A few things to know about this list are that I was very demotivated to play much single player games this year, especially in the back half. The chief victim of this being Horizon forbidden west, and a lot of interesting story based indie games that I otherwise might enjoy a lot.

10. Overwatch 2

This game barely qualifies and only because I needed 10 games to fulfill my own sickness and make the list proper.

That being said, I do think the gameplay changes have made the game as fun as it was when it first launched, the business model and other such things aside.

9. Compound VR

Every now and then I'll find some little VR game that just clicks and I end up playing it for hours on end. This year it was this fun boomer-shooter/rogue-like thing. It's such a blast and it's just pure fun “video game ass video game” time with creative weapons and great modifiers to keep it fresh.

8. Valorant

At some point i just decided i wanted to play a competitive shooter and my love of obscenely over detailed first person animations drew me in, the fun unique characters and abilities kept me playing for a long time. I wasted a lot of money on skins in my short time playing this game but I'll probably be back when they release a cool new character or something.

7. Rumbleverse

Playing Rumbleverse was so wild, it felt really crazy to play such a unique BR after all this time the genre is everywhere but they managed to make something so unique and well built. I sort of fell off quite quickly when the launch had so many problems but my time with it is still really memorable and I look forward to seeing how it grows.

6. Sifu

Still one of the most visually unique and tightest controlling games I've ever played. I think this game is one of the most underrated of the year. It's really special and has some insane depth to its combat system. I cant wait to see what sloclap does next.

5. Hardspace Shipbreaker

The chill vibes and slow methodical deconstruction of a spaceship were among the most satisfying gameplay experiences....ever? It's hard to express in words the experience of perfectly cutting pieces of the ship off and placing them right where they belong and how it just feels-right. The all too relatable story of being a corporate tool and having to deal with inept leadership who doesn't understand anything about the job is quite powerful as well.

4. Vampire Survivors

It seems like every year there is some tiny indie game that just smashes everyone's expectations and stands out in people's minds as THE success of the year and this time it was a little more special because it was EXTRA tiny. This $3-$5 video game is one of the most satisfying and fun experiences of the year. The saga of checking every weekend to see what new and wild secrets have been added was something very special.

3. Lost Ark

In my tradition I should mention I find this game to be deeply compromised by its business model and hesitate to recommend it to anyone with trouble managing their spending. THAT BEING SAID, this is the best MMO i have ever played. Its story is nothing compared to the saga of the star in Final Fantasy XIV, its combat is not quite as satisfying or deep as Black Desert Online, but the combination of the rock solid, super satisfying combat and incredible breadth of content rivaled only by MMOS with many more years of content development can rival make it something extremely rare. A real actual MMO with good combat and good content, deep mechanically challenging raids as the foundation to keep players invested and rich (if compromised) character and account progression to help you feel like you have actually moved forward. The game does have its problems but I'm more than willing to overlook them for the things it does that no MMO has managed to do before.

2. God of War Ragnarok

I loved the experience of playing this game, its beautiful world, its impressive visuals, the melancholy story of inevitability and hope in the face of hopelessness all speak directly to me on such a fundamental level. The combat that makes you feel like you are in control of any of the best choreographed cutscenes in any other action game is something I've come to sort of feel bored of because the depth that is there is a bit irrelevant, but I think that's mostly because they wanted you to be able to execute pretty much anything you could think of, and the amount of unique combat mechanics and interactions they created is staggering. This game is all about the performances and the story though and in that regard its second to none this year.

1. -Elden Ring

Something I mentioned about a lot of the games before this one is how they are “unique” or special. It's been a year of that, a lot of the great games did something very unique. Like vampire survivors is essentially an entirely new genre. This game is here not because it did something incredibly unique, Elden Ring didn't create a new genre but it did DEFINE one in a new light. Elden Ring is the culmination of everything FromSoftware has been making for the last 12 years, more if you include the kingsfield games which do have some lineage with demons souls. Arguably one of the most special game experiences I've ever had is how absolutely immersed I was with this world while playing it. It's a game that has invaded my every thought for months. I thought about where I would go next and what tasks I would do. I set goals for myself within the world because the game did very little of that for you. I decided what my character would use out of the immense arsenal of tools at my disposal.

THAT is what the souls genre is about, YOU deciding what YOU will do. The trick here is that the arsenal really truly is immense, and so is the world. Every step I took I was so sure I knew how much of the world there was left to explore and I was wrong until the very end of the game. When I was sure that I had scoured every inch of some underground area I had found, I would spy an area from a new vantage with some fresh hell for my character to experience or some beautiful new vista that was clearly meant to entice me into further exploration. When I say that it defined a genre it's easy to think I mean the souls-like genre which is true, but it's more than that-it is the definitive open world game to me, and that's why it's my number one game this year.