Hello everyone,
Before we end 2023, I wanted to share my favorite games of this year and wish you all a happy new year.
My full-time job (which I quit in August), the game I’m developing, and this newsletter didn't leave much time left for me to play as many games as I would like. Still, I've come across games that left a mark on me. Let me share some of them with you, and please, do share yours with me.
Top 5 Games I Played in 2023
Note that I didn’t include the games I haven’t finished yet. That’s why you won’t see Baldur’s Gate 3 or Inscryption on the list.
5. Marvel’s Spider-Man (2018)
In the fifth spot we have the first Spider-Man game from Insomniac, which I finally get a chance to play this year. It was a great cinematic adventure overall with a fun combat system. The game does a great job putting you in both Spider-Man’s and Peter Parker’s shoes and taking you on an emotional journey with memorable moments. And it feels good to play linear stories time to time.
4. Expeditions: Rome
In the fourth spot, we have Expeditions: Rome, which is the first game I finished this year. Developed by Logic Artists, Expeditions: Rome is a tactical role-playing game that takes you to Rome, Egypt and Gallia. After your father is assassinated by adversaries, you are forced to escape your home, and soon after you find yourself leading battles and defining the fate of Rome.
With great voice-acting, tactical and simplistic combat system, hard choices and a great story, Expeditions: Rome managed to become one of my favorite CRPGs.
3. Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous
In the third spot, we have Pathfinder: WofR, which consumed most of my gaming time this year. After rage-quitting the previous game, Kingmaker, I was determined to finish this one.
In P:WotR, you role-play as the commander of a crusade, missioned to defeat a demon army raging through the land. With more than 20 classes, subclass and multi-class choices, the game gives you tremendous options for character customization. Although the main theme, defeating a demon army, may sound cliche, the game manages to immerse you into its story by exploring a land and its people that have lived under demonic invasion for 100 years. In your quest to defeat demon lords, you make hard choices and face hard consequences, bond with your companions and solve their problems, manage your army and join epic battles against demon armies.
It gives you great sense of epic adventure. And only when you finish the game and look at the other branches of the story, you realize how different places the game can take you.
On the negatives side, Pathfinder is a complex system and it might feel overwhelming. The second half of the story is not as good as the first half, which is kinda disappointing. But overall, it’s a memorable experience and a must-play for CRPG lovers.
2. Gothic 1
When I first started Gothic and felt baffled with its weird control system, I didn’t expect it to be this much fun. It’s a 22 year-old game, but it still manages to be immersive in 2023.
I already wrote how it still manages to be immersive in a previous issue, so I won’t go in details here. But to summarize, Gothic throws you into a cruel and unforgiving world, and it doesn’t do anything to help you survive. You will die. A LOT. A simple fly will kill you instantly. You are nobody in the game. You don't have any special abilities or powers that set you apart from others. You don’t have any skills. To survive, you need to suffer. NPCs will demand money from you, and they'll beat you up if you refuse. They'll lie to you to lead you into traps. Even something as basic as getting a map requires some effort on the player's part, and that really adds to the game's immersion.
All these details makes it all the more satisfying once you finally get stronger. When you start roaming the map freely with no fear of any flies (because now you learned how to use magic and swing a sword), the game gives you the great sense of “earned power” as Mortismal Gaming puts it. I can’t wait to play Gothic 2 next year.
1. Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty
And the winner of GDJ goty award goes to Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty. I already finished this three years ago when it first came out, but since it changed so much with 2.0 update and its expansion, I thought it deserved its spot on the list.
Cyberpunk immerses you in its dystopian future with CDPR’s great quest design and storytelling. The world overflows with small details and lore. Quests forces you to make hard choices in ambiguous situations with no actual right choice. NPCs feel like real people, giving you no choice but bond with them deeply. Customization options let you become a hacker who can down enemies with a single look, or a shinobi who can slow time and behead enemies in seconds, or a gunslinger who doesn’t let enemies breathe, and many more.
There's nothing I can say about Cyberpunk that hasn't been said before. But the real reason it is on the first spot is that it’s not afraid to get human. In its dark world where the definition of human is blurry, Cyberpunk manages to capture human moments and leave an emotional impact.
Top 5 Books I Read in 2023
The Pathless Path: My favorite read was also the first book I finished this year. The Pathless Path helped me gain a more positive perspective on the uncertainty of life and pushed me to take more risks.
Meditations: So much wisdom in a single book. Meditations introduced me stoicism, and just like The Pathless Path, helped me deal with my struggles and anxieties.
Age of Madness 2: The Trouble with Peace: Joe Abercrombie manages to be so funny and so cruel at the same time. The second book of the Age of Madness series was roller-coaster of emotions.
The Sword of Kaigen: The Sword of Kaigen tells the story of the Matsuda family, who are struggling to become a "family" on a peninsula where catastrophic events are about to occur. I heard so many good things about this book before reading that my expectations skyrocketed. And Sword of Kaigen still managed to surpass them.
Atomic Habits: As the name might suggest, Atomic Habits delves into developing good habits and breaking bad ones. It was a mind-opening read that helped me develop systems to achieve my goals.
Thanks for reading!
And thanks for subscribing to this newsletter this year. It means a lot to me. I’m planning to alter the format a little to make it more useful (and more fun) for game devs.
That’s it from today’s issue of GameDev’s Journey. Next week I’ll be back with game dev stuff. Wishing you all a great new year. Please share your 2023 favorites in the comments. Reach out for suggestions, objections, questions, or just say hi.
But regardless, thank you so much for reading, and have a great game dev journey!