I’m stealing this from Nextlander Podcast host Alex Navarro because I simply can’t put it any better myself — this year in videogames was an astoundingly good one for products, and a miserable one for everyone who made those products.
It’s genuinely difficult to celebrate an industry that continuously chews up and spits out thousands of talented, amazing people who professionally sacrifice in ways that I’m just not down with. Studio closures came fierce, and mergers meant tons of behind-the-scenes jobs in advertising, PR, and community support became redundant overnight.
Rumors swirled around legendary studios when they slipped up even once with a sales disappointment. I also question just how quickly AI will sweep away potentially tens of thousands of jobs in programming, QA, and asset generation. The entire industry rests on a razor’s edge, and I sincerely worry we may have not yet seen the bottom completely fall out.
…And yet that terrible reality is juxtaposed with a year full of absolute bangers.
I am truly grateful for the people who make the games we get to play. It’s basically a miracle every time a good title gets released, and the stakes for every single one have never been higher. While I mourn the real-life pain of thousands of affected workers, this list is also a tribute to their incredible efforts that were behind both these games and the numerous others that were under strong consideration — and there were numerous.
2023’s “I F***** Up 2022’s List” Award: Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origins
There’s always one that gets away every year, and despite a propensity to play everything with the words “Final Fantasy” on the box, middling reviews and a constant fear of the “Soulslike” genre (which, as you will read later, is getting harder and harder to justify in writing every year) kept me away until it was on heavy discount earlier this year. It was then when I realized I made a huge mistake, as the adorably abbreviated SOPFFO blew away all expectations I had with outstanding character customization and infinitely variable combat because of it.
But that wasn’t the highlight. The true winner here is a story that, from afar, looked preposterously stupid in the Youtube clips I saw at launch. Little did I know that this prequel for Final Fantasy I was actually going to be the most brilliant unintentional parody of classic JRPGs I’ve ever experienced. I was in absolute stitches as all-timer dudebro edgelord Jack Garland grunted his way through every trope the genre has. He’s the JRPG protagonist the world needs, and I sincerely hope we have not seen the last of this lovable asshole.
2023’s “I’ll get to it eventually” award: Hi-Fi Rush
Hi-Fi Rush came out of nowhere in a lot of ways. Firstly it… well it did come out of nowhere as it was announced and released on the same day back in January. That’s a bold move, and one I’ve been pining for more developers to do, so kudos to Microsoft for having that confidence. Secondly, it came from Tango Gameworks, which I feel has exclusively made games that are interesting but only almost good for their entire existence. Considering how dark The Evil Within and Ghostwire: Tokyo both were, Hi-Fi Rush’s cheerful demeanor and funky stylings were even more refreshing.
Unfortunately, despite having it installed practically all year through Game Pass, I never quite got around to it. The 30 minutes I did play convinced me this was something I should spend time with, but I have this weird quirk about playing on Game Pass. Ownership (or whatever the hell that means nowadays) somehow adds to my drive to play something, so I’m sure I will get around to it when it inevitably hits $15 sometime in 2024. Maybe I should stop paying for Game Pass.
The “I really want to give this game an award but I just can’t” Award: Cyberpunk 2077 Update 2.0/Phantom Liberty
I spent a lot of time thinking about how I wanted to acknowledge Cyberpunk 2077 on this list. While it took three years to get to an acceptable state, I cannot deny that playing through 2077 after Update 2.0 and alongside the release of the exceptional Phantom Liberty expansion was one of the very best gaming experiences I had this year. It really is the most dramatic turnaround of a catastrophic single-player launch that I can recall. It’s never gonna reach the hype of being the transcendent RPG experience CDProjekt Red promised before launch, but they have clearly put in the work to make Cyberpunk 2077 a quality game that I’m damn near tempted to call polished.
The plan was to make this my 10th best game of the year, but then it won “Best Ongoing Game” at The Game Awards, and I threw up in my mouth a little. Fixing a broken single-player game and releasing one piece of DLC over a three year span should not qualify as “ongoing”, and while I do legitimately love this game in the year 2023, CDPR should not receive praise for doing what was necessary to fix a cataclysmic boondoggle that people will talk about for generations to come. For those, like me, who were waiting to play Cyberpunk 2077 “when it’s done”, now is that time. Enjoy it, but never forget the nonsense it took to get us to this point.
The 2023 Turd of the Year: Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 1
It was a tough choice this year, as there were a lot of excellent candidates. Again, Turd of the Year does not mean “worst game” or “most disappointing”. Turd of the Year is the most offensively bad game of the year. It is essentially the game that pissed me off the most. While Sonic Origins Plus certainly pissed me off and Atomic Heart was a game I genuinely hated, neither of them compare to the sheer, unadulterated anger in my heart towards Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 1. The PS5 version I will give credit for essentially being on par with the HD collection released a decade ago, but the other versions are inexcusably poor for a litany of reasons I don’t have space to talk about here.
So there’s a game on this compilation called Metal Gear Solid. It’s kind of a big deal. You may have heard of it, as it easily earns the distinction of being a truly revolutionary videogame. This is the first time the original Metal Gear Solid has been available for purchase on modern consoles in over a decade, the first time it’s been easily playable on PC in over 20 years, and the first time it’s ever been on a Microsoft or Nintendo platform (Twin Snakes doesn’t count/exist). This should be a monumental celebration! Instead we got the most bare-bones emulation imaginable that’s about on par with playing it on a Playstation Classic.
This hurts even more because Konami has actually done a stellar job with remaster compilations in recent years. I reviewed both the Castlevania and Contra Anniversary Collections for this site, and they’re both fabulous! Great emulation, slick menus, nice configuration features, and exceptional bonus materials. While the bonus materials in Master Collection are good, they’re buried under multiple game launchers, and many of the bonus features aren’t even on the disc. Why do I have to download the digital graphic novels? Konami couldn’t fit those on a 50GB disc on this compilation of one of their most important franchises, and the first time they’ve done anything with said franchise in half a decade? This package contains three of the greatest games ever made, full stop. They deserve to be crafted around a proper, historical artifact that generations of players in the future can experience, and this ain’t it by a longshot.
Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 1 is a pathetic effort from a pathetic company. I hate that I paid for this, and I hate even more that I’ll be buying Master Collection Vol. 2 on day one as well just to see how borked that Metal Gear Solid 4 port is going to be.
THE ONE TRUE LIST THAT IS CLEARLY BETTER THAN MY FELLOW WRITERS’ LISTS
Honorable Mention: The Legend Of Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom
I’ve been writing GOTY lists for this site for a while, and the biggest no-brainer #1 pick I’ve ever made was choosing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild as my personal Game of the Year in 2017. A dramatic reinvention of a longstanding videogame franchise with established mechanics is one of the hardest things to achieve in this business, and Breath of the Wild was certainly that. The Nintendo Switch does not become what it has become without launching alongside a legitimate GOAT contender, and Breath of the Wild didn’t just revitalize a legendary franchise, it revitalized an entire company.
And its sequel is… great. Really great, actually! Tears of the Kingdom is a tremendously well put-together sequel with an astonishing amount of content. It does not reinvent the wheel, but considering they blew up the car with Breath of the Wild and built a new one, that should be neither expected or necessary. With that out of the way, I can’t say it grabbed me in the same way outside of some truly mesmerizing memes seeing the insane things people created with its ingenious toolset. Garry’s Mod was not on my “inspirations for TOTK” Bingo card, but here we are, and I’m glad we’re here. Tears of the Kingdom is both of high quality and worthy of the franchise it represents, but let’s be real, its Breath of the Wild But Bigger-er, and in a truly exceptional year for releases, that wasn’t quite good enough to make the list proper.
10. Lies of P
We start the list with what was probably my biggest surprise of the year, as I was completely unaware of its existence until it released. Thankfully I had enough people send me the message of “Hey, the one you like is Sekiro, right? You should really play Lies of P“, and I’m really glad that they’re in my life. Lies of P is weird, haunting, occasionally disturbing, and has extremely well-tuned combat that is constantly adding new wrinkles all the way through its beautifully-realized world.
This is the best non-FROM-produced Souls game I have ever played, but I can’t really put it much higher on my list because Lies of P is basically plagiarism. Everything from the menus to the HUD to the world design to NPC interaction to the item descriptions (even down to the font) is ripped straight from various FROM works. But here’s the thing — a lot of games do that, and Lies of P is significantly more successful at it than something like Lords of the Fallen or Wo Long. It’s so damn good that I don’t really care that it’s an egregious copycat, and I don’t think Hidetaka Miyazaki does either.
Also, shoutout to The Republic of Korea for an awesome year of making big videogames. On top of this game, the country also produced Dave The Diver, the runner-up to my “I’ll get to it eventually” award. Korea has been producing games for a long time, but they usually stick to the FTP space dating all the way back to Maple Story. They haven’t made a lot of big-time, full-priced mainstream releases, but Lies of P definitely fits that bill. Here’s hoping Round 8 Studios and publisher Neowiz can keep that momentum going and Korea’s developer profile continues to ascend. We will forgive and forget about Gungrave G.O.R.E.
9. Like A Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name
I’ve been hesitant about legendary Yakuza protagonist and World’s Greatest Step-Dad Kazuma Kiriyu being such a large part of Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth. Like the previously mentioned Breath of the Wild, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios also succeeded in a complete reinvention of a longstanding franchise with 2020’s Yakuza: Like a Dragon, with its greatest strength being that it replaced a stellar ensemble cast with an equally stellar ensemble cast damn near seamlessly. With Ichiban Kasuga proudly taking the mantle from Kiryu with general ease, I felt like bringing back The Dragon of Dojima for One Last Hurrah wasn’t particularly necessary when they nailed such a difficult pivot already.
The Man Who Erased His Name convinced me that this is not only viable, but needed. Kazuma Kiryu deserves a better send-off than the weird place they left him after Yakuza 6, and this true ‘Gaiden’ of a release sets that up perfectly. For those who thought Kazuma being randomly shoehorned into the end of Like a Dragon was awkward, now it makes all the sense in the world. While The Man Who Erased His Name is really only for the most committed Like a Dragon fans, the more hardcore a fan you are, the harder it’s going to hit. The final chapter in this game is maybe the highlight of an entire 20 year franchise for those who have been there the entire time, and I do not say that lightly. It’s also a very tight experience, clocking in at a short-for-this-franchise ten hours (much longer for completionists), but it doesn’t have a drop of fat throughout the entire campaign.
It’s a tad overpriced, having to import a physical release was annoying (but cheaper!) and it doesn’t do anything new whatsoever. That keeps it low on the list, but this is an absolutely necessary entry into this franchise. It succeeded in its core mission of making me even more excited for Infinite Wealth than I already was, which I didn’t think was possible.
8. Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon
I love that FROM Software is in the middle of its “we get to do whatever the hell we want” phase after the past decade of abject success, and what they decided to do was go make another Armored Core. Not a reboot, not a remake, but Armored Core VI, as in “The Sixth Armored Core Game”. I hesitate to call it taking a chance because we’re at the point where anything with FROM on the box is probably going to do quite well, but as someone who grew up playing Armored Core, I really appreciated them straight-up just making a new Armored Core game and hoping everyone would go along with it like we all played Armored Core V in 2021.
Fires of Rubicon is a real meat & potatoes release. There’s a story and it’s actually rather interesting, but 95% of it is told through radio messages and powerpoint presentations. This isn’t some grandiose AAA extravaganza, but rather a gameplay first, mission-based, Capital-V Videogame full of boundless customization. Even slight recalculations of your AC’s weight and propulsion shows while playing, and I spent hours trying to build the perfect deathmobile for the playstyle I wanted to enjoy. It gets brutally difficult in spots, and the core Souls design the team has been sharpening for years definitely shows up in boss fights, but one also feels that same Souls-level sense of achievement when finally completing a particular hurdle. Armored Core VI was one of the purest game experiences I had this year, and I look forward to Armored Core being a thing again.
7. Star Ocean The Second Story R
2023 was a truly exceptional year for remakes. Dead Space, Super Mario RPG, and System Shock were all incredible from-the-ground-up revitalizations of beloved classics, and, hey, Resident Evil 4 got a remake too, I guess. However one stood above the rest in my eyes, and that was Star Ocean The Second Story R. As a production, Second Story R is outstanding, with great renditions of the original score, quality voice acting, and excellent menu design. There was no other game this year I loved looking at more than this one with its beautifully-realized rendition of the original title that still very much looks like Star Ocean The Second Story. It’s clear the people involved with developing this remake had reverence for the source material, and their love of it shines brightly here.
Early Playstation 1 JRPGs are not a group of games that have aged particularly well, and developer Gemdrops inc. did a tremendous job adding countless quality-of-life improvements while still maintaining the spirit of a game that can be rather punishing. Second Story R is essentially how the nostalgic part of my brain remembers Star Ocean The Second Story, and it makes the original release practically obsolete. It’s a title that was absolutely deserving of receiving such a classy, quality remake, and I’m glad it exists so a new generation can experience one of the true gems from the genre’s heyday.
6. Baldur’s Gate III
I didn’t even get close to finishing Baldurs Gate III and that’s the primary reason it’s so low on this list, as I’m pretty sure this was the best videogame released in 2023. If I was writing for another site and we were deciding an overall Game of the Year as a staff, I’d probably be advocating for Baldurs Gate III to win our site’s award, but the fact of the matter is that I’m maybe an eighth of the way through a 150 hour game, and I just got too distracted with too many others to fully commit to finishing this outstanding achievement. This game deserves ones full attention, and I have failed to commit to it properly.
I have never in my life played a game so down with however I want to play it, which is the thing people love about playing Dungeons & Dragons, right? Larian Studios has made the definitive D&D videogame, and the ability to have their virtual dungeon master make this absolutely massive game with so many variables work together is the greatest achievement of any title this year. It’s also amazing to see the incredible financial success this game is achieving. While the team did an unbelievable job porting this game to consoles, the astounding thing about Baldur’s Gate III’s popularity is they did it by making an old-school-as-old-school-gets PC RPG for their most hardcore fans first, and there’s never been an entry in this genre before as accessible to so many people while also maintaining such depth.
I am tremendously looking forward to the summer of 2024 where I may actually have time to play it.
5. Robocop: Rogue City
I was pretty sure I was going to dig Robocop: Rogue City considering how much I loved Terminator: Resistance, but I had absolutely no idea it would get this high on my list. Rogue City excels because I could not possibly imagine a videogame nailing its source material any harder. It’s the perfect Robocop game. Busting through walls, throwing guys through windows, and clearing Detroit of scum one bullet at a time while turning said scum into hamburger across a wide variety of dilapidated urban buildings — not since Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise has a property been so seamlessly transitioned to the world of videogames.
I wrote the review for the site, so any readers looking for a more detailed explanation as to what makes this game kick so much ass should go read that. Robocop: Rogue City is one of my favorite licensed games ever made, and it’s very deserving of this spot. Single-player First Person Shooters are a dying breed, and Teyon is doing their darndest to keep the genre alive one ’80s movie at a time.
4. Super Mario Wonder
New Super Mario Bros. as a franchise-within-a-franchise is perfectly adequate. They’re well designed, creative, and rather inoffensive entries into the Mario canon, but they’ve never quite had the spark seen in the upper echelon Mario games. Super Mario Wonder adds the one thing the development team needed to get it over the hump — drugs. Lots of drugs, which is what I would believe the development team had in abundance, but this game is made in Japan where drugs are a big no-no, so I’m just going to assume the people behind Wonder are high on life in all its grandeur.
The word of the day with Super Mario Wonder is variety. Nearly every level has some sort of quirk or mechanic to spice it up. There is no filler here. The level design starts at ‘exceptional’ and maintains an absurdly high bar of quality for the entirety of the experience. Any human walking the Earth today can have fun playing Super Mario Wonder, but achieving 100% completion and getting through the truly dastardly special stages is a real test for any player. 2D Mario is not nostalgic — it is eternal, and this is the best 2D Mario since Super Mario World.
3. Pizza Tower
There is something primal about Pizza Tower that really speaks to me. This game has a vibe, man. Taking heavy inspiration from the Wario Land games, Pizza Tower controls like an absolute dream while my main man Peppino Spaghetti frantically runs through well-designed levels that take full advantage of the movement capabilities the developers at Tour De Pizza have bestowed upon players. This is accompanied by the best beats I heard in any game this year, and the team channeled the spirit of the Sega Genesis in a way that this ’90s kid really appreciated. The escape theme drives fear into my heart while also making me bob my head in affirmation.
That same ’90s kid also adores the Nicktoons-inspired art beautifully represented on screen by some of the best sprite-work in recent memory. Even though it’s high quality, Pizza Tower’s ability to maintain said high quality while also successfully paying homage to dozens of sub-par, boilerplate 16-bit platformers in style and tone is commendable. It’s weird, it’s demanding, it’s occasionally unsettling, and it can be downright maddening for completionists, but I adored my time in Pizza Tower’s cheesy, gooey world. There’s nothing else like it in the astoundingly competitive world of 2D indie platformers, which helps Pizza Tower rise to the upper crust.
2. Final Fantasy XVI
I have a list of words and terms I desperately try to avoid when writing about videogames, and at the top of that list is the word ‘Epic’. The term that is far overused and it ruins the ability to use the term when actually justified. If everything is epic, than nothing is epic.
With that said, Final Fantasy XVI is maybe the most epic videogame I have ever played.
I’m a sucker for AAA ballyhoo, and this game had some of the most deliriously ludicrous production values I’ve ever seen. Beautifully rendered graphics, tremendous sound design, an exceptional orchestral score, a staggering level of detail in environments, and fantastic voice work, including a pun-fully-intended star-making performance from Ben Starr as lead Clive Rosfield. It’s a tad problematic in spots writing-wise and it drags a bit in the last third, but when it was firing on all cylinders, I didn’t have a better time playing videogames all year.
The scale of big moments here are absolutely spectacular, and spectacle has always been a hallmark of this franchise. Final Fantasy has never been the deepest JRPG or had the most complex gameplay mechanics, and so much of what I remember from playing this series for decades in particular has been crazy summon spells and hardware-pushing worlds. While I’m not sure of it’s merits as a Japanese Role Playing Game due to its “What if Devil May Cry was an MMO?” combat system, Final Fantasy XVI is absolutely a Final Fantasy game, and it was the most enjoyment I’ve got out of a mainline entry in over twenty years. That’s worth celebrating, and with Final Fantasy XIV producer Naoki Yoshida at the helm, I think the main franchise has a bright future.
1. Alan Wake II
This was an easy choice, but while I adored playing this game, it’s what Sam Lake and the team at Remedy have laid the foundation for that makes Alan Wake II stand above all else in 2023. What I’m referring to is the creation of the Remedy Interactive Universe. While they have referentially hinted at games they’ve created within their other games for decades now, they’ve now gone all-in on the concept of a shared universe. This can be occasionally problematic as Remedy only own the rights to about half their library, so some iconic names have to be changed. However, longtime fans of their work will be picking up on what they’re selling pretty easily, and the payoff is extraordinary for those players.
Alan Wake II is also the best videogame of the year partially due to the innovative usage of other forms of media. The Old Gods of Asgard are back, and they’re still pumping out hits. The goofy musical number in the middle of their horror game was already spoiled at The Game Awards, but I can’t even begin to describe the feeling of witnessing that thing having no prior knowledge. This work has the best-produced FMV in any videogame I’ve ever played, but the most impressive aspect of said FMV is how seamlessly it is integrated into the overall package.
In a year of very high highs, Remedy reached the highest, and nothing this year pushed the boundaries of what a videogame can be harder than Alan Wake II. Also, Ahti the Janitor is back, so that made this a pretty easy choice.
He is currently attending graduate school at Pacific University seeking a Master's In Teaching with a focus on secondary social studies. From 2015-2020, Jarrod worked as a school teacher in various countries throughout Asia, and is now seeking certification to teach in his home country so a global pandemic doesn't leave him stranded again.
- The PlayStation 5 Pro Difference: The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion Remastered - May 8, 2025
- Jarrod’s 2024 Top Ten Games of the Year and Other Meaningless Awards - February 26, 2025
- The Three Part Questionnaire: A PS5 Pro Review - December 29, 2024
This is a fantastic list – and a really good write up.
I have my thoughts on AI and am simply not as doomsaying as other places.
If you interested in my top ten list (I didn’t do one for Game Critics list) send me an email I think you will get a giggle out of it