When it comes to describing THE best game ever made, it is safe to assume that the verdict will never be unanimous.
For this issue, we are lucky to have received two completely different types of game opinions: mainstream and indie.
The Last of Us
by Ben Hobbs (he/him)
The Last of Us is a game that made a self-conscious 15-year-old cry and laugh in the space of a couple of minutes.
It is hard to articulate a feeling that a video game can give you, or to even understand which element of a game stands out best. So, before I attempt to do so, let me explain my story with The Last of Us and why I think it’s the best game ever made.
First, I am not a passionate gamer. I do enjoy gaming in moderation, but as someone with a busy schedule and a degree to complete, gaming is an area of my life that I often do not have the time for.
However, only one game completely hooked me.
I was 15 years old when I started playing The Last of Us. Back then, I had watched my favourite YouTuber’s playthrough and, even through his sarcastic banter, I couldn’t help but care for the protagonist.
When Christmas came around, I finally got my hands on the game and spent my entire Boxing day on it.
I already knew I was going to love it, but still didn’t expect it to eat up my evenings and keep me up late on school nights.
For some people, The Last of Us may feel like a brand new game thanks to the success of the 2022 TV show adaptation, but it actually came out in 2013 and was only playable on a PlayStation 3.
The TV show was praised by fans as the best video game adaption to date with how accurately it stuck to the video game. These strong foundations of brilliant story and character creation were laid out in the cinematic gameplay of the original game.
The original game had a brilliant story with complex and dynamic main characters that are essentially human. These characteristics allowed users to connect with them on a deeper level, creating that emotional experience.
The third-person game is set in a post-apocalyptic America following Joel, a middle-aged American dad who loses his only daughter the day of the outbreak by a gunshot.
Almost a decade later, Joel, living as a scavenger in a world filled with zombies, is asked to transfer a 14-year-old girl, immune to the zombie virus, on a cross-country journey.
The game showcases a special bond the two develop, filling Joel’s void left by his daughter, whilst navigating a broken America infested by zombies, human gangs and cults.
With brilliant graphics and design, combined with amazing storylines and characters, The Last of Us won’t let you move from your seat, making it the best game ever made.
Darkest Dungeon
How a Kickstarter campaign led to one of gaming’s most iconic indie gems.
by Joseph Murphy (he/him)
Chris Bourass and Tyler Sigman, two friends who’d met working for Backbone Entertainment, had long been brainstorming ideas for their perfect game, but were held back by their commitments to their current studio.
In 2013, they broke out, formed Red Hook studios and set themselves down a path that would lead to one of the best loved strategy games of all time – the award winning and critically acclaimed, Darkest Dungeon.
The game is a roguelike turn-based RPG, set in a world which is close to a mediaeval apocalypse, plagued by hordes of monsters and eldritch creatures. Darkest Dungeon is famed for its unique art style, taking inspiration from Eastern European painters and comic books, but also for its cruel and unforgiving difficulty.
The developers jumped at “a now or never” moment. Bourass and Sigman set out to begin working together.
Using personal savings to fund the studio’s creation, the two sought a grant from the Canada Media Fund, but were rejected. With this, the pair were forced to seek a way to fund their now necessarily extended development period.
Kickstarter, an online fundraising platform, turned out to have the answer to this call. With a trailer, released in October of 2013, voiced by Wayne June, the Kickstarter attracted colossal attention, with $313,000 received from over 10,000 people. The game dove into development, providing updates and progress logs to their donators and fans.
Red Hook’s director Bourassa had heard June’s readings of some of H.P. Lovecraft’s works and decided that with the occult and gothic inspired art style and story, June should be approached. June’s dulcet tones were deemed a necessary component of the game, after the production of the trailer, which led to him taking the permanent position as the game’s narrator.
By 2015, the studio had recruited 6 people, including 3 more to support sound, music and narration for the game. It was released on steam’s early access program in January of 2015, which was noted by designer and producer Sigman as “working while naked in a transparent cube above Times square” but notes that it improved the final product massively.
The premise of Darkest Dungeon follows that of most role-playing games, you play as and manage a roster of heroes/adventurers and send them to fight monsters and creatures of various ilk, gaining loot and experience in the process.
What sets Darkest Dungeon apart from other games in the strategy genre, is its famous difficulty and its finality, any character can perish at any time, with no do-overs, providing a souls-like feel to its gameplay.
The game is harsh, cruel and sometimes downright unfair – but it quickly becomes a deep dive into a horror-fantasy world which is hard to put down and profoundly compelling.
Each character belongs to the 15 different character classes, which can be sent into battle in a group of four. Levelling up your characters can be a slow task, made even harder by the knowledge that they may be finished off permanently at any moment.
In addition, health isn’t the only threat, as your character’s mental state, which is indicated by a black ‘stress bar’ underneath them, can also impede or stop progress.
Travelling without light or food, witnessing the death of an ally, or certain enemy attacks can also increase this – leading to death by heart attack, but lower levels of stress can impede abilities.
The Red Hook team wanted to avoid the concept of ‘insanity’ that often permeates Lovecraftian inspired media and instead focus on stress and mental health as a whole, what going through the horrors of war and combat does to the human psyche, a boundary pushing gameplay concept.
Each character has their own backstory, trauma and faults which are revealed by the lines they speak when stressed, damaged, performing an action or bantering between characters during downtime.
In the Darkest Dungeon, death is around every corner. With this, the likelihood of you launching your controller of choice across the room is high and only increases with the higher levels and difficulties.
However, the game seems to be one that constantly draws players (including myself) back in. Online communities for the game still thrive with strategy guides, metas, discussion and most of all – memes.
After their success and critical acclaim, receiving 84/100 on Metacritic and a 9.1/10 from IGN, the studio announced the now equally successful sequel, Darkest Dungeon II, in 2019 which released in 2021.
The original game, with its colossal replay value, endless team compositions, 3 DLCs, orchestrated soundtrack, gorgeously unique art style, compelling characters and lore make this, in my opinion, one of the greatest indie titles of all time.