The 10 Best Videogames of 2013 (original) (raw)

The funny thing about many of the best videogames of the last year -- and we think this trend will continue -- is you didn't see them coming. Sleeper hits, the games that stay off the radar because they aren't part of the game industry's annual jillion-dollar marketing extravaganza, have occasionally popped up in years past -- who could forget the year Katamari Damacy won our hearts with little advance fanfare? There are more and more Katamaris these days thanks to the independent developers who must rely upon post-release word of mouth, not pre-launch hype, to sell their products. Of course, some of the overly hyped triple-A stuff turned out to be pretty great too. After much passionate debate, here's our list of the best games of 2013.Above:

1. Saints Row IV (PS3/360/PC)

The Saints Row series once imitated Grand Theft Auto's style of stealing cars and causing mayhem but has since distanced itself from its inspiration. Saints Row IV is the logical endpoint of that divergence, if by "logical" you mean "absurd." The action takes place in a game-within-a-game, a Matrix-like simulation that contains the usual criminal trappings but also grants super-powers. That means there’s little need for stealing cars or drive-by shootings when you can sprint across town in minutes or punch cops into the air. And since it's all inside a computer-generated environment, the next mission could occur anywhere: a side-scrolling beat-em-up, a stealth action game, or the 1988 John Carpenter film They Live. Saints Row IV is the first open-world game in years that actually feels open, because it disregards the notion that players must struggle in the early chapters. This is no rags-to-riches tale -- the ground floor is “super-powers” and it only gets better from there. – Daniel Feit