Best Adventure Game of 2016 - Article
by Craig S , posted on 04 January 2017 / 8,109 Views
It may come as a surprise to learn that this, out of all of the genre categories, was the most hotly contested award this year - less than 0.5% of the staff and community voting separated the winning title from its nearest rival. That result is indicative of yet another strong year for the indie-dominated genre.
Games making the shortlist this year included an exploration of the ocean and its many lifeforms, a title that delved into the psychological impact of safeguarding the American wilderness, a supernatural mystery, and the third entry in the popular death game series Zero Escape.
The Shortlist:
Firewatch
ABZÛ
Zero Escape: Zero Time Dilemma
Oxenfree
The Winner:
Firewatch
This beautiful first person adventure title is the debut release from indie start-up Campo Santo and proved to be one of the gaming highlights of the first few months of the year. Players take on the role of a Shoshone National Forest fire lookout as he safeguards and explores his designated area of the Wyoming wildlife. It becomes a highly immersive exploration of the psychological impact of working alone in such a vast space and the bonds that develop between a fire lookout and his only point of contact with civilisation.
Its vibrant art style, strong graphics, and believable writing made it a rare example of an adventure game that was able to appeal significantly beyond the genre's traditional fan base and it quickly became both a critical and commercial success, selling over 1 million copies; a well-deserved milestone for an excellent adventure title.
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well deserved
Firewatch is not a bad game, but compared to really great ADVENTURE games of 2016 like Obduction, Anna's Quest, Silence and Goetia, picking, what is in its core more of an exploration game (to be polite and not use that other term), is rather silly.
Actually that's what i really liked about Firewatch. All that mystery stuff turns out as BS.
But, very important, it's about all the little things in life.
I agree with Shikamaru317, it's a real shame the fact that Firewatch just didn't do enough with its gameplay to match its storytelling and artstyle, Oxenfree does so much more in both regards.
