As we’re wrapping up 2018 in a few days, I thought it would be nice if we share our personal favorite games of the year. No rules here, any game you enjoyed in 2018 applies, not just games that came out this year!
My gaming time in 2018 was all about replaying some of my favorites of all time, in one form or another. Here are my favorite games played this year, in no particular order!
- Dragon Force - Saturn
As per the intro, I got on a kick of replaying some of my favorites games from the past, and this was the first one I replayed. Dragon Force is one of the games I could play forever as I love Strategy RPGs, so I was glad to play it again after not touching it for about 10 years.
- Wild Arms - PlayStation
This is a game that I owned back when the PlayStation was new. I played it several times about half-way through, then would get inevitably distracted by one of the new amazing games that kept coming out on the system (seriously, PlayStation had such a great library!). This changed this year, as I finally played it all the way through and it’s really deserving of being played, such a whimsical game. Love it!
- Yakuza Kiwami - PS4
A fantastic remake of the original PS2 game, which I finished back when it was released. Playing this one made me want to replay the whole series, which is made easy with all the remakes/re-releases/new chapters released on PS4.
- Battle Garegga Rev. 2016 - PS4
I own the Saturn version and still regularly played it when this came out, so I imported the Korean physical version with the intent to spend lots of time with it on PS4 (which I did!). Shooters are one of my favorite genres, so revisiting this port by M2 was a highlight of 2018.
- Final Fantasy II - SNES
This is one of the games that made me love RPGs, having picked it up at a pawn shop as a teen while on summer vacation with my family. I replayed it this year on the SNES Classic and enjoyed reliving those memories. Still one of my favorite SNES soundtracks!
- Shining Force - Genesis
I mentioned shooters being one of my favorite game genres above, with Strategy/Tactical RPGs being my other favorite games. I finally finished Shining Force this year, replaying it off the Sega Genesis Classics collection. Can’t wait to play Shining Force 2, and replay Shining Force 3 in 2019!
- Shenmue - Dreamcast
This one needs no introduction. I replayed it off the PS4 HD remake, then played it again on the Dreamcast (yup, double dipping some Shenmue in 2018! hahahahah ).
- Advance Wars - GBA
Advance Wars filled the time on many of my work commutes in 2018, which was a great way to start/wrap up my days. The charm in this one is off the charts, and this is still my favorite one in the series. I hope Nintendo will surprise us with a new entry on Switch in 2019!
- Ni No Kuni 2 - PS4
Seems like overall opinion on this game isn’t great, but I really enjoyed it. I agree that it’s not as engaging and charming as the first one, but it still holds its own as a simple, heartwarming adventure.
- Final Fantasy 9 - PlayStation
Last but not least, replaying this PS classic really brought me back to my early 20s. This was just before I moved to Japan for a few years, and that period of absolute freedom and lack of responsibility was just the best. The story in this game is so charming, and the ending is still one of my favorites of all time. So happy I got an opportunity to replay it this year.
Over to you guys, looking forward to hearing about your 2018 favorites!