Happy new year from Gaming Instincts! It’s time for a new and exciting year for video game fans. Here at Gaming Instincts we are true gamers and passionate people who love talking about our favorite games with our friends, families and most importantly you our audience. This is our first article of the year and we wanted to talk about why 2019 will be going down as one of the best if not the best years in gaming.
2019 is a year that is filled with many high profile titles that range from all kinds of different genre such as 3rd person action games, a dream come true remakes, sequels to our favorite franchise, RPGs, 1st person shooters and of course plenty of new IPs. Here is our official list of why we think 2019 is going to be going down as the most memorable and best year of this generation before next-gen starts in 2020 with PlayStation 5 and Xbox Anaconda/Scarlet. Here is a little montage we’ve created to get your video game hype up and running.
Coming in January we have 2 very high profile titles that are both dream come true and long awaited. I am of course talking about Resident Evil 2 Remake and Kingdom Hearts III. Resident Evil 2 is arguably the best Resident Evil game in the entire franchise, but don’t get me wrong Resident Evil VII was my favorite horror game of 2017 and also my favorite of this generation so far. For people who were born in the 90s, Resident Evil 2 Remake is an absolute dream come true. Not only does this game look amazing, it also seems to play very smoothly and is brought up to date for modern hardware when it comes to polish. Resident Evil 2 Remake launches at the end of this month.
Kingdom Hearts III is my childhood franchise. I was born and raised on Disney cartoons and Kingdom Hearts I and II are dear to my hearth since the glorious PlayStation 2 days. It’s quite insane to actually realize that Kingdom Hearts III is real and that it’s finally coming out after skipping an entire generation of the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 era. I first played the game at E3 2018, it was just surreal to be able to play it at the world’s biggest video game convention. It looked quite good, polished and felt great. I absolutely cannot wait to relive my childhood and continue the awesome saga of the Kingdom Hearts series, just like many of you as well.
February happens to be my birthday month and oh god it’s probably the best birthday ever, because we have games like Metro Exodus, Crackdown 3, Jump Force and most importantly Anthem coming all very close next to each other. I do not think it will be possible to tackle all the games at the same time, unless you live in an alternative universe where is there is more than 24 hours a day or more than 7 days a week. Metro Exodus looks fantastic. Metro is one of the most immersive and atmospheric FPS games I’ve played in the last decade. It’s gonna be weird saying this, but i almost wanna say that Metro has replaced the Half-Life feeling for me just because of how interesting the story is and the dark and gritty atmosphere. Also, don’t get me started on the sound design, it’s insanely scary and pleasing to the ears.
While I am not a huge fan of Crackdown 3, I still think its an important game for Microsoft simply because it’s an exclusive title. Not only that, but it will help those who are seeking to fill in that empty co-op void. Crackdown was a fun franchise back in a day, especially if you wanted a game where you could screw around it with your buddies and just do stupid stuff and be an unstoppable super hero with overpowered abilities. I hope that this game does well and I am pretty positive that there are people who can’t wait for to finally come out.
Anthem is a huge game for many people, particularly for me as well. It is currently sitting at my personal #1 anticipated title of 2019 simply because I’ve been looking for a hardcore sci-fi looter shooter with Diablo-like heavy influence that has a great story, lore and world. Anthem is most likely the most important game of 2019 and it needs to go down well for EA and BioWare, because if this game fails or disappoints in any shape or form there will be many angry and upset people and BioWare is not really in position right to afford that, especially after the disastrous launch of Mass Effect: Andromeda.
Also real quick – I want to give BioWare and EA a huge shout-out for letting us experience Anthem’s alpha back in December of 2018. As much as I wish to talk about my impressions of the game I am afraid I may not due to a strict NDA. However, what I can say is that after playing the game we have a ton of cool content ideas here at Gaming Instincts for our passionate Anthem fans, so stay tuned. Also be on a lookout for January 25th because that’s the day you can experience the public demo if you pre-order the Legion of Dawn edition of Anthem. We also have a guide of our own that explains all of the pre-order bonuses and purchases for Anthem right here.
Jump Force is looking quite good. I’ve played the game back at E3 2018 and it was a very fun experience and this is coming from a guy who’s not really into anime. However, I did watch Dragon Ball Z when I was a kid so the game kind of did grab my attention thank to the Dragon Ball Z characters and Unreal Engine 4. The game felt fun and was very fast paced. The reason why I think this game is important is simply because there are a lot of characters in this game that many people love and care about and its important for this game to succeed because anime fighting games are not that common especially with this many famous characters.
March is another insane month for games in 2019. We have games such as Devil May Cry 5, The Division 2 and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice.I got my hands on The Division 2 back at E3 2018 and played with the developers themselves in person. It was one of the most coolest moments I’ve ever experienced as a video game journalist. Never in my life I thought that my very first group of The Division 2 would include the developers of the game itself.
At first I thought that The Division 2 would just be more of the space, but honestly it felt much better than the first game and was also a lot smoother and had deeper combat mechanics. The Division was not a bad game, but it had its issues with end-game content and repetitive gameplay. The Division 2 is an important game for Ubisoft and 2019 because it’s a game that will be competing with BioWare’s titan Anthem and Destiny 2 which will be getting more content throughout 2019 as well. Can Anthem, The Division 2 and Destiny 2 co-exist and be excellent games that have meaningful content? We will find out.
Want to know something crazy? Right after playing The Division 2 I got to say hello to Miyazaki in person because I’ve noticed him sitting on a bench with his laptop near the Sekiro meeting room of which I unfortunately did not get a chance to book. I first met Miyazaki back in 2014 when Bloodborne was announced and I managed to snag an appointment for behind-closed doors showing of Bloodborne. Fast forward to 2015 I managed to sneak an appointment in for Dark Souls III. Let’s put it this way, I am a huge fan of the Dark Souls series and Bloodborne.
Bloodborne is my game of the generation along with Super Mario Odyssey, so you can bet your ass that I am super stoked to see what Sekiro has to offer. Anytime From Software is releasing a game you have to be on the lookout because it could potentially be another amazing experience which in most cases it usually is. It seems that Sekiro is much more action based and less RPG than Dark Souls/Bloodborne. However, Sekiro still manages to retain that Bloodborne fast-paced combat with trick weapons which is the arm in this case and you could definitely tell that this is a From Software game simply by the way it looks, plays and the atmosphere. Overall, this is a From Software game directed by Miyazaki which means its super important for those reasons alone.
11 years later we’re finally getting a true Devil May Cry sequel. Devil May Cry 4 was released back in January 31st, 2008. 11 years and a few months later we’re gonna be playing Devil May Cry 5. A decade and a year for a sequel? I am sorry I do not count the DmC by Ninja Theory a true Devil May Cry, no thanks. What can I say about Devil May Cry 5? I was quite surprised to see it in person at the Mcirosoft E3 2018 conference earlier this year, but most importantly the game received good reception based on what was shown and how the game plays. I unfortunately did not play the Devil May Cry 5 demo yet, so I don’t have much to say about it personally.
Capcom has been on the roll this generation for the last few years. In 2017 they released Resident Evil VII which was fantastic and my favorite horror game of the generation. In 2018 we got Monster Hunter World which received a ton of praise from the Monster Hunter community and gamers as a whole. Capcom are about to release HD version of the first Onimusha game, Resident Evil 2 Remake and Devil May Cry 5 in a single year. 2019 is a gigantic year for Capcom and it’s important it goes well for them on all fronts. If Devil May Cry 5 proves successful then it’s only a mater of time before we finally get a new generation Dino Crisis at this rate.
There are also many more titles to be excited about for 2019 such as Gears of War 5, Animal Crossing, Luigi’s Mansion 3, and much more. However, we’re still not sure when The Last of Us Part II, Halo: Infinite and Death Stranding are releasing which also leads us to the real big reasons why you should be excited for 2019. And that is the official reveal of the PlayStation 5 and the next Xbox which is rumored to be under the code name Scarlet/Anaconda. These topics are for another day, so stay tuned to Gaming Instincts. It’s going to be a huge year, happy new year everyone once again and enjoy it!
The developer released a 30 minute gameplay footage.
A Switch trailer was also released.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree is nominated for Game of the Year.
According to its listing on SteamDB.