Humor.  Chaos.  Guns.  Freedom.  This is #23 on my top 25 list, Sunset Overdrive.

Genre:  Platformer, Third-Person Shooter
Platform:  XBone

This is the newest game on my list by far and I’m not fully done playing.  I did complete the story, but there are so many things yet to do.  I know I have said that I don’t like shooters, but this game is a key example of how good story writing can make up for an element that I’m not too keen on.  And this game has EXCELLENT writing.  I LOL’d many, many times while I was playing.  It doesn’t take itself seriously at all and breaks the fourth wall quite often.

So what is this game?  It’s an open-world game, meaning you can go where you want when you want.  It’s all about the guns you can have, and it’s got a lot of them:

But there’s so much to it than that.  It’s also got heavy platform elements, which means that there are places that you need to get to, but it’s not always obvious how to do it and you have to use your brain to get there.  It’s also got some extreme-sports elements such as grinding rails and wall running.  What I enjoyed just about as much as the story were the collectibles.  I am a sucker for a lot of collectibles in a game.  There are 150 of five different items to collect and various other collectibles to get.  What’s unique here is that these aren’t just there for something to do – they make your character better by allowing for upgrades of weapons or abilities.

Similar to Grand Theft Auto and other open-world games, there are loads of side missions and quests to do.  My favorite series was helping a group of larpers defend themselves from the mutants which want to destroy their base.  I won’t give away any more of the story in case you intend to play.

This is an XBone-exclusive, but honestly, this game was a driver for me getting the console.  And I wasn’t disappointed.  It’s colorful, raucous and fun!