8. Titan Souls
Last one from Devolver Digital, but a game that instead of rewarding balls-out gun battles and explosive gunplay, is easily one of the hardest from both the year and decade combined. Playing like a top-down 2D version of Shadow of the Colossus, you're a small boy journeying through a beautifully-rendered world of stone structures, stretching fields and labyrinthine cave systems. The game doesn't feature anything other than bosses that need to be taken down, but the twist is your only ability is one retrievable arrow. It can be fired and called back to you from afar, and that's it. Each boss has one specific weak spot, alongside all sorts of things you'll have to do to open them up or provide a targeting opportunity; traits that don't bode so well when they occasionally fill the screen, creating a 'one hit and you're dead' setup. Titan Souls is an extremely annoying yet beautifully-rendered little game, but one for those who relish a challenge through and through, as the rest of us will simply get eaten up and spat back out, our only friend being the ever-present "Try Again?" screen.