This year belonged to the shooters. Be it Spring, Summer or Fall, there were shooters catering to every single kind of gamer. First person shooters made up a huge chunk of these classics, providing memorable campaigns for players to embark on when they weren’t setting new standards for visuals. Let’s take a look at the nominees for best first person shooter of 2016.
NOMINEES:
Call of Duty Infinite Warfare
Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare may have somewhat missed the mark on its multiplayer but the single-player campaign is top-notch with seamless transitions from first person shooting to dog-fighting. And hey, the story actually made sense. That’s already an improvement over Black Ops 3.
Battlefield 1
DICE talked up Battlefield 1 as its most epic iteration in the series yet. However, the final product managed to surpass the hype, delivering a fun single-player campaign and cool multiplayer moments courtesy of the new Operations mode. Realism be damned, Battlefield 1 proved it was king when it came to large-scale chaotic warfare.
Titanfall 2
It may have started as the underdog but Titanfall 2 became the dark horse of this year’s shooters. Featuring a proper single-player campaign that had critics swooning, Titanfall 2 further amped up the fun with many new additions to its classic multiplayer. Unlockable skins, hero Titans, more weapons, more abilities, fun new modes, banners, call signs and the same awesome gameplay elevated Titanfall 2 leaps and bounds above the original.
Overwatch
“Hero shooter” was a popular term this year but Blizzard Entertainment knocked it out of the park with Overwatch. It began with the sheer variety of tactics on offer courtesy of the 23 playable heroes. Overwatch gradually introduced us to its world with facets from MOBAs, twitchy first person shooters and solid objective play. The excellent post-launch support has ensured that Blizzard is only just getting started.
Superhot
What to do when time only moves as you do? Apparently slice up bullets with a katana, smash faces in, teleport across rooms and utterly dominate the glass-stained world of Superhot. Superhot plays around with all kinds of potential battles, each gunfight a potential puzzle waiting to unravel with the right input of mayhem. It wants you to run, jump, throw and yes, patiently stop in your tracks to destroy your foes.
DOOM
To see id Software, the grand innovators of the FPS genre, work so hard from underneath for DOOM was ironic. DOOM’s classic campaign surged with the trademark heavy metal and gore-tastic combat while also managing to update it for the new generation with abilities, improved movement and Glory Kills. The multiplayer may have been hit or miss but when it was fun, it was good ol’ DOOM fun.
WINNER:
Overwatch
When Overwatch first debuted at Blizzcon 2014, we all knew it was something special. It slowly evolved over the years from its extensive closed beta into a behemoth of epic proportions, becoming the fastest selling PC game of all time. What really made Overwatch so great? Was it the fluid gameplay that fit a variety of play-styles from CS:GO snipers to run-and-gunners and benevolent healers? Was it the fighting-game style combos and counters? Was it the age-old design of “easy to enjoy, difficult to master” that kept us coming back for more? It’s all of those things and more, encompassing the emotions of sweet victory and utter hilarity with crushing defeat and humbling circumstances. At the end of the day, Overwatch is the best first person shooter of 2016 and we can’t wait to see where it goes next.
Note: GamingBolt’s Game of the Year categories, nominations and awards are selected via an internal nomination, voting and debate process. You can check the rest of categories and the respective winners here.
