Gamezebo’s Favourite Games of 2024 – Gamezebo

With 2025 approaching, let’s check out Gamezebo’s Favorite Video games of 2024. Every member of the crew has picked their best choice, and as you may inform, we like all kinds of genres!

Inquisitive about our picks for final yr? Have a learn of our 2023 Video games of the 12 months function! It was robust for Adele to not decide Baldur’s Gate 3 once more…

Gamezebo’s Favorite Video games of 2024

The Editorial crew’s high picks…

Stellar Blade – Adele

Sure, sure, I do know this sport will get some flack, however in my view, it’s unjustified. For everybody who calls it a Nier Automata copy… you’re not flawed however you’re additionally not proper. Stellar Blade does its personal factor. Hell, even Nier’s creator, Yoko Taro, labored with Shift Up so as to add a Nier Automata DLC to the sport. Did I purchase it? In fact I did.

As a longtime fan of Nier, I had no concern with Stellar Blade replicating components of it, however I guarantee you it isn’t a direct copy and paste. To me, they’re each completely completely different video games.

In Stellar Blade, you play as EVE, a Colony soldier who’s been despatched to Earth to avoid wasting humanity. Battle towards the Naytiba, from mobs you come throughout while exploring, to adrenaline-pumping boss fights that spike in issue.

Unravel the story, which I can admit isn’t one of the best, and be taught extra about your companions, Adam and Lily. It’s not all concerning the motion although, as you may unlock new outfits by gathering blueprints and supplies. It takes combating stylishly to a complete new degree, and I like it. This may occasionally seem to be a faff to some folks, however for gamers like me, it’s one of many most important appeals.

As somebody who adores customisation in video video games, it’s a no brainer for me. I like switching between outfits and hairstyles relying on what tickles my fancy. And let’s not neglect that the sport is visually beautiful. Every location, particularly the deserted metropolis areas, is a deal with to the eyes. Glistening with neon lights, rainfall, and decrepit buildings, all the things fits the post-apocalyptic environment completely.

Love and Deepspace – Rachel

The primary Otome I ever performed was Mystic Messenger in 2017, and I used to be obsessive about it. So, when Adele beneficial Love and Deepspace to me as a result of it reminded her of it, I knew I needed to test it out (thanks Adele). I had no thought what it was about, and I used to be anticipating a chatroom-style sport the place I needed to set alarms at 3 am so I didn’t miss them (sure, I used to be a kind of gamers).
I used to be blown away by the graphics and artwork fashion.

However what stunned me extra was the in-depth storyline and battles. There’s a complete system to it! I by no means anticipated to should struggle in an Otome. Regardless of there not being chatrooms, you may ‘textual content’ the characters and take part in mini-games. Nevertheless, my private favorite is spending time with them and interacting with them. All of the characters are so distinctive, and I like the stability between enjoying the principle storyline, and the extra healthful facet of merely being with them.

For anybody who’s questioning, I’m a Zayne woman (and I’m right here to let you know Adele is a Rafayel and Sylus woman). Love and Deepspace has utterly modified the sport for Otomes, and I do know I’ll be enjoying it for a very long time to come back.

Horizon Zero Daybreak Remastered – Rob

When you have been to have requested me in January which sport I anticipated could be my decide for 2024, I most likely would have mentioned Prince of Persia: The Misplaced Crown. However I performed that sport, and I didn’t prefer it.

So what else? Thank Goodness You’re Right here is the form of sport I really feel I ought to put ahead as my favorite, as a result of it’s unique and artistic and really humorous. However there are two issues with that: 1) Simon the advert man already bagsied it, and a pair of) it wasn’t actually my favorite sport. It wasn’t a lot of a sport in any respect, if truth. It was a bit of interactive comedy whose gameplay and controls didn’t get in the best way of the jokes.

Balatro? Certain, a intelligent twist on poker that’s excellent for idling away the odd 20-minute patch of downtime, however not Sport of the 12 months materials. That will be like Meal of the 12 months being gained by a bar snack.

So I’m going to should retreat to my consolation zone of massmarket, action-packed, gratifyingly stunning AAA video games and select Horizon Zero Daybreak Remastered. Is it a damning indictment of 2024 that one of the best sport on this author’s opinion got here out in 2017? Perhaps. However there’s no denying that Horizon Zero Down is a hovering basic of the open-world action-RPG style, and the remaster appears sensible.

Potion Allow – Sho

Earlier this yr, I had the lucky alternative to evaluation Potion Allow, hoping to encourage readers like your self to test it out. And effectively, if you happen to didn’t learn my evaluation, the truth that it was my chosen title for launch of the yr ought to communicate volumes!

Potion Allow to me was all the things Stardew Valley by no means was. I don’t wish to put down one other title to hype, however the video games have comparable aesthetics and core options. I attempted to like Stardew Valley and all the time felt critical FOMO every time pals detailed their thrilling playthroughs realizing that it merely wasn’t for me.

Till Potion Allow. I’ll admit I used to be hesitant to present a evaluation at first since honesty is essential and if I had a Stardew Valley-like expertise that may’ve mirrored in my piece. Nevertheless, what I as a substitute found was a sport I couldn’t give up. I used to be hooked from the get-go and would eagerly watch the clock, counting all the way down to after I’d end work and leap in once more.

There’s simply one thing so charming and kooky about Potion Allow: the detailed pixel artwork, the quaint little village, and the charismatic and various NPCs. The sport has tons to like and an excellent quantity of freedom to decide on what you wish to do day-to-day all while working in direction of a story.

However wait… it retains on giving! Minigames, interactions, exploration, upgrades, and naturally, medicinal potion brewing. I concern I’ve yapped an excessive amount of as my GOTY entry is getting bloated and I’ve hardly coated all of it. So, I’ll conclude with a remaining message; you might have a loyal canine companion.

Nonetheless Wakes The Deep – Meriel

Can’t get sufficient of an excellent eldritch horror, and in order for you a contemporary title that looks like a basic story of terror, then The Chinese language Room’s latest title, Nonetheless Wakes The Deep is a good journey. This very Lovecraftian story takes place on an remoted oil platform, already an inhospitable place for most individuals, because it’s overtaken by one thing that’s as horrific as it’s unexplained.

You step into the sturdy workboots of Caz, an electrician caught in a scenario far far above his paygrade because the rig decends into chaos. It’s essential to navigate the disintegrating construction, assist survivors, and evade the horrible beasties unleashed on the world. It’s extraordinarily atmospheric, and performs into a complete vary of fears. Heights, water, tight areas, horrible incongruous abominations. It’s not simply low-cost scares, although. Nonetheless Wakes The Deep manages to supply shocking emotional… er, depth. I cried earlier than the sport was over.

It’s a reasonably brief sport, however there are, I’m certain loads of folks out of there who don’t have time to plough dozens or tons of of hours right into a sport to get to the payoff, When you’re a kind of folks, you may get a really satisfying expertise in underneath ten hours, and I don’t remorse a minute of it.

It’s additionally a Christmas sport. In the identical method that Die Arduous is a Christmas film. What’s it with Christmas and crawling via air flow ducts?

Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengeance of the Slayer – Simon

when one thing feels prefer it’s been made only for you? Effectively Slayers X (no I’m not typing out that entire title every time) is that for me. And I say this with the deepest respect, as I doubt many may hack quite a lot of minutes of enjoying this.

It’s principally a tribute to barely shonky outdated DOS video games like Duke Nukem 3D, being an FPS with an immature sense of humour – however contemplating so many titles don’t have any sense of humour in any respect these days, it’s a large breath of recent retro air. If that isn’t an excessive amount of of a contradiction anyway.

This Swap port is a little bit dodgy with the framerate typically taking successful, however I loved all of it the identical. And sure, that typo within the title is deliberate.
An honourable point out to Thank Goodness You’re Right here (sorry Rob), which can be deeply amusing – in a really completely different however very welcome method. Principally I wanted video games that made me chuckle in 2024, and I obtained two sensible examples of simply that.