- 14/05/2024
Control deserves your attention.
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00:00 Looking back on the last 10 years of gaming, there have been a lot of bangers.
00:03 After all, in that time we have seen games release on 3 whole console generations,
00:08 and AAA titles have only gotten bigger and bigger. Because of that, there have been plenty
00:12 of gems that have slipped through the cracks, and whether they're 6 months old or turning 10 this
00:17 year, they all deserve a bit more time to shine. So, I'm Josh from WhatCulture.com and these are
00:21 the 10 Best Hidden Gem Video Games of the last 10 years. But first up, an honourable mention,
00:27 Resistance 3. Listen, right, I know that Resistance 3 misses out on this list by half a year or
00:33 something, but it's my list and I just really want to talk about Resistance, so indulge me for a
00:39 second. It took them 3 attempts, but Insomniac finally fulfilled the potential of their post
00:43 apocalyptic alien shooter series with this final game. Though the first two releases weren't quite
00:48 the Halo killer that Sony probably wanted, they were still ambitious FPS games, with interesting
00:54 stories and a damn good world to fight your way through. The third game elevated everything though.
00:59 The narrative was more emotional, characters more well-rounded, and the gunplay was tighter than
01:04 ever. Throw in some spectacular set pieces and Resistance 3 was a bloody good shooter, but
01:09 nobody cared. At that point, PS3 players had kinda given up on the franchise ever becoming a smash
01:14 hit that it could have been, and with 2011 being a particularly stacked year, it ended up buried.
01:19 But still, bring Resistance back Sony, please go on for me.
01:24 Number 10, Visage. When it comes to the best horror games of the last few years, Visage absolutely
01:30 needs to be in the conversation, and not just because it made me so scared that I thought I
01:34 was going to throw up. On the surface, you can see why it didn't make waves. It's a small indie title
01:40 that's very clearly inspired by PT, from the familiar suburban house setting to the obtuse
01:45 first-person puzzles. But while the title wears this inspiration on its sleeve, it's so much more
01:51 than a clone, and is absolutely brimming with creative horror scenarios. Essentially split into
01:56 a few different vignettes focusing on specific characters and their tragedies, the house itself
02:01 transforms to fit each story. There'll be a section where your only light source is the flash
02:05 of a camera, scientifically one of the scariest horror setups whenever it's used by the way,
02:10 while another will see you taken on a trippy descent into hell itself. What makes Visage
02:14 though is its unpredictability. Despite spending so much time in the same hallways and rooms,
02:19 you never feel like you know what's going to be waiting for you. The apparitions haunting you
02:23 always catch you off guard, and the brilliant sign design immerses you in the game's traumatic story.
02:29 Number 9, Batman Arkham Origins. Though it took a while, Arkham Origins did eventually enjoy
02:34 something of a small reappraisal. But it shouldn't be forgotten that for the majority of its life,
02:39 this spin-off was treated as the unwanted child of a glorious superhero trilogy. I mean,
02:44 it wasn't even included on the remastered Arkham collection, and that's just doing it dirty.
02:50 Crafted purely as a stopgap between the final two main Arkham games, Origins' corporate reason to
02:56 exist is no secret, but the devs at WB Montreal overcame those limitations to deliver a worthy
03:02 follow-up that deviates from the core installments in worthwhile ways. Sure, there's still a lot of
03:06 familiarity present in the gameplay and setting, but the spin-off still boasts a great story. In
03:11 a way, it's kinda like the New Vegas of the Batman series. A quote-unquote "unnecessary"
03:17 spin-off that was initially poorly received, but which has since been embraced by the diehards as
03:22 perhaps the cream of the crop. I mean, it's nowhere near as good as New Vegas, mind. That thing is
03:27 GOAT material. Number 8, SOMA. There have been plenty of great narrative-driven first-person
03:33 games including the likes of Gone Home and Firewatch, and it's an absolute travesty that
03:38 SOMA is never placed on the same level as those genre-defining giants. And that's perhaps because
03:43 it was wrongly pigeonholed as a horror game closer to Blaze of Fear or the developer's own previous
03:49 title Amnesia. That genre heritage of course is still there, and you do spend plenty of time
03:54 crouch-walking around tables to avoid the petrifying gaze of horrifying mechanical beasties
04:00 in this game, but it's the storytelling and world-building that makes the title so
04:04 damn appealing. Uncovering the mysteries of this world, which takes the form of an underwater base
04:09 housing the last remnants of the human race following an extinction event, is tantalising
04:14 and features twists that are far too juicy to spoil here. So, please, just play it if you can.
04:20 Number 7, Assassin's Creed Syndicate. No matter what Ubisoft had up their sleeve to follow the
04:25 utter embarrassment that was Assassin's Creed Unity, it was always going to disappoint. After
04:30 years of growing discontent, Unity broke the AC series in half, with its bevy of glitches and
04:36 launch problems making for a limp jump to the next generation. That shadow extended to the next game,
04:41 the Victorian London set Syndicate, and made for one of the lowest selling instalments in the
04:45 franchise's history. That was a travesty though, because the follow-up was actually better in every
04:51 single way. Of course, it was the setting that was the real winner in this title though. Walking
04:56 the streets in zip-lining to the top of iconic London buildings never gets old, and it was
05:01 complemented by a story stacked with great characters and period-specific cameos. It's a
05:05 shame the location was a one-and-done affair, because it deserved way more time to shine.
05:10 Still, this was a fine send-off to the first era of Assassin's Creed.
05:14 Number 6, Mad Max. For as long as I've been at this job, I've championed Mad Max as one of the
05:21 most underrated games of the last generation. At this point, I actually can't even remember
05:26 if it's as much a bit as a genuine feeling, but I do know how much of an impact this left on both
05:31 me and Scott Telford. That's because the sandbox brawler could have been nothing more than a shoddy
05:35 tie-in to cash in on the release of Mad Max Fury Road, which came out just a few months prior,
05:40 but it was way, way more than that, and could easily rub shoulders with the best in the open
05:45 world genre at the time. It's death sentence came from releasing on the same day as Metal
05:49 Gear Solid V though, which completely overshadowed this risky purchase in comparison. That absolutely
05:55 sucks though because Mad Max was, and is, so much fun. What made it so special and charming was the
06:01 way it blended the surprisingly gorgeous sandbox with the core gameplay staples of post-apocalyptic
06:06 living. Everything here is purposeful, the action is tight, and crafting your own magnum opus
06:12 deathbringer car never gets old.
06:14 Number 5, Max Payne 3. Speaking of the rare things that me and Scott Telford actually agree on,
06:20 let's talk about Max Payne 3. Now, there are some people out there who think that Max Payne 3
06:25 simply shouldn't exist, and that it spits patooey on the quality of the first two titles that
06:30 Remedy created. However, those people are wrong. Rockstar took the reins of the franchise following
06:36 that second game and injected it with their own brand of detail-orientated design. The effort
06:41 the studio usually puts into delivering massive, dense open worlds was filtered into a linear
06:45 third-person shooter, and it resulted in one of the most tactile, visceral action games ever.
06:50 Though the deliberate-ness won't be for everyone, there's something so undeniably satisfying about
06:55 accounting for Max's weight and position that makes pulling off those sick, gravity-defying
06:59 slow-motion kills feel even better. Throw in a killer story that rivals any action flick,
07:03 and Max Payne 3 shouldn't be slept on by any shooter fan.
07:07 Number 4, The Evil Within 2. At the start of 2019, every video game fan and critic hailed Resident
07:14 Evil 2 as bringing the survival horror genre back from the brink. And that was always weird to me,
07:20 because The Evil Within 2, in my opinion, did that exact same thing years prior and nobody
07:25 cared. The original game was a rough around the edges charmer, but this sequel raised the bar
07:30 in every way. It was spookier, the story was better, the gunplay tighter and enemies nastier,
07:35 and even better, it introduced a semi-open world structure that somehow complemented the
07:39 horror elements and made the experience even scarier. The best thing you can say about The
07:44 Evil Within 2 though, is that it actively makes the original a better game in hindsight. The plot
07:49 points it picks up, the motifs it repeats and enemies that return are all deepened and granted
07:55 greater significance and it's generally just a great survival horror experience that you can now
08:00 even play in first person if you want. Number 3, Before Your Eyes. Right, if you've watched even a
08:06 few of my videos this year, you'll probably know that Before Your Eyes is my latest obsession. But
08:11 while I've boasted about it in its own editorial, please permit me to chat about it just one more
08:16 time because I couldn't leave it off this list. Before Your Eyes was always destined to be a cult
08:22 hit. It's only available on PC and the gameplay is based mostly around your webcam. See, this game
08:28 chronicles the entire life of a man called Benny told from a first person perspective. However,
08:33 the gimmick is that every time you blink in real life, you skip forward in Benny's life,
08:38 meaning that you're unlikely to see everything the game has to offer as you're always cutting
08:41 things off too early. It's more than just a gimmick though. The story of Benny's life is
08:46 unsurprisingly a tragic one and this framing device gives it a sense of urgency and fatalism
08:52 that makes the final moments so emotionally charged. The writing is spot on, characters
08:57 are well drawn and scenarios are memorable and it makes for one of the most moving things
09:01 you'll ever experience. Number 2, Control. It absolutely sucks that Control has already well
09:08 and truly cemented itself as a hidden gem and not the genuine smash hit that it could have been.
09:13 Whether it was the marketing or a general disinterest from the audience is unclear,
09:17 but Remedy's latest shooter hasn't broken out of its little niche corner of the industry,
09:21 which is a travesty considering that it has some of the slickest combat mechanics in recent memory.
09:26 Once you nab all the powers in Control, fighting enemies almost feels godly. Hovering around areas,
09:32 telekinetically picking up chunks of the environment and then launching them into a
09:35 huddle of goons while picking the remainder off with an alien shape-shifting gun makes for one of
09:40 those gameplay loops that should get old after 8 hours but somehow never does. It never stops
09:46 being so satisfying. That's only one part of the overall excellent puzzle though, it's the setting
09:51 that really shine, as the mysteries of the Older's house pose fascinating questions and that signature
09:57 Remedy charm runs throughout the veins of this creepy building. Games in 2019 had a major
10:02 personality problem and Control stuck two fingers up to that and embraced the weirdness.
10:07 Number 1 - Splinter Cell Blacklist
10:10 There hasn't been a new Splinter Cell game in nearly a decade now, which stings doubly because
10:15 the last installment, Blacklist, was such a confident step in a new direction for the series.
10:20 Coming towards the tail end of the 360 era, Blacklist followed up the controversial Conviction,
10:25 attempting to blend that title's action-orientated approach to stealth with the classical,
10:29 methodical approach of the original trilogy. Though franchises suffering an identity crisis
10:34 have tried and failed to find a harmonious balance before, looking at you Resident Evil 6,
10:39 Ubisoft's efforts surprisingly paid off here. If you wanted a more active, aggressive approach,
10:43 the level design accommodated for that while also providing the ability to take it slow
10:47 and ghost your way through areas. The focus was always on player choice and it made for an
10:52 inventive stealth game at a time where the genre was sadly no longer in vogue. A remake of the
10:57 first game is on the way, but should Ubisoft greenlight a sequel proper, it should build on
11:03 these foundations. But I guess, let's face it, it'll probably end up just being another open
11:07 world game won't it? So that's our list, what do you guys think down in the comments below? Have
11:11 you played and loved any of these hidden gems? And are there any that you think deserved a spot
11:16 on this list? Let us know and while you're down there, can you please give us a like, share,
11:19 subscribe and also head over to whatculture.com for more lists and news like this every single
11:24 day. Even if you don't though, I've been Josh, thank you so much for watching and I'll see you
11:27 soon. Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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