All Platforms 2026. Let’s guess and talk about the best games of the year, which will likely to get GOTY nominations at various places. Or even games you think will not even be nominated, but wish it would get more exposure. Let’s have fun before the GTA 6 mayhem. As always with these lists, it will upset anyone who does not see their games included. Especially so indie games with less exposure with not many ratings. Tell me your picks, either your personal or what you think will get the most GOTY awards. And remember, this discussion is just for fun.
Clarification: These lists are not based on what I played or like.
Unreleased games are not included here. Only official games with ratings and with players able to play the game are allowed here. That off course excludes nominations of GTA 6 in example. Also less known games with only a few critic reviews are also excluded here. The below rules are just for me, there is some selection bias from me too.
New Games
DLCs, Remakes, Remasters, and Re-releases are excluded from this category. Games started in Early Access in previous years are also excluded in this list.
- Sektori: Metacritic=
92, OpenCritic=91 - Big Walk: Metacritic=
91, OpenCritic=89 - Forza Horizon 6: Metacritic=
90, OpenCritic=91 - Mina the Hollower: Metacritic=
90, OpenCritic=91 - Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter: Metacritic=
90, OpenCritic=92 - Schrodinger’s Call: Metacritic=
89, OpenCritic=90 - Pokemon Pokopia: Metacritic=
89, OpenCritic=89 - Resident Evil Requiem: Metacritic=
89, OpenCritic=89 - Fire Emblem - Fortune’s Weave: Metacritic=
89, OpenCritic=89 - Phantom Blade Zero: Metacritic=
88, OpenCritic=88 - Star Wars - Galactic Racer: Metacritic=
88, OpenCritic=88 - Mewgenics: Metacritic=
88, OpenCritic=89
New Games that are Less Known
Only games with not many critic ratings are allowed on this list. Kind of obscure and less known games, but widely recognize for its quality by their players.
- Lost and Found Co: Metacritic=
90, OpenCritic=90 - Mythmatch: Metacritic=
89, OpenCritic=93 - Queen’s Domain: Metacritic=
88, OpenCritic=89
New Games leaving Early Access
Only games coming out of Early Access that started in previous years are included in this category.
- Valheim: Metacritic=
89, OpenCritic=90
Remakes
Only Remakes with big changes to its origin are included in this category.
- The Legend of Zelda - Ocarina of Time: Metacritic=
96, OpenCritic=95
Expansions
Only DLCs to an existing game adding considerable amount of playable content are included in this category.
- Revelations for DOOM - The Dark Ages: Metacritic=
91, OpenCritic=89 - In the Jungle for Dave the Diver: Metacritic=
86, OpenCritic=91
BTW, I use Neovim.
This has me realizing that I just didn’t do a ton of gaming this year. At least not new releases.
I played and enjoyed Mina the Hollower, but I wouldn’t say it felt like GOTY material to me.
I still intend to play Control Resonant but have simply not had time. I’d be curious to see where that falls on people’s lists.
I’ve seen Control Resonant being a high contender for some too. Especially with those who do Game of the Year awards. But to not fill this post with too many games, I had to make a cutoff somewhere. This year of gaming was insanely good, at least from perspective of high quality releases on the top end.
I’m well aware of all the other issues we had, but sometimes people forget the good things we have because bad news are upsetting so much. Me included BTW.
I still didn’t even play the original Control. I want to, but there is so much games in my library that I just don’t find for it. It looks really interesting. And Resonant doesn’t fall short in how interesting it looks to me.
Pragmata.
Reasoning: It’s a new IP. It’s not based on anything. Controlling two characters isn’t new (Brothers anyone?) but the shooting + hacking thing kind of is. And I feel like it works better than it should. I didn’t think I’d be able to play it, but I’ve taken to it quite well. Haven’t beat it yet, kinda been putting it off because I know how it ends. (Knowing how it ends was a purchase requirement, I was going to blacklist the game if the kid died at the end. I felt like they were heavily implying she would, so I waited for spoilers. Of course, that means I know what happens at the end, so after the big reveal, it’s like “okay now there’s nothing else for me except to just push through and finish it.”)
Pragmata looks actually very interesting, for personal reasons. But I excluded it from the list above because its critic scores are not as high as the other games listed, at about
85and86. And I don’t think with that many games available with that high scores, that Pragmata would even be nominated for most who do a Game of the Year award. And that is the vibe I was going for.And this speaks for the amount of quality games we got this year, if I do not even consider Pragmata being included in this list.
Is Star Wars: Zero Company worth including in these conversations? I haven’t personally played it yet, but it looked like an excellent tactics offering.
As a candidate for Game of the Year, I do not think so. At least based on the reviews by critics, as it sits at
84and84on both aggregator sites. But with these discussions, its off course a bit more open and we can talk about those games too. I am a personal Star Wars lover (before Disney got involved) combined with a tactics style game. It’s a game I would play, but its not on my radar because there is so much else interesting going on.But I’m sure it will be nominated for strategy genre.
The only two games that came out this year I’ve played are Star Wars: Zero Company (DNF, don’t get the appeal of XCOM apparently since this was my first XCOM-like) and Fortune’s Weave (absolutely rules, one of the better Fire Emblem experiences yet).
No Crimson Desert yet?
200+ hours for me on that alone, easily my GOTY
Well, the average ratings for Crimson Desert on those review aggregators are 77 and 78. I don’t think this game would have a chance of being nominated in most places (which is what I was listing about). It’s still a game I want to play on a personal level, but waiting for a good discount first.
I think that’s harsh. It has its faults (plot is confused at times - feels like there’s no overall strategy for the story, more of a committee with nobody told “No, that doesn’t fit”. Remembering all the different controls is hard, plus some of the puzzles aren’t at all logical), but there’s nothing else like it in terms of scale and (subjective) beauty.
It’s a must-play imo, which is something that GOTY encompasses.
I feel underqualified because I haven’t played too many of the new releases this year, but I was hoping Titanium Court could be nominated. I guess maybe it’s more of an “indie GOTY”. But it’s my favourite game of the year, from what I’ve played and seen.
Just to clarify, these aren’t games I have played. I just purely focus on what ratings those games got and how the games are perceived. So you can throw any game here, not just games you played yourself. It’s a discussion of games that could get many GOTY awards, but also of your personal experience if you want recommend something.
I nominate it based on my own experience (and some incidental others), even though I guess the Critics’ Average is borderline.
mewgenics over horsey game
This is MSPaint artstyle discrimination
I don’t understand this reply. It’s a quote I didn’t say/wrote. Which horsey game? Feel like I miss the context here.
sorry i was being facetious, Horsey Game is a game with a very similar underlying “genetic playground” premise as Mewgenics, but with physics sandbox gameplay and an “MS Paint” artstyle
Lol, alright that game look actually funny. But unfortunately the game doesn’t have enough critics ratings (in fact 0) on https://www.metacritic.com/game/horsey-game/ and is not even listed on https://opencritic.com/ . I guess it was a joke reply. If so, sorry to ruin it.^^
Witchfire is coming out of EA, and one of the best games I’ve played in years
Add Queen’s Domain to this list, it sweeps the rest, if not the majority easily.
Hmm, the game doesn’t have many critics ratings, so I excluded it for that reason, not for its quality. Maybe I create a dedicated list for games with not many ratings, but I have no idea how to name the category. This would be for games with less exposure, but are seemingly good; usually we call them Hidden Gem, but that word doesn’t fit either. Let’s see with what I come up with in the next 2 minutes.
