Now is truly a 2021 list? As the games industry grows less and less regular with an annual cycle, I suppose that question will only get weirder as time goes by. We might have to add a few epicycles into our model of the universe to keep a 2021-centric view that makes mathematical sense. My Top 10 Games of 2021 include one game that will not be truly released for many years now, one game from 2009, two games from 2019, and one game from 2020.
This is also probably the most Eric Fuchs list of video games I've ever made. Metroidvanias make the list every year, as do VNs, as do JRPGs. A lot of games on this list are Eastern-style RPGs, one Western RPGs and a ton of action RPGs. Never mind how vague those genre terms are getting these days. I'll add some epicycles to that view of the universe too. Writing this list, I used the word "Zelda" ten times or so. Square Enix is on here three times.
I do worry with my gaming habits that perhaps I am limiting myself and my scope of experience. This past year I owned Cyberpunk 2077 and never opened it. I bought Deathloop at a full $70 price and played two hours of it before losing interest. Maybe neither of those games belong on a Top 10 List due to their own merits or lack there of. But I couldn't honestly tell you. I'm told Monster Hunter Rise, Forza Horizon 5, and Age of Empires 4 are incredible. However, they are games not for me. There's nothing mobile, no open world extravaganzas, and very little that needed next-gen hardware despite this being the first full year of the PlayStation 5 era. Does this increasingly narrow band of gaming make me a worse critic? Sure, probably. But when I write about movies, I'm probably going to care more about gross horror flicks than documentaries or comedies. I like what I like, I'm 31-years-old, my back hurts sometimes. At a certain point, you have nothing to prove to anybody by playing a roguelike when you hate roguelikes.
Still, one thing I will not say is that this is an uninteresting collection of games. Even in a more narrow genre scope, I still found what I believe to be the fantastic experiences. If "Zelda"and "RPG" are a dirty words in your book, then maybe this isn't the list for you. You do not have to like what I like. We can still be friends.
2021 was a disappointing year for a lot of reasons. It seemed like a fresh start and ended up being another round in endless sociopolitical trench warfare, just globally. I cannot say the state of the gaming industry is trending in the right direction, I definitely can't say the state of the world is trending in the right direction. But I cannot worry too hard about the existential horror of Microsoft buying out the entire industry or the reckless capitalist nightmare that is NFTs, because if those change the universe, that's years down the line. I might as well try to stop the continents from shifting because I like how the current map looks. Years, industries, the states of society, it's all far beyond me and my powers.
For now, at least gaming is still a safe space. It's more creative, more creative, more fun space making better products than it made a decade ago. For now at least, things look pretty okay... maybe. Anyway, let's get to the list.
