6) Valiant Hearts: The Great War
When you take a step back and consider Ubisoft as a publisher, the thing that immediately springs to mind is its knack for lucrative, triple-A franchises. Annual behemoths such as Assassin’s Creed as well as the more intermittent Far Cry are no doubt the core money makers for the studio — series that facilitate the creation of similarly huge IPs in the vein of Watch Dogs and The Crew. But the French giant also unveiled two very different and very low-key projects through the course of 2014 that irrefutably proved its diversity.
One was the JRPG-inspired fairytale Child of Light — a remarkable title in its own right — while the other took up arms to explore The Great War in all of its rich, emotional and harrowing depths. That game in question was Valiant Hearts, an emotion-driven experience that allowed players to view World War I through the lens of an American soldier, a Belgian battlefield nurse, a French chief known as Emilie and his son-in-law, Karl, who has been drafted into the German army. It’s an intriguing set-up, and throughout the course of its non-linear story, we the audience view the conflict from both sides of the muddy trenches.
Granted, the message may get muddled in Valiant Hearts‘ gameplay — a disparity often referred to as ludonarrative dissonance — but Ubisoft Montpellier’s effort is stylish and rich to the point where you can almost feel the atmosphere of World War I emanate from the screen. So much so that you begin to empathize with the relationships between those four key characters, as they endure the trials and tribulations of The Great War. Plus, the ending itself is the culmination of this raw, poignant journey, and is an ending that will resonate in our own hearts for a very, very long time.
