My ten favorite games of 2020

I typically begin these posts by talking briefly about anything but games, providing small details about my life or the events of the year that may have had an impact on me. This year, as you probably know, isn’t one most of us will look back on in the future with any kind of fondness. Instead of dwelling on that, I want to try to keep this focused on the games I really loved and thankfully 2020 still had some fantastic games to play even if it wasn’t the most jam-packed year.

To avoid making this as long as my traditional end of the year posts, I’m going to be keeping things as brief as possible. What are the aspects I remember and will continue to remember most fondly about each game? Was it a culmination of everything the game had to offer, specific memories it brought back from my youth, key moments that exemplify everything that makes the game great, or something else entirely? Those are the sorts of things I considered when reflecting on each game that made my final list.

Beforehand, I have to mention a few games that just missed the cut. Here are my honorable mentions!

• If Found — A beautiful narrative told with remarkable originality about a subject I find myself learning more about every day. I want more stories like this, especially in games.
• Haven — It’s rare to see successful love stories in games, especially if that’s the focus of the narrative, but I think Haven pulls that off successfully. Like with If Found, I’d love to see more games like this in the future.
• Astro’s Playroom — This is both a brilliant showcase of the PlayStation 5’s bells and whistles and a fun reflection of the history of the PlayStation. Probably the biggest surprise of the year for me.
• Yakuza: Like a Dragon — The Yakuza series has been hit-and-miss (to me anyway), but Like a Dragon demonstrates how to refine a tired formula while still maintaining all of the elements I’ve come to love about the series. It’s not perfect, but it’s a step in the right direction.
• Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 — This isn’t Activision’s first attempt at remaking the original Tony Hawk games, but it’s the first in the series since the originals that nails the controls and handling perfectly. Once I reacquainted myself with the mechanics, it was like I was transported back to simpler times.

And now, here are my ten favorite games of the year.

The Streets of Rage games, specifically the first two, were games I obsessed over as a kid. To this day I still listen to the Streets of Rage 2 soundtrack regularly. The game itself isn’t especially great, but the visuals and the soundtrack elevate it to another level that hasn’t been replicated since. Streets of Rage 4 attempts to capture that magic, and I initially felt it didn’t stick the landing in a lot of ways, primarily due to an ultimately forgettable soundtrack and an art style I thought was kind of ugly upon first seeing it. Then I sat down and spent more time with SoR4 only to realize it’s absolutely a worthy successor to the series and probably the most fun I’ve ever had with a classic 2D beat ’em up.

I played through the entire game co-op with my partner, someone who has never played a Streets of Rage game before, and we both had a blast. The more I played, the more I realized how much I loved the visuals, the music, and the entire vibe the game was going for. Separately these elements didn’t work for me, but as a whole I found it to be an excellent experience and one I kept returning to throughout the year.

Supergiant Games is one of my favorite developers around and Hades is another brilliant example of the studio’s talent. While this didn’t have the same impact on me that it did for many others, I can’t help but love this game, especially as someone who is tired of 99% of rogue-likes (or rogue-lites, if you prefer). Hades never made me feel like an idiot or a failure for screwing up and each new escape attempt truly felt like an improvement on my last, even if only made small tweaks to my character’s build. In a year that felt like being stuck in an endless loop more than perhaps any other, Hades was there to remind us there is something better for us at the end of it, even if we stumble a bit along the way.

For a game that has so many people focused on its gruesome violence, revenge-driven plot, and supposed mean-spirited nature, The Last of Us Part II features perhaps the most empathetic moments in anything I’ve played this year. These are small, at times fleeting, but remind you of the best of humanity in the worst of circumstances. Even when we carry our past traumas with us around like a weight on our back, we still find time to help others and understand their grief. We recognize that pain in others because we’ve experienced it ourselves, even if we can’t relate to the specific circumstances that led to it. There is a lot that can be said about this game, both good and bad, but that’s what stands out to me about it the most and why I consider it an improvement on the fantastic original.

I’ve written a lot about the original Spelunky before and it’s hard to deny that Spelunky 2 is more Spelunky. There are, however, major changes and improvements, plus I love the new levels, enemy designs, and fun secrets that provide me the same sense of wonder the original did. At the end of the day though, more Spelunky is all I needed.

As of the time of me writing this in late December 2020, I still haven’t finished Spelunky 2 yet, but when I do I know I’ll feel just as accomplished as I did the first time I vanquished Olmec several years ago.

If you know me at all, you know I love movies just about as much as I love video games. I most likely realized this about myself when I first watched Akira Kurosawa’s classic Seven Samurai and began to not only watch his entire filmography, but the films that inspired him and the filmmakers that were inspired by him. It was a remarkable time in my life and I sometimes wish I could relive those days of discovery. While I won’t directly compare the quality of Ghost of Tsushima to the best works of Kurosawa and his contemporaries, it’s the closest a game has gotten to bringing me back into that time in my life.

Of all of the worlds I’ve explored in games this year, Ghost of Tsushima’s is easily the most beautiful. I spent hours riding around on my horse, checking every nook and cranny and finding every secret. I did this not for the purpose of crossing off items from a list but because I simply wanted to. Tsushima’s approach to open world design may be dated in many ways, but I found a lot to love about it nonetheless.

Not much comes close to capturing the feeling of pure joy I experience while swinging through New York in Spider-Man: Miles Morales. This was also true in Insomniac’s previous Spider-Man game, but something about playing as Miles made a lot of the moment-to-moment gameplay much more memorable. Best of all, I felt like I was even more of a “Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man” in this one, helping out the community in ways that felt true to both Miles and the idea of Spider-Man as a hero. While I did love the story, my biggest takeaway was I wanted a Spider-Man game where I simply went around solving the smaller problems in the city, not stopping some larger threat as those were easily the game’s highlights.

As a result of the year that was 2020, my feelings on Kentucky Route Zero have only gotten stronger as more time has passed. I started playing it back in 2013 when Act I came out and I’ve had a lot of time to think on its themes. I was initially not as invested as many who have played it, but with each subsequent release I found myself drawn more to the story and the characters.

Capitalism has ripped through this world like a hurricane, destroying lives and even entire towns along its path, and the journey you find yourself on takes you through the wreckage it left behind. This is a story about how to move on from that loss and how to best forge a path forward in spite of the chaos of the modern world. Act V is probably the best of the bunch, culminating in one of my all time favorite moments in any game I’ve played this year. It doesn’t offer any easy answers, but it does provide a story that reflects our modern times better than any other game in recent memory.

Special shout out to Clinton for gifting this to me on Steam all those years ago. It didn’t click with me initially, but I may have never given it a chance if not for you. Thanks, buddy!

I love so much about Spiritfarer. I was excited for it when it was initially announced last year, but it exceeded my expectations in every way and captivated me from start to finish, providing so many memorable moments with characters I will always cherish. What brought the experience together for me though was the incredible score by Max LL, which has burrowed its way into my brain in a way no other soundtrack this year has. It added to the sense of adventure I had with the large and diverse cast of characters as well as the melancholy I felt whenever I had to say goodbye to a companion I grew so close to.

If you take anything away from reading this, please take a little time to play Spiritfarer. It’s one of those games that only comes along once every few years that feels special. It’s not an easy game to play, especially this year of all years, but it provided me necessary catharsis and honestly had a positive impact on my life.

It’s almost 6am and I’ve been tossing and turning in bed for nearly an hour. At this point I have been working from home for the past several months with no end in sight. My daily routine has remained almost the same for that entire time and I was stressed beyond belief. Instead of staying in bed until my alarm goes off, I decide to get up, quietly get dressed, and sneak out of the room to do literally anything else with my time. I grab my Switch and load up Animal Crossing: New Horizons, a game that has become part of that daily routine, but one I look forward to every day.

Once I’m on my island, I immediately hear something familiar: it’s Tangy, my favorite villager, singing along with a song on a nearby record player. I quickly approach to see her dancing along happily to K.K. Bubblegum at six in the morning without a care in the world. Again, this isn’t something new, Tangy loves to sing and it always brings me joy, but at this moment it really hit me. I decide to sit down on a bench nearby and continue to listen for a little while, immediately feeling rejuvenated and ready for another routine day. This, among many other amazing little elements in New Horizons, always managed to brighten my day and kept me going throughout the year.

Any of the top three on this list could easily rank as my favorite of the year, but I can’t ignore what my heart is telling me. Final Fantasy VII is one of my favorite games of all time and is probably the game I’ve played the most in my life (or it’s at least tied with my other favorite Final Fantasy, VI). As soon as I watched the intro, which managed to both expand on the original’s first moments while also recreating them as perfectly as one could hope for, I knew this was going to be an experience I was going to love.

That intro is a perfect encapsulation of what makes the game so great: it’s an expanded, more detailed look at the opening sections of FFVII, fleshing out the moments I remember so fondly in some unexpected and brilliant ways while staying true to the original game’s vision. Sure, by the time you reach Remake’s finale, you realize just how the developers have decided to turn this story on its head, presenting us with a surprising take on fan expectations and how those can impact the overall experience of a remake. It’s not particularly subtle, nor is it handled perfectly, but I loved the sheer audacity of this approach nonetheless.

Changes aside, I can’t deny what I’ve known in my heart to be true all year: Final Fantasy VII Remake is a fantastic game, managing to both subvert and exceed my expectations in all of the ways that matter most. Is it actually the best game I’ve played all year? Maybe not! But at the end of the day, it’s the game that meant the most to me. Nostalgia is a powerful thing, it turns out.