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Why Metaphor: ReFantazio Should Win GOTY
Game of the Year is a tough race to call this year, but what I unfortunately do feel confident in is the fact thatBalatrowill not win. The little indie that could will find this mountain just too high to chug its way up, but that fact that it’s an outsider actually helps my case that it should be the one at the summit later this month. Balatro is the game we should be recognising in 2024, the only sort of year where we get the chance to.
Last year, Game of the Year was a dull affair.Baldur’s Gate 3had the thing locked down. Ditto the year before withElden Ringin 2022. The pandemic hit year of 2021 was a bit of a write off, and then in 2020 nothing had a chance againstThe Last of Us Part 2, even if that year’s Little Indie packed a considerable punch inHades. Next year, barring disaster or major shock, the clever money is already onGTA 6walking away with the crown. In 2024, I’m not sure. That’s a signal it should go to Balatro.
No Other Game Should Snatch GOTY From Balatro
While you’re able to cross your fingers behind your back and argue that technicallyBaldur’s Gate 3 is an indie, you’d be overlooking its Tencent funding, the fact the IP is firmly established, and its use of one of the most recognisable licenses in the world viaDungeons & Dragons. Balatro is a true indie, a game made by a single person that is on the shortlist entirely through word of mouth and quality, and that deserves recognition.
We don’t have a clear standout to celebrate this year, so why not celebrate a different type of game? Regardless ofthe sales figures of Black Myth: Wukongor thereview scores of Metaphor: ReFantazioandAstro Bot, Balatro is clearly the major success story of the ceremony relative to its expectations. It has done the most to even be there, and that should count for something in an industry so keen to celebrate the biggest budgets.
It may be rough around the edges, but consider its competition.Astro Botis a very good platformer, but we’ve had games like that miss out before and no one has much cared because it feels like there’s a ceiling on the substance or importance (which should factor into awards) these games have.
Elden Ring has already won, I don’t think I need tomake more of a case than has already been writtenabout.Black Myth: Wukonghasthe lowest critical score of any nomineeever.Final Fantasy 7 Rebirthis a sequel to a game that already lost atTGA, and while it starts off better than its older brother, it overstays its welcome and ends up worse.
Metaphoris my second favourite, so I struggle to say too much against it, but I will say no other JRPG has won before. So either this is the best JRPG in 11 years or other, better games have fallen short, and therefore Metaphor should not stand in Balatro’s way as a far more unique game, both to play and as a creative entity.
2024 Belongs To Balatro
TheGamer will be publishing arguments for all six games over the course of this week, so maybe it’s natural that as the defender of the little guy, I’m a mite defensive about why other games should not get to trample over it. But Balatro does not deserve victory merely because it would be nice for it to happen, or so that indies everywhere can win vicariously through it. Balatro easily makes a case as the best game there as well.
The other games are good, I grant you. Two of them will make my top five for the year, with Astro Bot and Metaphor joining Balatro. But on a purely mechanical level, it’s hard to look past Balatro. It is endlessly replayable because everything works so tightly to create a million different variables. No two games are the same as you expand your deck and build new combos. I have argued thatBalatro is not really a card game(knowledge of Poker is not necessary to play), but it is like a deck of cards in that it is impossible to get bored or run out of things to do with it.
There is a genius in the creative control it offers you as a player, whether that be finding broken Joker combos, adding power cards to your deck, or just making Pair the most powerful Poker hand known to mankind by playing it infinitely until the numbers go so high they turn into letters. A fiendish feast of a game, Balatro is a vampire for your free time.
I can also make a case for it as the Game of the Year quite literally. Every other game here was played by most people at launch for anywhere between one and four weeks, was either beaten or abandoned, and life moved on. Not so with Balatro. Launching in February, those who got on board early have been playing it sporadically ever since, while word of mouth has led others to pick it up consistently. Even its nomination had sales spiking.Helldivers 2is the only game to rival it as ‘the game of these past 12 months’, and Helldivers 2 isn’t in the race.
Balatro is an unlikely winner, but 2024 is an unlikely year. Whoever wins is doomed to be slightly forgotten amongst the pantheon of industry shaking winners the further we get away from 2024, unless that winner is Balatro. It deserves to be Game of the Year, and more to the point, I’m not sure any of the others do.
