My 2025 in Video Games

2025 is over. That means it’s time to take a look at the games I played in that year and tell you about the very best ones. I played a lot of great stuff this year, so this post may run a little long.

At the end of this post is a list of every game I played in 2025. The absence of a game on that list from the short list of highlights below does not mean that game is bad. I enjoyed almost all of them.

Additionally, although I didn’t do a lot of game development or writing about games this year compared to some prior years, you can watch my 2025 Super MAGFest talk embedded below. I enjoyed writing and delivering it and hope some folks will enjoy watching it.

Now, let’s talk about some great games.

Best First Plays of 2025

The following games are the best single-player or co-op games I played (or finished) for the first time in 2025 regardless of their original release year.

They appear in the order in which I finished them and are not ranked.

F-Zero AX (2003, Arcade)

GAME CLEAR post
There’s nothing like F-Zero, my beloved. At Super MAGFest 2025, I finally won a race on the toughest course and the only one on which I’d yet to win. With my memory card in tow, that meant I also unlocked the AX Cup for home play on my GameCube — a real thrill and a gaming goal 20 years in the making!

F-Zero GX is a racing masterpiece with some of the finest and most tightly-tuned controls I’ve ever had the pleasure of using in any genre. AX sacrifices some of that precision in exchange for the immersion of a full-motion cabinet that places you in the cockpit of an F-Zero machine. It moves as you move, so long as you remember to buckle up before the game starts. For me, playing the world’s fastest racer with all the arcade trappings is a dream. I can’t wait to take it for a spin again at Super MAGFest 2026 in just a few days.

Ninja Five-O (2003, GBA)

GAME CLEAR post
In a year in which I played multiple Shinobi games, I didn’t expect the one-off Ninja Five-O to be the best ninja game I played, but it was. This game relies a bit more on stealth and cunning than some of its peers. Its stages consist of multiple single-room encounters that work almost as puzzles. How do I rescue all these hostages without killing them or taking too much damage myself? An occasionally clumsy grappling hook and stingy life bar can frustrate, but not enough to take much of the luster off this one. I still think of that main track that plays throughout most of the stages too. Say what you will about Limited Run Games, I’m glad they ported this rare and expensive GBA classic to modern platforms for more to enjoy.

Balatro (2024, Multiplatform)

GAME CLEAR post
I’d wager the true meaning of “beating” Balatro is finding a way to put it down. The self-described poker roguelike really presses that “one more game” button. I got the itch bad early in 2025 and put a crazy number of hours in before finally moving on to other things, but when I need to kill a few minutes, I still fire it up from time to time. It’s as fun as everyone says.

Split Fiction (2025, Multiplatform)

GAME CLEAR post
Hazelight’s third co-op-only game is good, clean fun. You and a friend control two aspiring authors who must fight and navigate their way through their own imagined worlds when an encounter with a predatory publisher’s idea-extraction machine goes awry. Their respective sci-fi and fantasy preferences provide the setting for the game’s levels and is emblematic of their contrasting personalities. They way they butt heads is somewhat annoyingly written (and their enemies-to-besties arc all too predictable), but the cooperation required of them is a delight. The game is never content to stick with any one mechanical idea for too long, an despite this, it seldom offers up an undercooked one either. Most of the game’s trials aren’t very challenging, but they are rarely boring either. A finely tuned work of gameplay.

This game supports online co-op, but for my money, you can’t do better than playing this on a big TV on the couch with a friend.

C-Smash VRS (New Dimension) (2023, PCVR/PSVR)

GAME CLEAR post
C-Smash gives the esteemed Rocket League a run for its money as the realest sports game there is. With a bumping soundtrack and sleek minimalist aesthetic, C-Smash is part racquetball, part Breakout, all style. It doesn’t lack for substance, though. Placing shots just where you want them feels both achievable and good, and keeping the ball in play is a genuine workout. If I had a more convenient VR setup, I’d be getting more cardio in for sure.

To repeat myself a bit, that’s the magic. It really feels like you’re playing a sport. It’s virtual, of course, and rumble can only approximate the feeling of hitting a real ball, but it still offers real ballgame thrills in a way nothing I’ve played before has.

My only regret is that I haven’t found a human opponent to play PVP with. I bet it’s awesome! Maybe someday.

Starblade (1991, Arcade)

GAME CLEAR post 🧤
I had a unique and memorable experience with Starblade at Mikado Game Center in Takadanobaba that I describe in greater detail in the linked post. If I love this game, I had an encounter with a man who loves it about a thousand times more. Setting that experience aside, Starblade is still a thrilling, high production value 3D space shooter unlike any I’ve played. As an arcade experience, it is immersive and cinematic in a way that I think would be difficult to replicate in the home. Play it all the way through if you get the chance.

Even more interesting to me now is where it sits in the UGSF timeline. More on that when I talk about Shadow Labyrinth.

Otocky (1987, Famicom Disk System)

GAME CLEAR post
Otocky is high on the list of games I’ve played this year that has returned to mind the most often. It’s a 1987 rhythm game shooter, which seems like a concept roughly 30 years ahead of its time. The eponymous protagonist flies through his musical homeland blasting enemies with his yo-yo-like weapon. It fires with a cadence quantized to the beat of each stage’s musical track, and each of the eight directions it can be fired generates a different tone, while upgrades change the instrument and firing arc. This means that as you play through each stage, you are also essentially soloing over the BGM. Crazy!

On top of that, it’s got a composition tool that lets you compose new tracks of your own to play through the game with. It’s an utterly fascinating product for 1987 and is still awesome today.

It’s also the game that inspired me to purchase and repair a Family Computer Disk System while in Japan, which is one of the most rewarding tasks I’ve ever undertaken and, I hope, a stepping stone toward more involved hardware restorations in the future.

The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (2019, Switch)

GAME CLEAR post
It doesn’t bring much to the table for me to tell folks to play an entry in one of the video games’ most successful and well-known franchises, but Link’s Awakening was precisely what I needed when I finally picked it up this year (and I don’t even consider myself that much of a Zelda guy). It’s a classic top-down game with solid controls, simple yet satisfying mechanics, and killer visual design. Pretty great arrangement of the classic overworld theme too. It got a performance patch for Switch 2 as well, so if you’re looking for someone to play on your slick new device but have run through its slim launch lineup, it’s a great option.

SEGA AGES Fantasy Zone (2020, Switch)

GAME CLEAR post
SEGA and M2 amazed me once again with this brilliant port of the inimitable Fantasy Zone, originally released in arcades in 1986. I’ve always admired the look of the classic cute-’em-up and enjoyed its funky soundtrack, but I also found it quite tough and unforgiving. Thanks to some of the accessibility features of the SEGA AGES release, I’ve finally been able to get a grasp on this game and really loved it. Clearing it by the skin of my teeth with level select and other assists actually made me feel more motivated to someday go back and try to finish it for real. With enough practice, these games really are not so impossible.

1000xRESIST (2024, Multiplatform)

GAME CLEAR post
With of my favorite video game narratives ever, 1000xRESIST is a poignant reflection on imperialism, generational trauma, resistance, persistence, and interpersonal relationships in general. As such a deeply narrative-driven game, I hesitate to say more, but I recommend this game as strongly as any I played this year. It’s a special and heartfelt effort I’ll not soon forget.

Indika (2024, Multiplatform)

GAME CLEAR post
Indika is another great narrative adventure albeit a much more cynical and comedic one. It is largely a courier quest — you control the nun Indika who is tasked with delivering a letter from her convent to a monastery some distance away. For good reason, Indika has never fit in at her convent. She is subject to frequent hallucinations and indeed often hears the voice of the Devil himself. What starts as a simple (and almost tedious) game of walking and solving simple environmental puzzles quickly unravels into a much more surreal and existential affair.

At just 3-4 hours in length, this is one I can certainly recommend to anyone. You may not get as much of a kick out of it as I did, but I’d be surprised if you didn’t smile at least a time or two.

Gran Turismo (1997, PS1)

GAME CLEAR post
The inaugural Real Driving Simulator™ remains as impressive today as ever. Having only ever played Gran Turismo 7 on PlayStation 5, I was intrigued by the original, the best-selling game on the first PlayStation. The underlying simulation is obvious not as sophisticated as its successors, and the vehicle and track roster is much more limited, but all the ingredients have been there from the start. The racing feels great, and the “CarPG” aspect of buying and improving vehicles until you can take on the GT World Cup is hours of fun. The licensed and original tracks are all vibey as hell too. Love this game.

Mega Man Powered Up (2006, PSP)

GAME CLEAR post
I was wrong to have been reluctant to revisit the original Mega Man in this PSP remake. I certainly did not know how ambitious, cute, and feature-filled it was. It reimagines the first Mega Man title with love and respect for what that game was: a flawed but fun debut. With full voice acting, cartoon style cutscenes, and smoother gameplay, I actually think it serves as a great intro to the overall series.

But it doesn’t stop at being a great remake. It’s got all kinds of extras. You can play through the game as any of the bosses you defeat (with cutscenes and spoken lines redone to reflect this change), get engrossed in its robust level editor, and take on its 100+ character-specific challenge stages. The level sharing service finally went offline in 2022 (!), but you can still search and sideload stages online.

This is the original Mega Man as good as it gets. As part of one of the very finest video game series of all time, I can’t recommend it highly enough.

Shadow Labyrinth (2025, Multiplatform)

GAME CLEAR post
Bandai Namco’s weird little search action title is up there with Otocky as a game I can’t stop thinking about. It was marketed as a a grimdark Pac-Man spinoff, and it certainly sort of is. It has that weird late-2000s legacy sequel vibe for sure. It’s kind of the Hollow Knight of Bomberman: Act Zeros. It’s much more than that, though. It’s the most ambitious unification yet of Bandai Namco’s United Galaxy Space Force extended universe. Didn’t know Dig Dug took place in the same universe as Galaga? Well, you do now.

People use the term “cinematic universe” somewhat derisively now, and rightfully so, but based on the website they’ve meticulously maintained, this is something Namco has been cooking on for some time now. But Shadow Labyrinth is the best in-game example of the commingling of the Bosconians, Galaxians, Galagans, Xevians, et al that has been presented so far. And why shouldn’t those classic games and societies be fleshed out into a full sci-fi universe? You won’t find me as a naysayer. This game has me saying shit like “I really gotta check out Baraduke.”

Shadow Labyrinth is also a pretty fun search action platformer in its own right if you can stick with it past its tough opening hours and probably slightly too long runtime. Its shortcomings meant it didn’t review particularly well and probably didn’t sell well either, but I hope this isn’t the last game we see out of Namco with this particular mission.

Knight Move (1990, Famicom Disk System)

Knight Move is not a game I finished, but rather an endless, score-attack puzzle game by the master thereof, Alexey Pajitnov. Stuck as a late release for the Famicom Disk System of all things, Knight Move deserves a bit more attention. By navigating a knight chess piece around a small grid, you weaken each panel you land on. Three touches breaks the panel and creates a hole. Your objective is to create huge combos by destroying as many panels in a row without breaking your chain, all while gathering enough randomly placed hearts to move on to the next stage. The tricky part is that each hole you create poses a threat of an instant game over if you should fail to avoid it. This risk/reward system is super fun, and it’s all accompanied by one of the wackier soundtracks of the 8-bit era. I highly recommend emulating this one if you don’t have access to a Famicom Disk System.

Best Multiplayer Experiences of 2025

The following are the games I had the most fun playing with or against others in 2025. After the past couple years, I can more or less copy and paste this section. But here’s a couple of real winners anyhow.

Rocket League (2015, Multiplatform)

The world’s best sports game remained great on its 10th birthday and beyond. I think I got back into this game a bit more than I expected this year. It still kicks ass, and I’ve still got a great team to play with, so I think Rocket League will remain firmly in the rotation for the foreseeable future. Here’s to 10 more years!

F-Zero 99 (2023, Switch)

F-Zero 99 was less of a priority for me in 2025, but I still played it some, and I finally managed another Grand Prix win after a long slump. I expect I’ll continue to play it from time to time in 2026 and hope to see y’all on the track! 🏁

Games I made in 2025

In the spirit of keeping myself honest once again, I’ve got nothing for this section. I have actually just barely begun my next game, though, and I intend to see it through. It’s a bit more complex than my 2600 projects, though, so it may be a while yet. Still, I fully expect to finish it in 2026. I look forward to sharing it with you all.

My 2025 Super MAGFest Panel

There’s not really anywhere else to put this, but in January 2025 I wrote and gave a talk at Super MAGFest with my friend Rhys covering (as much as an hour would allow) the history and influence of full-motion video (FMV) games. I thought we did a pretty good job. You can watch it below.

All Games Beaten in 2025

The following list is mostly for my records but is presented here for your consideration as well.

Beaten:
01/13 - Late Shift (PS5)
01/21 - Rocket League (PS4)
01/22 - Five Dates (PS5)
01/24 - StreetPass Mii Plaza: Puzzle Swap (3DS)
01/25 - F-Zero AX (Arcade)
01/25 - StreetPass Mii Plaza: Market Crashers (3DS)
02/02 - Street Fighter: The Movie (Saturn)
02/13 - Attack of the Friday Monsters! A Tokyo Tale (3DS)
02/13 - Tomba! Special Edition (PS5 [PS1])
02/18 - 3D Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master (3DS [Genesis])
03/02 - The Last of Us Part I (PS5 [PS3])
03/08 - LocoRoco Remastered (PS4 [PSP])
03/10 - Ninja Five-O (PS4 [GBA])
03/11 - Balatro (PS5)
03/16 - Um Jammer Lammy (PS1)
03/17 - No One Can Stop Mr. Domino (PS1)
04/07 - Split Fiction (PS5)
04/08 - C-Smash VRS New Dimension (PSVR2)
04/14 - Trip World DX (PS5 [GB])
04/27 - The Typing of the Dead (Arcade)
05/01 - Starblade (Arcade)
05/06 - Omega 6: The Triangle Stars (Switch)
05/13 - Otocky (FDS)
05/14 - Family Computer Golf: U.S. Course (FDS)
05/28 - Nazo no Kabe: Block-kuzushi (FDS)
06/02 - Robot Gyro (FC)
06/03 - A Way Out (PS4)
06/07 - Mario Kart World (Switch 2)
06/09 - Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour (Switch 2)
06/10 - Popeye (FC)
06/16 - Arcade Archives 2: Ridge Racer (PS5 [Arcade])
06/21 - Bad Dudes vs. DragonNinja (Arcade)
06/22 - Suikoden I HD Remaster: Gate Rune War (PS5 [PS1])
06/23 - Devilish (Game Gear)
06/24 - Donkey Kong 64 (N64)
07/03 - Baseball Stars Professional (Switch [NEO GEO])
07/05 - Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club (Switch)
07/11 - The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (2019) (Switch)
07/12 - SEGA AGES Fantasy Zone (Switch)
07/16 - Dariusburst: Another Chronicle EX (Arcade)
07/22 - Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 (PS5 [PS2])
07/31 - 1000xRESIST (Switch)
08/07 - Toree 2 (Switch)
08/09 - Mega Man: Dr. Wily’s Revenge (3DS [GB])
08/12 - Mega Man II (3DS [GB])
08/24 - South of Midnight (XSX)
08/25 - Indika (PS5)
09/03 - Gran Turismo (PS1)
09/09 - Gran Turismo (PSP)
09/10 - Mega Man Powered Up (PSP)
09/16 - Omega Boost (PS1)
09/19 - Arcade Archives 2: Aqua Jet (PS5 [Arcade])
09/23 - Pilotwings Resort (3DS)
09/25 - Shinobi: Art of Vengeance (PS5)
09/29 - Tekken (PS1)
10/06 - Pac-Man World 2 Re-Pac (PS5 [PS2])
10/07 - Halloween Forever (Vita)
10/08 - Knobswitch (Vita)
10/23 - Shadow Labyrinth (PS5)
10/27 - Undertale (Vita)
10/31 - Pumpkin Jack (PS5)
10/31 - Pac-Man Halloween 2025 Google Doodle (PS5)
11/18 - Monument Valley (+ Forgotten Shores + Ida’s Dream) (PS5)
12/06 - Monument Valley 2 (+ The Lost Forest) (PS5)
12/10 - Monument Valley 3 (PS5)
12/16 - Dragon Quest VI: Los reinos oníricos (DS)

Completed:
01/24 - StreetPass Mii Plaza: Puzzle Swap (3DS)
02/13 - Tomba! Special Edition (PS5 [PS1])
04/14 - Trip World DX (PS5 [GB])
04/27 - The Typing of the Dead (Arcade)
05/01 - Starblade (Arcade)
05/13 - Otocky (FDS)
06/02 - Robot Gyro (FC)
06/09 - Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour (Switch 2)
06/21 - Bad Dudes vs. DragonNinja (Arcade)
07/05 - Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club (Switch)
07/31 - 1000xRESIST (Switch)
08/09 - Mega Man: Dr. Wily’s Revenge (GB)
08/12 - Mega Man II (GB)
08/25 - Indika (PS5)
09/19 - Arcade Archives 2: Aqua Jet (PS5 [Arcade])
10/07 - Halloween Forever (Vita)
10/23 - Shadow Labyrinth (PS5)
10/31 - Pumpkin Jack (PS5)
10/31 - Pac-Man Halloween 2025 Google Doodle (PS5)
11/18 - Monument Valley (+ Forgotten Shores + Ida’s Dream) (PS5)
12/06 - Monument Valley 2 (+ The Lost Forest) (PS5)
12/10 - Monument Valley 3 (PS5)

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Progress - 2012 - 2013 - 2014 - 2015 - 2016 - 2017 - 2018 - 2019
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Finished - 0024 - 0041 - 0034 - 0022 - 0025 - 0014 - 0019 - 0025
**100%** - 0000 - 0004 - 0005 - 0001 - 0002 - 0001 - 0002 - 0002
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Progress - 2020 - 2021 - 2022 - 2023 - 2024 - 2025 ——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Finished - 0038 - 0060 - 0042 - 0038 - 0052 - 0067
**100%** - 0006 - 0006 - 0005 - 0006 - 0009 - 0022
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