Paige FTW: What I Want In 2020
As we teeter on the brink of 2020, let’s alter the typical “most anticipated” list and instead discuss what we want out of our games next year.
I can tell you what I’m looking forward to — Final Fantasy VII Remake, The Last of Us 2, Ghost of Tsushima, Cyberpunk 2077, etc. Meaty role-playing games, mostly.
For me, the most treasured moments come from complete immersion — when I forget that I am not actually Geralt of Rivia, Tidus, Lara Croft, whoever. I feel the strong attachment to other characters — like my personal agony when I chose to save Alistair’s life by pushing him towards Morrigan, or when I watched Legion sacrifice himself for the Quarians.
To me, that is the pinnacle of gaming. No other medium can do this. That sense of immersion, of identification is unique to the video game.
The other thing I love in a video game is, well, completely the opposite.
A year ago, when recovering from surgery, I spent many, many, many happy hours clearing the map in Assassin’s Creed Origins.
It was a complete waste of time. Most of it had nothing to do with the story. I was just clearing the icons off the map, ticking off an endless number of checkmarks. And I couldn’t have been happier.
It’s probably the appeal of Death Stranding — a game consisting entirely of fetch quests and an entire infrastructure system to build. People spend hundreds of hours delightedly constructing roads and generators.
So that’s the second thing I love: a beautiful system that’s so smooth and appealing that even the most tedious of fetch quests are a joy to complete.
These two elements do not often overlap, as you might imagine…
But hey! Maybe in 2020, one game will achieve the holy symbiosis. We shall see…
