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There has been a lot going on in 2024 in the games industry from the numerous closures, layoffs, and video game releases. Too many game releases have occurred and while it’s been impossible to play every single game, I decided to recap my favorite 10 titles that I have played from 2024 so far. I am working through the large list of games from earlier this year including Rise of the Ronin, Banishers Ghost of New Eden, Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD, Bo: Path of the Teal Lotus, and others but I haven’t finished those yet. I will continue to play many more games that are releasing through the rest of the year. If you want to see everything I have finished in 2024, including releases from past years, check out my thread here. Without further ado, here are my favorites from 2024 in no particular order so far.
Persona 3 Reload – Atlus (Played on PS5)
I have loved the Persona franchise ever since my friend told me to play them… you know who you are if you are reading this. I have liked almost every title that I have played, which isn’t super common for me in multi-titled IPs. I never played Persona 3 in the past, even though I own P3P and P3F, but since this is a remake I decided to play this version of the title. P3 Reload definitely isn’t my favorite game in the Persona universe but it is a great title that can stand on its own nonetheless. I obtained almost all of the trophies, and the last one will be obtained when I do my second playthrough in the future. I am excited for the DLC coming soon, but not sure when I am going to get around to playing it unfortunately with the already intensive lineup in September. This title will probably end up making my final list in December, but I am not sure where it will fall as of now.
Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth – Square Enix (Played on PS5)
I never played the original FFVII before, and after playing Remake and Rebirth, I am not sure if I even feel the need to go back to the original. There is so much content in these two parts of the game, plus the third part coming out in the future will probably have a lot of content as well! I didn’t 100% complete the game, but after 85 hours, it definitely was my GOTY when I finished it. The game is still in that spot, with only a couple of upcoming titles potentially challenging it. The title has a bit of everything from mini-games, open world exploration, tons of side missions, a fantastic story, wonderful art, stunning music, and much more. Is it perfect… no, it definitely isn’t. Things like Gongaga’s map really sucks, Cait Sith’s gameplay is simply just a slog, and a couple other things here and there that bog down the overall experience. I overlooked these kind of things as I personally felt everything else was terrific.
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown – Ubisoft (Played on PS5)
I haven’t absolutely loved Ubisoft’s oversaturated open world games in the past, but their more condensed, single player adventures are terrific. Both of the Mario and Rabbids games I consider to be highly well crafted and are my favorite adventures from them and then Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown comes in and really puts a smile to my face with how great it is. I have played some of Ubisoft’s smaller titles, and a couple of their big open world titles, and the smaller ones are usually better in my experience. I haven’t played many Prince of Persia games, but Lost Crown is its own story without needing to play any other which I was grateful for. Overall the plot of the game is just okay, but everything else from the music, gameplay, world building, and art are just all around great! It might slightly get pushed out of my top 10 come end of the year, but it definitely has made me want to go back and play more Ubisoft games from the past.
Unicorn Overlord – Vanillaware/Atlus (Played on Switch)
Man, do I absolutely love RPGs, strategy games, the Vanillaware titles that I have played and when you combine all three of these things, you get the beautiful Unicorn Overlord. A tactical and strategy game that has more depth than meets the eye from the complex combat system that ever got old for me to the stunning world that you are traveling through. I enjoyed the game enough where I ended up grabbing multiple copies of the game, just because I wanted to replay the game next year on a whole new platform… it is that good! This title is one of my favorite titles from 2024 and will absolutely stay up there on my list, but since it isn’t a “juggernaught mainstream” title, it most likely will be overlooked by many people which I feel like is a big shame. It is one of the most polished and well made titles that I have played in a long time, and a game like this one doesn’t come around very often. I wrote a full review of the game which you can check out here; then go play the game… it even has a demo if you are unsure if you will like it!
Penny’s Big Breakaway – Evening Star Studio/Private Division (Played on PS5)
Sonic Mania was one of the best Sonic games for a long time when it came out in 2017, and now the creators of that game created a brand new 3D Platformer. Penny’s Big Breakaway was announced a long while ago and during the February 2024 Nintendo Direct, it was shadow dropped. I got the chance to review the title on PS5, and man did I have a bunch of fun with the game, even if it wasn’t a perfect experience. One of my favorite genres in gaming is 3D platformers and when a brand new one shows up, I definitely am very interested in it. While there are loads of Platformers in the gaming world, I am not sure if there really are any that are like this one. If you want to check out my full review of the game, feel free to read it here. Will it hit my favorites list at the end of the year… we shall see!
Ereban Shadow Legacy – Baby Robot Games (Played on PC)
I feel like the more people can experience a game, the better the game will stand out. Originally this game was planned to come to Xbox and PC at the same time, it unfortunately changed course and only released on PC since they decided to self publish the title. I hope this is rectified with a console release of Ereban Shadow Legacy since this game absolutely doesn’t deserved to be stuck exclusively on PC where it may not reach the amount of players it could with console releases. The gameplay was entirely your choice of how you want to play from being either full on ruthless to silently sneaking around the world. The voice acting was also very superb with a surprise of a big name that I didn’t expect to make an appearance. As of right now it’s in my top 10 list, but with how many games I’m playing and planning to play, it may not stick around… but for a studio’s first game it was absolutely phenomenal! Check out my full review here if you want to know more!
Children of the Sun – René Rother / Devolver Digital (Played on PC)
Devolver Digital is one of the power houses in video game publishing for indie games, and with so many great titles in their library its hard not for them to get lots of love for their games. Puzzle games are absolutely terrific titles where you have to use your brain and this one definitely requires you to have some brain power. It isn’t a long game but not an extremely easy game since you get one bullet per level to take out all of the enemies that are around. Some of the Steam achievements are tricky to obtain as well, but thankfully I got them all which was a nice thing. This game has a good story despite being somewhat confusing. It may not make my top 10 of 2024, but it definitely left a mark up until now. Check out the full review here!
Another Crab’s Treasure – Aggro Crab Games (Played on Xbox Series X)
Souls-like games and me are not a normal combination that occur as I don’t normally play them. I have no shame in saying that. While I like a challenge in my games, I don’t like trying to stress myself out when playing one. Another Crab’s Treasure is a title that has so much to help accommodate players who want to play the game, but not like the extreme challenge in the title. It is a game that, thanks to GamePass, I took a chance on and found myself really loving the title, and would love to support a physical copy if one was announced. I will admit, there were a couple of bosses that I did need extra support on and the accessibility features helped to overcome those (yes, I used the gun on one of them… oh well). As a whole it is a nice game with a story that went deeper than I originally thought it would. It has a great soundtrack, nice visuals, and awesome combat. As of now, I am not sure if it will make my “favorites in 2024” but is up there!
Duck Detective The Secret Salami – Happy Broccoli Games (Played on Switch)
Being a detective always sounded like an intense but kind of fun job where you have that responsibility to uncover the truth. Who doesn’t love playing games were you are a talking animal trying to complete a story. Well, in this title you play as a detective where you have to solve a mystery of what is going on with a office team. There is more at work than meets the eye at the beginning and while the game might be only about two hours, it was such an enjoyable and all around extremely fun experience where I could not put it down until I beat it. The voice acting was a delight from beginning to end, the music, art, and gameplay were all terrific as well. It might not make my favorite 10 games as a whole come December, but it would be hard for this one to not be one of my top 5 indies of the year!
Granblue Fantasy Relink – Cygames (Played on PS5)
The story may not be the most unique thing in the world where a damsel in distress is taken, but the gameplay as an RPG is absolutely fun and terrific. From the wonderful visuals, terrific bosses, stunning music, and great characters it is a terrific experience. The post game grind is very boring and overstayed its welcome in Chapter 0… but other than that the pacing of everything else in the game was absolutely a blast. Playing the same bosses wasn’t super fun, but with the online features of random missions it took the fun to another level where you don’t just rely on the NPCs. Definitely a good all around RPG, but I am pretty darn sure this title will be pushed out of my favorites list come the end of the year.
I am still playing catch up on titles from this year, and probably will continue to do so well into next year, but these 10 are standouts for me so far. There are many more games coming out in the next few months including Epic Mickey Rebrushed, Gori: Cuddly Carnage, Akimbot, The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, Dragon Ball: Sparking Zero, The Plucky Squire, Metaphor Refantazio, and so many others this fall and holiday that I am excited to see where games end up on my list after I beat them. Are there games that have released that I should have on my radar that maybe aren’t here? Let us know in the comments!
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