Entertainment

Games: The best of 2020 including Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, The Last of Us II, Ghost of Tsushima and Animal Crossing: New Horizons

There was no better reminder of happier days in 2020 than Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 and 2
There was no better reminder of happier days in 2020 than Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 and 2 There was no better reminder of happier days in 2020 than Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 and 2

2020 Review

LIKE many of you, I know what I did last summer – and cradling a control pad factored heavily. In a year where many discovered they didn't need fun to have alcohol, videogames not only provided vital escapism but a way to safely rub virtual shoulders with fellow humans.

If two consumer items could sum up 2020, the elusive PlayStation 5 was the big-ticket item in our annus horribilis, though running a close second was bog roll – a two-ply reminder of just how s*** the year was.

Thanks to the pandemic, games became a bigger industry than movies and sport combined. And, with digital purchases, we could shop while others dropped from the safety of our disinfected hovels.

While it was a strange year to showcase a new generation of consoles, 2020 also marked the farewell tour for PS4 and Xbox One – with Sony in particular ensuring the old guard went out with a bang.

So, what were the gaming highlights in a lowlight year? If 2020 was a boss battle, these games provided the extra lives we so dearly needed.

Not everything that wafted across from Asia in March was bad news, and Nintendo's Animal Crossing: New Horizons was a comfort blanket for a planet in crisis. As lockdowns bit, Halloween and Christmas were recreated in cutesy glory on the small screen, with people even tying the knot on its virtual shores.

A game where players could wander to a friend's house and admire their new chair may not raise the pulse, but it was exactly the kind of benign bimbling we craved while the world crumbled.

But if Nintendo's island paradise offered pure escapism, The Last of Us II played out like a 2020 survival guide. Continuing the tale of a world gone to hell in a handcart, Sony's misery simulator dovetailed perfectly into a miserable year.

Hot on its heels came Ghost of Tsushima's ripping yarn of old-school samurai, full of Mongol-bashing heroics 'n' horseplay. Stretching the ageing hardware so much you could hear it praying for a lethal injection, Sony's final PS4 blockbuster was one helluva headstone for the console.

If the PS4 went out with a bloody bang, the PS5 brought more family-friendly fare. Pack-in game Astro's Playroom was a joyous celebration of the company's 25-year history, while Sackboy: A Big Adventure provided some welcome respite from the gloom, our burlap-bonced star bouncing through a carnival of platforming set to one of gaming's greatest soundtracks.

In a year where the value of nostalgia sky-rocketed, there was no better reminder of happier days than Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 and 2. The richest man on seven-ply maple proved heaven really was a half-pipe with this reworking of 1999's skateboarding phenomenon and its superior sequel that transported me back to my student years, when spending your life drunk on a couch was by choice.

2020 proved that developers can still deliver the goods in a pandemic – hell, Shakespeare wrote some of his finest work during the plague. At the very least, having new consoles to feed gives us a reason to keep ploughing through the misery. Happy new year!