As is customary for me, I’m late to dropping my gaming opinions.

Oh well, better luck next year, am I right?

2025 was an insane year for gaming; almost every week saw another Metacritic banger. While I was wrapping up my Like a Dragon odyssey, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Blue Prince, Split Fiction, Elden Ring: Nightreign, Arc Raiders, and more were dropping like hot cakes.

It’s incredible how well this year was for gaming, although there was plenty of ugly peppered in for good measure.

Again, I’m late, but let’s talk highlights and lowlights of 2025.

2025 was a Rollercoaster of Genres

2025 saw my year-long Yakuza journey come to a close, as I wrapped up a little after Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza hit port. Moment of honesty, I only played the mainline entries. I didn’t dive into Judgement or its sequel; I tried Like a Dragon: Ishin!, but found it boring.

That said, Infinite Wealth has to be one of my favorites in the series, which is a nice turnaround considering how I rage-quit Yakuza: Like a Dragon near the end of the game.

After my trek through Japan, I shifted gears and thought I could tackle the Souls games, since I own nearly all of them. I failed spectacularly until I challenged Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice… and I won.

I started Lies of P right after, and while I enjoyed it, I stopped sometime around 15-20 hours in. I did find myself picking it back up because, to my utter shock, where I stopped was damn near the end of the game. Might as well finish it, am I right?

I found myself lost in Hollow Knight, and I love both games. I understand why they’re so highly regarded; both Hollow Knight and Silksong are fantastic titles that encourage perseverance and reward exploration fanatics. 28 hours later, and I’m still not done with Silksong. I still need to unlock the final act to complete what I think is an amazing experience, although I do have gripes.

During my Silksong sabbatical, October came and went, with moments spent playing Cronos: The New Dawn and Silent Hill f. I wrote up a piece on both, but to sum it up, Cronos has great gameplay and a weak story, Silent Hill f is the exact opposite. Both experiences were incredible in their own ways!

I found myself trying to satisfy the yearning I had for a good RPG adventure. I wrapped up The Outer Worlds 2 (8.5/10 for me), and while I don’t remember much about the first game, the sequel is very good, although the satirical nature of consumerism is a little too realistic, which is probably the point.

RoboCop: Rogue City is more Fallout than Fallout is and was pretty fun, although I wouldn’t consider it super RPG-like. It just felt right to put in this block.

I have many more RPGs to go through, Fallout: New Vegas, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, and revisiting 2023’s Game of the Year, Baldur’s Gate 3, are just a few on my plate. 

Shoutout to The Rogue Prince of Persia, an outstanding game that is incredibly addictive.

So yeah, a busy year! There are more I forgot to mention, but I’m proud of how diverse and complete my year played out.

Ghost of Yotei left me very mixed

I was pretty excited for Ghost of Yotei because I loved Ghost of Tsushima. Sucker Punch figured out a nice formula with GoT, and I was excited for more of it on the PS5.

Flash forward to the game’s launch, and 10 hours of playtime later, I was officially checked out on Ghost of Yotei.

My issues here are twofold; the story is way weaker than the first game’s, and the gameplay is exactly the same.

If Tsushima refined the Ubisoft formula, Yotei brings it forward with little to no innovation. You follow the wind, visit hot springs, liberate villages from hostiles… it’s the same song and dance.

The story is also weak… very weak. You could say the first game had a weak story, but Yotei’s focus on personal revenge and it being told nonlinearly is also not for me. It feels like The Last of Us Part 2, and while I don’t like the sequel, it was at least very cinematic and had top tier presentation. Yotei felt way less than that.

**Minor Spoilers**

There’s also this weird loop that the game continued to push out. Atsu would find herself ready to take down a member of the Yotei 6, yet her plan would fail. She’d regroup, then take down the target. It happened at least three times in a row if I remember correctly, and it got to a point where I knew it was going to happen.

I’ve been very critical, so you’re probably wondering where the mixed feelings come in. Honestly, it’s because the world’s beauty and the feeling of badassery when you mow down a small platoon of soldiers is unmatched. Sucker Punch continues to nail that aspect very well, although it sucks that the rest of the game didn’t hold me over.

Sucker Punch is working on the follow up to the co-op Legends mode, and I can only image the team might work on DLC for Yotei. If Sucker Punch wants to continue the Ghost series, I do hope the team does something completely different to shake up the core.

My Game of the Year is…..

Look, this year was massive, with so many good games coming out seemingly every single day. So I don’t envy the position Geoff Keighley and company stood in when they voted for their Game of the Year, although it was a sweep like no other.

With that said, Dispatch holds the crown for my title of the year. While the gameplay is certainly on the weaker side compared to other choices here, its characters, the story, and moments shared are some of the best I’ve experienced this year. It’s so good, and while it was short, I savored every single second I put in. It’s even better with friends (shameless plug of my playthrough). 

Honorable mentions go to Hollow Knight: Silksong and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, both monumental titles in their own way.

2026 at a Glance

Before I round up the good things to look forward to in 2026, we have to address the elephants in the room.

Does AI continue to take over the world? In the right hands, AI could be a tool, however, we’ve seen it weaponized, resulting in a landscape of fear and layoffs galore.

Xbox – will they continue to burn their remaining reputation? 2025 alone saw an insane rework and price hike of GamePass, workers laid off in a full push to AI, exclusive games are “antiquated??” It was an ugly year for Team Green, and while I’m not condemning them, I’m not sure where they go from here.

Switching gears.

There’s a lot to look forward to in 2026. In February we get Yakuza Kiwami 3, the remake of the third game, although there’s a lot of controversy around that because of character remodels and actors being weird.

More highlights to come:

• GTA 6 may finally be coming, barring another delay.
• 2026 is the year of Wolverine, i.e, Insomniac’s next title in its PSMCU (PlayStation Marvel Cinematic Universe)
• LEON S. KENNEDY COMES BACK AFTER WHAT FEELS LIKE FOREVER.
• Tomb Raider returns, although in the form of a remake of the first game. I personally would’ve loved a continuation of her more recent trilogy.
• 007 First Light sees James Bond in video game for the first time in a long time!
• Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight gives us the Batman game we deserve.
• Remedy Entertainment looks to bounce back after FBC: Firebreak with Control Resonant.
• Can Bungie recover any goodwill with Marathon?
• Will the GabeCube bring Half Life 3?
• Does Highguard become the fabled Concord 2?

That’s not even half of the video game news, but we can’t forge television highlights like Invincible, JJK: The Culling Games, Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War Part 4, Fire Force, and The Boys making a return. The latter three enter their final arcs!

2026 will be a year, and while I’m excited for what’s to come, I’m also hesitant on what’s hiding in the grass. I hope it brings many victories to everyone, and I hope my 2026 recap is on time.

Also, welcome to “Completed Games – 2026,” which is exactly what it sounds like. I document what I’ve completed with my thoughts.

Honorable Mention: Music in 2025

Holy fuck, did we get some really good music in gaming. Expedition 33, Hollow Knight: Silksong, The Rogue Prince of Persia all have incredible soundtracks. That’s just from this year alone mind you, I played Stellar Blade in 2205 and almost every track is an absolute banger.

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Happy New Year!