All throughout 2019, I feel like I’ve heard a common refrain from the games media I follow regadless of platform: “This year isn’t as good as last.” To be fair, 2018 had some absolute bangers released: Red Dead Redemption 2, God of War, and Marvel’s Spider-Man were among the cream of the crop. But every time I heard that refrain in 2019, I couldn’t help but think “But I’m playing some really good games now and not getting to others I want to play!” 2019 was a weird year - we all knew we were on the precipice of a console generation shift without knowing what that would look like, and still only have rough ideas of what’s coming in Q4 2020. The industry continued to change under people’s feet, with a seemingly new battle royale title every month for a while, until it became clear that genre has settled into what it is. Here in the last days of 2019, console cross-play is seen as the emerging standard, not a pipe dream held hostage by whoever the dominant console holder is at the time. But the constant in 2019, at lest for me, was a relatively unending parade of good to great games to play.
The rest of this article will be those games I wanted to write about or acknowledge somehow but who didn’t make my top 10 list. In what I still thought was a good year, these games made some kind of impact on me, but didn’t quite hit that arbitrary “Top 10” mark.
Two of the biggest omissions from my Top 10 will be Control and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, for completely different reasons. Control is probably my biggest gap or Title of Shame for 2019 - based on everything I’ve read, seen ,and heard of it, I think I’d enjoy it quite a bit. It was a victim of circumstance, releasing at the end of Summer when I had plenty of other titles to play and knew I would be getting professionally very busy; I’ve just reached the point where I’m resigned to being spoiled onsome of its moments and picking it up when it’s on sale or part of Xbox Game Pass. Sekiro is the opposite - this game released when I was looking for something to play, but it’s pedigree of being from the makers of Dark Souls and Bloodborne turned me away. Those are very well loved, well reviewed games that I have no aptitude or interest in, and I’m a little proud of myself for not falling into the trap of thinking I had to try this iteration and be part of The Games Discourse. I don’t like FromSoftware games, and I don’t need to try to play a fourth one at this point to be reminded of that.
I want to acknowledge two games still in Early Access that I enjoyed quite a bit as well but didn’t make my top 10 list. I have no personal policy keeping Early Access titles from my final list, but these two games just didn’t quite crack that arbitrary cut-off. Gloomhaven is the digital adaptation of the wildly popular and complex board game I’ve been playing for nearly 18 months with friends. The Early Access digital adaptation is a bit bare bones, eschewing the board game’s campaign for a still entertaining rogue-like “Adventure” mode, and slowly bringing classes into the mix. I’ve enjoyed checking in from time to time and seeing how development has progressed, and I’m confident 2020 will see more progress and have the full release as a strong contender for my Top 10 list. Griftlands seems to be a bit further along in development, and the game’s title screen includes a countdown to the next update. It’s a deckbuilding rogue-lite from developer Klei where the player manages two decks of abilities: one for combat and one for negotiation. Encounters play out mechanically very similarly, but the player is presented with the option to resolve conflicts without bloodshed, or to haggle for a better deal on their next contract.
There are three other games that didn’t release in 2019 that I still considered including but ultimately axed from my final list. Final Fantasy XIV did the impossible: it held my attention as a console MMO for longer than a month. I gave it a shot based on the strong word of mouth around the third and latest latest expansion, Shadowbringers, but being me had to start from the beginning and am still playing through original, pre-1st expansion content. Hitman 2 continued to release new content, from small and frankly uninspired contracts and escalations to two all new, impressive locales in the New York bank and the Maldives resort. the resort was fun, but the bank was among my favorite Hitman levels since the 2016 reboot. And making a late play for inclusion was 2013’s Payday 2. This sat in my Steam inventory until my friend Patrick and I were considering games to play co-op during my Extra Life stream. we both tried it out solo, then had an even better time playing on stream and have plans to continue. Ultimately, I think this is a hard sell if you don’t have at least one semi-regular partner in crime.
Finally, I want to just briefly shout out the other games of 2019 I played and considered, but ultimately found I didn’t enjoy as much as my Top 10. In no particular order: Baba is You (fun and challenging puzzle game that got too challenging too quickly), Resident Evil 2 (Great job capturing vibe of original but addition of Mr X turned me away), Void Bastards (fun rogue-like shooter that I just bounced off), Outer Wilds (ambitious exploration game whose controls prevented me from getting very deep into, will probably win a TON of Game of the Year awards), F1 2019 (Great racing feel and good take on the career mode), Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 (Solid continuation of the franchise, but I always found myself booting up one of two other games on the Switch that did make my Top 10), Super Mario Maker 2 (hampered by Nintendo’s failures to understand how important on-line functionality is, how modern players use them, and how to build a community around them), and The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (see the entry for Marvel Ultimate Alliance, replacing “continuation of the franchise” with “revisitation of one of my favorite entries in the franchise”).
Were there other games I played? Yes, but the less said about Anthem and The Division 2 the better I feel. Ace Combat 7 failed to grab my imagination, and Tetris 99 was a fun, quirky mash up of Tetris and battle royale that just reminded me I have other, better Tetris games to play. But I think stopping at 15 games that almost made 2019’s Top 10 list is a good place to stop for now.
