Honorable Mention: Steep
It’s award season here at Twinfinite! Starting with a few runner ups, let’s look back at the best Ubisoft games from this year and our 2016 winner!
We haven’t seen a truly great winter sports game in quite some time. While the 2012 reboot of SSX released to a pretty warm reception, nothing has stood as competition, until now. Steep gives players complete freedom to explore and experience a large chunk of the Alps mountain range in whatever way they see fit. Be it by snowboarding, skiing, wingsuit, or paragliding, you can do all of them, whenever and wherever you want to.
Steep is more than just an open-world snow sports game, though. It wants players to link up and tackle trails together, set high scores for one another, and use the extensive range of camera options to capture your perfect run and give it the production value it deserves. Of course, there are your traditional events to complete too, such as races, high score competitions, and time trials to complete too, if you want a little more structure to your shredding escapades.
While Steep does many great things, it could have learned a lesson from SSX. The trick controls are limited, fiddly, and oftentimes unresponsive. This makes nailing a run far more frustrating and less frequent than it should be, and for reasons beyond your control. After a while, you’ll tame the control scheme and things will, for the most part, fall in place. It’s just a shame it’s inconsistent.
Honorable Mention: Far Cry Primal
It may well have had one of the worst reveals ever, but when Far Cry Primal finally released, it silenced many of its skeptics. Some just didn’t understand how a series that relies so heavily on FPS mechanics could go to the prehistoric period. Yet, it managed to pull it off perfectly.
There was a certain awe about heading out and exploring this foreign world teeming with life. Mammoths herded together and minded their own business, Sabertooth tigers made every journey one fraught with ambushes, and the dense greenery made for fantastic views. Ubisoft put a lot of time into the research behind Far Cry Primal even to the point of hiring historical specialists to create the voice-acted prehistoric language.
While the setting was definitely different and made the standard Far Cry formula feel fresh, it did have its drawbacks. Melee combat wasn’t quite as satisfying as firing your bow and arrow from a distance and could even be a little disorienting as the camera bobbed around with each swing. It’s also a typical Ubisoft game, which will have you going from point to point on a map, clearing out outposts, popping a bunch of stuff on your map, and clearing it off. Ubisoft had great ambitions with Primal, but couldn’t quite stick the execution this time around.
Second Runner Up: Werewolves Within
Werewolves Within is a game that’ll never get half as much attention as it truly deserves thanks to the fact it’s a VR title. Based on the social game, Werewolf, which has two players assume the roles of werewolves while other villagers try to suss out who the werewolves are, Werewolves Within is a perfect match for VR’s strengths. However, Werewolves Within adds a couple of twist inclusions to the cast. You’ve got the likes of the Turncloak, who wants the werewolves to win and knows who they are, but the werewolves don’t know who the Turncloak is. Gossips, on the other hand, are given a true and a false clue each game which may reveal the werewolves true identities.
Thanks to the head-tracking capabilities of the VR headsets, however, your body movements can be used to gesture or trick other players into shifting their suspicions. You can even make direct eye-contact with the crudely drawn character models, making for intense battles of who can hold their nerve the longest. Leaning to whisper to the person next to you, or standing up and pointing can both have different effects on the game dependent on who you’re playing with and what character you are.
Werewolves Within is a great social game and one which has an abundance of replayability thanks to every person you play with being different. Unfortunately, the game isn’t cross-play, and with the relatively low adoption rate of PSVR in comparison to the 50 million PS4s out there, it’s unclear how long Werewolves Within will survive for. Werewolves Within is a great game whether you’re playing with strangers or long-time friends.
First Runner Up: The Division
When The Division released back in March, players went crazy to jump into the life of an Agent and explore the streets of Manhattan. Whether you were playing on your own or as part of a team with friends, there were plenty of objectives to complete, and hidden collectibles to find.
Things only got more intense if you headed into the Dark Zone, The Division’s PVP arena that had players battle it out for some of the best loot in the game. It was moments like this, as you sprinted towards an extraction point to secure your loot with your friends laying down covering fire at hostiles, that The Division really shined. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to last for all too long.
Considered by many upon its release as a competitor to Bungie’s Destiny, one thing became incredibly prevalent after completing The Division’s campaign. The initial end-game was weak and lacked any serious grind or challenge. As the DLC packs released, bugs, glitches, and imbalances in the weapons plagued The Division, leading to a reported deteriorating player base.
While it may not have maintained players well, The Division is back on the rise. A recent update fixed many of the game’s problems and even straightened out the endgame content too. While it was far from perfect, The Division was a fun game while it lasted.
Winner: Watch Dogs 2
Watch Dogs 2 had many wrongs to right, courtesy of its predecessor. The original Watch Dogs had an uninspired, boring world, and equally dreary protagonist, and it was all far too serious. Hacking felt limited, and there was only one real way to complete a mission, eliminating the sense of freedom that being able to hack the city should bring. Watch Dogs 2 solved it all.
Set in sunny San Francisco and putting you in control of eccentric hacker, Marcus Holloway, Watch Dogs 2 has a much more lighthearted feel to it. Everything is about having fun and messing around by experimenting with the tools you have at your disposal. Missions can be completed in whatever way you see fit. Don’t see Marcus as a gun-wielding maniac? Use your hacking skills and non-lethal combat options to take a less chaotic approach to missions.
Watch Dogs 2’s freedom and flair don’t just end with its missions, though. The entire virtual rendition of San Francisco perfectly encapsulates the culture and vibrancy of the real deal. Ubisoft has also scattered a number of side missions and a bunch of other random activities that’ll have you exploring the city, and most importantly, having a great time while doing so. If you liked the idea behind the original Watch Dogs but were put off by its serious tone and limitations, give Watch Dogs 2 a try. You won’t be disappointed.
Congratulations to Watch Dogs 2, our pick for the best Ubisoft game of 2016! Be sure to visit throughout the month for more award announcements including the big one, our game of the year for 2016!
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