Best games of 2019, thus far

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As the title says. Mine are:

Resident Evil 2. Everything about this game feels like it's been refined as far as possible. It feels like the developers found the appropriate scope by taking the Resident Evil remake on Gamecube and implementing the modern third-person control scheme in such a way that it complements the original vision. I think this is one of the best games ever made.

Sekiro. To be honest, this game is massively flawed. I've played through it over ten times, so I feel qualified to say that this game isn't perfect, and it's why it isn't taking top position. The level design sucks. Personally, a big judgement I make for these games is: how much of the game is actually worth playing VS how much do you skip over. Sekiro has a lot of content that isn't worth playing. In fact, I skip over most of the game on subsequent playthroughs, because I know it isn't fun. Lite stealth isn't fun, and the base combat is too simple. Then again, the bosses are like Dark Souls except with more things to pay attention to; the final boss is one of the most finely crafted challenges that I have ever faced.

Most of the games I've played this year are shoot 'em ups, visual novels, or Metroidvania style action platformers. Mostly I've been playing older titles. This is everything I've played that came out in 2019.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
Chaos;Child
Etrian Odyssey Nexus
Higurashi When They Cry Hou - Chapter 7 Minagoroshi
Muv-Luv photonflowers*
Touhou Fantastic Danmaku Festival 2
Touhou 17 - Wily Beast and Weakest Creature
Touhou Chaos of Black Dragon
Touhou Hollow Song of Birds
Touhou Luna Nights
Wargroove

Of these, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night was the best action platformer I played. It wasn't perfect, but it was a hell of a lot of fun. A throwback to the 2D Castlevania games, feeling like a sequel to Order of Ecclesia. Higurashi When They Cry Hou - Chapter 7 Minagoroshi was by far the best visual novel release. It's an exciting and tense read from start to finish, feeling like a culmination of the prior arcs with many moments of catharsis. It's one of the best entries in the series. Touhou Fantastic Danmaku Festival 2 is the best shoot 'em up I've played this year, with a lot of creativity and gorgeous visuals. None of these will probably be on any toplists at the end of the year, but there hasn't really been any large budget releases that have really caught my eye other than Sekiro, which I've yet to play.





There's a few games I'd like to get that will release later this year. Minoria and Gensokyo Night Festival are some great looking action platformers due to release soon. Ciconia When They Cry is a visual novel releasing next month, a sequel to Higurashi and Umineko. And Boneworks should release this year, a VR game coming from the developers of Hover Junkers and Duck Season. The only big budget game I'm looking forward to is Doom Eternal, based on how good the last Doom game was.

Hoping the bst are yet to come, in the form of Borderlands 3 in September and the Outer Worlds in October. Fingers crossed.

So far, My Time At Portia and Dragon Quest Builders 2

I would also say Sekiro, but I don't take as much issue with its flaws as OP. Terror is a pain, some areas can be trivialized with stealth, and the firecrackers are overpowered. That said, it has some of my favorite combat in any game. The difficulty (almost) always feels fair, and it is very rewarding when you finally get the hang of the combat system. The shinobi tools leave lots of room for experimentation and playing the game the way you want to play. The boss fights are (mostly, looking at you guardian ape rematch) amazing. As OP said, the final bosses (whichever one you get) are excellent. On top of all this, the music is superb. The game is right up there with Bloodborne for me.

Pokemon Sword and Shield
New Super Lucky's Tale
Dragon Quest XI
Dragon Quest Builders 2

Now that 2019's pretty much over, these are all the 2019 games I played and my thoughts on them.

-Beat Saber - This music rhythm game is pretty fun, but the mod content elevates this to osu! levels of greatness.
-Blasphemous - It's a difficult, macabre action platformer with methodical, timing based combat and by far the best sprite animation I've seen this year.
-Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night - One of the most fun, accessible action games I've played this year, a love letter to fans of Castlevania and a great game in its own right.
-Boneworks - It's undeniably rough around the edges, but it's bold and ambitious and flies in the face of conventions, which VR gaming has been held back by since its inception.
-Chaos;Child - A weak entry in the Science Adventure series.
-Etrian Odyssey Nexus - It's like a greatest hits of the Etrian Odyssey games. Enjoyable if you like this sort of thing, which I do, but it's basically a prettier version of the same game concepts done a million times before.
-Higurashi When They Cry Hou - Chapter 7 Minagoroshi - A riveting entry to the Higurashi visual novel series that sees many of its plot threads resolved.
-Minoria - It's a decent action platformer, but not as good as its predecessor Momodora 4.
-Muv-Luv photonflowers* - An uneven followup fan story compilation to an uneven visual novel, that like the original is at its best fantastic and at other times mediocre.
-Pistol Whip - It's a flashy, stylish, fun music rhythm game, but it's too damn physically taxing to play for more than short bursts.
-Spice & Wolf VR - It's an uninspired, redundant Spice and Wolf VR animation. It doesn't have an interesting story to tell, or any discernible character arc. But it lets me headpat Holo and brush her tail which just about redeems it.
-SOUND SHOOTING!! - Rhythm Action & 2D Shooter - Wait, what a mobile game? I hate mobile games! But this one is awesome. It's a mix of a bullet hell and a music rhythm game. The touch controls and music are perfect, and the stage structure works well for the mobile format.
-Touhou 17 - Wily Beast and Weakest Creature - It's an interesting mainline game, feels like a mix of Touhou 7 and 12 and mechanics. I love the final and extra boss designs and music, and the darker story.
-Touhou Azure Reflections - It's interesting to see the homages to its inspirations, and it's prettier than them, but it's a pretty mediocre game in itself.
-Touhou Chaos of Black Dragon - It's a fun game, I like the partner system which feels like Touhou 8's partner system, and the final boss is awesome.
-Touhou Ephemeral Unnatural Balance - It's decent, though it doesn't feel particularly fresh. It has lots of characters from the series that typically have had smaller roles to play, but I'm not a fan of how the entire game feels like a rearranged mashup of parts of Touhou games rather than anything original.
-Touhou Fantastic Danmaku Festival 2 - This might seem weird given what I said about the prior game, but this is basically a remake of Touhou 7. And I love it. Despite basically being a rearrangement of that game, it feels very inspired, with new characters, awesome arrangements of classic tracks, and reinterpretations of characters. Plus it's gorgeous, visually sumptuous.
-Touhou Hollow Song of Birds - The game is excellent, the stages and bosses inspired, the music is memorable. The only thing holding it back is its abysmal performance. Not sure why it performs so badly when it's basically low resolution sprite art with tons of assets that get reused across stages, it seems to be an issue with loading assets.
-Touhou Luna Nights - An inspired action platformer with neat time manipulation mechanics, smoothly animated sprite work and some awesome arrangements of Touhou music.
-Touhou Shoujo Tale of Beautiful Memories - Remember Super Mario RPG? This is basically that, set in the Touhou setting. It's well made, though the in game sprites could have been better.
-Wargroove - It's a very capable and polished Advance Wars clone that makes some minor variations to the formula.

I used to play the Battlefield series,
But I'm am tired of all the cheating,
So I have given them the flick,
For the time being.

Getting into Skyrim again.
Checking out some of the more obsure assignments.