Top Five: Video Games of 2021

• Thought I would get this out in January. It's like I don't even know me. Anyway, here are my top five games of 2021, in roughly the order I encountered them. They're all even video games this time!


• Tokimeki Memorial - Is it weird to name a game that I have never played as a top five game of the year? Absolutely yes, but it is the right choice. On January 1st, Tim Rogers released his review of Tokimeki Memorial, the game the jump started the dating sim genre in Japan, and then streamed the game to fans eager to see more of the game. To say that I've become enamored by the game might be an understatement, considering I went out of the way to import a copy for my collection. Tokimeki Memorial is simply a game about attending high school, juggling the attention of multiple girl, and, hopefully, finding the love of your life. It's not just a visual novel with a few routes to persue. Instead, Tokimeki Memorial is positively stuffed with possibilities. I've never followed through on my plan to learn Japanese to watch anime or read manga untranslated, but discovering this game got me closer than ever before.


• Yakuza: Like A Dragon - Anyone who has read more than one of these Top Five lists must have noticed a pattern by now: there is going to be a Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios game on it. As long as they keep putting out games this good, I'll be happy to reserve the space for them. Yakuza: Like A Dragon is a departure for the series, leaving behind the traditional brawler combat for an RPG system. In all other ways, this is every bit the Yakuza game, if not even better than before. Moving from a solo brawler to a party-based RPG also has story ramifications, ensuring there is a reason to have friends around wherever you go. That, I think, is what make this game so special. Instead of playing as a lone hero against the world, Like A Dragon puts you in a community and makes you care for it. When the game was over, I was excited for the future of the series. Not because I wanted to see what the next fight or next challenge would be, but because I am looking forward to hanging out with my friends again.


• Control - I've never spent much time with Remedy's games. A couple hours in Alan Wake aside, I just haven't been interested. That was at least until the folks at Giant Bomb got me very interested in trying it out. Control's Oldest House is a fascinating environment to explore, though it was easy to get confused as to how everything fit together. I suspect some of that is by design, but confusion is a wily target to hit. I did eventually fall off the game, but I had enjoyed my time with it quite a bit.


• Lost Judgment - After playing Judgment, easily a top three Ryu Ga Gotoku Extended Universe game, my anticipation for a sequel shot through the roof. Lost Judgment did not disappoint. As with the earlier game, Lost Judgment tackles an important issue, this time the horrors of childhood bullying. This main story was a great driver for the game, with newer and greater stakes appearing over time. Some of the leaps felt a little disjointed, as though there was some uncertainty as to how to mess the escalating mysteries together. What save the overall game, though, is the School Stories. This massive overarching mystery encompasses nearly all of the sidestories and new minigames in a wonderfully satisfying second plot to follow throughout the game. All this might be for naught if the gameplay did not hold up, but Lost Judgment's brawler combat is the pinnacle of their Dragon Engine games. Where in prior games I avoided combat once if because too tedious, here I sought out street fights just to test my fighting prowess. Once again, this side series faces an uncertain future, but I'm am eager to follow Yagami and his companions on their further adventures.


• Cyberpunk 2077 - I waited nearly a year after launch to finally try Cyberpunk 2077, a game that I received as a Christmas gift in 2020. Patch 1.31 seemed like a significant enough number to dive in, and I'm glad I waited. Cyberpunk protrays a fascinating world to explore, its Night City a bleak projection of unrestrained capitalism and structural inequality writ large on the alluring and offputting sites of the future. Combat-wise, the game reminded me of Borderlands shoot-and-loot style. (I actually like that game, so the comparison is positive.) Unfortunately, I got distracted and moved on to other games, but I absolutely will be back to try again.


• And that was my 2021. There are already a couple games that are sure to make my 2022 list, so I'm better get that started.

Random Shots: I Bought A Game I Can't Play

• Back on the first day of 2021, I discovered a video game that (spoilers) is going to land on my Top Five list for the year. Only the game came out in 1994. And it has never been translated to English. And I haven't actually played it.


• Maybe this will explain:

• Probably should have warned you that the video was six hours long. Sorry.


• After watching the video a few times (I'm up to seven times by now), I knew that I had to own this game. So off to Amazon I went. For an astoundingly low amount of $40, this copy was making its way to me from Japan.

• I was pleasantly surprised by the condition of the box. One corner was a little crushed, but the quality was still impressive for a 27 year old game.

• Opening the box, I was happy to see that the contents are in great shape as well. That popout on the lid was at one time a music box. Of course a quarter century has killed the battery dead. If I was the adventurous sort, I'd try to restore it, but I'm too much of a coward.

• The box comes with the game itself, a pair of mousepads, and a PS1 compatible mouse (that's it in the white cardboard box).

• Opening the game case, I felt an immediate kinship with the prior owner. I found the various cards, stickers, and obi strip tucked into the manual just like I have done with my own games.


• The box current sits atop my game cabinet, Shiori Fujisaki watching over me even now as I type this. It is a nice totem for a game that, although I can't play it, has meant a lot to me this year.

Theme Parking: Disneyland Part II

• Looking at this blog, you wouldn't know that COVID had happened. You wouldn't know that anything happened, honestly. But I passed the time in a number of ways, watching for the markers that life was returning to normal again. If there was ground for optimism, this set of annoucements is a company with hope for the future.


• Disneyland is reopening April 30, 2021 - It may not be the biggest news, but I think it's the most iconic: Disneyland announced that they are opening April 30. Although California Guideline allowed for reopening as of April 1 (and Magic Mountain was right there waiting), Disneyland set a date that gives them time to: 1) wind down the Taste of Disney event, 2) recall Cast Members and retrain them, and 3) give the county time to reach a better tier. That last part worked out because Orange County has already reached the Orange tier and is swiftly moving toward Yellow at the end of the month. I was never one of the doomsayers who thought that Disney would pull up stakes because of onerous state guildlines (hah!). But it is nice to the the light at the end of the tunnel may be Tinkerbell.


• DisneylandForward - For as important as reopening is, this was the news that got every Disneyland fan in a tizzy. On March 25, Disney announced... something. The most extreme fans immediately declared that Disneyland had annouced the mythical third gate and started trying to parse what rides and lands that the concept art was portraying. Thankfully it did not take long for more rational heads prevailed and the real story came out: DisneylandForward is Disney's public relations campaign to lobby the City of Anaheim to change the zoning of the Disneyland resort. Exciting, huh?

  As it is, the Disneyland Resort Specific Plan was drawn up when Disney was planning California Adventure and pretty clearly lays out how each part of the resort can be developed. Although it ushered in a massive upgrade to the resort, Disney now find themselves too constrained by that same agreement. There are only so many backstage areas they can demolish while pushing out the margins before they finally run out of all available run. (Though Tomorrowland continues to be wildly underutilized.) So now Disney is asking for more freedom to develop what they have left however they see fit. It is an exciting development in that it shows that Disney wants to continue investing in their original park. But don't get hung up on a bunch of artwork in a zoning proposal.



• Alcohol in the Blue Bayou - Not nearly as big of news, but I'm still fascinated to see this headline. Disneyland announced that they will start selling alcohol at the Blue Bayou in New Orleans Square. When Oga's Cantina opened with Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge in 2019, the alcohol ban was already done, but it stayed limited to a highly-thematic location. The Blue Bayou is the best place to expand the practice. And if following the example of WDW's Magic Kingdom, alcohol will stay limited to table service restaurants. Though considering how few of those there are in the park, maybe Disneyland will expand their dining options in order to expand their alcohol sales.


• Annual Passholder Tears - I was an annual passholder once upon a time, and I loved having that kind of freedom to go to the parks at a whim. But when Disney announced that they were cancelling the program, there was a part of me that was fascinated by the implications for the park. Not everyone was so thrilled and many have been very vocal online about their displeasure. I know I shouldn't be mean about this, but I was struck with the thought of buying a mug with the phrase "Annual Passholder Tears" if such a thing existed. Failing to find one on Etsy, I may have to source one myself...


• April 30 is just around the corner and I'm excited to see what's coming in Part II of this grand Disneyland story.

Top Five: Video Games of 2020

• Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio has owned my gaming time for the last few years and will own 2021 as well when I finally get to play Yakuza: Like A Dragon. (I'll have an Xbox Series X someday. Hopefully.) So I'm not surprised to find them on this year's list. But that's not all I played. What a year.


• Judgment - After playing through a number of Yakuza games over the last few years, Judgment was both familiar and a breath of fresh air. The game leans more toward a dramatic tone where Yakuza can weave wildly between extremes, but that focus gives Judgment enough distiction to stand apart from its predecessor. The main chararacter, lawyer-turned-hard-boiled-detective Takayuki Yagami, and his companions are much more grounded, but the story is as big as ever. I loved playing this game from start to finish and I hope RGG Studio keeps making side games like this.


• The Yakuza Remastered Collection - Yes, I'm cheating by combining three games into one slot so that they don't dominate the entire list. I have been infatuated with the Yakuza series since Zero. I knew that, once I finished that game, I would have to play all the rest. Since 3-5 were all Playstation 3 exclusive, I knew that might be difficult, but Sega seems to have anticipated my needs. I have now played to 3, 4, and I'm working on 5 as the year draws to an end. The series continues to be a delight in drama and creativity.


• Fantasy Life - There is a good chance that I bought this game on the recommendation of Austin Walker (formerly of Giant Bomb and Waypoint). There is so much to it, though, that I quickly ran into a "too-much-to-do" mental block and dropped the game. It wasn't until the pandemic hit that I had the time and desire to lose myself in a fantasy world. Fantasy Life's simple gameplay, colorful characters, and inviting world was a welcome escape in the early days of the lockdown.


• Hades - I've never done the whole "follow a game through early access" thing before, but Hades was the exact right game to try it on. A lot of credit has to go to the team at Supergiant who had the game nailed from the start. All of the time after I started playing was just adding more and polishing the gem-like core that was already there. It was fun to watch the game grow over time, and it was amazing to play from day one.


• Kingdoms Of Amalur - Reckoning - It certainly is big game, which is why previous attempts at the game eventually faltered. (The studio name Big Huge Games should have been a giveaway here.) It is easy to fall into the completionism trap when the quests are so diverse and the stories so interesting. But there is so much of it and there is enough sameyness to the dungeons it can feel monotonous. But it's hard not to be drawn to the combat and, maybe, see a glimpse of the MMO that might have come.


• Since this is going up in April, I'll totally admit that I have a Series X now. Also, I've already beat Like A Dragon. I really need to try harder on these posts.

Top Five: Video Games of 2019

• It may have been a slow gaming year again, but some big titles found a way to overcome my inertia. Here are the games that refused to let me ignore them.


• The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - When I first received my Nintendo Switch as a Christmas present, Breath of the Wild was the game I was most looking forward to playing. And... I didn't like it very much. I ran around a bit, followed the story line, but it just wasn't clicking for me. I thought it would go back on the shelf, unfinished.

  But then my brother played and finished the game himself and encouraged me to try again. I don't know what changed. Whether I was in the right headspace or I just figured out what the game wanted of me, it finally clicked in a big way. Breath of the Wild is an explorer's dream. The world encourages you to wander around and check everything to see what is hidden there. In a way, this is the closest a Zelda game has come to replicating the feeling of the NES The Legend of Zelda.



• Hades - I have been a fan of Supergiant Games since their inception. Their first game, Bastion captivated me entirely with its riff on the action-RPG and the studio's now-signature narrative and musical excellence. Unfortunately, although their next two games didn't hit me the same way, Hades has hit me just right. Its combat feels right out of Bastion, but with a run-based, Rogue-lite underpinning that has me always eager for "one more run." Even though Hades is in early access, it is stuffed with systems and content that, bar an ending they haven't completed, would be a release game for any other developer. It seems that Supergiant is not satisfied with "good enough" and Hades is all the better for it.


• Zen of Sudoku - I purchased Zen of Sudoku in 2007 and have played it for over 279 hours. When I need to unwind and let my brain take a rest, this is my go to game. It comes up on my list this year because 2019 just demanded it. (In looking up these stats, I see that I also purchased Bookworm Adventures around that time for three times the price and only played for four hours. Woof.)


• Marvel's Spider-Man - I'm a little surprised that I've never played a Spider-Man game before. Spidey is hands-down my favorite superhero. But a combination of platform issues and reticence to try something different has always kept me away. Thankfully, the praise for Marvel's Spider-Man overcame all of that and I was treated to a distillation of everything I love about the character. And although I am awful at the combat (even on the lowest difficulty), the joy of swinging through the city is enough to earn a spot on the list.


• alphacross - My affinity for crossword puzzles assuredly can be traced to my grandmother. She did the crossword every day, in pen as is proper. Just recently, I was looking for something to keep me occupied and discovered alphacross on the Google Play Store. It is everything I need from a crossword puzzler without a bunch of the crap you usually get from one of these apps. It's just a subscription to as many puzzles as you can manage and the tools to complete them. I have been rediscovering the special language of crosswords that comes from seeing certain clues repeat over time. I have also been cursing the puzzle designers who are always too clever by half. But from time to time when I work on another puzzle, I remember what it was like to sit at the kitchen counter and do the crossword with my grandma.


• An honorary mention goes to the board game The 7th Continent which would have taken a spot had I need to fill out the top five. A survival adventure game about ridding yourself of a terrible curse, I spent countless evenings with my daughter learning the continent and dying horribly again and again. We're sure to win one day.