I always love to look back on a year and reminisce over the things I’ve done, including books I’ve read, games I’ve played, TV and Movies I’ve watched, music I’ve listened to. Of course there’s still 25+ days left this year, which is plenty of time to experience new things, but I wanted to share some of my favorites from this year and hear from all of you (selfishly to fill out even more potential things to do next year)!
I don’t have a prescriptive format or anything for this thread, but I’m going to do my “favorite” (or at least one of my favorite bc I love a lot of stuff) game, movie, tv show, book, and album I experienced this year. Would love to hear from y’all but feel free to post whatever you enjoyed this year, favorite or not, and feel free to add things outside the categories I’m using!
Game: Death Stranding
I played a lot of games this year and picking a single favorite is really difficult, but something about Death Stranding keeps sticking with me (I’m also waist-deep in its sequel right now and loving that game even more). Big-budget AAA games usually don’t make it to the top of my list, but Death Stranding is ambitious and messy enough that it really endured itself to me. It does take a while for what the game is doing to really click, in my opinion, and players may still not gel with that and leave. But once this game resonated with me I could not stop playing it. I got so into the gameplay, characters, and its world (a sci-fi world that I think is really earnest, ambitious, and novel). It’s a great hybridization of really impressive gameplay and design (the scope and execution feel AAA-justified to me) and a very optimistic, humanist theme. I was so pleasantly surprised by this game.
Movie: 12 Angry Men
This one’s a classic, and similar to Death Stranding I think it’s a work that wears its heart on its sleeve. I don’t think there’s a ton of ambiguity or nuance in this story, and that’s part of what makes it work. There’s an interesting setup, a well-written cast of characters, and another appeal to human goodness. I feel like this movie has hardly aged and is extremely accessible. There’s also a real dedication to keeping this movie engaging, which must have been a challenge given its static setting (the whole thing takes place in one room).
TV Show: Twin Peaks
While I have felt the influence of this show in many of the things I love my entire life, I’ve never sat down and watched it. I am so glad I did. There are a lot of things that are like Twin Peaks, but nothing truly like it. To me this is proof positive of believing in a vision, even if there’s not a proven path that it will succeed. Is this show a mystery, a soap opera, a comedy? Is it focused on the supernatural, or is it a police procedural, or a high school drama? It’s all of that, somehow. It flies in the face of a lot of advice about staying within genre bounds and instead tries to paint a more holistic vision of life, which I adore. I think that there is no life without romance, horror, comedy, and despair - focusing on just one of those things can make for very interesting art but can only go so far. And that’s totally fine and sufficient, but Twin Peaks stands as something that wants to view the human experience more holistically. It’s also extraordinarily goofy and weird. The third season, made in the 2010s, is a pretty big tonal departure, but I still really enjoyed what it had to say, and think its core ethos is very much in line with what I loved about the show.
Book: Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud
This is one of the most inspiring books I’ve ever read. One of the first things I can ever remember wanting to be was a cartoonist. Somewhere that shifted to game developer, but I’ve always had a love for comics and cartoons, so this book interested me. It’s so much more than that, though - this is a thesis on the power of form and art not just in comics, but in everything we can create. Just seeing someone so eloquently present the merit and power of comics was inspiring to me. I feel like for game development (as well as any creative endeavor, particularly those that involve a visual component) there is a ton to be learned here, and you’ll find it really vindicating/cathartic to see someone who really gets it go into detail.
Album: #1 Record by Big Star
I was not familiar with Big Star before this record was suggested to me, and I still don’t know a lot about the band (my music listening is pretty touch and go; I don’t get attached to groups really quickly) but this album went on repeat all year for me. I listen to a pretty wide variety of stuff, but Big Star is a little outside of my comfort listening’s normal cohort. This album was different for me, though. There’s something very genuine about all the tracks in here, not just in their quality, but in their variety. It’s kind of like a chocolate box of music, even though it all has a classic rock lean.
