As a reminder, as a game reviewer, I am more qualified to declare Game of the Year than any faggot running something called the "Gay Awards" or some nonsense. So that is what I am going to do. Below is the list of the nominees for 2024's Game of the Year. I will go into brief depth on each game in the replies to this post telling you why each game is good (and not good). There will eventually be a poll, but just like the gay awards, your vote does not matter at all.
Granblue Relink
Reverse Collapse Codename Bakery
Iron Meat
Shadow of the Ninja Reborn
Metal Slug Tactics
Card en Ciel
Bakeru
Virtua Unlimited Project
Granblue Relink
Reverse Collapse Codename Bakery
Iron Meat
Shadow of the Ninja Reborn
Metal Slug Tactics
Card en Ciel
Bakeru
Virtua Unlimited Project
Granblue Fantasy Relink
This one speaks for itself. If you have not played Relink, what is wrong with you? Equal parts character action and MonHun set in a beautifully realized rendition of the Granblue Versus franchise.
Cons: Endgame grind is so slow glaciers will pass you by, but you will, 99% of the time, be having fun while you grind because the game itself is still so good.
More detailed review at https://tmdvidya.neocities.org/reviews/granbluerelink
This one speaks for itself. If you have not played Relink, what is wrong with you? Equal parts character action and MonHun set in a beautifully realized rendition of the Granblue Versus franchise.
Cons: Endgame grind is so slow glaciers will pass you by, but you will, 99% of the time, be having fun while you grind because the game itself is still so good.
More detailed review at https://tmdvidya.neocities.org/reviews/granbluerelink
Reverse Collapse: Codename Bakery
Just as with Relink, Bakery is another shot where gacha devs try to make a real game. This time the Girls Frontline guys revisit and totally revamp their first game. Most of you never played the first game, but the core point is that this is Fire Emblem with guns but also VERY hard. Important that it is Fire Emblem, not XCOM. Cover and cowering in such does not help you very much here, and the average fight is your four man squad including one barefoot anime girl versus 40-80 dudes, all of whom can down you in just a couple good shots.
Cons: Dr. Skelton, a dumbass: "Man, most SRPGs are boring move-attack stuff. I really want one that makes me think every move!" I HAVE NOT ONCE, NOT FUCKING ONCE, CLEARED A SINGLE TURN OF THIS FUCKING GAME WITHOUT HAVING TO RELOAD AND RETRY AND RERUN IT SEVERAL TIMES TO FIND A COMBO OF MOVES WHERE I DO NOT EAT SHIT. It REALLY is hard as hell and extremely draining to play. I am never going to finish this crap because as exceptional as it is, playing it is just totally exhausting, and I am too proud to drop difficulty.
Just as with Relink, Bakery is another shot where gacha devs try to make a real game. This time the Girls Frontline guys revisit and totally revamp their first game. Most of you never played the first game, but the core point is that this is Fire Emblem with guns but also VERY hard. Important that it is Fire Emblem, not XCOM. Cover and cowering in such does not help you very much here, and the average fight is your four man squad including one barefoot anime girl versus 40-80 dudes, all of whom can down you in just a couple good shots.
Cons: Dr. Skelton, a dumbass: "Man, most SRPGs are boring move-attack stuff. I really want one that makes me think every move!" I HAVE NOT ONCE, NOT FUCKING ONCE, CLEARED A SINGLE TURN OF THIS FUCKING GAME WITHOUT HAVING TO RELOAD AND RETRY AND RERUN IT SEVERAL TIMES TO FIND A COMBO OF MOVES WHERE I DO NOT EAT SHIT. It REALLY is hard as hell and extremely draining to play. I am never going to finish this crap because as exceptional as it is, playing it is just totally exhausting, and I am too proud to drop difficulty.
Iron Meat
Literally this is Contra but good. That is all you need to know. It is fair, it is quick, it has a rocking soundtrack. At NO point does this game ever stick you in a vehicle or waste your time with a dumb mode-7 style minigame. There is no competition for Contrafags. This game wins period.
Cons: It is JUST Contra. And there is currently no way to really play it arcade style. The game is full stage select, resets your lives every stage. It is still quite tough if you ask it to go hard on you, and I actually prefer stage based play, but if you are a purist, the game does not really care about you. (Then again, neither do the actual Contra devs, and they care a LOT less since they did not even make Iron Meat for you.)
Literally this is Contra but good. That is all you need to know. It is fair, it is quick, it has a rocking soundtrack. At NO point does this game ever stick you in a vehicle or waste your time with a dumb mode-7 style minigame. There is no competition for Contrafags. This game wins period.
Cons: It is JUST Contra. And there is currently no way to really play it arcade style. The game is full stage select, resets your lives every stage. It is still quite tough if you ask it to go hard on you, and I actually prefer stage based play, but if you are a purist, the game does not really care about you. (Then again, neither do the actual Contra devs, and they care a LOT less since they did not even make Iron Meat for you.)
Shadow of the Ninja Reborn
The makers of Pocky and Rocky Reshrined, Wild Guns Reloaded, and Ninja Saviors: Return of the Warriors remake another classic. I have seen the discourse here, I know you guys aren't playing those. But this is still a top notch platformer of top notch pixel art made by masters of their craft. There has not been an arcade length game that really called me to replay for mastery as much as this one. It is a blast from start to finish. Plus the ninja gorl has nice thighs.
Cons: If you like your ninjas fast and agile and leaping and flipping everywhere, this game is not for you. They did a lot to make jumping a high commitment move and not an answer to combat. This game really cares about jumping and what it means in a way that very few have, but the way they treat it throws off a lot of people expecting something more conventional. I love it myself.
The makers of Pocky and Rocky Reshrined, Wild Guns Reloaded, and Ninja Saviors: Return of the Warriors remake another classic. I have seen the discourse here, I know you guys aren't playing those. But this is still a top notch platformer of top notch pixel art made by masters of their craft. There has not been an arcade length game that really called me to replay for mastery as much as this one. It is a blast from start to finish. Plus the ninja gorl has nice thighs.
Cons: If you like your ninjas fast and agile and leaping and flipping everywhere, this game is not for you. They did a lot to make jumping a high commitment move and not an answer to combat. This game really cares about jumping and what it means in a way that very few have, but the way they treat it throws off a lot of people expecting something more conventional. I love it myself.
Metal Slug Tactics
The quick answer is just to say this game is worthy of the Metal Slug name. What it really is is Into the Breach remixed as Metal Slug. A quick playing, elegant strategy game where health is small and fights are over quick. The core conceit is that the farther you move each turn, the more damage you can "dodge," as in you just tank and ignore it. But if you can attack something a teammate is attacking, you can join in for a follow-up attack. This tug of war dictates every single move you make in the game. Move far, but make sure far is still useful to your teammates. A relatively short run length, a lot of different team members with different perks, weapons, gimmicks, and five difficulties that meaningfully change enemy formations and abilities all give this a lot of replayability.
Cons: Fairly buggy in its current state. A couple maps I keep running into feel overtuned, but since it is a roguelite, I do not get do-overs to see if it was just me misplaying. I do almost as much move recalculating here as I do in Bakery, but here it takes a fraction of the time because the whole game is designed around testing your moves and undoing them to see how they look until you finally make an action and commit, which again, might not be for everyone.
The quick answer is just to say this game is worthy of the Metal Slug name. What it really is is Into the Breach remixed as Metal Slug. A quick playing, elegant strategy game where health is small and fights are over quick. The core conceit is that the farther you move each turn, the more damage you can "dodge," as in you just tank and ignore it. But if you can attack something a teammate is attacking, you can join in for a follow-up attack. This tug of war dictates every single move you make in the game. Move far, but make sure far is still useful to your teammates. A relatively short run length, a lot of different team members with different perks, weapons, gimmicks, and five difficulties that meaningfully change enemy formations and abilities all give this a lot of replayability.
Cons: Fairly buggy in its current state. A couple maps I keep running into feel overtuned, but since it is a roguelite, I do not get do-overs to see if it was just me misplaying. I do almost as much move recalculating here as I do in Bakery, but here it takes a fraction of the time because the whole game is designed around testing your moves and undoing them to see how they look until you finally make an action and commit, which again, might not be for everyone.
Card en Ciel
Inti Creates makes a roguelite card battler out of all their unused art assets and attaches it to an idol song album and also gaming's only lap pillow simulator. Lots of variety in card abilities and rarer than an SSR gacha pull is Inti Creates finally making a game with a rank system that does not ruin casual gameplay.
Cons: If you play other roguelite card games, the fact that the game predetermines your core deck gimmicks might feel unsatisfying, where the more traditional games of this genre have you cobbling together an answer to the game from whatever the game feels like offering.
Inti Creates makes a roguelite card battler out of all their unused art assets and attaches it to an idol song album and also gaming's only lap pillow simulator. Lots of variety in card abilities and rarer than an SSR gacha pull is Inti Creates finally making a game with a rank system that does not ruin casual gameplay.
Cons: If you play other roguelite card games, the fact that the game predetermines your core deck gimmicks might feel unsatisfying, where the more traditional games of this genre have you cobbling together an answer to the game from whatever the game feels like offering.
Bakeru
3D platformer set in Japan that LOVES Japan. From the guys who did Kirby's Epic Yarn and Yoshi's Woolly World comes a game as joyful and fun as any Kirby game ever was.
Cons: It is also as easy as any Kirby game ever was.
3D platformer set in Japan that LOVES Japan. From the guys who did Kirby's Epic Yarn and Yoshi's Woolly World comes a game as joyful and fun as any Kirby game ever was.
Cons: It is also as easy as any Kirby game ever was.
Virtua Unlimited Project
Iron Meat was a crazy Russkie making Contra. VUP is some crazy chinks making Mega Man Zero, and this is good for the same reasons Iron Meat was good: MMZ done right is almost always going to be one of the best platformers you ever play and VUP nails that, iterating on the MMZ formula in several clever ways.
Cons: Same as Iron Meat, it is still JUST MMZ. If you want spikes to instant kill you properly, you have to beat the game once and play on the unlockable difficulty.
Iron Meat was a crazy Russkie making Contra. VUP is some crazy chinks making Mega Man Zero, and this is good for the same reasons Iron Meat was good: MMZ done right is almost always going to be one of the best platformers you ever play and VUP nails that, iterating on the MMZ formula in several clever ways.
Cons: Same as Iron Meat, it is still JUST MMZ. If you want spikes to instant kill you properly, you have to beat the game once and play on the unlockable difficulty.
Just some other games of note that did not make the list: Granblue Versus Rising dropped this year but only faggots and homos play fighting games.
Metaphor Refantazio probably deserves a spot in the list. By all rights it looks like one of the most interesting and full-featured things Fatlus has done in decades, but JRPGfags can suck it. SMTfags are losers and will NEVER get GotY. Plus Fatlus works for a child groomer publisher who loves Denuvo so I'll probably never get around to trying it.
Antonblast is also coming soon and I am taking a big risk making this thread now but... I think I will simply put my e-cred on the line: I think it will be good. I do not think Antonblast will be GotY material like Pizza Tower was. I could be totally wrong, this is as risky as any political prediction, but I am going to make that bet.
Metaphor Refantazio probably deserves a spot in the list. By all rights it looks like one of the most interesting and full-featured things Fatlus has done in decades, but JRPGfags can suck it. SMTfags are losers and will NEVER get GotY. Plus Fatlus works for a child groomer publisher who loves Denuvo so I'll probably never get around to trying it.
Antonblast is also coming soon and I am taking a big risk making this thread now but... I think I will simply put my e-cred on the line: I think it will be good. I do not think Antonblast will be GotY material like Pizza Tower was. I could be totally wrong, this is as risky as any political prediction, but I am going to make that bet.
@DrRyanSkelton Metaphor is 100% about current year politics, the director even says its meant to be a "metaphor for real life"
ひげ
