Edge Of Nowhere's Brian Allgeier Shares His Top Games Of 2015

On the lead up to Game Informer's Game of the Year awards of 2015, we've invited a number of the video game industry's influential figures to share their favorite games of the year.

After making Hanna Barbera's Cartoon Carnival for Phillips CD-i, Brian Allgeier went on to work on some of the biggest titles for PlayStation 2, most notably as the creative director of Insomniac Games' Ratchet & Clank series. He also was the creative director of Insomniac's co-op shooter, Fuse. He is now working on Edge of Nowhere, an exclusive VR title for Oculus Rift.

Here is Brian Allgeier with his Top 5 games of 2015:
 
This year I wandered off my usual action-adventure path and ventured into the dark woods of horror and branching story lines.
 
Life is Strange
Being able to turn back time and make new story choices is a brilliant mechanic. It addresses the problem that many story branching games have in that the consequences are not always clear and as a result, the choices don’t feel very meaningful. I found myself exploring the different timelines of Max’s story and despite not being a teenage girl myself, relating to her and feeling the weight of her dilemmas that don’t always have black and white solutions. It also made me wish I had an Undo feature in real-life…
 
Until Dawn
I’m a sucker for B-movie genres re-envisioned through a triple A lens and Until Dawn is exactly that. I didn’t know what to expect and was pleasantly surprised by the well-crafted story, strong performance captures, and what is essentially an interactive love letter to the cabin/slasher film genre. While sparking memories of “Cabin in the Woods” and many horror films from the 80s was a treat, I enjoyed the modern elements, the Native American mysticism, and psychological layers that offered a deeper experience than the movies that inspired it.
 
Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture
While I enjoy the more cinematic driven and story branching adventures, it’s always a nice breath of fresh air to play a game where I can discover the world and story at my own pace. I did sense the invisible guiding hand of its creators, yet my exploration of Yaughton still felt like I was discovering the village as if I were really there. The minimalistic HUD and environmental storytelling made me look harder for clues and begin to notice the smaller details which would spark my imagination of what happened to the village residents. It’s great to play a game where the little things matter and flashy spectacle isn’t always needed to create dramatic tension.
 
Her Story
When I first started working in video games, FMVs (for you young folks, “Full Motion Video”) was all the rage. It was a time where we thought Hollywood Cinematic storytelling would merge with this new upcoming interactive medium. The logical conclusion of this was “Choose Your Own Adventure” with video! The other logical conclusion is that the whole concept would fail, which it did. Yet I always hoped some potential for an interactive “movie” game existed. Fast forward 23 years later to “Her Story” a novel method of piecing together a story by entering search terms. At first I wasn’t sure what to make of the random clips I was pulling up, but I soon began discovering some surprising reveals and was impressed with Viva Seifert’s ranged performance.
 
Soma
I began playing this game for research to understand how to better craft horror for my current project. I quickly forgot to take notes and got pulled into Soma’s haunting world of disturbing choices. I’ve never had a game make me think so much about what it means to be human and the moral implications of this possible dark future that could result with this dystopian vision. Looking back, I was impressed with how the game could build an atmosphere of horror, priming players for that dreaded and often surprising scare.