January 15, 2025
17 min read
What did I play in 2024? Did I play things?? Let's find out! ðī
A certain kind of game dev's paradise
UFO 50 pushed me out of my comfort zone at a time where I really needed it. I relished the diverse set of experiences it offers. I loved playing this game with friends in various settings, but most of all projected on a basement wall on launch day. Opening up random games for the first time and being totally surprised every time. I wrote a little more about UFO 50 earlier in the year.
My UFO 50 top games
These are some of my other standouts from the collection:
I like lore and I don't care who knows
Discovering new things in the Lands Between is great. I'm really glad I had a reason to return. I thought the beginning through mid game was amazing. I like how the world let you explore in so many directions at once.
I didn't enjoy the more linear end game sequence as much. It was still enjoyable! But, I really preferred the initial breadth of experience. The base game had a sort of "linear conclusion" as well, but it landed better with me for some reason. Maybe it had more time to bake?
Best game
I enjoyed playing ping pong when I worked at an office with a table. It's too hard to find a place to play regularly if you don't have space for your own table though. Pickleball is much easier to play in town at public courts.
You can get a lot more exercise running around in Pickleball. There's so much room for placing weird shots, spinning the ball, and goofing around. Just an all around great time.
Best story arc
The base game of Arcs by Leder Games I find more interesting than amazing. I still enjoyed it, but I think it would've stayed in HM tier for me. Annoyingly ð, the 6-10 hour 3 part campaign experience really catapulted it up my list for the year.
The campaign of this game is the best systemic emergent story arc I've ever experienced. I've seen great tales from events in Eve Online or Dwarf Fortress, but never really been able to get into that myself before now.
I am the Steward. A beacon of the Empire in this blighted system. Through military strength, I asserted Imperial rule over my fellow regents (and I took from them my just rewards for doing so).
My success goes to my head. Heavy is the head that holds the crown? I think not. It is easy to rule over my fellow regents when they all gleefully support the Empire. They are glad to give me tributes for ensuring continued Imperial success and stability.
Part way through the round, a SHOCKING development - some of my former fellows decided to secede from my Empire?! For seemingly no cause at all! I was counting on those valuable contributions to keep the Empire going. Without my former friends doing their part everything collapsed around me.
As a failure, I'm forced to pick a new Fate. I have become The Judge. The lore text on my new Fate spoke to me:
"Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Only I can balance the scales."
I will show these dissidents what they're missing without me as their shepherd. They think they can keep the Blight at bay without ME? Their hubris knows no bounds.
More games should have good writing
I don't have too much to say about this game. Tactical Breach Wizards by Suspicious Developments is just a really really well executed game on a bunch of axes. ðŠ
Choose your own level of engagement
I really like how Tactical Breach Wizards lets you play at different energy levels. You can just beat the current map. You can push to get all the optional objectives. You can do bonus missions. You can watch bonus character interactions. There are nice optional rewards that make those things feel worthwhile, but totally ignorable if you're not interested.
It is great how easy it is to change your level of engagement as you play too. I did all the bonus objectives early on, but stopped bothering once I had outfits for my characters I liked. Then I was focusing on getting to the end of the story.
GOOD writing
Narrative is well paced between game play sessions. It is character driven. I got along well with the humor. The writing is well edited.
It's good
I heard Tom Francis say somewhere that he was trying to make a "tactics game for people who don't like tactics games" and I think that he nailed it. Each level hits the right balance of puzzle and freedom I enjoy in this genre.
Ol' reliable
Still going strong, I love that there's still new content. Slice & Dice is one of my favorite games of all time. This is my perfect Steam deck game. Lately, I've been watching Voyix's daily video with my morning coffee.
I'm not sure what it is, but Hard mode Slice & Dice just has the perfect level of systemic goodness for me. I love how many interesting things can rise of a combination of relatively few combinatorial pieces. Two particular items can cause a crazy combo until you run into one specific enemy or curse that totally neuters it.
I love PVP
I used to like multiplayer games, now I do again. I gave this my coveted "The Best RTS Since Sliced Bread" award a last year. This is still true. I love how accessible Mechabellum makes RTS style strategy. Unit counter plays, pivotal upgrades, capitalizing on momentum to crush your opponent or invest in economy.
Best bite
Leap Year is a really delightful 3 hour experience. I love concise experiences like this. It is really worth seeing through to the end.
Daniel Linssen was my first game dev/game jam inspiration. I loved seeing a longer form project from him, and I hope to see more!
Party fav
This has gone over great every time I've brought it out. It does have a weird thing where the first game you kinda have to get everyone to calibrate ðĪ, but the games are so fast that every first game I've played has been followed up with "let's do that again".
Party fav - words edition
This has ALSO gone over great every time when I've brought it out. This is my current favorite "yes this is technically a game, but really we're just here to have fun with words" game.
I was inspired to make a single player puzzle game version of this called Flippy Words too for this year's Confounding Calendar.
Grunn is Good, Grunn is Great, Thank You for our daily Grunn
A really fun indie game at the perfect length. It's hard to say too much about Grunn without spoiling the experience. If you think it looks interesting, it is - play it!
Classic
I've played many deck builders derived from this game, but there's a lot of magic in this original game that I think other adaptations have lost. I'm not quite sure what it is, but would love to play this more to find out.
I'm not finished with Lorelei and the Laser Eyes yet, but it has been a good time. I don't think it will crack my top games though. So far, this isn't really my favorite style of puzzling. I like when it is more integrated into a larger system or the way the world works. Maybe that opinion will change though, I think we're around halfway. If the story can land it would help a lot, I'm not totally sure what it is cooking right now! It is unquestionably a lot of fun to play co-op with my friends.
Rise of the Golden Idol was good, but not great. I liked the first game, The Case of the Golden Idol a lot more.
While it was maybe a bit annoying to click on every word, I don't like getting a bunch of words at once as much in the new game. I feel like the investigation of each scene is more rote and less interesting now. The old system had annoyances too, but those rough spots allowed for more of a detective-y feeling.
I didn't find the narrative arc of this game as enjoyable as the first game. I didn't like the Idol returning. I have a lot of assumptions about how that works from the original. Each scene felt more like applying variations on what I already knew vs. seeing something totally unexpected in the first game.
I'm not sure how the Idol could have ever been surprising and interesting again as a central story point. I feel like I know too much about its mechanisms now.
I do think the narrative bundled everything together nicely in the end, but I didn't really feel satisfied by that. The scenes earlier on in the story felt mostly disconnected to me. The new UI was also more annoying to use on Steam Deck than the original, though I could see it being nicer on PC.
I really loved the first 1/2 or 2/3rds of riding copilot with my friend, Brendan, on Animal Well. I think the feelings of the end game kinda "soured" (that's too strong) my opinion on the game. I still think it is cool and good. I just feel like it doesn't quite crack my top games.
It is interesting - the earlier secrets and mechanical depths felt really grounded in the game's world and I loved that. The later stuff got super metagame-y and wasn't my cup of tea. I wish the deeper secrets had been more about lore or the world instead of hard puzzles.
Factorio is fun, but I barely got into the Space Age DLC content on my new play through. I like how the DLC has changed the pacing on some stuff in the early game. I'd like to get back here some day, as the premise for "Factorio but with new wrenches in the gears" is enticing.
Caves of Qud by Freehold Games hit 1.0 this year and got a tutorial. I've been listening to the Eggplant Show podcast episodes on it. I really want to check it out, but haven't managed to get in yet.
Chants of Sennaar was a lot of fun. I played it at the beginning of the year. I really appreciated it and it would easily be in my top 10 of games released in 2023 (had I played it in 2023). For whatever illogical reason, this feels like a 2023 game I played late vs. a 2024 play for me, so I'm leaving it down here. But I did want to shout it out! Good game!