22) Assassin's Creed: Unity?

Yes, always found that a cool piece of trivia.

Nope, that's not the one either.

Armello is a nice little indie surprise. In it's core it is a board game which look like it could work without a computer at all. But with a computer it is all a lot nicer. You move your figure over the hex-tiled randomly generated map of the kingdom and try to solve quests, defeat banes and your competitors, find gold and useful items and ultimately challenge the king.

The plot is simple: the king is corrupted by the rot and four clans compete to take over the crown. There are four ways to win: cleanse the rot with spirit stones, become corrupted by rot yourself but stronger than the king and defeat him in a rot duel (this is actually quite challenging because of the rules for rot), defeat the king in a normal fight or if none of the players manages one of the above conditions until the king dies, the player with the highest prestige wins.

The game is quite challenging, you often have to think about the best course of action. Also everything is pretty well tuned, every card, every quest, everything matters, it is not that you can concentrate on one thing as it outshines everything else.

The game is out on pretty much every platform. It also has gotten some DLC extensions, which expand the fun. Give it a try.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DIV8Hwy4n0

#29

Journey (PS3, PS4)

Change YOY: -1

In terms of pure experiences there are few games that are better than Journey. Everything in the game, from the visuals to the music works together to create an atmosphere unlike any other in video games. The story is told subtly and wordlessly through the game's environments and brief cutscenes that leave the events of the past to the player's own interpretation.

Ultimately, Journey is just a game that I can go back to over and over again, whenever I feel like I need a few hours of relaxing time accompanied with beautiful visuals and music. In many way it's a very simple game, but that's also what makes it so great.

#28

Kingdom Hearts (PS2)

Change YOY: -2

There was a time back in the PS2 days when the first two Kingdom Hearts games were among my personal favourite video games of all time. I loved the idea of mixing Disney and Final Fantasy and creating an original storyline with new characters around them. It's such a preposterous idea that had no right to actually work, but somehow they did it better than I would have ever expected. Of course, when you really think about it, the story is often silly and even stupid, but the heartfelt sincerity that permeates the game and especially the characters still carries it through those moments.

After the first two games I was immediately ready and hyped for the follow-up, wondering what they could do with the series on the new console generation. Shame they then spent the next 13 years creating one side story and spin-off after another on every possible platform except the ones that I actually owned (Birth by Sleep being the only exception), slowly sapping my excitement towards the series as a whole. I still haven't even bought Kingdom Hearts III let alone played it, and while I will eventually do so, it's just a sad sign of how far my interest in the series has fallen over the years, simply because they wasted so much time with everything else except a proper sequel. KHII still remains a favourite of mine, but I just don't feel any excitement for the series otherwise anymore, which is a shame.

Looking over my list, it is clear that I am a fan of strategy/tactic games (among others). Jagged Alliance is pretty old, but it still is unmatched in some qualities.

The game had you as an organizer of mercenary services and your client was a scientist who developed a cure from some mutation some trees on the island of Metavira were showing. But a former partner of him had sabotaged his work, stolen stuff and had gained control over the island besides a small corner left. So he hires you to get things back on track. And you go on a satellite phone app (or something) to hire mercenaries from an organization that offers people that are willing to shoot first and ask questions later.

And with that interface to A.I.M. (Association of International Mercenaries) the game starts showing it's uniqueness that I haven't seen in this combination in any other game I know. The mercenaries are all different, have all theirunique abilities but also quirks. And most just aren't working for an unknown client, you have first to successfully finish a few missions, before they are willign to join your team. But that is not all. Some mercenaries hate other and will only work for you if you fire the other first. Or let him die in the field. But too many deaths or too much hire-and-fire is also a reason they don't want to work for you.

In the field they are also showing their personality. Some might be more than willing to shoot the other guy they hate in the back. They have their unique way on commenting about the missions and what is happening. And sometimes they do what they want and aren't follow you command. Say someone is in a shooting duel with an enemy and you want to order him to a better position, they might stay were and keep shooting. This is happening not often, but it happens. More professional mercenaries abstain form such behaviour, but they ask for a much, much higher salary too.

So you start taking over the map sector by sector, managing the income of harvesting the trees, guarding sectors you have taken over from enemy attacks and slowly advance towards the enemy headquarters. But things can go wrong fast. Your mission might go well, but then suddenly something goes wrong. Your guy doesn't disarm the bomb and it goes off. One or two enemies are seemingly bullet-proof and just keep hitting your guys. Learn to save often.

Gog and Steam both offer this great game. So it is easy to try out. It works well in DosBox. Or you can play for free in the browser at archive.org.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W52AJktdt2g

Moving on up

18) Problem: Dominant hand discrepancy. Solution: Mirror everything.

17) Magical beast, magical leash

16) "Eight. Eight. Eight. Eight."

18: Twilight Princess

Yep, that's the one

Final Fantasy 8?