Here’s the thing.
I love ranking stuff. A lot.
I started this blog for a lot of reasons, but the biggest of all was just that I wanted to have more of a platform for a bunch of ranks I was literally doing for myself.
The ranks that excite me the most for this blog are my “BigNerdGaming Awards.” This is when I rank my top 10 games for a bunch of categories for the year. I love doing it so much that I decided that this year, I wasn’t going to wait until the end of the year. Welcome to the 2025 BigNerdGaming Mid-Year Awards. These are all of my category winners for the first half of 2025. I am doing a top 5 instead of a top 10 for each.
I haven’t even finished several games that I will be ranking here, but this is a great check-in on how things are going so far. A lot could change fast, but you’ll have to tune in at the end of the year to see how things shake out.
Also, apologies to Monster Hunter Wilds, The Alters and Mario Kart World, which are some of the higher rated big games that I haven’t had a chance to play yet. I’m also still only 15 or so hours into Death Stranding 2, which could be an even bigger factor once I finish it. With that, let’s get on with the ranking!
Best Story
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Death Stranding 2: On the Beach
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
- Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector
- Wanderstop
If you don’t like Expedition 33, you probably aren’t going to enjoy these awards very much. I need more time to sit with it before I say that Expedition 33 has my favorite video game story of all time, but it is being heavily considered. The game has many of the biggest moments of the year and handles its themes with eloquence. It’s just a beautiful experience and a very special story. I wrote two articles about the story, and I never really do story deep dives on this blog. I still think about random small moments from it. It’s incredible.
Death Stranding 2 gets off to a slower than expected start, but once you get near the end of episode 1, things start ramping up fast. I’m not far into the game yet, but there are several plot threads that have me extremely intrigued. I can’t wait to see what happens next. The game is also just as weird as the first one, which is great news.
I’m a little over halfway through Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, but I can’t imagine this not being in my top 5 for story at year end when I finish it. It’s so easy for a story to go by the wayside in these big open world games, but I’ve been invested from the start to where I am now. There are lots of fun politics and twists and turns here. Also, there are tons of great standalone stories in the side quests as well. The story is the #1 reason why I won’t let the year end without finishing this one.
Citizen Sleeper 2 is a visual novel/TTRPG type of game with some player choice involved. It has a very dark concept, and it really handles its theme and world wonderfully. Wanderstop has a much lighter concept related to healing and handles it in excellent fashion. It also has one of my favorite endings of the year.
Best Exploration
- Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo
- Ender Magnolia: Bloom in the Mist
- Avowed
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
This is a category often designed for open world games and Metroidvanias. Thus far, Metroidvanias are winning out.
Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo is kind of a mix of Metroidvania and the old handheld Zelda games. Its world is PACKED with secrets and fun navigation puzzles. The game has the perfect balance of organic exploration with plenty of quality of life elements that I absolutely love in this genre.
I feel mostly the same about Ender Magnolia. That game has some really fun navigation abilities and an excellent Metroidvania map. I think every Metroidvania map should use some of the features Ender Magnolia has in the future. In a game that I thought was a bit uneven in spots, the exploration never disappointed even a little bit.
Avowed was a big surprise this year for how strong its exploration is. The maps are a perfect size where they aren’t overwhelming, but they are all densely packed with things to find, and the game lets you figure it out all on your own in a good way.
This is one of the few categories where Expedition 33 isn’t dominating. I honestly think I’d have it #1 if it had minimaps and indicators that let you know how much you have to find in each area of the game. These missing features really make the exploration frustrating at times. But despite those annoyances, I still had a blast exploring the world map in particular. It is one of the best world maps I’ve ever seen in a video game, as it actually has a lot of areas to explore and quite a few secrets tucked away. The world map is also freaking beautiful.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 strikes a nice balance between organic exploration and quality of life with its map, and it is also quite well done. You can stumble upon things, but the game guides you to the important stuff.
Best Graphics/Art Direction
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Death Stranding 2: On The Beach
- South of Midnight
- Split Fiction
- Wanderstop
Oh, look, it’s Expedition 33 again. That game obviously has excellent fidelity, but the art direction really puts it over the top as one of my favorite games to look at ever, probably only behind Hellblade 2 from last year. There’s an ethereal feel that I just adored, and that fit the game perfectly.
I’m not super far into Death Stranding 2 yet, but it is obviously an incredible looking game as you’d expect. The scope and environments are stunning, and I hear there is a lot more variety than the last game. I haven’t gotten to that variety yet, but I’m still loving looking at the game in the few hours I’ve spent with it.
South of Midnight nails its stopmotion design and has some really beautiful environments and neat character models as well.
Split Fiction has been really underrated for its art direction this year. The game has a huge variety of environments between its sci-fi and fantasy settings, and they all look great. Wanderstop is an indie gem with an art style that I really loved.
Best Music
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Death Stranding 2: On The Beach
- DOOM: The Dark Ages
- South of Midnight
- Wanderstop
Expedition 33 is one of the coolest stories this year for its music. The composer was found on soundcloud. Lorien Testard creates a soundtrack filled with intense battle themes and somber tones that fit the themes and mood of the story. Every song just fits the world so well and is a banger to boot. It’s an incredible soundtrack.
Just like in the first game, it’s an amazing feeling when you are wrapping up a delivery in Death Stranding 2 and one of its perfectly selected songs start playing. Once again, I’m pretty early in, but I think this game likely has a better soundtrack than the first game based on what I’ve heard so far.
DOOM: The Dark Ages got a lot of heat for moving on from Mick Gordon, but I actually like this soundtrack a little better. It’s a little more “generic” metal, but it’s still really well done, and I actually think it fits the game better. It isn’t quite as overpowering as the stuff from Gordon, and I view that as a good thing.
South of Midnight has some very cool jazzy and folsky tunes that the game also literally uses as a storytelling device in some neat ways. Wanderstop has an excellent soundtrack that fits the chill vibes of that game really well.
Best Character
- Verso (Expedition 33)
- Maelle (Expedition 33)
- Boro (Wanderstop)
- Esquie (Expedition 33)
- Lune (Expedition 33)
Usually, when I have my “best character” category, it is essentially my “favorite character” category. It takes a great character for me to like them usually, so it works well enough for me to just think of it that way.
This year made me change that thought process a little bit, and that is because of Verso. I never really loved Verso. But god damn, I always thought he was interesting. Verso is one of the most compelling and complex characters that I’ve seen in a video game. He is so multi-faceted, and while he doesn’t always do things that I agree with, I always understood his point of view. The guy has been through a lot. I don’t want to talk more about him in this kind of post, but if you want some more thoughts, I wrote about Verso and many other Expedition 33 story things here.
From there, we get to characters that I genuinely like a lot. Maelle is another very complex character in Expedition 33. She undergoes some real transformations over the course of that game and is an incredibly deep and well-rounded character.
Boro from Wanderstop is our one character that is not from Expedition 33. He plays the role of a simple sage. He is full of wisdom, but he is also humble and pretty funny. It’s impossible not to like him.
Esquie from Expedition 33 has a similar kind of appeal as Boro. He is partly a mascot or pet of sorts, but he is also a lot more emotionally intelligent than he first appears. His conversations with Verso are a constant highlight in the game.
Lune rounds out the list. I just love her fire and intelligence. I admired her conviction throughout the game, and she can be very sharp and funny as well.
Best Performance
- Jennifer English (Maelle- Expedition 33)
- Ben Starr (Verso- Expedition 33)
- Kirsty Rider (Lune- Expedition 33)
- Shala Nyx (Sciel- Expedition 33)
- Charlie Cox (Gustave- Expedition 33)
Oh man, it’s all Expedition 33. Hopefully, when I got farther into Death Stranding 2, this changes, but what a freaking cast.
It’s hard for me to see Jennifer English losing at The Game Awards this year for this award. She already has some name recognition from Baldur’s Gate 3, which matters in these awards. But her performance with Maelle is on another level from what she did with Shadowheart. She has so much range here and so many powerful moments. She deserves an incredible amount of accolades for what she was able to do with Maelle.
I love Ben Starr as a person, and he was my personal best performer in 2023 for his work with Clive. But I can’t lie, I wasn’t sure if he was a one trick pony or not. His performance with Verso confirmed to me that he is not. It’s easy to think early on that he is just a kind of quieter Clive, but he shows a lot more depth as the game goes on. His delivery on some lines near the end of the game are unforgettable. I hope he at least gets a nomination at The Game Awards this year. It’s exciting to think that he is going to be a powerhouse game voice actor for years and years to come.
Kirsty Rider and Shala Nyx are similarly awesome in their roles as Lune and Sciel. Charlie Cox recently revealed that he only spent 4 hours doing his lines as Gustave. There was something a bit different about his delivery that didn’t click with me early on, but he really won me over as the game went along. What a talented performer to pull off what he did in such a short time.
Best Optional Content
- Split Fiction
- Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- Assassin’s Creed Shadows
- Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time
Split Fiction is my pretty easy pick for #1 here. As you play each level, there are optional “side stories” that often surpass the main game. They are short and go in wildly different directions where you never know what is coming next. I was so pumped every time one popped up. My favorite moment in the game and one of my favorite moments of the year was during a side story in this game. They are tremendous.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is no slouch at all at #2 here. I think it has the best side quests that I’ve seen in an open world game since Cyberpunk 2077. Every side quest seems to have more to it than first meets the eye. They all have twists and turns and some fun characters. They are all extremely well executed.
Expedition 33 has my favorite optional element this year with its campfire bonds. The problem is that while they are technically optional, it’s hard for me to fully consider them that. They really should be mandatory, as there is VERY important context and character development delivered through them. They are all very easy to unlock outside of the last parts of the stories, so I feel like they were set up in a way where everyone would see all of them. So I’m not fully counting those. But even without them, there are some fun optional things to find in the world map.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows is packed with optional content. The game throws as many assassination circles at you as you can possibly handle. I wish that more thought was put into some of them so they felt more different from each other, but the core formula is good enough where I still really enjoy it.
Fantasy Life i feels like a game almost entirely made up of optional content. The game has a huge open world area that you only have to go into once for the main story from what I’ve seen so far. There can be some empty calories there, in my opinion, but it’s still impressive how much the game gives you to do.
Best Combat
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
- DOOM: The Dark Ages
- Monster Train 2
- Avowed
- Assassin’s Creed Shadows
Expedition 33 comes in at #1 with one of my favorite turn based battle systems ever. The game’s actual turn based elements are really neat on their own. Each character is very unique, and the game has a lot of cool options for creating builds for each character and builds that work together with your whole team. The game also has excellent action elements with its parry and dodge systems that I really enjoyed. It’s truly a best of all worlds system, and it’s going to be tough to stop from winning this category.
DOOM: The Dark Ages nails its combat, just like the first two games did. Obviously, the game is great with its shooting, but the new systems with its shield make things even more fun for me. I love the parry, and the new shield thrust a lot. The shield might be one of my favorite FPS weapons of all time.
This category is about combat, but that doesn’t necessarily have to be action combat. Monster Train 2 has fantastic roguelike deckbuilding combat. There are so many layers to its combat and so many different builds you can pursue. There is a lot of depth here, and the game does a fantastic job of improving on the first.
Avowed has some of the best first-person combat in a non-shooter that I’ve played since Cyberpunk 2077. I love how many options the game gives you, with the ability to quickswap weapons and dual-wield. The magic feels so good to use in particular. I was stunned at how good this was considering Obsidian’s track record of less than stellar action combat.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows retains the series excellent combat. It isn’t really special in any way, but it is well executed. The animations, in particular, remain a highlight.
Later this week I will have my top 10 games of 2025 so far! If you enjoyed this article, make sure to follow me on social media! Thanks for reading.
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