All aboard! It's time to get on the Hype Train, as we leave 2024 in the dust and head forward into the futuristic setting that-is 2025. Another year closer to the grave, another year to spend playing games! The next twelve months should be packed with amazing titles: some we expected greatness from since the moment we first heard of their existence, others will come out of nowhere to blind us with their brilliance.

Here in this piece, we'll be sharing our most anticipated video games of the upcoming year. Whether they be on Steam, PlayStation 5, or some other console known or unknown (cough Nintendo Switch 2 cough), these are the titles we're most looking forward to in 2025. It's going to be an adventure...or a heist...or a card game? Look, not all genres make for a good play-on-words.

Without any further ado, let's go to it. Toot toot!

StormKnightSera's Most Anticipated Game - Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is basically what I've wanted the Final Fantasy franchise to do for a lonnnnggg time: enough of this "I really want to be an action game" tomfoolery, I want to take turns like a respectable lady with taste. Built for Unreal Engine 5 by a French developer (no, not that one) with no prior game on the market, who better to give us the old-school feel of a turn-based RPG with the gorgeous visuals of the modern era? Clair Obscur can tell its uniquely French tale without any baggage of "legacy" to worry about like Square Enix has to contend with. A fresh experience, modernizing a classic genre and pushing it forward; that's what I'm hoping for. If this game is a hit, perhaps they'll rename the genre to "FRPG" (...that's French RPG, as opposed to...yeah, you get it).

The other major reason I want to play Clair Obscur has to do with my sister. It has recently come to light that one of my sister's favorite things to do growing up was not playing video games with me directly, but rather experience the story alongside me as I play an RPG or the like with her in the passenger seat. Preferably a title I've never played before, so we can listen to the dialogue and learn of the world together (as opposed to me theoretically railroading through a story I'm already privy to). Clair Obscur will be that new experience for us both, rekindling a relationship with my sister via streaming a game for the first time. Hopefully my computer can run it!

  • I would be remiss if I forwent a shout-out to Borderlands 4, a franchise that's not classy enough to use words like "remiss" and "forwent" and yet I love its goofiness. BL3 had a story that was...less than stellar, but the shooter gameplay was better than ever, so I'm curious how it'll turn out this time.
  • I also want to mention the Lunar Remastered Collection, my childhood RPGs returning to the modern age! Not exactly a fan of them replacing the voice talent for every character, but I'll give the new actors a chance.

Demonxz95's Most Anticipated Game - Ghost of Yotei

When I first got my PlayStation 5 back in 2022, my time with it was dominated by two games: Gran Turismo 7 and Ghost of Tsushima.

Ghost of Tsushima is a standout for the system with fun gameplay, beautiful environments, and a story that hits you with its themes of morality and knowing that sometimes you might just have to give that up. As such, when Ghost of Yotei was revealed at the PlayStation State of Play in September, I was quite excited.

And as of now, I nominate it as my most anticipated game of 2025. Stealth is just fun to utilize in general (let's be real, we all eventually landed on going the stealthy way over the "honorable" way), and it was already fun in the first game, so I have no doubt that it'll be fun here too. I'd love to see where this game can go and to take in the sights of the area 300-ish years after the first game. I'd love to see the story of Atsu (the new protagonist in this game) and how she handles her struggles and the way her adventures compares to Jin's. This being a franchise also means that they can explore other eras of Japan with a similar setup which will have different technological spins on the stealth concept. There's nothing to not be excited about really.

Nirast's Most Anticipated Ga-Console?! - The Switch Successor

When sitting down to write something for this article, I realized there's not much I could talk about. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure there's plenty of games I'll enjoy and even love, but there's not much making me super hyped this year, except Ghost of Yotei, which Demon already has covered, and South of Midnight, which I haven't been paying much attention to because I want to go in as blind as possible.

And then I remembered there's something I am excited for: The next Nintendo console! We don't have a name for it, but Team Red said it's the successor to the Switch, so I'll call it the Switcher from now on. And yes, I expect it to come out this year, since Nintendo said they're announcing it before the end of the fiscal year, which is the end of March. And I actually think it'll be sooner, but I'll get to that.

Now the Switch is a great console, but the hardware was out of date even when it launched. The biggest thing Nintendo needs to do with the Switcher is give it a more powerful processor, and that would be enough to make it a smash hit. They already announced that the console will be backwards compatible with the Switch.

In terms of other hopes and expectations, I really want the screen to be an OLED from the start, with bezels as thin as the current Switch OLED model. I also want to see better software, like the ability to change the theme of the console besides dark and light mode, and a store that's NOT LAGGY! It would also be great to see some apps that take advantage of the tablet form factor, like an e-reader would be great, but that's in "pipe dream" territory.

Speaking of software, what's a game console without games? Obviously, we don't know much about what's coming, since nothing was announced. That said, Mario is a pretty safe bet, and this year is the 40th anniversary of Super Mario Bros on the NES, so there's a really good chance we're getting a new game this year. There's also Metroid Prime Beyond, which is supposed to come out in 2025. Would've been nice to be able to play all it's predecessors on current hardware, but I guess just the first one will have to do.

But the big one has to be Pokemon Legends Z-A, which I'll focus on for a bit. For the game itself, I expect a similar gameplay loop to Legends Arceus. I also expect more Mega Evolutions for various Pokemon that don't have them, like the X and Y starters, which I'm also willing to bet you'll be able to get one of early in the game, like how you could get a Kanto starter in X and Y. Oh, and Mega Charizard Z. Obviously.

Finally, I'm expecting this to a launch title for the Switcher. That's because the release trailer mentioned it's "releasing simultaneously worldwide", which could be talking about the countries where it'll come out, but many (myself included) think it's about releasing on both consoles, like how Breath of the Wild came out to both the Switch and Wii U. And Nintendo has been holding Pokemon Directs on or around February 27th, Pokemon day, for a while now, so we're bound to learn more then.

So I'm making a prediction: There's going to be a Direct either this or next month, before February 27, and it'll focus on the Switcher. I could be wrong, Nintendo and other companies can make the most baffling decisions, but this makes the most sense to me. Also, they don't have much time after that if they don't want to be called liars. 

Sinti's Most Anticipated Game - The Bazaar

I think my most anticipated game of 2025 as of right now is The Bazaar. It is a mix of card game and auto-battler, leaning more towards the latter, and card mechanics mostly serving as a tool to be used as UI more than anything, and probably to make the game more interesting to players of that genre, which I think is working.

I have only started playing auto-battlers in 2024 with likes of Vampire Survivor or Brotato, and I liked those games just fine, but it wasn't doing it for me from a longer-term replayability value, even though those games do have that component in them, they just weren't ticking all of my "boxes", I suppose.

The Bazaar dropped out of nowhere at the end of October and after watching few initial gameplay videos, I really loved what the game was going for. Ever since, I have watched a bunch more videos and I really really love the direction and gameplay loop of the game. I think it having a decently similar art-style to Hearthstone is one big selling point for me, and probably for a lot of other people. But what I like the most about it is that you are kinda incentivized to "make do with what you get", which brings me back to old days of Hearthstone Arena and its drafting system where you also just had to play the hand you were dealt, while being able to influence it to a certain degree during the draft pick.

I think The Bazaar took heavy inspiration from several Hearthstone game-modes, and the game itself, which only makes sense since the man behind it, Reynad, is a former Hearthstone Pro Player. I have not opted to buy into the closed-beta, because the entry fee of $33 to $100 was more than I was willing to pay at the time, more so since open beta is supposed to follow soon. There were, and probably still are, some performance issues from what I've seen, so I'm not sure when the open beta will start exactly, it was said to start in December. I think they need to sort those before they can open it to public, or however great and interesting the game is, if it plays like crap, nothing can save it. With that said, they made very large and noticeable progress in this area in just a month, so I am optimistically hopeful.

I'm sure there will be other, bigger and smaller, games I will want to play in 2025, but I would say I haven't been this hyped for a game in a while, and I hope my excitement will not leave me after I get a chance to play it for myself :)

Echo's Most Anticipated Game - ???

(Note From Sera-the-Editor: Someone couldn't follow the format and decide on just one main game, with a couple extra shout-outs at most. I'll allow it...just this one time!)

 

Howdy folks, I'm returning from the land of the Wifi-less to hype up my most anticipated game of 2025. Just jumping straight into it, I'm cheating and saying Streets of Rogue 2 and Monaco 2 and there is NOTHING that can be done to stop me. A big reason for that is because despite a very different coat of paint, both the original Streets of Rogue and Monaco are more or less the same game. Load into a level, be given an objective, try to accomplish said objective when suddenly something bad happens, then spend the rest of the time panicking trying to string together gambit after gambit. Monaco's levels are more story-driven with specific set pieces while Streets of Rogue's were all Proc-Genned, but both very easily fill the "chaotic heist simulator that scales in fun depending on how many friends you have" void that my heart currently has. If I am being forced to pick one, I *guess* I'd have to go with Streets of Rogue 2, just because I've seen things in it beyond just the name, but trust me when I say that even if Monaco 2 is in the shadow of its predecessor, I will still dump dozens of hours in it.

As for other games I'm looking forward to (some don't have release dates, but I will pray they come out)…

  • Rift of the Necrodancer -> Same developer as Cadence of Hyrule which is another great local coop game
  • Hyper Light Breaker -> Funny how this game was supposed to come out last year in the fall originally but then was pushed back a ton. Not concerned about the quality since I've had the opportunity to meet some developers at Heart Machine and they put endless care into their craft.
  • Matt's Hidden Cats -> Ok so, this one's an odd ball for sure. It’s a glorified Where's Waldo book but it's made by one of my all-time favorite indie developers who made countless games I treasured growing up. Personal bias and what not but I'm stoked to click on some cats.
  • Orcs Must Die Deathtrap -> A fun game where you make labyrinthian networks of traps to torture poor orcs, very good co-op game.
  • Everhood 2 -> Everhood 1 is a rollercoaster of a ride and from what Foreign Gnomes showed of Everhood 2, the game seems to be just as much of a wild ride.
  • Deltarune (presumably chapters 3-5) -> I'll be honest and say I don't think more Deltarune will be released in 2025, but Sera mentioned it to me and I'm a dreamer until I die so putting it on here. Deltarune is good and will be a contender for my personal GOTY whenever it finally comes out.
  • V.A. Proxy -> This is the game that got a bit of virality when the developer posted a clip of parrying a nuke on Twitter. It's a bit clunky getting used to things in the demo but once things click, they *click*.

Those are all the games I'm excited for now, though I'm sure my eventual favorite game of the year is going to be some obscure indie game that isn't on anybody's radar because it's not publicly announced anywhere. Anyway until the next time I'm summoned, adios!

Will you be checking out any of the titles listed above? What game (or games) are you most excited for in 2025? Let us know in the comments below!