Alex's Games of 2024

 

Hello, it's that time of year again.

Alex's Games of 2023

We're doing things slightly differently this time. For various reasons that I'll soon get into, I was in an odd place when it came to games in 2023. So instead of the standard list of ten games, I'm going to take you through my year in gaming roughly chronologically - but don't worry, along the way I'll share some recommendations, and you'll get that top ten by the end.

Alex's Top Ten Games of 2022

Thought you were going to get away without hearing about my favourite games in the past year? Think again.

Alex's Top Ten Games of 2021

...And here we are again. Whatever may have gone on in your past year, rest assured that as always, I have played some video games, and at least ten are worth rambling about! Let's get straight into it.

Alex's Top 10 Games of 2020

 

Well... that was fast. Perhaps I can tempt you into reading on by promising this opening to be the last reference to 2020's C-word. One way or another, I had ample opportunities for playing games this year - here are ten of my favourites.

Alex's Top 10 Games of 2018

Here we are again. Another year has passed and, unsurprisingly, I have at least ten games to talk about. Let the (discussion of said) games begin!

Alex's Top 10 Games of 2017

The year 2017 has come and gone, and as has become tradition, I will ramble here for a little while on my personal top 10 video games that I played in the calendar year.

Ys II - "What's All Ys, Then?"

Japanese role-playing games - or JRPGs to their friends - are perhaps one of the most inaccessible genres to the uninitiated. The most common crime they commit is enforced grinding, as players have to circle a patch of tall grass or forest or "world map", fighting the same creatures over and over until characters in their party are sufficiently levelled up to take on a boss. Then there's the minute-to-minute tedium of the gameplay, which even in the more complex JRPGs often boils down to selecting "attack" from a menu every time. And of course there's the time investment, which can stretch to 50, 100, even 200 hours or more - this becomes a more crucial metric the more your age and the size of your Steam library goes up.

Behind these off-putting elements - some of which it could be argued are central to the experience of playing a JRPG - there can be a lot of value, depending on the quality of the game in question. Persona 4 Golden is my personal Best Game Ever, and I could ramble on for quite some time about a fair few Final Fantasy's. It makes me feel a bit sad that the above issues could (very reasonably) put someone off ever delving into the genre.

If there was ever an entry-point, a catalyst for more interest in games that many find so impenetrable, I believe it is Ys Chronicles. This Steam bundle contains the first two games of a long-running series that has seen endless rereleases, remakes and enhanced reimaginings. I finished them in a total of 18 hours. There are no random encounters. The combat is real-time and could not be played while sleeping. Grinding is almost entirely unnecessary. What's more, Ys and Ys II are exceptional games and they do far more than just stand the test of time. They're easily some of the best 2D games I've ever played, and I want to let you know why you should check them out.

Alex's Top 10 Games of 2015

This website, as you may have noticed, is quite partial to rating individual games out of 10. This year, I have decided to flip this concept on its head, and rate ten games, against each other. I call this radical idea, this list-based article, a "Top 10".

A Story About My Uncle - "Wrong, Said Fred"

A Story About My Uncle is a first person platformer held together with grapple physics. Putting you in the boots of an unnamed protagonist retracing the steps of the titular Uncle Fred, this game tries hard but unfortunately ends up proving that the indie badge does not guarantee value for money.

Elite Dangerous - Never Not Scanning

Some months ago I wrote a blog post summarising the appeal Elite: Dangerous held for me, and relating my early experiences in the game. After roughly 30 hours, I had a Cobra Mark III, and an excited feeling that 'the real Elite: Dangerous begins here'. I was about to dive into the explorer class headfirst.

Approximately 150 hours later, I haven't come up for air yet.

Elite: Dangerous - Space Truckin'

I'm obsessed with space. If you're one of the twelve-ish people who read my short-lived series of blogs covering my time with Kerbal Space Program, you already know this. I am so riddled with space madness that I once shook hands with Arjun (perhaps you know him as arjybarjy) in agreement that we would both sign up to Eve Online. Thankfully, I have so far reneged on that promise - I don't need more spreadsheets in my life, my day job more than satisfies that quota. Meanwhile, the concept of Kerbal fascinated me, but its realistic physics and rulesets ultimately limited my ability to interact with it. My ideal space game, should it ever arrive, needed to deliver the mindblowing vastness of the cosmos with the comparatively mundane tools of, say, a Euro Truck Simulator-style open world.

Enter, stage Space, Elite: Dangerous.

Mind: Path to Thalamus Really Makes You Think

There's a good chance you haven't heard of Mind: Path to Thalamus. The name is perhaps not the most memorable, and I'm guessing the marketing budget of a small indie studio from Spain is fairly modest. I came across it by chance, and while at first I felt it aped Dear Esther a little too much, the story premise, first person puzzles and stunning surreal visuals make this game well worth a look.

The LCS starts soon and I am stoked! (With a few little predictions)

If for some crazy reason you have no idea what the LCS is then take a seat and let me explain. Once I have I hope that you will join me on a thrill a minute ride through the world of competitive gaming. LCS stands for The League of Legends Championship Series and it represents the highest level of League of Legends competitive play in Europe and North America. This year there will be ten teams in both EU and NA leagues all vying for the chance to represent their region in international and worldwide tournaments culminating in the League of Legends world championship. If you would like more information on this great game then checkout this site. It will explain it a lot better than I ever could.

What's in a Name? Reflections on my Irrational Mistrust of the Online Persona

Xbox Live, harsh but fair.

Usernames, gamertags, SteamIDs, whatever you want to call them, the online pseudonym has been around since Alexander Graham Berners-Lee first tied two soup cans together and invented the internet (I think that's how it went, anyway). I'm hardly a stranger to them, mainly because you just can't do much on the net without having one, especially with the ubiquitous connectivity of today's gaming platforms. For some reason, I've always felt uneasy about the idea of being referred to or known by an internet nickname, and I can't fail to notice that others online take a very different tack on this. I thought I'd write a semi-comprehensible post here to explain my username Luddism, self-critique a little bit and give my co-bloggers the opportunity to tell me what it's like on the other side of this fence I'm pretty sure I just made up.

Handheld Funtimes: Introducing My Friend Playstation Vita

Handheld gaming devices have played a curiously limited part in my gaming history. Like practically everyone in the 90s, I had a GameBoy - first a Pocket, sadly lost to supermarket thieves, and then a Color, still mostly operational to this day. The likes of the GameBoy Advance, DS, PSP and Sega Game Gear passed me by and I never particularly felt like I was missing out. This decade-long hiatus finally ended last month when I purchased a PlayStation Vita, and seeing as I seem to be the only person alive who owns one, I thought I'd share my first impressions of it and maybe, just maybe, convince some fellow gamers to pick one up.

Shakespeare Enters the World of Video Games, Stage Left

Renowned works of literature - especially those many centuries old - are not often to be found in video game form. Off the top of my head, only Dante's Inferno comes to mind, a game that came in for a good deal of criticism for its stale gameplay (ripped straight from God of War) and some mystifying departures from the source material. It seems strange, to me at least, that some of the most thrilling and thought-provoking stories ever written down so rarely find a place to stay in Video-Game-Land. Imagine my pleasant surprise, then, when I saw a set of games on Humble Bundle's latest sale that included two entitled The Chronicles of Shakespeare, adaptations of Romeo and Juliet, and A Midsummer Night's Dream. Works from arguably the greatest literary artist of all time, expressed through a medium advancing and evolving in unprecedented ways. What could go wrong?

BFVG Dream League Of Dreams Week 4

We are proud of what we have achieved so far in the Dream league Of Dreams. FAFF (Federal Association For Football) has founded one of the greatest sports in the world. Literally millions of people from all 4 corners of the globe have watched some of the finest athletes in the world compete at the highest level.
For those who do not know what the DLOD is all about; we are basically a group of friends who have drafted a team on PES14. Each week we then sim the games on which we attempt to commentate although most times we simply resort to insulting each other.

This weeks recap is a special (if not short) one for it will be the last weekly post that we do concerning the DLOD. If you wish to catch up on any of the previous weeks you can do so here; Week 1, Week 2, Week 3. Hopefully once a month we will give a short recap of the previous few weeks action. You can of course keep up to date with the DLOD by watching it live on our Twitch channel. See below for last weeks results.

BFVG Dream League Of Dreams Week 3: The Darkest Hour

As we entered the 3rd week of the DLOD the excitement was palpable. Last week we saw some cracking results some of which came as a huge surprise. So we all sat down ready and in anticipation for what was going to be an amazing week of football. However all was not well within FAFF. There were murmurings from some of the players that they were being forced to work far to hard for little to no money and some of them were threatening to strike.
This all started a week ago when FAFF (Federal Association For Football) announced major changes to the format of the games. Instead of the regular 5 minutes each half, the matches would now consist of two, 10 minute halfs. For some reason there was an assumption amongst the players that their pay would also double in size. When they received their paychecks they were in for a shock as not only were they now being forced to play games for twice as long, they were having to do so for half the salary. The players did not notice that in the smallest print that could be printed (measuring exactly 2 micrometers tall), FAFF had written a clause in all the players contracts stating that, 'If in the unforeseen circumstance that FAFF decides to increase the length of the games, the salary of the players will match the change in a negative direction'.
Week three would continue as any other and on Wednesday 30th October 3 games were played as planned. However the fans could tell that something was not right as this day would go down as one of the most underwhelming days of football in DLOD history.

BFVG Dream League Of Dreams Week 2

Week 1 of the Dream League Of Dreams was filled with plenty of end to end, none stop, edge of your seat action. But here at BFVG we are always looking for ways to make things even more exciting. So we decided on a couple of rule changes that came in to immediate effect.

In their infinite wisdom the FAFF (Federal Association For Football) came to the unprecedented decision that the length of all future games will be doubled. Instead of the regular 5 minutes per half, games will now last 20 minutes consisting of 2 ten minute halves.
The second change that FAFF announced this week was that the games will now take place over two days instead of the previous one. 3 games will now be played Wednesday evenings with the remaining 3 played the following Saturday. In an official FAFF statement released on the 22nd of October they declared that; 'These changes were agreed by a 10-2 majority in favour. The aim of these changes is to ensure that the sports popularity continues to grow and that the DLOD continues to appeal to the younger generation.'

The Dream League Of Dreams will continue to be broadcast on the BFVG official Twitch channel, now taking place twice a week. For more information on future DLOD broadcasts and any other gaming related tom foolery please follow us on Twitter, Facebook and right here on Blogger. And for anyone who didn't catch this weeks action have a quick read below for this weeks football round up.