EvilBlackSheep

A Year of Backlog Fight in Review

Happy New Year fellow assassins! I hope you all had a good start on 2017 and I wish you the best for the rest of it :)

I thought I’d have a look back at how things went since I joined BLAEO in May (as you can see on the chart below, I had a big backlog explosion in april/may and decided it had to change). Overall I can’t say the backlog fight has been successful in 2016 BUT I have made progress nonetheless towards the end of the year, and I intend to keep going in 2017. A few details about that in the battle plan section. And last but not least, I thought I’d share with you my favorite games I got to play this year, in no particular order. I highly recommend all of them.

What about you, what were your favorites in the past year? Feel free to share in the comments, I love to hear about great games people played.

Sorry this got extremely long and hence a bit late. Thanks in advance for anybody who’ll take time to read though, I hope it’s not too boring.



Finished: 91
Beaten: 26
Completed: 65
Gifted games (SG + others) finished: 38 (17+21)
Added to the Backlog of Doom: 270
Best month: October (-8)
Worst month: April (+53)

EvilBlackSheep
Backlog of Doom

The Backlog won a battle but not the war!


Month Finished Backlog+ Balance
January 0 8
+8
February 0 3
+3
March 0 15
+15
April 2 55
+53
May 3 42
+39
June 9 31
+22
July 10 32
+22
August 17 14
-3
September 4 15
+11
October 21 13
-8
November 14 21
+7
December 16 21
+5

Stardew Valley

87 hours playtime, 17 of 40 achievements

Even though I haven't completed it yet, I've spend a good chunk of time this year playing Stardew Valley. I had been following the developement of this game for ages so it was one of my rare day one buy. I immediately got addicted and lost all notion of time spent playing for a long while. And then I got other people addicted too who in turn lost their notion of time. NO REGRETS! I love this game to pieces, it's all what harvest moon on PC could have been and then much more. It's not only a great addictive game, but it's also so nicely crafted and detailled than when you think everything has been done by ONE guy, I think that its success is really well deserved.

Fallout 4

354 hours playtime, 84 of 84 achievements

I think the time I've spent playing this game speaks for itself. I've completed the game and all the DLCs and then played some more. Hell, this game (and Stardew Valley) is the reason I completed nothing for the first third of the year as it was sucking all my gaming time. I'm not gonna preach to any of you that the game is perfect, because I think it is not. As usual for Bethesda, some things never got fixed and will need you to install mods to fix things that should have been fixed by the devs. I guess Skyrim players know what I mean. I also think that the whole storyline is way weaker than Fallout New Vegas. But nonetheless it was a great experience and a lot of fun. If you have the basegame and can't get your hands on the season pass for a good discounted price, just be aware that in my opinion, only Far Harbor and Nuka World DLCs are worth the money asked for them, but they are great.

Steamworld Heist

0 hours playtime, 0 of 47 achievements

It might appear weird to some of you that one of the game that made it to my favorites of this year has zero time played, but hear me out. I actually played and completed the game on 3DS before its PC release AND THEN bought the game again almost full price: that's how much I loved this game. It made me sad that it got so little attention and so many people dismiss the game because they have the wrong impression of what it is. It is NOT a plateformer, and only shares with its predecessor Steamworld Dig the universe and the graphical style. What it is, though, is an extremely fun and well balanced tactical game with space pirate robots (how could that NOT be a winner already?). It might surprise you but if you're a fan of X-com and X-com 2, there is a real high chance you'll have a blast playing this game, so please give it a try.

Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc

26 hours playtime, 12 of 38 achievements

This game was such a surprise for me, and at the same time one of my greatest discovery this year. There is no better way to describe this then "Phoenix Wright on drugs". If you like mystery games and are not allergic to sillyness and anime graphics, this game might be for you. It alternates between 3 types of gameplay: the "normal" phase inbetween murders where you can go around, collect stuff and get to know the characters, the "investigation" phase where you collect clues about what happened and try to build your case, and the "trial" phase where you try to argue your way to find the guilty person. The story was really enticing, the characters interesting and overall it was a great experience. There is a whole second game mode that you unlock after completing the story and looks very different, but I haven't played it yet.

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair

25 hours playtime, 23 of 47 achievements

It's more of the previous game, still as good. It introduces new characters, a new story and new locations, but the gameplays remains the same. If you loved the first one and want more, just go for it, it's well worth its price. However, if you haven't played the first one, pick it first as the story of this one is a sequel to the other and there are multiple references to it. You could choose to play this one first but you'll miss a great part of what's going on by doing so.

Oxenfree

6 hours playtime, 9 of 13 achievements

It's hard to tell you all the good I think about Oxenfree without spoilers, but I'm gonna try. First of all, it's an absolutely gorgeous point & click / interactive adventure thriller. You follow a group of friends gone to spend a night on an island as some kind of party and accidentaly open a portal between dimensions, getting them in trouble with some ghosts. For the rest, you'll have to play for yourself if you wanna know more. I really fell in love with the graphic style of the game and thought the story was interesting.

The Wolf Among Us

12 hours playtime, 35 of 35 achievements

I obviously waited a long time to play this game, as it was sitting in my library for more than a year (I initially had bought it for a friend but he already had it on Telltale's plateform). I went without much expectations in it, as I didn't read the Fables comic books, but everybody was so positive about it... and boy were they right. I absolutely loved the universe, and found the story to be even more appealing than the walking dead ones, which I already love, don't get me wrong. A late but great discovery for me this year.

Seasons after Fall

8 hours playtime, 21 of 21 achievements

I probably would have passed this one if I hadn't won it in a raffle my friend made for his birthday, as I usually don't get out of my way to pick plateformers, but I'm so glad I did get to play it. The plateforming is not too hard so even with my non-existent skills I managed to complete the game, so I guess plateformers fans won't get a level of challenge here as high as let's say in Ori or supermeatboy, but it has some interesting mechanics with the cycling of seasons. The design of the game is absolutely gorgeous (Screenshot Simulator 2016) and the story is cute and touching. Plus there is a fox. I mean LOOK AT HIM.

Dying Light

104 hours playtime, 53 of 68 achievements

I went into this game with no expectations what so ever. I, for one, didn't even like Dead Island as I got bored with it very fast and never picked it up again, but I was curious about the combination of zombie and parkour. Well, I got caught up in the game and it's massive DLC The Following and I had a blast. I actually had so much fun that I kept playing for maybe 10-15 more hours after I was done with both the game and DLC storylines and sidequest just to grind a few more achievements (but really because I was enjoying it). If you're not tired of zombies games, I recommend you pick it up.

Renowned Explorers: International Society

21 hours playtime, 64 of 148 achievements

I almost didn't pick this game as I thought it was a rip-off of The Curious Expedition but after I watched Totalbiscuit's video about it, I changed my mind, and I'm glad I did. It's a really neat exploration game coupled with some turn based tactical fights. Add to the mix some silly dialogues, cute art and a lot of fun side game mecanics. And to add to all this the game has A LOT of replayability. I also highly recommend the More to Explore DLC that adds new content and new mecanics to the game, it's well worth getting.

This War of Mine

44 hours playtime, 20 of 31 achievements

There are games that you love because they're so fun and you're having such a blast while playing them... and then they are that other kind of games where "fun" is an appropriate word to define them. Yet they are by no mean boring or bad, they're just... something else. This war of mine is one of those. This game is about surviving a war, not as a soldier, which is almost always where war games put you at, but as a regular civilian, with no "super power". This game is depressing, can be hard and punishing until you find the correct way to manage your ressources and your survivors, but yet this game is so good. And it makes you think (or at least it should), especially with the current context. If you haven't played this yet, what are you waiting for?

Undertale

17 hours playtime, no achievements

Some people will tell you that Undertale was just overhyped and it's just a crap game, but I'm not one of them. Even if I respect that it's not a game for everybody, I had such a great time playing it. Even if the graphic style is quite simple, it fits the game really well and you can see some effort has been put into it. Add to that a great soundtrack, a touching yet funny cast of characters and an interesting story and you have Undertale. It's even better if you have managed to keep yourself spoiler free.

Mini Metro

8 hours playtime, 13 of 32 achievements

Now that's a game that seems deceptively simple, and then you soon realize it is not. It starts on the basic idea to let you manage a city's metro system, with a neat design that reminds you of those metro plans you can always find in stations to show you all the line stops and changes. So the premise to bring passengers from point A to point B soon becomes more complicated when you have to take in account the limited ressources, the stations types and the increasing traffic of citizens. The music is extremely soothing, and even challenging puzzles can help you relax after a stressing day. My favorite puzzle game of the year.

Out There: Ω Edition

18 hours playtime, 45 of 59 achievements

That game had been sitting for a long while in my library and I always wanted to give it a try, but you know, procrastination... And then it had the perfect things I was looking for during October's scavenger hunt, so I finally came around to play it. And what a great surprise! It was like a pacifist (no combats involved) version of FTL, but with prettier graphics. It wasn't mind blowing but I found myself playing run after run across the galaxy and it was extremely addictive. If it's sitting in your library or you can put your hands on it, give it a try!

Hexcells

4 hours playtime, 6 of 6 achievements

Another great puzzle I played this year that got me totally hooked. So much that I played the whole trilogy in a row. If you're a fan of puzzles, give a chance to this one. It's a mix between minesweeper and picross, with an extremely clean and simple visual style, but it has really cool mecanics. I recommend you also pick the two sequels: Hexcells Plus and Hexcells Infinite as they just add more and more puzzles of the same quality.

  • Undertale
    Undertale

    17 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Shan Gui
    Shan Gui

    2 hours playtime

    8 of 8 achievements

  • Tap Heroes
    Tap Heroes

    233 hours playtime

    50 of 50 achievements

  • This War of Mine
    This War of Mine

    44 hours playtime

    20 of 31 achievements

  • Abyss: The Wraiths of Eden
    Abyss: The Wraiths of Eden

    10 hours playtime

    20 of 20 achievements

  • Left in the Dark: No One on Board
    Left in the Dark: No One on Board

    5 hours playtime

    13 of 13 achievements

  • Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink
    Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink

    5 hours playtime

    19 of 19 achievements

  • Mind Snares: Alice's Journey
    Mind Snares: Alice's Journey

    7 hours playtime

    17 of 17 achievements

  • 9 Clues: The Secret of Serpent Creek
    9 Clues: The Secret of Serpent Creek

    4 hours playtime

    19 of 19 achievements

  • Among the Sleep
    Among the Sleep

    7 hours playtime

    10 of 10 achievements

  • Renowned Explorers: International Society
    Renowned Explorers: International Society

    21 hours playtime

    64 of 148 achievements

  • Fallout 4
    Fallout 4

    354 hours playtime

    84 of 84 achievements

  • Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
    Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc

    26 hours playtime

    12 of 38 achievements

  • Little Inferno
    Little Inferno

    4 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • LYNE
    LYNE

    24 hours playtime

    33 of 33 achievements

  • Strata
    Strata

    10 hours playtime

    24 of 24 achievements

  • Tengami
    Tengami

    81 minutes playtime

    4 of 4 achievements

  • Pixel Puzzles: Japan
    Pixel Puzzles: Japan

    19 hours playtime

    26 of 26 achievements

  • 10,000,000
    10,000,000

    18 hours playtime

    11 of 14 achievements

  • Mini Metro
    Mini Metro

    8 hours playtime

    13 of 32 achievements

  • 80 Days
    80 Days

    8 hours playtime

    9 of 35 achievements

  • Catch a Falling Star
    Catch a Falling Star

    6 hours playtime

    41 of 45 achievements

  • Time Mysteries: Inheritance - Remastered
    Time Mysteries: Inheritance - Remastered

    9 hours playtime

    10 of 10 achievements

  • Time Mysteries 2: The Ancient Spectres
    Time Mysteries 2: The Ancient Spectres

    11 hours playtime

    11 of 11 achievements

  • Time Mysteries 3: The Final Enigma
    Time Mysteries 3: The Final Enigma

    6 hours playtime

    11 of 11 achievements

  • Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today
    Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today

    6 hours playtime

    24 of 24 achievements

  • The Silent Age
    The Silent Age

    4 hours playtime

    24 of 24 achievements

  • Orion: A Sci-Fi Visual Novel
    Orion: A Sci-Fi Visual Novel

    4 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Back to the Future: Ep 1 - It's About Time
    Back to the Future: Ep 1 - It's About Time

    3 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Back to the Future: Ep 2 - Get Tannen!
    Back to the Future: Ep 2 - Get Tannen!

    2 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Back to the Future: Ep 3 - Citizen Brown
    Back to the Future: Ep 3 - Citizen Brown

    2 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Back to the Future: Ep 4 - Double Visions
    Back to the Future: Ep 4 - Double Visions

    2 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Back to the Future: Ep 5 - OUTATIME
    Back to the Future: Ep 5 - OUTATIME

    2 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Mandagon
    Mandagon

    50 minutes playtime

    5 of 5 achievements

  • SUPERHOT
    SUPERHOT

    4 hours playtime

    17 of 26 achievements

  • The Secret Order 2: Masked Intent
    The Secret Order 2: Masked Intent

    6 hours playtime

    24 of 24 achievements

  • The Secret Order 3: Ancient Times
    The Secret Order 3: Ancient Times

    6 hours playtime

    26 of 26 achievements

  • Dying Light
    Dying Light

    104 hours playtime

    53 of 68 achievements

  • Reigns
    Reigns

    6 hours playtime

    4 of 13 achievements

  • Chroma Squad
    Chroma Squad

    20 hours playtime

    29 of 43 achievements

  • Saints Row: Gat out of Hell
    Saints Row: Gat out of Hell

    24 hours playtime

    40 of 45 achievements

  • Batman: Arkham Asylum GOTY Edition
    Batman: Arkham Asylum GOTY Edition

    20 hours playtime

    37 of 47 achievements

  • Chef Solitaire: USA
    Chef Solitaire: USA

    36 hours playtime

    20 of 20 achievements

  • Seasons after Fall
    Seasons after Fall

    8 hours playtime

    21 of 21 achievements

  • Dungelot : Shattered Lands
    Dungelot : Shattered Lands

    43 hours playtime

    57 of 57 achievements

  • Legends of Solitaire: Curse of the Dragons
    Legends of Solitaire: Curse of the Dragons

    24 hours playtime

    20 of 20 achievements

  • Out There: Ω Edition
    Out There: Ω Edition

    18 hours playtime

    45 of 59 achievements

  • Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair
    Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair

    25 hours playtime

    23 of 47 achievements

  • Spec Ops: The Line
    Spec Ops: The Line

    13 hours playtime

    46 of 50 achievements

  • Costume Quest
    Costume Quest

    10 hours playtime

    21 of 21 achievements

  • Costume Quest 2
    Costume Quest 2

    10 hours playtime

    18 of 18 achievements

  • Tormentum - Dark Sorrow
    Tormentum - Dark Sorrow

    8 hours playtime

    34 of 34 achievements

  • The Yawhg
    The Yawhg

    61 minutes playtime

    no achievements

  • Stray Cat Crossing
    Stray Cat Crossing

    3 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • You Must Build A Boat
    You Must Build A Boat

    23 hours playtime

    8 of 12 achievements

  • Fran Bow
    Fran Bow

    8 hours playtime

    18 of 18 achievements

  • Cthulhu Realms
    Cthulhu Realms

    9 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Tick Tock Isle
    Tick Tock Isle

    3 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Oxenfree
    Oxenfree

    6 hours playtime

    9 of 13 achievements

  • 9 Clues 2: The Ward
    9 Clues 2: The Ward

    7 hours playtime

    39 of 39 achievements

  • Enigmatis: The Ghosts of Maple Creek
    Enigmatis: The Ghosts of Maple Creek

    7 hours playtime

    11 of 11 achievements

  • Fragments of Him
    Fragments of Him

    2 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Voodoo Garden
    Voodoo Garden

    28 hours playtime

    33 of 33 achievements

  • Dead Rising 2: Off the Record
    Dead Rising 2: Off the Record

    50 hours playtime

    38 of 50 achievements

  • Fairy Tale Mysteries: The Puppet Thief
    Fairy Tale Mysteries: The Puppet Thief

    6 hours playtime

    17 of 17 achievements

  • Oh...Sir! The Insult Simulator
    Oh...Sir! The Insult Simulator

    10 hours playtime

    5 of 18 achievements

  • Fairy Tale Mysteries 2: The Beanstalk
    Fairy Tale Mysteries 2: The Beanstalk

    8 hours playtime

    11 of 11 achievements

  • Hamlet or the last game without MMORPG features, [...]
    Hamlet or the last game without MMORPG features, [...]

    2 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Alice's Patchwork
    Alice's Patchwork

    28 hours playtime

    18 of 18 achievements

  • The Forest of Doom
    The Forest of Doom

    5 hours playtime

    31 of 31 achievements

  • To Be or Not To Be
    To Be or Not To Be

    5 hours playtime

    33 of 33 achievements

  • The Wolf Among Us
    The Wolf Among Us

    12 hours playtime

    35 of 35 achievements

  • An Assassin in Orlandes
    An Assassin in Orlandes

    3 hours playtime

    10 of 10 achievements

  • Catacombs of the Undercity
    Catacombs of the Undercity

    3 hours playtime

    12 of 19 achievements

  • Curse of the Assassin
    Curse of the Assassin

    2 hours playtime

    23 of 32 achievements

  • Cinders
    Cinders

    7 hours playtime

    8 of 8 achievements

  • Crime Secrets: Crimson Lily
    Crime Secrets: Crimson Lily

    5 hours playtime

    24 of 24 achievements

  • Batman: Arkham Origins
    Batman: Arkham Origins

    48 hours playtime

    35 of 60 achievements

  • Road Not Taken
    Road Not Taken

    14 hours playtime

    14 of 20 achievements

  • Hexcells
    Hexcells

    4 hours playtime

    6 of 6 achievements

  • Hexcells Plus
    Hexcells Plus

    20 hours playtime

    6 of 6 achievements

  • Hexcells Infinite
    Hexcells Infinite

    17 hours playtime

    7 of 7 achievements

  • Plantera
    Plantera

    14 hours playtime

    29 of 29 achievements

  • Puzzle Agent
    Puzzle Agent

    3 hours playtime

    no achievements

  • Puzzle Agent 2
    Puzzle Agent 2

    2 hours playtime

    52 of 52 achievements

  • Richard & Alice
    Richard & Alice

    5 hours playtime

    21 of 21 achievements

  • The Magical Silence
    The Magical Silence

    40 minutes playtime

    1 of 1 achievements

  • Zup!
    Zup!

    63 minutes playtime

    118 of 118 achievements

  • Zup! 2
    Zup! 2

    48 minutes playtime

    229 of 229 achievements

  • Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons
    Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons

    3 hours playtime

    12 of 12 achievements

  • Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna)
    Never Alone (Kisima Ingitchuna)

    6 hours playtime

    19 of 19 achievements

= SG win - = Gift or Other Win

  • Have fun! That might seems like an obvious point, but I don't wanna have gaming turn into a tedious task. I already have a job to induce stress and frustation, so I don't need more of that.

  • Prioritize SG wins and gifts from friends and try to at least play all of them. Tso's challenge of "No 2015 SG wins unplayed" last year inspired me greatly. I'm gonna attend to do something similar this year, but with a twist. I'm including the games that I've been gifted by friends in this pool, as they have even more "value" in my eyes. If they break the first rule, then I'll still make an effort to at least beat them unless they've been given to me as a troll gift (yes I have special friends...).

  • Try to improve my completion rate. I started a little in the past months, and right now it's at 50% and I'm aiming for 75% if I can. The first mesure for that is to try to complete (100%) the games as much as possible, AS LONG as it's still compatible with the first rule. Even if the cheevos are grindy but I'm having fun, it's fine I'll go for it, but I won't go through super tedious ways just to get some cheevos.

  • Finish what I started. Still in the objective of the previous point, I'll need to finish what I started. This mean both going back to previously started games that I dropped in the middle for no other reason that I started playing something else and never went back. It also implies keep a small number of games I'm playing at the same time (1 is unrealistic but 5 max even between devices sounds reasonnable).

  • Keep the backlog expansion as tamed as possible. Self explainatory, but I feel better since I'm trying to keep the number of games I activate on my steam as low as I can (I've tried zero like Revil but it's unrealistic for me).

  • Clean the backlog. Last but not least, and I've been trying to do it since I joined BLAEO in May, go through the list of games once more and move the ones I really don't intend to ever play to the "won't play" list. Maybe give them a quick chance to impress me before? I haven't decided yet. In any case this needs to be done.


State of the Targets on January 1st 2017 (for tracking purpose)

Won on SteamGifts 75 games

72% never played
5% unfinished
8% beaten
15% completed

Gifts & Other Wins 133 games

53% never played
28% unfinished
6% beaten
13% completed

malabagaa

HA! I’m doing a similar post and this graph you put is better than mine, totally copying it! :D

Garcias

Looks like you already have a great plan, only the execution is missing! Good luck and have a great 2017 Mrs. Sheep! :D

EvilBlackSheep

I’ll try my best :3

uguleley

Good stuff! Looking at the graph it’s visible how joining BLAEO has had a positive effect on your number of finished games. :)

As you asked, some of my favourite games I played last year in no particular order:
Dishonored and Portal 2, both of which I finished in early 2016 before being here. After joining BLAEO, I’d say the highlights were Bioshock 2, Life Is Strange, Guacamelee and The Wolf Among Us. All of them pretty well-known titles.. but that’s mostly what I play. I’m not good discovering ‘hidden gems’ on Steam.

EvilBlackSheep

Definitely. And it’s not like I wasn’t playing at all the 4 first months of 2016 but i was suffering about 2 syndromes: Starting games but not finishing them, and playing Fallout 4 / Stardew Valley over and over and over (and getting distracted from the main quest). BLAEO also helped me greatly in giving more thoughts to what I was adding to my steam library.

Thanks for sharing your favorites with me :) Those are all excellent games (I still have to play Guacamelee though, it’s been sitting in my library forever).

BigBlueWolf

That’s an amazing post with so much detail! Congrats on all your achievements. Hope you slay tons of games in 2017!

Q: is there a shortcut tag now for the standard game tiles or do we still have to manually pull the code from source view and edit it ourselves?

EvilBlackSheep

Thanks, I’ll try my best.

Sadly there is no shortcut tag (or not that I know at least) I’ve been doing it manually :/

escollo

Keep the backlog expansion as tamed as possible.

I feel strange, ‘cause I do quite opposite.

EvilBlackSheep

I’m curious, do you consider ALL the games you add to steam your backlog as in “I intend to play every single one of them” or do you add some of them just for the +1 or the cards? (No judgement here, I think the backlog is very personal and i totally understand that some people wanna add as many games as they can to it ;) )

escollo

Both.

TopDeer

I’m just amazed by the amount of work you’ve put into your post! *_* Great job! =)

My feelings for Fallout 4 are complicated. I’ve spent about 1/2 of your time on it and haven’t played DLCs (I didn’t even see some parts of the main game, like that ship with robots). I really love Fallout universe (I think it is my favorite one), and I enjoyed game’s open world, with so many interesting stuff to find. But some things left me very disappointed - the new skills system, average plot, base building and the gameplay itself at some points. My most memorable moment was some big battle between three forces, and I just walked across all the fighting like I was invisible, because I didn’t make an enemy of any of them up to this point =( I also didn’t like that the game became more of a shooter, and VATS became useless. So, although I hope I’ll play it again sometimes, but I can’t compare it to Fallout 3 and New Vegas, both of which were finished more than twice by me.

Danganronpa’s school mode is mostly a grind, because you’re doing the same things again and again, and you need to finish it four times to get a couple of achievements and learn something about the characters, if you didn’t have a chance to do it in the main game. I did it in the first game, but I didn’t have a patience to do it in the second =)

I loved Oxenfree’s graphics and special effects! Didn’t expect so much fun from 2D game (I think I’m biased towards 2D, especially platformers). The story and the characters were great, too (I remembered Life is Strange a few times while playing it).

I think that Undertale is underrated =D To me, it’s not just an interesting game I can compare to other games, but it’s something that stands on a whole different level, maybe like a work of narrative and visual art. I can’t explain it well, but it’s like seeing an abstract painting in a row of traditional art works. It has so many brilliant ideas, even though it looks like a simple (maybe, even pretentious to some people) game! Anyway, to me it was one of the most significant games I’ve played in my life =)

One more thing - can you, please, fix something in your layout? =)
Can you change this in game descriptions

<p style="..."></p>
<div style="float: right;">
<a href="..." /></a>
</div>
<p style="margin: 8px; margin-right: 218px; text-align: justify;">
<...>
</p>

Into this

<p style="..."></p>
<div style="float: right; margin-left: 8px;">
<a href="..." /></a>
</div>
<p style="margin: 8px; text-align: justify;">
<...>
</p>

It shouldn’t change anything in PC browsers, but it would make texts readable on smartphones, because now they are not very readable - I just see a very long column =)

EvilBlackSheep

Ooops sorry for the smartphone thing, I corrected it with your code, lemme know if it’s better. I wrote the post over 3 days and at some point got a bit lost in the tinkering with html, I totally didn’t check if it looked of on smartphones :(

I agree for Fallout with pretty much all your points, as I said, no matter how much time I’ve spent in this game, I’m not one who’ll tell you that game is perfect. Fallout is my favorite universe and from the “modern” ones, Fallout New Vegas is my favorite despite the bugs. I’m pretty sure you’re talking about the battle of bunker hill as the same occurred to me at that point, it was quite awkward to say the least.

Thanks for the head’s up on Danganronpa’s school mode, I’m not sure i feel like going for the grindy achievements.

I really loved Undertale obviously or it would never have made it to my list, and I really felt more involved in this game than in most Only went the pacifist run, and will never touch the game again as I don’t want to “reset” things or harm the monsters.

TopDeer

Now it’s perfect, thanks! =)

EvilBlackSheep

You’re welcome, thanks for the fix :)

Douglas

First of all, I loved your post, so informative and well made :3
You also did a great progress in 2016 and finished/completed a lot of games \o/
About my favorite ones, well, is so hard to pick just few of them. Let’s see (in no particular order): Trine 2, Hell Yeah!, Nihilumbra, Orion A Sci Fi VN, Dishonored, The Darkness II and Fran. I liked other games too, but I think these are the ones I liked most. And I’m not counting the games I played again just to complete, otherwise the list would be totally different ;p

Ah, and you have good plans for 2017. Wish you all luck and hope you keep doing the great progress in this year as well :3

EvilBlackSheep

Thanks, I’m glad some people are reading and enjoying it as it took me a while :3

I don’t think I’ve ever completed as many games in a year than this past year, and it’s a great part thanks to BLAEO :3

Fran almost made my list too (but as you say it’s so hard to pick just a few of them and I was already at 15) as it was such an interesting game and view on mental illness. I liked Orion too, and Dishonored (played it back then on 360 but I plan to replay it now with the DLC before i start Dishonored 2). For the rest I’ll keep an eye open for them, thanks for sharing your favorites :3

I’ll try my best in 2017, good luck to you too with the backlog fight :)

Douglas

I like to read them, and I try to follow all posts is gettting hard to follow all posts lately - we have so man now wow!
I’m here for while, but it still surprise me to see how helpful BLAEO and its community can be :3

Ohh, yes, play both DLC. They tells us a bit more about Dishonored story and world. I thought them a bit harder than the main campaing, but nothing impossible.
I believe you can make a great progress this year too! :D Thanks and good luck to you too :D

IcyGlare

My favorites from 2016:

Dark Souls III + Ashes of Ariandel DLC - The level design isn’t as good as the first Dark Souls but the combat is a lot smoother. Not to mention it looks gorgeous. It’s like a polished version of the first Dark Souls. Ashes of Ariandel was short but the Sister Friede boss fight was awesome. I think over half of total play time of the whole DLC was spent on that boss fight alone. It took me around 7 hours to beat her for the first time. I beat her several more times to make sure that I didn’t just get lucky. :p

Oxenfree - Is.Leave.Possible. I only learned about the game because I was deciding on which game to give away and a lot of people on my whitelist had it wishlisted. The visuals, the writing and the voice acting were pretty good.

Rise of the Tomb Raider - I got it as a gift. I enjoyed going for those collectibles and those environmental puzzles. I normally don’t like puzzles but the ones here were just the right difficulty for me. It also looks beautiful. Couldn’t stop taking screenshots.

Blood and Wine (The Witcher 3 DLC) - The visual style is different from the base game… much brighter. Like the base game, everything was great. Also, dat ending. XD

EvilBlackSheep

Thanks for sharing your favorites :3 I know dark souls is not for me but I have Rise of the tomb raider on my wishlist and The witcher 3 + DLCs sitting on my backlog so it conforts me to know they’re great :)

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This comment was deleted over 7 years ago.

Adelion

Seeing as Seasons after fall is one of the easier platformers it walked up some places in the wishlist. And that fox is really cute ^^ Other than that I can’t even remember what I completed in 2016 O.o Not as much as you. Pretty sure about that one. But let me think. I liked:

  • Wait - Extended: Another simple RPG maker “horror” game. But I found the atmosphere and story interesting.
  • Why Am I Dead at Sea: Okay, that was technically december 2015 -_- But I will never cease to recommand this game. It is just great.

Played a lot more (like Shadowrun: Dragonfall, POE, four different kinds of Resident Evil and more) but those are definetely the favourites.

EvilBlackSheep

There have a free dose of cuteness for sharing your favorites with me:
hey hi

Oh, I was curious about Why am i dead at sea but never got around to get it, I’ll try to keep my eyes open for it. I also will need to play the shadowruns and POE this year, but I just started Tyranny and I’m already caught in XD

Kaleith

I’m in the same boat about Steamworld Heist, minus the re-buying it on Steam part. I think it’s safe to assume it’s gonna be in a bundle (humble monthly?) sometimes soon, so maybe more people will find out how great it is

EvilBlackSheep

Maybe, and even though bundles always mean less money for the devs, I’m still glad if it gets attention. This game is so good.

Forsaken

Fantastic games! Congratulations on all your completions :) I was so happy to read that Seasons After Fall is not very demanding in terms of platforming. I really wanted to play that game but for some reason I thought that I’d be rubbish at it. I added it back to my wishlist again after learning that it didn’t have that challenging platforming. Thanks a lot for the info :)

EvilBlackSheep

Worry not, I’m extremely unskilled at plateformers yet not only I had a blast, but I also 100% the game. It has a few puzzles but nothing too complicated. I hope you enjoy it if you end up getting it :)

Barghest

Great progress and post! I^v^I why do I have the feeling that the formatting took longer than I could ever handle? :O

I’m actually waiting for Danganronpa to finally release on PS4, hopefully the distribution here won’t be as bad as it usually is with non-highly mainstream Japanese games… Aren’t they a bit dungeon crawly tho?

Also kinda glad to hear that Seasons isn’t that hard since I was rather close to doing something terrible to my controller while playing Ori. :p

Anyway, as for favs this year:
The Witcher 3 (since I’ve only gotten a PS4 last year)
Final Fantasy XV
The Last Guardian
Persona 4
LISA (took me a year to go back to it…)
Ori and the Blind Forest

Ok, should be enough (unless replaying my Metal Gears for the x time counts, then add those too :D). :p Happy gaming! I^v^I

EvilBlackSheep

Thank you (because it took a bunch of time split over 3 days? you don’t have to be so obsessive tho :p)

Danganronpa is not dungeon crawly to me. I guess depends on what you mean by that. There are some part (during the 2 first phases) where you navigate in the environment, dungeon crawling style maybe BUT there is no ennemy to fight or nothing of the like, so I’d say no.

Thanks for sharing your favorites. I really need to play Ori and the witcher 3, they’re both in my library. I wish i had a PS4, i’d totally get persona and the last guardian.

Happy gaming to you too :3

Barghest

:O I had no idea what I was looking at when Lenor send me some code for gallery formatting, I seriously applaud you for your patience!

Oh, I think I saw some gameplay from the part you’re talking about and just got a bit of an SMT vibe for some reason. Thank you for clarifying. :)

Persona 5 will also be releasing for PS3 if that helps you in any way. Also, Atlus still has a contract with Nintendo so I guess they’ll make SMT5 a Switch exclusive.

EvilBlackSheep

Actually, the closest thing to relate danganronpa to is the Pheonix Wright Ace Attorney series. Except that the trial part includes more interesting game mechanics.

I have the 3DS one (Persona Q if i recall correctly) and it was pretty fun. The problem here is that Atlus game are pretty badly distributed (I’m in europe) and sometimes they even skip some of them…

Barghest

Oh, I never had any Nintendo console, so hearing that Danganronpa is similar to Pheonix is great! :D

Q is, as far as I’ve seen, the definition of fanservice done incredibly well. :)
I know what you mean. With games like these here I can literally only count on one highly weebish game store (they’ve had Digital Devil Saga and Lucifer’s Call for PS2 recently for example) and that’s basically it. IiviI

Tumalu

Hello EvilSheepie, hope you’re doing well.
My TrueSteamAchievements stalking has shown that you have started playing Broken Age!
Turns out I have that game in my library too! (Whoops, totally forgot)
Let me know what you think!

EvilBlackSheep

Hey Tumalu :3

I haven’t played far into the story yet but so far so good. The graphic style is cute and the writing is funny, but I don’t know how good the main storyline is gonna be. I realized I had it sitting in my library and it’s part of the monthly theme so I thought I’d give it a try. I can let you know how it went when I’m done ;)

Tumalu

Sounds like a plan! :)

EvilBlackSheep

So, I finished it and I’d say it’s worth playing if you like point & clicks. I understand after playing the reason of the polemic and bad rep when it came out but played as a whole, it’s ok. The graphics are pleasant and the writing is funny. The ending is a bit on the bleh side (some stuff are just left kinda unresolved/unexplained) but overall it’s worth playing if you own it ;)

Tumalu

Sorry Sheepie, I’ve been meaning to reply to you earlier but Tumalu is lazy.
I’m actually not that big of a Point and Click fan. The pace seems a bit too slow for me.
However, if the story is good and the writing is funny, I will definitely give it a shot! Thank you for your valuable opinion! :)

EvilBlackSheep

No worries ;)

The pace IS classic point’n’click slow so be warned but yeah I found it really funny and the story was fun even if like i told you the ending feels a little rushed. Lemme know what you think if you play it :3

Tumalu

I actually thought Life is Strange was pretty well paced for a point-and-click like game and I really loved the story, so I’ll definitely give Broken Age a try.

Lumino City, on the other hand was soooo slow, and I couldn’t handle it. If you haven’t played either one of these games, ignore what I’m saying. I’m just using a few games as “reference” to my patience level haha.

EvilBlackSheep

I’d say it’s a bit somewhere in the middle. It’s not as “action” paced as Life is Stange which I more put in the bag of the Telltale games, but it wasn’t as slow in my opinion as Lumino city (which I liked too but I get your point)