Oisín Kuhnke's Games of The Year (Kinda) | Winter Spectacular 2021

As posed excellently by Ruth Cassidy, I too question what ‘Game Of The Year’ even means. Actual awards like that of The Game Awards do nothing but blow smoke up the asses of games that had the biggest advertising budget that year. They continuously ignore the little guy, the games that really do something different. Even Best Indie Game categories are littered with releases from a publicly-traded publisher valued at almost $1bn. 

Perhaps equally frustratingly, they often only focus on games that were released that year, with some mild lip-service paid to live-service games like Fornite. It constantly feels like we only talk about the current “it” game and move on as soon as buzz has died down (with live-service games being the exceptions that prove the rule). So, to try and counteract that a little, here’s my ‘Games of A Year’ list. Because I played mostly games that didn’t come out this year! And I liked some of them quite a lot, and you should play them too if you haven’t already.

Hey buddy, get out of my line of sight! IMMA TRYIN’ PONDER AN ORB OVER HERE!

You got red on you pal.

Bloodborne

OK, so I’m quite late on this one. The year 2021 marked my first completion of everyone’s favourite eldritch Victorian era Souls-like, and wowee, I am an idiot for waiting so long to play this game. I’ve tried out Dark Souls here and there, and while I still need to give the series a proper chance, I think Bloodborne will now always be the standard I hold all Soul-like to. I was even inspired to write about how interesting a character I think Ludwig is a couple of months ago. 

The feeling of gliding across the cobbled roads of Yharnam as I dash-dodge and butcher my way through legions of beasts and hunters alike is unparalleled. There is no single game whose movement encapsulates the essence of ‘cool’ as Bloodborne and its causal ferocity…  Except for maybe Jet Set Radio, and that is a very different sort of cool. 

This box art is so damn good.

Metroid Fusion

Did you know that Metroid is, like, really good? Who knew! 

Seriously though, I don’t think people talk about it enough. Metroid is really good! We forget that sometimes when we talk about the genre that is half named after the series. When Metroid Dread got announced earlier this year I thought to myself, “Hey bozo, why haven’t you played a Metroid?” to which I responded, “That’s mean, but you’re right, I should play one.” And so I busted out the old emu- I mean my very own GameBoy Advance, and popped in Metroid Fusion. 

Hello beautiful, have you ever tasted wave beam before?

Going back to the original GameBoy Advance is tough before God graced us the SP’s backlight on the seventh day. So playing it on more advanced hardware, in 2021 meant the colours were incredibly vibrant, and in turn that made Fusion an alien meal I wanted to savour. It’s incredible how well realised that game is on such a tiny handheld, and while navigating the space station is mostly quite linear, the 2D art still managed to convey a real, living environment.

DEVOTION

I know I said that these were going to be games that didn’t come out this year, and DEVOTION technically was released in 2021, kind of.

Originally released in 2019 the game was pulled from sale due to a political controversy and pressure from the Chinese government. But now, two years later the Taiwanese developed indie horror game finally received a full release. DEVOTION is a near-perfect masterclass in atmosphere, tension, and horror storytelling. Part walking sim, part puzzle game, there isn’t a game I want everyone I meet to play more than this one. I don’t even want to tell you anything about it, go in blind if you can, though do seek content warnings if you need to, as it deals with more than just horror. If not for the political controversy, I think DEVOTION would be much more prolific than it is now, so please, give it a chance.

I feel like we’ve done this before.

NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139...

OK, this one definitely feels like cheating. NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139... technically came out this year, but for the most part, it’s the same game as 2010’s NieR. However, in the original western release of the game, dubbed NieR: Gestalt, you played as a dad. Now, in this remaster, you see the story in a way that previously only Japanese audiences got to experience, as you play as the brother protagonist of Yonah.

While this remake is good, I’m actually using this game as a way to tell you to go back and play the original. Both versions of NieR are beautiful games, full of textually queer characters who find hope and comfort in one another. While the brother protagonist of Replicant fits the bill of ‘anime boy protagonist’, and is incredibly loveable - particularly his young version- I found there’s something about an adult man who genuinely cares for those around him that marks Gestalt as something truly different in a sea of grouchy dad games. Whether you play the original Replicant on an imported PS3, ver.1.22474487139… on your PS5 or Gestalt using Xbox’s backwards compatibility just play NieR. In any shape or form.

No. This cannot continue.

These games only capture a fraction of what I’ve played this year. There are so many more games that I haven’t had a chance to touch, 99% of which didn’t release this year. I’m sure I’ll manage to tackle them eventually, even with my ever-growing backlog. But genuinely, make sure you find time for some old stuff too. The games industry likes to forget about its history unless it is fleecing you nostalgia (looking at you, Nintendo), and this piece doesn’t do enough justice to everything that came before, but it’s what I got.