End of Year 2018: Waypoint Community's Favorites

[Emily]

Favorite Game Feel — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Marvel’s Spider-Man

@Navster

There was nothing that felt as good as thwip-ing through Manhattan and laughing at the landlocked mortals stuck in traffic below. This single mechanic was so good that I kept doing repetitive, formulaic open-world activities until I got my first platinum trophy ever.

2. Celeste

@CrimsonBehelit

It’s masocore platforming, without the masochism. Pixel perfect execution and puzzle solving, but only if you want it. You can scale it down to whatever you’re comfortable with, and even then it still feels snappy and rewarding.

@MabaseSlums

Celeste is probably my favorite game of the year. While part of that has to do with the work around the center, I wouldn’t have put, like, 30 hours into the game if Maddy’s movement didn’t feel so goddamn good. It’s the closest thing to skillful and natural joy that a platformer’s given me since Mario 3, and the fact that it keeps getting more and more complex while still feeling Just As Good is no easy feat.

1. Dead Cells

@keydemographics

I never really got the hang of Dead Cells and only occasionally managed to get into that flow state. But, how good is rolling through a door?

@Diglett

[Dead Cells] has this incredible moment-to-moment flow to its platforming and combat. That game is at its best when you’re flying through its worlds and levels from enemy to enemy, point-to-point, not even thinking about how you’re going to get to the next one because you don’t need to, it’s just instinctive and twitchy and great.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Game Music — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Deltarune

@Niko

Last Halloween, Toby Fox shocked the world by releasing Deltarune - Chapter 1, a work-in-progress demo of his next game. Probably the least surprising thing about it was that it was packed full of incredible music! The power of leitmotif mastery shined through Toby once again with several new themes woven throughout many tracks in a variety of different styles. The central theme can be found in tracks such as Field of Hopes and Dreams, A Town Called Hometown, the haunting Don’t Forget (which features vocals by Laura Shigihara), and more. The woodwinds and strings of Scarlet Forest evoke the iconic Beware the Forest’s Mushrooms from Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, yet manages to incorporate this central theme as well. And I’d be remiss to not mention Rude Buster and Vs. Susie, which just might be two of the most bangin’ battle themes ever written. There are so many nuggets of musical genius here, and I absolutely cannot wait to hear more!

2. Tetris Effect

@sputnik

I should mention the Tetris Effect soundtrack, which is cool and dynamically changes depending on how many lines you’ve cleared and every button press adds a different sound to the mix.

Also totally agree with the take that it reminds me of a more “hopeful” era in electronic music.

1. Celeste

@vehemently

Let’s! Talk! About! Celeste!

I really, really it think deserves attention for having remixes of its own tracks that are not only phenomenal, but fall in line with the fact that you’re playing remixed levels.

The normal soundtrack has this wonderful, soft sound, filled with disparate piano and warm synths. Then the remixes are these killer tunes that totally reinvent their original track. And since those levels are NAILS hard, the remixes are generally amped up versions of the original.

@foxtrot

I don’t know what to say about this song other than that it is an extremely powerful bop and might be the best original piece of music I’ve heard in a game since Transistor. The soundtrack as a whole is something truly special, an all-time great

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Multiplayer — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Jackbox Party Pack 5

@jaguar

The iterative process of the Jackbox series has been a treat to watch over the years. Each collection has its share of successful ambition and failed experiments, but I still appreciate even the less fun stuff they’re putting into the multiplayer sphere. I think between the excellent text-to-speech hijinks of Mad Verse City and the improv-friendly versatility of Patently Stupid, Jackbox Party Pack 5 is up there with my favourites from Jackbox Games.

2. Sea of Thieves

@Emily

When I didn’t have the time to sink lots of hours into a longer game, or the mood to play one of the many great indies that released this year, I found myself playing a lot of multiplayer games. None were quite like Sea of Thieves.

There was a lot that I liked at the launch of Sea of Thieves, between the art direction and the way Rare really nailed a perfect balance of making sailing an involved but intuitive process, one where you could have fun in the chaos of everything going wrong. That said, the game did feel a little light on things to do. It very much felt like a make your own fun sort of game, which I can appreciate up until the point where the fun for a lot of players became attacking smaller, less defended ships like my own. It wasn’t until Rare started rolling out their post-launch updates that the game really clicked for me.

1. Monster Hunter World

@Dapp

There are few games where I have been happy to replay the first 5 or so hours before making my way further into its unseen depths and new locales. Yet Monster Hunter World had me repeat the early stages of that game over and over, not out of a desire to get better drops, but to link up with others who where making their first footfalls just after me. While MHW still has its finicky stop-gaps (nothing quite like sitting at the canteen waiting for the cut scene to be activated on a friend’s end), watching each of my fellow hunters gravitate towards different weapons and playstyles, huge pangs of excitement throughout the group as they pull off something spectacular accidentally the first time, but with each excursion getting more confident with their tools. By the time you reach the end of those first few hours, typically signified with the vanquishing of the first true seemingly impossible obstacle the Anjanath, you have seen the friends begin, grappling with the differing layers of combat and exploration, and turn the corner into capable hunters, dodging under fire and lining their strikes just right to make maximum impact. This loop was so satisfying, and the feeling of passing on knowledge so genuine, it never surprised me that after those first few hours were up I would gladly run that gambit again.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Ongoing Game — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Warframe

@m_o

I picked up Warframe during a gaming lull in the Spring last year. I didn’t expect how important a game it would become to me. I spent countless working through the star map, and then on Sedna with friends, then on the plains, watching build videos on youtube, decorating the Digital Pyramids Dojo, and working on my fashion. The Warpoint community that has sprung up has been nothing short of amazing. I fell off over the summer, and haven’t jumped back in yet. That said, finally getting into Fortuna is the thing I am most excited for in 2019.

@Wartribution

Been playing this game for 5 years and loving every minute of it. I enjoy their consistency on updating their game with new quest, weapons and warframes. I also like watching their live streams where they address any problems the players and developers are facing while playing the game and their goals in the future. They also highlight what the community is up to whether they’re touring Dojos made by other clans or showing cosmetic designs which can be bought by the players and some of the proceeds can go to the artist themselves.

Their biggest expansion [this year] Fortuna allows players to help a struggling mining community fend off against their capitalist overlord Nef Anyo. Players can also explore an icy terraformed planet on Venus while cruising on a K-Drive (Hoverboard) and help conserve the wildlife and earning floofs (plushies)

2. Destiny 2

@Emily

I quickly want to shout-out the community of Destiny 2 players that make up our various D2 clans and who hang out in the Waypoint Discord. I wouldn’t have followed the game nearly as long if not for the folks there, that I can share in the enthusiasm (and frustration) with. It has been very rewarding to watch that group of folks grow alongside the game. Thank-you to everyone who takes part in that community!

@VulpesAbsurda

I continue to have a lot of issues with Destiny 2’s microtransactions but they’ve made some good compromises with some of it, by letting you buy shaders anytime you want them once you’ve gotten them once and still hand out the almost purely cosmetic items (ghosts can have minor bonuses to XP [which in the post game only gets you more loot boxes anyways] and some sparrows are quicker to use) pretty regularly via leveling. And this year they’ve added a LOT to the game and while I don’t love all of it I do love shooting bows so for me Forsaken is the obvious choice for this category.

@Catiline

Destiny 2 has been the game I sit down with almost every day since its release - I’ve put hundreds of hours in to it since PS4 launch. It’s a fantastic looter shooter at its core with fluid movement and fun shooting. While not every expansion has delivered the same breadth or quality of content, I am repeatedly impressed how each content release brings something new to the game. I come back to Destiny 2 with the expectation that I will find new things to love about the game – and I’ve not been disappointed yet.

1. No Man’s Sky

@Emily

No Man’s Sky is unquestionably my favourite ongoing game this year, and possibly every year following its release. I was among the people who largely liked what was there at launch for NMS but I’ve been very impressed by how Hello Games has supported it since with several major expansions. What I experienced of the NEXT update this year was just fantastic (the planets have rings now :o) . I had a delightful time moving from solar system to solar system, recording my travels with many screenshots taken from the fairly robust photo mode. It’s a game I can quite easily see myself revisiting again in 2019 and I’m excited to see what more Hello Games does with it.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Re-Release — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Spyro Reignited Trilogy

@CookieUniverse

Spyro Reignited Trilogy is one of the best remakes I’ve ever seen. The changes in art design i think are all welcome updates to the ps1 originals and they feel maybe even a tiny bit smoother to play than the originals. But they’re still those Original games at heart. My only problem is the whole subtitle kerfuffle. The game should really have those and i hope they come in a patch at some point. Even if you don’t have any personal nostalgia tied to these games if you love 3d platformers these are still some of the best.

2. Katamari Damacy: Reroll

@CrimsonBehelit

Katamari Damacy Reroll. Hey, remember that awesome, upbeat little game that had you grinning the entire time even though it wasn’t really that challenging? Remember how there hasn’t been a good one in like ten years?

1. Hollow Knight

@SecretSeashell

Didn’t get a chance to play this in 2017 but dang is it a perfect on-the-go game. What really stands out for me is the atmosphere and world-design. Hollow Nest felt like a real place rather than a videogame level, while at the same time just being a joy to explore and uncover all the secrets. This is the first time a Souls-like really called to me, but now I’m thinking of digging deeper in to the genre (Ashen next, maybe?).

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Sound Design ---- [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. God of War

@Niko

I found myself relying heavily on the parry move while playing God of War, if only because of the extremely satisfying “clang” and accompanying slowdown effect that would occur every time I got the timing correct. I’m not even that good at parrying in games!

@WastelandHound

The World Serpent alone is enough for me to give this to God of War hands down.

2. Tetris Effect

@Dapp

Tetris Effect takes the conductive nature of its spiritual predecessor Lumines where every button press, movement or block placement adds to sweeping soundscapes giving you that feeling of creation, contrasted to your general goal of bringing the block level down. What the game changes from that formula, that Tetris allows for, is room to breathe and a sense of tempo. As the cacophony increases in speed, so to does the block’s descent. Just as it can feel too much the bare, the music shifts the pace relaxes and you have a moment to collect and recover. This addition and incorporation of Tetris various speeds adds to Enhance’s already deft hand when it comes to sound design, and give you a better sense of orchestration.

1. Return of the Obra Dinn

@jaguar

it almost feels like the elephant in the room for this category but the way that Return of the Obra Dinn used those orchestral hits and musical stings to punctuate the clunky-but-physical feel of the UI absolutely blew me away. playing that game feels like becoming part of a stage play, the melodrama of the score buoying you through every step of your discovery and exploration.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Timeout Game — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Tetris Effect

@WastelandHound

Tetris Effect. I’m feeling chill just thinking about it.

2. Forza Horizon 4

@m_o

Forza Horizon 4 clicked for me as a chill out game when I turned off the music. Sure, Hospital Records is amazing (and Forza’s canon radio station) but the game opened up for me when I started playing it while I was on voice calls with friends, and when I played it listening to podcasts or audiobooks. This transferred the best part of my routine commute to Forza’s version of Scotland, where there is little traffic and less responsibility. Whether I am street-racing, trying to figure out the right car to get the biggest air off some jump, or just careening through some sheep fields in a Pagani Zonda that has a massive Yuri On Ice Decal, Forza captures the best, most idealized parts of driving (and zoning out on the open road), in an incredibly accessible way.

1. Into the Breach

@Niko

I don’t know if there’s a word for this, but I’ve occasionally experienced a phenomenon where I’d close my eyes to try and fall asleep, and clearly see gameplay from a game I’d been playing a lot of recently. This has happened to me for a number of action games in the past but never for a turn-based tactics game - until Into the Breach. I was seeing fake puzzles of my brain’s own design because I could not stop thinking about this game. In fact, on one particularly sleepless night, I was having so much trouble falling asleep that I got up, played an entire run and won it, then immediately went back to bed and fell asleep almost immediately. This helped me realize that playing Into the Breach was a release valve for the nervous energy I had built-up in 2017 and 2018 and I greatly appreciate the game for that aspect. It was wonderful to be able to get home from work, tune out the world, and jump into another timeline.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Writing — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. Donut County

@BuriedinGroves

Donut County has sharp dialogue that feels real. The texts in the game sound like ones I’d send. Beyond that, the main characters and their complexities are written concisely and effectively. BK is, in truth, a not great guy. I actually got angry at him. But his mistakes (and his redemption) are believable and resonant. The storyline about gentrification is also timely, though more context in the missteps of an earlier prototype. The lives the characters lead and htw words they speak, though, make the game feel like a true product of our time.

2. Celeste

@TheCastleBuilder

I know Celeste is quite the darling already, but I think the thing that impressed me most about it from a writing perspective is how much it does with relatively little. Dialogue in Celeste is fairly infrequent and brief, but always impactful towards character development and speaks well to the core messages of the game.

In my opinion, a lot of Celeste’s success with art, music, mechanics, and writing are due to it all working together so well. Each of these elements got to shine in the narrative because they only hard to communicate a part of the emotion and story. The writing is bolstered by things like intense musical moments or adorable selfies of Theo and Madeline, so it can be a little understated and still succeed.

1. Heaven Will Be Mine

@BuriedinGroves

Heaven Will Be Mine somehow outdid We Know the Devil in its poetics and the way it perfectly balanced strong feelings, natural seeming dialogue and constructed segments and language. By being close to “realistic” but still being clearly authored and subtle, it really rewards re-reading and returning to. The ending monologues in HWBM will never not make me cry.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Gritty Presents: Favorite Fighting Game — [Discussion] — [Poll]

3. UNDER Night IN-BIRTH Exe: Late[st]

@syz

Bit of a weird one in terms of “releases” just because it’s, as the title might suggest, more of a Super Turbo update. Was out in Japanese arcades for a couple of years prior to finally, mercifully making it to PS4, and then taking another several months to make it to PS4 outside of Japan this year. The console version at least brought with it a new character or two, a world-class tutorial, and a VN-style story mode for its chuuni-as-hell characters to star in. I think that if I were to sit down and focus on any of the myriad of fighting games on the market these days, it would be this and Tekken 7.

2. Dragon Ball FighterZ

@Emily

This was the first time I ever got into watching the EVO livestreams and boy did I pick a good year to tune in. The Dragon Ball FighterZ grand finales match between Sonic Fox and Goichi is one of the most edge-of-my-seat experiences I’ve had all year. It was such a good match and I can’t wait to see what that rivalry brings in the future.

1. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

@Sputnik

Nostalgia is everywhere, sweet and poisonous; Kirby floats through the air then turns into a stone and everything underneath him is a blur of smoke and bright diagonal lines while the controllers shake like they are alive.

@superhiero

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate isn’t just a game to me. It’s a bridge allowing me to express myself to other fans of the game, through the freeform nature of the game’s mechanics combined with the huge cast of fighters. To see every character return is something special, and the newcomers are fresh (woomy!) and exciting. There’s something here for all Nintendo fans, and I can’t wait to see the heights of competitive play.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Beyond Keys and Control Sticks: Your Favorite VR, Mobile & Tabletop Games — [Discussion]

@Tolinky

While I haven’t had a chance to play it yet, I finally got my hands on Dialect: https://thornygames.com/pages/dialect

A gorgeous tabletop storytelling game about building the language of an isolated community with its end on the horizon. What staggered me was the mindfulness and grounded nature of the game. It could have easily been about aliens or fantasy kingdoms and still been as heartbreaking but the scenarios given are real, varied, politically charged. From an English boarding school to an abandoned mars base to an island nation of slaves liberated from the British after a revolution. There’s a huge range. There’s chapters on how real languages die and how to engage in language preservation in the book. That and the clear love of linguistics on show that this game shares with you makes this game truly one of a kind.

@just_benj

Wipeout Omega Collection. Now the game itself technically released last year, but a VR patch was added earlier this year. And boy howdy…is it impressive. Upon hearing last year that VR would be coming to Wipeout, I was skeptical–no, worried. Not because I thought it wouldn’t be a good fit for the medium, but rather because I was concerned about the effect it would have on users’ bodies. If people (myself included) were feeling dizzy and nauseated by more traditional racers like Driveclub VR I could only imagine what an anti-gravity racer with vehicles zipping around a track at speeds of 300+ mph might do. And that answer, surprisingly, is essentially nothing. While I haven’t put a substantial amount of time into the game (I’d say less than 10 hours), I haven’t once started to feel sick while playing. I don’t know what kind of forbidden magic they used when putting this together, but it just works.

@chryssalidpunk

Root came along at exactly the right time for me. I had fallen away from board games for years, but learned about and became fascinating by GMT’s COIN games earlier this fall (from an episode of 3MA). I ended up playing Leder Games’ Vast a little while after that, and from there found out about Root.

Ultimately the COIN games are much more interesting to me, in part because their asymmetry is essential to the conflicts they depict, and the combination of their fiddly mechanics and historical flavor just really works for me. But the experience of playing Root bridged a gap between wargaming and board gaming for me, and made me feel like there was a place for me in both parts of the hobby. While playing Root I’ve met wargame nerds who told me about Supply Lines of the American Revolution, but I’ve also convinced friends who typically play Eurogames to try Cuba Libre and Colonial Twilight.

There’s nothing that revelatory about the fact that there are all kinds of people out there playing all kinds of tabletop games, and the lines between genres are blurry. But Root was the game that opened those doors for me, and that made me feel more welcome in the hobby.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

“That Time When…” - Moments in Games that Sparked Our Senses and Stuck in Our Minds — [Discussion]

@Sputnik

Experiencing the Tiger Fight in Yakuza 2 Kiwami was like hearing the tall tales of an epic exploit over the internet campfire for years, then finally seeing it for yourself.

@ligeti

Seeing Florence (even if she’s a cartoon character inside a video game) find a way to move on from her pain, in the end of Florence, finding the strength to think positively on what was and to recognize what her time spent loving another person did for her – that was something I really needed to see.

@40mackenzie

I spent 20+ hours after No Man’s Sky Next came out just kinda stumbling through my starting solar system. I wanted to explore everything, scan everything on every planet, save up for a cool ship and ended up being confused by what you are supposed to do in this game. I played through the base building quest up until the point where I had to recruit a scientist, and to do that I had to go to another solar system. Sorted out the antimatter housing and antimatter and I was finally ready to jump

I looked at my target destination on my galaxy map and… "What the fuck—" the target galaxy is my name- like my IRL given name. At this point I wasn’t sure if this was just part of the game’s design and Hello Games just pulled your info off your PS4 or whatever, but that seemed very weird too.

@notanimal

Just as I was about to give up on Return of the Obra Dinn, I was staring at the page with the pictures of the crew, and something clicked. I noticed something that helped me identify someone. Exhilarated, I put his information in the book, then used the information I inferred to identify someone else. Soon I had three correct identifications. From there I began to understand the roles of other crew members, and before I knew it I had three more. In a flurry of activity I finally managed to get the message that I had correctly identified the fates of all possible crew members, less than 10 minutes after that revelation.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

What is Small Anyways? - Your Favorite Short Games & Games By Small Teams — [Discussion]

@notanimal

Fugue in Void is an excellent little experience that I couldn’t recommend more! You make your way through a series of landscapes and architectural spaces and just take in the disconcerting beauty around you. The geometric interiors and brutalist cityscapes burned themselves into my brain. I dreamt about them for months after playing. There’s no real story to speak of, just room after room of perfect screenshot material. It’s not my favorite game of the year, but it’s stuck with me more than most of the bigger games I’ve played this year.

@Emily

I’ve already said a lot about The Missing: J.J. Macfield and the Island of Memories but I feel it worth reiterating just how much of a surprise this was. In the past I’ve respected Swery’s work from a distance but this was the first time one of the games he worked on really spoke to me. I found the story to be incredibly resonant, and the depictions of the characters were handled with a sensitivity I’ve rarely seen elsewhere. It’s a small game, one that’s difficult to recommend to everyone between the tough platforming puzzles and heavy themes (cw: self harm, queerphobia, gore). That said, I think the message it contains is one of the most important of the year.

@slimesiren

I’m still in the process of playing through a bunch of small games at the end of the year here but i have to shout out Secret Little Haven. It’s a game about a trans girl discovering herself in the late 90’s. it’s an adventure game in the style of a virtual desktop with fake OS’s browsers, chat programs, text programs etc. I found the story really moving and relatable and it’s only about 2 hours long.

But i should warn as it says on the games store page: [CONTENT WARNINGS: Parental conflict, gaslighting, flashing visuals]

It’s a game that can get pretty emotionally intense at times but it’s probably the most emotional i’ve gotten over a game all year. I can’t recommend it highly enough if you think it’s something you can handle.

@Emily

one night, hot springs is a lovely little game that I really needed in 2018. Created by a Japanese trans woman, it tells a story about the anxieties and fears trans folks have to live with while navigating public spaces. In spite of that, is it a very heartwarming game that never dwells on the tragedy so frequently explored in trans narratives. Instead it manages to impart an honest yet hopeful & posi message that I carried with me for the rest of the year.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Animated Work — [Discussion]

@foxtrot

It’s gotta be Hilda! It’s surprising, whimsical, upbeat, charming and the writing is just super sharp. Laughed a bunch and honestly got kind of emotional too at times. For me, it’s Netflix’s best original offering, and just a fantastic series all-around.

@slimesiren

Laid-Back Camp was the comfy cozy show i needed in the winter of 2018. It’s brimming with this love of the outdoors. The attention to detail is such that there were times where , silly as it sounds , i could smell the outdoors just watching them camp. I can’t wait for another season of these dorks camping!

@Catamari

A Place Further than the Universe’s depiction of friendships and the way people interact with each other is so genuinely real. The writing and pacing is incredible and the emotional moments are so well-done. It’s a beautiful show and everyone should check it out.

@BuriedinGroves

Pop Team Epic overcame its early reputation as ‘shitposting the anime’ and never stopped experimenting. By using multiple mediums, including felt, and fearlessly trying despite a mix of successes and failures, it is a singular show that will have an impact on anime for years. Also it’s super funny.

@WastelandHound

Everything you’ve heard about Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse is true. It’s as good as everyone says it is. My only quibble is that it’s not long enough for all the side-Spideys to have their own full-length feature. I want two hours of John Mulaney as Spider-ham!

@Sputnik

The finale to Adventure Time, “Come Along With Me” aired in 2018, The cartoon itself, all 9 seasons of it, was brilliant.

The finale covered a lot of themes but I liked the reoccurring one of timelessness, the ability of stories to exist outside of time. Which has to be the most reassuring theme to have in a final episode: yep this story has ended, but really it goes on forever and you can relive the parts you love any time you want!

@slimesiren

Between its storybook and real life segments, Liz and the Blue Bird is gorgeous. It’s maybe one of the most effective uses of music I’ve seen in a movie. The story was utterly moving and I was a crying gay mess by the end

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Books — [Discussion]

@hans_moleman

My vote for best book this year is Michael Pollan’s How to Change Your Mind, which is nominally about the increasing body of scientific research on psychedelics, but more affectingly, the book is a personal travelogue of Pollan’s experiences with psylocibin (among other compounds), and the ways that they have both shaped his interior landscape, and how his attitudes towards them have changed over time. The book is perhaps a little too enthusiastic about the potential of psychedelic substances, but at the same time, takes a clear stance that fun and joy (but also intense introversion) are also tangible benefits of these chemical experiences. As someone with predilections towards anxiety, as well as a low threshold for self-help, this book felt graceful, personal, and true–at least to my own experiences on other planes and wavelengths.

@ricotta

I have to give it to Maria Dahvana Headley’s The Mere Wife. A suburban, feminist retelling of Beowulf. I’ll admit a bias since I majored in Medieval Literature. It was a great story, the main character (Grendel’s mother, Dana) is one of my favourites of the year in any medium. And it got me very excited for Headley’s translation of Beowulf coming out next year.

@Sputnik

The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition by Ursula Le Guin, illustrated by Charles Vess

Amazing collection of Le Guin’s Earthsea stories. I had previously only read the first trilogy, so getting to read her follow up stories was an unexpected pleasure, plus the afterwords included that she wrote in 2012 were very interesting. Like how she saw the original Wizard of Earthsea written in ‘68 as being comforming (it’s a young man’s hero journey) and subversive (none of the main characters are white - something most of the cover illustrators at the time chose to change).

@Lastly

I read Bloody Rose by Nicholas Eames and it has reinvigorated my passion for reading. The story in the book is great but I think the real strength is in the characters. They’re a bunch of queer messes and I love them all so much.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Comics/Manga — [Discussion]

@gio

Go For It, Nakamura is the pure and innocent comedy yaoi I’ve needed all my life. … Nakamura’s your standard awkward protag, but he’s really funny and relatable; his crush on Hirose also takes him to some pretty unexpected places throughout the story. The art is very reminiscent of Rumiko Takahashi (Ranma, Inuyasha), which might totally be your jam (like it is for me).So Nakamura doesn’t exactly tread new ground, but it’s very creative and there just don’t seem to be a lot of stories like this for gay folks like me.

@Yuriy

For the second year in a row I’m having a hard time saying anything other than ShortBox comics. They’re a tiny publisher from the UK headed by an acclaimed critic Zainab Akhtar and somehow, I really don’t understand how, everything they put out is gold. Most notably for me this year they released Beneath the Dead Oak Tree by Emily Carroll, who is my favourite comics creator, Homunculus by Joe Sparrow, Your Mother’s Fox by Niv Sekar, and The River Bank by George Mager.

@slimesiren

Nancy’s new author Olivia Jaimes has been on fire this year. I’m not normally a newspaper comics reader (i was when i was a kid) but this is one everyone should be reading.

@spacelung

Gotta be Prism Stalker by Sloane Leong for me. It is cool as hell. The biopunk abstract future world of pneumatic kung-fu and psychic buildings and completely inhuman aliens is totally unlike anything I’ve read before.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Live-Action Work — [Discussion]

@Sputnik

Shirkers was one of those movies that came out nowhere and stuck with me. It’s a documentary about a teenager in 1992 Singapore who decided to make a movie. Just as they finished one of her collaborators ran off with all the film, and she didn’t see it again for 20 years.

It’s beautiful and tragic and made me sad/happy nostalgic about the 90s.

@atomictofu

the film that has gnawed at my brain the most this year has been Burning:

I could talk about the weight of class hierarchy that hangs over the entire film or just the technical aspect of how the story is delivered but I think above all, it’s an affecting portrait of three incredibly lonely and alienated people trying to connect. I can’t stop thinking about it.

@Terranova

As for me, probably the most high quality piece of live action work is Hannah Gadsby’s Nanette I don’t think anything else really captured 2018 for me. A depressing, sometimes silly, mostly sobering piece on why comedy sucks. A piece that feels to me like a microcosm of the horrors and the oppression going on in everyday society that we smear over with things to make us superficially feel good, even though its terrible when you think about it.

Its not fun, i don’t ever really want to watch it again. But best? Yeah, its the best thing i’ve seen all year.

@BlueHighwind

It was obvious to me the first time I saw it that Annihilation would be Movie of the Year. Nothing else has really even come within striking distance either. It’s a beautiful and terrifying SciFi tale about a cancer upon reality itself. The world mutates, the story mutates, the ending is a horrifying confrontation that is as weird and intense as anything in 2001. (Plus the bear attack, holy shit.)

@axemtitanium

I saw Blindspotting in theaters and was transfixed by it. I watched it again recently to confirm that it was really that good and it is. It’s the film that confronts white privilege in the right way. In a year full of great Oaktown movies (Black Panther and Sorry to Bother You to name a few), Blindspotting takes the cake. I consider it best film of the year.

@slimesiren

The Good Place continues to be great through all its twists and turns. For all the heavy topics it tackles, it never forgets the characters. The show continues to make me laugh, cry, and root for these characters to have a happy ending.

@Emily

In many ways the latest season of Better Call Saul felt like an ending. The ongoing conflicts of the series finally reached a tipping point at the end of season 3, and with this one we were witness to the fallout. And what a show it was. No doubt it will continue on in the future (and I’ll be there for it) but the final few eps I watched in 2018 felt like the payoff BCS had been building to for so many years.

---

[back to top]

[Emily]

Favorite Music — [Discussion]

@foxtrot

Here’s some reckless shit that I can’t take back: Ka is the greatest lyricist I have ever heard in my entire life. This year he released a project called Orpheus vs. The Sirens under the name The Hermit and the Recluse and it is one of the greatest rap albums I’ve ever had the pleasure of listening to. So clever and dense with wordplay that I pick up on something else in it every single time I listen. He is incredible, massively underrated an overlooked (though this increasingly seems intentional on his part). It’s a beautiful, genuine, fascinating album in so many ways

@Kozmosborn

Joy As An Act of Resistance by IDLES — This is the album that has been on rotation the most throughout the year since it released in August. It’s loud, angry, vulnerable, and about as loving and tender as a punk rock record can get. The opener, Colossus, is one of my top tracks this year.

@Protome

Kendrick Llamar (and a LOT of other artists) - Black Panther

So, this one caught me off guard because on the face of it it shouldn’t really be my kinda thing. A big hip-hop collab album that’s connected to a fucking Marvel movie? No thanks. I’m sure people will like it but that’s extremely not my thing.

Oh wait, it is my thing you say? It’s amazing you say? I’ll listen to it all year you say? Well whatever, I guess it’s number one then.

@jaguar

if i could convince anyone to hear any one thing from 2018, it’s gotta be Whack World

Tierra Whack - Whack World

it seriously boggles my mind that Tierra Whack a) got a grammy nom b) for best video and c) it’s not for this 15-minute seamless masterpiece that accompanies the entirety of her debut album

---

[back to top]