Lets jump straight into the deep end with this Up For Debate. Jon just said to me The Witcher 3 embarrasses The Shadow Of Mordor. Those two titles won their Game of The Year Awards for 2015 and 2014, respectively. So I wanted to get a feeling from everyone, about how you feel games are progressing.
Did the games of 2015 outshine those from 2014 or are they getting worse? If you are not sure what the best of 2015 and 2014 looked like then you only have to pop over to our area of the site dedicated to it.
Global Game Awards 2014 Results
Global Game Awards 2015 Results
It should be a no brainer. As time goes by, people get better hardware and new games are released having been built using that better hardware. So they should just get better and better, right? But of course, some years are a bit of a wash out and some years shine with incredible gaming gems.
The sort of games we enjoyed during 2014 looked like this
2014: Far Cry 4, COD: Advanced Warfare, Wolfenstein, Civ Beyond Earth, The Banner Saga, Dragon Age 3 Inquisition, Stick of Truth, Divinity 2 Original Sin, The Sims 4, Goat Sim, Shadow Of Mordor, Elder Scrolls Online, The Wolf Among Us, Alien Isolation, Dead Rising 3, Borderlands The Pre-Sequel, AC Unity, This War Of Mine, Tropico 5.
Compared to this
2015: ARK:Survival Evolved, Fallout 4, SOMA, ANNO 2205, Gal Civ 3, Dying Light, H1Z1, Life Is Strange, Grand Theft Auto 5(PC), Cities Skylines, Pillars of Eternity, Bloodborne, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, Rocket League, Undertale, Her Story, Jotun, Until Dawn, The Witcher 3, StarCraft 2: Legacy of the void, Satellite Reign, Total War Attila, Battlefront, The Order 1886, Project CARS, Magicka 2, Tales From The Borderlands, Heroes of The Storm, Batman Arkham Knight, Mad Max, COD Black Ops 3, Battlefield Hardline, Wolfenstein: The Old Blood, Shadowrun: Hong Kong, Game of Thrones: iron From Ice
Those lists are not definitive, so please share your highlights of each year below. Other than that, lets see which year you felt was the best for gaming, was it 2014 or 2015?
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People talking about the size of the list: 2015 is still so much fresher in our memories that we're shortchanging 2014. Here are some games that came out in 2014 that aren't on that list: Wasteland 2, Metal Gear Rising (PC), Octodad: Dadliest Catch, Nidhogg, Fable: Anniversary, AC: Freedom Cry, Thief, The Walking Dead Season 2, Dark Souls 2, Titanfall, Hearthstone, MGSV: Ground Zeroes...
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...Infamous: Second Son, Diablo III: Reaper of Souls, Sir, You Are Being Hunted, Transistor, Watch_Dogs, Mario Kart 8, Murdered: Soul Suspect, Valiant Hearts: The Great War, Shovel Knight, Sniper Elite III, Five Nights at Freddie's, Metro Redux, Destiny, The Evil Within, Bayonetta 2, Pokemon Ruby+Sapphire remakes, Super Smash Bros, and undoubtedly a ton of others I'm forgetting.
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So... it isn't like more big-name games came out in 2015 than 2014. That said, I'd still vote for 2015 over 2014 solely because of The Witcher 3, one of the best games of all time. Take that out of the equation, though, and 2014 wins in a walk.
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I wouldn't call at least half of the games you named big name games. In fact a decent amount of them were utter trash. Even if you take witcher 3 out of the equation 2015 still wins by a long shot. The only games I would say were truly great to come out of 2014 were shadow of mordor and alien isolation. 2014 was the worst year for games in a long time.
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This poll is neck and neck.
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witcher 3 + gta5 pc, hands down best games of 2014 and 2015:)
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2016 will be the best.
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I am aiming for FarCry primal, don't want to put my finger to futuristic games.
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first time when i saw farcry primal, i was so disapointed with ubisoft lack of creativity. for people who never played far cry it should be interesting, but i recommend farcry 3 for them:/
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Life is strange is such an amazing story everyone should play that game
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Poor atm so gotta wait ɛ
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You forgot Dark Souls 2 for 2014. Easily the game I spent the most time playing in both years
Although this year did have Witcher, Fallout and MGS5 so its 2015 for me
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DiRT Rally, Project CARS, Life is Strange. Just to name a few reasons why 2015 was an epic year for gaming!
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Well the size of list speaks itself :D
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My favorite year in gaming is 2007 because Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed and Bioschock were released. 2015 follows second of course.
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yeah , we can't say 2007 is the best , but it is the start of the best games ever!
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Also don't forget COD 4 MW and Halo 3.
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ummmmmmm...that's like comparing one direction and the beatles
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I don't like both haha xD
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hmmm not a fan a fan of classic rock i see.
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not a fan of Beatles to be exact,
I do like (among many others) Deep Purple, Queen, AC/DC, Aerosmith, Black Sabbath, Bon Jovi, Van Halen and many other classic rock bands,
and I played some pieces by Dream Theater, drummer here :)))
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The point of the conparison does not need the subject to favour either side. Although either side probably get more action on a single weekend than us GDers get in our collective lifetimes ;)
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Where the hell is AC SYNDICATE!!!!!!!! :-p
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2015 because in 2014 I was hyped for ac unity and then disappointed
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Also Watch_Dogs hype and disappointment
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Witcher 3 gta v fallout 4, need I say more?(wow that rhymed!!)
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My game is Dying light with the following soon!:)
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wither 3 and gta 5 for most of people
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Even till this day, I am still shocked that Crysis(1) was released on 2007.
2007!
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Also, you can just simply get Texture mods for Crysis(1) and the game will look Next-Gen.
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Crytek makes the best graphics.
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Yea, but after 2007. They slowed down on graphics improvements. Back then, it seems that everyone was going big, trying very hard and pushing hardware beyond limits.
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Hardware should have been covered as well. 2014 would have looked a bit better. Feel sorry for 2014.
Was there any other year better than 2015 in the past decade though? I mean this year was very impressive.
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2005 was awesome
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Rainbow six seige and mad max too
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definitely 2015... though i enjoyed shadow of mordor (still playing) and stick of truth (finished) .... but witcher 3!.. still playing it though... can't wait for 2016 games... hopefully another great open world would be out next year...
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I put a decent amount of time into Shadow of Mordor, but I never quite understood how it won GOTY. It was fun because it was easy to just pick up after a while, and hop right back in. But to me, most of it was just "Kill high-ranking orc, he ranks up again, rinse and repeat". Nothing really new throughout the entirety of the game IMO.
The main thing that stood out to me was how they somehow took a relatively large map and made it seem small. Lighting/camera angle I guess..
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yeah i know... though for me i enjoyed those fights, and yeah it really does get old...
and maybe it won because many gamers liked it?.. i don't know... i don't even know how the Game of the Year is decided... :)
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and BTW, i built this rig just for witcher 3... :D
damn sweet game...
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I own it, but haven't had a chance to get into it yet. From the sound of things I'm missing out though!
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2015 Is the best year for me because Hirez brought Tribes Ascend back to life
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Yea, but only like 3 ppl are working on it last I read about it. xD