1) Children of Morta (Dead Mage) The Bergson family have a lovely home that looks like something out of a pixelated Wes Anderson movie – if it weren’t for the pesky Corruption that lies in dungeons underneath the floorboards. Luckily the Bergsons know a thing or two about fighting, each with their own unique style, from close-quarters melee to ranged archery. Defeat enemies and bosses, level up, learn new skills, and spend some downtime with the fam. It’s all in a day’s work in this meticulously detailed RPG.
2) Old Lefty’s Rubbin’ ‘n’ Racin’ (Old Lefty’s Arcade) If there was any justice in the world, this currently one-off, event-specific game would be in every bar. It’s a one-button, four-player racing game that’s as simple as it is charming. The top-down tracks make for quick matches and lend themselves to player-demanded rematches. Remember the name Old Lefty and keep an eye out for this one at local events.
3) Remnant: From the Ashes (Gunfire Games) Team up with friends or test your mettle on your own: Gunfire Games follows up on last year’s underrated Darksiders 3 with another solid third-person action RPG featuring enough unique environments for three games. This time around you have guns to help you mow down the evil trees.
4) Darksiders Genesis (Airship Syndicate) It’s a local twofer as Airship Syndicate expertly takes the Gunfire Games property into a top-down format. The fourth horseman of the apocalypse takes the reins this time around, so you know things are going to get messy.
5) Overpass (Studio Bean) There’s two ways to play this sleek rhythm game: Focus on every beat and try to perfect the groove, or tweak the settings and chill out in a world passing by as if through the sunroof of a car. It’s worth the trip either way.
6) Pre-Shave (Saam Pahlavan) This short interactive experience puts the clippers in your hands to learn about “grooming yourself as a brown man.” It’s all fun and games until you send the protagonist into public without eyebrows.
7) Defector (Twisted Pixel Games) Why it took virtual reality developers this long to put you into the shoes of a secret agent that kicks ass, skydives, and drives cars out of planes, we’ll never understand. Thank you Twisted Pixel.
8) Vacation Simulator (Owlchemy Labs) From the minds that gave us Job Simulator comes a VR slapstick of vacation, and it’s exactly what we needed after a long day at the office.
9) Dapper Dashery (Cloud Fine Games) Well-dressed, juggling penguins go head-to-head with some fish-slapping multiplayer antics.
10) Knight Fright (atooi) This Q*bert-like game for mobile devices adds a bit of strategy to the formula and executes perfectly for short bursts of play.
This article appears in Top 10s 2019.
