2014 was a right old muddle. With the new-gen consoles on shelves around the world, game publishers found themselves stuck between the past and the future. Big new franchises jostled with endless remasters, big releases were plagued with problems, and the best games of the year came from some surprising sources.
So was 2014 a good year for games? Well…
We published 73 reviews across XBA and PST in 2014, at an average score of 76.39%. That’s up from the previous year’s average of 72.75%. But that doesn’t tell the whole story. 2014’s scores were far more even than 2013, with fewer peaks and troughs. In fact, around 50% of the games we reviewed in 2014 earned 80% or more and just three earned more than 90%, one of which was a remaster. In 2013, two games scored 100% and seven scored 40% or lower.
2014 had plenty of good games (when they worked), but only a few stood out. At the start of the year you’d have predicted that Titanfall and Destiny would have been the big, swinging dicks of 2014. But it didn’t quite work out like that.
February set the tone for the year. Rayman Legends and Fable Anniversary brought old experiences to new platforms; Thief, Strider and Garden Warfare attempted to breath new life into existing franchises; and Lightning Returns, Lords of Shadow 2 and (kinda) LEGO The Movie Videogame continued the sequel treadmill.
Most notably, as DICE continued to grapple with Battlefield 4’s many problems, neither Fable Anniversary nor Thief enjoyed flawless releases, launching with frame rate problems, crashes and progress-halting bugs between them. But as we know know, 2014 would see far bigger balls-ups.
March was a big month, ushering in four highly-anticipated releases. South Park: The Stick of Truth finally arrived after a string of delays, earning plaudits despite being censored in Europe; Dark Souls II earned our biggest review score of the year (a whopping 95% from Mr Abrahams); and Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes split opinion with a brilliant, but very short campaign.
March's biggest release? Titanfall. Respawn's debut mech-clomped and free-ran onto Xbox and FPS fans were pleased with the results. The game’s only real problem was the lack of a compelling single-player component and a player count that dwindled between big updates. Regardless, Titanfall earned an 88% review score and secured our award for Best Multiplayer of 2014.
March was an important month for Xbox in other ways too, with Phil Spencer taking over the role of Xbox boss from Don Mattrick. He immediately set about undoing some of the more questionable decisions made under his predecessor. We won’t miss Mattrick’s dodgy blazers or his dodgy ideas.
April arrived with a couple of digital-only gems from Ubisoft. Fairytale RPG Child of Light was so good it inspired Rich “Chimpanzee chops” Walker to write a review entirely in rhyme, while Trials Fusion reignited our passion for crashing and crying (but in a better way than that sounds). Later in the year, Valiant Hearts topped the lot with a touching tale of love and loss in WWI. Ubisoft’s digital output in 2014 was spot on.
Also in April, Kinect Sports Rivals did the best it could with dodgy tech in what turned out to be something of a last hurrah for the motion-sensing peripheral. A month later, Microsoft announced that Xbox One would no longer come with a compulsory version of the camera, despite previous assertions that it was part of the company’s “vision” for the console. Big Phil had started flexing his muscles.
May’s games ended up being a surprise. While Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs carried the most hype and racked up a number of sales records at release, it was Wolfenstein: The New Order that ended up earning the most praise. Revitalising a tired series, MachineGames cemented its reputation as a creator of unique, story-led action games.
Meanwhile, Microsoft announced the arrival of Games With Gold on Xbox One, with Max: Curse of the Brotherhood and Halo: Spartan Assault. The service’s offerings grew stronger as the year progressed.
In June, E3 2014 heralded the usual flurry of announcements, trailers and surprises. The Xbox press conference was well received, as Big Phil stepped out on stage to reveal exclusives like Halo: The Master Chief Collection, Crackdown, Platinum Games’ Scalebound and Rise of the Tomb Raider. Lara’s return turned out to be merely a timed-exclusive, but that didn’t stop the internet having a mini meltdown.
It was Ubisoft that took top honours for its E3 conference, however. Assassin’s Creed Unity, Far Cry 4, The Division and The Crew all looked impressive, while Rainbow Six: Siege came out of nowhere to stamp its mark as one our most-anticipated future releases. Ubisoft’s getting rather good at keeping at least one big surprise under its belt at E3. And long may it continue.
With the quiet summer months out of the way, September began 2014’s crescendo with a glut of big games. NHL 15 (rubbish) and FIFA 15 (weaker than usual) hit their annual release slots, while Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and Forza Horizon 2 both impressed. You’d be forgiven for thinking they didn’t exist though. In terms of hype, one game dominated: Destiny.
Most players were disappointed. The story was non-existent, the systems were poorly explained and the content felt inadequate. But it wasn’t a complete loss. The gunplay is unrivalled, the Vault of Glass raid was a revelation and… did we mention the shooting’s fun? Let’s hope Bungie can continue to develop on a good idea as Destiny evolves.
The biggest story of 2014 belonged to Microsoft. In September, the Redmond firm dished out a ludicrous $2.5 billion to buy Minecraft and its developer Mojang. What they intend to do with it - beyond allowing the game to remain on rival platforms and green lighting that Telltale Adventure game - nobody knows. Meanwhile, Minecraft creator Marcus “Notch” Persson probably doesn't give a shit. He’s too busy counting jelly beans in his new mansion.
Survival horror made a console comeback in October, with both Bethesda and SEGA taking a gamble on the genre. The Evil Within, made by Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami no less, may have been a bit inconsistent, but Alien: Isolation was a revelation. Creative Assembly swapped strategy for scares to brilliant effect, earning themselves our coveted Game of the Year award in the process. Alien: Isolation is chuffing brilliant.
Traditionally the biggest month of the year, November rolled out the big guns. Assassin’s Creed Unity, the new-gen version of Grand Theft Auto V, Assassin’s Creed: Rogue, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Halo: The Master Chief Collection and Far Cry 4 all exploded into action. Or at least, they were supposed to explode. Some were just wet farts.
Assassin’s Creed Unity had more bugs than a Parisian brothel; Grand Theft Auto Online’s re-launch was troubled; Dragon Age: Inquisition’s issues, relatively mild in comparison, prevented Dan from giving the game 90%; and Halo: The Master Chief Collection’s multiplayer was broken for weeks. But hey, at least Far Cry 4 and AC: Rogue came out of the mess relatively unscathed, right?
Botched launches, broken games and struggling servers ended up defining 2014 and driving consumer confidence to an all-time low. Publishers may be pushing pre-orders with increasing ferocity, but the truth is - right now - we can’t trust them. Very few companies seem capable of ensuring that their games will work at launch. It’s a sorry state of affairs.
2014 came to a close with both Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network recovering from DDoS attacks that left players unable to get online over the Christmas break. We all knew it was coming, but neither Microsoft nor Sony could prevent it. What should have been the culmination of a year spend enjoying a diverse selection of strong games ended up being a frustration. We demand better in 2015.
Thankfully, the signs are good. Several high profile titles slated for 2014 were shunted to 2015, including Evolve, Batman: Arkham Knight, Battlefield Hardline, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, The Division and Dying Light. That’s a pretty decent potential Game of the Year list right there. The delays were annoying, but if it means they arrive in full working order, we’ll take it. Fingers crossed that’s the case.
As the games industry grappled with the shift to new-gen in 2014, XBA and PST consolidated their position as the best Achievement and Trophy sites on the internet, while striking out in some exciting new area.
We moved into our first offices in London, returned to YouTube with a fresh perspective, launched a brand new Twitch channel and a brand new website, and brought it all together under the umbrella of the Resero Network (Resero means “unlock” in latin). It’s early days but we’ve already had great success, smashing personal records with our YouTube content, building a brilliant community on Twitch, and vastly outstripping the goals we set at the start of the year. We’d like to thank you all for your support.
We’d also like to thank everyone who turned up to our MCM London Comic Con Games Stage shows this year. The event continued to break attendance records in 2014, with 110,000 of you squeezing into the ExCel in October. If you’ve never attended before, consider coming in 2015, as the Games Stage continues to go from strength to strength.
And finally, thanks to all those that turned up to our annual PAX Prime piss-up. Yet again it was a legendary night, with queues stretching out of the bar all night long. We’re hoping to do even more with you guys in 2015, so keep an eye on the Community & Site news feed. Happy new year!