2013 was a big year for gamers. With the Xbox One from Microsoft and PlayStation 4 from Sony making headlines left and right toward the end of the year, 2013 has been a very exciting time for gamers, a year that will be unparalleled for the better part of a decade until more next-generation consoles rear their above average heads.
Until then, we can only look back on some of the best and brightest blockbuster games that left our jaws on the floor this year. Below is HNGN's list of the top 5 Blockbuster games of 2013, in no particular order.
Grand Theft Auto V: Setting aside the fact that the game broke Guinness World Records for sales after making $1 billion dollars in just 24 hours, "Grand Theft Auto V" has revolutionized the franchise. Many games have boasted having an "open world" or "sandbox" but none have done it quite to the extent of Rockstar Games' latest installment in its popular criminal franchise. Whether you'd like to visit a gun range, skydive, jet ski, drag race or just cause some good old fashioned mayhem around the city of Los Santos - Rockstar has provided gamers with a way to do so in amazing detail and with enough tongue-in-cheek fun to keep people clamoring back for more. However, if single player isn't your thing and you need some competition, "Grand Theft Auto Online" will allow you to purchase property, upgrade cars and just have the time of your life at the expense of your friends and strangers who are also occupying the sandbox. Lock and load in 2014 and show the online community in Los Santos that you're not to be messed with.
Bioshock Infinite: Videogames can do two things: Tell a great story and be outstandingly fun. However, very few games are able to accomplish both of these simultaneously like the Bioshock series. Irrational Games' Ken Levine have brought us the ruins of the underwater city of Rapture and, in 2013, the soaring heights of Columbi, a metropolis floating in the clouds with a much darker underbelly than meets the eye.
As the Nerdist reviewers put it: "Just as the original Bioshock presented us with a fallen Objectivist paradise, Bioshock Infinite shows us an alternate history of American exceptionalism that rings all too true. Like biting into a Good N' Plenty, Columbia's utopian candy coating belies a horrific center of racism, patriotic jingoism, and zealotry (which is roughly the equivalent of black licorice), which the player experiences through snatches of overheard conversation, propaganda posters, and some seriously stomach-churning cutscenes."
The game centers around your character, Booker, and his quest to rescue Elizabeth from her tower prison and make good on your escape. However, this mission won't be so easy as iron clad warriors pit you in the middle of some serious class warfare that's been bubbling under the surface of this "utopia" for far too long.
Call of Duty: Ghosts: Of course a Call of Duty Game made our list. We're not barbarians. Few games can boast being as addictive as Call of Duty. While Treyarch has its loyal fans, I've always been partial to Infinity Ward and Activision's partnership and the Modern Warfare series. The original trilogy began as a realistic military shooter set in the modern day. However, after two sequels, the world left behind by the game's canon story became more and more like a post-apocalypitic warning of what too much war can bring. With "Ghosts" the developers rebooted the series with a new storyline set in the aftermath of far too much warfare. The only kind of person able to still make their way in the world is the type of person behind the barrel of some high-tech weaponry with a fellow Ghost solider at his or her side. The story is an epic adventure with a surprise ending and the multiplayer is literally calling my name as I sit here trying to write this article. Call of Duty: Ghosts is a symbol of modern gaming that shows everything next-generation can be while taking nothing but queues from what we've learned form the previous generation. Mount up and lets roll. We'll see you online (you won't see us).
The Last of Us: Survival Horror is back. One of gaming's most interesting and difficult genres is back with a vengeance in the form of Naughty Dog's 2013 triumph The Last of Us.
"If 2013 is the year of the "escort quest", then I'm fine with that, because this is the year that developers managed to make us not just see our traveling companion as a burden waiting to be protected from wave after wave of bad guys, but rather as people about whom we cared and wanted to protect out of a sense of duty. The emotional bond forged between Joel and Ellie as they make their way across the country in search of the Fireflies would make a fine film, but it is in the interactive element that only comes with video games that the story is elevated from entertainment to art," the Nerdist writes in its spot-on review.
The Last Of Us took storytelling and game play to a whole new level and has raised the bar for any developer trying to make a cinematic but still playable adventure. Anyone who wasn't watching closely in 2013 will surely be left behind as fans are already frothing at the mouth for whatever Naughty Dog has planed for them next.
Tomb Raider: Yes, I'm one of those horrible "women should have a better presence in games" type of people. But honestly, with the majority of games focusing on a male audience, the plethora of girl gamers I come across have a right to be a little miffed. For a time Lara Croft was simply a gimmick in the video game world. A Big breasted badass with little clothing and character development. However, in Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics reboot, Croft found herself in a survival situation that would bring lesser men to tears and shame. Her gender was not an obstacle, a gimmick or a novelty - it was a fact. You played as a girl and that was the extent of it. Her real problems were the violent people trying to kill her, trap-filled environment and low numbers of provisions.
Her overly heroic qualities were stripped away as well, showing off just how fragile our main heroine can be and adding another level of depth to the survival aspect of the game. High stakes and higher rewards put Tomb Raider on our list of 2013's best games.
We're certain that we missed several titles, but we tried to keep it to just the blockbuster games. Have an omission form the list you're particularly upset about. We'd love to hear it. Comment and share your thoughts on the best games of 2013 with us below!
