Imagine living the worst year of your life and you randomly test some walking simulator game, because its first episode is free-to-play. Later the full game goes on sale and you buy it, because you're interested in it. You start the game and become immersed in it by every episode and every twist. You fall in love with the characters as the story takes a deeper and darker turn. After twenty-something hours of playing you've reached the end of the story with the choices you've made and you feel empty for knowing that you will never experience it for the first time again.

Life is Strange was the highlight of that shitty year as it showed me that not everything goes my way, but still sometimes things just have to happen the way they happen. And I found comfort in thinking that maybe that year held a meaning I was not aware of yet. I can never be thankful enough for stumbling upon this game at a time when I needed it the most.

This is easily one of my favorite games as it has done right so many things I would expect from a great adventure game. Kena is set out to find a sacred mountain shrine, but is eventually held up by the corrupted nature and lingering spirits that she has to help in order to reach her goal. The game features cute creatures, Rot, that Kena collects during her journey and they ultimately have their place in the gameplay as well. Combat is fun and bosses are challenging. Melee combat could use an update, but otherwise I like it for what it is. The game looks beautiful and it's part of the reason why exploring is pretty fun too. The story may be a lackluster for some people, but I love it for its subtlety, especially for its take on the importance of death as a part of the natural cycle. The game is not too long and I would love to see a sequel happen, even though it's very unlikely. This will be that one game that I will replay at least once a year to remind me of my first playthrough.

The first open world RPG AC game that's set in the Ptolemaic Egypt. The accuracy of the historical details took me by surprise and even more so, when I found out you can go on fucking virtual tours around the game world. The story is eventually meant to reboot the AC franchise by telling the origin story of assassins and it was pretty okay. The world is beautiful, the map is massive and the gameplay is good for the most part. It also features two separate DLCs, both of which are good. Combat is clunky at times and clearing everything on the map can get pretty repetitive. The game is too long for me to ever even consider another playthrough.