My yearly review (though a bit late) of all of the most notable games I played in 2025.

As usual, I don't really have a good way to catalogue every game I've played in the last year. Most of them are not new releases, which also doesn't help. I can look in my Steam library or in my recent games on my Switch and kinda figure out when I last played something, but for the most part, I have to rely on my ol' addled noggin for most of that so uh... wish me luck.

As I did before, I'm going to divide up the most novel entries into three categories: "It was fine", Honorable Mentions, and Honest Recommendations.

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It was Fine...

Ender Lilies

Big Vicar Amelia vibes in this fight. NGL, I love the catholic apocalypse setting. I had been wanting to pick up Ender Lilies for quite some time. It's got a real 2D Nier/Souls-like action thing going on that I had always thought looked interesting. I honestly like the vibes, but it's one of those games that really feels more style than substance to me. I haven't yet finished it, but I'm pretty sure I made it over half way, so on the list it goes.

Pokemon Legends: Arceus

I do think Legends Arceus is the best looking pokemon game to date. I understand what the hype was around this game. It took me almost until the new Pokemon Legends game came out for me to pick this one up, but still, I'm kinda glad I did. I will say it's one of the better more recent Pokemon games for sure, and I was quite impressed with a lot of the stuff going on in it, but I think I'm still just kinda burnt out on pokemon. I've never really been that impressed with the customization in pokemon games, though I did enjoy the outfits you got further into the game. My main gripe is that you have to do so much grinding to fully fill out a pokedex entry... it kind of feels like it only exists to pad out the time you spend with the game.
It was fine.

Cris Tales

This game honestly looks like something I would've designed in college. I really like the idea of this game. The main mechanic is that you can see into the past, present, and future at the same time and use that ability to solve puzzles and fight your enemies more effectively. I think I probably would've liked it more as a child. The plot is pretty straightforward and kind of basic, I think, but the art is lovely. There is some jank to it that makes it feel like the dev's first game. (And looking at their history on steam, I guess it was?)

Piczle Cross Adventure

This game really feels like something I would've played on Newgrounds in 2007. This is one of those games that came in a bundle on the Nintendo eshop. I love picross as much as the next guy--No. More than the next guy. I eat picross for breakfast. I bench press 20x15 puzzles every day. Which means... I'm somewhat of a picross connoisseur. I don't need hints. I don't need autofill. I don't need random tiles filled in every time I start a puzzle. I just want decent puzzles. Puzzles that you can kinda guess what they are while you're solving them. Ones that don't feel like they ran out of ideas about 20 puzzles into making the game.
And you know what, this game ticks that box.
The music is kinda annoying. I don't really want a whole adventure story with my picross. Making me walk around an environment actually subtracts points, because it only pads out the time between me and my next puzzle. But it's fine. It's fine!
I've played a lot of bad picross games this year and this is not one of them. It's perfectly fine.

Apico

I understand what's wrong with this picture, but do you????
(My farms always look like this whenever I play a farmsim.)
(If you're asking yourself, "what farm?" ...Exactly.) It feels a bit weird to put this game here since I lost sooo many hours of my life to it, but I think ultimately, it was just fine. Apico is a bee husbandry and conservation sim. It's got a neat little crafting system and sooooo many species of bees and genetics and punnet squares and shiny bees and flower breeding. It really sucked me in. Until I had very early on pretty much crafted everything that needed to be crafted, and bred most of the unfrustrating flowers and bees, and talked to every NPC (none of whom really change very much over the course of the game) and just kinda felt myself perpetuating the bee machine just... to do it? This game consumed me I think for about a week and then I fell off pretty hard when I reached the edge of the map and ran out of more interesting things to do. But the bee genetics mechanic is very fun to me, so if you like breeding shiny pokemon with perfect IVs, this game might be for you.

Honorable Mentions

Welcome to Elderfield (Demo)

This game really wears its inspirations on its sleeve, but I think it really makes it work. To go on a mild tangent... During October, my friends and I played a bunch of horror games, and one of them was World of Horror, a game that many of us had been looking forward to for a long time. I had heard some gripes about it before it came out, but thought, "This is what early access is for. Hopefully, they'll work out the kinks." Well, it's out of early access now. And it's... a disjointed mess. I can see the bones of something good in there, but I don't know if it's just that the devs are inexperienced, or that they had a different vision for the game, but it's... strange. And not really in the way I would want from a horror roguelike. You are given a scenario that you need to solve. Your character kind of does this automatically? Like you're given a list of places you can go, and the game just tells you which one is the one you have to go to in order to advance the plot, but completely unexplained, as you are doing these tasks, the game rolls a die and tells you a random and disconnected event that happens to your character. "You were trying to take the train, but you just wandered randomly into the apartment of the horror manga artist who lives down the hall and you got cursed by his drawing." "You were trying to go the the mall, but you got bitten by a spider in a back alley." "You were trying to go the the ramen shop, but you got bitten by a spider in a back alley." "You went to take a bath and you got bitten by a spider in a back alley." (This literally happened to us when we played.)
Welcome to Elderfield is the World of Horror that we all deserved. (See? I brought it back around. lol)
Welcome to Elderfield is a turn based horror RPG/farm/life sim set in a small town plagued by strange occurrences and eldritch entities. It has a genuinely dark and creepy atmosphere. The random events everyday feel like they're part of a bigger force in the town. There's plenty to explore. You could (and I did) spend your whole time with the game not even going to the farm and just talking to people in town and solving their own little side quests. It feels like a living breathing world with sinister plot threads woven into its very fabric, and I'm definitely looking forward to its full release.

Edenwound (Demo)

Just a little guy. A rare game that I think does hostile design pretty well. It's a game that will keep you on the edge of your seat, walking on eggshells, nervous to move forward but also nervous to stand still. It's hard, but not impossible, and finding that little hint--the glimmer of hope that helps you move forward--really enhances the feeling like you're learning. You can overcome this impossible challenge before you. You can beat these stacked odds somehow.
Life is horror. Death is horror. Descend the floors. Conquer the dungeon. Figure it out. Figure it out. Figure it out.
Despite the difficulty, I think it's a very interesting game. Pick it up if you're a masochist. lol.

Perfect Vermin

Just a normal game about smashing things. This was another short game I picked up for Halloween. It's about smashing furniture. It's about finding imposters. It's about meat. It's also like, 15 minutes long and it's free. Go play it.

Woodsy

His name is Froggy... but he's a fish? Well, I guess it's fine. Okay, last Halloween game. (It's because I didn't make a Halloween list this year. u_u)
Woodsy is just a very charming little spooky adventure game where you run errands for various monsters. The sprite work is super charming and the interactions are quite delightful. Another very short free game. Go play it.

Of the Devil

Gotta learn when to hold 'em. Gotta learn when to fold 'em. Of the Devil is a deduction game releasing in chapters. It's Ace Attorney with a little gambling flavor on top, set in a dystopian cyberpunk world where the constant surveillance and advanced tech doesn't render the perfect evidence that the system hopes it would, and you've got to get that not guilty verdict somehow! I won't say anymore because there are some twists and turns in this thing that are pretty juicy.
I do think everyone is a little bit too chatty in this game (outside of the deduction sections), but it does add a lot to the flavor of the world and really lets you get to know the characters, so I'll just chalk it up to being a "me" problem because I hate reading words on screens. (I'm sorry.)
Chapter 2 juuust released about a week ago (as of writing), so that's definitely on my list to play this year!

Honest Recommendations

Formless Star

It's so cute... ;v; <3 Another Splendidland joint. I swear they make games just for me. It's a little creature cataloguing game where you are sent to document an ever changing planet and its mysterious biomes and creatures. There are many to find and some of them do surprising things when you interact with them. It's just very pleasant (and occasionally disturbing--as it should be), and I think Splendidland really understands creature design in a way that few others do. Also free. Go play it.

24 Killers

I really love the art style of this game. I wrote another blog post about this game a few days ago, so you can go read that for my more in depth feelings on it. But beside that, I had a great time with 24 Killers. I do heartily recommend it to people looking for a dreamy and laid back Moon RPG-like experience.

Nubby's Number Factory

Number go up. Nubby go down. Everyday Louie (Louie Zhong) wrote a song about Nubby's Number Factory last year and that's the entire story of how I found this game. Anyways, it's great and you should go play it. It's peggle but you're Nubby. It's just addictive enough for me ot pick it up when I'm bored, but also repetitive enough that I can put it down as well (unlike farmsims which trap me in their horrible dopamine loops for hours). I love the 1990's pc game aesthetic. There are a surprising number of modifiers that change the game and it keeps getting updates? I leave the game for months at a time and come back to see there's just a bunch of new stuff?? Anyways, it's good. Perfect to play when you're listening to a podcast and you just need something to do with your hands.

Thank Goodness You're Here

You're just a little guy. What a game. I've played it maybe three times in the past year (with different friends each time) and had a great time. It really feels like a love letter to a particular time and place built off of the humor that belongs there. Also, there's some stuff that's a little horrifying. (THE MILK...) But you know, I think humor and horror work best together. Anyways, if you want a funny little adventure game where you solve problems by slapping them, go pick it up.

Egg Squeeze

This game costs less than 5 dollars and it will change your life. EGG SQUEEZE. EGG SQUEEZE. EGG SQUEEZE.

Hades II

Iiiiit's Hades. Again. What is there to say about Hades II? It's Hades. But it's the second one. And It's good. I really enjoy all of the extra stuff to do in this one--gathering resources, gardening, crafting--though it was a bit overwhelming at first, and I really enjoy how they mixed up the other layers you cross through so it's not all just "pick between two doors" every time. I did find myself caring a bit less about the characters in Hades II, but I know some people really liked the cast. I guess it's just up to personal taste. I did see the credit roll, but my uh... computer broke before I could make it to the epilogue... And there are quite a few character quests that I have left unresolved, so maybe that'll change if I can ever buy a new gaming computer... ;_;

Hollow Knight: Silksong

I just wanted some whiskey, but I had to fight like 30 ants down there. And they were mean. I love Hollow Knight. I played it in 2024 on stream as preparation for Silksong to come out, and unlike Hades II where it kind of largely felt like the same game again to me but with mostly cosmetic differences, Silksong feels like a true sequel. There's substance in there. I think they really hit on some great level design as far as exploration is concerned this time around. There are so many secrets and hidden things (some of which are necessary to progress) but that really tickle your spidey senses as you're wandering around. I really like Hornet as a protagonist. I love seeing how differently she interacts with the other bugs in this world. I know it's maybe an unpopular opinion, but I looove Hornet's moveset. It really gives you a different feeling moving through the world. She's so acrobatic and sharp and precise. The tools are a great addition, but probably my greatest gripe is that the game seems front loaded with the currency you spend on your tools without really have a need to spend them, and then there's a dearth of them as you get further and further in, leaving me kind of desperate in boss battles that I have to repeat many times. I will say, I definitely had more trouble with some of the fights in Silksong than probably any single fight in Hollow Knight. And probably not the fights that you would think. A lot of the ones necessary for progression feel really good to me, like the difficulty of them is just right, but some of the optional ones, man... They really messed me up.
Maybe I'll write a larger review for Silksong once I've actually finished it. I'm at the end of act 2 and had to take a break because of some of those aforementioned optional fights.

The Procession to Calvary

Yeah. Preceded by Four Last things and succeeded by Death of the Reprobate, The Procession to Calvary is the second game in the "Immortal John Triptych" as the developer calls it. Another winner. It's a point and click adventure built from public domain (usually medieval and renaissance) paintings and music. These games are a little dark, very goofy, dryly witty, absurd, and a great time for a group or just by yourself. I'm playing the final one next year for sure.

Squeakross: Home Squeak Home

The rat cam is honestly such a big brain move. I love watching my little guy scurry around his house. Squeakross is the picross game we all deserved this year. It's got everything that I want from a picross game: chill vibes, a cute little mouse that you can customize and dress up, a house for the mouse that you can decorate with furniture that you "order" by playing picross puzzles, and pretty good puzzles! I really cannot overstate how many bad picross games I've played. How lazy and uninteresting the puzzles are sometimes. I know it's hard to make pixel art, but simply making pixel art does not make a good puzzle. While Squeakross doesn't necessarily always make legible puzzles, and I'm sometimes confused how the pixels align when the image is revealed, they are at least interesting to solve. They really shake it up, playing with the size and dimensions of puzzles, even including puzzles that mix in dimensions in multiples of 4 (so like, an 8x8, 10x12, 16x20 puzzle), which is a thing I have never seen before in a nonogram game. Anyways... SQUEAKROSS IS GOOD.
If you like picross (or even if you're new to picross and nonograms) and you love a cozy puzzle game where you can design a house for a little guy, please pick it up.
You also get emails with rat facts and "spam" about sunflower seeds and they're very cute and wholesome. I love it... I love Squeakross......

Wilmot Works It Out

Gaze upon my unfinished puzzles and despair. (This is new game+ btw. They do not normally give you this many unfinished puzzles. lol.) Finally, we come to maybe the first game I actually played this year. Haha. (If you remember, it got an honorable mention last year since it came out like a week before I posted my 2024 list). The... sequel? to Wilmot's Warehouse. Wilmot has retired from his stressful job (I assume) and has bought a house. And joined a monthly puzzle club. There's also a surprisingly nice story going on in the background (mostly delivered to you by your mailman because you presumably never leave your house).
If you love solving little puzzles, sometimes being surprised by the ways that they go together, having a very chill and pleasant time, and then less so when you start new game plus and they time your puzzles, then give Wilmot Works It Out a go.

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Those are all of the notable games I played last year! There were more that I had revisited (like Cave Story, Space Funeral, Wind Waker (which I swear I will actually finish one of these days), and Hollow Knight), some that I started and didn't finish, aaaand quite a few new games that I really thought were not remarkable enough to mention honestly.

If you made it all the way to the end, thanks for sticking with it. Haha. Here's to playing some more exciting games (new and old) in 2026!

Stay fresh!

I'mma go take a nap...