Okay, so I'm going to comment on my top 10 favorite games here this year. I'll do a separate post for each one and link them all together as I go along. Let's get started.
Other entries in this series:
9. Perfect Tides
8. Uncharted: The Lost Legacy
7. Chop Suey
6. Knights and Bikes
5. Super Metroid
4. Gone Home
3. Butterfly Soup
2. The Last of Us Part I
1. The Last of Us Part II
10. GIANA SISTERS: TWISTED DREAMS
There's no objective way to justify including this game in any top 10 list. Although quite well-made overall, it has certain clear shortcomings. Even in the superior Switch version of the game (the one I most recommend), there is, from time to time, a bit of choppy animation, and the enemy variety leaves much to be desired. The presentation is basic and the story is as simple as they come in games: Giana enters the Dream World to rescue her sister after she's taken there and promptly gobbled up by a dragon. How the hell does such a title fare this well in my book? More than anything else, it's the game's subtle sub-messaging that gets to me more than any present in most titles.
Twisted Dreams is a formal sequel to the 1987 Commodore 64 game The Great Giana Sisters, which was a platforming title intended to be an answer to still-new-and-fresh Super Mario Bros. The NES never really caught on in Europe like the Commodore 64, so for Europeans, this title was, contemporaneously at least, actually the defining platformer of the era. In this 2012 sequel, Giana is a teenager; a stage of life that's all about transformation, and to which end has learned to manipulate her dreams. She uses this newly-developed ability to jump between dreams and transform herself into Cute and Punk personas in order to deal with her inner conflict and fear while she searches for her sister.
In terms of game play, shifting between personas completely changes the appearance of the level you're playing: Cute Giana's version is always set at night, while Punk Giana's is set in the daytime. You can shift personas on the fly with the press of a button and doing so is necessary to change the levels in ways that allow you to progress. You advance from level to level by collecting enough gems to move on, which obviously motivates the player to explore rather than just focus on progressing to the end of the stage. Shifting personas also seamlessly changes the background music between a synth version of the stage's track (for Cute Giana) created by the first game's composer, Chris Huelsbeck, and a heavy metal version of the same track (for Punk Giana) created by the Swedish band Machinae Supremacy and Fabian Del Priore, the latter of whom had worked on the Nintendo DS remake of the original game shortly before. It's a really clever play hook that firmly distinguishes Twisted Dreams from anything Mario, giving the franchise at long last exactly what Giana spends the game working out: a clear identity of its own.
Aesthetically, this game exists at the intersection of retro gamer geekdom and some cross between punk and metal attitude, replete with castles, demons, dragons, hair dye, spikes, flying pirate ships, angry birds, ghosts that look more like costumes than any persuasive conception of the real deal, and nods to classic chiptunes and Halloween, which is precisely the headspace that I live in. It's nothing less than a perfect match for my own personality. But deep down, this game is subtly, very subtly, about finding yourself, which is just something I never ever have truly felt like I've managed to do in life. It's perfect for teenagers and those of us living with BPD or other mental health struggles that just make it perpetually so difficult to place one's self in the world. Giana's volatile identity is closely bound up with her sister, Maria, and I can relate only too closely to finding my sense of self continuously in ties to others rather than autonomously. The way the game's visual and musical choices are deployed to convey those themes is nothing less than sublime magic to my soul. I'm known to shed tears sometimes during game play. I don't have a sister IRL, but Twisted Dreams has a way of very quietly making me feel like I need one. It won't reach everyone that way, I'm sure, but Twisted Dreams just feels so tailor made for someone like me.
Last edited by Jaicee - on 14 January 2023
