Games of the Year 2015

Other Awards

Best Multiplayer – Rocket League

Kyle – Another surprise victory for Rocket League, the little indie game that could. In a year that was full of huge, AAA multiplayer experiences, Rocket League stood above all the rest. It helps that it simply honed in on what makes a multiplayer game work so well: short, simple bits of fun gameplay.

The main draw of Rocket League is its completely flat ruleset. The cars all drive and handle almost the exact same, the maps are all the same (aside from the recently released Wasteland arena), the rules never change, and there are no powerups. If you lose in a game of Rocket League it is almost always because the other team was simply better than you.

And yet, it still featured unlockable items and DLC, things that usually destroy the multiplayer experience. However, developer Psyonix handled them in the best way possible, making them all cosmetic and optional. You won’t be able to buy your way to victory in Rocket League.

Honorable Mention – Call of Duty: Black Ops 3

Bets Indie – Rocket League

Kyle – What else can I say about this fantastic game? It’s the best Sports and Multiplayer game of 2015, but it is also the best game to come from an independent studio all around. Psyonix has made some games before, including the inaptly named predecessor to Rocket League. Yet they’ve truly shined with this release, both in the game’s initial design and in their follow up to it.

The game itself is game design simplicity in its best and more pure form. It is easy to pick up, and hard to master, making for a deeply rewarding experience from its first hour to its hundredth. Yet every match is technically exactly the same. This could make for a game that surges in popularity and then shrinks back into obscurity.

However, developer Psyonix has kept things fresh and interesting throughout. There’s the random DLC packs, giving devoted players new cosmetic items to play with, but they also gave fans their most requested car with the Back to the Future Delorean popping up as DLC shortly after release.

Then Psyonix continued to improve the game with the first non-regulation map hitting recently, along with modifiers to the core physics and settings. Finally the Hockey mode hit earlier this month, creating a truly new and fresh take on the game.

For all of this and more, Rocket League takes our best indie game award for 2015.

Honorable Mention – Hotline Miami 2

Best Story – Rise of the Tomb Raider

Dean – Story is something that has been lost in many games due to the removal of single player campaigns, which makes strictly single player experiences all the more rare. Thankfully, there are still games out there like Rise of the Tomb Raider that focus on an interesting story that spans the entire experience.

Serving as an excellent follow-up to Lara’s first adventure in the reboot, Rise of the Tomb Raider provides gamers with a much more confident Lara in a story that feels like a very natural progression of the character’s story arc.

The game features very interesting characters that help to propel the plot forward in many different directions, with familial ties playing a very large role.

The plot does a great job at showing a Lara that continues to grow into the adventurer you know and love, while also still bringing in some crazy story elements that are very befitting of the series.

Honorable Mention – Tales from the Borderlands

Most Innovative – Splatoon

Kyle – Innovation has been a been pretty tough to find in the gamin industry these past few years. Sure, you have the occasional game that bucks trends and goes its own way, but overall developers pump out safe bet sequels year after year. That’s just not Nintendo’s way though, as they have shown with games like Splatoon.

From the moment it was first announced it was obvious that Splatoon was something a little different. Playing like a normal third-person shooter, the mechanics were turned on their head with a few shifts to the experience.

You weren’t just a normal person running around a battlefield here. Instead you were an Inkling, a kid who can turn into a squid. And you weren’t really shooting each other, so much as you were covering the level in your team’s ink. This was the main goal of the game, to own most of the map, but it also helped you, as you could swim faster through your own ink color.

All of these innovations created our favorite shooter for 2015, but they also showed that this game was the most innovative of the year.

Honorable Mention – Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

Hit the next page for our Worst of the Year

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