Quarantine got you down? Don’t worry, Nerd Is the Word Contributor and gamer extraordinaire Sam Murdock has you covered. Here are his top ten games to help you survive your quarantine and self isolation. Enjoy.
10. Animal Crossing (Nintendo Switch, Rated E)
People always ask “What do you even do in Animal Crossing?” The answer doesn’t clarify anything. You move to a tiny island, sink deeply into debt to Tom Nook (a tanooki from Japanese myth), then wander an island full of randomly selected adorable animal villagers. You upgrade their home, you shake trees to find fruit (or sometimes wasps or tarantulas, yikes) and you gradually repay Nook. Once you’ve paid off your debt you can take on more to upgrade your house. There’s custom clothing to be designed, make your house your own and just have a peaceful time in a tropical village.
9. Doom Eternal (PC, PS4, Xbox One, Switch, Rated M)
The absolute opposite to Animal Crossing. The classic series that helped shape the first-person shooter genre is back with a sequel to the fantastic reboot Doom (2016). With more demons, more weapons and a surprisingly deep lore to it, Doom Eternal will keep you busy collecting figurines, new skins, battery packs for your Doom Fortress, and fighting your way through a gory campaign. The fun really shines when you take on the multiplayer though because it’s not just a simple deathmatch between two teams of 4 “DoomGuys”. In this versions’ multiplayer you can choose to be a demon-complete with special weapons and abilities-or you play as the classic character himself. It’s an a-synchronous multiplayer done right and it’s sure to keep you busy.
8. Horizon Zero-Dawn (PS4, Rated Teen)
While being one of the older titles on our list, Horizon Zero-Dawn is a retro-futuristic masterpiece that puts you in the shoes of “Aloy” (pronounced A-loy) as she journeys across the land trying to discover her own backstory. With a lengthy campaign, deep RPG mechanics and a lot of abilities to unlock, this game has a fantastic storyline with a satisfying ending. A sequel is in the works so if you enjoy this, keep an eye on the news for the next one.
7. Marvel’s Spider-Man (PS4, Rated Teen)
The wall-crawler is back in perhaps the best game to be put under his name. With combat reminiscent of the Batman Arkham games, this adventure has you controlling Marvel’s most popular hero. With a fully realised New York (including some famous Marvel locations if you know where to look) and near perfect web slinging mechanics this is the game that fans of the web-head have always wanted. Spidey is here in his full, sarcastic, one-liner glory. With a campaign that takes a little over 15 hours to beat on its own, coupled with excellent bonus items hidden around New York that let you unlock a surprising amount of Spidey costumes, this is the definitive version of Spider-Man games.
6. Ori and the Will of the Wisps (Xbox One, PC, Rated E)
Ori is back again with another amazing game. While nothing can ever compete with the tear-jerking opening minutes of the first game, Will of the Wisps chooses instead to focus on the found family storyline. Having adopted the baby owl (Ku) from the end of the first game, the beginning of this one sees Ori teaching Ku how to fly. One bad storm later and Ori and Ku are separated in yet another land slowly being corrupted and it’s up to Ori to stop it, find Ku and get home. Featuring a new combat system, the same adorable graphics and some interesting abilities added in, this is a sequel done right.
5. Jack Box Party Pack (Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC)
This is a bit of a unique one. Jack Box isn’t one game, rather it’s a set of different party games. If you’re quarantined alone you can easily set up a zoom call (or other screen sharing method, Mixer is built into Xbox One) and get some friends. Featuring everything from games needing you to be clever with your answer, to purposefully trying to get everyone playing to disagree with each other, the Jack Box series features six different selections (Party Pack) with five games in each. Some are a little better suited to being in the same room (Fakin’ it requires participants to point at each other, or raise their hands. Tricky on a conference call), most are fine and easy to play from all ends of your quarantine. The best part is that only one person actually needs to own the game, everyone else simply connects to it with their favourite internet capable device and has fun.
4. Final Fantasy VII Remake (PS4, Rated T)
Cloud Strife is back and looking better than he ever has. This remake of the classic RPG brings everything you loved back in the day (how has it already been 23 years!) with updated graphics. Seeing all your old friends, Cloud, Tifa, Aerith and even the villainous Sephiroth, in full HD graphics brings a chill. This is the RPG that many people look fondly back on and mark as their starting point to enjoy this genre. While it has been done before, FFVII made it good, and made it memorable.
3. Roll20.net (PC and Mobile)
Okay we’re cheating a little on this one. This isn’t a game on its own per se, but rather it’s a virtual place for you to host a session of your favourite RPG. While we prefer to play the classic Dungeons and Dragons, they have Pathfinder, Starfinder, Call of Cthulhu and a lot more. It’s a free platform, with a massive market for purchasing premade campaigns if you’re new to dungeoneering, or set pieces lovingly designed if you prefer to make a story yourself. It has built in dice rolling, video and audio sharing (so you can see your friends faces drop as you reveal your brilliance) it might the closest you can get to playing Dungeon’s and Dragons while also quarantined. You don’t even need to have people ready and willing to play, roll20 has a built-in tool to either find players for your game, or to join one yourself.
2. World of Warcraft (PC, Rated Teen)
The grand-daddy of MMORPG’s (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games), Blizzard’s World of Warcraft (WoW) has been around forever. With six different expansions plus the base game, it’s a fair bet that there are people playing this game that don’t even know we’re in quarantine. While it does require a subscription it’s worth every penny for the sheer amount of content that WoW offers. Choose a side (Alliance or Horde), choose a race, a class and just explore. Best played with friends, but easy to find other people to tag onto if no one wants to join you, World of Warcraft has stuck around this long for a reason. There are entire economies in the game that revolve around people explicitly not going into dungeons. They hunt for rare leathers, or fish, or sew, blacksmith or any of the other number of professions. There is so much to do in this game that it could easily have its own article. If you’ve never checked it out before you can pick up the free Starter Edition and get a character to level 20 before you decide whether it’s time to dive fully in or not. Personally, if you’re looking for hours to fly by, this is definitely the game that will make the clock irrelevant.
1. Legend of Zelda: Breath of The Wild (Switch, Rated E10+)
The killer app for Nintendo Switch, Breath of The Wild once again has you in control of Link, the silent protagonist of the series. This time in a post-apocalyptic version of Hyrule, this is the first game in the series to take open world seriously. If you want to rush Ganondorf and fight the final boss in ten minutes you can. You decide where to go, what to do, and how long it’s going to take the saviour of Hyrule to actually do some saving. With new mechanics that have been designed specifically for the open world, and the option of doing anything you want at any time, if you own a single title for the Switch it should be this one. Cooking, climbing, finding weapons or better equipment, hunting, fighting legendary beasts or simple bokoblins, everything is doable from the moment you leave the tutorial plateau with your trusty wind glider. If you want to experience everything this game has to offer, it’ll take over 180 hours (on average). Nintendo outdid themselves on this one, and you’re doing yourself an injustice if you haven’t played it yet.
By Sam Murdock
Image via Blizzard Entertainment
