GOTY 2019 - Liam Gregory's Best Games (and The Worst Things) of 2019

2019 has been one hell of a year for the Games Industry. From the newest games to the release of Google Stadia, 2019 was jam-packed. I’m going to look at the three best games I’ve played this year, as well as three of the worst/controversial. These are in no set order. Sit back and enjoy.

The Best Games

Thanks to my University course, I’ve been playing some narrative-based games. One of those was 2018’s Firewatch by Campo Santo. This beauty of a game takes a rather boring story and turns it into a suspenseful, possibly supernatural masterpiece. Along the way, you’ll get some cheesy humour, a sexy ass drawing of the main character and maybe even a meme or two. The game is only between three and five hours long and even if you don’t care for the story, the stylised graphics are marvellous. I highly recommend everyone to pick up this game and experience Hank’s summer. Just be careful climbing, okay?

Florence is one of the few apps on your phone with the power to make you cry that isn’t Twitter.

The second game I want to talk about also came from my course. Florence, another game from 2018, developed by Mountains. I wasn’t expecting much, at first, when I saw that it was a cheap mobile game, but boy was I proven wrong. This hour-long game provides interesting ways of conveying an emotional story through gameplay mechanics, as well as the mundanity of day to day life. If you have a spare couple of quid and an hour to spare, I highly recommend Florence. Make sure to play with sound though to get the full experience.

Now it wouldn’t be a 2019 Game of the Year list without a game coming out in 2019, would it? So my third pick is the somewhat controversial Pokemon Sword and Shield. I seem to focus a lot on controversy in this article, as you will see shortly. But Pokemon Sword and Shield is the only game to have rebounded, and that’s putting it lightly. Sure the graphics weren’t the greatest, the cleverly named Dexit (where Game Freak didn’t include half of the Pokedex) happened and the story was - to be blunt - awful, yet I’ve had the most fun in a Pokemon game since Pokemon Sun and Moon. The dialogue is scarily accurate to Britain, even if it gets a little stereotypical in Wyndon, and can we take a moment to bask in the glory of Rose’s theme? The sales figures don’t lie, Pokemon Sword and Shield was a hit.

Oh look, its the three starters! Grookey, Boring and The Guilt Trip.

The Worst Games

Let’s get the elephant out of the room first: Activision Blizzard. After the disaster last year with Diablo Immortal, one would have thought that Blizzard would be trying everything to not have a repeat. But their 2019 was sealed before it even began. Killing off Heroes of the Storm was a questionable but not an outlandish decision. Firing over 1000 staff after a record-breaking financial year, however? Inexcusable. Follow that up with the mixed reviews of World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth and the constant discussion on the Overwatch League’s legitimacy, there wasn’t much more they could do wrong… right? But we all know what happened in October with the Hong Kong Hearthstone player, Chung "Blitzchung" Ng Wa and the multiple protests, both in-house and out, that followed. Their apologies (or lack of) didn’t garner them any support and even despite the announcements of Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4, people are still not happy. 

Everyone’s favourite Modern Warfare (2019) character… Jack Cooper? Dude McGrizzle? Not Price?

Then, we move to Activision and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. Where do we even begin with this? Accusations of rewriting history, terrible maps, multiple game-breaking bugs, a shotgun that can one-hit kill for miles and a twenty-five MILLION dollar buy-in for their Call of Duty League (CDL)? What were they thinking?

Now that’s over with, let’s move into the second biggest controversy of 2019. Fallout 76. Just like Blizzard, Bethesda had already caused a stir with Fallout 76 in October 2018 when it was first launched, thanks to its lack of content and the canvas bags debacle. Throughout the next twelve months, it also had more problems, including a data breach. But then, a year later after all their work with the community to fix the game, Bethesda undid all their goodwill by saying one word—Subscription. The announcement of Fallout 1st, a monthly (or yearly) subscription broke the community apart. Those that had purchased the subscription began to make subscription-only sanctuaries, while the ones who hadn’t begun to harass and hunt the aristocracy. What a nightmare! Greedy, greedy Bethesda.

COUNTRY ROADS,

TAKE ME HOME,

OUTER WORLDS,

IS VERY STRONG.

For the final game, let’s look at one that has a good ending. Fortnite started the year off rough. Season 10 brought in B.R.U.T.Es, or as we know them, Mechs. Epic has a habit of putting in things that break the game, such as the Infinity Blade in Season 7. However, the blade was removed shortly after Epic realised that it made an individual god-like. The Mechs, however, wasn’t. They stayed in the game during the entire season, causing several players and well-known streamers to quit the game. But as I said, this has a good ending. The Mechs were removed from future seasons and the Black Hole event, leading to Season 11 (or “Fortnite 2”) has refreshed the game, so much so I may even go back and give it a shot. Good job Epic, now maybe you can work on fixing your crunch issues next?

Editor’s note: I haven’t played Fortnite in over a year, does Drake still play?

So that’s my list. You’ll probably notice that some games *cough* Anthem *cough* didn’t come up, just because of how dire and depressing the situations are. Moving into 2020, we have several games to look forward too, such as the new Animal Crossing, Ghosts of Tsushima and one of my personal watches, Lost Words: Beyond the Page. We even have the next generation of consoles, PS5 and Xbox Series X! Let’s hope the controversy stays in the past and an infinite amount of fun hours awaits.

I only heard about Lost Words: Beyond the Page while editing this but a quick look at some screenshots and now I have very excited for it.