Lovespuds

What an incredible year for games, I feel like every year outdoes the last, I am constantly amazed and enthralled.

With Sekiro and the possibility of TLoU2 releasing in 2019, my hopes for this year are really high. Anyway, my picks for this year are:

God of War
Spiderman
Hollow Knight

I have to give an honourable mention to Deadcells and Dragons Quest to.....what a year for Playstation 4

I am really sad to hear so much negativity in the comments, I absolutely love this game and while I concede the music is repetitive I personally really liked it, I would hum along to it constantly.

I think the repetitive stuff is something you can level at almost every JRPG ever made, for example, I haven't played FFVII for 15 years but I can still hum every song in that game to to how repetitive it was when I played it. I gavent heard thd same complaints about repetitive music in Nino Kuni 2 either and the same goes for every Zelda I have played. Just to clear, I am not comparing the songs themselves, after all, Zelda would beat anything else 😃.

Interesting list Rebecca, I will definitely look to check out all of your Indy picks as they have largely flown under my radar.

As I move on from Red Dead I am slowly coming to recognise that it has some pretty big flaws that really stopped me from loving it as much as I should have. In particular, I found the mission structure super repetitive and the shooting really boring after a while. The world and story were utterly incredible and that's what dragged me through to the end, but I did find it a slog over the last 10 to 15 hours.

As long as it's another spin off and they leave Nate to enjoy his well earned retirement I will definitely be up for another Uncharted.

It would be cool to see a Sully origins story perhaps? Maybe even a game with one of my favourites, Cutter? I think there are lots of directions the franchise could take that would appeal to the Uncharted fan base.

I had such a great time with this game, utterly brilliant to play, the story was none-to-shabby either. It is actually 3rd in my own fave games of the year behind God of War and Dragon Quest 11.

I thought that all I wanted from FromSoftware was a Bloodborne sequel, that was until I saw gameplay of Sekiro.

I have come to realise that new games from FromSoftware are even more exciting than sequels or remasters. Don't get me wrong, I will play anything they make and I adore Bloodborne but I do enjoy pondering on what they might come up with next.

@stevenfins
I am so jealous buddy, I would love to experience those games again for the first time. You really are in for a treat fella!

I just got the Platinum trophy in Hellblade and Spyro 1 and I am about to jump back into Monster Hunter, I have seen on or two videos on the subject of January releases getting overlooked come GotY time and the Monster Hunter gameplay made me fancy revisiting the game.

Ploughed a good 25 hours into this game, mainly on grinding for crafting materials and I have to say, I had an absolutely brilliant time....I really need to get back to this game, it really is chock full of fun and great content.

Its even more impressive that GoW is in with a realistic chance in so many categories.

While I have ground to a halt around two thirds of the way through RDR2, I replayed GoW a second time to go after a platinum and I can see me playing it again in the future.

GoW got my vote for each category it ran in, Bear McCreary's soundtrack is utterly epic and I think it looks and runs better than anything else I played this year (I was forced to turn off the broken HDR on Red Dead).

Saw the Giantbomb crew play thu s a few months back and it looked tremendous fun, great to see it reach PS4.

The items may be inconsequential but even that short video has be gagging for this game......I am getting seriously hyped to the point that I am contemplating booking Monday off to get a 3 day weekend on it 😁

Games drop in price very quickly, especially at this time of year when there is so much competition for consumers money and time.

There are many games I buy at release but I buy them because I am excited to play them and I want to be part of the zeitgeist, it never concerns me that the games I buy drop in price.

There are titles that I identify that I want to play but that I am not in a desperate rush to play and in these instances I will hang on until I have a window of time to play it which often results in picking the game up a little cheaper.

@Gremio108
I was also a subscriber to GamesTM until very recently. I cancelled mine as I found I disagreed with their reviews pretty consistently and was frustrated by the large amount of freelance writers used which made it difficult for me to build a familiarity with the editorial staff.

I have a real softspot for nagazines as someone who read Zzap64 as a kid, PCzone as a teenager and OPM throughout my 20's but the fact is, anything you might read in a magazine is generally old news these days if, like me, you visit games websites and listen to podcasts.

I don't think I have seen a decent Snooker game on the last couple of PlayStation consoles so I have high hopes for this. I'll see if I can pick up where I left off with Jimmy Whites Snooker on my trusty old Amiga, I used to really love snooker games.

My only gripe with this game is the horrible, generic nature of the title.

Seems pretty black and white to me, I know precisely where 'the line' is. Any piece of media that legitimizes sexual activity with kids is an utter disgrace, any media that legitimizes sexually activity against someone's will is disgusting; any person with a desire to experience that media is a deviant, simple as that.

The idea that censorship is a bad thing, in the context of this subject matter, is completely disingenuous.

It was a toss up between this and Assassin's Creed, both of which I am keen to play.

Because Red Dead 2 is on the horizon I opted for North Star as I didnt want to suffer any open world game fatigue by rolling from AC straight into Red Dead 2.

I also wanted to support the devs and publishers of these kinds of titles, I truly believe games like North Star add so much variety to the PS4 catalogue and as such, I like to give them my money.

Oh my god, I am so happy to see The Pupeteer getting some love, I always assumed I was alone in my adoration for this game.

I would be thrilled to bits to get hold of a remaster on PS4.

I own and love all of the Assassins Creed games (I even had a great time with III and Unity) and I do have Odyssey pre ordered however......I am a little worried at the direction the series has taken with the introduction of mythical creatures.

It was the historical setting that I found irresistible and it seems from the trailers I have seen that Medusa and Cyclops will both feature in ths game and this detracts quite heavily from the historical accuracy I enjoy.

On a side note, if Medusa's hair consists of snakes, does her armpit (and other🙄) hair consists of little snakes...just wondering

@PS_Nation
Agreed, the game is bloody brilliant and in my humble opinion, somewhat underrated.

This is one of my eagerly anticipated titles, I imported the PS3 version from Hong Kong and if the remaster has English subtitles I may well do so again if an EU release date is way off

Gotta say, I was really intrigued by the rumours surrounding the behind doors demo at E3, people seemed blown away with what they saw.

Now, having seen the footage for myself, I can totally understand where the hype had come from, the game truly looks like a generational leap, I cannot wait to play this game for myself. It's fair to say, CD Project Red are fast establishing themselves as one of the leading developers in the industry.

Well I am still super excited for Sekiro personally. I buy 2 or 3 games a month and I have only experienced one game that was adversly affected by in-game purchases, that game being the last Mordor game.

In general, I have managed to enjoy every game just fine without using micro transactions and I am sure Sekiro will be no different. Anyway, I prefer to know something as a matter if fact before I waste any effort being upset about it.

I feel like it's much harder to keep track of the news from Gamescom in comparison with E3 (although you guys at PushSquare did a sterling job of keeping us informed). Without a focal point like the conferences at E3, I suppose this will always be the case.

All the same, there has been a lot of fun articles and videos coming out of Gamescom and in general I have really enjoyed the content and news over this past week.

Thanks for the review, this looks like a pretty great game and your review definitely has me interested. I guess the devs must be gutted about Dead Cells releasing so closely to their own game, especially given the quality of Dead Cells.

@Enuo
Nah, each game in the series is fantastic. Dark souls 2 might be the weakest of the series, but that is only in comparison to other Dark Souls titles, it still stacks up well as a great game in its own right.

This sound fab and right up my street, thanks for the great review!

I was completely oblivious to the existence of this game and that is a real shame, it does make me sad to think of really talented devs struggling to get exposure for their projects, it must be really tough to see your games flying under the radar of the gaming community.

@FreakerZ
Need to get back to this game, I reckon I sank around 30 hours in before getting distracted by something else. It is a fab game for sure.

I am enjoying a second play through of Nioh at the moment, great to see Japan's star rising again in respect of quality videogames.

@ToniK
Pretty sure this will turn out to be an action undertaken by a few employees rather than some high level strategic decision undertaken by the board.

They have to own it now, as demonstrated by a the formal response, but this whole issue will go nowhere and the over reaction is completely unwarranted in my humble opinion.

Personally I think there has been an over reaction across the board. There was no justification on the part of Bethesda to act in the way they did but I suspect this was the result of one or two over zealous employees.

Equally as stupid are the over reactions of people on the internet. Honestly, I find it depressing how quickly people will create a huge fuss over nothing on the internet these days, particularly against companies that for the most part, demonstrate that they are doing their best to service their customers.

Any company who release games like Prey, Evil Within 2, Wolfenstein and Doom are pretty awesome in my book.

I am distracted by Deadcells and Spiderman' s releases so I am not pining for RDR2 too much, game does sound great though. Surely we will see some new gameplay footage soon?

Had my eye on this for a long time, got my physical copy for 20 quid on Shopto with my gold membership.

Really excited to get my hands on this, thanks for a great review!

Absolutely cannot wait to play this, I have watched the Giantbomb crew play this on UPF here and there over the last 6 months on PC and it looks fantastic.

Just wish there was a physical copy I could pick up.

God only knows how this guy is still given a platform to air his opinions, he is wrong more often than he is right.

@hookedWORM17
Actually, I had forgot about The Witness, I have read that it is really impressive in respect of HDR.

It's on my backlog, perhaps it's time to play it, thanks for the reminder 😃

Have a great weekend.

I have had my Pro since the day it launched and I have never regretted it, even when games that exploited it were rare at first.

As demonstrated in this list, support for the Pro is fantastic now and I couldn't be happier with it. Reckon Doom deserves some love along with Wìpeout, these are both excellent on Pro.

I'd also like to sing the praises of the Sony X900F TV, utterly incredible HDR performance

Really enjoyable article, staggering amount of great games.

I was surprised to see Diablo 3 so high up the list, it's a terrific game but one that has dropped off most people's radar. Couple of games I might have included would be the Southpark titles, Prey and Deus Ex.

Games really do continue to get better and better, we are so lucky!

Had my eye on this since I saw it on Giantbomb about a year ago where it looked amazing, defo picking this up.

That's a spicey meatball!!!

Even my favourite ever series would be unable to lure me into dropping 4oo quid, even if it was a gold plated statue of Joel and Ellie I would balk at the prospect.

I think the game itself has real promise though, I really enjoyed the other two titles in the series.

Generation after generation, Sony have continued to deliver fantastic titles that you cannot experience anywhere else and I honestly believe that is why PlayStation finds itself in such a strong position.

They have a proven track record of taking risks on games, delivering variety and quality and this goes a long way towards establishing brand loyalty with its fan base. I picked up my PS1 when Resident Evil launched and I have been a fan of Sony ever since.

I think I am still most excited for Last of Us, but God does Tsushima run a close second.

I always found him very self important and a bit of a know it all back in the IGN and XOXO days but in general he was a nice contrast to Greg Miller.

Unless I am missing something, the PushSquare podcast isn't currently publishing, right?

I don't tend to chase them much anymore as I find my attention span has greatly reduced over the last 4 or five years, mainly as a result of wanting to move onto the next hot game. I do like to platinum games I love so my platinum list is a paltry 36 games but each is a game that meant a lot to me.

I find the greatest barrier to a trophy hunt for me isn't difficult as I can be a really stubborn git sometimes, it's the time commitment that puts me off.

I have no reason to complain about the number of studios on Sony's books, after all, I feel I have been well serviced in respect of exclusives over the last 20+ years, however, I would be more than happy to hear of Sony creating or buying more studios.

If I could choose any developer for Sony to tie up it would have to be From Software or Platinum Games, pipe dream stuff I know, but I have a lot of love for those teams.

I have always based my decisions on who has been most impactful on the PlayStation platform. For me, Solid Snake IS PlayStation, he was probably responsible for selling more consoles than any other character other than Mario.

Not only is Solid iconic, the games were ground-breaking

The thing I note with almost every game with this kind of content is that they are usually garbage and it's only the controversy that raises the profile of a given title.

On a side note, I saw the Catherine: Full Body trailer earlier and simply cannot wait to play it, such a shame it's 2019.

@AFCC
All good bro, I guess sarcasm is always difficult to communicate on a comment board. Perhaps I was a little over sensitive because of the awful stuff I have seen from N4G.

Have an awesome weekend buddy!

@AFCC
Steady on with the lesbian stuff chief, you can get all that out of your system on N4G.

As for the contest, I always knew it would come down to choosing between Drake, Ellie or Joel. Despite an immeasurable affection for Joel and Ellie, Drake has been a PlayStation icon for 11+ years, spawning a massively successful series of games. Each of those games set a new benchmark for storytelling and this has lot to do with the magnetism of Drake in my opinion.

The character single handedly made Nolan North a household name in the gaming community, and Drake was so beloved that Bruce Straley, Amy Hennig and Neil Druckmann were celebrated and recognised in a way very few devs achieve.

As a old fart who collects physical games, I have always been a bit snobby about these budget labels, all the same, these sure are amazing value.

Too many games to choose from, but it's safe to say I won't be bored over the next couple of years.

I was a little disappointed at the lack of news of a Demon Souls remaster and although it was unlikely, I was hoping for a little more news on Spelunky 2 too.

Also, a little frustrated at Cyberpunk gameplay being shown behind doors given that it generated so much buzz, I hope it gets shown to the wider public soon.

I wish them the best, I really loved Enslaved and had always held out hope for a sequel.

They are a talented team, not doubt about it, but I dont think they are capable of reaching the dizzy heights of Sony's best studios.

Given MS's track record I really hope that their next game is a commercial success because MS won't hesitate to shutter them if they don't get the returns they expect.

It's very difficult not to appear as if I am showing PlayStation bias here, but honestly, I think it speaks to the immense quality of the games that I couldn't choose between Ghosts of Tsushima, Last of Us 2 and Spiderman as the best thing I saw from E3.

I hear Cyberpunk is blowing people away too and there are stacks of great looking games but the above 3 just look to be head and shoulders above anything else in my opinion.

Really intrigued by Death Stranding and while it looks very early, it certainly informs you of the vibe they are going for and I am completely on board

I reckon they will have had a few options to call on, depending on how much they would need to respond to MS's conference.

I think that while MS's conference was very strong, they didn't do anything that would unduly worry Sony so I think they may well hold back on splurging all their news tonight.