Jamie’s Top Ten Games of 2024

AJ ruminated on the shenanigans of the games industry in 2024, so I won’t go on too long and I highly recommend you go check out his top 10 list here. Yet another year for record layoffs in both development and media mean the industry is more fractured and uncertain than it’s been in a long time, and we hope everyone affected has found new paths and jobs. We also hope that the bigwigs look a little more inward both at the exorbitant pay gaps and also at the products they want to sell us – not every fucking game has to be the biggest thing in the world – nor can it be – so more focus on unique, fun games would be a great start. But as ever, I’m about as far from a business man as it comes, so what do I know. Just be good to each other, and let’s see about getting gaming back into a more positive space in 2025 yeah?

With that said, there were certainly developers out there who fucking brought it this year despite all the nonsense. Games both big and small that utterly floored me with unique ideas, different takes on tried and true formulas, and titles that came out of nowhere to be something I will genuinely be putting on my top tier list of all time. Allow me to introduce my list of 10 games that I thought were all but essential playing this year, and know that even whittling it down to this was a hard task (honourable mentions at the end because why not).

10. A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead (review)

This tenth spot could have gone many ways, but ultimately I settled on A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead as – despite it’s flaws – I came away with a feeling that this’ll be a game I revisit a few times over the course of my gaming life thanks to it’s tense atmosphere and surprisingly good stealth systems. Having to be mindful of not just the enemies when they’re near, but also literally everything around you (from leaves on the floor to bottles and cans, the creak of a door as it opens, or making use of louder noises to hide our own) gave the game a truly suspenseful feeling at every turn. There are rare safe moments throughout, and as such we can never truly relax. Some solid set-piece moments punctuate well crafted scenarios of slow stealth, and outside of the poor implementation of the microphone feature it is a title that comes recommended for players of games such as Outlast, Dishonored, or The Last of Us.

9. The Casting of Frank Stone (review)

I’ve been a big fan of Supermassive’s work since Special Guest Pete convinced me to play Until Dawn on the PS4. Their formula of teenage horror, gruesomely realistic characters meeting untimely ends, and twists aplenty has had me engaged in nearly every release since. The Casting of Frank Stone mixes Dead By Daylight into the mix, and even as someone who isn’t familiar with the lore of that series it was still perfectly approachable, spinning a unique narrative that is one of the best Supermassive have produced to date. It’s a suspenseful game without relying on cheap jump scares, and the paths available for us to explore are numerous. One excellent touch to help us explore this is the Cutting Room floor; this allows us to see all of the available pathways and story divergences (with no spoilers) and even pick up from certain points in the story so we don’t have to play the whole game (or even whole scenes) again.

8. Alisa (review)

Another horror-themed entry, sure, but this one takes us way back to the mid-90’s, dialling back almost all progress in the genre to be reminiscent of the original Resident Evil‘s and their ilk. We get clockwork mannequins, court jesters, and clowns rather than zombies but it’s no less tense for it. Tank controls, limited inventories, lots of backtracking and combat that is slightly unwieldy all feature but don’t take that as a negative. Alisa is a love letter the games of old, and faithfully recreates their idiosyncrasies to celebrate the beginnings of survival horror.

7. Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden (review)

The first entry on this list that caught me off guard; I try to keep abreast of upcoming releases as best I can but had no idea what this was until we were offered a code for review. My reviewer was otherwise engaged so I figured I’d have a go (I’m always game for something different). And boy, am I glad I did. Banishers is a game from DontNod that steers away from the interactive story nature of the recent Life is Strange-type titles they were doing and moves into a real-time action adventure – albeit still bringing in a heart-wrenching story of love and loss. The full review goes into why I loved this game, but sitting here several months after the review I can still pick out certain scenes and decisions I want to redo to see the alternate outcome. That it was backed up with some fun, meaty combat only made exploring the world and getting into scraps more enjoyable. It’s a shame that this seems to have gone way under the radar for folk, but it is easily one of my favourite games this year.

6. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 (review)

In all my years I don’t think I’ve ever considered a Call of Duty game as anything but a fun distraction. I had a blast with Modern Warfare and its sequel on the 360 but otherwise have keep an arms length from COD until Cold War a few years ago, Even that one didn’t leave a huge lasting impression on me; a month after my review I’d moved on entirely. Black Ops 6 is a different beast though and not only is the campaign on of the best I’ve played in the series (taking the series in fun new directions with more than shooting everything in sight) but the multiplayer has been a mainstay nearly 2 months after release – and it shows no sign of slowing down. It could be the influx of new players from Game Pass but we’ve found the lobbies to be excellently balanced, the maps lots of fun, the guns and upgrades worthwhile to experiment with, and overall, it’s just been an absolute blast to play once again. It’s even got traditionally COD-adverse Gray and Pete to join in multiple times – a feat previously unheard of. After an iffy remake of MW3 last year, all eyes were on Xbox and Activision to make the first day one GP release title a worthy effort and all signs point to them having done that – and then some.

5. Crow Country (review)

Alright, back to business as usual. Crow Country is another love letter to the survival horror days of yore, albeit more on the Silent Hill side this time. Played from an isometric viewpoint, we can fully rotate the camera as everything is rendered in 3D despite the backgrounds looking pre-rendered. Combat is once again clunky but really the best course of action is to run away most of the time as ammo in limited and enemies can take a beating. Obtuse puzzles feature alongside the usual backtracking and weird and wonderful twists to the story with a final twist that is seen a mile off but is no less enjoyable for it.

4. Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (review)

A super late entry into the list, and one that – in all honesty – I didn’t expect to be making. MachineGames did a fantastic job at nailing the aesthetic, feel, tone, and essence of Indiana Jones with The Great Circle – and I’m not even a massive fan of the franchise. It goes from movie set-piece to semi-open world gameplay seamlessly, and in these open areas I was surprised to find so much enjoyable stuff to do, from finding trinkets to saving NPC’s, exploring tombs, and gathering upgrades. The enemies are dumb as rocks (well, I mean, they are Nazi’s) but in a strange way that makes it more enjoyable to stealth around them and smack them on the noggin with a shovel, bog brush, hammer or whatever else we can get our hands on. The elements of immersive-sim-lite are fun to play with, usually offering multiple routes or options to complete a quest or find a hidden area, and it’s the kind of game that will have people comparing how they achieved this or that for the most part. It also looks stunning, the likeness of Ford as Jones being almost photo-real and only enhanced by Troy Baker’s fantastic performance. We had high -but tempered – hopes for this, and it managed to be exactly the globe hopping adventure we were after.

3. The Holy Gosh Darn (review)

Perfectly Paranormal have been on a roll with their last two titles – Manual Samuel and Helheim Hassle – and this third title in the semi-linked series is their best work yet. It’s incredibly well written, funny, packed with great puzzles and has my favourite example of a time loop in gaming yet. The constant rewinding is not just for our benefit as main character Cassiel actively remembers previous events too, letting her chime in with more witty banter as we rewind over and over. The parodies of Heaven, Hell, and all of the associated cast are very Kevin Smith-esque, but with slightly fewer dick jokes replaced with slightly more contemporary gags. It is, quite simply, brilliant from start to finish and something that comes highly recommended indeed.

2. Promenade (review)

My only 10 given this year, Promenade is the kind of game that should be used to introduce someone to the medium of gaming. The light-hearted in tone, beautifully drawn 2D visuals ease us in, but the loop of exploring the levels in search of hidden puzzles to gain the cogs needed to progress is perfectly pitched in terms of difficulty, letting us get the idea of mechanics before almost taunting us to explore what else can be found with the tools at our disposal. There always feels like there’s one more thing to find (and there usually is) but other than the required handful of cogs we need to progress, the rest are optional challenges that are well worth seeking out for the simple fact of being fun to do. It’s a collectathon players dream game, and gives us as much back as we’re willing to put in. Utterly masterclass level and puzzle design through and through.

1. Dragon’s Dogma II (review)

Just wow. Much like Banishers, Dragon’s Dogma II was not on my radar at all. In fact, when I realised it was releasing soon I remember not even considering it as an option to play, looking at other games on the calendar in its place. However, as above, I’m always up for checking new games out even if it’s not my bag, and so Capcom were very kind to provide us with a couple of codes for review. I started the game and…wasn’t keen. It was slow, weirdly laid out, and with a strange sense of design that just felt like it was actively trying to put me off playing. I persevered though, and about 6 hours later I suddenly realised I was still playing. From here, I was hooked.

It absolutely is not a game for everyone, and the issues I mentioned at the start remain true throughout, but that is also what I love about DDII. It presents us with a large (but not massive) open world packed with characters and quests to find, and then leaves it up to us to find something to do. Head to the nearest town to progress the main quest? Sure – but on the way, what if I explore that cave or speak to that person, or get into a scrap with an ogre or griffin or dragon or…what’s that? I’m now on the total opposite side of the map to the main quest location? Well, I best head bac…as soon as I explore this derelict town/cave/settlement.

It’s a game that presents options and relies on us to follow through. Some quests are time sensitive, but don’t expect the game to tell us how long we have. Sorry lost boy, but I’ve got other shit to do and you are far down the totem pole I’m afraid.

The pawn system is another genius idea masquerading as madness as we must constantly swap them out in order to keep our party strong, but they are so charmingly annoying that we kind of grew fond of them even as they were levels below us. Our main pawn does level with us, and can join other players games to gain items and knowledge of the surrounding area – a fantastic way of getting hints of new missions or goodies while grounding it within the world and not forcing us to go through endless menus prompts or way points. In fact, waypoints are a luxury in DDII; most of the time we get given a location and then have to find the specifics on our own.

I’ll leave it there and let Ross’ review and AJ’s write up add to my own waffling, but all that is to say that if you let it in, Dragon’s Dogma II will be unlike any other game you play this year (or most other years) and is, in my eyes, utterly essential playing.

Onto the honourable mentions, and we’ve got titles like Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II, Still Wakes the Deep, Paper Trail, Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, and Dungeons of Hinterberg to prop up what was a brilliant list of games that were released this year. We’ve got lots to look forward to in 2025, but hopefully if you’ve missed any of my recommendations you’ll find time to get to some of them over Christmas.

Thanks for swinging by the Tavern throughout the year, and we can’t wait to get into things in 2025!

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Written by
I've been gaming since Spy vs Spy on the Master System, growing up as a Sega kid before realising the joy of multi-platform gaming. These days I can mostly be found on smaller indie titles, the occasional big RPG and doing poorly at Rainbow Six: Siege. Gamertag: Enaksan

2 Comments

  1. Great write up. Banishers is something i plan to play this holiday

    Reply
    • It’s a dark horse in terms of the greatness this year but I think had it had more of a push it would have been on many more peoples lists come GOTY time

      Reply

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