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GAF Games of the Year 2015 - Voting Thread [LAST DAY FOR VOTING]

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spekkeh

Banned
Glad to see Splatoon get some love in the last few pages. To see GAF ignore innovation for safe blockbuster iteration is kind of depressing. You'd think more people would've gotten a Wii U after last years 1-2-3, but it was probably just a blip.
 
1. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt ; The combination of solid open-world combat, unparalleled world design, and writing of a quality that has never been seen in a game of this magnitude much less any game combine to create what may dethrone Morrowind as my favorite game of all time.

2. Ori and the Blind Forest ; Without a doubt the most visually stunning game of the year, and almost certainly the best-looking 2D game in history. Fortunately it's every bit as much of a joy to play as it is to look at. It's a game that gives you endlessly compelling powers and wonderfully precise control and challenges you to take on what it can dish out.

3. Life is Strange ; An ultimately underdeveloped ending does not stop this game from accomplishing great things. It takes the formula Telltale has used to such great mainstream success, and goes somewhere worth visiting for a while.

4. Rise of the Tomb Raider ; This game was frequently jaw-dropping on XB1 which for all my anticipation was not something I was expecting. The fleshed-out areas to explore, raid, and hunt really made the reboot installment look like a warmup for Crystal Dynamics. On top of that, the plot was excellent and supported by some genuinely exceptional sidestories tied to collectibles that made exploring every tomb and valley worthwhile.

5. Halo 5: Guardians ; Probably my longest-running love affair with games is with this franchise, and I could not be happier that I'm playing the best game in the series in 2016. 343 found their voice with Halo 5 crafting a confident campaign with superb level design and a setup of the most interesting plotline in the franchise so far while introducing a cast of awesome new characters. This is all tied together by the biggest step up for the franchise's core gameplay in series history. I can't go back to the old games now. It just doesn't feel right, and multiplayer support is going to keep me playing until Halo 6 is in my hands.

6. Rocket League ; It's a damn fine video game. I loved playing shitty soccer with friends on Excitebike 64, and Rocket League fleshes that idea out beautifully. Just a good old fun game to go with all these entertainment media powerhouses.

7. Dying Light ; Ever since Modern Warfare 2 when I would haul ass around the map knifing people with the Commando perk I've loved parkour and enhanced movement in games. Dying Light does this so well while building on the things I loved about Dead Island. The story is laugh out loud stupid at times, but in an entertaining way and it's the gameplay you're here for which delivers in spades.

8. Smite ; I really couldn't get into any MOBA's on PC, but I started messing with Smite on XB1 over the Summer. Soon enough, my friends and I were having nightly sessions. It has its issues to be sure, but it is damn fun nonetheless. I love the layer of accessibility the use of gods familiar to most people adds to what is otherwise a daunting genre even for the initiated. Despite some technical issues, it is clearly a game that is receiving a lot of love from its developer and the community of fans. I'm hoping to dabble a bit more when Halo 5 isn't consuming my competitive multiplayer time.

9. Bloodborne ; It's a little bit different than Souls fans are accustomed to, and unfortunately a lot of the changes I found to be less than impressive. Fact is, these games are often more compelling than most other games at their lower points. The narrowing of focus to one combat style as well as some real shortcomings in the visual design department made From Software's latest effort not quite as memorable. It didn't live up to my expectations, but it turns out that still leaves it in good company on this list.

10. Metal Gear Solid V ; The Phantom Pain[/B]; It's a shocking game that does some amazing things with its gameplay and mechanics. Unfortunately, it was extremely disappointing as the last real hurrah for the series. Level design, game structure, storytelling, and other problems work against it. Regardless, the achievements in gameplay design cannot be ignored.
 

Oddduck

Member
1. Life is Strange ; My favorite game of 2015. The story is Degrassi meets Twin Peaks meets Twilight Zone.
2. Rocket League ; One of the most addicting games of the year.
3. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt ; Excellent open world gameplay.
4. Bloodborne ; Gaming perfection
5. Splatoon ; An excellent multiplayer shooter from Nintendo.
 

Phinor

Member
1. DiRT Rally ; To understand how important game release this is for a niche genre, you have to be pretty deep into sim racing. The previous game anyone sane would call a great rally game was released in 2004, over 11 years ago. That's a pretty long time for any popular genre to exist without a good new game, wouldn't you say? What's almost as remarkable is how they released the game. No fanfare, no hype, no pre-order crap. Codemasters simply announced and released the game in early access at the same time with an exact schedule for new content every month and they stuck to that schedule precisely. We've had the full game for about a month now and all I want is more, more and more! Milk me, take my money and create us even more new special stages! Hopefully the game sells well and changes Codemasters for the better. They clearly still have the talent we got used to years and years ago. It was a great year for games and these past few years have been plentiful for sim racers but there is no doubt in my mind that DiRT Rally is my favourite game of 2015.
2. Cities: Skylines
3. Tales From The Borderlands
4. Super Mario Maker
5. Life Is Strange
6. Bloodborne
7. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
8. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt
9. Fallout 4
10. Project CARS
 

Mr Rivuz

Member
1. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt ; This is the game i've always dreamed of. A third person action rpg set in a huge beautiful world to explore, filled with an incredible amount of interesting characters to meet and stories to live. In other games of this kind like the Elder Scrolls series everything felt fake and dull to me, so i've never really gotten into them, but with this game i was totally absorbed by it. I just couldn't play anything else until i got to the ending, after 150 hours. Best game of this year, and one of the best games ever for me.
2. Yakuza 5 ; Waited for this game to be translated in english for 3 years, and it was worth it. A trip through japan with the characters i learned to love through the previous games, with an incredible amount of sidequests and activities.
3. Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate ;
4. Batman Arkham Knight ;
5. Xenoblade Chronicles X ;
6. Yoshi's Woolly World ;
7. Super Mario Maker ;
8. Bloodborne ;
9. Shin Megami Tensei Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker ;
10. Splatoon ;
 

Shotterke

Member
1. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt ; Best RPG I’ve played in years. Combat wasn’t anything special but everything else was just amazing. Great main story, amazing side quests, a beautiful world full of stuff that you can discover, interesting characters, ... The list just goes on.
2. Yoshi's Woolly World ; I played this with my girlfriend in co-op and we had a blast.
3. Splatoon ; Most innovative game of the year.
4. Rocket League ; I never heard about this game until I was at a lanparty and we bought it with 8 people. We spent the next 10 days playing it against each other while screaming and yelling against each other in the tent. It's just so much fun.
5. Tales from the Borderlands: Episodes 2-5 ; I’m a big Borderlands fan so playing a game in the Borderlands universe that’s not a shooter was refreshing. The characters were awesome and I loved the story.
6. Life Is Strange ; Loved everything about this but was a bit disappointed by the ending.
7. Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft ; The game that I play when I don’t have a lot of time.
8. Until Dawn ; Never heard anything about the game but decided to buy it after the good reviews and I ended up really liking it. The facial expressions were weird though.
9. Contradiction - Spot The Liar! ; The FMV stuff was really refreshing and the story was pretty interesting. The ending was bad though and way to predictable.
10. Guitar Hero Live ; I never really played the other GH or RB games before because of the amount of DLC that was available but with the “2 channels”-feature I decided to buy this and really enjoyed it.
 

Hasney

Member
Glad to see Splatoon get some love in the last few pages. To see GAF ignore innovation for safe blockbuster iteration is kind of depressing. You'd think more people would've gotten a Wii U after last years 1-2-3, but it was probably just a blip.

It scraped in on mine. I hate using the gamepad as a controller though so it docked points from me. I understand why it's part of the design, but if I could use the Pro Controller, I think I would have played it a lot more.
 

Arthea

Member
The first two are easy to guess but the next 8 are harder.
Splatoon has a shot to be in the Top 5.

If I was to guess top 10 by following this thread, not going to count or anything, it'll probably will be The Witcher III, Bloodborne, Life is Strange, MGS 5, Splatoon, Rocket League, Undertale, these are almost sure will end up in top 10, other 3 are somewhat harder, probably Xenoblade Chronicles, Super Mario Maker and Ori?
 

d3vnull

Member
When will the list be up? Looking forward to the most important game of the year award on the internet. :p
And kudos to the people counting all those posts.
 

SomTervo

Member
So am I. We really had some exceptionally great games last year. I haven't followed this thread for a few days, but I find myself thinking about it almost daily. At some point it seemed that Bloodborne would take the cake, so it really will be interesting to see the final results. I'm also hoping a good ranking for Life is Strange and I think it will get one.

It's funny – for me, genuinely, GotY 2015 was a #1 tie between The Witcher 3, Bloodborne, MGSV and Dying Light. Seriously. I would be 100% happy with any of those games getting the #1 slot.

It was an unbelievable year for me. I literally can't think of another year where I would happily have several GotYs in tied first place. The early '00s were pretty amazing, but games nowadays are just in a different league (as playable experiences obviously - creatively the early '00s were phenom, too).

I too think W3 will win, but the gap is very very small.

Agreed. It's going to be so close.

Nah, I't going to be Bloodborne. TW3 will be robbed.

That's the thing - no matter what wins, no game will be 'robbed'. They're all so amazing they all deserve the #1 spot. In previous years I've always known which game (or two) stood head and shoulders above the crowd, but 2015 there were so many of those.

When will the list be up? Looking forward to the most important game of the year award on the internet. :p
And kudos to the people counting all those posts.

They say it took a few hours to generate the winner last year, and the voting closes at the end of the 23rd (Saturday night).

So we'll probably know by Sunday morning.

1. DiRT Rally To understand how important game release this is for a niche genre, you have to be pretty deep into sim racing. The previous game anyone sane would call a great rally game was released in 2004, over 11 years ago. That's a pretty long time for any popular genre to exist without a good new game, wouldn't you say? What's almost as remarkable is how they released the game. No fanfare, no hype, no pre-order crap. Codemasters simply announced and released the game in early access at the same time with an exact schedule for new content every month and they stuck to that schedule precisely. We've had the full game for about a month now and all I want is more, more and more! Milk me, take my money and create us even more new special stages! Hopefully the game sells well and changes Codemasters for the better. They clearly still have the talent we got used to years and years ago. It was a great year for games and these past few years have been plentiful for sim racers but there is no doubt in my mind that DiRT Rally is my favourite game of 2015.

This is really refreshing - you've all but convinced me to get the game. I loved the earlier DiRT games. How much is it?
 
Hardly played any 2015 games...

1. Cities: Skylines ; A worthy successor to the crown that Sim City owned and then lost in a pile of mud.
2. Grim Fandango ; Still great, the remaster adds some nice effects and the developer commentary is awesome!
3. Super Time Force Ultra ; Great game that keeps you hooked and opens loads of different strategies to the player.
4. The Talos Principle ; Interesting puzzle game
5. Grand Ages: Medieval ; Fine strategy game that allows you to conquer the entire known world!
6. Rocket League ; Fun romp all round
7. Tropico 5 ; Fun strategy game with a decent PS4 adaptation.
8. Geometry Wars 3: Dimension s; Great Vita game borne to be on the handheld!
9. Posting Simulator 2016 ; One of the few highlights of NeoGAF this last year. GAF gold is not what it once was.
10. Bloodborne ; Only played a grand total of 60 minutes so far, more to come.
 

EloKa

Member
1. Bloodborne ; the game which fascinated me the most
2. Rocket League ; the game I usually pick up for short multiplay sessions
3. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain ; the gameplay and open world style still compensate the story
4. Evoland II ; really nice niche RPG with gaming history
5. Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster ; I've enjoyed the remaster a lot and spend at least 100 hours on both games
6. Prison Architect ; really good tycoon styled game. I'm still interested in all upcoming updates
7. Posting Simulator 2016 ; it's a neverending story with a new unexpected episode each day
8 .Grand Theft Auto V ; well ... it's GTA
9. No Time To Explain ; awesome games to play with some friends online. Very fun concept
10. Gemcraft: Chasing Shadows ; good PC version of the flash games

Edit: added numbers, ty ekim
 

ekim

Member
Bloodborne ; the game which fascinated me the most
Rocket League ; the game I usually pick up for short multiplay sessions
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain ; the gameplay and open world style still compensate the story
Evoland II ; really nice niche RPG with gaming history
Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Remaster ; I've enjoyed the remaster a lot and spend at least 100 hours on both games
Prison Architect ; really good tycoon styled game. I'm still interested in all upcoming updates
Posting Simulator 2016 ; it's a neverending story with a new unexpected episode each day
Grand Theft Auto V ; well ... it's GTA
No Time To Explain ; awesome games to play with some friends online. Very fun concept
Gemcraft: Chasing Shadows ; good PC version of the flash games


From the OP:
You may list up to 10 games for your ballot. The games must be numbered, and consecutively listed in numerical order from 1 to 10.

btw: did someone already count what we got so far?
 

generic_username

I switched to an alt account to ditch my embarrassing tag so I could be an embarrassing Naughty Dog fanboy in peace. Ask me anything!
Man seeing these lists reiterates what an absolutely fantastic year this has been for games. We have atleast three contenders that are surely to keep coming up in the potential GOAT list thread we will eventually have at GAF. To think 2016 has the potential to be even better is blowing my mind.
 

Shahed

Member
Glad to see Splatoon get some love in the last few pages. To see GAF ignore innovation for safe blockbuster iteration is kind of depressing. You'd think more people would've gotten a Wii U after last years 1-2-3, but it was probably just a blip.
Everyone has different tastes. In my case a Wii U is for the likes of Zelda, Xenoblade and other campaign or single player focused games. Splatoon while new and a different take on shooters, is still a multiplayer shooter in the end.
 

ElTorro

I wanted to dominate the living room. Then I took an ESRAM in the knee.
1. Bloodborne ; It shall not be robbed.
2. Metal Gear Solid V ; Played in the toilet.
3. Grand Theft Auto V ; Still one of the best open worlds in gaming.
4. Until Dawn ; I love love these kinds of games, and this one here managed to create one of the most convincing senses of meaningful decision making yet.
5. Life Is Strange ; Beautiful production and music. Good story telling, albeit a bit slow and corny at times.
6. Destiny: The Taken King ; This is how Destiny should have been at released. Had a blast playing the raid with friends.
7. Star Wars: Battlefront ; Amazing visuals and audio. Sadly, it got boring rather quickly. Still a great Star Wars game.
8. SOMA ; Great story that would have been perfect with better voice acting.
9. Game of Thrones ; Telltale managed to recreate the feeling of the show very well.
10. Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 ; Competent entry in the series.

Haven't yet played The Witcher 3, Arkham Knight, Halo 5, Super Mario Maker, and some others. I am sure they would have made the list otherwise.
 

Alo0oy

Banned
Before the voting ends, is my list properly formatted?

1) Bloodborne; I spend the most amount of hours on this game, followed closely by Metal Gear, it was a hard choice, but The Old Hunters made the choice easier, I spent more hours on that DLC alone than I have any other game not named Bloodborne or Metal Gear.
2) Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain; Story sucks, but this game is the best playing shooter ever so it deserves some recognition.
3) Until Dawn;
4) Dark Souls 2: Scholar of the First Sin;
5) Rocket League;
6) Marvel Future Fight;
7) Call of Duty: Black Ops 3
 

Alo0oy

Banned
no, it is not...
seriously that's so baffling, it's not like you have to read 100 page manual or something

I'd appreciate it if you could tell me what needs fixing, I did read the instructions in the OP and I just wanted to make sure everything is properly formatted.
 

SomTervo

Member
Just read the OP and I really can't see what is still wrong.

I'd appreciate it if you could tell me what needs fixing, I did read the instructions in the OP and I just wanted to make sure everything is properly formatted.

I think you need a space between the game name and the semicolon?

Also I'm not sure if numbers can be like 1), 2). I think they need to have periods, like 1., 2.. Just copy the template from the OP and copy/paste in like that, easiest way.
 

Shahed

Member
Just copy and paste the example template in the OP. Then highlight over the names and comments and replace with your own. That's what I've always done and never had a problem.
 

Arthea

Member
I'd appreciate it if you could tell me what needs fixing, I did read the instructions in the OP and I just wanted to make sure everything is properly formatted.

Considering the parser reads votes with Steins;Gate as Steins I don't think the space is needed.

it clearly states in the OP that format has to be as it is in an example, meaning there has to be spaces separating semicolon from the text on both sides

correct format

1. Game A ; Your thoughts on Game.
 

Alo0oy

Banned
it clearly states in the OP that format has to be as it is in an example, meaning there has to be spaces separating semicolon from the text on both sides

correct format

1. Game A ; Your thoughts on Game.

That was an example, the space isn't necessary, there's no need to be rude about it, especially when you're wrong.
 

SomTervo

Member
Considering the parser reads votes with Steins;Gate as Steins I don't think the space is needed.

As Arthea said, I'm not referring to that, what I mean is:

This would be right > 1) Steins;Gate ; comment

This would be wrong > 1) Steins;Gate; comment
Hopefully the parser doesn't see that as a second vote and discount me...

That was an example, the space isn't necessary, there's no need to be rude about it, especially when you're wrong.

If it's not necessary – that's cool. Good stuff!
 

YomommaZ

Member
1. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain ; A final game in my favourite game series. One of the last truly stealth action games with fantastic gameplay, giving a player absolute control with many possibilites of aproaching and tackling outposts and fortified bases. Very polished semi-open world game with virtually no bugs and many details to discover even after hours of gameplay. Not a perfect game by any means and a few dubious design decisions like FOB bases, crafting timers and less attention to story are holding it back from landing on my all time favourite list, but an awesome game nonetheless. Also the best soundtrack ever!

2. Destiny: The Taken King ; Probably not a popular opinion but I had a lot of fun playing the game with friends. Bungie made a lot of changes for the better compared to the original release. I have since stopped playing but I still spent a lot of hours in the game and I'm looking forward to see what comes next for this franchise.

3. Until Dawn ; I'm not really a fan of horror games but I quite liked this. The biggest surprise of 2015 in my opinion. A beautiful game that hits all the right notes and doesn't overstay its welcome.

4. Bloodborne ;

5. Rocket League ;

6. The Order: 1886 ;

7. Batman: Arkham Knight ;

8. Life Is Strange ;

9. Her Story ;

10. Journey ;
 

Arthea

Member
That was an example, the space isn't necessary, there's no need to be rude about it, especially when you're wrong.

I'm not wrong, though

and I'm not rude, just exasperated



If it's not necessary – that's cool. Good stuff!

It is necessary when it's separating a game name from comment.
Why are you all questioning OP, they know better how they parser works.
What's wrong with you people?


OTOH, do what you want.



BTW, about SteinsGate

Steins;Gate has a semicolon in its title! What do I do?
It's the one game title that uses a semicolon. We're using that character as a delimiter, so it's not included in the title here. If you use a semicolon in that title, it'll turn out as "Steins" and it won't get sorted automatically. So, don't use a semicolon in that title. Use it as a delimiter.

it's in OP too.
 

Alo0oy

Banned
I'm not wrong, though

and I'm not rude, just exasperated





It is necessary when it's separating a game name from comment.
Why are you all questioning OP, they know better how they parser works.
What's wrong with you people?


OTOH, do what you want.



BTW, about SteinsGate



it's in OP too.

No offense, but you need to calm down, I'll happily fix my list if the parser doesn't read it, but stop being rude to everybody.
 

TheFatMan

Member
Is it just me or are there not very many voters this year? I recall previous GOTY votes having more pages and more votes.

Maybe I'm being crazy!

EDIT: Nevermind I pulled up the old voting threads in a search, and this year's is actually longer haha.....crazy me
 

SomTervo

Member
I
It is necessary when it's separating a game name from comment.
Why are you all questioning OP, they know better how they parser works.
What's wrong with you people?

I'm on your side, homes. Take a chill pill.

I initially argued that you do need a space for the semicolon. My comment only said "if" we don't need a semicolon, that's cool. But I thought we did.

Wait... Do I need semicolons for the games I didn't bother to write a comment about?

Check the OP. I think you do. better to be safe than sorry.

No, I didn't. But if I would, it would probably place in my top 3.

Plenty of time for it this year.
 

Corto

Member
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1. Nuclear Throne; This game was my Spelunky of the last 2 years. The fast paced action, the procedural generation of the levels, the different abilities of the different characters, the different weapons and the way they change the way to play, the relentless, nail biting screamig curses to the sky difficulty are just all spot on in this game. I’ve been playing it since 2014 in Early Access and have between the Steam version and Vita version almost 300 hours of play. Whenever I have 15-20 minutes to waste I just take my Vita and go for a quick run. No pressure to get to the Throne, just want to run havoc and have a blast. Playing. Pure playing.

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2. Agar.io; Agar.io is love, agar.io is life. Another perfect time waster. I was absolutely in love with its mechanical simplicity: eat, grow bigger, move slower as you you grow, eat more, risk/reward of splitting to grow quicker eating other smaller players, reach the top of the food chain. Life. On the background of these simple mechanics are the personal feuds, me against that (%&$ucker naziLOL666 player, Tsipras chasing Merkel to gobble her whole, the organic coop between some random players that turns into a bloody feud in a few seconds, the horrible lag that can turn a well calculated split into a catastrophic move. All of these beats in short sessions that could extend to hours of oblivious play. A simple idea turned into a fantastic game.

Honorable Mentions

I had a rough/good year in terms of work so there were some great games that I didn't play enough to make an educated final vote but I'm sure if I had more time they would enter the official ballot. Here they are.

x. Pillars of Eternity
x. Invisible Inc.
x. TIS - 100
x. The Witcher 3
x. Splatoon
x. Darkest Dungeon
 

Santiako

Member
Almost forgot to do this, I'll keep it short:

1. The Witcher III: Wild Hunt ; Easily the best open world RPG ever made, outstanding in every sense.
2. Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate ; Best Monster Hunter to date, the amount and quality of the content puts almost every other game to shame.
3. Bloodborne ; I feel like it's the worst of the Souls series, but that means that it's still better than essentially everything else.
4. Wasteland 2 Director's Cut ; It's a bit buggy, but it's a better Fallout than Fallout 3 and 4.
5. Tales from the Borderlands ; Best Telltale game, funny and witty and charming. Just great.
6. Steamworld Heist ; Fantastic game, perfect for short bursts.
7. Broken Age ; Nice adventure with gorgeous visuals.

I'll not put into the list because I voted for them last year:
x. Divinity Original Sin Enhanced Edition ; It would be number 1 again, it quickly became one of my favourite games of all time.
x. Dark Souls 2 Scholar of the First Sin ; I'd put this one above Bloodborne, the DLC is great and the 60fps feel amazing.

Gigantic dissapointment:
x.Fallout 4 ; They streamlined it so much that they removed everything that made New Vegas great.
 
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