There are only a few hours left before we head into 2025 and, while it’s easy to fixate on what’s to come – especially when next year is set to be a historic year for video games thanks to the likes of Grand Theft Auto VI, Monster Hunter Wilds, Elden Ring: Nightreign, and more – it’s important to look back on 2024 and reminiscence about the smorgasbord of incredible titles we experienced this year. From several one-man indie gems and platformers which harken back to better days, to transformative new JRPGs and expansions which test the limits of the very definition of “expansion”, 2024 was absolutely a masterclass year for games.
With so many incredible games, we here at KeenGamer have come together to discuss our favourite games of 2024. In this article, you’ll hear from several members of the KeenGamer team all of whom have a different game they consider as the best of the year. Some of them are standout games that you’ll likely have seen at other award shows or in other GotY lists, but others are more underground indie titles which you have missed as you tried to keep up with the more mainstream titles of 2024.
Here are KeenGamer’s Games of the Year for 2024. Enjoy and have a great 2025.
KeenGamer’s GotY 2024
Penny’s Big Breakaway
Devon Williams: Penny’s Big Breakaway effectively wins by default, simply because so little of what I play is actually new, though don’t take that as any sort of indication that this game is not an exceptional experience, because it truly, truly is.
The Sonic Mania team’s first stab at their own intellectual property is a bold, creative, and colourful experience that no gamer should miss. The sense of momentum you get is exhilarating, and Penny’s moveset is one of the most novel and creative I’ve seen in quite a long time. Its cartoony stylings are super charming, and it’s impossible to play it without putting a smile on your face.
With Astro Bot dominating at the Game Awards, hopefully, that means we’ll get more wondrous and joyful games like Penny’s Big Breakaway.
You can read Devon’s review of Penny’s Big Breakaway here on KeenGamer.
Penny’s Big Breakaway
Thank Goodness You’re Here!
Daniel Levitt: 2024 has been another good year for new AAA releases. However, some games didn’t get the attention they rightfully deserved. One such game is Thank Goodness You’re Here!, a short adventure set in the North of England.
You play as a travelling salesman who gets distracted by all the wacky requests from the townsfolk of Barnsworth while awaiting a meeting with the mayor. You’ll go through the game completing puzzles and having a good laugh along the way. As someone who lives in the midlands of England, Thank Goodness You’re Here! caught my attention pretty quickly after their first trailer dropped. From all the subtle and not-so-subtle British references to the general relatability of how everyone acts, it almost felt nostalgic.
The characters you meet on the way are all unique and really funny. The most memorable character is the Gardner due to being voiced by the legendary Matt Berry. The humour feels comforting and familiar, similar to shows like The Mighty Boosh and IT Crowd but set in a colourful cartoon, perhaps a somewhat British Smiling Friends. For anyone who needs a laugh and has a few hours to spare Thank Goodness You’re Here! should not be missed.
Thank Goodness You’re Here!
Botany Manor
Laura Speller: I’ve played quite a few games in 2024, but there’s one game that really stood out for me, and that’s Botany Manor. I had the pleasure of playing and reviewing this on the Nintendo Switch back in April. At first, I thought this was going to be some quirky gardening game. It is that, but it’s so much more. It turned out to be a beautiful masterpiece of a game that has stuck with me all year.
Everything in Botany Manor was well put together, from exploring the titular manor, to solving the complex puzzles, and the joy of watching the plants bloom. Not to mention the intriguing story set alongside the game that breathes even more life into it. I would love to see a sequel for Botany Manor one day. For me, this is my Game of the Year.
Also, I would like to give a few honorary mentions to the other games I played this year, which include Hidden Through Time 2 (both Myths & Magic and its sequel Discovery), Caravan SandWitch, and Shin-chan: Shiro and the Coal Town. These are my other contenders for Game of the Year.
You can find Laura’s review for Botany Manor here on KeenGamer.
Botany Manor
Crow Country
Abigail Westwood: As more of a ‘modern gamer’ (I hate the phrase too, I can only apologise) two things are certain: my backlog is ginormous – not a euphemism – and I absolutely suck at tank controls. And so, despite being a fan of all things weird, due to lack of time and gaming ability, I have yet to play classic horror titles such as Silent Hill and Resident Evil. However, I have played Crow Country, which is basically the same thing, right? Right?
An ideal introduction to retro survival horror, Crow Country’s creepy fairground attraction is dripping with the love of its developers paying homage to the horror games of their childhood. The ability to seamlessly switch between retro and modern controls, the optional passive mode, as well as the behind-the-scenes mechanics ensuring you never have too much or too little ammo made this a very beginner-friendly experience.
The narrative is short and easy to follow, poking fun at genre tropes and feeding you information through in-game journal entries and letters. Much like the games which inspired Crow Country, solving puzzles requires finding items and backtracking to previous areas. There are secrets to be found though nothing is too obtuse, and more weapons unlock upon completion if you fancy round two. With its ‘newcomers welcome’ approach, intuitive puzzles and gloomy atmosphere, Crow Country is not only my Game of the Year but the perfect cosy horror game.
You can find Abigail’s review of Crow Country here on KeenGamer.
Crow Country
Pacific Drive
Luis Cano: My 2024 highlight is definitely Pacific Drive. From the moment I saw it and what it was trying to do, I was sold on the idea. Driving around a beat-up car in an eerie exclusion zone, where it’s just you and the anomalies that are going around, never seeing another human, and piecing together a story from context and clues reminded me of how I felt when I played another one of my all-time favourites: The Outer Wilds.
Now, I wouldn’t say these are equal, as The Outer Wilds is superior in storytelling and in scale, being about the whole universe or galaxy or whatever. But I still prefer Pacific Drive for the gameplay loop. I swear there were runs I did that was just about spending time out there, gathering my resources and taking in the beautiful and strange equally. Pacific Drive gave me the eerie exploration I was expecting from Firewatch. Really, not many games or media in general have really nailed what the word “eerie” can be, but Pacific Drive did.
I feel like playing it again and again. One of the few games that didn’t get uninstalled when I completed it. I’ll just fire it up again now, probably.
You can find our review of Pacific Drive here on KeenGamer.
Pacific Drive
Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
Morgane Suquet: In essence, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is an incredible redefinition of the very nature of sequels, one that builds confidently on the achievements of its predecessor while injecting some newness into the concepts. The narrative probes very loudly into the human relationships binding such character icons as Cloud, Tifa, Aerith, and Barret, with scenes varyingly heartwarming, poignant, and painfully tragic. Bold narrative twists and enriched lore (Zack’s mystery and destiny, for one) keep any veteran in deep thought while winning accolades for honouring the originating spirit.
Gameplay does not fall short of a thousand different experiences; a tactical and real-time action melee combat system is in place with fluid combat, different methods of interacting with NPCs on request, and complete character diversity that fosters strategic options. Open-world exploration gives players the opportunity to uncover Gaia’s secrets in the vastness of the world filled with lore, while the different materia-l (materia, material, got it?) systems encourage customization.
Visually enlighted, it’s the power of the Unreal Engine to create lush environments, sophisticated character designs, and lifelike animations. The soundtrack, originally composed by Nobuo Uematsu (he worked on the song “No Promise To Keep” for this game) and then by Masashi Hamauzu and Mitsuto Suzuki for the re-recording, combines reimagined classics with new compositions for a connected cinematic experience.
Final Fantasy Rebirth strikes a perfect balance between nostalgia and innovation, serving as an emotionally charged and visually majestic odyssey of adventure. For all these reasons, it is more than just a game—it is a ride of a lifetime and my Game of the Year personally (and I can’t wait for the last part)!
You can read our Final Fantasy VII Rebirth review here on KeenGamer.
Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree
Youssef ‘Yuri’ ElKhedry: Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree is my vote for Game of the Year as it has not only surpassed my expectations but completely redefined what an ‘expansion’ is and can be.
The sheer amount of content present in this DLC makes it so that you are almost playing a sequel. This is without mentioning the sheer quality of the boss fights – some even surpassed those in the base game. With loads of new weapons, builds, encounters, and enemy types, this expansion had me hooked for endless hours.
All in all, it’s safe to say that while Shadow of the Erdtree still falls under the category of expansion packs, it is jam-packed to the brim with content that almost parallels that of the base game. Furthermore, the already critically acclaimed art style returns with a darker, more gritty art direction that immerses players further. If you haven’t picked up the DLC yet, this is your sign to do – it’s not just an expansion, it’s an experience.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree
Astro Bot
Marc Catalano: My pick for the best game of 2024 is none other than Team Asobi’s Astro Bot. Astro Bot is almost anachronistically good. Harkening back to a time when more big releases were bright and colorful, and chock full of fun mechanics and charming characters. A style of gaming that Nintendo has had a monopoly on for the past decade or two.
I fully believe that games can tell engaging narratives in ways that film and novels can’t. I love games like BioShock and Alan Wake for the amazing stories weaved through the interactive experience. However, as time has gone on, most big game developers and publishers seem to have developed a mindset that games can only be that way. Every game now has to be a hyper-realistic open-world roguelike, soulsborne, or walking simulator with about 50 cracks in the wall to shimmy through.
Gone is the simple enjoyment of charming series like Crash Bandicoot and Sly Cooper. But Astro Bot showed that there’s still a huge market for games of that style. As well as celebrating PlayStation’s criterion collection of IPs that they claim they don’t have, Astro Bot shows off the capabilities of the PlayStation 5 better than the fourth or fifth re-release of the same The Last of Us game ever could. Simple yet stunning visual presentation, tight and understandable controls, and more particle effects than your 5th-grade PowerPoint transitions.
To put it simply, Astro Bot is my pick for game of the year because it represents the antithesis of the progression of video games over the last 20 years. There are no live service elements. No microtransactions. All DLC (so far) has been completely free. No sacrifice of fun for the sake of “realism.” And, most importantly of all, it actually functioned at release without needing several patches. Let this be the wake-up call to Sony that causes them to finally revisit all their dormant beloved franchises that have been ignored for far too long.
Astro Bot
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
Jack Carson: Compared to the all-consuming might of Baldur’s Gate 3 last year, 2024 doesn’t really have a definitive Game of the Year. Sure, Astro Bot (rightfully) won Game of the Year at the Game Awards but other award shows gave that honour to a wide variety of other titles. 2024 had so many amazing games that it can be difficult to remember them all, especially the ones that were released so early on in the year. And that’s why, while Astro Bot was eventually the game which captured my platformer-neglected heart, I wanted to gush about the first game I fell in love with in 2024 and that was Ubisoft’s Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown.
From top to bottom, this is a phenomenal Metroidvania with some of the best sidescrolling combat I’ve ever played, with it managing to combine the fast, rapid action of Hollow Knight with the precision and spectacle of Sekiro. I don’t think anything else this year, aside from the pitter-patter of the haptics in Astro Bot, felt quite as tactile and satisfying as landing a parry in The Lost Crown to the point where I still think about it almost a full year later. Paired with fluid, almost effortless 2D parkour and you have easily one of the most gratifying gameplay loops I’ve ever played, even outside of sidescrollers.
The Lost Crown also goes above and beyond when it comes to understanding the fundamentals of the Metroidvania genre, namely in how it prioritises replayability and variety. Revisiting old areas with new abilities was a treat, not a chore, mainly down to how fun and experimental Sargon’s new powers often were. Every new area felt different and their various gimmicks rarely overstayed their welcome, letting you test your combative and platforming skills again and again without feeling burdened. I wanted to complete every quest, I wanted to find every collectable, and I desperately wanted to plot out the entire map of Mount Qaf because it was just so much fun.
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
I haven’t even mentioned the little details – the anime-esque flourishes, the stellar soundtrack, the beautiful, angular art style – because I know I’d be here all day. The lack of attention Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown received was, in my eyes, criminal because I know that it’s the kind of game we’ll look back on in five, ten, fifteen years with a storied remembrance, just like how many people do for the original Prince of Persia games.
It’s a shame, then, that the team who made this brilliant Metroidvania masterclass may never get to make another one, with Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown’s underperformance leading Ubisoft to disband the team and put them on other projects (although, how many of Ubi’s games actually perform well, nowadays?). If this is the last we see of Sargon, then I’m glad Ubisoft Montpellier were able to pull out all the stops to make one of the best Metroidvanias ever made. I really hope we get a sequel to The Lost Crown.
2024 Games of the Year
Those were our favourite games of 2024. What was your 2024 Game of the Year? Let us know in the comments and have a great 2025.
