Red Pages Podcast Games of the Year 2017

Gord's Pick

I'm in a weird place this year. The suddenly plural boys are getting older and absorbing more and more attention, and my ability to observe the passage of time is diminishing. This and an inundation of entertainment has left me desperate to feel like I'm spending my gaming time the most wisely, which means that I'm less willing to sink the required amount of time into games that might not thrill me. I've got my comfort defaults (Heroes of the Storm, Dwarf Fortress) and ten thousand things I should be doing instead, and nothing substantial binding me to games that came out this year.

So what do I reach for?

Super Mario Odyssey

First-party Nintendo titles promise a lot, but more importantly to me is how it competes with Super Mario Sunshine.

Sunshine holds a special place brightly colored by nostalgia and populated with many hours of good fun. It greatly refines its predecessor's essence and isn't substantially worse than its successors. It's bright and cheery and makes me happy.

It would be so easy to fail to emulate that, not through any fault, but by failing to live up to impossible standards.

So is Super Mario Odyssey better than Super Mario Sunshine for this specific human?

I don't know!

I don't know if Odyssey is better or worse than Sunshine. I'll tell you in another fifteen years.

I can say that it's the game experience that stands out the most in 2017, followed by The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and West of Loathing.

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