2014 was a year. There were games. Not many of them were great but that doesn’t make 2014 a bad year for games, just a hard one to pick a list of top games. So many titles were in the running for this top 10 and games like Destiny, Wolfenstein, Divintiy: Original Sin, and a handful of others were right there on the cusp of making it in. But the ten games listed below impressed us just a bit more. Here are our top 10 games of 2014.
10. Far Cry 4
Fozzy fought hard for this game. OK maybe not too hard but everyone but Don was kind of meh on letting Destiny on the list Fozzy slipped this one by us. Why is it here? I don’t know, you’d have to ask him. I think it had something to do with a honey badger.
9. Forza Horizon 2
The original Forza Horizon was a great game so its no surprise that its sequel was also a great game. What was a surprise was how good it was and how much of a showcase it was for racing games on the new generation of consoles. But its biggest success was being hands down the better game in every way against Sony’s big social racing game, Driveclub. Forza Horizon handles better, it has more content, has better social features, and ultimately is just more fun than its competitor. And that fun factor is why it is here on this list. Nothing quite beats driving your Lancer square into the side of a good friend during a round of infection and then speeding off laughing slightly maniacally.
8. Super Smash Bros. For 3Ds/WiiU
Smash smash, bash bash. It has nearly every character from a Ninetendo game you’d ever want to play as (except the Ice Climbers). It has levels and music that dig deep into the Nintendo history books. And it looks like you are playing a well done Nintendo cartoon. Judging by Jeff’s pants, it is a Nintendo fan’s wet dream. You can’t really ask for much more than that.
7. South Park: The Stick of Truth
South Park: The Stick of Truth is, ultimately, one of the best, if not the best, licensed game to be developed. Stick of Truth perfectly mirrors the TV show with a witty and fun adventure that is like an interactive series of episodes. The gameplay was as entertaining as the plot, using the more involved controls of Super Mario RPG as opposed to regular RPG battle controls. But the highlight is the ingenious story about the boys from South Park, and the absurd amount of references to the TV show. Any fan of the series should play this without a doubt.
6. Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor
Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor came out of nowhere to stab us in the back and chop off our head. The combination of an Assassin’s Creed-style stealth system with Batman: Arkham Asylum-esque combat was compelling enough. Yet the thing that drew us all into this game was the Nemesis system. The notion of rivalry with enemies, the return of that one annoying dude with the ax who always seemed to appear at the most inopportune times, and the internal conflicts among the Orc captains all gave the feel of a living, breathing enemy force. This game was the first I played that was truly next-Gen.
5. Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare
Call of Duty was great. This sentence is one I didn’t expect to be typing in 2014, not after the game’s recent utterly mediocre showings. This was a series on the downtrend. But Advanced Warfare rolled back the tide, with an interesting and fun campaign (having Kevin Spacey helped quite a bit there), a robust co-op mode which several members of our staff spent weeks and week in, and a multiplayer suite that reached back and rediscovered what was fun about leveling up. The random drops added a bit of surprise to the system, which is fitting, as this game’s extraordinarily high quality took us by surprise as well.
4. Mario Kart 8
Where Smash Bros. is a Nintendo fan’s wet dream. Mario Kart 8 is a Mario fan’s wet dream. It is the best looking and best playing Mario Kart to date. The levels are amazing, the racers look fantastic, and nothing is sweeter than hitting Jeff with a red shell seconds before he rolls across the finish line to steal the victory from him. Well maybe laughing maniacally into the crappy WiiU gamepad mic after the match is sweeter, but not by much.
3. Diablo III: Reaper of Souls
Much like it’s core game, the Reaper of Souls expansion for Diablo III is a very consuming experience. Blizzard is known for bringing the loot whore out in all of us, and this is no different. Even for someone who has played a few dozen hours of Diablo III, Reaper of Souls has the ability to captivate and engross players with a new character, a new chapter, and more importantly, Adventure Mode. And of course, having the ability to enjoy all of that with a local friend on your couch is even better, because while Diablo III: Reaper of Souls is great on PC, it is in a class of it’s own on consoles.
2. Dragon Age: Inquisition
Dragon Age: Inquisition provided AAA gamers one thing that had been missing all year- an expansive and beautiful open-world RPG. While I can’t help but admit the systems seem to be a bit simplified (I think I used the tactical map at the beginning of the game and then never touched it again), the game does an excellent job of providing a world that is worth exploring. There is so much to do, and, unlike a lot of other open world games (cough… Watch Dogs… cough), it is all well considered and fun to do. The storyline does an excellent job of working back in characters from previous games, and, while the narrative is weakened a bit by the nature of the game (the urgency of closing the breach seems lessened when the only person capable of doing so is searching the wilderness for blood lotuses), it does provide a compelling backdrop against which the RPG is played. I loved my time in Ferelden and can’t wait to go back.
1. Titanfall
When my friends ask which console they should buy, I always says, “Xbox One, so we can play Titanfall.” When people come over to my house, Titanfall is the game I show them. Inevitably, the controller makes its way around room, passed from player to player, as everyone wants in on the action. The shooter is addicting, with a wonderful unlock system, a wide variety of maps, fast yet controlled gameplay, and, of course, the giant, fully-weaponized, badass mechs. Respawn has done an excellent job supporting the game as well, even going so far as to add, for free, an excellent wave-based co-op mode six months after launch. Titanfall was fantastic, the one game this year that I played obsessively, and is incredibly deserving of Critically Sane’s Game of the Year.
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