kot-headerlogo-01 A U

See Games Differently

Subscribe

The Video Games We’re Most Looking Forward To

markserrels Avatar
markserrels

Let’s be honest: it’s been a dry couple of months. But the remainder of 2015? It’s about to get crazy. I asked everyone in the office about their most anticipated games for the remainder of 2015.

And no, not everyone chose Fallout 4.

Presented by Lenovo. We make the technology that powers the world’s best ideas. Innovation never stands still. This is Lenovo.

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain


Mark Serrels, Kotaku Editor
Metal Gear Solid V comes out in a matter of weeks. Has everyone forgotten about this?

In all the controversy regarding the split between Konami and Kojima Productions, amidst the horrible stories of employee treatment, I think it’s been all too easy to forget that a major video game is about to be released. Like a proper major one.

Metal Gear Solid V might not have the same maelstrom of hype that we saw in the lead up to Metal Gear Solid 2 or Metal Gear Solid 4. But we’re forgetting one thing: Kojima always gets it right with his odd numbered Metal Gear games!

Metal Gear Solid 1. All-time classic.

Metal Gear Solid 3. Probably the best game in the series.

Metal Gear Solid V? Well, I’m hopeful.

I’m hopeful because Ground Zeroes, for all its lack of content, showed a new accessible control system and a host of new inter-connected systems that are incredible to toy with. I honestly expect this game to be special. I expect it to be a game of the year contender.

Unravel


Danny Allen, Publisher
Remember how endearingly nervous Martin Sahlin was at E3? His charming little platformer has been on my radar ever since — a kind of physics-based, puzzle-driven cross between LittleBigPlanet and Limbo. My wife’s not a huge gamer, but those are the last two games we kicked back and got tipsy playing together. Unravel looks beautiful and I can’t wait to get wrapped up in it.

Destiny: The Taken King


Luke Hopewell, Gizmodo Editor
Look. Destiny has problems. Lots of them. It’s corporate and soulless; it’s expensive and it has no story. But as a reformed WoW player, there’s something about The Taken King that I’m really looking forward to.

I wasn’t sold on it during E3, but now that we’re in pre-launch hype mode, details that are coming out are really helping to get me over the line. It’s going to be less of a grind because the Light system has been abandoned. The story will be a little more cohesive. The voice acting will be better. New raids are coming in. There are new skills. You don’t have to go back to the vendor to hand in quests. It’s promising, and I want it to deliver.

Fallout 4


Campbell Simpson, Gizmodo Journalist
I didn’t really get into Fallout 3 or New Vegas, to be honest. Halfway through my FO3 playthrough I ran into a game-breaking bug, and NV just didn’t capture my attention for more than a couple of hours. What I did love was Fallout 1 and 2 — those games were my childhood, and I finished them dozens of times each. (Fallout Tactics never existed, guys. It never. Existed.) They just had awesome worlds, deep lore, great settings, and memorable characters. I’m hoping that Fallout 4 will bring that back, without changing things too much — just keep the great voice acting, the feeling of lawlessness and danger in the wasteland, the ability to roam freely and explore, and the weird and messed up evolution of post-apocalyptic human civilisation, and I’ll be happy.

*** runner-up goes to Star Wars: Battlefront. I just want to cut some bad dudes up with a lightsaber, yo.

Fallout 4


Rae Johnston, Journalist
I’m a sucker for an open world RPG with great storytelling and stunning visuals, so Fallout 4 fits the bill for me. There’s no level cap so you can just keep playing forever after the main storyline is over. I’m going to lose my life to this game and I’m perfectly okay with that. I have three Pipboy editions on their way for each member of my family, so cosplay plans are sorted, too.

I genuinely can’t recall the last time I was this excited for a game. It may even pry me away from trying to collect every shard in Dragon Age: Inquisition (that will be the true test). In the meantime — I’ll placate myself with being increasingly disturbed by my vault management style in Fallout Shelter.

Torment: Tides of Numenera


Chris Jager, Lifehacker Editor
While everyone has been salivating over Fallout 4, I’ve been keeping my eye on another Dystopian RPG.

Torment: Tides of Numenera (terrible title) is the spiritual successor to Black Isle Studios’ critically acclaimed Planescape: Torment; a game that has an almost mythical reputation: despite receiving universal critical acclaim, not that many people actually played it.

The new game promises to retain many of the elements that made Planescape: Torment so memorable, including old school pre-rendered isometric environments and an emphasis on dialogue choices to steer story progression. Built off the back of a Kickstarter campaign, there’s a lot that can go wrong with this project — but if it can deliver a gaming experience that’s even half as dark and fascinating as the original, we’ll be in for a treat. But maybe change the name, eh?

Mad Max

Spandas Lui, Lifehacker Journalist
Fallout 4 is my most anticipated game for 2015, but a title I’m surprised to be looking forward to is Mad Max. I’ve already read the less than stellar first impressions of the game and I know it’s not directly related to the spectacular Mad Max: Fury Road film, but sometimes, I just like doing things that I know aren’t good for me. Maybe it’s the trailer, which I thought was done quite well and displayed the dark post-apocalyptic tone that I’m such a sucker for. Maybe I’m drawn to the epic car battles that Mad Max is promising. Either way, I’m buying the damn game and it might just be my cup of tea.

The Witness


Junglist
I’m hoping this is actually released this year… I’ve been hanging for it for a while now. Jon Blow displayed impeccable design in Braid, and I’m looking to The Witness to provide the same kind of steadily expanding puzzle systems and interesting meta – in its own unique way – as Legend of Grimrock 2 and Talos Principle gave us last year. At first I was sceptical about how a premise so basic could provide for an entire “Double-A” game, but seeing its progress has been encouraging.

I’m taking Jon Blow’s distraction of making his own coding language as a hopeful sign that the game is finished and waiting for its Sony-approved release date. Hopefully. Maybe? I’ll be playing HOTS in the meantime

SOMA


Hayley Williams
2015 thus far has been a great year for horror with the release of games like Dying Light, Kholat and Until Dawn, but nothing has me as excited for long nights of sleepless terror as Frictional Games’ latest title SOMA. Frictional – the studio behind long-time ‘scariest video game’ contender, Amnesia: The Dark Descent – is back to mess with our minds again, this time exploring themes of identity, consciousness, free will and artificial intelligence, all set in an abandoned underwater research facility. If we learned anything from the first Bioshock (other than not to trust people with Irish accents) it’s that the bottom of the ocean can be creepy as all hell. And SOMA isn’t even nice enough to give you a wrench. The areas we’ve seen so far certainly don’t disappoint on the creepy factor – they range from the sci-fi standard of run-down, utilitarian corridors to vaguely organic-looking tunnels of winding pipes and metal plates that recall something straight out of Giger’s wet dreams. SOMA is due for release on the 22nd of September – I don’t know about you, but I am so ready for every blinking standby light in my house to become a potential nightmare.

That’s our picks! What are yours? Let us know in the comments below.

The Cheapest NBN 1000 Plans

Looking to bump up your internet connection and save a few bucks? Here are the cheapest plans available.

At Kotaku, we independently select and write about stuff we love and think you'll like too. We have affiliate and advertising partnerships, which means we may collect a share of sales or other compensation from the links on this page. BTW – prices are accurate and items in stock at the time of posting.

Comments

35 responses to “The Video Games We’re Most Looking Forward To”

READ THE COMMENTS