41
HADES
RELEASED 2020 | LAST POSITION 79Jorge: A gorgeous and stylish hack-and-
slash roguelike featuring some of the best
writing, voice acting, and music around.
As Zagreus, the Prince of the Underworld,
you try to escape to the land of the living
to meet your mother. Meanwhile, your
father, Hades, is doing everything in his
power to keep you from her. Playing
Hades, you’ll tell yourself, “OK, this is the
last run, then I’m going to bed,” but before
you know it, you’re up at 4am for the third
night in a row.42
THE
SIMS 4RELEASED 2014 | LAST POSITION 18
Mollie: I have a lot of love for The Sims 4. It
had a rocky launch and issues that still
persist years later, but it’s the first game I
boot up whenever I get that creative itch.
The build mode is genuinely fantastic, and I
feel like Maxis is finally getting the hang of
making consistently excellent expansion
packs. The gameplay is still a little vapid
compared to earlier entries, but it’s a hell of
a lot better than it used to be. The biggest
bummer, and the reason for its steep drop
this year, is how high the financial barrier to
entry has become. The base game is
painfully barren, with simple additions like
seasons and pets essentially locked behind
paywalls. You could buy a lot of games in
the Top 100 for the same price as a
complete Sims 4 collection, and that
makes it harder to recommend.
The Top 100
FE ATURE
RESIDENT
EVIL
VILLAGE
RELEASED 2021 | LAST POSITION New43
James: So much more than the tall
vampire woman. I mean, Lady
Dimitrescu certainly makes a lasting
impression, but she’s just one chapter of
this excellent cosmic horror anthology.
Moving from a frozen village overrun
with lycans, through a classic game
of cat and mouse in a lavish castle,
and later arriving at colour-drained
industrial body horror – something
like Hellraiser meets Saw – Village
goes from goofy action to the scariest
setpieces in the series’ history. Along
the way, it embraces everything I
identify with Resident Evil: locked
doors, ridiculous keys and goofy
characters. This is Resident Evil at
its most self aware, at its scariest,
and its most surprising.