When you combine the talents of William Pugh, who worked on The Stanley Parable, and Justin Roiland, who is the co-creator of the widely popular and cult-followed Rick and Morty, you were bound to get something quite odd, yet still very intriguing.

There were several moments during my 107 hours with Xenoblade Chronicles 2 where I had a love-hate relationship with the game. While the characters, its story, and the gorgeous locations drew me in, the objective marker system, its mixing of high and low-level enemies, and its awful Gacha system for unlocking Blades did everything it could to pull me out of it.

The original Life is Strange is a favorite game of mine. The characters, the story, the time travel gimmick, each of these are highlights of the series for me. Chloe Price was hands down my favorite character and when talk of a prequel about her and Rachel Amber was announced, I was really excited.

Hellblade is an experience. It is also a discussion about mental health, a subject often considered taboo in many forms of entertainment, let alone one being addressed through a video game. While characters with mental health issues do exist in the industry, they are rarely ever positioned as the main protagonist.

While Breath of the Wild isn't my Game of the Year or even in the top three, It is still an absolutely incredible game. The original Legend of Zelda became the roadmap for the adventure genre for decades and still continues to inspire countless game designers on a daily basis.

Destiny 2 has been largely under the microscope since its release; offering less content than its predecessor and gameplay systems that are often at odds with one another. The remaining community has been very vocal about the lack of endgame content present in the current build of the game.

The Assassin's Creed games have never enticed me. I've peeked behind the curtain and played several hours of the first two in the series, but it wasn't until Black Flag, the series' fourth official installment, where I began to take notice. Despite this, I somehow own all of them.

If you tuned into the bizarre yet hilarious mock-press conference this past E3 from publisher Devolver Digital, you may have noticed a black and red aesthetic sci-fi punk slasher and shooter by the name of Ruiner.

I wasn't exactly sure what to expect with a game titled Cat Quest. I had briefly heard about the game through a few gaming podcasts and needed something to fill my time on my Nintendo Switch before I dived headfirst into Xenoblade Chronicles 2. At just $15, I figured why not.

Horizon Zero Dawn is one of the best games I've ever played, and frankly, one of the best looking video games ever crafted. Its combat was fast, ferocious, and made even more impressive due to its robotic cast of creatures that you could literally dismember with a well-placed arrow or set up traps to bring that lumbering beast down to the ground.

A good game has an interesting and engaging story, well-conceived characters and gameplay mechanics that serve to complement the many intricate systems at play. If either of these elements gets in the way of one another, then it can upset the balance and cause the experience to be poor.

2015's Star Wars: Battlefront originally released with a shallow offering of content. It featured no single player campaign, a small assortment of maps, and attempted to sell a season pass that was nearly the price of the game itself.

It's safe to say that Sonic has seen better days. The lightning-fast blue blur of a Hedgehog hasn't been able to produce a memorable and satisfying title in years until the release of Sonic Mania earlier this year, a title, I might add, that was initially crafted by fans of the series rather than an in-house established development team.

When Activision announced that Call of Duty would be continuing with its trek into the future of war with Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, fans were outraged. The reveal trailer became one of the most disliked trailers of all time and this led to poor sales when compared to the highs the series was known for.

The first Life is Strange was such a well told and enjoyable game. Max, Chloe, and the time-traveling shenanigans that each of them got up to, not to mention the emotional finale the game ended on, depending of course if you picked a certain ending, is one of my favorite games ever made.

There are few gaming franchises that can stay as consistently relevant and enjoyable as Mario. The plump little plumber has raced go-karts, competed in the Olympic games against Sonic the Hedgehog, and is always down for a party, or two, or eight, or ten.

Right from the very start, Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus puts a strong emphasis on its characters and its shock and awe narrative that will stick with you during the 10-12 hour campaign. There were so many moments where I sat there in disbelief to the very scenes that unfolded, the situations the characters found themselves in, and one of the most shocking twists I've seen.

While I enjoy the characters and relationship systems of the Fire Emblem series, the turn-based strategy elements were always something I never really took a shine too. I did find some fun in the combat systems, but it was always the characters themselves that I kept coming back for.

When Shinji Mikami returned to Resident Evil with the fourth title in the main series, he didn't just develop the most popular entry in the franchise, he redefined the third person shooter. There isn't an over-the-shoulder action game out there since 2005 that wasn't in some way influenced by what he and his team had created.

While you may not know the studio by name, Supermassive Games was the team behind the successful, yet somewhat overlooked, Until Dawn; a choose-your-own-adventure game about a group of teenagers being hunted down one by one by a mysterious killer.