Death Stranding is possibly the best video game ever made. It certainly has impressed, exhilarated, and stayed with me more than any other game before or since.

Death Stranding has completely reinvented social interaction in games. Although Death Stranding is a single-player campaign, it necessitates a connection to the internet. It is here that Kojima's purpose begins to take shape; the theme of "we are stronger when connected" bleeds into every aspect of gameplay. As Sam reconnects the chiral network and puts America back online, portions of the map connect to the grid. This means that the player can build structures like generators, rain shelters, player homes, zip lines, bridges, roads, etc using a PCC kit to 3D print structures out in the world. Once another player connects that same area to the grid in their own game, there's a chance that your structure will appear in their world, and vice versa.

You can also collect lost cargo from other people's games and request deliveries from other players. Once, I desperately needed a floating carrier but didn't have the resources. I estimated I'd arrive at the Distro Center West of Lake Knot City in about 30 minutes, so I requested that someone deliver a floating carrier. Lo and behold, it was waiting for me when I arrived! I felt loved at that moment; some stranger had put aside what they were doing and spent 30 minutes of their time bringing me this carrier for no reward or recognition.

Each structure has the name of the player floating above it, and you can "Like" other players' structures if they helped you. I cannot begin to count the number of times other players' structures saved my life. BTs are chasing me - I come upon a shelter. BB is crying, and my exoskeleton is sputtering out - there's a generator. My boots have worn out, and the MULEs are charging at me - but someone has left a motorcycle at the edge of the road for me. A ladder to cross a chasm, a belaying hook to scale a cliff, all left by strangers for strangers.

I felt truly connected to everyone else playing Death Stranding because everything I did had real-world implications. These were real people out there, with real goals and real aspirations. This infinite loop of everyone in the world delivering packages to each other, Liking each other's structures, and positively affirming each other was beautiful. If we all give, no one is left wanting.

One of the "sweetest" games I've ever played. I don't really know what I mean by "sweetest" but this game just TASTES sweet, ya know?

For a game that was developed by a never-before heard studio with barebones budget, Firewatch sure as shit feels, looks and plays 10 times better than most of the AAA games I've played in the past few years. I don't even know where this little gem came from or how it came to be but I seriously have been such a fan of this game ever since I first played it and I'm glad I got to experience it.

Firewatch is a game that, at its core, is not a game. It's an interactive story that, by the end of it, leaves you with something. And I think nowadays, less and less games are focused on TRULY making you get to the end credits with a sense of satisfaction and a new-found purpose. That's why I have a hard time labeling Firewatch as a walking simulator. It's true that wandering about and listening to dialogue are the main ways of interacting with the game, but the freedom to roam where you choose, the option to respond as you please, and the tools you'll find to enhance those abilities, give the game a level of agency usually absent from the genre. I didn't feel like I was being led around an already plotted out course, I felt like I was actively crafting it.

And what a pleasant course it was to craft! The Shoshone mountains may be more cartoony than realistic here, but they are still striking in the same way, if not more, that I would imagine that wilderness to be, producing some truly "it was worth lugging this camera all the way up here" shots. The natural beauty, freedom, and isolation inherent to a post deep out in the wilderness feed straight into the game's narrative.

It's a game that, on a surface level, is just about some guy protecting a forest in bumfuck nowhere. But as soon as it starts, you truly GET what this game is about. It's about loss, coping, forgiveness and acceptance. It's a game that looks like it's made for children, but it treats its player like adults because IT IS a game for adults. The themes that are discussed and tackled in this game are done with such care and honesty that I often found myself feeling in Henry's shoes in ways that made me uncomfortably comfortable, if that makes sense.

Henry is sort of an everyman, but that just serves to represent just how much Henry is us. We all have baggage, we all have fears, we all have doubts, and we all have things we want to run away from. And while not many of us have the first instinct of simply running to a remote forest to live in a firewatch tower for the summer, that does not mean that we can't empathize and BE Henry. Because, like I mentioned earlier, Firewatch often feels more like an exploration of one's soul instead of a game.

While you're stuck there in the woods, wandering through the seemingly endless trees and trying to follow your map, you're just bound to drift off with your mind. Whether you start thinking about the game, about your life, about the world, or about that leftover pizza in your fridge that's been there for 3 days and it probably sucks now... This game is bound to make you think. It's bound to make you feel.

The feeling of loneliness you feel for the majority of the game is probably why I love this game so damn much. Because while you have Delilah, your trusty companion and/or life coach on the other side, talking to you through a walkie-talkie, you never truly feel NOT alone. The sense of solitude and at times distress you feel are never able to go away, because there will always be a barrier between you and Delilah. Maybe it's a metaphor for an emotional drift between you and the people you care about, or maybe it's simply a physical distance. But at the end of the day, the blockade between you and the only other person you ever interact with is what separates this game from any other of the genre.

Because even though this game probably looks more like What Remains of Edith Finch or Gone Home, I can only compare what I felt to the feeling that I had when I played Silent Hill 1 & 2. You feel alone, but never quite alone enough to warrant fear. There's things to be seen and stories to be experienced in this game and it's all in your hands. You're gonna laugh, you're gonna be confused, you're gonna be afraid but most importantly... You're gonna feel free. Free from the restraints that every game has nowadays, free from the problems of your life, free from life itself. And towards the end of the game, that's when consequences of both yours and other people's actions begin to set in and there's almost an incredible tonal shift in the game which not only serves to give you new purpose, but it makes the game feel fresh once again. And although the ending is a bit more lackluster than one would expect, this game is not about the ending. It's about the journey, and what you're left with after those credits roll.

I loved Firewatch, and you should too. It's an underrated, undernoticed game that is something very well needed in this day and age. It can be enjoyed by almost everyone, and there is no real difficulty to it. Firewatch is one of the best videogame journeys I've ever experienced in my life. And even if it's not in my Top 10 Games of All Time, it's a game that I will always be fond of.

"You are here, and it's beautiful. Escaping isn't always something bad."

Cannot for the life of me understand why people dislike this one so much. Billy and Rebecca are the best protagonists in the series despite having very little non-gameplay interaction, and the duo mechanic makes for great puzzles, and saves time on backtracking by exploring with 2 characters at once. Item dropping brings a whole new layer to inventory management, and isn't that bad so long as you keep things in a centralized location. By the end where there is no central location, you get a steady enough stream of ammo that it doesn't matter anyways if you're good at ammo management. The backgrounds blend in incredibly well with the actual 3D models. All around great game, second favorite of the series.

The little (big) engine that could. It's been said but it bears repeating; this game eats the Call of Duty formula, chews its up, and spits out what that entire franchise could only dream of being. What Respawn does here is insane because it is aware of the surface level comparisons that would inevitably be made and actively subverts every one of the typical tropes found in those games- the corny camaraderie and cringe-worthy banter, the swelling booms and sweeping heroism of the soundtrack, the banal linearity of the level design and bacon crisp gunplay. It's all here sure, but Respawn injects gorgeous attention to detail into the visual atmosphere, boundless creativity in each and every level of its five-six hour campaign, propulsive pacing that pushes this roller-coaster narrative, brutally diverse mech combat, and most importantly, a warm earnestness that permeates every facet of its creation. The game balances a serene and almost ethereal natural landscape with a heavily industrial aesthetic that wouldn't be far off from a James Cameron film. And such as the likes of Aliens and Judgement Day, Titanfall II is as much a story about surfacing imperialist forces weaponizing extraterrestrial technology for further bloodshed as it is a tale of ardent brotherhood; no matter how artificial the links between them are. The first half introduces a couple outlandish gameplay mechanics and gimmicks that keeps things consistently fresh as the relationship between BT and Cooper builds but it's the barreling second half where the weight of cosmic stakes take both literal and metaphorical flight. Cumulatively, it never skips a beat and is just constantly satisfying. It remains silly enough to have fun and not take it too seriously but I won't lie when I say some parts gave me flutters in my heart from the utter immensity of the spectacle (shit looks amazing for 2016 and runs like a dream) and the handling of the dynamic between the two protagonists. For something that was so prone to failure at launch, I was pleasantly surprised by how much returning to this bolstered my previous playthrough and will probably continue to stand the test of time from here on out. Simply put, the apex of blockbuster gaming.

Occasionally stirring but anyone that's played more than a couple of these games will spot the tired tropes seen across the board since Journey. Nothing wrong for those who simply want to bask in the visual and aural splendor of the experience but it's all so minutely orchestrated to be something profound that it ultimately feels phony by the end. It's a solid recommendation for those not entirely versed in the medium but otherwise will be repetitive with its erratic inclusion of last minute enemies and opaque narrative.

The seminal 21st century horror masterwork. An utterly consuming post-modern translation of Victorian anxieties; the dangers of industrial progress being married to church doctrine as told with both gothic and celestial aesthetics. However it doesn't stop there. That's nothing to say on how the game further goes on to explore the terrifying Eldritch possibilities of unspeakable extraterrestrial beings beyond comprehension lying dormant within labyrinths and our attempts to understand and exploit these cosmic powers. How the result of humanity's endless search for more knowledge is ultimately rendered as capital once it breaches the surface. Just an unimaginably dense work capable of being terrifying, moving, sexy, and amusing in equal measures and completely goes all in on these facets; never shortchanging. My mind spins on the many narrative tangents this game takes you on, its profound sense of empathy for the cursed victims of exploitation, and beyond that it's also just a really fun and addictive gameplay loop with gorgeously designed areas and haunting bosses/enemies that ring in the head long after the television powers off. So stimulating exploring different weapons and builds and seeing what works and what doesn't. Perhaps some of the areas are more annoying than others (Nightmare Frontier, Upper Cathedral Ward, and Yahar'gul can fuck right off) but for something I deeply loved the first time I'm just shocked how much better this feels now. The m-word gets thrown around a lot nowadays but this work of art truly deserves the plaudit of being labelled a masterpiece. A sweeping culmination of everything FromSoftware has been striving to achieve. Everybody else should just stop trying.