It’s that time of the year again. The end. Well, the end of 2025 at least, and with another year gone by, a lot more games have been completed. This is the fourth year I’ve been doing this now, but if you’re new here, then here’s how it goes: I rank the games I played this year, not what was necessarily released this year. Some games may come from 2025, some may be much older; that’s the fun of it! Also, this year I’ve kicked it up to a top 15 rather than a top 10. So, without further ado, here are my favourite games I played in 2025!
15. TASOMACHI: Behind the Twilight
It’s hard to quantify what exactly appeals to me about Tasomachi. On the surface, it is a sandbox platformer with a very clunky and hard-to-adjust-to control set. Beyond its first impressions, however, is a very quiet, lonely and eerie core. The motivation is to explore these beautifully laid towns masked in fog and wonderful architecture. Platforming up buildings, completing small tasks and puzzles and collecting coins scattered through the areas. There are some challenge rooms in each town, all with their own themes that vary in degree of difficulty.
As you progress through the game, you unlock new abilities that aid in traversal, which unlock secrets in earlier levels, encouraging further exploration. There are no threats here, no enemies, no people, nor any bosses to subdue. Just you, exploring these towns, speaking with their cat-like inhabitants and exploring through platforming. There are segments in which you need to fly your airship through Spyro-like flying levels. But it never gets too complex, and is a short and sweet tale that doesn’t outstay its welcome.
Tasomachi doesn’t do anything new. It doesn’t try to be grandiose or bigger than it needs to be. It’s a short, sweet and subdued experience to cleanse your palette between larger journeys. Being scored beautifully by composer Ujico*, with its songs entering my rotation of gaming music from time to time. It’s somewhat refreshing to have a quaint, quiet and somewhat soothing platforming adventure. Especially in the realm of artificial difficulty and loud and in-your-face mascot protagonists (I still love these, of course).
14. Sword of the Sea
My first impression of Sword of the Sea was that it was reminiscent of Journey, but with the sword surfing from Metaphor dialled up to 11. This impression was quickly proven wrong as it’s more than the sum of its parts. It’s a quiet experience, no dialogue and rarely a combat encounter, but accompanied by a wonderful soundtrack. Its storytelling is told through visuals and the world itself, allowing the player freedom to make their own ideas of the sequences that unfold.
Gameplay is where this game takes strides: surfing on the sword is the primary means of traversal. This, on the surface, may seem daunting and cumbersome, but it controls like a dream. You can effortlessly perform jumps and tricks off the waves of the sand sea, and it always feels satisfying to do. As the story progresses, sand shifts to snow, and even lava as it hits the climax. The final encounter is mesmerising and challenging, especially when you factor in the achievement of not taking any damage.
This is a game I only picked up due to it being on PlayStation Plus Extra, and I do not regret picking it up. It’s one of the rare times I can be in full favour of a subscription model, allowing me to experience something I wouldn’t normally. It’s still available on there now, so give it a shot! It’s short, calm and mesmerising. The perfect thing after a stressful day, as gaming should be.
13. SpongeBob SquarePants: Titans of the Tide
It’s weird, I’m a huge SpongeBob fan, but I’ve never written about it, outside of maybe a few listicles. I grew up with the first four seasons and the movie, what some would call “the golden age”. Alongside those were video games, Battle for Bikini Bottom, the movie tie-in and Lights, Camera, Pants? are notable for me. When Battle for Bikini Bottom Rehydrated came out, I was ecstatic, even more so when The Cosmic Shake was released.
Flash forward to August of this year, and the Titans of the Tide trailer dropped. David Hasselhoff singing a sea shanty about King Neptune and the Flying Dutchman having a feud? I was sold immediately. Fan service aside, Titans of the Tide doesn’t do anything to blow you away. It’s a fairly safe licensed 3D platformer built in the engine of its predecessors, which is not a bad thing. The fact that kids today have these games to experience, as I did, is wonderful.
All I expect out of these entries is a nostalgic feeling blast to my childhood, with some laughs, tight gameplay and a colourful exterior. It delivers on this perfectly, without talking down to the player or cramming every sentence with memes. This entry is exactly what you need when you need to escape adult life and remind yourself what being a kid feels like. And what could be better than serving up smiles?
12. Blue Fire
Going into this, I expected a slightly spookier in-tone 3D Platformer. What I ended up with was a Zelda-like experience with platforming elements. Functionally, the game takes place in a large floating structure separated into different areas. There’s a volcanic engine, an old forest and an icy labyrinth, among others, that help each area feel distinct. The platforming of this game is very parkour-heavy, lots of wall jumping, manipulating double and triple jumps and speed-based traversal.
The shadowy residents of this world are mysterious and help motivate the player to explore and learn about the world. As you enter and explore each dungeon, you’ll find a key ability or item that will help you complete the temple. These abilities can aid in exploring between the dungeons, too, very similar to Zelda. How it deviates is that there are spirits hidden all over the world, and from quests. These spirits grant the playable character abilities, perks and can help aid in platforming, combat and much more.
A platforming-heavy approach to Zelda-style gameplay is unique, and a welcome twist. Finding certain spirits and collectables through manipulating your abilities is fun and helps the player feel more engaged. To top it off, there’s a bunch of collectable costumes, so the playable character can look however you’d like. The parts of this game aren’t unique, but when sewn together, they make a delightful experience that kept me eager to keep pushing forward. I’d love to see more games in this style in the future. Blue Fire is definitely a pioneer of this gameplay style.
11. Journey to the Savage Planet
This entry was easily my biggest surprise of the year, a title I never expected to become so invested in. It’s a simple premise: land on a planet, scan the fauna and flora, explore the ruins and investigate. As you explore, you get upgrades, new equipment, and collect resources to further your progression. While this sounds simple and a standard sandbox, it excels in its presentation. The titular savage planet is vibrant, beautiful and intriguing, but equally deadly and hostile.
Exploring the planet, scanning the weird creatures and solving puzzles is super satisfying. It’s the kind of gameplay loop that sinks its teeth into you and keeps you pushing to find and see more. Even its DLC, Hot Garbage, is a microcosm of the savage planet and is equally intriguing and fun to explore, for even more content. You could play through the whole experience with a buddy, if you’re that way inclined, with unique interactions made for that mode.
The story is full of cringey, gross-out humour that will either hit or miss entirely, depending on your sensibilities. To me, it wasn’t super interesting, so I didn’t pay too much attention to it. The gameplay loop itself kept me invested, which means I can’t say this game is amazing due to it lacking in a major way. It is fun to goof around, explore and complete your logs, but the lack of a gripping story makes this become a meandering exercise after a while. Thankfully, it’s not long enough to get too grating, so it’s the perfect bite-sized exploration game to satiate that craving.
10. Epic Mickey Rebrushed
I have already spoken about Epic Mickey Rebrushed in great detail, so I will keep this brief. Epic Mickey tries hard to be dark and mysterious, but it misses the mark outlined in its concept art. While it’s an enjoyable, high-quality 3D platformer, it reeks of missed potential and corporate meddling and doesn’t quite hit the highs its name would suggest. I recommend it to fans of Disney and platformers, but maybe don’t try to go for completion: you’ll end up with the sour taste in your mouth of repetition.
9. The Plucky Squire
Made from All Possible Futures, founded by James Turner (of Pokemon designer fame) and Jonathan Biddle (Stealth Inc), comes The Plucky Squire. A wonderfully hand-drawn adventure within a children’s storybook, but with a twist. The plucky squire has inadvertently gained the ability to transcend his two-dimensional shackles and enter the third dimension. This twist is novel and is the main draw mechanically, but is it enough to hold an entire game?
The 2D sections are beautifully drawn, with an art style that you can’t help but fall in love with. The puzzles here are cute, too; you’ll be manipulating the book and hopping in and out of the pages to solve them. While the 3D sections have a toy model of the plucky squire exploring dioramas and toy props on a table, whilst defeating enemies and entering drawings and paintings on the desk.
While I adore the art style and the concept, and the plot is standard and engaging enough for what it is, it’s lacking. It doesn’t push its concept far enough and is relatively short and undercooked. I’d love to see a sequel that pushes the envelope further, but as a start, it is serviceable, and the potential of the concept is wide open. I want to highlight the boss fights, though, clearly the most imaginative and creative concepts the game has to offer.
8. Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip
If you’ve been with us for a while, you know that we have covered a lot of Super Rare Games releases over the years. Well, Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip is an entry that comes from their publishing label and it’s been on my radar for a long while now. When it hit PS5 this year, I was there day one, ready to jump into the ridiculous world that Terry inhabits. So, what exactly is Tiny Terry’s Turbo Trip? Well, to overly simplify, it is a love letter to 3D sandbox games like The Simpsons Hit and Run, with its own quirky world and inhabitants.
The main objective here is to grab as much junk as possible to upgrade your car so that you can drive to the moon. Yep, it’s outlandish, goofy and hilarious. You’ll help out the town’s inhabitants by completing various tasks for them. You can clear the country’s massive debt, find inner peace and steal and sell cars for profit. There’s hidden junk, quests, collectables and secrets to find in every inch of the world, with platforming and exploration being the primary gameplay.
I firmly believe that the 3D platformer genre is being pioneered and carried by the indie scene. Developers like snekflat demonstrate that their creative prowess and reverence for the genre are unparalleled. I enjoyed this game so much that I even wrote a trophy guide for it! The future feels bright for snekflat, and the genre as a whole has some exciting projects are slated for 2026. I absolutely recommend this if you miss the craziness from Hit and Run and similar games of the 2000s.
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