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This was one of the weakest years I can remember. None of the home consoles got going yet, 3DS dropped the ball. I might have come up with 10 titles for this, but many just don't deserve it. Not sure whether I can name a honorable mention without the normal list being full, but I wouldn't know if I'd number my last entry. I'm hopeful for 2015 though, it finally seems to accumulate more refreshing titles and both REmake and Majoras Mask are certainly better remasters than ports from last year.
1. Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney ; This game has finally granted my wish, or rather, it came closest to it. When it comes to Professor Layton, I have only finished The Curious Village and it was a mixed bag, to say the least. I could hardly consider it a videogame. If it wasn't for some few story scenes and minimal interaction between the incoherent puzzles, it would have been as little of a fullfledged video game as playing Windows Solitaire or solving crossword puzzles in your browser. On the other hand, the presentation was very unique and beautiful. Hence I was always hoping I'd eventually see the great presentation and premise in a proper adventure game. And so, the time has finally come. While I've also taken a glance at the other 3DS Layton titles, which have seemingly improved, they also still seem to contain too many of the problems. The combination with another series' has not only done wonders, but a few complaints you hear here and there, about supposedly ,,dumbed down'' puzzles, also actually happen to be one of this title's strong points. The Layton parts of this game are not about generic calculating puzzles and the likes anymore, but solving a variety of challenges, which mostly correlate with the story context instead of featuring abstract brainteasers, only for the sake of it. This finally feels like an Adventure title with actual progression.
But it obviously also still has the Layton atmosphere. The game already starts with a great scenery of nighttime London and generally looks really good. Seeing footage of this after Ace Attorney 5 was a little perplexing, since the latter just looked that amazing. But other than not being up on par with the best looking cartoon game on the system, this game still looked fine for what it is. The art direction is great and looks especially good with 3D on. Technically, I'd only have minor complaints, like some character's hands looking a little too polygonal, but there's no major complaints, despite Ace Attorney 5 setting the bar a little higher. Also, mixing the character design styles of each series works well enough, even though this was always going to be a little awkward. But then there also is the music. And what can you say about music in a Level-5 game? This is definitely a strong one too. The title theme alone might as well be from some Ghibli fantasy adventure flick. The rest is yet again both mysterious and classical, while the Phoenix Wright parts are not only great too, but the musical style there has also been altered to fit the tone of the story. Yet the tracks during the crucial moments in court also still remain an imposing tone. If there's one problem, it's that the German voice acting, which I apparently couldn't change without changing my whole system's settings, was pretty awful. Can't speak for the other languages, but I wouldn't be surprised if only the English cast wasn't bad. Thankfully there wasn't much voice work.
Speaking more directly about Phoenix Wright, this series also benefits very much from this crossover. From this series' point of view, the text heavy encounters in court are now more unburdened, through the more challenge- and somewhat exploration based adventure sections, instead of solely continuing the talking sections in other areas. Ace Attorney 5 especially went even more into visual novel territory and dumbed the gameplay down a little too much in places. That was also the case in court, which has now been handled much better in this title. In Ace Attorney 5's court room sections, the penalty system (which was always kind of iffy) was turned obsolete, with automatic checkpoints at each corner and instant retrys, making random guessing for the right answers and evidence acceptable. In this crossover, they also eased the somewhat archaic ,game over' system in court, but by introducing the Layton hint coins in it. They can be found by looking through the areas in the exploration parts of the game and either give hints within the ordinary puzzles, but now also highlight the points that should be investigated during a court session, once you are stuck. Other than that, the new mechanic of mob cross examinations, in which more than person is questioned and several testimonies have to be combined, also freshens the court gameplay of the series a little more than what was introduced in the latest Phoenix Wright games. One minor flaw is that you have to keep track of the people you are currently not talking to, but once they give a crucial reaction, the text can not be fast forward, which makes it obvious when a testimony can be combined. Fortunately, the structure of the court sessions become a little more complex than that during the game.
I've seen some complaints about the story, in particular about the ending, but that was again, in reality, a very good point about this game. On one hand, the game does a great job of introducing mysteries (accomponied by the perfectly fitting atmosphere) and then goes crazy with it at the end. It was exactly what I was hoping for and that is being absolutely insane. Sure, maybe it was also close to being nonsensical, but one must not forget that this is a crossover between Professor Layton and Phoenix Wright. Mixing these two completely different worlds is nonsensical to begin, not to mention putting them into a plot, in which both main characters are trapped in a medieval fantasy land within a magic book. Going batshit during the ending was great, even if some minor things weren't resolved. If there is a problem with the story, it's that both series' sidekicks are still annoying brats. And I guess it got too sentimental at the end, but it's still funny how only Ace Attorney 5 was rated M, yet this title is pretty grim during the early sections too.
In the end, I actually would have prefered if this wasn't a crossover. The two series' mechanics complement each other perfectly, cut the slack on both fronts and take logical enhancements, maybe making it the best on both fronts. Hence, I'd love to get more, but as a crossover one-off, this most likely won't ever happen. I actually didn't care all that much about the fact that I've been playing Professor Layton and Phoenix Wright as characters, but more about diving into the great fantastical and mysterious atmosphere, whose plot got also pretty suspenseful. With this game, I got what I actually expected from Level 5's Ninokuni, which instead had Level 5 falling flat on their faces. With that and the now varied, yet not action orientated gameplay style, this might as well have been a new ,,fantasy detective'' IP or something of that kind that isn't as shallow as the Layton puzzle collections. Still, at the very least we've got this absolutely amazing game, which will not be run into the ground by Level 5 within two years as a standalone series.
2. Shin Megami Tensei IV ; Will you look at this, the EU peasants have now actually been allowed to play this. Even though I don't like digital and should rather support the localisation efforts of NIS, I still delved into this right away, because of the 20 price tag. Hence, I regret nothing. Well, because of that and because this game, regardless of the shitty localisation behaviour by whoever is responsible at Atlus, still is amazing.
Personally, I don't care how good the Persona subseries is supposed to be, I can't stand the immediately generic looking anime teens and dating aspects. The great thing about Megaten usually, and still also about SMT4, is, that it still offers both settings and plots that don't consist of tired anime cliches and their modern tropes, which are overly present in what are currently the more popular stories from Japan. There's no melodrama, there's no wacky animal sidekick, there's no emo mcgee with hair combed through his face (even though one or two main characters still look a little dumb, but it's not too offensive in general). And thank god for that. But the series also usually goes with somewhat fresh scenarios. Even bad entries like Digital Devil Saga at least have that going for themselves. Well, you might have already seen some kind of wicked Tokyo, but it's also been a while for this series iirc and SMT4 also has it's own feel going for it. In fact, the atmosphere is amazing. The story itself is great at building mysteries, but it's also not very flamboyant and doesn't spell too much out for you. So soaking up the world they've created is a big aspect too. And it feels great. Tokyo is grim and the electronic heavy (and generally incredible) soundtrack gives it another unique twist. Meanwhile, even though the story, as I've said, really isn't melodramatic, it doesn't stray from several grave events. The almost stoic nature of the narrative just adds to the weight, especially for some decisions later on.
On the other hand, there's still the hilariously bizarre chitchat you can have with the demons you want to recruit for your team. Providing the best kind of comedy, without losing any of the seriousness. Speaking of the monsters, I remember some outrage about enemy models not being 3D, but I can only applaud them for that. Hence the battles are quick and precise. No drawn out attack animations are required. Other than that, there actually has been some very useful streamlining for the gameplay. First of all, no more random encounters. The dungeons feel more open and aren't trapped within the typical maze layout. Also, while fusing your demons, you can now control which skills to keep. That might make it too easy for some hardcore fans, but you probably still need more strategy than in your usual JRPG and it eventualls just feels right in that regard. The only major complaint there is, is the pretty shoddy map system. There's no location names displayed on the map, so you're eventually lost, especially for sidequests asking for specific locations. Thankfully, the progression for the main quest is somewhat linear and you won't have a problem for that one. In fact, you don't even need to rely on meticulously working through sidequests, since thankfully each new area has demons giving you more than enough EXP. While this game unfortunately doesn't have any kind of puzzles, you'll at least be very busy throughout regardless, since you'll be leveling very often and requiring new demons, hence there's always new strategy management for you awaiting.
However, even though the progression of the main story on the overworld is pretty linear, that doesn't mean that there's no exploration. Within the locations you can enter, you'll have lots of room to explore. Many places feel overwhelming on your first visit, in a good way, but aren't as big and empty as certain WRPGS nowadays. It's the perfect balance.
3. South Park: The Stick of Truth ; This was a surprise on several levels. On one hand, because it's hilarious. I've been watching the show for way over a decade and oh man, has it gotten mediocre after season 10 or 11. Despite some funny episodes here and there, they often seem to have forgotten what makes something funny. At season 12, they just started making poor parodies of the latest blockbuster, or some other pop culture topics no one gives a damn about two months later already. In many cases, it has become mostly references, or having two jokes ready, which are merely repeated throughout an entire episode. Other than that, there's eventually some commentating on things that happen in the news, but they usually forget to add a funny storyline nowadays. So the first surprise was that this game actually feels like classic South Park. Sure, some gags are almost copied from the early show, but even recycled jokes from back in the day are so much better than what they do today. And so are most videogame related jokes in this. I'm also glad that I've imported the US version. I wouldn't have wanted to miss the jokes cut in EU. And, of course, for a longtime fan, there's simply tons of fan service at every corner. I already laughed merely at spotting Alabama Man from some really dumb live action skit in an early episode. The ending is also perfect. It might be funny on it's own, but if you know the show, the final words are perfection, as you've almost thought they wouldn't come. The only thing that gets a little tedious are the repeated voice samples for the enemies in the second half of the game.
The other surprise was, that the game itself is also incredibly good. First off, the battle system, that was clearly made with the Super Mario RPGs in mind, doesn't even come close to the latter. But thankfully the rest is excellent. This might be my favorite WRPG, as it not only has a unique setting for once (because, well, it's South Park), but also because exploration actually feels meaningful and it's tons of fun. The town itself is pretty open from the very beginning, but it's not just some giant, empty space, like in certain other games. To the contrary, South Park is compact and filled with secrets and tons of stuff to discover. Some fetch quest might be tedious on their own, but they naturally unfold as you explore, adding to the motivation. What you find is not only fan service, but actually pretty useful in most cases. Finding hidden characters not only makes a fan smile, but also gives you an ingame Facebook addition, which helps your stats. There's also other collectables, but even in the worst case, you should at least find something like outfits for the character customization.
There's also some Metroidvania-esque elements, giving you new gameplay abilities over the course of the game, which open up new secrets and locations. And while the battle system might not be spectacular, the variety in environments, puzzles and mechanics is pretty big. In fact, there's many neat surprises until the end. Some environmental puzzles also play into the battles itself, which shakes things up. Unfortunately, this game was a little glitchy and somewhat technically unpolished in a bunch of places, at least on PS3. I think I had to reboot the console once or twice, even. It's a shame, but other than that, all thumbs up for this game, in particular for longtime South Park fans. Might even make you forget how they've been pushing Pewdiepie in your face recently.
4. Bayonetta 2 ; To my surprise, I had to find out that the first Bayonetta was probably the weakest Kamiya game. The battle system was obviously good, but there were so many cheap spots. Tons of instant-death QTEs and similar stage events out of nowhere, some annoying enemy tactics and horrid shooting sections bringing the experience down. It didn't make you feel any better that the game was basically giving you the finger with bad rankings, which were only poor because of the cheap parts instead of your skill.
Now there is Bayonetta 2. It basically took the first game and removed all that crap. Not only is the cheapness gone, but it also has a much better art direction and graphics in general, the adventure parts at the beginning are more adventurey, the enemies are more varied and the game simply is bigger and better than the first. The intro might already be one of the best, if not the best I've seen in an action game. The combat is slightly faster and more fluid, the controls are more repsonsive and feel better. Iirc there's a couple more weapons than the original, giving you a great variety in combat, which should offer fighting styles for almost every taste and situation. Since you can hold two weapons at once, there's also quite a bit of experimentation possible. And you want to do that, since while some button combos stay the same, the effects can often be very different per weapon of choice. The only bad part that remains is that while there's some decent secrets, there's also some really tedious backtracking remaining if you're going for 100% (which also includes getting the highest ranks), which adds nothing to the core gameplay. Well, that and maybe a too heavy focus on the story. Some unskippable story events are unfortunate for multiple playthroughs, although the story is surprisingly decent. On one hand, it's as beautifully cheesy, over the top and stereotypical as you'd expect, but it also isn't just some new story arc, but really fits well into the story line of the first game. Unfortunately, while the beginning and the later parts are more spectacular than almost the entirety of Bayonetta 1, especially because the final chapters ramp up quite a bit, it kinda halts in the middle, with some not very interesting stage designs. But, although there might a little too heavy focus on free floating mechanics, the bosses are at least interesting throughout, especially since they are now mostly testing your skills instead of only being imposing.
The replay value is there and I guess you can't really get too much better within this series, even though I might still prefer the battle system from Ninja Gaiden 2 and the variety of a God Hand shows that the halt in the middle wasn't necessary, even though the game still is very varied, more than the first title anyway.
5. Mario Kart 8 ; Oh wow, here it is. The first somewhat ambitious Nintendo title in HD, finally offering what I've always expected from them in that area. Even though the gameplay is very similar to Mario Kart 7, this title at least offers one other important aspect that would make a new generation title worthwhile: great presentation. Because the tragedy of Wii U is not only that Nintendo for the first time did almost nothing significantly new with gameplay and as little genre/franchise variety as ever before, but despite this finally being their jump into HD, their games also don't look impressive. All these 2D titles and minigames might as well be their recent predecessors running on Dolphin, to a more casual gamer's eye anyway. Cheap rehash after cheap rehash (and droughts inbetween). But I guess sub-Dreamcast sales for the machine are telling the whole story well enough. And the first sales success comes from the title that actually looks like some effort was put into it. Who would have thought that? Although Nintendo's lighting effects are still a little too abstruse here and there, this is still a fine looking game. Not only on a technical level, but finally a proper art direction from Nintendo has been realized in HD, making it look not too much worse than cartoony games on stronger platforms. There's tons of imagination and details everywhere. The courses of this title are in fact showing what the painfully uninspired and soulless looking Mario platformers on WiiU should have been instead. But hey, at least it's in one game now. They've also designed completely new vehicle parts, almost none recycled from Mario Kart 7, again featuring tons of detail and care put into it.
Unfortunately, they didn't do much with the anti gravity gameplay, compared to some crazy track designs from Mario Kart Wii and 7 (utilizing their new mechanics much more). But at least the core gameplay remained good. Mario Kart 7 might be a little better balanced still, but this certainly is no disaster like the chaos that was Mario Kart Wii. Experienced players certainly won't lose to anyone significantly less skilled than themselves, but it might get a little wacky again, once everyone's on the same skill level. The new item balance seems better at first, since you'll mostly be getting boosts (making course knowledge more important) and it's not possible anymore to stay behind on purpose for better luck. But since it's 12 players again, instead of 8, your biggest enemy won't be blue shells anymore, but tons of (now bigger?) green shells and all that small stuff spammed in the midfield. While it's often possible for the first place to build a ridiculous lead. Still, that also brings some tactical thinking into the competitive matches. The online is okay, I've put about 100 hours into it as of now and the eventual frustration is, again, at the very least much smaller than in the Wii iteration. The more demanding side of Mario Kart is back, even though that already was the case with 7. The kart customization has a lesser impact, since it was also already in the latter, but thankfully it stayed, allowing for all kinds of driving styles. And there doesn't seem to be any imbalanced combo, excluding the fact that heavy characters are probably prefered. But at least it's only details like these and I don't have to kill my thumbs through snaking to keep up.
Speaking of the online modes, the DLC is pretty good at a fair price and patches fixed some of the early problems, which only highlighted once again that the WiiU gamepad was a dumb idea. The public online mode was a little bad for a while, but thankfully also got fixed alongside the DLC update and some awkward menu problems/missings were also fixed. Personally, I never cared about battle modes, but I guess technically they could at least bring back the mission mode from Mario Kart DS. But I've put enough hours into this, even without the singleplayer content. Also, the retro courses are for the first time pretty extensive and altered, so they could in many cases be legitimately all-new content too.
Honorable Mentions
x. The Evil Within ; It's funny how the foundation of this supposed psychological horror title is as schizophrenic as it gets. And by that I mean, I've probably never seen a game that can go from being amazing to being rancid trash and back again so quickly. First of all, they have completely failed to deliver on the supposed ,,return to survival horror'', not to mention the promised ,,nostalgic'' horror, unless you started gaming with Resident Evil 4 (which has significantly damaged the genre to begin with). Out of fifteen chapters, only one is true survival horror. However, there still are several excellent parts of action horror. Chapters 7 to 10, as well as 13 and 14 have many menacing locations and encounters, providing lots of tension. To my surprise, chapter 1 was pretty great too. In videos it looked like some dumbed down cinema sequence, but then it was pretty suspenseful and I was ready to eat crow. Unfortunately, then the rest followed. Most chapters that give you a partner are awful. Best case you get a poor man's Resident Evil 4. But in chapter 6, or 11 and 12, you feel like you might as well be playing Resident Evil 5+6. God knows, that's the very last thing you want to be reminded of in a Mikami game. And that has nothing to do with high difficulty, which was good, but these parts simply are unbearably generic and nothing but the most mediocre corridor shooting. Take these sections out and you would have gotten a rock solid to even brilliant action horror title. It would have also still been a long game, so I don't get why these awful parts are in there. But I guess that's what happens when Mikami clearly wasn't happy to work on this kind of thing in his new company (some of his recent interviews... yikes). Still, there's at least also a pretty good new game+ and unlockables, which were unfortunately missing in the otherwise superior Vanquish.
1. Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney ; This game has finally granted my wish, or rather, it came closest to it. When it comes to Professor Layton, I have only finished The Curious Village and it was a mixed bag, to say the least. I could hardly consider it a videogame. If it wasn't for some few story scenes and minimal interaction between the incoherent puzzles, it would have been as little of a fullfledged video game as playing Windows Solitaire or solving crossword puzzles in your browser. On the other hand, the presentation was very unique and beautiful. Hence I was always hoping I'd eventually see the great presentation and premise in a proper adventure game. And so, the time has finally come. While I've also taken a glance at the other 3DS Layton titles, which have seemingly improved, they also still seem to contain too many of the problems. The combination with another series' has not only done wonders, but a few complaints you hear here and there, about supposedly ,,dumbed down'' puzzles, also actually happen to be one of this title's strong points. The Layton parts of this game are not about generic calculating puzzles and the likes anymore, but solving a variety of challenges, which mostly correlate with the story context instead of featuring abstract brainteasers, only for the sake of it. This finally feels like an Adventure title with actual progression.
But it obviously also still has the Layton atmosphere. The game already starts with a great scenery of nighttime London and generally looks really good. Seeing footage of this after Ace Attorney 5 was a little perplexing, since the latter just looked that amazing. But other than not being up on par with the best looking cartoon game on the system, this game still looked fine for what it is. The art direction is great and looks especially good with 3D on. Technically, I'd only have minor complaints, like some character's hands looking a little too polygonal, but there's no major complaints, despite Ace Attorney 5 setting the bar a little higher. Also, mixing the character design styles of each series works well enough, even though this was always going to be a little awkward. But then there also is the music. And what can you say about music in a Level-5 game? This is definitely a strong one too. The title theme alone might as well be from some Ghibli fantasy adventure flick. The rest is yet again both mysterious and classical, while the Phoenix Wright parts are not only great too, but the musical style there has also been altered to fit the tone of the story. Yet the tracks during the crucial moments in court also still remain an imposing tone. If there's one problem, it's that the German voice acting, which I apparently couldn't change without changing my whole system's settings, was pretty awful. Can't speak for the other languages, but I wouldn't be surprised if only the English cast wasn't bad. Thankfully there wasn't much voice work.
Speaking more directly about Phoenix Wright, this series also benefits very much from this crossover. From this series' point of view, the text heavy encounters in court are now more unburdened, through the more challenge- and somewhat exploration based adventure sections, instead of solely continuing the talking sections in other areas. Ace Attorney 5 especially went even more into visual novel territory and dumbed the gameplay down a little too much in places. That was also the case in court, which has now been handled much better in this title. In Ace Attorney 5's court room sections, the penalty system (which was always kind of iffy) was turned obsolete, with automatic checkpoints at each corner and instant retrys, making random guessing for the right answers and evidence acceptable. In this crossover, they also eased the somewhat archaic ,game over' system in court, but by introducing the Layton hint coins in it. They can be found by looking through the areas in the exploration parts of the game and either give hints within the ordinary puzzles, but now also highlight the points that should be investigated during a court session, once you are stuck. Other than that, the new mechanic of mob cross examinations, in which more than person is questioned and several testimonies have to be combined, also freshens the court gameplay of the series a little more than what was introduced in the latest Phoenix Wright games. One minor flaw is that you have to keep track of the people you are currently not talking to, but once they give a crucial reaction, the text can not be fast forward, which makes it obvious when a testimony can be combined. Fortunately, the structure of the court sessions become a little more complex than that during the game.
I've seen some complaints about the story, in particular about the ending, but that was again, in reality, a very good point about this game. On one hand, the game does a great job of introducing mysteries (accomponied by the perfectly fitting atmosphere) and then goes crazy with it at the end. It was exactly what I was hoping for and that is being absolutely insane. Sure, maybe it was also close to being nonsensical, but one must not forget that this is a crossover between Professor Layton and Phoenix Wright. Mixing these two completely different worlds is nonsensical to begin, not to mention putting them into a plot, in which both main characters are trapped in a medieval fantasy land within a magic book. Going batshit during the ending was great, even if some minor things weren't resolved. If there is a problem with the story, it's that both series' sidekicks are still annoying brats. And I guess it got too sentimental at the end, but it's still funny how only Ace Attorney 5 was rated M, yet this title is pretty grim during the early sections too.
In the end, I actually would have prefered if this wasn't a crossover. The two series' mechanics complement each other perfectly, cut the slack on both fronts and take logical enhancements, maybe making it the best on both fronts. Hence, I'd love to get more, but as a crossover one-off, this most likely won't ever happen. I actually didn't care all that much about the fact that I've been playing Professor Layton and Phoenix Wright as characters, but more about diving into the great fantastical and mysterious atmosphere, whose plot got also pretty suspenseful. With this game, I got what I actually expected from Level 5's Ninokuni, which instead had Level 5 falling flat on their faces. With that and the now varied, yet not action orientated gameplay style, this might as well have been a new ,,fantasy detective'' IP or something of that kind that isn't as shallow as the Layton puzzle collections. Still, at the very least we've got this absolutely amazing game, which will not be run into the ground by Level 5 within two years as a standalone series.
2. Shin Megami Tensei IV ; Will you look at this, the EU peasants have now actually been allowed to play this. Even though I don't like digital and should rather support the localisation efforts of NIS, I still delved into this right away, because of the 20 price tag. Hence, I regret nothing. Well, because of that and because this game, regardless of the shitty localisation behaviour by whoever is responsible at Atlus, still is amazing.
Personally, I don't care how good the Persona subseries is supposed to be, I can't stand the immediately generic looking anime teens and dating aspects. The great thing about Megaten usually, and still also about SMT4, is, that it still offers both settings and plots that don't consist of tired anime cliches and their modern tropes, which are overly present in what are currently the more popular stories from Japan. There's no melodrama, there's no wacky animal sidekick, there's no emo mcgee with hair combed through his face (even though one or two main characters still look a little dumb, but it's not too offensive in general). And thank god for that. But the series also usually goes with somewhat fresh scenarios. Even bad entries like Digital Devil Saga at least have that going for themselves. Well, you might have already seen some kind of wicked Tokyo, but it's also been a while for this series iirc and SMT4 also has it's own feel going for it. In fact, the atmosphere is amazing. The story itself is great at building mysteries, but it's also not very flamboyant and doesn't spell too much out for you. So soaking up the world they've created is a big aspect too. And it feels great. Tokyo is grim and the electronic heavy (and generally incredible) soundtrack gives it another unique twist. Meanwhile, even though the story, as I've said, really isn't melodramatic, it doesn't stray from several grave events. The almost stoic nature of the narrative just adds to the weight, especially for some decisions later on.
On the other hand, there's still the hilariously bizarre chitchat you can have with the demons you want to recruit for your team. Providing the best kind of comedy, without losing any of the seriousness. Speaking of the monsters, I remember some outrage about enemy models not being 3D, but I can only applaud them for that. Hence the battles are quick and precise. No drawn out attack animations are required. Other than that, there actually has been some very useful streamlining for the gameplay. First of all, no more random encounters. The dungeons feel more open and aren't trapped within the typical maze layout. Also, while fusing your demons, you can now control which skills to keep. That might make it too easy for some hardcore fans, but you probably still need more strategy than in your usual JRPG and it eventualls just feels right in that regard. The only major complaint there is, is the pretty shoddy map system. There's no location names displayed on the map, so you're eventually lost, especially for sidequests asking for specific locations. Thankfully, the progression for the main quest is somewhat linear and you won't have a problem for that one. In fact, you don't even need to rely on meticulously working through sidequests, since thankfully each new area has demons giving you more than enough EXP. While this game unfortunately doesn't have any kind of puzzles, you'll at least be very busy throughout regardless, since you'll be leveling very often and requiring new demons, hence there's always new strategy management for you awaiting.
However, even though the progression of the main story on the overworld is pretty linear, that doesn't mean that there's no exploration. Within the locations you can enter, you'll have lots of room to explore. Many places feel overwhelming on your first visit, in a good way, but aren't as big and empty as certain WRPGS nowadays. It's the perfect balance.
3. South Park: The Stick of Truth ; This was a surprise on several levels. On one hand, because it's hilarious. I've been watching the show for way over a decade and oh man, has it gotten mediocre after season 10 or 11. Despite some funny episodes here and there, they often seem to have forgotten what makes something funny. At season 12, they just started making poor parodies of the latest blockbuster, or some other pop culture topics no one gives a damn about two months later already. In many cases, it has become mostly references, or having two jokes ready, which are merely repeated throughout an entire episode. Other than that, there's eventually some commentating on things that happen in the news, but they usually forget to add a funny storyline nowadays. So the first surprise was that this game actually feels like classic South Park. Sure, some gags are almost copied from the early show, but even recycled jokes from back in the day are so much better than what they do today. And so are most videogame related jokes in this. I'm also glad that I've imported the US version. I wouldn't have wanted to miss the jokes cut in EU. And, of course, for a longtime fan, there's simply tons of fan service at every corner. I already laughed merely at spotting Alabama Man from some really dumb live action skit in an early episode. The ending is also perfect. It might be funny on it's own, but if you know the show, the final words are perfection, as you've almost thought they wouldn't come. The only thing that gets a little tedious are the repeated voice samples for the enemies in the second half of the game.
The other surprise was, that the game itself is also incredibly good. First off, the battle system, that was clearly made with the Super Mario RPGs in mind, doesn't even come close to the latter. But thankfully the rest is excellent. This might be my favorite WRPG, as it not only has a unique setting for once (because, well, it's South Park), but also because exploration actually feels meaningful and it's tons of fun. The town itself is pretty open from the very beginning, but it's not just some giant, empty space, like in certain other games. To the contrary, South Park is compact and filled with secrets and tons of stuff to discover. Some fetch quest might be tedious on their own, but they naturally unfold as you explore, adding to the motivation. What you find is not only fan service, but actually pretty useful in most cases. Finding hidden characters not only makes a fan smile, but also gives you an ingame Facebook addition, which helps your stats. There's also other collectables, but even in the worst case, you should at least find something like outfits for the character customization.
There's also some Metroidvania-esque elements, giving you new gameplay abilities over the course of the game, which open up new secrets and locations. And while the battle system might not be spectacular, the variety in environments, puzzles and mechanics is pretty big. In fact, there's many neat surprises until the end. Some environmental puzzles also play into the battles itself, which shakes things up. Unfortunately, this game was a little glitchy and somewhat technically unpolished in a bunch of places, at least on PS3. I think I had to reboot the console once or twice, even. It's a shame, but other than that, all thumbs up for this game, in particular for longtime South Park fans. Might even make you forget how they've been pushing Pewdiepie in your face recently.
4. Bayonetta 2 ; To my surprise, I had to find out that the first Bayonetta was probably the weakest Kamiya game. The battle system was obviously good, but there were so many cheap spots. Tons of instant-death QTEs and similar stage events out of nowhere, some annoying enemy tactics and horrid shooting sections bringing the experience down. It didn't make you feel any better that the game was basically giving you the finger with bad rankings, which were only poor because of the cheap parts instead of your skill.
Now there is Bayonetta 2. It basically took the first game and removed all that crap. Not only is the cheapness gone, but it also has a much better art direction and graphics in general, the adventure parts at the beginning are more adventurey, the enemies are more varied and the game simply is bigger and better than the first. The intro might already be one of the best, if not the best I've seen in an action game. The combat is slightly faster and more fluid, the controls are more repsonsive and feel better. Iirc there's a couple more weapons than the original, giving you a great variety in combat, which should offer fighting styles for almost every taste and situation. Since you can hold two weapons at once, there's also quite a bit of experimentation possible. And you want to do that, since while some button combos stay the same, the effects can often be very different per weapon of choice. The only bad part that remains is that while there's some decent secrets, there's also some really tedious backtracking remaining if you're going for 100% (which also includes getting the highest ranks), which adds nothing to the core gameplay. Well, that and maybe a too heavy focus on the story. Some unskippable story events are unfortunate for multiple playthroughs, although the story is surprisingly decent. On one hand, it's as beautifully cheesy, over the top and stereotypical as you'd expect, but it also isn't just some new story arc, but really fits well into the story line of the first game. Unfortunately, while the beginning and the later parts are more spectacular than almost the entirety of Bayonetta 1, especially because the final chapters ramp up quite a bit, it kinda halts in the middle, with some not very interesting stage designs. But, although there might a little too heavy focus on free floating mechanics, the bosses are at least interesting throughout, especially since they are now mostly testing your skills instead of only being imposing.
The replay value is there and I guess you can't really get too much better within this series, even though I might still prefer the battle system from Ninja Gaiden 2 and the variety of a God Hand shows that the halt in the middle wasn't necessary, even though the game still is very varied, more than the first title anyway.
5. Mario Kart 8 ; Oh wow, here it is. The first somewhat ambitious Nintendo title in HD, finally offering what I've always expected from them in that area. Even though the gameplay is very similar to Mario Kart 7, this title at least offers one other important aspect that would make a new generation title worthwhile: great presentation. Because the tragedy of Wii U is not only that Nintendo for the first time did almost nothing significantly new with gameplay and as little genre/franchise variety as ever before, but despite this finally being their jump into HD, their games also don't look impressive. All these 2D titles and minigames might as well be their recent predecessors running on Dolphin, to a more casual gamer's eye anyway. Cheap rehash after cheap rehash (and droughts inbetween). But I guess sub-Dreamcast sales for the machine are telling the whole story well enough. And the first sales success comes from the title that actually looks like some effort was put into it. Who would have thought that? Although Nintendo's lighting effects are still a little too abstruse here and there, this is still a fine looking game. Not only on a technical level, but finally a proper art direction from Nintendo has been realized in HD, making it look not too much worse than cartoony games on stronger platforms. There's tons of imagination and details everywhere. The courses of this title are in fact showing what the painfully uninspired and soulless looking Mario platformers on WiiU should have been instead. But hey, at least it's in one game now. They've also designed completely new vehicle parts, almost none recycled from Mario Kart 7, again featuring tons of detail and care put into it.
Unfortunately, they didn't do much with the anti gravity gameplay, compared to some crazy track designs from Mario Kart Wii and 7 (utilizing their new mechanics much more). But at least the core gameplay remained good. Mario Kart 7 might be a little better balanced still, but this certainly is no disaster like the chaos that was Mario Kart Wii. Experienced players certainly won't lose to anyone significantly less skilled than themselves, but it might get a little wacky again, once everyone's on the same skill level. The new item balance seems better at first, since you'll mostly be getting boosts (making course knowledge more important) and it's not possible anymore to stay behind on purpose for better luck. But since it's 12 players again, instead of 8, your biggest enemy won't be blue shells anymore, but tons of (now bigger?) green shells and all that small stuff spammed in the midfield. While it's often possible for the first place to build a ridiculous lead. Still, that also brings some tactical thinking into the competitive matches. The online is okay, I've put about 100 hours into it as of now and the eventual frustration is, again, at the very least much smaller than in the Wii iteration. The more demanding side of Mario Kart is back, even though that already was the case with 7. The kart customization has a lesser impact, since it was also already in the latter, but thankfully it stayed, allowing for all kinds of driving styles. And there doesn't seem to be any imbalanced combo, excluding the fact that heavy characters are probably prefered. But at least it's only details like these and I don't have to kill my thumbs through snaking to keep up.
Speaking of the online modes, the DLC is pretty good at a fair price and patches fixed some of the early problems, which only highlighted once again that the WiiU gamepad was a dumb idea. The public online mode was a little bad for a while, but thankfully also got fixed alongside the DLC update and some awkward menu problems/missings were also fixed. Personally, I never cared about battle modes, but I guess technically they could at least bring back the mission mode from Mario Kart DS. But I've put enough hours into this, even without the singleplayer content. Also, the retro courses are for the first time pretty extensive and altered, so they could in many cases be legitimately all-new content too.
Honorable Mentions
x. The Evil Within ; It's funny how the foundation of this supposed psychological horror title is as schizophrenic as it gets. And by that I mean, I've probably never seen a game that can go from being amazing to being rancid trash and back again so quickly. First of all, they have completely failed to deliver on the supposed ,,return to survival horror'', not to mention the promised ,,nostalgic'' horror, unless you started gaming with Resident Evil 4 (which has significantly damaged the genre to begin with). Out of fifteen chapters, only one is true survival horror. However, there still are several excellent parts of action horror. Chapters 7 to 10, as well as 13 and 14 have many menacing locations and encounters, providing lots of tension. To my surprise, chapter 1 was pretty great too. In videos it looked like some dumbed down cinema sequence, but then it was pretty suspenseful and I was ready to eat crow. Unfortunately, then the rest followed. Most chapters that give you a partner are awful. Best case you get a poor man's Resident Evil 4. But in chapter 6, or 11 and 12, you feel like you might as well be playing Resident Evil 5+6. God knows, that's the very last thing you want to be reminded of in a Mikami game. And that has nothing to do with high difficulty, which was good, but these parts simply are unbearably generic and nothing but the most mediocre corridor shooting. Take these sections out and you would have gotten a rock solid to even brilliant action horror title. It would have also still been a long game, so I don't get why these awful parts are in there. But I guess that's what happens when Mikami clearly wasn't happy to work on this kind of thing in his new company (some of his recent interviews... yikes). Still, there's at least also a pretty good new game+ and unlockables, which were unfortunately missing in the otherwise superior Vanquish.
