It doesn't take much for me to like a game. It only needs to do one thing: make me grin. I can't explain clearly why that makes certain games stand out over others but when I'm grinning I know I'll be playing that game to the finish at least twice.
Hitman made me grin. Released on the 11th of March 2016. It was released episodically throughout 2016 from March to December.
I've been playing Hitman since Hitman 2 on Xbox (one of my first games for the console) and with every subsequent instalment in the series, my love for it and its bald pro... an... tagonist(?) has grown. It helped that with every new game the A.I. (artificial intelligence) improved to a degree that didn't send my controller into a wall because that bastarding guard saw through my bastarding flower delivery guy disguise because I stood still for too bastarding long. (Ahem)
The initial release of 2016s Hitman didn't offer a great amount of content, but for me, it was enough to make me grin. It felt good to be plopped into a massive (by previous Hitman standards) level and pretty much left to figure out how to take out your selected targets. Being able to play the level any way you chose was the Hitman game I had been waiting for since Blood Money. (Absolution would have been perfect if not for the levels that were clearly NOT Hitman levels. I'm looking at you "escape from the cops and jump on a train" pfft).
Every aspect of the series that should have been expanded on such as being able to creatively take down your targets while also remaining undetected, to the A.I. to the scale of the levels was vastly improved for this instalment. Introducing "Level Mastery", a system that rewards you for replaying a level repeatedly to unlock new weapons, starting locations and gadgets to help reach your targets. It gives you opportunities to explore every inch of a level to find a perfect vantage point or a discarded disguise. On paper, this sounds monotonous, boring. But there's enough content to each level that you'll discover something new with each play through.
Then there are the Escalation missions. These give you new targets to hunt but after each successful mission, it will add a new objective or handicap. These are great in making you think of the layout of a level in a completely different way. Every assassination is a puzzle and Hitman rewards those who think outside the box and, most of all, have fun trying to figure it out.
The one section of this game I feel I have very little time for is the player created levels known as Contracts. These involve players marking their own targets within a level, assassinating them then challenging everyone to do it better. This was a feature introduced in Absolution and while fun, it can be a bit of a mixed bag in terms of finding a quality mission. I'm sure there's fun to be had here but it really isn't my thing.
For an episodic game to hold my attention and keep me occupied until the next was released is impressive. Even more impressive to me is that for all but two of those months (June and November) there was content released that added 2-6+ hours (depending on your determination to discover every corner and opportunity a level has to offer) of gameplay each. Of recent memory, it's one of three games I've sunk masses of my time into, The Binding of Issac being one and my next pick for game of the year being the other.
Final Fantasy XV made me grin. Released on the 29th of November 2016.
Like a lot of my friends, my first foray into Final Fantasy was with VII (7) which was released almost 20 years ago to the day of this post (31st January 1997). Oh, I just made myself feel old. One of the things I love about the series as a whole is it can have you save a near future world from a giant meteor while another can be pitting you against an insane jester determined to gain the powers of a god. You know, normal everyday stuff. But almost every time it's distinctly Final Fantasy. (Barring a few exceptions *cough* Lightning Returns to name one *coughcough*)
My first hour of Final Fantasy had me grinning from ear to ear nonstop. Everything from the "Stand by Me" cover by Florence and the Machine to the car radio playing music from the previous games in the series. Everything was just so nostalgic and charming. Having not read or seen anything about the game before it was released (except for the demos) pretty much everything was another point of joy on my bro trip. After a certain amount of exploration, I remember excitedly shouting "DUNGEONS" to an empty room. Soon followed by "NOPE" after entering said dungeon at level 14. Pro tip: don't do that.
At the opening of the game, a message reads "A Final Fantasy for fans and first-timers". As a fan, this filled me with a certain amount of doubt. What have they dumbed down for first-timers I wondered. Will I have to prove I'm a fan by benching 20 Iron Giants? (I'm sure that's how weights and being a fan of the series works) It turns out that message is referring to the two-button combat system. It's simple and effective. It doesn't bog you down with menus and options but at the same time feels satisfyingly substantial if your fighting one of the more challenging hunts later in the game, quickly being able to switch between weapons and magic at the touch of a button.
The game is split up into chapters, supplying you with the main (make the story go) quests and most of them with oh so many side (hey, go here and do a thing) missions, hunts and other fun distractions. These extracurricular activities will take up the majority of your playtime, my own coming in at 60hrs 5mins for the first completion. That time didn't even factor in all the side stuff I missed. I moved straight on to New Game+ so I would have new stuff to see on my second play through. That made me grin, the fact that I was willing to go into a second playthrough of at least a 60-hour game without even thinking about it.
There is one note of criticism, however. Chapter 13. I get it. The whole game can't be rolling hills and bro-fives all the way to the Chocobo Races. Tonally it's quite appropriate for what's happening in the game at the time. But that doesn't mean that you have to be as miserable as Noctis is while playing as him right? It takes the "Not Alone" section of Final Fantasy 9 and combines it with the never-ending corridor that is Final Fantasy 13 (wait, Chapter 13, long corridors, Hajime Tabata you magnificent bastard) and makes that what feels like 2 hours of your life (might only be about 45 minutes).
After the most recent instalments to Final Fantasy I was sceptical that this would be the one that would recapture the feeling I got from playing 6 through to 9.(Wait, 6+9 IS 15. Hajime Tabata you magnificent bastard) There's still more content to come with the season pass but the game as it is (including a massive patch that added more story content and fixed Chapter 13) is more than I ever expected from a modern Final Fantasy.
When I started writing this post I was fairly sure I knew what game I was going to pick as my game of the year. In writing this, however, I've convinced myself that the negatives of my other choice aren't negatives at all. Why should I punish a whole game for one section that I thought wasn't for me? As a whole, Final Fantasy 15 made me laugh, maybe even shed a tear. One, solitary man tear of respect for a job well done. Not the other kind. Hitman provided a game that I could drop in and out of and have fun with every time for the duration of half the year.
Ultimately my game of 2016 is Final Fantasy XV!
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