Awards by Matt S.
It is safe to say that 2014 has been a good year for games. It’s not just that we’ve seen spectacular blockbusters released almost from the start of the year, across all game consoles; 2014 has been a spectacular year for game creativity as we’ve seen indies and arthouse titles find real success courtesy of download platforms.
Our awards this year have been the most popular that we’ve ever seen on the site, with well over 1,000 people voting for their favourite games across 16 categories. Over the next couple of weeks we’ll be listing the two highly commendeds (second and third place) and winner of each category, one per day.
First up this week is the award for the best blockbuster of the year. At DDNet we do tend to prefer indie and arthouse games, but we can’t deny that we like the occasional big budget fix too. And there were some great blockbuster games that were released this year.
Highly Commended
You can always be assured that where there is a Smash Bros. games, the plaudits from both the media and community won’t be far behind. Super Smash Bros. on the Nintendo Wii U is no different. This breathtaking party game is so special thanks to its massive cast and sheer content, rock-solid mechanics, and stellar visual presentation. Multiplayer games don’t get much better than this… but even the single player game is compelling stuff.
It’s been a long time since there was a big budget game that wasn’t a mindless action game (we’re looking at you, Resident Evil). This year we had two with The Evil Within and Alien Isolation. Alien Isolation got the lead with our readers, though, we suspect because it was a more genuine horror experience in that there’s no real way to fight back. It’s also possibly because this is the best use of the Alien license in a game so far – nothing has captured the Alien atmosphere quite like Isolation.
Winner
Big budget “western” RPGs are rare these days. It’s been a long time since Skyrim, and although we’ve seen some noble budget attempts (Risen 3 and Bound by Flame, for example), the nature of this genre is that it really needs a blockbuster release to do it justice. Enter Dragon Age: Inquisition. This game has it all – a dynamic narrative, brilliant characters, huge environments to explore and a highly tactical combat system. RPGs simply don’t get better than this one.
– Matt S.
Editor-in-Chief
Find me on Twitter: @digitallydownld
