Hollow Knight delivered on all that you'd expect to make it a real indie classic.Ģ018 TechRaptor Awards Won: Best Evolving Gameĭeveloper: StudioMDHR | Release Date: September 29th, 2017 | Game PageĮver since cartoons have been coming out, games have been trying to copy their art style. When you navigate your cute bug through the world, trying to keep them alive and away from various enemies, it's hard not to get engaged. If Ori and the Blind Forest showed that you could bring back 2D metroidvanias with cute art and fun gameplay, Hollow Knight showed the same thing but also add "intense combat" and "high difficulty" to that list. There's just something fantastic about climbing on top of a giant moving tower and looking over the lands to see just how the robots have changed everything.ĭeveloper: Team Cherry | Release Date: February 24th, 2017 | Game Page From a beautiful game world to creative enemies, there's a lot to love here. The fact that Horizon: Zero Dawn makes actually hunting these animals a ton of fun is only icing on the cake. Look, you had most people at "a woman hunts robotic animals with a bow." That's enough.
Changing the series to first person, setting it in a fantastic environment, and making the villains terrifying was more than enough to make Capcom suddenly get an incredible second wind.ĭeveloper: Guerrilla Games | Release Date: February 28th, 2017 | Game Page Yet this game marked the new Capcom and took everyone by storm. Resident Evil 7 looked interesting, but if it would be worth it was up in the air. None of their projects were landing, and "will Capcom shut down?" was becoming a seriously asked question. It may be hard to tell now, but in 2017 Capcom was in a miserable place. probably the original.ĭeveloper: Capcom | Release Date: January 24th, 2017 So is that enough to make people care? When it came out the answer was a resounding yes, and we ended up with the best Sonic game since. The result is Sonic Mania, a 2D Sonic game that takes the gameplay and presentation from the classics while also giving it enough of a modern twist to really feel unique. So what does Sega do? Ask a team of fans to make something better. Sonic is another one of those IPs that hasn't really managed to put out much quality in quite some time.