The 2025 Game of the Year field is crowded and varied, and I don’t think there’s a wrong answer within 

It’s dark before 5pm here nowadays so that means only one thing: seasonal affective disorder! Okay, maybe two things. It’s also Game of the Year discussion time.

2025 has been a long grind for everybody, but there’s been a myriad of excellent titles that have made the days go by a bit more easily. The year is winding down with just under two months left, and I have my own frontrunner for GOTY 2025, but I genuinely think you can’t go wrong with a number of titles.

Our Destructoid chat was abuzz today with discussion about GOTY 2025, sparked on by the fact that ARC Raiders may have thrust itself into the conversation, especially considering its multiplayer focus while most of the other games on the shortlist this year are single-player excursions. We’ll be talking more about awards in a few weeks, but for now, let’s open up the discussion with you all.

If we’re going strictly by review scores, then no game has a better claim for GOTY than Hades 2. While it launched into early access in 2024, it launched on all applicable platforms just over a month ago and has a whopping 95 overall Metascore when it comes to critics (I gave it a high score myself), and 8.7 user score. It’s a masterpiece and evolution of the roguelike genre.

Then there’s the game on the tip of most gamers’ tongues this year: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. With a 92 Metascore, it’s one of the best-rated games of the year, and may come to define what most players think of the turn-based RPG genre. It’s the game I think of most when it comes to excellence in 2025 as an expertly-crafted title made all the more impressive that it came from a small team of mostly ex-Ubisoft devs based in France.

And it just gets wilder from there. Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is arguably some of Hideo Kojima’s best work. Hollow Knight: Silksong delivered on impossible levels of hype after going M.I.A. for years. Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 provided a stellar RPG experience.

Puzzles more your thing? Blue Prince took everyone by surprise when it dropped in April. Easy-going co-op gamer? Split Fiction was another stellar two-player entry from Hazelight Studios. Open-world platformer lover? Donkey Kong Bananza became one of the Switch 2’s first must-have games this summer. And all of them have a case for GOTY discussion.

The list goes on. Sword of the Sea, Monster Hunter: Wilds, Absolum, Ball x Pit, if you’ve played it in 2025 and you name it, you can probably make a case for it to win some awards. And the variety in there is just fantastic for gamers, because there’s something for just about anybody.

So now, I feel compelled to pose the question to you, dear reader: what’s your pick for GOTY 2025? Let us know in the comments below, and keep it civil, because it doesn’t feel like there’s any wrong answer.