The Best, Worst & Blandest of 2019

This week in Zero Punctuation, Yahtzee recounts the best, worst, and blandest video games of 2019.

Transcript

 * And so ends the year 2019;
 * What a cascade of failure and pain it has been.
 * Out came the games to not that much cheer,
 * But lots of hostility and yawning and sneers
 * That made all the publishers recoil in fear
 * And push back the games that looked good to next year.
 * But no amount of pushback would have been enough
 * To lift our poor industry out of the trough
 * Of artless, -sploitational grind-a-thon guff,
 * Of loot box, live service, and all of that stuff.
 * But anyway, to close out 2019,
 * The best, and the worst, and the blandest I've seen.

5th Best
(drum roll, followed by a cymbal crash)

 Remnant: From The Ashes  ' unique mix of co-op focus, Souls-like dungeon crawling, and over-the-shoulder shooting could very easily have been a sandwich of flavorless paste between two fiberboard ceiling tiles, but somehow, it clicked for me. I just wish these Souls-likes would take their own advice and "git gud" before the 10- to 15-hour mark.

5th Blandest
(drum roll, followed by dry coughing)

At this time of year, it's important to remember the true meaning of "blandness". It's not just for repetitive live service games; if you try to put out an interactive thriller like  Man of Medan , populated entirely with characters it's impossible to like, whose actions don't matter a gnat's twat, then maybe Blanda Claus will leave a little turd in your stocking, too.

5th Worst
(drum roll, followed by a belch)

It's true what they say, isn't it: you either die Spec Ops: The Line or you live long enough to see yourself become the Call of Duty. It turns out that there was officially about one-and-a-half good games in the Wolfenstein: New Order continuity, and all that's left is  Wolfenstein: Youngblood , which came along, burst into tears, pissed itself, and ruined their attempt at an Aristocrats joke.

4th Best
 The RE2-make  is RE2-fine; whatever. But I'm troubled by the announcement of the RE3-make; this is a can that can only be kicked down the road so many times, Capcom. Where does it end? Are you going to end up taking another crack at Resident Evil 6? That'd be like when Europe took another crack at the bubonic plague.

4th Blandest
As I sort through my list of reviews from the past year, anything I struggle to remember specific things about is sorted straight into the "Bland" pile, and that's most definitely the case with  Crackdown 3 . It's only in fourth place 'cos I do pretty distinctly remember Terry Crews shouting at something. I forget what; the bleakness of the human condition, perhaps.

4th Worst
For a time, it seemed like movie tie-in games were starting to lose their stigma, but then  Blair Witch  got things back on track with its spooky-forest walking simulator of the type that has been overdone since before teenage girls were sacrificing each other to Slender Man. Still, what else can you do with the Blair Witch IP? A game about the rotting carcass of a horse being flogged by Lionsgate executives?

3rd Best
You know how sometimes there's a glitch in the Hollywood system and they accidentally make a sci-fi film that's subtle, engaging, and intelligent, like Moon or Arrival? That's what  Observation  made me think of; a bit too linear, but an interesting story uniquely told from the perspective of an A.I., one that might make you a little more understanding whenever your computer is taking too long to load PUBG.

3rd Blandest
Apocalypse, motorbikes, love triumphing through adversity, zombie hordes that poo on everything; it's weirdly impressive that  Days Gone  can have all of these things and still gravitate to total boredom like a compass needle to magnetic north. I blame the main character; you can dress Deacon St. John in a feather boa and fishnets and take him out seal-clubbing, and he'll just whinge the whole time about wanting to be in bed by 10.

3rd Worst
A late entry into the "Worst Games" list; late as in, " the late Shenmue franchise ", or indeed, "the late Sega Dreamcast", which died partly because Shenmue killed it. Its poor design and stiff characters made it funny once, but the laughter can't be sustained through its crushingly slow pace, so now it's just bad. If you don't stop giving Yu Suzuki money, Shenmue will kill again, especially if you're allergic to SHIT!

2nd Best
I was hesitant to reward  Bloodstained  just for being Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, but it isn't that, really; what it is is exactly what I wanted: for Castlevania to stop pissing about and pack all the good ideas it's had into one game that we can finally call "good" without qualification. "Okay, but can I make the protagonist wear a silly hat?" Yes, Koji Igarashi, have all the silly hats you want. "I will!"

2nd Blandest
I hate to be predictable, but somehow, every fucking year, Ubisoft tops its previous record for mindless live service overly-monetized sandbox bullshit, this time with  Ghost Recon Breakpoint . Apparently, its failure caused Ubisoft to push back all its upcoming games to reassess things, meaning that it officially sucked hard enough to suck entertainment value out of the future, as well.

2nd Worst
 Left Alive  came to us from the place where war games, stealth games, and giant robot games meet, and apparently, all three of those genres were using that spot as a communal latrine. But amid a year of games that were mostly just depressing or disappointing, Left Alive 's mismatched gameplay blend and atrocious A.I. was a rare and special kind of terrible that I call upon whenever something needs to be hastily dowsed in steaming piss.

Best Game
Yeah, I said I wasn't going to make this my game of the year, but that was before the rest of the year's games plopped out like marbles from the nose of a remedial student. But why qualify it?  Disco Elysium  is great, because it embodies three things that the games industry desperately needs to embrace: intelligent writing, originality, and self-abuse.

Blandest Game
 Anthem  is mind-numbing live service tosh, with fewer original ideas than a BBC daytime television commissioner, but that's not why it's topping my "Blandest" list. The real reason? Because while I was writing down the obvious candidates - Days Gone, Ghost Recon - I suddenly noticed Anthem on the list of 2019 releases and thought, "Huh... I completely forgot about that." And THAT, viewers, is what gives you the edge in a mediocrity contest.

Worst Game
I hate when publishers take the easy route by making cash-in live service looter games and slapping a familiar name onto it. Consider that for a moment:  Contra: Rogue Corps  was taking the easy route, AND THEY STILL FUCKED IT UP! It's sad that Konami turned evil; it's doubly sad that they're so fucking bad at it! Contra: Rogue Corps is boring, lazy, and generally awful, and its attempt to bring across a devil-may-care sense of humor just adds insult to injury, like being pursued by a monster clown that can't even be bothered to run fast or whip his dick out.

Addenda

 * Still muddling along: Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw
 * Next year, a new event: my best, worst, and blandest climate disasters
 * Prepare to feel old: Batman: Arkham Asylum came out an entire decade ago

Runners-Up and Rejects
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice


 * Just didn't quite click for me
 * Maybe I'm racist

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order


 * Alright I guess
 * (Sound of a flatlining heart monitor)

Control


 * Interesting enough
 * In a "trapped in a conversation with the school weirdo" kind of way

The Outer Worlds and Outer Wilds


 * Both fine in their own way
 * One may have copied the other's homework

Borderlands 3


 * (Nothing; the words "Runners-Up and" have been crossed out, leaving only "Rejects")