Review Anna Comet's Game Awards 2024

Yes, I know it's the end of February. I needed time. And The Game Awards happening before the year is actually over is stupid. Also yes that is my name now I just haven't changed it on here yet.

BUT ANYWAY LET'S GIVE OUT SOME AWARDS!!!! I played a ton of games last year, many of which actually came out that year. So because Geoff Keighley and his show sucks I wanted to do my own awards.

Best Indie Game: Another Crab's Treasure
This one had very stiff competition with Ultros. And while I really loved both, I had to give the edge to Another Crab's Treasure because honestly, that's just the one I think about more. It's a Soulslike game, but it exchanges the dark fantasy aesthetic common in that genre for a more cartoony and heartfelt experience. The story touches on topics of ocean pollution, capitalistic greed, privilege, and unwavering determination, and it just really struck a chord with me because of this. It's also designed as an entry-level Soulslike that's not as difficult as the genre is known for, though not easy either. You're still going to die quite a bit, just not nearly as much. This turned out great for me as the genre had been something that's intrigued but also intimidated me for a while, and now that I have some level of experience maybe I can move up to something like Dark Souls III or Elden Ring. But anyway, it's very well designed across the board and has some great accessibility options to mess with if you need them. Or if you're like me and just need to tone down the damage enemies deal a bit.

Best Soundtrack: Astro Bot
Astro Bot is a phenomenal game. But I'll save that conversation for later. This section is about how great the soundtrack is. All of the music in this game is just as phenomenal as everything around it.

Best DLC: Final Fantasy XVI: The Rising Tide
Okay so I just want to get out of the way that literally the only competition this had was Pokémon Scarlet: Mochi Mayhem which was a very short epilogue for the DLC that released the year prior. But even despite that this is an incredible DLC for an incredible game. Final Fantasy XVI was already one of my favorite games of all time, and this DLC just added to that. Also Leviathan's abilities are FIRE (reverse pun intended).

Best Metroidvania: Ultros
Oh hey it's the other game that almost won Best Indie. Ultros is a fantastic Metroidvania with very interesting lore. You wake up with no memory on something called The Sarcaphogus, sort of a living space station orbiting a black hole. It's caught in a time loop, and you take it on yourself to break it so you can escape. But there's two different ways to do that. You can either violently fight your way through and destroy the cycle by force or dig deeper into what actually happened and is happening and try to spread new life. Despite what it seems, neither is treated as the "wrong" choice. It also has themes of hunting (like, the actual philosophy of hunters and how they integrate themselves into nature) and rebirth which I really enjoyed. The art style is very psychedelic and cool with lots of bright colors and abstract shapes. All in all, it's a very unique Metroidvania that unfortunately really flew under the radar and didn't get a whole lot of greater recognition, at least from what I've seen. I felt this enough to write a whole review of it on this very forum which you can go check out if you want.

Best Horror Game: Crow Country
Shockingly I actually had multiple nominees for this category. But Crow Country is easily the winner. It takes a lot of cues from PS1-era Resident Evil and Silent Hill, but played from an isometric view with horizontal camera control. To simply what the hell I just said, it's like Resident Evil but displayed as a diorama you can spin freely. It also takes place in an abandoned amusement park. How fun! The story is pretty interesting and does some cool stuff with the lore, and overall it was just a very cool and enjoyable experience.

Best Multiplayer Game: Marvel Rivals
This game is amazing. I like to describe it as Overwatch but with Marvel characters and actually good. But that description doesn't really do it justice as it's pretty different from Overwatch and other hero shooters in general. The game itself and all the characters are free without any catch which is awesome. The only thing you'd pay money for is cosmetics, and those are both really freaking good across the board and can be earned without paying any real money, though it'll take a while to build the funds. But anyway the game is just FUN. So much fun. I'm a Peni main btw. Mines are also fun.

Most Addictive Game: Balatro
I don't think I even need to explain anything here. It's Balatro. For those uninitiated and/or who live under a rock, Balatro is basically poker turned into a roguelike. You start with a standard deck of cards and need to play valid poker hands to earn enough chips to beat the blind. Sounds simple and boring. But then you have the other stuff. Jokers are the main thing and they effect the chips you can earn. There's also Planet Cards which give certain hands more base chips, and Tarot and Spectral Cards that can be used to manipulate your deck. It is easily one of the most addictive games I have ever played.

Most Disappointing Game: Mario & Luigi: Brothership
I don't really like being negative. But I do like expressing my opinion in a non-toxic manner. This is a series I adored. The third game is one of my favorite games of all time. So you can imagine my excitement when this revival was announced. I preordered it and everything because I just wanted to support the series. But upon playing it...it just wasn't that great. The tone and writing is still there, though maybe not as strong as previous games, but it's the gameplay that really gets me. Luigi no longer feels like half of the main duo, but rather a companion to Mario in the same vein as the Paper Mario games. He's mostly just an NPC now outside of battle. The combat also feels way more sluggish now, mostly due to incorporating extra button prompts in your basic attacks. Playing through the game itself is just tedious most of the time. I haven't finished the game yet because of this. I'm about three quarters of the way through it though and from what I've heard, the last act really drags. I hope they fix these issues with the next game and bring back the gameplay of the old ones.

Most Disappointing non-2024 Game: Alan Wake Remastered
I played this for October, alongside Crow Country and Silent Hill 2. After all the buzz about it and its sequel, I was expecting it to be amazing. It wasn't. The combat was stiff as all hell and incredibly frustrating when fighting large groups (which the game loves to throw at you at some points), the story was just nonsensical, and the acting was very monotone and bland. But the most annoying thing is that the game acts like it's way better than it is. I don't know if this is what pretentious means but it seems to think it's telling a way more interesting story, even though for me at least it was just a mess and only really made sense if you thought about it as Alan just being insane. I wouldn't call it bad per se, I just don't really get why it attained such a cult following.

Best non-2024 Game: In Stars and Time
This game just barely missed the mark for being eligible for this year, coming out in November of 2023. But it quickly became one of my all-time favorites, The characters are all super charming and wonderful, the story is just the right amount of depressing but kinda hopeful. The worldbuilding is cool. The gameplay is fun. Just everything is great. You play as a member of a pretty typical RPG party (Siffrin, the rogue-type character), nearing the end of their journey. But in the final dungeon, you screw up. You missed a trap and end up dying. You then wake up in the field you took a nap in the previous day. You are caught in a time loop, and you're the only one aware of it. As you progress through the game constantly reliving the same two days, Siffrin slowly starts to lose his cheerful and honestly gremlin-like personality, it being replaced with cynicism and apathy. The game goes all the way with this premise and shows just how much of a deep personal hell being stuck in a time loop can be. It's the kind of story that sticks with you for a while, both with how depressing it gets and how happy it ends up (it does eventually have a happy ending yes). Big recommend.

Game of the Year: Astro Bot
That's what we in the business call, foreshadowing. This game is utter perfection, distilled into the form of an adorable robot. It's a 3D platformer that has been heavily compared to Super Mario Galaxy. It is just incredibly fun and designed so amazingly well and is one of the most joyful experiences I've ever had. It also is a massive love letter to the history of PlayStation, a history that Sony itself seems to be squandering and abusing as of late. Not only is this game great, but it'll hopefully serve as a wake-up call to Sony that not everything has to replicate The Last of Us. Because this is the first thing Sony's put out in a while that I feel like isn't doing that to some degree. And it freaking has several direct cameos from that game.

And now for some honorable mentions.

Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown - This is a fun game. A full reboot of the Prince of Persia series, now as a 2D Metroidvania. The exploration is on point, the tools and abilities are fun, the combat is really deep (honestly too deep for me to take full advantage of at first). The story does some cool stuff, but the main problem comes with the ending. It doesn't have a proper one. When you reach the end of the game, the story kind of just fast-tracks a real resolution, making it feel like it was only supposed to be a "Part 1", of sorts. But unfortunately, due to its low sales Ubisoft disbanded the team and there is no sequel planned at the moment. Considering where Ubisoft as a studio is right now, this is beyond disappointing.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard - I haven't gotten too far into this game yet due to other things taking my attention. But so far I love it. I know it's not as grounded and dark as the seriously originally was, but that's not really a bad thing. Series change. And even though I like a good, grounded fantasy world, with the way the real world is right now, I welcome something more fantastical and colorful as an escape from the hellscape going on outside. The fact that I'm allowed to make my character a trans woman and the game actively gives you more dialogue options specific to that, is something really special that needs to be rewarded. It's sad that that's the case if I'm being honest, but it's true.

Nodebuster - This is just a really simple game about blowing up cubes until you kill God. Really enthralling for what it is.

Buckshot Roulette - Honestly I have a similar sentiment to this as I do with Nodebuster. It's just a short, fun, somewhat addicting experience.

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune - Obviously this didn't come out in 2024. But I played it for the first time this year. My thoughts on it pretty much boil down to "I would love this game a lot if 90% of it wasn't bad gunplay." I think that speaks for itself tbh. But I've heard it gets better with each entry so I'm excited for the future.

Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary - Another game not from 2024. This game has high highs and low lows. At its best it is a phenomenal FPS with a cool story and fun gameplay. At its worst it's hard to figure out where you're going and you get flooded with enemies (pun intended) and die over and over.

And that wraps it up! I would now like to take a moment and claim my award for having the latest Game Awards celebration for 2024. Not one of you can take that from me it's too late. Toodles!