To anyone out there who play video games for the purposes of reviewing, my hat is off to you.  Hell, I review movies which usually take less than three hours to consume, and I can barely manage that!  That’s why this isn’t some arbitrary ranking of the best or worst of the year as I didn’t play enough games for this to be comprehensive, and most of the games I played this year I didn’t even finish!  I’ve got stuff to do like the aforementioned movie review!! These are just some of the games that I either bought or first played in earnest in 2016, both good and bad, which means plenty of these weren’t even games that came out that year.  Hey, what do you want?  These things are expensive and I can’t afford to buy them when the first come out!!  Also, almost all of my gaming this year has been on the PC; not because it’s the best, but because it is the most convenient as I spend most of my time on one of those anyway.  I’ll not when a game is NOT something I played on the PC, but those are definitely going to be the minority on this list.  Alright, let’s get started!  I can feel your excitement already!!

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Adventure Time: Hey Ice King! Why’d You Steal Our Garbage?!! (3DS)

Developed by WayForward Technologies

I wouldn’t say this is a GREAT game, but WayForward managed to drill down into what makes Adventure Time so much fun (spoiler alter: it’s the adventure) and crafted a game around that core conceit.  Unfortunately, probably due to this being a license game, it feels a bit rushed out the door as the game relies on backtracking and slow over world traversal in order to draw out the game time, and the mechanics never really grow beyond the first hour or so.  If WayFowrad were given the chance to put as much development time and effort into an Adventure Time as they do with their Shante series, they might have an all-time classic in the making rather than just having one of the better (if not the best) games based on this series.  Then again, maybe they DID have all the resources they needed and STILL managed to do just an okay job with it.

Continue reading “Jumping the Soapbox: Games of 2016 (Part 1)” →