joystiq-best-of-2013
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Joystiq Top 10 of 2013: Saints Row 4
Team Joystiq is barging into 2014 with a celebration of last year's best games. Keep reading throughout the week to see our assembly of ingenious indies and triple-A triumphs. Saints Row 4 is a deceptively smart, dumb game. The developers at Volition Inc. have successfully mated the tightest gameplay in the Saints Row series to date with its most over-the-top weapons (including flight, telekinesis and other superpowers), most drawn out, ridiculous celebrity cameos, and some of the finest funny video game writing ever scribbled down. Granted, the game has its fair share of lowbrow poop jokes (not to mention weaponized sex toys), but at the same time it's apparent that the writers at Volition are some very clever people. Saints Row 4 rarely relies on memes or easy humor, and the surprisingly deep level of satire underlying the experience is simultaneously welcome and totally unnecessary to your enjoyment of the game.
Joystiq Top 10 of 2013: The Stanley Parable
Team Joystiq is barging into 2014 with a celebration of last year's best games. Keep reading throughout the week to see our assembly of ingenious indies and triple-A triumphs. If you could bring yourself to describe and spoil them, it would be much easier to write about the marvelous moments that make The Stanley Parable such a special piece of entertainment. These moments, some of which commandeer the game and some of which seem insignificant as they pass you by, shape the outcome of Stanley's story. Whether you decide to go along with the narrator's dialog, following his every command to the letter, or completely ignore him and forge your own path, or just stand still, The Stanley Parable has something to say about your decision.
Best of the Rest: Susan's picks of 2013
Team Joystiq is barging into 2014 with a celebration of last year's best games. Keep reading throughout the week to see our assembly of ingenious indies and triple-A triumphs. Puppeteer Come one, come all, to hear the remarkable tale of Kutaro and the magical scissors, Calibrus! Come, see the evil Moon Bear King as he tries to cast the world into nonstop darkness! Come, see his 12 generals steal the power of the Moon Goddess! And see young Kutaro ... basically get mixed up in the whole thing by accident. Wrong place, wrong time, delicious-looking head. You know how it goes. Puppeteer commits to its puppet show aesthetic with gusto, crafting every character, object and bit of scenery out of paper, wood, string, or fabric. The narrator provides the exposition with the nuanced delivery of someone who's attended one too many acting classes, and the cast does their best to remember their lines while the audience murmurs in appreciation. The entire setup is bonkers, keeping its tongue placed firmly in its cheek as you cut down the Moon Stone-hoarding generals one by one and eventually square off against the rotund MBK himself. With sly writing, a spectacular soundtrack and gorgeously detailed locations that include neatly manicured gardens, a Halloweentown, a swamp and outer space, Puppeteer is a gaming experience to savor, rather than rush. Of course, it will take multiple run-throughs to find all of the collectible puppet heads, so you'll have more than enough opportunity to catch every joke and notice every secret. As a PS3 exclusive at the end of that console's cycle, Puppeteer didn't get nearly as much attention as it deserved, but this is a real gem. Hunt it down and play it. Your audience awaits.
Joystiq Top 10 of 2013: Fire Emblem: Awakening
Team Joystiq is barging into 2014 with a celebration of last year's best games. Keep reading throughout the week to see our assembly of ingenious indies and triple-A triumphs. The last time I fell so deeply in love with a strategy-RPG was with Shining Force on the Sega Genesis, so Fire Emblem: Awakening was one of this year's most pleasant surprises. It rekindled an addiction I'd long thought dead, and its deep mechanics kept me hooked through several playthroughs. Previously, the Fire Emblem games scared me away with their brutal permadeath mechanics; earlier series entries kill off major characters for good if they fall in battle, often leaving players with a gaping hole in their ranks if an enemy should land a lucky critical strike. Awakening allays these fears with its new "Casual" mode, which mercifully allows characters to retreat after being defeated, instead of croaking on the spot. Casual mode is a boon for fretful players (and obsessed micro-managers), and it allows both casual fans and hardcore veterans to customize their experience to a degree never before seen in the series. For instance, if you want to sample Fire Emblem's traditional high-stakes gameplay but don't want to risk losing several units during each battle, you may want to set the game's difficulty to Easy while opting out of Casual mode. During my second playthrough, I chose to play on "Hard Casual," a seemingly oxymoronic combination that provides a satisfying level of difficulty without the stomach-churning risk of permanent character loss. It proved to be an ideal solution for me, emphasizing everything I like about the genre while downplaying the elements I didn't especially enjoy.
