Coint and Plick 2013 - The Sixth Annual ILX Video Game Poll

DJP - we should play Borderlands 2 together. I suck at shooters too. Might be a good laugh.

hahaha yes

it will be 5 minutes of shooting at a wall while desperately looking around for any type of melee weapon before the first controller goes flying across the room

We'll have to play with JJJ so he can actually progress the story while we empty our guns into the ground, sky, and each other.

things just got really sexy in here

get a room you guys! and if you've got a room, lose some weight!

its still worth giving borderlands 2 a shot (heh) if you hate shooters, because its still just a shooter on the face w/rpg dice rolls behind it (or at least that is my understanding).

nope, not banned yet

http://i.imgur.com/ZnEcIXJ.gif
#4: Fez – XBLA – 103 pts – 8 votes - 1 top game votes - Top XBLA Exclusive Game

http://tech.co/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/fez.jpg

Official Game Site

Metacritic

Gameplay Video

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a7/Fez_videogame.jpg

Zero Punctuation

Experience Points

Lego Fez

Flash Fez clone “for poor people”

PopMatters

Soundtrack

2007 Dev Interview

2011 Dev Interview

Renaud Bedard Interview

The California Literary Review

NY Times

More like MicroBucks mirit? ...but maybe not.

http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/kotaku/2009/04/fez-thumb-main.jpg

fez

CraigG: I've probably only put a couple of hours into Fez, but I've played enough to know it deserves a place in my C&P poll, and that when I get a chance to spend a chunk of time on it I'm going to really enjoy it.

diamonddave85: Like a lot of people, I'd been waiting for this game since its first reveal: the visual aesthetic was beautiful and the 3d rotation seemed novel and fun. When it finally arrived, it was boring as shit. This was my most disappointing game of the year.

if: Provides a kind of constant brain-tickle of enjoyment through both the puzzle design and satisfaction of just rotating the world, and the beauty of the music and visuals. I just discovered that the soundtrack album is available to buy separately and it is probably worth it! Graphically the bright and simple colours are there not just out of a desire for retro accuracy but to create some amazing scenes - there was one particular moment in my playthrough with a bright purple sunset that I am not going to forget. I actually loved the down-a-rabbit-hole design of the map too, and the sense of mystery and things lying just out of the reach of comprehension, to the extent that I didn't feel even the need to go far into the cryptography stuff because it was a joyful and complete experience as it was.

WillM: This is one of two games I included just because of feel. I mean, sure, it's a good game. It's fun to do some of the puzzles, even if some are repetitive and others are so goddamn inscrutable that it makes you wonder why the fuck you're even trying to do it without a FAQ. But there was just something about playing this game with the lights out in late summer while the sun set and dusk set in. Maybe it was the excellent soundtrack (similarly with my other similarly-chosen pick, Hotline Miami). Maybe it was the graphics being so sharp, so bright, and so well-framed. Maybe it was the hints of a bigger story that I never fully uncovered but passively wondered about. I didn't beat Fez -- to be honest, I am not sure I'll go back and do so -- but on those perfect warm summer nights, this game was my fucking jam. I felt good just hanging out in it.

jjjusten: Definitely the most interesting game of the year, and one that actually lives up to the endless development cycle hype. It is at least nominally a platformer, and it is perfectly fine at doing that, and at times even ramps up the challenge, but it has very little twitch timing going on, because it is 100% at heart a puzzle game, so platforming only really comes into play in service of that. I know that deceptively simple is one of those horrible game review catch phrases, but behind the 8-bit sensibility lurks a strange and complex beast. This is the first time that a d/l title has actually done what all the other 5 star titles (fuck u braid) claimed to, which is deliver aha moments over and over and over. Immensely rewarding in every way, and brilliantly layered - whether you are in full on cryptography mode or just finally getting to the top of a pedestal, every frustration is met with that magical all-too rare feeling of actual gaming accomplishment.

gorgeous looking & sounding, gameplay didn't grab me personally.

loved this; concur most definitely with the sentiment of ok-Gameplay but WOW everything else, what an experience

really atmospheric too. Maybe I should give it another go...

ok too low, now forks u are banned

i dont mean to be this guy, but so journey and frog fractions made the top three? i voted for one of them, but gtfo with that nonsense

i like the idea of being the kind of gamer who is super into Fez, but i gave up really early after getting bored by thought of lots of backtracking and trial & error. :(

Journey already showed up at #6.

the backtracking is not that bad since at the end of each hub, they open a portal to quickly bounce between the other hubs

spelunky, frog fractions and what for top 3?

Dishonored

Dishonored was #8.

it was so good, it will also be #3

Well I guess either CODBLOPS2 got no votes, or it's top three.

I'm really hoping Spelunky has won it though.

guessing no votes, actually

add spelunky to the big pile of idgi for me

I've never even heard of Spelunky

it sounds like the title of an Aphex Twin track

FTL totally ruined my night. I could. not. stop. And I didn't even get that far during my first two attempts! As with the best of Roguelikes, though, I feel like I know exactly went wrong during the disastrous ending of my last attempt, and I feel like I'll do much better next time. Highly recommended to fans of Roguelikes.

I should mention I played a shitload of The Real Texas last year, before getting hung up on one of the puzzles and drifting away.

i am legitimately baffled as to what the third finisher is.

i will say that as much as i dont really want frog factions to win, i will take it if the alternatives are spelunky or blops2 winning

shocking #1 finish for Lollipop Chainsaw!

wait did xcom place yet

How many of us actually played cod: black cops 2 last year, anyway?

only 5 people played blops2, but all of them used 10000 racial slurs during multiplayer

there really wasnt any decent way to tweak the VU analogy but you get me

spec ops 0 votes daaaaaaamn

i coulda figured that out earlier if i had remembered spelunky tho

since there is a lull, anybody want to offer up any recs from last year that fit my usual 50 cent blood on the sand wonderful/terrible category? lollipop chainsaw isnt going to last forever

Well, Tokyo Jungle totally fits in that category.

god, honestly spec ops fits that category.

wow, so either Spec Ops or BLOPS II didn't place at all?

jjjusten: have you tried Asura's Wrath?

Okay, top three now in fast fashion. I seriously am working on that goddamn essay and will post when I'm done.
Thanks again to ZS for his help on this tempest in a fairly small teapot.
Without further ado:

http://i.imgur.com/Zm8x6K3.gif
#3: Frog Fractions – Browser – 110 pts – 7 votes - 2 top game votes - Top Browser Game - FREE

http://indiegames.com/frog%20fractions%20title.png

Official Game Site

Gameplay Video (WARNING, SPOILERS)

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/images/12/oct/frogfractions.jpg

Experience Points Podcast

Dev Interview

Soundtrack

http://assets.thecreatorsproject.com/blog_article_images/images/000/037/751/FFdragon_detail_em.jpg?1352832014

Frog Fractions

jjjusten: Almost didn't vote for this because I know it's going to pound the votes home, but it's just too good to ignore. Totally insane, deeply satisfied with being as odd as possible, and despite being a one trick pony while still seeming like the exact opposite of that, it's the game that everybody should play (or maybe experience) this year.

WillM: Frog Fractions is unique in that it references a bunch of game genres without being what some might call "a love letter" to those genres. It is a send-up. It's like a good one-hour stand up special -- great jokes, relatable, but not just yelling "TEXT ADVENTURE!" and getting laughs just because you and I both recognize what a text adventure is. Well, okay, there's a bit of that. But there are some great gags in there. I really like seeing stuff like this. It's good to know that some people who make games still have a critical bone in their body and aren't afraid to lambast the medium.

S. Clover: iOS games, due to the limitations of the system, and I suppose the demographic most likely to be carrying it, are very strong at hitting nostalgia buttons. Bitmapped graphics, chiptunes, etc. In fact, all the games I've listed could have run on systems from at least ten years ago. Frog Fractions, the only browser game I've picked, is less a game to be played repeatedly than a détournement of retromania, a fantastic genre mash-up that takes childhood memories and adds twists. Every puzzle revolves around ignoring one or more long-held conventions/limitations of the genre in question, while the core gameplay of each stage mimics the genre perfectly. The basic premise -- what if the fake-fun of educational games that were supposed to spark our childhood imagination (as viewed through an adult PBS prism) was the actual-fun of our much-less-limited actual childhood imagination.

http://i.imgur.com/VjyHiAj.gif
#2: XCOM: Enemy Unknown – X360, PS3, PC – 126 pts – 7 votes - 3 top game votes - Top PS3 / X360 Game

http://i3.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article1377074.ece/ALTERNATES/s615/XCom:+Enemy+Unknown

Official Game Site

Metacritic

Gameplay Video

http://cache.g4tv.com/ImageDb3/293318_S/xcom-enemy-unknown.jpg

Zero Punctuation

Quarter to Three

California Literary Review

Nightmare Mode

Soldier Progression

How to Save-Scum

Rock Paper Shotgun Post Mortem

Soundtrack

Polygon: The Making of XCOM’s Jake Solomon

http://timenerdworld.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/xcom-enemy-unknown.jpg?w=600&h=400&crop=1

is there an XCOM thread?

CraigG: This year it is far too easy for me to pick a no.1 game, and it has to be XCOM. I've spent more time on this that any other game this year. I think this is a great start to a new dawn of XCOM games, though that's not to say it isn't without it's failings.
I feel like it's missing a lot of the more intricate management stuff that was present in XCOM Apocalypse - the last one I played (and I played that to death) - and I miss the big grid that represented your backpack for loadout that I could fill with hundreds of clips for my various guns, piles of grenades, etc. That said, I do appreciate the 'Lite' aspect of it where armor is just armor, rather than having a dude running around in khaki's wearing a Marsec helmet because there was a spare helmet lying around but no armor, and guns just *have* ammo to reload rather than counting clips. It would have been nice to have the option of the old school over-the-top management.
That even the tutorial introduces you to the fact that your are going to lose scores of soldiers is a great touch, too. I bored my girlfriend, and confused my friends with tales of how one friend just shot another friend in the face and killed him when he freaked out because he's a pussy and got scared by a wee alien, and I must admit to the occasional reload cheatery when one of my 'good friends' died (though I was on CraigG the 4th or something by the end of it) - perhaps a bit of an eye opener when I lost a team mate, thought about reloading, and went "Meh, it's only Danny"...

WillM: Leading up to XCOM I was ready to hate it. Turn-based tactical games like the original X-COM are pretty much my favourite genre of all time. I've played some pretty awful ones, especially over the past few years, to get my fix. The genre has been a graveyard for some time. What was the last computer turn-based tactics game that was even mediocre? Silent Storm? Calling that game even mediocre is a stretch. So I already had my arms crossed when I heard about the new XCOM. Add to that the 2K Games label, whose name might as well be Ruiners of Games, and Firaxis, who, while okay, I guess, seemed like a weird fit for XCOM -- I was expecting a disappointment I'd be able to complain about for another few years.
It was probably for the best that they didn't stick to the original game's winning recipe too closely, in the end, because it wouldn't have compared favourably. This game makes its own mistakes, but it makes them on its own terms. Most franchise revivals these days feel too of-the-moment -- either frenetic and ADD and IF SOMETHING'S NOT HAPPENING EVERY TEN SECONDS WE'RE FAILING THE USER -- or too achievement-unlocky, too collecty, too IF THE USER DOESN'T HAVE EXPLICIT THINGS TO STRIVE FOR OUTSIDE OF THE MAIN GAME FLOW WE'RE FAILING THE USER. XCOM avoids both of these. It's slow, at times, but engaging. It's confident in its design, doesn't pile on hours of "fun" with collection (unless you WANT to research everything, which is entirely up to you). You can certainly play through the game with restrictions on yourself -- no reloads or whatever -- but it doesn't ask you to. If only every remake was this assured and cool.

i really should get asuras wrath, shouldnt i

http://i.imgur.com/uXvpICL.gif
#1: Spelunky – XBLA, PC – 138 pts – 9 votes - 3 top game votes - Top Game 2013, Top PC Game, Top XBLA Game - FREE on PC

http://www.spelunkyworld.com/images/spelunky-friends.jpg

Official Game Site

Metacritic

Gameplay Video

http://killscreendaily.com/media/img/articles/spelunky.jpg

Free for PC Download

Creator Interview

Soundtrack

Sexism in Spelunky (and more discussion therein)

Gameshelf: Why I Still Play Spelunky

Necessary Games: Spelunky vs The Fate of Atlantis

”It started when my son told me that he had sacrificed his babysitter on the bloody altar of Kali.”

http://media.avclub.com/images/157/157203/16x9/627.jpg?7030

spelunky (rogue-like platformer for pc mac xbla etc)

if: Juuuust on the right side of too damn frustrating.

JCL: I played so much of this game during 2012 (over 800 tries) and I still haven't beaten it. For me, it's perfect. Different every time you play it, challenging, but balanced. Games generally last less than twenty minutes, sometime way less, which is great for me, as I usually don’t have the time or desire to play a game for hours and hours.

u people and your spelunky

i have never even heard of spelunky