a little bit before with League of Legends, it seemed everyone and their dog was playing MOBAs, based on the old Defense of the Ancients maps on WarCraft III (let you in on a little secret: even this is adapted from Aeons of Strife from the original StarCraft). I never got into the trend so I never “got” its appeal, but these games have largely taken over from PvP servers on MMOs such as World of Warcraft and competitive RTS play like StarCraft. They offer a new style of competitive play that ties personal progression to team goals, which I think is pretty unique and probably part of the appeal.
Anyway, just as Journey offered a compelling narrative without words in 2012 – and as much as some of you may say this game is overrated – The Last of Us is a storytelling masterpiece in the realm of gaming and my choice for best and most revolutionary of 2013.
The Last of Us, as its creators have said, is a story about love. From the trailer above it may not seem like it, but even leaving aside the fantastic post-apocalyptic level design and scenery pieces, The Last of Us immediately felt like something new and different. While it was in one respect another AAA title from Naughty Dog, it was one that went all out, with the voice acting and script making it seem like a full-blown big budget film. The Last of Us boasts lush and beautiful level design and a winding journey cross-country in a post-apocalyptic America, a pretty sizable cast (and rather well voice acted, not just by gaming standards but by your ordinary standards), motion-capture acting allowing for realistic movement, and even an overarching theme focused on survivor’s guilt.
I wouldn’t presume to say The Last of Us is a thinker’s video game; it is hardly a deep, academic exploration of survivor’s guilt. But the game has a lot of heart, more than I think we were used to seeing in even a big-budget game until that point. As I said, The Last of Us feels like the first Hollywood-tier writing in video games, and that by itself is a big deal. And starting with this game, it felt like gaming in the 2010s had reached a new level of storytelling, which carried on to other games such as NieR: Automata, Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture, and Life is Strange.
Runner Up
Papers, Please: Speaking of games with strong stories, here is also an example of a game which introduced a whole new idea of gameplay altogether. No shooting, no puzzle-solving (I guess it might count if you stretch the definition of “puzzle”), and no stats-building. In Papers, Please, you are a border guard of an Eastern European country called Arstotzka, and the gameplay is simple: examining the passports and visa stamps of all those who want to pass through, searching for valid bases for entries and looking for any inconsistencies. In addition to games with heart, now we have games that are increasingly cerebral.
Players were faced with not only this interesting puzzle of navigating travel documents within a variety of complex and changing guidelines, watching carefully for dissidents and terrorists, but with the implications of this kind of work in the real world including difficult moral dilemmas such as separating families. Like a surprising number of games this decade, Papers, Please has been a sterling example of how video games can be used as an art form (This War of Mine is a similar game that comes to mind).
Honorable Mentions
Tomb Raider
Grand Theft Auto V
Outlast
Bioshock: Infinite
Dota 2
2014
This year was (one of) the hardest to choose for given the range of games that changed the game (sorry, I’m really trying to stop myself). But for this year, I had to choose Five Nights at Freddy’s.
I mean, look how far we’ve come in four short years: from Amnesia eschewing shoot ’em up horror gameplay for unarmed, totally helpless stealth horror against demonic hellspawn, to monitoring haunted animatronics through security cams and defending yourself with steel doors. Not only is Five Nights at Freddy’s scary as hell, but the concept of haunted animatronics looks quite unlike the endless zombie hordes of the 2000s.
To top it all off, this is not only yet another indie release, but one that has transformed into one of the biggest gaming franchises of the decade, with a huge and mysterious in-universe mythology, all from the mind of Scott Cawthon. A one-man show is hardly a novelty, but for such a small game to blow up into such a huge franchise is just one of many signs of the times. Another sign of the times, apparently, is the massive number of unconventional horror and survival games released by indie developers to unexpectedly massive success.
Runner Up
Dark Souls II: I hinted at it earlier in this post with Skyrim, but another major gaming trend in the 2010s was the wave of open world games, particularly adventure and open world RPGs. But in addition to that was the wave of open world survival games, like The Forest, Darkwood and The Long Dark. And then there was Dark Souls:
Hard as hell. Unforgivable. Frustrating as hell, but also beautiful and fascinating. All of these words describe the second installment of the Dark Souls series by Hidetaka Miyazaki (and each of the others in the series, but hey). The Dark Souls series represent a fairly well-known gaming trend this past decade, which is the ramping up of game difficulty I mentioned before. Many of these developers were likely inspired by some of the tough-as-nails and unforgiving classic 2D games of the ’80s and early ’90s, but Dark Souls takes it to whole new level, with minor mistakes being severely punished. And yet, that aggravating, ball-busting difficulty is part of the appeal, and why Dark Souls remains a beloved franchise to this day.
Honorable Mentions
Transistor
Shovel Knight
Among the Sleep
The Talos Principle
BattleBlock Theater
2015
As we enter the home stretch of the decade, we can see that games are becoming deeper and more thoughtful, and gameplay and the overall play experience are reaching new heights. This comes as little surprise, of course; games that would have been dismissed a decade ago as being “out there” or missed by gamers entirely because they weren’t AAA titles are not only the norm, but are widely available and roundly celebrated.
More so than 2014, I would say 2015 was the hardest year to pick a single game that stands out as both best and most revolutionary, and I almost did cave in and pick two. But I would never do you like that, so here’s my pick for 2015: Undertale.
With a tone similar to Earthbound but a combat system that allows a perfectly pacifist run, Undertale is perfectly representative of the nostalgia streak of the 2010s as well as the inclination towards weird games. Apart from the 8-bit visual style and offbeat humor of the colorful characters, as I mentioned, is the genre-mashing combat system, which allows players to either defeat monsters in bullet hell combat or befriend them by healing their emotional scars. It is an interesting mechanic which may seem simplistic at first, but which has a direct impact on the possible endings the player can experience.
Beyond that, Undertale is also a surprisingly emotionally charged story that tackles the moral choices you would normally expect to find in any RPG through this unique combat system. Finally, I have to give credit for what others have called the “friendliest” RPG – it has heart, and the characters stick with you.
Runner Up
The Witcher 3 – The Wild Hunt: I do not know that I would necessarily say there is anything unusual or revolutionary about The Witcher 3, as such. But ignoring its impact as a solid quality action RPG to the 2010s in gaming would be doing a disservice to this entire post.
Based on the dark fantasy novel series by Andrzej Sapkowski, CD Projekt Red pulled out all the stops on this release. The game boasts over 950 speaking roles and around 450,000 words of dialogue and story script. The game itself offers over two hundred hours of content, a huge cast of characters, and over thirty-six endings. It is huge, both from a development standpoint and in terms of the sheer size of the game and the world map, and in a decade that has had The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim and Grand Theft Auto V, that is saying something.
As I said above, apart from being based on a novel series – which, obviously, the first Witcher release was as well – and the large scale of the game, there is nothing that sets The Witcher 3 apart as a “revolutionary” game per se. However, it is a solid amalgamation of a lot of trends we have seen in games in this past decade, such as the game’s open world and morally ambiguous story, including serious real world themes such as alcoholism and abuse in everyday medieval life.
I would also say it was somewhat unique for a video game to be adapted from a series of novels, rather than comic books, movies, or even other video games – with the exception of The Lord of the Rings adaptations, that was a pretty rare thing among AAA titles until The Witcher. Not to mention this game too does not mind dipping into the weird side every now and then – there is a brief hint at a major character visiting the universe of one of CD Projekt Red’s other IPs.
Honorable Mentions
Ori and the Blind Forest
SOMA
Pillars of Eternity
Splatoon
Life is Strange
2016
Before we go on, I want to take another slight detour. You see, Overwatch and the rest of the battle royale world of gaming is not my pick for 2016, or any year, really. But I do want to highlight for a quick moment what a significant trend battle royale such as Overwatch, Fortnite, and PUBG have been to this past decade. Just as MOBAs were largely a defining trend of the earlier part of the decade, massively multiplayer battle royale games have defined the latter half, arguably starting with Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds. You may think they’re annoying because of the multiplayer experience, but there is no denying these games represent a major part of defining gaming this past decade.
All that being said, I think the most important game of 2016 had to be That Dragon, Cancer.
I am not going to put up footage of the game because it should be experienced on its own terms. In That Dragon, Cancer, you are not a hero. It is not a quest and you will not get on the leaderboard for your K:D ratio. Instead, the game tells the story of Joel, a child diagnosed with terminal cancer, and his parents undergoing the grief, pain, and anxiety of gradually coming to understand that there is nothing they can do but cherish the time they have been given together.
The gameplay proceeds in a kind of surrealistic – and often painfully realistic – point-and-click fashion, through the painful story of the disease’s progression in the game developers’ real-life son, Joel, who died in 2014. This is not escapist entertainment and there is no “winning” this game; what will happen, will happen.
Now, truly, I think it could be said that video games had proven they were capable of artistic expression. It feels a bit tone deaf to say it that way: this is a game about a young child’s real suffering and death, but That Dragon, Cancer proved video games were capable of so much more than mere entertainment or escapism. It was a personal expression of the game developer’s struggle with his son’s disease and his ability to find faith in suffering, something I think most of us would not expect from a video game just a few years before.
Moreover, this game suggests we are only just beginning to tap into the full potential of the medium, and in the years to come, I expect we will be amazed at the way video games of the future can continue to convey meaning and set themselves apart as an artistic medium.
Runner Up
Hyper Light Drifter: In direct contrast to That Dragon, Cancer, which eschewed escapism, enter Hyper Light Drifter. This game was created by Alex Preston, a young game developer with a congenital heart disease that, as he describes it, is a ticking time bomb: it can kill him literally at any moment. In order to deal with this experience and give voice to it, Preston designed the Drifter, a blue humanoid suffering from an unnamed disease, who seeks a cure by repairing his world which has been cursed by the enigmatic dark sentience known as the Immortal Cell.
On the surface, there may not appear to be anything special about Hyper Light Drifter: it is a 2D top-down action adventure game with pixel art and synth-y sci-fi music. Much of the art is reminiscent of Studio Ghibli productions (and particularly early Miyazaki stuff like Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind and Future Boy Conan) and the combat and exploration is clearly inspired by 2D Legend of Zelda games. But what makes this game unique is, unlike tributes and retro homages that try to recreate the experience of their source material, Hyper Light Drifter absorbs all of these influences and the end result comes out feeling new and original and fresh; the flow of the game is unlike anything else in the genre, despite wearing its influences on its sleeve.
More than that, it is just a solid, polished game with one heck of an intriguing world. The mystery behind the actual nature of the quest and the history of the Drifter’s world sets off the player’s curiosity which is only partially satisfied by context clues in the environment, but trying to uncover and decipher those clues becomes part of the fun. There is a certain other game in this list that operates by the same principle, but what makes Hyper Light Drifter stand out, even in spite of following many of the trends already highlighted in this retrospective, is that exploration becomes its own reward. It is little wonder Hyper Light Drifter became one of the best loved games of the whole decade.
Honorable Mentions
Firewatch
Planet Coaster
The Last Guardian
Grim Dawn
Inside
2017
I really think 2017 was a banner year in gaming. I have not gotten much of an opportunity to talk about Nintendo so far, but I think it’s worth mentioning here that 2017 ended up being a sea change for the company thanks to the Nintendo Switch. It’s a console that is turning out to be one of their most successful of all time, and its features such as easy portability may just influence console gaming in subsequent generations. I guess we will see what the future holds.
As I said before, the excellent range of releases in that year is what originally inspired me to write this post. It was honestly difficult to pick the Honorable Mentions, let alone the game that would represent what was so revolutionary about this year. It was a difficult decision, but ultimately I had to go with The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
Yes, it is the only Nintendo game in this list to make the top spot, but it’s a pretty unique game by their standards. Breath of the Wild has been a source of division amongst Zelda fans and non-fan gamers: some would say this game has perfected the open world formula, while others point to the lack of meaningful rewards to consider it subpar when held up to other solid releases of the genre, such as The Elder Scrolls or Fallout.
I would venture to say, however, that Breath of the Wild has brought something important to open world games. In most iterations of the genre, the player character arrives in towns or reaches a checkpoint that activates map markers, and the player is expected to grind several hours either completing those quests or ignoring them. But is the grind fun? While the rewards for exploration in Breath of the Wild may not have great variation beyond spirit orbs and Korok seeds, it did not feel like a chore to complete side quests and explore unknown areas. Instead, exploration is its own reward and it is the journey that is the source of all of the fun.
Indeed, Breath of the Wild’s primary strength is in the thrill of the experience itself: planning your moves, the careful gathering and consumption of resources, and the absolute freedom to do and go virtually anywhere. The fact that you can – theoretically – ride straight to the final boss from the training area speaks to that quite well. The game world also encourages survivalist play styles, which is pretty interesting, but if you think about it, kind of a no-brainer for an open world game (Fallout: New Vegas did have elements of this too, but Breath of the Wild having this element was a pleasant surprise).
Nintendo has a few tricks left up its sleeve, after all.
Runner Up
Hollow Knight: Okay, I kind of lied before – it was exactly this game that inspired this entire project (although it was between this, Zelda, and NieR: Automata for the top spot). Anyway, Team Cherry’s Hollow Knight is an impressive undertaking: it features a vast Metroidvania world to explore, beautifully composed soundtrack by Christopher Larkin, with thrilling and challenging combat to boot, but with a control scheme that feels fluid and natural. Oh, and it’s all a Kickstarter-funded indie game by a tiny Australian company, and this is their first release.
The visuals and especially the environmental back-drops are nothing short of jaw-dropping, with Larkin’s soundtrack completing the picture. The whole art style calls to mind the sort of animation many of us Millennials used to enjoy (or make) on Newgrounds, and the whole set of characters appears to speak a language of their own, Buglish, if you will.
On top of it all, as with Journey and Hyper Light Drifter, the world is enveloped in a massive and mysterious mythology, and uncovering the world and the lore – and the truth behind your character’s origin and purpose – drives most of the enjoyment of the game. It is grand, expansive, and way more enjoyable than a small indie game has any right to be, even by the standards of the other releases that have been featured here. It is little wonder so many gamers and reviewers are putting this game on their own top ten lists for the decade.
Honorable Mentions
Doki Doki Literature Club
NieR: Automata
A Hat in Time
Star Trek: Bridge Crew
Fortnite
2018
Once again, I wanted to highlight just one more trend around the middle of the decade, which is the revival of pirate sims on the PC. There is nothing particularly “revolutionary” about pirate sim games, but two things the 2010s did bring to the table for this genre were high-definition graphics and greater support for massive multiplayer experiences, from both a co-op and a PvP standpoint. As you can imagine, these are a great boon to player immersion, though my understanding is in reality, this was a hit-or-miss proposition. Some notable releases this decade include Blackwake, Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, and Man O’ War: Corsair, all culminating in Rare’s Sea of Thieves.
Anyway, yes, the end is in sight. As we reach the end of the decade, more abstract games are getting greater recognition and acclaim, and nowhere is that more evident than with Gris.
Gris is a simple platformer about a girl “lost in her own world,” as described by developer Nomada Studio. After a terrible loss, she journeys through this world to find strength and acceptance of the loss she sustained.
With beautiful environments and soundtrack, the overall experience is one of ease and observation, rather than challenges and luck – in other words, “gaming and chill.” Clearly, this was done with the intent to have players focus on taking in the experience in a holistic way, rather than narrowing their focus to completing the game. And that is not without good reason: this game was designed as a work of art. Some have interpreted its presentation as representing the five stages of grief, while others have pointed to struggling and coming to terms with mental illness.
In that sense, it is little wonder that Gris was launched to overwhelming fanfare: the language of emotions is universal.
Runner Up
Return of the Obra Dinn: Brought to you by the creator of Papers, Please, the game Return of the Obra Dinn is an exciting adventure in . . . insurance adjustment. Well, specifically, the game takes place on a seemingly abandoned East India Company vessel called the Obra Dinn, and you are an insurance adjuster investigating the ghost ship at the behest of the East India Company for compensation by the English Crown. The entire sixty-person crew is either dead or missing, and it is your job to find out what happened to them and why.
In addition to the “1-bit” graphics that are reminiscent of old Macintosh games and the unconventional detective-style gameplay, what makes Return of the Obra Dinn stand out is that the story is not incidental to the gameplay; the story is the gameplay (or more accurately, the gameplay consists of piecing together the story). These two elements are so intertwined that it is like a literal interactive novel, and you cannot muddle your way through to the end by just skimming; you need to pay attention to the clues in order to piece together the disparate threads of the story until you are able to complete the story yourself.
Honorable Mentions
Red Dead Redemption II
Mega Man 11
God of War
Celeste
Monster Hunter: World
2019
Finally, we have reached the end of the decade. Before we jump into the last string of games for the decade, however, I want to call this space an “in memoriam” dedication to Telltale Games. They were responsible for another major trend of this past decade: the resurgence of adventure games, including titles such as The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us, which were presented – or planned to be released – in an episodic format. The last “season” of the Telltale The Walking Dead series would have been released this year, if not for the company going defunct last October. Now we can only wonder what could have been (same to the apparently planned Stranger Things episodic adventure game, now cancelled).
While 2019 was more the year of the “solid” game than a year of “revolutionary” or game-changing releases, no game is more deserving of that distinction than Death Stranding.
What clearer apotheosis of a unique and revolutionary decade can there be than the weirdest Hideo Kojima game of all time (which is saying something in itself)? Some see a mere walking simulator that is as boring on paper as it is in execution; others see a thrilling masterpiece about community and building connections. At the heart of it all is a story about fatherhood that tugs at the heartstrings.
Death Stranding takes you to a post-apocalyptic America after the United States has been dissolved, following the calamitous merger of the world of the dead with the world of the living (the titular Death Stranding). The player character, Sam Porter Bridges, is a courier in this ruined landscape, delivering packages to the disparate settlements of the ruined America while avoiding BTs, the phantoms of souls that have been unable to move on to the afterlife due to being “beached” in the world of the living. His mission is to reunite America under the banner of the United Cities of America, and hopefully to help end the Death Stranding.
The gameplay is rather straightforward on paper: make deliveries across a rugged terrain, avoiding the phantom BTs and terrorists who are trying to prevent the union of America. In practice, Death Stranding can be a difficult and incredibly frustrating walking simulator as, in addition to avoiding these enemies, you have to worry about using your controller to shift the weight of Sam’s packages as he moves. The end result is a lot of falling over, damaged packages, getting pulled under by enemies that would be otherwise avoidable, and falling in rivers . . . a lot.
I could tell you the challenge is part of the appeal, and I am sure for some that it is. But where Death Stranding really shines is in its “asynchronous multiplayer” feature. You see, Death Stranding is actually a massively multiplayer online walking simulator . . . except you will never meet another player character. But what players do can impact the game world you encounter: their deaths can cause explosions which leave craters in your landscape, but they can also build things – bridges, ziplines, roads, and more – to aid you as you traverse the landscape. Players can leave each other equipment, and signs to show them easier paths or areas to avoid.
Asynchronous multiplayer is actually not a new concept, although it is not exactly widespread either. But the way it is utilized in Death Stranding is worth noting. Structures built by the player or others degrade over time, so the rebuilding and maintenance of the world becomes a sort of collaborative undertaking. This sort of cooperative multiplayer, this endeavor for players to build something together, is simply fascinating and inspiring.
Although opinions on the game have been massively divisive, I believe we are looking at one of the few games that have done the “interactive movie” right, with a good balance of cinematic visuals and gameplay. On top of that, it is superbly acted, beautifully written, and visually incredible. There are several notable appearances in the game apart from player character Norman Reedus, including Guillermo del Toro, Lea Seydoux, and Mads Mikkelsen – truly a star-studded cast.
Hideo Kojima has said the idea behind the game started with building bridges and connecting people. As the United States talks about building a wall and the United Kingdom threatens Brexit to detach itself from Europe, he wanted to put a game into the world that reminded people of the importance of coming together. Along with Far Cry 5, Death Stranding reflects an apparent growing interest among game developers to deliberately comment on world affairs. I expect we will see more of this in the coming decade. Finally, as a new father, I admit I was touched by the relationship between player character Sam and his baby in a tank, BB-28.
Runner Up
Hypnospace Outlaw: To kick off the finale, here is a weird game from the mind of Jay Tholen, creator of Dropsy. In an alternate universe 1999, you are a member of the Hypnospace Patrol Department, a sort of law enforcement agency charged with moderating the Internet. Your mission is to track down and report infractions and violations of Internet regulations, based on a set of guidelines set by the game.
I would hesitate to say this is a totally new kind of play experience, but like so much we have seen this decade, Hypnospace Outlaw turns a lot of genre conventions – in this case in the point-and-click detective genre – on its head. Additionally, the user interface itself and the lovingly and comprehensively populated Internet of Hypnospace Outlaw is a Y2K-era Geocities/Angelfire fever dream, which is funny since several of the websites in the game do frame Y2K as a sort of impending apocalypse. This game has become a darling of the vaporwave community for a number of reasons, not least of which being that this game so perfectly captures the essence of the – sometimes ironic, sometimes not – buzzword, ＡＥＳＴＨＥＴＩＣＳ.
I suspect games like this and Return of the Obra Dinn may be hints at what we can expect from gaming in the new decade. Only time will tell, but I can’t wait to find out.
Honorable Mentions
Metro Exodus
Untitled Goose Game
Baba Is You
The Outer Wilds
Cadence of Hyrule
And there you have it: ten years, ten games. This post was destined to be incomplete and unsatisfying to many people. For one thing, Nintendo games are massively underrepresented (not for lack of trying). But there are too many hundreds of amazing games that came out this decade. I have mentioned nearly a hundred titles in this post, and yet I’m just barely scratching the surface.
I just wanted, through this countdown, to say my final goodbyes to a truly incredible decade in gaming. I can’t wait to see what 2020 and beyond will bring. Thank you all so much for reading through this. I hope you enjoyed it. See you in the new year and the new decade.
My list is far from complete – what games would you add for each year? What trends or game-changing events would you add? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below!
Nerd Revolt 