THE EDGE AWARDS
A decade comes to a close, and with it, the end of a generation – and the latter is quite evident in the pages that follow. This was, once again, a far from stellar year for big-budget games, with platform holders and old-guard publishers largely keeping their powder dry ahead of next year’s launch of Scarlett and PS5. Ten years ago, that would have made for a rather fallow Edge awards, but the landscape has changed vastly over the course of the 2010s. Back then, we had a separate award for indie games. Now they dominate the top ten.
As a result, our rundown of this year’s finest interactive entertainment yields a list of no little breadth. At the top end of the budgetary scale, there has been growing consternation at how the ever-increasing cost of game development has fostered an aversion to risk. Yet the smaller studios, student teams and back-bedroom programmers that operate at the other end of the funding spectrum are hardly immune to it either. In a generation where the big players’ fear of failure has led to too many big releases smelling the same, however, indies have learned that being different is the pathway to success.
Hence a top ten comprised, variously, of games that cast you as an FMV voyeur, a heartbroken synthpop motorcycle warrior, a late-stage alcoholic detective and an 8bit sheep, to name just a few. Over the pages that follow we present the best, the worst and the weirdest – and there really is a lot of weird – of another fascinating year in games.
PLAYSTATION GAME OF THE YEAR
RUNNER-UP
CONCRETE GENIE
Developer Pixelopus Publisher SIE Format PS4, PSVR
Despite a wobble with its pro-creativity, antiviolence messaging towards the latter half, Concrete Genie deserves a spot on this year’s list for its elegant motion-controlled painting mechanic. Pixelopus offers you the perfect balance of freedom and constraint to help you create living murals – and imaginary friends with whom it’s a delight to interact.
RUNNER-UP
DEATH STRANDING
Developer Kojima Productions Publisher SIE Format PS4
Pioneering masterpiece or self-indulgent folly? An exercise in frustration or a daring break from open-world tradition? Hideo Kojima’s eccentric adventure – literally putting the ‘post’ in ‘post-apocalyptic’ – demands to be played, if not always enjoyed. Either way, it delivers in the quality of its performance capture and its stark, surreal art direction.
WINNER
BLOOD & TRUTH
Developer/publisher SIE (London Studio) Format PSVR
London Studio’s gangland romp proved, like last year’s Astro Bot, that Sony’s commitment to PSVR endures. The elevator pitch is essentially Jason Statham’s Operation Wolf VR, and it’s every bit as enjoyable as it sounds, a love letter to the big smoke that veers from high-end glitz to the seedy underworld, with no little elegance.
XBOX GAME OF THE YEAR
RUNNER-UP
CRACKDOWN 3
Developer Sumo Digital Publisher Xbox Game Studios Format PC, Xbox One
Hard to see quite what took so long. Yet if Crackdown 3’s extended development resulted in a game that felt out of time even before release, the end product is a charmingly unruffled explosive romp. Ignore the multiplayer and focus on the campaign: a brisk, unreconstructed bit of lizard-brain entertainment tailor-made for Game Pass.
RUNNER-UP
GEARS 5
Developer The Coalition Publisher Xbox Game Studios Format PC, Xbox One
Despite shedding two-thirds of its franchise name, The Coalition’s second Gears hardly skimps on the ‘war’ part, while exploring its impact on those involved. And though the series’ usually relentless pace slackens during its pseudo-open-world sequences, those sweeping expanses of ice and sand offer some of the game’s most gawp-worthy sights.
WINNER
XBOX GAME PASS
Developer/publisher Various Format PC, Xbox One
Yes, this again, though this time it’s less a jibe at Microsoft’s firstparty output and more a reflection of what has become Xbox One’s killer app. With a lineup of remarkable breadth, depth and generosity, it was the best reason to own an Xbox in
