It wasn’t an easy task, but we’ve somehow managed to narrow that down to ten of our favourites- ten nominees to win our PC Game of the Year award. So without further ado, let’s take a look at these ten nominees, before moving on to talk about what we feel was the best PC game of the year.

STEAMWORLD DIG 2

Steamworld Dig 2 is everything an ideal sequel should be. Where its predecessor was a game with excellent ideas that were occasionally held back by a lack of refinement or polish, Steamworld Dig 2 is the perfect realization of those concepts. Digging and mining are still the name of the game here, but the improvements to level design and mechanics that have been made make the experience so much better than what we expected it to be. On top of that, the game goes out of its way to deliver in other areas as well- from its narrative and its characters to its slick visual style and great soundtrack, Steamworld Dig 2 continues to surprise and delight for the entirety of its 10-15 hours.

PROJECT CARS 2

Project CARS 2 is a game that rewards you the more time you’re willing to invest into it. For automobile enthusiasts, that experience becomes even more rewarding. This is a game that is loaded with incredibly detailed and well-built cars, with excellently designed tracks, with tons of customization tools for players to tinker with. Driving a car in Project CARS 2 feels and sounds better than you’d expect, especially if you’re playing with a wheel instead of a controller. The game is admittedly held back by a lack of polish in some areas, as well as other issues that can pop up as minor hindrances every now and then, but this is still an incredibly satisfying experience that begs players to sink dozens upon dozens of hours into it.

PLAYERUNKNOWN’S BATTLEGROUNDS

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is the success story of the year. It came out of nowhere, entering Early Access on Steam in March 2017, and went on to break every record on the books from then on. And even though the game is technically unfinished, and doesn’t have all that much content to begin as things stand right now, it’s incredibly fun- and in the end, isn’t that what matters? PUBG’s enduring popularity is testament to how well executed its core concept is, and we can only see it going from strength to strength in the future from here on out.

HOLLOW KNIGHT

If you’re a fan of Metroidvanias, you want to play Hollow Knight. Its ingenious level design and the staggering amount of things it allows you to do, without ever forcing you in any particular direction or prodding you towards any specific activities, make it a constant delight for even hardened veterans of these kinds of games. Even dozens of hours in, you will continue to find interesting new quests, new places to explore, and new ways to try out your in-game skills and abilities. Throw in a gorgeous, soulful art style, and a melancholy that pervades everything in the game, and you’ve got yourself a winner.

NIGHT IN THE WOODS

Night in the Woods has to be one of the most under-appreciated gems of 2017. This is a game that has a very clear vision in mind, one that it sticks to, and one that it puts into motion with grace. Night in the Woods tells a hard-hitting story and tells it very well, and though this is definitely a narrative about meaningful topics, the game never becomes overbearing in that regard, always making sure to break up the tension with endearing moments of wit and humour every now and then. What helps is that the cast of characters in Night in the Woods is incredible, written expertly and with great passion, with tiny details and quirks that add so much charm and personality to everyone you meet. Night in the Woods may not be the glossiest, shiniest release of the year, but it is, without a doubt, one of the best PC games we’ve played in the last twelve months.

DIVINITY: ORIGINAL SIN II

Divinity: Original Sin II is a staggering achievement. With a rich setting and textured lore, , a memorable cast of expertly written characters, a wealth of things to do, both on the main path and off it, and actual meaningful choices with tangible consequences, Original Sin II stands out from other games in the genre, including its own already-excellent predecessor, in stunning ways. It will surely go down in history as one of the all time RPG greats. It’s that good.

NIER: AUTOMATA

For the glory of mankind! Nier: Automata marries the eccentricity of creator Yoko Taro with the pitch perfect mastery over action gameplay that Platinum brings to the table, showing a streak of eccentricity and genius that you don’t often see in this industry. Everything about Nier is incredible- the memorable soundtrack, the fantastic game design that has no qualms with all too often switching perspectives and even genres, the incredible story and the way it is told. Nier: Automata is one of the most uniquely great games ever made, and far and away a stunning triumph of video game storytelling.

CUPHEAD

It’s hard not to fall in love with Cuphead, right from the moment you first see it. Cuphead’s beautiful and imaginative art style simply cannot be praised enough, but even beyond that, the game backs up its style with real meaningful substance, as it really does play as well as it looks. Truly the Dark Souls of action platformers, Cuphead is a gruelling, exacting game that has no qualms about punishing sloppy players- and yet it never gets unfair. It’s a game where you’ll come for the art style, and stay on to conquer it for trying to kick your ass- and when you’re done, it will stay on with you for a very long time.

TOTAL WAR: WARHAMMER II

The first Total War: Warhammer presented an interesting argument for how two unique strategy play styles could come together for a single, cohesive experience. Warhammer II comes along and, rather than re-inventing the wheel, builds upon that idea with flawless execution, making tons upon tons of tiny little improvements that all come together for what is one of the better strategy games of the last few years. The campaign here is top-notch, and in terms of moment-to-moment gameplay, the combat and the map design are absolutely stellar. Total War: Warhammer II is an incredible experience, one that you should by no means miss if you’re a fan of strategy games.

WHAT REMAINS OF EDITH FINCH

What Remains of Edith Finch is not a conventional game. It is not concerned with implementing its mechanics to perfection, or with introducing new ways to play a game. No, what it is, is a game that is concerned with telling a collection of beautiful and heart-breaking stories, all of which come together for one of the most memorable and enriching experiences we’ve had in a video games in the last few years. What Remains of Edith Pinch plays with storytelling conventions every step of the way, delivering one strong story after another unrelentingly, all the while sticking with a singular larger vision. As a video game, What Remains of Edith Finch may fall short in some areas, but viewed simply as a story, it’s hard to think of a lot of games that are better than this.

WINNER- DIVINITY: ORIGINAL SIN II

A lot of games claim to give you hours upon hours of content that is both meaningful and is actually shaped by player choice, but very few have ever done it as well as Divinity: Original Sin II. The game is packed full of excellent writing and personality, its characters will stay with you long after you’re done with the story, it has some of the greatest side quests we have ever seen in an RPG, its turn based combat system is incredibly addictive, and it is set in a fantastic world ripe with rich and fascinating lore. Divinity: Original Sin II is an instant classic, the kind that deserves a spot in the hall of fame of video games even so shortly after its release, and will always be remembered as one of the greatest RPGs ever made.

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.

We’re going to take a look at games released this year that we feel had the best art style, games that had the kind of look you cannot simply put out of your mind. So without further ado, here are GamingBolt’s nominees for the best art style of a game in 2017.

THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: BREATH OF THE WILD

In Breath of the Wild, around every corner, there is something marvellous to behold- the ruins of an old castle, the glistening form of a snaking river, a massive volcano towering over the landscape, a vast open field dotted with forests and lakes. And all the while, thanks to incredible draw distances, in the distance you can see looming figures begging you to move in their direction, from towers and mountain ranges to dragons floating across the sky. Breath of the Wild is a game that wants you to explore its world, and it does so by presenting you with striking imagery everywhere you go. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that Hyrule has never been this beautiful.

CUPHEAD

Cuphead is the kind of game that grabs your attention from the moment you lay eyes on it. That’s a testament to just how unbelievably amazing it looks. But while it has to be commended for how incredibly faithful it is to its 1930s animations influences, it deserves even more praise for how it puts its money where its mouth is. Cuphead pulls off its its desired visual look with great aplomb, from the boss and enemy design to the animations, from the way the titular character snaps his fingers to the way barrels explode in clouds of white plume. The sense of personality that the visuals imbibe in every aspect of Cuphead is, without a doubt, one of the game’s greatest strengths.

SUPER MARIO ODYSSEY

Throughout the course of Super Mario Odyssey, you visit all kinds of locations, from deserts and forests to frozen landscapes and ruins of destroyed kingdoms, and it is thanks to the game’s excellent art style that all these places are brought to life so convincingly. Every place you visit has its own distinct flavour and personality, every enemy you see is designed excellently, and the sheer imaginativeness of everything you feast your eyes on is frankly astounding. Super Mario Odyssey represents the good that can come out of a Nintendo that is unconcerned with abiding to any sane structure, and its visual style is the perfect illustration of that.

HORIZON: ZERO DAWN

The idea of a post-post-apocalypse is one that sounds intriguing on paper, but it is Horizon’s beautiful art that truly brings it to life. Everything from the overgrown forests to the snow-capped mountains, from the look of the machines that roam the land to the look of the cities and small settlements- it’s all just so imaginative, so beautiful. And then there’s the tiny little details, like the way the inhabitants of this world dress, to the way the remnants of the old world are just lying about, all of which sells the game’s setting so well. You don’t often find a game whose art style is as beautiful as it is technically impressive, but Horizon: Zero Dawn definitely falls into that sparsely crowded category.

MARIO + RABBIDS: KINGDOM BATTLE

How do you bring the worlds of Mario and the Rabbids together? How do you mesh them into a single, cohesive whole? A vibrant and colourful visual palette, ingenious character design, and an incredible attention to detail- that’s how. The idea of properly bringing the two worlds together may have seemed outlandish a few months ago, but Ubisoft’s Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle handles that task expertly. It blends the two distinct worlds and their contrasting personalities so expertly, it’s now become hard to imagine why people were even skeptical about it in the first place.

PERSONA 5

Literally every nook and cranny of Persona 5 is jam-packed with visual flair. The bold art style of Persona 5 manifests itself in every pixel of the game, from its character design and dungeons to even things as simple as its menus or, hell, the fonts it uses for its text. Even something as basic as the screen you see every time a battle ends is like nothing we have ever seen in any RPG. This is a game that oozes funk and personality for the entirety of its 90 hour run, and it does so with supreme confidence.

NIOH

Nioh is a game of contrasting tones. On the face of it, it’s a decidedly grim and gritty experience, in vein of a typical Soulsborne experience, but it’s also a game that revels in refusing to take itself too seriously. That contrasting nature manifests itself in the game’s art style as well. In Nioh, authenticity meets a fantasy-fuelled take on feudal Japan. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the gloriously memorable and over the top interpretations of classical Japanese monsters and mythological creatures. It’s a striking look, to say the least, and one that melds realism with imagination expertly.

XENOBLADE CHRONICLES 2

In true Monolith Soft fashion, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 has the capacity to make you stare at your screen and the wonders being displayed on it for minutes on end. The world of Alrest is a breathtakingly beautiful one, and every location you visit stands out in memory long after you’ve moved on to the next one. The game is full of beautiful, sweeping vistas and majestic structures looming in the distance, making you want to explore, just for the sake of exploring- and a large part of that is thanks to its incredible art style. It’s semi-cel-shaded style does wonders too, because while it’s clear that the game is lacking from a technical point of view, you just know that its visuals are still going to hold up well years from now.

PYRE

By this point, we’ve come to expect a certain standard of visual quality from games by indie developer Supergiant, and fortunately enough, Pyre doesn’t disappoint. In fact, it exceeds expectations. It’s a game that is full of life and colour, all of which is thanks to its sharp and vibrant visual style. It’s hand-drawn style assets are beautiful to look at, the character design is pleasantly unusual, while its more abstract style helps lend a certain distinct flavour to the game’s environments. Pyre a game that looks gorgeous and alien at the same time, in a manner that just sucks you in right from the moment the it kicks off.

HOLLOW KNIGHT

There’s something about Hollow Knight’s clean, crisp visuals style that immediately attracts the eye. It doesn’t try to dazzle you with an explosion of colour, nor does it present you with ambitious scenes of epic scope in an attempt to make you gasp. It’s unconcerned with making any kind of an in-your-face visual statement, and that boldness and simplicity is exactly what elevates its art style to another level. The places you visit in the game are rendered with confidence, in a manner that is both subtle and effective at the same time. You don’t often find games that go down that route, especially not ones that do it well, and we cherish Hollow Knight all the more for it.

WINNER- PERSONA 5

This was a category that could have easily been won by any of our ten nominees, but ultimately, we just had to pick Persona 5. This is a game that can best be described as an absolute treat for the eyes, a game with a sense of style like no other. It’s like an masterfully illustrated comic book in motion, and perhaps the best use of an anime-like art style we have ever seen in any video game. Atlus have clearly worked incredibly hard on making sure that every aspect of the game is bound together by a cohesive and memorable artistic flair, even in things that other games in the genre so often choose to ignore, and that is something they deserve a lot of praise for. No matter what you’re doing in Persona 5, whether it’s dungeon crawling or roaming about a city or even looking at menus, you will be visually impressed. Persona 5 is a stylistic attack on the senses in the most amazing way possible.

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.

We got plenty of good soundtracks in games this year, and here in this feature, we’re going to talk about a few of what we felt were the best of the best, before moving on to give our Best Music of the Year award to the one game that stood tall above all its competitors. So without further ado, here are GamingBolt’s nominees for the best music in a game this year.

PERSONA 5

An excellent soundtrack is one of the things people expect most from a Persona game, and Persona 5 delivers what is probably the best soundtrack in the series (though we’re pretty sure scores of Persona 3 and 4 fans will be up in arms about this statement). It’s acid jazz brand of music contributes to the game’s incredible sense of style in a major, major way. From nondescript tracks that accompany the most mundane activities in the game to major pieces that play in the background during some of the biggest set piece moments, the music of Persona 5 can make you feel like you’re truly part of the on-screen action like few other games can.

NIER: AUTOMATA 

Keiichi Okabe has been composing some brilliant music for the Nier series for a long time now, but he truly outdid himself with Nier: Automata. The game’s music perfectly encapsulates everything good about the game itself- it’s weird, it’s bold, it’s wildly eccentric, and it’s this exact blend of variety that makes it so darn good. Very few soundtracks are capable of making players stop playing and actually put down their controllers, just so they can listen to the music in the background, but Nier: Automata’s soundtrack is definitely that good.

THE EVIL WITHIN 2

A good soundtrack is probably more of a requirement in horror games than it is in any other genre of video games, which is you shouldn’t understate just how good the music in The Evil Within 2 is. In a year where so many games have had some truly excellent music, the quality of The Evil Within 2’s soundtrack has kind of been swept under the rug, and we feel that’s a little unfair. From slow, moody scores that accentuate moments of looming horror and tension to the louder, blaring tracks that make the truly scary moments that much scarier, The Evil Within 2 features some of the best music we’ve heard in a survival horror game in the last few years.

THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: BREATH OF THE WILD

Though it’s used much more sparsely than what you’d expect from a game of this franchise, Breath of the Wild has an incredible soundtrack- one that, rather than being as orchestral as previous Zelda soundtracks, chooses instead to mostly use the piano. It is a soundtrack that is the perfect companion for the kind of game Breath of the Wild is- a game about discovery and exploration, but also a game about fighting against a malevolent, insurmountable evil. From new tracks that will go down as some of the best this series has ever featured to remixes and new takes on fan favourites from previous entries in the series, there’s truly something for everyone here.

DESTINY 2

There was plenty that Bungie got wrong with Destiny 2, but the one aspect of the game that they managed to nail totally was its soundtrack. It was almost surprising, how good the game’s music was. Destiny 2 is undoubtedly a marked improvement over its predecessor in terms of its narrative and storytelling, and a large part of that boils down to the game’s music. Even during moments that should have fallen flat due to shoddy writing or poorly directed cutscenes, the soundtrack managed to deliver the emotional punches. Destiny 2 continues the long tradition of Bungie games with excellent music.

WINNER- THE EVIL WITHIN 2

This wasn’t an easy to choice to make, but it was one that, after careful deliberation, we just had to go with. The Evil Within 2’s soundtrack isn’t as good as it is because of conventional reasons, such an any particular tracks that stand out in memory or you just can’t stop humming (though there are a few of those in there too). What makes the soundtrack so good is how perfectly is manages to capture the atmosphere, the spirit, the tone of the game. The Evil Within 2 is psychological horror in its purest form, dotted intermittently with in-your-face jumpscares, and throughout the entire ride, the soundtrack does a perfect job of conveying all those things through music. It doesn’t matter whether Sebastian is mourning the loss of someone he knows, or whether he’s fumbling to reload his weapon while a walking nightmare rushes toward him to deal a killing blow, or whether he’s holding his breath and walking through a dark corridor in anticipation of what may or may not be around the corner, the music in The Evil Within 2 captures the game’s mood perfectly the entire time. When a game’s music is as much responsible for building atmosphere as the game itself is, you just know it’s top-notch.

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.

Deciding which game had the best narrative this year was no easy task, though, considering just how many excellent interactive stories we got to be a part of, but we did it nonetheless. We’re going to take a look at GamingBolt’s nominees for the best video game narrative of 2017, before finally revealing the deserving winner. But though only one game can truly win in this category, the excellent of all the runners-up simply cannot be ignored.

Without further ado, we present to you GamingBolt’s nominees for the best story of 2017.

WHAT REMAINS OF EDITH FINCH

What Remains of Edith Finch isn’t your conventional game or story in any sense of the word. The heart of the game lies not in one single story, but several smaller ones, all of which come together to convey overall themes of death and loss, and it presents each of these stories with a surprising amount of confidence. It plays with storytelling conventions of video games in unique and interesting ways, and continues to deliver strong stories unrelentingly, each of which will stay with you long after you’re done with them. And though it’s an inherently sad game, full of heart-breaking moments, it’s also a game that will make you smile, a game that will make you glad that you got to spend the little time that you could with the characters it portrays. What Remains of Edith Finch is not the best game you’ll ever play, since it admittedly has issues that cannot be ignored, but if you look at it simply as a story, it’s hard not to take your hat off to its sheer brilliance.

INJUSTICE 2

Injustice 2 really is a dream come true for DC fans in every sense of the word, but it its also very surprising how strong its story is- that’s just not what you usually expect from a fighter. And in spite of that, Injustice 2 manages to deliver strongly on that front, in addition to being a benchmark in quality for its genre as well. It has an over-the-top and bombastic narrative, pulling in beloved characters from all corners of the DC multiverse, and it does it all so well. From pop culture icons such as Batman, Superman, and the Flash to relatively less popular but still fiercely loved characters such as Green Arrow, and Braniac, Injustice 2’s massive cast of characters has them all, and each of them is written and portrayed with great style. It also helps that the way the game tells its story is just top-notch, with some of the flashiest, most entertaining cutscenes we’ve ever seen. For all these things and more, Injustice 2 is a strong contender to win GamingBolt’s best story of 2017 award.

ASSASSIN’S CREED: ORIGINS

Assassin’s Creed Origins’ story shows the kind of laser sharp focus and single-minded drive that the series had been moving away from over the last few years. Rather than being bogged down in global political intricacies and modern conspiracy theories, Origins is, above anything else, a deeply personal tale of revenge. Sure, it still tells large-scale stories about the fall of the Egyptian empire, and the origins of the Assassins Brotherhood, among other things, and it does a pretty good job of those too- but it is blessedly unconcerned about so much of the stuff that had started to become something of a burden for the franchise. It never forgets that, in spite of all the shadowy global conspiracies, it is mostly about Bayek’s quest for vengeance. After the convoluted mess the Assassin’s Creed franchise had become over the last few years, Origins’ unwillingness to fall into those same traps and its focused simplicity are a very refreshing change of pace.

PREY

Arkane Studios’ re-imagining of the Prey series gets praised for a lot of things, but one of the things you don’t often see it get praised for is its story- and we think that’s a little surprising. Prey’s story isn’t the most complex, nor the most ambitious, even in comparison to some of the games we’ve nominated in this category itself. And yet it’s unbelievably engaging, and captivating in a way that few stories in video games are. The space station Talos I is a haunting place, full of unreal environments and crawling with terrifying enemies. Atmosphere has to be the game’s story’s biggest strength, because when you’re wandering the corridors of the space station, which have been realized so convincingly and so vividly, you can’t help but feel on edge. It’s also worth mentioning that the choices you make as Morgan Yu can often have an actual impact on the way the story unfolds, making you even more invested in the narrative. Prey’s isn’t an excellent story in the most conventional sense, but it is one that will keep you thoroughly intrigued from start to finish.

DANGANRONPA V3: KILLING HARMONY

At this point, people pretty much know what to expect from a DanganRonpa story, and DanganRonpa V3 delivers on all fronts exactly the way we expected and hoped it would. Though the game’s narrative is largely disconnected from the story we’d been following over the previous two instalments, it is every bit as outlandish, over-the-top, and ridiculous we wanted it to be. DanganRonpa V3 is a game that fluctuates between being grizzly and comical, going from being laugh-out-loud funny one moment to ripping your heart out with depressing twists and turns the next. Like its predecessors, it’s helped along the way by a wonderful cast of characters – each with their own personal quirks and charms – and some of the best writing you will ever see in a video game. It’s fair to say that a visual novel like DanganRonpa is only as good as its ability to keep players hooked to the narrative, and thankfully enough, in that area, DanganRonpa V3 delivers in spades.

DIVINITY: ORIGINAL SIN II

Too many games in today’s day and age claim to have a story that shapes itself based on the choices that players make, but very few do it as well as Divnity: Origins Sin II. Almost every decision you make has an impact on how subsequent evens pan out, every dialogue option you choose has weight, every branching path leads to something truly different. Divinity II lets you craft your own stories in a way not a lot of other games do, so that the tale the game tells really feels like one of your own making. On top of that, it boasts of rich and riveting lore, a fascinating setting that is all too easy to get lost in, and a wonderful cast of incredibly written characters. Even the small, seemingly insignificant stories Divinity II tells, the one that have no impact or bearing on the larger narrative, feel special, making it seem like extra love and care has gone into crafting every aspect of the game. It’s a wonderful achievement not just for storytelling in video games, but for video games in general.

XENOBLADE CHRONICLES 2

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a return to story-focused role-playing games for Monolith Soft, after the much more open-ended Xenoblade Chronicles X on the Wii U, and what a spectacular comeback it was. It has an unbelievable sense of scale, a winding and captivating story brimming with shocking twists and stunning revelations. Its setting, Alrest, is an inherently beautiful world, one that is as much fun to explore as it is gorgeous to look at. The cast of characters is vibrant and colourful, full of personality and charm. And on top of all those things, in typical Monolith Soft fashion, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is never afraid to ask philosophical questions of deeper meaning. It constantly creates riveting concepts and introduces new plot threads, and it explores them all with surprising ingenuity. The game is, admittedly, occasionally let down by its tendency to resort to typical JRPG storytelling tropes, but such minor issues are quite easy to ignore in light of how accomplished Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is in how it tells the bulk of its grand tale.

PERSONA 5

Persona 5’s is a story about trust and friendship, a story about finding yourself, a story about righting the wrongs in the human society. It’s filled with characters we simply fell in love with, with conflicted antagonists who have stayed with us even months after we finished playing the game, with messages that ring true in our hearts in so many ways. Like its predecessors, Persona 5 manages to strike the perfect balance between simply being a story about teenagers going to high school, and being a story about much larger issues on a global scale. It starts out as a thrilling tale of vigilantes, and escalates till the very end, where it crescendoes with stupendous ambition. Given Atlus’ track record with previous games in the Persona sub-series and the larger Shin Megami Tensei franchise, almost everyone expected Persona 5 to have an excellent narrative. Unbelievably, though, Persona 5 manages to exceeded even those lofty expectations, and in more ways than one.

NIER: AUTOMATA

It’s rare to find a game that is incredibly whimsical and has incredible depth, both at the same time, but that is exactly what Nier: Automata is. The game is never afraid to embrace its quirks, never afraid to go into the realm of deep philosophy, never afraid to hit you with hard-hitting and unpredictable twists and revelations. The world of Nier: Automata is a captivating one, sure, but its the characters that inhabit that world that truly make the game the masterpiece in storytelling that it is. It’s a game that is unequivocally devoted to telling the story it wants to tell, and it does so with great aplomb. Every time you finish Nier: Automata, you learn something new about the world, about the characters, and you’re given deeper contextualization for things in a way that makes you appreciate the story even more. It boasts the kind of crazy, unhinged genius you usually expect from a Yoko Taro game, and it has to be one of the finest stories we’ve seen in video games over the last few years.

HORIZON: ZERO DAWN

Ambition. Escalation. Ingenuity. Such are the words one associates with the narrative of Horizon: Zero Dawn. It takes the concept of a post-apcalypse and uses it in wonderfully innovative ways. It introduces concepts that sound extremely cool on paper, such as mechanical dinosaurs, but then actually gives them weight and meaning through its story. It builds a vivid, fascinating world full of flavour and personality, and it makes you actually care about it. In its opening few hours, Horizon: Zero Dawn‘s narrative doesn’t seem like it’ll amount to anything we haven’t seen a hundred times already, but as the game progresses, it peels back layers upon layers to reveal some shocking revelations, all of which come together to build an extremely imaginative setting that is rich with lore and history. Guerrilla Games’ writing has to be commended- they weave an intricate web of twists and turns, all the while having thought of even the tiniest little details, to the point that it becomes almost impossible to poke any real holes in the game’s story. Looking at all its accomplishments, both in terms of storytelling and outside of it, it’s a little hard to believe that Horizon is Guerrilla’s first game in the RPG genre. It truly is a magnificent achievement.

WINNER- PERSONA 5

While deciding on who the winner would be between our ten nominees for the best story of 2017, it ultimately came down to two games- Horizon: Zero Dawn and Persona 5. And though both stood tall in this category, Persona 5 managed to emerge victorious. And that mostly boils down to one single fact- Persona 5 has an excellent story, yes, one that manages to grab your attention fairly quickly and doesn’t let go until the very last second. But more importantly than that, it is a story that has a very human heart. It features a wonderful cast of characters, one that, by the time you’re done with the 90 hour long story, you’ll truly look at as friends and comrades. It boasts of excellent writing, writing that manages to deftly balance a humorous and charming high school drama story, as well as a darker tale of conspiracies and duels between higher powers. It is a game that knows not to take itself too seriously all the time, but also one that isn’t afraid of tackling challenging topics, such as abuse and real issues that plague even our real world’s society. It’s a game that will make you think, laugh, cry, and cheer, a game that develops all its characters and narrative threads with such excellence that, even during moments when the pace feels like its slogging, you’ll want to stick with it and see things through. On top of all that, it does all of this with an incredible sense of style and panache, so that even if you’re not looking for any deeper meanings or hidden truths and are simply looking for a good, fun time, you won’t leave disappointed. Is it perfect? No. But it’s ridiculously compelling over a massive run time of one hundred hours. If nothing else, that’s an achievement in and of itself.

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.

We’re going to take a look at the best looking games of the year, first listing out fifteen nominees that could have won this category any other year, before finally moving on to the sixteenth game- the game that we feel had the best visuals of any game in 2017.

Before we get started, please take note- while picking these sixteen games, our primary focus was on technical achievement above anything else, rather than pure artistic excellence. So while games such as Persona 5 and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, for instance, are undoubtedly gorgeous to look at, they (and some others) just couldn’t figure into our final sixteen, owing to the very nature of our criteria for this category.

With that out of the way, let’s get right into it.

INJUSTICE 2

Injustice 2 is without a doubt one of the best fighters to have been released in the last few years. And that quality went beyond just the content- Injustice 2 was an excellent looking game, with great character models across the board, excellently directed cutscenes, and beautiful, flashy looking fights, which all came together to make for a delightfully bombastic package.

Which is why deciding which games were the absolute best of the best is so hard this year. Sure, it’s hard every year, but this year it was even more so. Even so, somehow, after intense debates, votes, and discussions, we at GamingBolt managed to do just that. Here, today, we’re going to take a look at what we decided were our favourite 25 games of the year, listing them out in order from #25, right down to our Game of the Year 2017.

We all know what we’re really here for, so without further ado, let’s get right into it.

#25. CRASH BANDICOOT N.SANE TRILOGY

Developed By: Vicarious Visions| Available On: PS4 | Read Our Review

It’s a little hard to believe that three games that are by now twenty years old are still as much fun today as they were back when they first launched. It’s a testament to both, the original excellence in game design by Naughty Dog, and the excellent remastering work done by Vicarious Visions. Crash Bandicoot N.Sane Trilogy is an absolute blast, a three-game romp of jumping, spinning, and collecting Wampa fruit that is helped along the way with beautiful updated visuals and an ability to be challenging enough to make you want to rip your hair out.

No, but seriously- what a year it’s been, chock-full of games that can easily be described as not only the best this generation has had to offer, but also as some of the best games we’ve ever played, period. But it all can’t be good. Like any other year, 2017 had its fair share of disappointments, of controversies, and, obviously enough, its fair share of horrendous releases. We’ve spent plenty of time over the past twelve months talking about all the good things this year has given us in terms of gaming experiences, but now it’s time to talk about the bad stuff.

So without further ado, we present to you GamingBolt’s nominees for the worst game of 2017.

TROLL AND I

Troll and I at least has to be praised for being a game that had some pretty unique ideas, and for having some pretty lofty ambitions. But that is exactly what works so badly against it. It tries too many things at the same time, and sadly enough, it doesn’t succeed at any of them. You can see that the ideas it has are often interesting on paper, but the game itself is a confused mess that is riddled with pervasive issues, such as obnoxious glitches and terrible voice work.

SYBERIA III

Syberia III has a fairly interesting setting, which is made even more interesting thanks to some decent art work. Unfortunately though, in almost every other area that actually counts, the game falters quite drastically. Syberia III is bogged down by technical issues (the awful lip syncing immediately comes to mind), while the stilted dialogue and uninteresting script don’t do the game any favours either. The game’s been awaited by fans of its predecessors for some time now, which is why it’s a real shame that the wait has ended in such bitter disappointment.

1-2 SWITCH

In all fairness, no one really expected 1-2-Switch to be amongst the best games of the year or anything. When you really get down to it, it’s hardly even a game. It wasn’t supposed to be anything more than a collection of mini-games that served as an advert for some of the Switch’s most unique features and functionalities. Somehow, though, 1-2 Switch manages to fall short of even these meagre expectations. It’s nothing more than a half-baked attempt at making something mildly fun, with not nearly enough content to keep anyone interested for long.

DYING REBORN 

With a name as silly as Dying: Reborn, you really wouldn’t expect this game to amount to much. Surprisingly enough, though, the game actually makes a decent first impression. In its opening few minutes, Dying Reborn’s atmosphere does a decent job of pulling you into the experience, and the escape room concept is an inherently exciting one. Sadly, it never manages to move beyond that, and ends up feeling repetitive and unfinished. It often almost feels like a pre-alpha, or a small demo that could be used as a pitch for a bigger and better idea.

LIFE OF BLACK TIGER

Even if technological advancements were taken back to twenty years ago, Life of Black Tiger would still be a horrendous game. It looks bad (as you can see), it lacks even the most basic animation transitions, and it’s full of visual bugs and technical glitches. But a game doesn’t have to be judged solely on its visuals, right? Maybe it plays well? Well, it frigging doesn’t. Life of Black Tiger is bogged down by shoddy and unresponsive controls, poorly designed empty maps, and a basic concept that has zero potential for becoming anything interesting.

VROOM IN THE NIGHT SKY

One cannot possibly go overboard while criticizing this game. Vroom in the Night Sky looks like it was hurriedly put together in a few hours using decade old assets and then made available to the masses without any concern about what it might do to their mental well-being. And for all we know, that may very well be exactly what happened. It’s that bad. Don’t play it. Don’t even look at it.

MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS: MEGA BATTLE

What a mighty terrible game. It’s mega shitty. These horrible puns are the best things that have ever been associated with Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Mega Battle. That should give you a fair idea of how bad this game is. It’s lacking in the areas that you’d usually expect most from in a Mighty Morphin Power Rangers game, that being corny and cheesy humour, while repetitive gameplay, poorly executed mechanics and generally boring combat all make for a game that will disappoint you, even if you go in expecting nothing good.

RESERVOIR DOGS: BLOODY DAYS

You don’t really expect much from games that are making use of licenses to begin with, so our expectations from Reservoir Dogs: Bloody Days weren’t exactly sky high. Predictably enough, the game ended up being exactly as underwhelming as we thought it would be. It has some interesting ideas, sure, and at times it can definitely be a mildly enjoyable experience, but it just feels half-assed and incomplete in everything it attempts. From its characters and technical aspects to its boring, repetitive mission design, Bloody Days is by no means a game that you ever need to try out.

DE-FORMERS

De-formers, despite the few rare moments of fun, and despite having an admittedly good soundtrack, is ultimately a broken game with terrible shooting mechanics and some bland level design. It’s not a game that you could rightly recommend to anyone, and it truly makes you wonder why a developer like Ready at Dawn is wasting its talents and resources on something like this.

DOUBLE DRAGON IV

Double Dragon IV at least has to be commended for having a very specific vision and sticking to it. The game is dedicated to being an ode to 1980s style brawlers, but sadly enough, it takes that dedication a bit too far, to the point where it actually becomes detrimental to the overall experience. Double Dragon IV makes use of mechanics and game design practices that haven’t aged all that well- these are ways of playing a game that have faded away for very good reason, and yet the game bafflingly insists on sticking with them. It’s a real shame, too, because you can’t help but feel that underneath all the excessive nostalgia and obtuse game design, there might actually be an enjoyable game in there. It never comes to fruition, sadly enough, and what we’re left with is a pretty terrible game.

GAMINGBOLT’S WORST GAME OF 2017- VROOM IN THE NIGHT SKY

Vroom in the Night Sky as an inexcusably terrible game. Vroom in the Night Sky is a boring, broken game with an asinine and ridiculous concept, and it’s no damn fun at all. Even its name is a disgrace. It makes us questions our own existence, and not in a good way. Vroom in the Night Sky has no right to exist, and you shouldn’t recommend it to anyone but your most hated enemies- maybe not even them. If it even can be called a game, then it is, without a doubt, the worst game of 2017.

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.

Lawbreakers

In a way, you have to feel bad for Lawbreakers. This was Gears of War creator Cliff Bleszinski’s return to the games industry after a long sabbatical. It was supposed to be the perfect union of hero shooter and arena shooter. Sadly, Lawbreakers was handicapped out of the gate with a market dominated by Overwatch. The actual game had a paucity of content with poor matchmaking and weird balance issues. Of course, the high skill ceiling, lack of personality to its heroes and outright lameness didn’t help either.

Star Wars Battlefront 2

On the surface, it seemed like Electronic Arts had learned its lesson with the first Star Wars Battlefront. People don’t like expansion passes? They’re gone! People want a campaign? They get it and you get to play as the Empire! More maps, proper class loadouts, space battles – it almost seemed like a dream come true. Of course, in true EA fashion, it turned into a nightmare. The campaign was barely worth experiencing. The game’s loot boxes completely ruined progression, leaving the min-maxing of loadouts to random luck of the draw.

Friday The 13th: The Video Game

Friday The 13^th: The Video Game suffered from many of the same expectations as Star Wars Battlefront but on a smaller scale. It was the first time we’d get to properly play as Jason Voorhees. With an asymmetrical multiplayer approach, everything seemed like it was on track even with some delays. Sadly, the actual game was riddled with bugs and server issues that made it nigh unplayable at launch. Though such issues were resolved later, Friday The 13^th: The Video Game was still just a fairly okay game and not the murder-a-thon we expected.

Mass Effect Andromeda

Mass Effect Andromeda was doomed from the EA Access trial with horrible facial animations, poorly written dialogue, glitches, an odd set-up and strange design choices. The full game was worse with severe performance issues, game breaking bugs and glitches, a total waste of a new setting, the squandering of any potential that the premise could have had and don’t even get us started on the co-op multiplayer mode. Mass Effect Andromeda’s combat was up to snuff but everything else makes us think that the series died just so we could have an amazing year of games. Was it worth it? Hmm.

Marvel vs Capcom Infinite

A hilariously bad story mode, low-rent roster, lack of additional features, idiotic new mechanics and terrible graphics – at this rate, you’d wonder why we had any expectations from Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite. Well, this was the follow-up to the critically acclaimed Marvel vs. Capcom 3 and to a series that we thought was generally dead and gone. To think that we went from “Take you for a ride!” to this nonsense is just sad.

Need for Speed: Payback

Electronic Arts just couldn’t catch a break in 2017. It’s not like we had too much to hope for Need for Speed Payback until its reveal. Over the months, we thought its open world approach, introduction of Heists and three playable characters might finally offer something cool. Expectations were tempered to say the least. Unfortunately, as with Star Wars Battlefront 2, EA ruined it with Speed Cards that could be earned either in-game or with microtransactions. Again, it’s not like the game is suddenly better without microtransactions – customizing your vehicle this way is simply asinine and completely up to RNG. The story was horrendous, the open world didn’t offer much by way of fulfilling gameplay and for an industry that needs microtransactions to fund triple A development, Payback didn’t look particularly good either.

Sonic Forces

When Sonic Forces was first announced, there was cautious optimism. A sequel to Sonic Generations with some kind of war setting? Hurray-ish. Then it was revealed that Sonic would be working alongside all his critter friends. Then all his past enemies appeared as well. And for some reason, Sega thought to throw a customizable avatar. All these bells and whistles aside, Sonic Forces takes everything Generations did right with its gameplay and messes it up. Present Sonic is meh and the Avatar levels are boring. The experience is underwhelming at best and disappointingly idiotic at worst.

NBA 2K18

NBA 2K titles used to walk a fine line between love and hate. Virtual Currency has been an epidemic for a while but the games were generally well built on the basis of their gameplay and campaign. NBA 2K18 looked like it would be even better with its Playgrounds and Career mode and whatnot. Then, like most everything else this year, it was ruined with microtransactions. Customization options are severely gated by Virtual Currency and the game would reward very little of it, pushing you towards microtransactions even more. What could have been a great game is ultimately a decent one that demands way too much money from you past the initial $60.

WWE 2K18

Visual Concepts and Yuke’s haven’t really given us much in terms of quality wrestling for the past few years but past WWE 2K games were at least somewhat decent. WWE 2K18 beats that streak, mixing in a number of amazingly stupid glitches along with a nonsensical MyCareer mode. Though the loot boxes included aren’t purchased with real money, they still severely limit customization and lean towards RNG luck than any kind of actual freedom. This year’s iteration is the best-looking yet but that can only get you so far when everything else is so fundamentally bad.

Styx: Shards of Darkness

Styx: Master of Shadows wasn’t exactly the next Assassin’s Creed (which doesn’t mean much since the current Assassin’s Creed is so different). However, it offered a nice little offbeat fantasy stealth adventure that players could sink their teeth into. Styx: Shards of Darkness sadly failed to build on that. Level design was better this time around but instead of paying homage to the old-school while streamlining gameplay elements, the game stubbornly stuck to it. Stealth is very easy to cheese, which makes you wonder what the point even is and the humour just doesn’t click.

Winner: Star Wars Battlefront 2

It started with the realization that Star Cards could upset the balance of gameplay in multiplayer. Fans were irate that a $60 release introduced pay to win elements. Naturally, DICE responded and promised changes. However, once Star Wars Battlefront 2 hit the early trial stage, the costs of various heroes proved to be the tipping point. The “sense of pride and accomplishment” comment by EA’s community management team became the most downvoted comment in Reddit history. It eventually snowballed into microtransactions being removed and EA experiencing severe falls in its stock prices.

But that’s not what made Star Wars Battlefront 2 a disappointment. It’s the fact that the campaign is a few hours long and fails to deliver on its promise of an Empire state of view. It’s the fact that the multiplayer would suffer severe rubber banding and latency issues, making matches unplayable. It’s the fact that progression makes no sense and is so heavily gated by randomness that you’ll probably never get rewards for the classes you enjoy the most.

Star Wars Battlefront 2 is the most disappointing game of 2017 because EA took what should have been a winner with its graphics, presentation and sound design and utterly ruined it out of pure greed. That it accomplished this even after Star Wars Battlefront (2015) was so heavily panned is remarkably sad.

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.

Nominees:

The Last of Us: Part 2 – Excessive Violence

Anyone who’s played the first game knows that this universe isn’t all hugs and happy feelings. However, it was hard not to be a little uncomfortable when The Last of Us: Part 2 was showcased at Paris Games Week with a woman having her arm broken and another being hanged. The trailer would attract controversy for its portrayal of violence against women but Sony’s Jim Ryan defended it, stating that the game was made by adults “to be played by adults.”

Detroit: Become Human – Domestic Abuse

As if offering a preview of the violence to come with The Last of Us: Part 2, Quantic Dream showcased Detroit: Become Human at the same conference. The demo itself saw a little girl being abused by her father (who can even kill her at one point), the inherent reveal of him killing her mother and Kara’s role to play in all this. Needless to say, it garnered tons of controversy for all kinds of reasons. Of course, creator David Cage defended the scene and really, you can go either way on the whole thing if you really wanted.

Star Wars Battlefront 2 – Pay To Win

Attempting to recap this whole saga of blunders would be even more painful than narrating the prequel trilogy. Basically, EA revealed that Star Cards could be acquired in Star Wars Battlefront 2 through loot boxes. Players were angry over the pay to win implications since loot boxes could be purchased with real money. Changes were made and the EA/Origin Access trial went live. The pay to win problems remained and on top of this, the rate for earning credits and unlocking heroes was far too high. EA made further changes. The backlash continued. EA disabled microtransactions for the time being. In short, this whole controversy capped off a horrible year for EA.

Forza Motorsport 7 – Loot Boxes

It wasn’t so much that Turn 10 Studios’ had implemented microtransactions at launch for Forza Motorsport 7. In fact, it hadn’t, though they could very well come later like with previous games. No, Forza Motorsport 7 drew controversy for its inclusion of loot boxes which could contain cars, cosmetics, race mods. It was still possible to earn cars with enough credits and XP but even that highlighted the VIP Pass changes which no longer conferred permanent double XP for each race or the lack of XP bonuses for higher Drivatar difficulties. The former was thankfully rectified by Turn 10 though the game remains controversial for its loot boxes.

Middle-Earth: Shadow of War – Loot Boxes

If the loot box epidemic wasn’t enough, Middle-Earth: Shadow of War revealed that it would package Orc followers and gear in loot boxes. It’s worth noting that you can still level up, find loot and recruit followers by playing the game normally. However, when you reach the end-game Shadow Wars activity – which is the gate way to the true ending, mind you – those high tier followers and gear really become valuable. This further incentivizes either buying loot boxes or pouring hours of grinding into the game. And if gear and followers are abundant enough, why have loot boxes at all? It also doesn’t help that the Shadow Wars portion is monotonous as hell.

Visceral Games Shut Down

Electronic Arts hasn’t exactly had the best year but it did have some intriguing releases to look forward to, like Visceral Games’ untitled Star Wars title. With Uncharted series director and writer Amy Hennig at the helm, what could go wrong? As it turns out, everything as the announcement was made of the project being shifting to another EA studio and Visceral Games’ closure. Though many assumed that the shift was done to make it more of a “games as a service” title, reports from Kotaku’s Jason Schreier indicated that the game has had development problems for a while now. Either way, Visceral Games was no more and it sucked.

Mass Effect Andromeda’s Development Issues

Mass Effect: Andromeda, Bioware Montreal’s first full-fledged video game, was another EA disaster. Upon release, Andromeda was soundly mocked for its story-telling, glitches, quest design, world design, performance issues, awful multiplayer balancing and much, much more. However, once again thanks to Kotaku’s Jason Schreier, reports began to surface of development troubles. Along with problems working with Frostbite, the studio didn’t have a clear direction or premise. The game itself was put together within 19 months at best and unfortunately, it showed. Bioware Montreal is now more or less a skeleton studio while the Mass Effect franchise is on the back-burner.

Persona 5 Streaming Controversy

What’s the best way to avoid spoilers leaking for your huge new role playing game (which has been available in Japan for a while anyway)? Why, lay out guidelines for streamers and YouTubers to follow. If they fail to follow this, issue content strikes. This was the approach that Atlus took to avoid spoilers for Persona 5’s story being leaked. Needless to say, it backfired tremendously.

Sony’s Approach to Cross Play

We’ve been hearing about cross platform play for a while now especially as Microsoft announced its initiative for cross-play through Xbox Live. These goals would slowly become reality as cross-play with mobile, Nintendo Switch and Xbox users was announced for Minecraft. Sony wasn’t too interested to join the party and made several remarks disparaging the concept…despite having cross platform play with Rocket League on the PS4 and PC. While Sony haven’t backed down on the same, not going with cross-play hasn’t exactly harmed their bottom line either. It is what it is.

PUBG Dev Not Happy With Fortnite: Battle Royale

Imagine a relationship between Epic Games and Bluehole Studio, the latter having developed the monstrously successful PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. Bluehole licensed Unreal Engine 4 from Epic Games. Suddenly, Epic comes out with Fortnite: Battle Royale, it’s own spin on the genre and references PUBG in the marketing. Suffice to say, Bluehole wasn’t happy about the similarities. While it didn’t pursue any legal action, citing that it doesn’t mind other companies trying their own versions of Battle Royale, it’s certainly a little too protective of a concept that’s not wholly its own.

Winner: Star Wars Battlefront 2 – Pay to Win

The fact that EA shoehorned microtransactions into Star Wars Battlefront 2 to provide players with advantages in multiplayer was bad enough. The fact that the credit costs for heroes was so high because of a “sense of pride and accomplishment” was simply awe-inspiring in its lack of thought. However, the backlash continued after the microtransactions were removed because gating any kind of competitive progress behind loot boxes is preposterous. There’s also the fact that for all this talk of triple A games becoming more expensive to produce, Star Wars Battlefront 2 still had a number of problems. The single-player campaign was woefully short and awful, multiplayer was buggy and so many things – from hero battles to maps – needed more work.

Still, seeing this kind of sweeping change and pushback against loot boxes was simply unprecedented for the industry and a warning sign for numerous publishers. To that end, Star Wars Battlefront 2 and its pay to win trappings is the Biggest Controversy of 2017.

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.