One of my favorite parts about this time of year is that for a brief moment, almost everyone seems to take on my love of ranking things. I will see top 10 lists from all sorts of people on my social media feeds, even those who don’t appear to be ranking aficionados.
Video games are a special medium. To me, top 10 lists are more than just showing what video games we played this year. These lists are ways of expressing ourselves. These lists are also deeply personal. An average video game top 10 list may feature 300-400 hours of video games played (that’s around where this one is for me). Maybe more, maybe less, but regardless, a lot of time was poured into just about any of these lists.
I take these lists very seriously because these are my main ways of remembering the year, as well as my best way of encouraging others to play the games I loved. That’s why I put so much energy into this. The last few cuts were very difficult to make because of what this means to me. If you read this list, my hope is that it will bring back memories of a game you loved fondly, as well as pique your interest in something you haven’t played yet.
Happy New Year! Hopefully, 2025 is as great as 2024 was for the blog!
(Reviews for each game are linked in the title).
My Other Year-End Content So Far
BigNerdGaming’s Top 10 Indie Games Of 2024
AndresPlays Top 10 Games of 2024
BigNerdGaming’s 2024 Honorable Mentions
When the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube generation arrived when I was still a kid, I had a realization. Graphics were only going to get better, and one day, they likely would be hyper-realistic. One day, playing video games might feel like I was actually playing a movie.
While there have been a lot of tremendous looking games this generation, Hellblade 2 was the first game where I felt like we had really reached that point. From the fidelity to the lighting to the motion capture, this game actually feels real.
But graphics aren’t enough to create a great video game experience, and luckily, I actually enjoyed playing Hellblade 2 as well. This game has some of the best set pieces this year, as well as surprisingly intense combat (especially if you put it up to hard). There are really tight parry windows, and the motion captured combat leads to something that doesn’t quite feel like anything else out there. The performances are also as fantastic as you’d expect.
Oftentimes, when I roll credits on a video game, it’s a pretty quick transition to booting up a new game for me. When I finished Hellblade 2, I really had to sit with it for a second. I needed to emotionally recover from the intensity that I had just experienced. This is a raw and visceral experience, and one I’d love to experience again someday.
I love roguelike card games, and have ever since I played Slay the Spire back in 2019. But they can be a bit annoying to jump into sometimes. They can take a while to get going, and it can take a bit to really learn all the mechanics the games have. Because there are so many of these games out there, you need to do different things to stand out from the crowd, and that often means adding a lot of depth and complexity. That isn’t a bad thing at all, but it can take some time to really fall in love with these games.
Balatro is a roguelike card game that stands out from the crowd by going in the opposite direction. It is the simplest and most accessible game this genre has probably ever produced. Balatro functions off basic poker mechanics. So, if you have any understanding of how poker works, it is extremely easy to jump in and immediately feel like you know what you are doing.
Obviously, this wouldn’t stay interesting without some twists to that formula. Luckily, Balatro has just enough depth to keep things engaging. You are constantly making decisions on what Joker cards to get, how to arrange those joker cards, and which card packs to buy. It’s nothing incredibly hard, but it does keep you thinking just enough. You also can’t get too comfortable. I’ve had many runs where I thought I had a win in the bag and still somehow blew it near the end. I have a few nitpicks where I wish it was easier to play the game in different ways, but this was still an excellent experience. I actually had this at #10, but after buying the phone app and putting another 5 hours in on top of my original 40, I realized it needed to be a spot higher.
8. Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden
Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden is a great example of how important it is to go out there, touch grass, and not play video games sometimes.
I say this because my experiences outside of video games made me love this game so much more than I might have otherwise. I met my now wife back in 2014, and loving her made Banishers so much more powerful for me. This is a game about love and loss. The idea of losing my wife is one of the scariest things that I can imagine. Banishers puts you face to face with that fear. The story starts out strong and retains its momentum throughout the game. This is in large part thanks to how excellent Red Mac Raith and Antea Duarte are as characters, as well is how excellent the performances are behind them.
This game feels like a supernatural version of Law and Order at times, as the characters investigate how various deaths in the game happened by communicating with ghosts. These “hauntings” are consistently strong, with fun little twists and turns in each story.
If this game’s combat was a little better, this easily could have been top 3 for me. But it does just enough with its combat and exploration to get by. Otherwise, Banishers is carried by its story and characters, and those two elements were easily strong enough for it to make this list for me.
There is just a whole lot of fun packed into Astro Bot. Every jump, every sound effect, every cameo, the music, it’s all just filled with joy. It’s almost impossible not to be captivated by it, even if you aren’t as into the nostalgia as I was.
While all the little bells and whistles around Astro Bot are great, the core platforming is also really strong. I love how the game is definitely something that kids can beat, but it has more challenging optional levels for the sickos like me. It lets you try and find all of its hidden secrets, but if you replay levels, the game has options to help you find every secret if you want. This is one of those rare games that I genuinely feel is for everyone.
Astro Bot also has some of the most creative level design this year. Each level has its own gimmicks, and some of these are outlandishly clever and fun. The game also ramps up to such a badass ending level and credits sequence. It’s only a shame that many of the best gimmicks end up being one-offs, while a lot of the more generic gimmicks end up getting re-used several times. Despite my nitpicks, I thought a game like this winning Game of the Year at The Game Awards was very cool.
If you’ve been following me for a bit, you may have heard me talk about how much this game means to me already, but buckle up because I’m going to talk about it again.
While Crypt Custodian is my #6 game of 2024, it is actually #1 for game that had the biggest impact on me emotionally. Crypt Custodian is a game about a cat who dies tragically and then goes on a quest in the afterlife to find a mirror that will let him visit his former owners. By coincidence, I started this game right around when I had to make the difficult decision that my beloved dog Chester needed to cross the rainbow bridge. The picture above is me playing the game with him in my lap, as we did multiple times for four agonizing days.
Once Chester passed, I felt like this was the only game I could play until I beat it. It has this sad yet quirky vibe that really helped me heal in a difficult moment in my life.
But also, I didn’t just love Crypt Custodian because of the emotional impact it had on me. This is a genuinely great video game. It is the second time that solo developer Kyle Thompson has made my year end top 10. This game has some of the most well thought out Metroidvania elements of any game I have ever played. The game gives you a lot of freedom to explore, but I was almost always able to figure out where to go next without any help. Exploring side paths consistently gave me rewards that actually helped me. The platforming is solid, and the combat’s bullet hell elements give it a unique twist. Excellent sound design, music, and a fun personality all add to the experience. This is just a great video game, whether you are going through a tough time with your pets or not.
RIP Chester. You are still so missed.
5. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
It speaks to how great this year was that The Lost Crown only ends up at #5 on my list. I love 2D Platforming, and this might be the most fun I’ve had with 2D platforming since Celeste. The scenario designs are so good, and the game does a great job of very slowly giving out abilities, so the platforming stays fresh and interesting for the entire game.
The Lost Crown also contains some top-tier 2D combat, with a very fun parry mechanic in particular. I said at the time and still think that this might be the strongest combination of 2D combat and 2D platforming in one game that I have ever seen. Both are at an extremely high level.
The game is held back a bit by some Metroidvania elements that I didn’t enjoy, but even then, the game has its moments with that. The Lost Crown has a feature where you can take pictures of areas that you can’t finish exploring, so that when you get new skills, you can look at the pictures you took on the map to figure out what you can unlock instead of going back to every unfinished area and hoping for the best.
Apparently, this game did not sell all that well, and that is a huge bummer for me, as I would have been all over more Prince of Persia from these developers. Those are the risks of falling in love.
While I view myself as a pretty positive person when it comes to video games, I also think I’m pretty talented at finding nitpicks with any game I play. If I play a game for long enough, I can almost guarantee I’ll find a few ways to ding it.
I must have been at the 20-hour mark of Unicorn Overlord when I realized… I don’t really have any complaints about this game. At least from a gameplay perspective. Unicorn Overlord feels like a mixture of Ogre Battle 64 and Fire Emblem gameplay, and it is done masterfully. It’s deep but accessible. The real-time movement is much more interesting than the turn based movement in most SRPGs, in my opinion. The level design was varied. There were short levels that took a few minutes, and epic ones that took a few hours. The open world gameplay was very fun and rewarding. The game just does not miss at all with its gameplay.
The game does invest a fair amount of time into its characters and story, and unfortunately, it mostly misses in that regard. If the story hit, there is a good chance this would have been my #2 game of the year. Regardless, this is a must play for any SRPG fan, as I think a case can be made that it is the best the genre has to offer.
Sometimes, the greatest thing a developer can do is essentially just fuse two different types of games together and see how it goes. Dungeons of Hinterberg is basically a Zelda game within a Persona framework. It also has some great vibes with its music, an excellent and unique art style, and it tackles themes that aren’t explored very often (overtourism and work burnout).
As cool as this mix of elements is, it wouldn’t work without excellent execution, and Hinterberg has that in spades. The biggest strength is easily the dungeons, which have a flow to them that feels like the best of the Zelda series. Puzzles keep you thinking but aren’t too over the top. A bit of combat is mixed in to keep things interesting, and that is pretty solid as well. There are also lots of fun ideas implemented throughout, like a snowboard mechanic that ends up being a total blast.
Exploring the town also ends up being very fun and rewarding. The game is transparent about what benefits you get for hanging out with each person in town. The story ends up having more fun twists than I would have expected. I felt like Hinterberg was very ambitious when I started reading previews for it, and I think it truly lives up to everything it was going for.
Back when I was a teen, I lived for “Summer of Arcade” when all the biggest indie games would hit the Xbox. As this game hit in July, I had flashbacks to those times. This is up there with Bastion and Mrs. Splosion Man for me as the greatest indie game I have ever enjoyed in the summer on an Xbox console.
I love the Persona series, but I have been ready for a similar game that gets away from high school. From the first time I saw a trailer for Metaphor: ReFantazio, I had a feeling that this would be the game that lives up to my dreams, and it sure as hell does.
Metaphor takes the Persona series and takes it to a fantasy setting. This leads to (in my opinion) a better plot, better characters, and a more epic feeling in general.
The game also has one of my favorite class systems I have ever seen in a video game, and a battle system that has a lot of fun (and maybe occasionally frustrating) elements of risk/reward. Despite there being a lot of choices for classes and skills, I never spent all that much time in menus. It’s really well executed.
This was my favorite story of the year, as it somehow stays interesting from the first to the last hour of the game, with tons of great moments interspersed throughout. This also has some of the best characters and best performances of the year.
There are a few small growing pains from taking a stab at something brand new that left this just short of my #1, but this is still a JRPG masterpiece.
It’s been interesting watching the opinions shift on Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth over the course of the year. When it first arrived, I saw almost universal acclaim. But coming out early in the year can be punishing sometimes, and some of the narratives turned as the months went on. From what it’s worth, despite playing this in February, this has remained my easy #1 all year. Metaphor had a few hours where I thought it had a chance to take the crown, but it never quite got there. Nothing else ever came close to making me question this rank.
I loved Final Fantasy 7: Remake for the story, the characters, and the combat. Rebirth takes all of these elements to another level. While the main story isn’t as interesting this time around, there are multiple excellent character arcs that had me enthralled. Just about every character in the game has a real moment of growth, and those moments are consistently excellent. It helps that all of the characters are also impeccably voiced.
The combat is more of the same, but there are a lot of smart tweaks that fix the flaws from the last game. You are no longer in spots where you don’t have the element needed to stagger foes as an example. Otherwise, the excellent mix of action with hints of turn-based elements continues here, and I still believe it is a fantastic way to push the series forward while honoring the past.
Yes, the open worlds can be a bit checklist-y, but there are a lot of legitimately awesome side quests. And each open zone is so big and unique that it’s hard not to get pulled in. I can’t tell you how many times I said, “I can’t believe this is real,” as I played this game. The best in class music also enhances just about anything in the game.
Yes, some minigames are forced on you, but they are almost all at least decent. With a few being among the best minigames on the market. Queen’s Blood is the obvious crowd pleaser, but Chocobo Racing and the piano are elite as well.
I only had a few games this year that I played from start to finish without touching any other game. The other few games that I did this with weren’t any longer than 20 hours. I played Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth start to finish over 80 hours. For someone who loves game hopping like me, that is incredible stuff, and shows why this is easily my Game of the Year.
Thanks for reading! Coming next week, a two part series with my top 40 moments of 2024! Then, my year end coverage will finally be complete.
Big Nerd Gaming 
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