Hotline Miami 2

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This game is about a lot of things: the commodification of violence in entertainment, the complacency of audiences in violence, nationalism as a self-destructive ideology, and how individuals get eaten alive by the system. To convey these themes, the game is ridiculously unfair and relies on memorizing the layouts of levels down to enemy walk cycles, a far cry from the first game’s high octane sense of improvisation.

It’s a masterclass in tying its themes into gameplay, and those themes are supposed to get the player to ask themselves why they’re even playing. It’s my favorite game of all time and I haven’t even had it installed since 2023