While the whole editorial staff contributed to our 2014 awards, we wanted to allow everybody the opportunity to publicly name their personal top 10 games of the year. While many did play the majority of releases in 2014, please remember that unlike our main awards, the editors are not naming the best games, but their personal favorites out of the selection they played.
It would seem that the Fallen have been able to get their hands on the Golden Age SIVA nanotechnology, transforming them into technologically enhanced beings capable of mass destruction. This story is pretty cut in dry as you’re initially tasked with investigating the Plaguelands, which leads you to gain further information on SIVA itself, and then you need to destroy the Splicer leadership.
We have all-new worlds to explore. Immediately after the opening act, your character is exiled into the European Dead Zone. It’s an Earth destination and the biggest map we’ve ever created by far. You will explore this destination and its lush forests. That’s really where you’ll start your new journey. You’ll journey to Titan, an oceanic moon. The entire moon is one big sea, but there are these human installations that were erected during the Golden Age. You’ll go to Io, which is one of Jupiter’s moons and is the last place the Traveler touched before the Collapse. It’s a place of magic and mysticism. Finally, you’ll go to Nessus, which is an unstable planetoid that has been completely transformed into a machine world by the Vex.
Having been mixed on Divinity games in the past, I was hesitant to jump into Larian Studios’ latest game. It took only ten minutes before I realized I shouldn’t have worried as Divinity: Original Sin is one of the most hardcore RPGs in a long while. This isn’t something that holds your hand; it’s up to your own memory and thoughts to determine the outcome of specific scenarios. You also have to really enjoy detailed menu systems and walls of numeric values for each character to appreciate what kind of RPG this is. Mix in a turned based combat system similar to that of XCOM: Enemy Unknown, with dice rolls and strategic placing, and Divinity: Original Sins is an RPG of the ages.
We’re not bringing back any of the old weapons and armor because all that stuff is turned to ash and dust by the Cabal. That’s one of the great things about Destiny 2. It enables us to create a brand-new tale with a fresh start for every single player. Whether you’re someone who looked at Destiny from afar, feeling like you couldn’t jump into the world or feeling like you’ve been left behind, or whether you’re a veteran player with 100% completion in your record book, you are all joining this new adventure on equal footing. You will be attacked in the same moment. You will all lose the things that your Guardian holds dear. You will all need to go out into the wild and rebuild from the ground up.
One day long ago, a gigantic intergalactic sphere called The Traveler appeared in our solar system, most notably making contact on Mars. This mysterious colossal-sized globe was not a world conquering alien, but instead friendly, helping humans accelerate technological advancement dramatically, allowing them to traverse the stars, terraform planets and build towards a better future. This was considered the Golden Age of humanity, even boosting the average lifespan of man threefold. Unfortunately, that prosperity didn’t last long as a deadly and ominous force called The Darkness appeared, destroying anything in its path and destiny2Focus.com nearly tearing down everything Humans had built. This kicked off an event called The Collapse and everything in the galaxy took a toll because of it. The most important and unfortunate casualty was The Traveler itself as, in its last act, protected the Earth with its unresponsive body shielding the newly-built Last City.
As for yourself, you are a Guardian which, thanks to a ghost, is bestowed with the power of light (from The Traveler) to battle the Darkness. These are mechanical drones that originally came from the Traveler attach themselves to a deceased soldier. They serve as scouts, librarians, and mechanics, being able to access different types of machinery and bypass alien decryptions. They are vital to the survival of mankind, ensuring their warriors are properly guided and revived when need be. As for the allied races, there are Humans, Awoken and Exos. We really don’t have to talk too much about Humans as it’s pretty self explanatory what they are. Awoken were formerly human, but were transformed during The Collapse, and now they stand divided, either on Earth or with their recluse Queen on the Reef. Finally, Exos are mechanical beings created by Humans long ago to be proficient in combat. At some point they became self-aware, but unlike the Terminator, they stand with humanity.
It’s a difficult thing to predict. I know that we’re going to constantly pay attention to how the community plays the game. We’re going to listen to the things they talk to us about. We’re going to take their suggestions and blend it with our vision for how the franchise can evolve and change. We’ll always give those who play Destiny new challenges to face, and we’re going to send them to new worlds. We’re always going to tell new stories and keep players guessing. We don’t want Destiny to become stagnant or predictable.