As always, we’re going by the year of a game’s PC release, not when they might have come out on consoles years earlier. It’s also this particular version of a game we’re recommending as well, which is why you might see certain games absent from their original release year if they’ve had a shiny new remaster or remake recently. The RPS Time Capsule is also not intended to be a definitive best games of the year list - it’s simply a collection of our personal faves, and ones we’d want to save in the event of some probably not at all inevitable apocalypse. They will (hopefully) be games that hold important lessons for the future, whether that’s being an exemplary example of their respective genre, or just, you know, too gosh-darned good to consign to the digital doom shredder.
Rocket League
Ollie:Rocket Leagueis still the finest competitive game ever made. From a spectator’s point of view, it’s perfect. There are no huge on-boarding videos, you don’t need someone at your shoulder explaining everything that’s happening on-screen. All you need is four words - “it’s football with cars” - and you’re ready to sit back and enjoy some spectacular acrobatic plays.
I don’t think I ever got as good at another game as I got at Rocket League. After the first hundred or so hours (a tiny amount of time when it comes to deep competitive esports), everything just clicked. I was able to start doing reverse aerials, wall-pinches, dainty redirects, and all the other things that you can coax your rocket-powered car to do once you’ve learnt how. By my 500th hour, I was a Grand Champion - the highest rank in the game. I played for another 500 hours after that before finally the advent of thebattle royalegenre started to snatch away my attention. Highly intuitive, incredibly rewarding, and unfathomably deep, Rocket League is absolutely perfect at what it sets out to do.
Hayden:Sometimes I think I don’t likeGTA V, but I’d probably feel the same way about anything after playing it on and off again for almost 10 years. That’s a long time, but the memory of my initial playthrough hasn’t faded. I still remember waking up early to complete the Jewellery Store Heist before school, like a goblin craving some chaos before being thrown into the pits of Catholic education. Sublime.
Of course, GTA V is a two-part package, and GTA Online has everything you could ask for. It’s a playground filled with things to do, and me and my pals had a great time getting lost in its many myths. Between hunting for the ghost of Mount Gordo, documenting alien murals around Mt Chiliad and more, GTA Online renewed that buzz we had while hunting for the mythical Ratman in GTA IV, and it made for some very fond memories.
Alice0:Little Partyis one of my favourite short days. Your artsy daughter is holding an artsy sleepover with her artsy pals at your cute little home in the woods, and you’re there mumming about while they paint and compose and make games and such. It’s a lovely and gentle experience, pottering about, chatting with people and seeing what everyone’s up to, with a little tension running through the gaps in the story.
The game is so beautifully put-together. The mix of 3D art with 2D sprites for characters and objects is gorgeous, the world crammed full of interesting details and decorations. Time-skipping forwards as you do things around the home is pleasantly subtle. The dialogue is sweet and thoughtful. It’s not a life-changing day, but it is one of those little important days that truly makes life worth living. And the dog, oh what a perfect dog. Had Little Party come out five years later, it would likely be claimed by “wholesome games”. Let us be thankful that it avoided the discourse and can just be its wonderful self.
Ed:It took me nearly six years to completeThe Witcher 3, after I bounced off its jank and became a bit overwhelmed by the scale of its open world. But once I understood that I could just take things at my own pace and soak up its plentiful side quests, then things clicked into place. I clocked that it was a bit rough around the edges but its pull lay in its chats, not its fights with giant rats.
And those side quests - wow. It’s rare to play a game where the optional stuff is just as dense and winding as the main story, with dialogue options that, yes, might be a bit irksome at times, but genuinely determine how things shake out. I like how you know that each side story will spiral out of control and itstillmanages to surprise. In the end, you’re gripped less by the action and more by the strength of each character you meet along the way.
Soma is actual psychological horror, by which I mean Soma poses you questions about selfhood and consciousness andbeingand they are terrifying. You play Simon, who closed his eyes for a brain scan and opened them again to find himself in a semi-derelict deep-sea science facility. The walls are weeping. It makes strange noises. It is full of semi-human monsters and machines in pain – which I won’t spoil because, though these monsters do make Soma technically a survival horror, they’re not the scariest part. There’s a version you can play without them as well, if you don’t like being chased by weird things. Either way, Soma set a standard for intelligent horror games that needs to be preserved, if only to balance out one of the ubiquitous haunted Edwardian mansion games.
See in Undertale, you can choose not to fight the monsters you encounter. Solo dev Toby Fox took one of the biggest troupes found in RPGs and chucked it straight out the window by giving the player one simple choice: Attack or show mercy? It’s something that’s not made obvious the first time you play (as I horrifically found out after killing my surrogate goat mum on my first playthrough) but options like “talk,” “pet” and “flirt” encourage you to find other ways to solve conflict in fun ways. There’s a lot of hype about Undertale online (some of which is massively overblown) but fundamentally, it’s just a solid game with funny jokes, an earnest story, and a clever, little RPG twist. Oh, and I’ll also metaphorically chuck in a copy of the soundtrack into the Capsule as it’s just banger after banger. It’s honestly impressive.
Alice0:I like the skeleton.
James:Let’s be honest, much ofMetal Gear Solid Vis a joke, and not the ha-ha kind. It’s actually missing those, abandoning the series’ endearing oddness in favour of a dour attempt at a conventional thriller tone, and the final hours – comprised mainly of recycled missions on higher difficulty settings – collectively form the worst example of bodge-jobbing I’ve ever seen in a creative work.
It’s also a damned outstandingstealth game. The open-world, sandbox approach affords it a far greater playfulness than the grumpy demeanour would ever suggest, and the strength of your toolkit is balanced by challenging level design and baddie AI that acts logically but is never too easy to manipulate. I’d be reluctant to leave this particular example of MGS storytelling as the one to be remembered, but the sneaking?That’sexemplary.
Alice0:It’s amazing how good this game is despite so much being so bad.
There’s a few differences between Dying Light and Dead Island, mind, and I wasn’t immediately chuffed about all of them. Dead Island’s bizarre, unwieldy, hand-waving melee attacks were one of my favourite parts of that game, because they’re so frantic when you’re fending off the zombs. While Dying Light dropped that particular electrified crowbar, Techland made the possibly genius decision to chuck parkour in there instead. And it just sings. Techland kept throwing more stuff on the Dying Light pile for years after the game was released, too, with expansion pack The Following’s dune buggies being a notable boon. I’m not sure anything else can top the thrill of leaping between post-apocalyptic Harran’s buildings in the dark while freaky superhuman night-time infected are roaring for your flesh, though.
Rebecca:Not long after I first playedLife Is Strange, I was walking across campus when I heard a lad behind me shout “Max!” and I instinctively turned around to respond. I think that was the point where I realised quite how much I’d come to identify with this game and its characters.
