GOTY 2014 | Number 3 — Jackbox Party Pack

A few years ago, there was a big push for smart phone inte­gra­tion into con­sole video games. Microsoft had their Smart­Glass ini­tia­tive and Sony fol­lowed their lead with the PlaySta­tion app short­ly after­ward. Since then, aside from a few games putting the mini-map on an iPad, there real­ly has­n’t been much uti­liza­tion of this. Enter Jack­box Par­ty Pack and one of the more inno­v­a­tive moves to take place in gam­ing this year. This game allows any­one with a mobile device to log on to their web brows­er and play the game via touch screen. This elim­i­nates the need for extra con­trollers and all but assures every­one can play. One of the games, Lie Swat­ter, even sup­ports up to 100 players.

This would all be well and good, but if the games were bad no one would care. Thank­ful­ly, most of the games are a blast as well. Fib­bage XL, my per­son­al favorite, has you cre­at­ing fake answers to triv­ia ques­tions and Draw­ful, anoth­er house favorite, tasks you with draw­ing real­ly bizarre pic­tures on your touch screen. This game is the best thing to hap­pen to couch mul­ti­play­er in a long while. It’s one of those con­cepts that I sin­cere­ly hope gets repro­duced many times over in oth­er games. It may seem like a steep ask for $25, but it will end up being worth it since you’re get­ting 5 games out of the deal. This game tru­ly deserves to be as high as it is, at num­ber 3, on my game of the year list for 2014.