MadCap's Game Reviews - "The Worst of 2016"

Well, it's time that time once again! One of the worst years on record is now getting its due thrashing...in games, anyway. It's not like we call kill off a a year for killing off a slew of our favorite celebrities, allowing an rotting Pumpkin with a loud mouth to be elected President, and overall sucking more intensely than a well-maintained Hoover vacuum. But here are the worst games of 2016 as told by me. And, like previous years, this is not a comprehensive list of games that just came out this year, but a list of games that I personally have reviewed this year. So, if it's not something I reviewed this year, it doesn't have the remotest chance to be on this list. This is admittedly also a biased list, as it has been in years past. If I didn't like it, I'll at least come up with a good defense as to why I didn't like it.

Now with that in mind, let's get into number 10...

10. Fallout 4
Review here

Now now...don't start panicking, you haven't gone completely insane. Maybe.

This is on this list for two reasons: the blunt force trauma in getting the story along (something which previous games in the series didn't do, at least not nearly as heavy handed a manner), and the crafting mechanics. I understand Bethesda wanted to do something new and were no doubt following the wide-spread popularity of creativity games like Minecraft.

You know what I don't come to the Fallout series for? Settlement building. Running around to find every scrap of adhesive and steel I can to upgrade my Power Armor. It's ridiculous. Sure, it's true to the situation of being in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, but I don't look for realism in a game where I regularly fight scorpions the size of a mini-van.

Apart from those complaints, the game is actually not too bad, which is probably why it's so low on this list. I do actually like Fallout 4, it's just that so much was changed that didn't really have any reason to be changed. Would Fallout 3 or New Vegas have been improved by you traipsing about the Wasteland for scraps in order to build up settlements in the Capital or Mojave Wastelands? I have my doubts.

And yes, you can easily leave the Minutemen to rot up in Sanctuary and just horde your own things, but that still ultimately has the same problem of either finding it all for yourself or just having to outright ignore a major part of the game that Bethesda was clearly very proud of, and that irks me more than a little.

9. Doom (2016)
Review here

Again, another low entry on the list because I do genuinely like the game, it's just a certain aspect that I feel the need to re-iterate: it does its job too well. I recently tried to boot it up again and found myself still in that panicked state whenever combat got more than a little fusterclucky. It's visceral and enjoyable, but I find myself getting anxious very quickly.

Good game. Too good, really. Hence why it's so low on the list.

8. Star Wars Battlefront
Review here

Yes, EA got the rights to produce Star Wars games for the forseeable future. No, there's nothing you can do about it unless you stop supporting any games that offer online multiplayer, which you aren't going to do. No, this is not a tirade against people who can't enjoy the single player experience. Move on!

7. Pokemon Go
Review here

"Hey, have you ever wanted to play Pokemon anywhere?"

"...I can do that, I have a 2DS."

"No, no...I mean, like...on your phone."

"...why would I do that? That sounds really stupid."

"No, man! It's great! And you can use a satellite to track your movements and it's great! Honest!"

"...y'know, I'm just gonna go back to playing my 2DS and wait for Sun and Moon. Bye!"

"But MadCap, you know that Sun and Moon are already out, right?"

"...CRAP!"

6. Dragon Age - The Descent
Review here

If you're going to send me on a trip for several hours, Bioware, there better actually be a good reason other than vague foreshadowing about Dwarven things. Or to let Steve Martin explain it to you...

5. The Technomancer
Review here

Want to be Batman crossed with a Sith Lord on Mars? Too bad! Ultimately, a game that's too big for its britches. As I said in my review, it wants to be a Bioware game so bad when it grows up, but its ultimately bogged down by the same problem as Final Fantasy 13 - namely not telling you anything and still expecting you to be invested.

4. Fallout 4 - Vault-Tec Workshop
Review here

See my complaints about the crafting mechanic in the #10 slot. Really, it's all that and then multiplied by a thousand. I actually went to video review because the mere existence of this depressed me as much as it did. I know I was really mean to Hearthfire when it came out, not undeservedly so, but at least that was just building one player home, not scrimping and hording away every single resource you could find to build and expand settlements.

Building  your own Vault should have been fun, if you were going to do it at all (Vault-Tec, canonically, are bastards and so is anyone following in their footsteps), not a chore to this extent. Much less having to run experiments and the like after setting everything up for the lazy ghoul Overseer.

3. Alice the Madness Returns
Review here

I stand by what I said in my review: It's boring, it's been done, and there's long stretches of absolutely nothing that serve no purpose. Even the Mad Hatter won't touch this...

2. Pokemon Black and Blue
Review here

Once again, Nintendo, if you come please sue PETA into the ground so they will stop making these incredibly boring, preachy, and overall idiotic parody games, that'd be great. I know you guys have read my e-mails. Get on this!

1. No Man's Sky
Review here

Yeah, I tried hard to avoid the controversy here, but I was unable. This game just blows. And that's sad, because it literally had so much potential behind it. Hello Games promised an epic masterpiece and while we got a beautiful visual side to things...that's all we got. It's very pretty to look at, but ultimately is lacking in any substance.

Which is sad, because the pieces of a great exploration game are most definitely here, they're just so muddied and dimmed out that they might as well not be there at all. When you give an endless sandbox to explore, but nothing to do in it, I get bored very quickly. And get bored very quickly I did. The exhilaration of taking off from the starting planet and going to another galaxy...very quickly shriveled up like a cold day in the locker room when I realized that that was literally all there was.

And that, ultimately, is why this game ranks so low. It had such promise...and it failed so amazingly. Why it failed isn't necessarily important, but the results are before us and...frankly, it's sad. Rather like the year 2016 in general.

And so, that's my list. As always, feel free to tell me why I'm wrong in the comments or on Twitter. I look forward to the new year and I hope all of you will join me in staying up until midnight on New Year's Eve just to watch this annoying pain in the ass of a year die.

Happy New Year!

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