Podcast links: iTunes, Hipcast, Direct Download
Man, we really have to write a lot for this one. Because this is it! This is our first ever Game of the Year award! This is really important! Exclamation marks! Mike’s Top 10 Games of 2013 are up, so please do check that out before you scroll on down and check out today’s winners.
If, for some reason, you missed the last two days of coverage, here’s everything in one neat pile o’ links: GOTY Part One, GOTY Part Two, Steven’s Top 10, John’s Top 10, Andrew’s Top 10, Mask’s Top 10. Go check that stuff out!
Now, on to the main course! We’ve got two big end-year awards for you! First off…
Worst Burning Pile of Trash: Aliens: Colonial Marines (Runner-up: Defiance)
Let’s be fair about this: none of us played Ride to Hell: Retribution. In some parallel world, that game won this award. But we’re not too sure about that. Even if you discount the rumors about the game allegedly being some kind of Springtime for Hitler-esque scam, Aliens: Colonial Marines is a truly awful video game. And that’s if you discount the rumors and forget about reality! The game was sold on sequences of gameplay that never made it into the final product. No matter what Randy Pitchford says, the demo shown at trade shows was not a work in progress. To borrow an excellent turn of phrase from Jim Sterling, Gearbox sold a work in progress for $60.
Is the multiplayer good? Possibly, but the campaign waffles between dull and frustrating, with muddy textures, glitchy character animations, horrendous writing, and guns that lack any real weight or impact. Aliens: Colonial Marines fails on every conceivable level, but at least you can play it?
And now, ladies and gentlemen, the moment of truth! We’ve got an ordered Top 10 of video games released in 2013, and Number 1 is Video Game Choo Choo’s Game of the Year! From #10 to #1…
10. Divekick
9. Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
8. The Last of Us
7. The Stanley Parable
6. Saints Row IV
5. The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds
4. Gunpoint
3. Super Mario 3D World
2. Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
And our Game of the Year is…
1. Gone Home
What a great game. And it is a game, before you rush off to the comments to complain about our choice. Gone Home is an fantastic example of how games can be used to properly tell stories. The way it utilizes the interactive nature of this medium to convey a series of familiar yet compelling tales, is nothing short of brilliant.
Our choice for Game of the Year speaks to what Video Game Choo Choo as a collective entity wants to celebrate. We want games to take advantage of interactivity and tell compelling stories. We want more representation in games. We want piles of X-Files tapes. We want great voice acting.
We want good videogames, and Gone Home is a superb videogame.
Congratulations to the Fullbright Company, and commiserations to the runners-up! So marks the end of Video Game Choo Choo’s first year in existence, and we think it’s been a pretty good one. Thank you all for reading, listening, and commenting. It honestly means the world to us.
Have a great New Year’s weekend, and we hope your 2014 is fantastic!
Lachlan’s going to be thrilled about that one haha.
Oh yeah, as soon as we finalized the list, I knew he’d get a real kick out of it!
Interesting number one choice for sure, though I still feel like Kentucky Route Zero and Papers Please both do far better jobs of telling compelling, interactive stories using the medium.
I like Kentucky Route Zero a lot. It’s going to be considered for 2014 GOTY.