Friday, January 3, 2025

Year In Review: 2024

Nothing says a "Year in Review" like lists so let's stick with a good thing and make a tradition out of it!

We're going to start off with games and demos released in 2024 that I played, followed by games that I bought in 2024, followed by games released in 2024 that interested me that I neither played nor bought.  And then we'll close everything up with both the Nintendo and Steam's lookback at 2024; with a heavy caveat that The Squire has heavily influenced both of my lists.

Games & Demos Released in 2024 that I played:

Games I Purchased in 2024 that I Haven't Played Yet
I believe that these two games were the only games released in 2024 that I purchased but have yet to play. Although because these were games "funded" through Kickstarter, I didn't actually pay for them in 2024, I'm still allowing them here because they were released this year. Pendant semantics, I guess.

Games Released in 2024 that I Have Not Yet Bought or Played
  • Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown (January 18)
  • Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (January 25)
  • Balatro (February 20)
  • Pentiment (February 22)
  • Alone in the Dark (March 20)
  • Dragons Dogma 2 (March 22)
  • Botany Manor (April 9)
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Arcade: Wrath of the Mutants (April 23)
  • Another Crab's Treasure (April 25)
  • POOLS (April 26)
  • Stellar Blade (April 26)
  • Animal Well (May 9)
  • Senua's Saga: Hellblade II (May 21)
  • Duck Detective: The Secret Salami (May 23)
  • Still Wakes the Deep (June 18)
  • Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition (July 18)
  • SteamWorld Heist II (August 8)
  • Black Myth: Wukong (August 20)
  • Tactical Breach Wizards (August 22)
  • Emio - The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club (August 29)
  • Squirrel with a Gun (August 29)
  • Star Wars Outlaws (August 30)
  • Edge of Sanity (September13)
  • The Plucky Squire (September 17)
  • UFO 50 (September 18)
  • Enotria: The Last Song (September 19)
  • Home Safety Online (September 20)
  • The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom (September 26)
  • Mouthwashing (September 26)
  • Zoochosis (September 30)
  • Silent Hill 2 (October 8)
  • Neva (October 15)
  • Clock Tower Rewind (October 29)
  • Dragon Age: The Veilguard (October 31)
  • Slitterhead (November 8)
  • Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake (November 14)
  • S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl (November 20)
  • Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (December 9)
  • MiSide (December 11)
So as you can tell from this last section, I haven't played nearly enough games released in 2024 to have any kind of informed say as to what "The Best Game of 2024" should be.  Of all of the games that I played that were released in 2024, the only one I paid for was Hatch Tales which was from a 2018 Kickstarter, while all of the rest were either free-to-play, demos, or I received through Keymailer.  I'm actually planning on an article after the first of the year going into several of the games that I've helped fund through various online fundraising platforms and for one reason or another, have not played (yet).

So let's briefly take a look at my Nintendo 2024 Year in Review and Steam 2024 Replay.


On the Nintendo Switch, I think the funniest thing is how much The Squire played New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe using my account, so therefore, I ended up clocking upwards of 45 hours in that game.  Or did I?  


I would say that "I think" that this chart feels accurate, except that since this is how Nintendo categorizes games, I guess it is accurate.  All of the top three games have action elements as well as Role playing and adventure, although NSMBUD  is probably considered just straight action since I don't see "Platformer" as a genre.

As for Steam, the genres are a little more varied and less traditional:


I feel like Rhythm is solely from the BIT.TRIP series that The Squire likes to play and have me play, which I'm perfectly fine with; unless he wants me to play as Invisible CommanderVideo, which he does often.  The only game I can think of as Tower Defense is Plants vs. Zombies which I didn't think we played that much, but that's obviously not true.  I'm sure I can track down the Metroidvania games, and I'm positive that the rest of the genres here are from a combination of free games I acquired through Keymailer this year and a bunch of demos that I played too.


The only other metric that surprised me a little was how much I actually played on my laptop, but then I remembered that most of the Steam games I play with The Squire are all played on my laptop and I usually get in an hour or so of gaming on the Steam Deck.  Even though it accounts for 68%, I'm still thankful to the Steam Deck for getting me not only back into my Steam queue, but also making games through other clients accessible since my laptop isn't the powerhouse it never was.

Now, if we were to do the same thing for TV/Streaming shows, movies, and games, we'd probably be here for another couple of minutes, but let's be quick about it.  I read through mostly more Forgotten Realms books ending with Ed Greenwood's Crown of Fire, the second book in the Shandril's Saga trilogy.  I did read Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo and really enjoyed that take on a new fantasy setting that wasn't strictly Western European based.  In TV land, Conklederp and I really enjoyed The Acolyte, the ill-fated Star Wars series, and were both saddened by its cancellation.  We started and are still planning on finishing the second season of The Rings of Power, but finding time to sit down and watch an hour of TV after The Squire goes to bed has been really difficult for the last six months.  This is also why we have yet to start watching Skeleton Crew.  Movie-wise, Conklederp and I did see Longlegs back in August (I think), and then I went out to see Alien: Romulus with Himo.  I think that's it.  I would have wanted to see a couple of other movies, but again, finding an available sitter during a specific weekend is not always the easiest.  And the new Nosferatu was just released, so maybe we'll be able to sneak away for the requisite 3.5 hours to drive, see the movie, grab a post-movie beer, and drive home?  I might also end up seeing the new Superman without Conklederp as I'm not sure if that's her cup of tea.

So yeah, that was 2024.  I don't know if we'll be picking up the Switch 2 if it's announced/released in 2025.  Maybe that could be a Christmas present?  This means any 2025 games will end up being played on the Steam Deck, although there's always the high possibility that there'll still be plenty of indie games released on the Switch as well.  It's also probably getting close to the time to replace my laptop, but before we do that, we'll likely be replacing Conklederp's 2014 (or is it 2012?) MacBook first.  I guess it's just about that time to consult my hastily scotch-taped crystal ball to find out what's in store, assuming that it's not just showing an empty void after the third week of January.



~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
Hide From the Scary Scenes

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