The Discussion Thread - The 14th Annual Greatest Games Event

[psychicscubadiver]

5. Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story
There is something oddly compelling about this game. Many RPGs take themselves too seriously, and even the ones that don't, rarely reach the insane goofiness of this title. But somehow it strikes the perfect chord with me. The humor in this game had me laughing at every other piece of dialogue. Fawful is not the most intimidating villain Mario and the crew have ever fought, but he's easily the most amusing. And the battle system is just so much fun. Action-command RPGs are my favorite style of RPG and this game delivers the best Bros Attacks in the series. Bowser is smoothly worked into the battle system and being able to swap between fighting as him and altering his cartoonish biology as Mario and Luigi brought a great 'team effort' to the boss battles. Turning Kaiju-sized was also great fun, although I'm glad they didn't overuse the mechanic. Even as fun as it was it's hard to put into words exactly why I love this game, but something about put a smile on my face every moment I played it, so that will have to be enough.

4. Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze
Gone was the waggle tech, gone were the tikis, gone was the single health barrel rocket that was the bane of many player's existence. Retro looked at a good game in 'DKC Returns' and thought 'we can do better' and they did. The theming of artic creatures in viking style ships invading and conquering the kong islands is great. It opened up a ton of level variety without it ever feeling odd or out-of-place. But big credit has to go to David Wise for bringing the soundtrack to life with some of the best video game music out there. It didn't matter whether it was the ominous harp and horns of the viking fleet in the opening, the surfer rock of Busted Bayou, the harmonica and strings of Windmill Hills, or the African folk music of Grassland Groove. Each one nailed their respective levels and even had subtle little changes depending on where you were in the levels, like changing as you went underwater. And despite the improvements to QoL Retro did not make this game any easier than its predecessor. It was just as much of a challenge and joy to earn 100% completion.

3. Super Mario Odyssey
A few games ago when talking about Mario Galaxy, I spoke about how movement is the core of a Mario game. Odyssey is the one that did that best. Running, jumping, rolling, flipping, and more moves are at your disposal and they feel so fluid and natural that is unreal just how much fun it is to simply explore each level. And each world is a sandbox just waiting to be explored with collectibles and characters of all kinds to uncover. I'd have enjoyed this game even if that was all there was to it. but the ability to possess other characters really opened up the gameplay possibilities even more, giving insane amount of variety to the challenges. The music here was good too, but i have to give a special shout-out to Jump-up Superstar for being such a perfect encapsulation of the spirit of a Mario game, jazzy, high energy and just a good time from start to finish. And the game did have a hell of a finish. Not the final fight with Bowser, although that was fun too, but the final secret level, the dark side of the moon. Once you gather 500 moons and conquer that challenge, you climb the flagpole of the skyscraper, the lunar landscape spreads out before you and Cappy, your companion through the whole game, reminisces with you about everything the two of you have been through until you finally finish the climb and collect 4your prize. It's a quiet, poignant ending to such a wild-ride of a game and I loved how bittersweet it felt to know something I had loved so much was done.

2. Twilight Princess HD
It might be cheating a bit to specifically list the remaster, but I had already loved this game and the remaster fixed what few flaws it had. The tutorial was shorter, the tears of light missions streamlined, waggle tech was gone, and hundred little QoL improvements were made. But all of that was icing on top of the cake. Where Majora's Mask and Windwaker had experimented, Twilight Princess returned to the formula of Ocarina of Time and executed it in a darker and more mysterious world than we had yet seen in Zelda. Zant had a terrifying and otherworldly aesthetic, commanding the screen in all of the early cutscenes. His shadow creatures were alien and unnatural and it gave weight to a world invaded and conquered nearly overnight with only a single province on the edge of the kingdom resisting. But the story aside the world itself strange and wonderous with some of the best dungeons and best bosses not just in this series but in all of video games. I deliberate didn't save and restarted my game 3-4 times just to replay the Stallord boss battle. It was my favorite Zelda game over just over a decade. Then we come to my number one.

1. The Legend of Zelda: The Breath of the Wild.
As I've said a number of times at this point: I love to explore. As a child I walked and biked my entire neighborhood, tracing all the culverts, and accidently traveling several miles from home by trying to find the source of a local creek. Even as I grew I enjoyed hiking, camping, backpacking. Even just driving around so long as it let me find something new and interesting. Even when I was inside, I read books that took me to new and strange worlds, letting me experience things that were impossible here on Earth. And of course, I played video games. I explored the worlds inside my TV always looking for what was over the horizon.
In 2017 I was an adult in grad school. That feeling had never left me, but it had grown more muted with age and experience. By happenstance I found a Switch for sale while on a family vacation and I gladly scooped it up since they had been in short supply. After I got home, I bought Breath of the Wild and I felt the same joy of discovery that I had as a child. The journey was hard, I quickly learned to avoid guardians and Lonels in the early game and I can't tell you how many times I slipped off mountains due to rain. But that's part of exploration. The breaking weapons never bothered me because that was just a impetus to find more and better. The map size never intimidated me because that was just more to explore. The first thing I did once I was off the plateau was race like a madman to each of the towers to fill the map. And I looked out over everything once I had that accomplished and just followed my heart's desire, investigating whatever interested me in the moment. There's a good argument to be made that Totk is the superior game, that it improved on BotW in numerous ways. But while I love both, nothing can replace that magic that I felt first playing Breath of the Wild.