20 Best Video Games Of 2017

8. Nioh

Team Ninja's phenomenal return to form feels like it was slightly undone by an initial open Alpha demo that convinced the masses of some overwhelming difficulty. However, the developers tweaked this to perfection, and Nioh exists as "Samurai Dark Souls" on its face, yet has a number of great innovations and a stunning art style to its own name.

Because while Nioh borrows liberally from Dark Souls base framework of shoulder button-controlled combat, banking XP at checkpoints to levelling up and piping in other players' death markers to help with where to go, it also adds to each element, too.

Combat is shaken up with a variety of weapons that all filter through four stances a piece. You can customise a number of "when parrying, do X" or "When dodging, do Y" animations, and the XP grind is tied to other player data, as fighting any deceased avatar will give you a chance to acquire a piece of their gear - essentially giving real benefit to grinding an area, outside of just XP.

All of this, and the art style is channeling Capcom's beloved Onimusha series in the best way possible. Nioh is a stellar action game, and one that deserves to be picked up on some inevitable end-of-year sale.