Red Dead Redemption 2

Without a doubt, the best video game I have ever played. I know this has been talked about countless times already, and RDR2 is pretty much everybody's favourite game, but this game is a testament to how good a video game can really be, and there has been nothing to compete with it since (in my opinion). No game has the narrative depth and storytelling complexity, combined with the sense of immersion and masterfully written characters, as well as the seemingly real ecosystems and lively towns and NPCs. I could go on about how perfectly crafted this game is for hours. This was the first video game I played that felt like I was playing a movie. It's a video game, but it's also a cinematic masterpiece. It's a game from 2018, but still looks good to modern standards while running better than new games that look remarkably worse. RDR2 is slow-paced, there's a lot of talking, the missions may be a little repetitive, but these did not matter at all to me as I played. I wanted to listen to what each character had to say, I wanted to learn more about them. I genuinely cared for everybody at camp and wanted to talk with them and do any of their side quests whenever they popped up. Although in hindsight it may have been repetitive at times, the gameplay was still fun and that kept it fresh; a perfect blend of realism and fake, making me feel like an actual badass cowboy that could gun down anyone I came across if I really wanted to. The way guns could blow peoples heads off, the way deadeye has you mowing down entire swarms of people. It's just pure fun and badassery. Importantly, the narrative is emotional and extremely well written. Upon completing the game all I could do was sit in silence and watch the credits roll. If you haven't played this game, you need to. It's the best game ever made, and it has me extremely excited for what Rockstar has in-store for us next.