danielpholt

Talked myself into getting this one with some left over Eshop credit from Christmas.

Horizon Zero Dawn is probably one of my favourite games from the last few years, and one of the few things that might force me to seek out a PS5. That first game is something else.

Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course Feels like this one has been in development for 4-5 years already (which IIRC was how OG Cuphead went?). Should be out in the summer months. Bayonetta III You know how sometimes you just want to slay a fuck load of angels whilst making pithy comments about the size of their appendages and I dunno, having your hair turn into a giant demon-dog thingy? That. Hogwarts Legacy JKR aside, I still really like the world of Harry Potter and I think we're due a good game within this universe. It'll probably suck, but here's hoping. Splatoon 3 I spent an awful lot of time playing Splatoon 2 in the year after it came out. I'm well up for more of that now, only I've got the added bonus of having a 4 year old who I think would absolutely love the core idea of this game. I've no doubt missed a few, but there we are. What are you most looking forward to in 2022?

Couldn't find a topic for this so I made one... The Forgotten City With peoples GOTY lists coming out, I've spent a good chunk of time listening to people talk about how this game isn't to be missed, so I found a few hours (5-6) to give it another shot, and much like Outer Wilds a few years previous (another time-loop game) it grabbed me hard on the second attempt. I'm not sure why that is, but I think its got more to do with my own mental state than the game itself. As for the game, it's a genuinely interesting game with a time-loop mechanic that not only works well, but for the most part doesn't fall foul of the same issues that something like Twelve Minutes, or even (one of my favs) Outer Wilds does; the time-loop as a mechanic doesn't impede your enjoyment, or turn things into a repetitive slog. The ending has an awful lot to do, but for the most part it handles it well enough. It's a bit corny, but all in all, I enjoyed it enough. It's one XBOX Gamepass, and I definitely recommend it.

These are my 'newborn baby won't sleep unless they're attached to me' games for the coming months.

MoM is definitely the weakest entry in the series, tbh it's probably their weakest game to date, and I include that Police thing they made after Until Dawn in that list. For what its worth I also played Little Hope this year, that's also pretty good. I adored the setting on that one.

It is done. My top 5 games from 2021. I'm still playing through Far Cry 6, which I don't see breaking the top 5 of this list. And I'm going to give The Forgotten City another chance in the coming days, so I may end up editing this list.....but if not, then here we have my top 5. Weird year. I don't 'love' any of these games. They're all good, some of them are great but I don't feel passionate about any of them like I might have done in previous years. That could well be more to do with my own state of mind than than the quality of these games however.

My full 2021 list is here. It includes everything I played to a significant degree. My list of 'beaten games' looks like this: 1. Steamworld Quest 2. The Medium 3. Edith Finch 4. Super Mario 3D World + Bowsers Fury 5. Maquette 6. The Division 2 7. Resident Evil 3 8. Genesis Noir 9. Prey 10. Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion 11. Titanfall 2 12. RE: Village 13. Superliminal 14. Dark Pictures: Little Hope 15. Last Stop 16. Portal 17. Trine 4 18. Twelve Minutes 19. Toem 20. The Artful Escape 21. Outer Wilds: Echoes of the Eye 22. Sayonara Wild Hearts 23. Halo 4 25. Guardians of the Galaxy 26. Dark Pictures: House of Ashes 27. Forza Horizon 5 28. Boomerang X 29. The Gunk A lot of not-2021 games on that list.

My boss sent me a £25 voucher to be spent in store. Naturally grabbed some Eshop credit.

In which case (like Ethan said), it's going to go the other way and the couple that clearly aren't right for one another are going to 'give it another go' and show their daughter that sometimes, families should stay together because........ Family Game of the Year!

Another thing, I'm not really sure that I'd want to play that game with my significant other. It's about a couple admitting they're probably better off alone right. Maybe it speaks to my own issues, but I don't need that directly in mine and my partners face .

Sorry, I have the means I just don't have the co-op partner. Which is why it's similar to B4B to me. All the will in the world I can't get my brothers interested in playing anything that isn't Rocket League or Call of Duty.

Hot Wheels looks super fun. My nephew got it for Christmas and I think once it hits a more appealing price point, I'll be jumping in with him. Not played a Far Cry game since I finished Blood Dragon, but I've got this sudden urge to blow shit up and upgrade my hunting bow (they have that right?) so I guess this is the game I'm playing for the next 4-5 weeks.

Got a few games here. I'll start from the beginning... Gato Roboto - Cute cat-based Metroidvania. I played most of this one over the course of a few days at the start of the year. Everything was going swimmingly until I got to the end-game boss. Hours, literally hours of my life spent trying to beat this fucker before I ultimately decided it just wasn't worth it, and rage-uninstalled it. Not gone back to it. Scarlet Nexus - I went into this one hoping for exciting combat and some cool cut-scenes. It delivered on the latter but the former I found to be a little underwhelming. I got maybe 1/5 of the way through (I heard it's actually surprisingly long?) before I decided I didn't have the time to give to the game and haven't gone back. That being said, it's on Gamepass and I could see myself giving it a second look. Game Builder Garage - Oh Nintendo. There's something truly incredible about GBG, but as is so often the case with Nintendo games, their inability to figure out the online component utterly ruins the end product. GBG is no different in this regard. They made something amazing with the core game, and then failed to deliver on even the most basic of online features; the ability to browse other peoples creations in-game. This is the studio that made Mario Maker (a series not without it's own online issues), you'd think they'd understand the importance of letting people download and share their creations in-game, but nope. For many people the promise of GBG wasn't that they'd be able to create their own levels, it was that they could download, play and learn from others. Unfortunately Nintendo makes that almost impossible, and in the process makes GBG a much weaker product. Turns out Game Builder Garage left a bigger impression on me than I originally thought.

If I could dedicate as much time as I used to to games, I'd throw the cash down in the knowledge that I'd have more to look forward to in the future, but atm that sort of money just doesn't make sense when I've also got work and family stuff. As for the games in your list, Biomutant is a game I'm probably going to play when it hits gamepass/goes sub £10 in a year or two. Everything about it looks cool, and I've heard it's fine. Fine is um...fine. House of Ashes is my favourite entry into that franchise. They've perfected their formulae IMO. The Forgotten City is one that I just couldn't get into when I got around to it a few months ago. That being said, I've still got the itch, and I can see myself going back in. That's what happened with Outer Wilds and it ended up becoming one of my favourite gaming experiences to date. It Takes Two fits into a similar slot to that of Back 4 Blood for me. Super interested in trying it, I just don't have a means of playing it.

It's been a long year and I don't know about you but there's a laundry list of games that I've been meaning to play, but for one reason or another, just haven't been able to find the time (or console in some cases) to actually play them. What games from 2021 that you most regret not getting around to? I'll go first. Deathloop - PS5 Deathloop (and the game below) just aren't available on a console I own. It sucks, but I'm sure as hell not in a position to spend £500 on a console for just one game, and as such, I'll wait for this to hit Gamepass in 2022. Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart Unlike Deathloop, I doubt I'll play this any time soon. Which is a real shame because this is the perfect game for me at the moment. Something I can kick back and relax with; no stress, just colourful fun from beginning to end. Inscription - PC I'll be honest, I don't know much about this game but *everyone* seems to be falling over themselves to talk about how insane this game is. I'm getting some big Obra-Din vibes off of the discourse around it. I imagine it'll make the hop over to consoles at some point, but until then I'll patiently wait. Back 4 Blood - PC, XBOX, PS5 Back 4 Blood is available in places that I play games. Unfortunately the big reasons for my wanting to play it is also the main reason why I haven't played it. My life just doesn't fit into this sort of game anymore....but if it did I'd probably have had an amazing time playing this game with my friends. Moncage - PC, Mobile Finally we've got Moncage, a little indie puzzle box game that again, just isn't available in places where I play games. It's coming, but it's not here just yet. Maybe 2022 will be kinder to me in this regard. ------ And there we have it. My list of the games I most regret missing in 2021. A 'Potential' game of the year list of sorts. What makes your list?

The Gunk A few technical issues aside, I really enjoyed my time with The Gunk. It looks pretty, it has a nice charm to it and it's got an enjoyable enough core mechanic (sucky suck suck) that the 4-5 hours it took to complete breezed by. Won't win any awards, but yeah, not a bad little game this.

The Gunk The first '3d' game from the Steamworld people, The Gunk is a game about um, sucking up tonnes of...you know, gunk. I'm about 3 hours in and I'm happy to report that I'm 'finding the fun' in that. It's got a highly enjoyable vacuuming mechanic, and as a Luigi fan, I do enjoy a good vacuum mechanic. And whilst I don't see it seriously threatening my top 5 games of the year list, I do think it's another solid addition to gamepass, and one that's worth of a look, especially if you're looking for something linear to pass the time over the Christmas break.

Love to see the Tories lose a seat, especially when it was utterly avoidable. Another nail in Johnson's coffin....which I think might be a bad thing for Labour. IMO they want to keep this mess rolling for a while. I can see them beating Johnson in a general, I don't feel as strongly about Sunak.

This was one the cards when the British Government stripped an IS supporter of her Citizenship a few years ago. Unfortunately because 1) she's brown and 2) she went off to fight for IS the good British public didn't question it too much and now where in a situation where the Govt has carte blanche in this regard. It's an absolute disgrace, but most people just don't care because...you know.

Mark Brown (GMTK) does these annual accessibility round-ups. Here's 2021's. Worth a watch for sure, especially if you're passionate about that sort of thing.

I think we're finally starting to see the Tories lose ground in the polls. Granted, polls aren't everything but it's a decent indicator for how the public is feeling about a certain topic, and right now, the Tories are fighting fires in all directions....and it's finally starting to change people's perceptions of them. My only concern is that with the arrival of BoJo's child he'll have a few weeks to hide away and see if this entire thing passes by. If it does, he might survive for a while but if it doesn't shift soon, I think we're seeing the end of BoJo as (at the very least) an uncontested leader of the Conservative party.

I'm pretty confident that I can throw together a list at this point. Here's my top 5; unordered. Forza Horizon 5 Boomerang X Resident Evil 8 The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes Guardians of the Galaxy Shout-out of Echoes of the Eye (Outer Wilds DLC) that was pretty great; although maybe not as mind-blowing as Outer Wilds itself. And Toem, which is a very neat little game that really helped me get through some pretty bad times during the middle of the year.

Boomerang X I can totally understand why people say this game is best experienced on a PC. The Switch does a good enough job, but I did have some pretty bad hand ache after I'd finished most of the latter levels. That being said, I think this game ends up in my top 5. It feels super tight and is satisfying off the bat. Looks.....I dunno, great (I think it nails what it's going for) to be honest with you, especially one the Switch's smaller screen.