My top Xbox One games of the generation (2013 to 2020)

The Xbox One is entering its twilight years, as games begin prioritizing next-gen Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S systems instead. I switched to an Xbox Series X like many other Xbox One owners in the latter part of this year, and thanks to backward compatibility, all of those Xbox One experiences are coming forward for the ride.

Given that it’s the end of the year (and what a year it has been), I thought I’d cast a glance into the past and review all of my favorite experiences on the Xbox One line of consoles. The Xbox One generation isn’t really officially over until games stop launching for it. Many of the best and biggest most anticipated Xbox games for 2021 and beyond are launching on the Xbox One, as well as the Series S and X. The gen, however, is very much over for me personally.

The Xbox One generation was marked by a rocky start, and a bit of a limp to the finish line, with Halo Infinite getting delayed to next year. Alas, Microsoft has set itself up with a big recipe for success in the near future, with cloud gaming, next-gen power, and one of the largest lineups of blockbuster studios in the West. However you feel about the Xbox One gen personally, I had a blast with it, quite easily spending more time playing than I ever did on any previous generation. Here are some of my favorite experiences from the years of 2013 all the way to 2020, not including games that I’ve only played on next-gen systems (sorry Cyberpunk 2077.

What are your favorite games of the Xbox One generation? Hit the comments below, and chime in!

15. The Evil Within

The Evil Within is a truly grotesque experience with some of the most jaw-dropping monster designs ever committed to pixels. I was surprised to discover completing the game on Normal was a “Rare Achievement,” at least back when I did it, which could be a testament to the game’s grating difficulty spikes. The Evil Within is well-worth playing even now in 2020, if you can stomach the relentlessly haunting atmosphere and painstakingly slow-paced gameplay. Every layer of The Evil Within’s design is oppressive by intention, and few games have the guts to be this punishing in 2020.

Super Time Force is a bullet hell side-scroller with inspiration from Gunstar Heroes and Contra, albeit with unique time-bending mechanics and truly laugh-out-loud dialogue. Super Time Force is a rare gem of an indie game that deserves far more recognition. You navigate Super Time Force’s huge array of enemies by sending time clones of yourself back to the past repeatedly to correct your mistakes. The game has an epic soundtrack that is memorable despite the fact I haven’t listened to it for years, with a beefy amount of content with a low price point—great, pure gaming.

State of Decay 2 remains the closest thing to my ideal zombie survival simulation game. You play as an entire community of survivors, with perma-death mechanics and resource management at the heart of surviving the zombie apocalypse. State of Decay 2 has its issues, from multiplayer tethering to engine quirks, but few games nail that cinematic emergent feel. The scares in State of Decay 2 are derived purely from the simulation rather than scripted events, making them all the more nail-biting.

Since launch, Undead Labs came in-house to join Microsoft itself, and in the summer of 2020 revealed State of Decay 3.

A time travel experiment gone wrong gives Jack Joyce the power to navigate the shattered timelines and combat Monarch Solutions, who are exploiting the chaos for corporate gain. Quantum Break also featured high-quality live-action TV segments that interweaved between the game itself, featuring some of the best visuals on the console at the time, with great performances from Shawn Ashmore, Aidan Gillen, and others.

Quantum Break didn’t live up to the hype somehow, but the story delivery was compelling and bold enough to try something new. I long for a sequel to reconcile the game’s cliffhanger ending, but Quantum Break is a wild ride even without it.

Darkest Dungeon is a Lovecraftian strategy RPG, which tasks you to return a decrepit manor estate to its former glory. To do it, you have to invest in mercenaries and clear out nearby crypts, infested swamps, and ghoul-ridden dungeons, to eliminate all the cursed abominations that have taken hold across the land.

Darkest Dungeon famously introduces stress as a mechanic, where your adventurers suffer psychological ailments of all types as the burden of their experiences begins to weigh. Darkest Dungeon is a neat little game that I find myself coming back to time and time again.

Ori and the Will of the Wisps is a truly delightful experience from every angle, with stunning art, music, and precise platforming gameplay seamlessly blending into a magical whole. Ori takes players into an enchanted forest to save it from spreading corruption, with a beefy and evocative audiovisual adventure that players won’t soon forget.

The Long Dark is a solitary survival simulation game, complete with a powerful story mode and emergent gameplay mechanics. Set in the Canadian north in the midst of a meteorological disaster, you find yourself stranded in the biting cold with nothing but the clothes on your back. The animals have been driven mad by magnetic phenomena, and mastering the game’s various survival mechanics forms the basis of play.

The Long Dark gave me some of my most memorable experiences in a game this gen, owing to intersecting dynamic systems that can frequently put you on the brink of death.

Battlefield 1, of course, showcases WW1 in all of its grisly majesty. The first industrial-scale war, with clunky tanks, strange makeshift weaponry, and chemical warfare so horrible it was scarcely used by any side in WW2. Battlefield 1 wasn’t the most historically accurate game by any stretch, featuring vehicles in abundance that were in some cases barely out of the prototype phase. However, it was perhaps the most visceral of the series, with a bigger emphasis on up-close melee combat. Battlefield 1 was soberingly brutal and hauntingly beautiful.

Wasteland 3 is a turn-based isometric RPG that gives you a great deal of control over building up your playstyle and tackling quests. Another great title in a bit of a renaissance for CRPGs, Wasteland 3 is a great experience that represents a big step up for inXile.

Resident Evil 2 launches originally on the PlayStation 1, and Capcom took what they learned remaking Resident Evil 1 for the Game Cube and poured it into Resident Evil 2, reimagining some parts while sprinkling in new ones. It was truly awesome to experience the Raccoon City Police Department all over again with modern visuals.

Blizzard’s character-based shooter spawned a range of copycats until the battle royale craze took the spotlight. Overwatch retained a dedicated and passionate player base, though, like most Blizzard games, and received persistent updates, new content, and free heroes since its launch.

Every time I play Overwatch, I feel like each game plays out a little differently. Every hero is diverse and decently balanced for team play at a casual level, with intersecting abilities and exciting ultimate powers that can, if used correctly, wipe an entire enemy team. Overwatch is one of those rare games where sometimes it can actually be fun to see how enemy players have cleverly outplayed you, using the game’s diverse maps and mechanics to their advantage. Endlessly addictive, Overwatch is my favorite multiplayer shooter of the gen.

Life is Strange is a tale about friendship, loss, love, and youth told through the lens of a dark narrative adventure that may just scar you for life. In a good way. Sorta. Life is Strange is incredible.

Set on a mysteriously vacant space station, you play as a scientist lost in a facility full of oil-like aliens called Typhons. You can customize your playstyle a great deal as you work your way through the failing living quarters, battling alien forms and avoiding mimics that can disguise themselves as any object.

Prey had some of the coolest gameplay, best music, and most wonderful environmental storytelling of the whole generation. An underrated gem that deserves far more recognition, Prey is well worth your time.

Monster Hunter World has some of the most satisfying combat mechanics I’ve ever experienced in a game, tasking players to master their weaponry as much as the monsters themselves. Each beastie has a unique set of behaviors to learn and overcome as you build up an arsenal of powerful weaponry and gear to take on ever more difficult challenges.

Playing Monster Hunter World with friends and family during the lockdown periods has helped me (and likely many others) stay sane.

The Witcher 3 is based on a series of novels by the same name, set in a dark fantasy world where magic and mythical beings inspired by European folklore are commonplace. Geralt of Rivia of the Order of the Wolf is trained and alchemically enhanced to battle monsters that lurk in the dark, at worst terrorizing farmers and eating livestock, and, at worst, attacking people and devouring them. Geralt’s skill sees him tangled up in all sorts of political intrigue as nations clash and evil cultists wait in the wings spreading corruption amidst the chaos.

The Witcher 3 has some of the best writing, character delivery, and gameplay the industry has ever seen or may ever see. And remains a benchmark experience all future action-adventure games should look to.