Weekend Hot Topic, part 1: Readers’ Top 20 of 2021

metro.co.uk:

GameCentral readers vote on their favourite games of the previous year, including everything from Resident Evil to Chicory.

Although we revealed our Top 20 games of 2021 at the end of last year, we always leave it to the end of January for readers, so that people get a reasonable chance to play what they got for Christmas. We then ask everyone to vote for their top three titles and tally the results for a Hot Topic.

With so relatively few new games released last year it’s perhaps no surprise that the two Top 20s are more similar than usual but there were a number of titles that never appeared in our chart, including Deathloop, Ratchet & Clank, and Resident Evil Village.

Third time lucky Resident Evil Village I really don’t think Resident Evil is a top-tier modern game in the franchise, but that’s a testament to how good games like Resident Evil 7 and the Resi 2 remake were. Taken on its own merits, though, and I found it to be a well-executed horror shooter, with some great puzzles (the bells!), excellent atmosphere (those creepy werewolves perched on buildings!), and truly memorable moments (that baby?!). I would also mostly agree that Hardcore difficulty is very manageable, with one caveat; the final boss is unbelievably spongey. I had to reload an old save with loads more ammo and she still took forever to put down.

Metroid Dread

I was a bit worried that this wouldn’t be a ‘proper’ Metroid game, as MercurySteam’s first crack at it is apparently more of a boss chase with less emphasis on navigation puzzles. I was wrong, though, and Metroid Dread feels like a full-blooded sequel to Super Metroid et al. I should give special mention to the E.M.M.I. enemies too, which do a better job as a persistent, unkillable enemy than