Game Under Podcast

 Phil Fogg’s Top Ten Games of the 2010’s

While putting together the Top Ten games of the 2010’s feature, my co-host Tom Towers and I had to balance varying factors in how we made our selection, such as impact, influence and innovation. It is therefore refreshing just to study the list of games I’ve completed over the last ten years and narrow them down to about 60 games, then 20, then 14 and now finally the Top Ten Games I remember the most fondly.

Special mentions (in order) to Titanfall 2, Mass Effect 2, Sonic and Sega All-Star Racing and Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. Of course all of the Yakuza games were not eligible for my personal list or the top 5 slots would be 1. Yakuza 6, 2. Yakuza Zero, 3. Yakuza Kiwami 1, 4. Yakuza 4 and 5. Yakuza: Dead Souls.

It should also be mentioned that many AAA games that I gave high scores to, and enjoyed while I played them, are not included in the list because when I play a AAA game I am never surprised. Yes, I enjoy them, yes, they are impeccably produced, but that’s all baked into my enjoyment of the game. Will I like Last of Us Chapter 2? Undoubtedly, but my expectation levels are already so high I cannot imagine that I will actually like the game, or that it will “stay with me” like all of the games on this top ten list do.

Most of these games we’ve talked about over the years on the Game Under Podcast, so links to the audio have been provided (and where shorter impressions were made excerpts are included below).

10. Until Dawn

Supermassive Games, 2015. Playstation 4, Playstation 3
This is the game that TellTale, the makers of The Walking Dead adventure games, would make if they had the technical chops and tenacity to focus all of their efforts on a single game.

Until Dawn is a branching narrative game in which the choices the player makes severely change the narrative. This has been done varying degrees with other games, but Until Dawn is the best realization of the concept so far.

The plot is ripped straight from the 1980’s teen horror film genre, and played at a perfect pitch. The game respects its characters lending them a credibility in an outrageously unrealistic setting. Playing the game, which alternates from third-person exploration to first-person dialog choices, is enjoyable providing all the suspense and anticipation of games like Silent Hill 2 or Resident Evil 4.

On top of that the presentation of the game is top notch. I’ve just convinced myself to play it again.

To listen to my impressions of the game from the time I played listen to Episode 96 (excerpt below) :

9. Fallout New Vegas

Obsidian, 2010. PC, Xbox 360, Playstation 3
Of all the games on this list, this is perhaps the sole guilty pleasure. Fallout New Vegas did nothing to add to the Bethesda Studio’s take on the WRPG, other than Obsidian Studios did what Bethesdidn’t — make a functional game with great story telling.

The fact that Obsidian was an outside studio enabled them to take the franchise slightly less seriously and as a result the game feels looser with many self-aware moments. It also helped that many of the original developers of the Fallout franchise, formerly from Interplay, were now working at Obsidian, which was based in the same Southern California city of Irvine.

It is is of no small importance that the game is set in the warm desert states of Arizona, California and Nevada enabling the player to enjoy an entirely different range of warm colours, as opposed to the green/gray hellscape of Fallout 3’s Washington D.C.

For me it is matched only by The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind for the best game in the Elderscrolls/Fallout franchise.

8. Beyond Two Souls

Quantic Dreams, 2013. Playstation 4, Playstation 3, PC
The second best thing David Cage could have done (after quitting after Indigo Prophecy/Farenheit) would have been to quit after making Beyond Two Souls. Indigo Prophecy was the genesis of what he was attempting with branching narratives, simulated haptic controls and exploitation of the female actors he worked with, and Beyond Two Souls was the apex, where he finally achieved the best outcome of the device he had built (and also violated his female lead’s trust at what must be the highest level since The Guy Game lured a 17 year old to reveal her breasts on a video without disclosing it was for public use).

Beyond that however, Beyond Two Souls features a plot that would not be out of place in a series like Stranger Things, but focuses on one girl’s struggle with her abilities, rather than Eleven. I was enraptured by the character and her travel through the United States where she struggled with need, loneliness and abandonment.

This is the best of David Cage’s work as while Detroit: Become Human is a smoother technical experience, it is an ensemble piece with a heavy-handed message (spoiler: racism is bad).

To hear my impressions of the game from the time listen to Episode 96 or listen to this excerpt from our conversation:

7. Tearaway

Media Molecule, 2013. Vita
I don’t hate anything in my life that is external to my being, but when I sit down and try to play a Media Molecule game, my level of disgust generally leads to me giving away the game, no, not just quitting the game, but removing the physical presence of the game from my home. In retrospect, I guess my issue is with the only game they are actually known for which is Little Big Planet, which to me is a Little Big PAIN IN THE ASS.

So when they deviated from Little Big Planet for the first time and made a game specifically designed to take advantage of everything the Sony Playstation Vita had to offer, I had little hope for enjoyment. Instead, amidst all its gimmicks, I found myself constantly smiling and surprised while I played. I felt that I was a part of the world on the screen. The game was, by notion of its reliance on the many sensors and features of the Playstation Vita, novel, new and most importantly unique.

So far as I am concerned it is the only essential game for the Playstation Vita.

To hear my impressions from the time listen to Episode 47 of the podcast or hear my excerpt below:

6. Spec Ops: The Line

Yager, 2012. Playstation 3, Xbox 360, PC, Linux, MacOS
This is a game, much like the one that preceded it (Driver: San Francisco) about subverting the expectations of the parties that bought it. People going into Driver did not expect what the game was going to deliver (see the next entry) and players expecting a AAA third person modern warfare depiction of war where to be delivered something else when they played Spec Ops: The Line.

When the game was released absolutely no-one expected anything from the developer Yager, who had not made a game after their debut nine years prior (the eponymous flight sim that received a lukewarm reception). Similarly Ubisoft had not done anything with the Spec Ops franchise for ten years, so the bar was set low. Low enough that it appears not many corporate overlords were paying that much attention. So little attention that quotes like this from the lead designer were not noticed “We invite the player to encounter some of the more horrific experiences that we hear from soldiers and the stories they tell as they come home from modern conflicts. These are not happy or heroic scenarios, but we feel they are important because they cause us to question ourselves…” Not the usual PR you’d expect from a Oorah shooter.

The game plays with expectations, which is why it is on the list, but it’s also an enjoyable shooter with impressive physics for the time. It’s a game worthy of at least two playthroughs and absolutely essential for any videogame enthusiast. For the story behind the story read Walt Willams’ book Significant Zero.

To hear my impressions of the game from the time I played it, we did a whole episode on it, you may listen to Episode 1 here. Spec Ops talk starts at 1 hour 17 minutes into the show.

5. Driver: San Francisco

Ubisoft, 2011. Playstation 3, Wii, Xbox 360, PC, MacOS,
Driver was a very predictable franchise on life support when Driver: San Francisco was released. It started out as a novel, mission based driving game on the original Playstation and was eclipsed by Grand Theft Auto II in the PS2 generation, turning the concept of Driver into a mere mode in a game rather than a stand-alone concept supporting an entire game.

With the final entry of Driver, Ubisoft delivered a game that was creative, well executed, fun, goofy and perfect. Most would never have tried Driver: San Francisco, given the assumption that it was a generic mission-based driving game. However the game included, by way of the main character entering a coma, a “shift” mechanic which enables you to leave your vehicle, where the game camera takes on a birds-eye view, then select any other vehicle in view and take control of that. The possibilities are endless, if your competitor in a race has a faster car, then you can take over an oncoming tow-truck and plow it into them, and then jump back into your car. If you are cornering and mess up, you can leave your car and take over a car that did make the corner.

The story is great, with you playing as a police officer in a coma who learns he can take over the bodies of anyone who is driving a vehicle. All through the game you trying to convince your partner that while you may appear to be a woman, or a other ethnicity, that you are who you say you are. Layered on top of that you get to see the reactions of passengers who slowly realize that the friend who was driving a few minutes ago now is acting strangely.

On top of this, it’s an ejoyable arcade racer, and I’ve just convinced myself to play yet another game on my list.

To hear my impressions of the game, along with those of Tom Towers please listen to Episode 74 (starting at 1:40:35)

4. Saint’s Row: The Third

Volition, 2011. Playstation 3, Xbox 360, PC, Linux, Nintendo Switch
The only GTA game you’ll ever need to play. A timesaver in that regard. The original Saint’s Row was bare-boned, but it beat Rockstar to the punch it the Xbox 360/ PS3 era, so it was a good enough substitute. What it lacked in polish and nuance it made up for with HD and physics. Saint’s Row 2, was actually a fully formed game and thoroughly enjoyable in every aspect, where characters developed and Volition started to demonstrate a degree of confidence by inserting humour more readily into that game. Saint’s Row: The Third is the ultimate third-person open world game, which is still to be surpassed. It absolutely nails every required aspect and on top of that delivers comedy like only a handful of games have managed over the entire history of gaming.

To hear what we had to say about it closer to the time of release Listen to Episode 27 of the podcast starting at 1:40:07

3. Jazzpunk

Necrophone Games, 2014. PC, Playstation 4, Linux, MacOS
Jazzpunk is a first person adventure game that takes itself seriously while being a game that gives itself over and is satisfied in being a comedy game. I loved it at first sight, the humour, the visuals, the audio, everything about it. Jazzpunk has the sensibility of games made in the era of the Commodore 64 with it’s simple, colourful graphics, stripped-down inputs and willingness to insert humour.

Read this review by Alex Navarro, because if I write anything about this game it is going to come off as plagiarism, as on this one game alone we have the exact same experience.

2. Deadly Premonition

Access Games, 2010. Playstation 3, Xbox 360, PC, Nintendo Switch
This is an open world game made in Japan and led in design by Hidetaka “SWERY” Suehiro, and in that regard alone it is an interesting game. There are genres that the Japanese just don’t touch, and open world is one of them. While Japan’s outward appearance in many aspects has been strongly influenced by the west since the end of the second world war, it is important to note that Japan has been developing its own very distinct culture for about 30 thousand years, and this can surface in strange and unexpected ways.

Like the Houser Bros. with Grand Theft Auto, in making an open world game SWERY had to deal with the technological limitations of the day—how he and his team chose to spend the technical credits available to them is a study in cultural anthropology. Examples from the west spend those credit on the horizontal—how wide a space can be, but Access Game focused on how deep the details of a game can be.

The depth of detail in each character, their mannerisms, accent, dialogue, relationships with other characters is as deep as any game since produced and layers of complexity above most films. Can you pick flowers in the game? Of course. Can you run out of petrol? Why wouldn’t you? Can a single non playable character (NPC) have an absolutely unique and fleshed out relationship with every single other character in the game, well of course.

Compare this to an open-world game like GTA III and its sequels where NPC’s are repeated like a wallpaper pattern, and no matter how many old women in a blue dress carrying a shopping bag you run over, they are all identical and will never have a relationship with any other character.

On top of the level of detail demonstrated by Deadly Premonition, it has a legitimately good whodunit plot with supernatural elements and sincerely creepy moments.

If you have not played Deadly Premonition, it’s time to put some F.K. in the coffee, especially now it’s available on Switch and ahead of the release of its sequel.

Tom gives his impressions in Episode 8 (1:55:47) of the game when it was released on PC.

1. Papers, Please

Lucas Pope, 2013. PC, Mac, Linux, iOS, Playstation Vita
Papers, Please puts you in the role of a border agent who must confirm passport and visa details of citizens seeking entry into your country. Your job is to make sure that noone fraudulently enters your country. You are the sole arbitor, but you are monitored, and mistakes are noted closely. The stress of performing your job correctly carries most of the game, but then at a certain point subverting your stated goals becomes a morally and emotionally more stressful challenge. Perhaps at first you will enjoy the power of denying an challenge to your authority, but as the plot plays out, and the task of verifying documents increases, balancing your job performance against your moral judgments starts to seem overwhelming.

The simple rubber stamping job, quickly becomes a stress test that intensifies until the game’s conclusion.

Papers, Please is masterpiece and the best game of the 2010’s.