Astro Bot is easily my Game of the Year and it's not close. Back during the leadup to the PS5's reveal, Astro's Playroom was one of the games I was really interested in playing and when I finally got the console in 2022, I was not disappointed and it ended up being my #2 game of that year. Needless to say, I was very excited when this game got announced and had very high expectations, expectations which the game managed to exceed.

It expands upon everything that made Playroom so great and tops it with some of the most fun and most creative levels I've ever played in a 3D Platformer. The powerups are more varied than Playroom and it largely ditches the lesser gimmicks of that title. The bosses are large, epic spectacles that trounce basically every other set of bosses in other platformers. The soundtrack is just as great as Playroom's, loaded with catchy tunes that are sure to make any enjoyer of Video Game music add it to their regular rotation. The entire game is filled to the brim with charm and little touches that, along with everything else, made for an experience where I was almost always smiling. The game is perfectly polished, with no bugs or performance problems. The very few problems I have with the game amount to nitpicks like not being able to increase the camera turning speed, or the music being quiet when you're not using headphones.

Astro Bot is one of the best 3D Platformers I've ever played, and considering that it's my favorite video game genre and that I've played quite a few games within it, that's no small feat. It rivals some of Mario's best adventures, imo topping even Super Mario Galaxy. It is the PS5's best game, and THE reason to own one. If you can play it, you absolutely should.

I've always been a big fan of Mario Party, and other fans of the series will likely know that the series went through a dark era. Starting with Mario Party 9, the direction of the series changed for the worse. It took until 2018's Super Mario Party for the series to finally begin moving back in the right direction, though that game still had a lot of issues. 2021's Mario Party Superstars was a proper return to form and it topped my list that year, but it was still a collection of old boards and minigames. My hope was that NDCube would follow it up with a proper new title that takes after the foundation of Superstars, and I'm very happy to say that they did just that.

Super Mario Party Jamboree is easily the best Mario Party entry since Mario Party DS all the way back in 2007, and it's a contender for being one of the best entries in the whole series. The game has 5 new boards and 2 classic ones, all of which feel distinct from each other and the news one feel very original. Unlike many previous entries, there aren't multiple boards that I don't care to play on. With the exception of the Goomba board, I really enjoyed all of the boards on offer. The core mechanics are largely ripped from Superstars, though there are some additions to help give the game a more unique identity.

The minigames are largely great too and there are very few duds in the lineup, though some games feel like they belong in the classic battle game category that was first ditched in Superstars instead of being in the regular rotation as free for all minigames (Hot Cross Blocks goes on too long for this, same with the Key game). The biggest issue with the game is that if you decide to play without motion controls (which forces you to use JoyCons if enabled), the minigame selection will be one of the smallest in the series and you'll quickly get through all of them.

The game has some fun sidemodes on offer as well. Koopathlon and Bowser's Kaboom Squad are fun online modes to play here and there, the Story mode is a cute, chill little adventure, and I can't speak on the rest since I haven't gotten to them yet. The game also has an achievement system that governs progression towards unlocking various things which I thought was neat.

I could probably go on longer but this is already getting really wordy so I'll end by saying that I really loved this Mario Party game. If you're someone who was turned off by games in that dark age, rest assured knowing that Mario Party has finally moved on from that..

Soulsbornes have been one of many things that I was interested in trying out but never got into for the longest time due to my primary gaming interests lying elsewhere and the intimidation of trying one. I never expected that it'd be this year that I'd get into them, but after seeing this game on sale for just $10, and after getting more hooked than expected on my brief "make sure it works" play session, I fully dived in.

Despite getting my ass kicked in the early hours, Father Gascoigne especially took me a very long time, I never considered dropping it because I was having a lot of fun and knew that I could push through eventually. After breaking down the wall that was Gascoigne, I got better and better and impressed myself. Beating Vicar Amelia on my second try is now one of my proudest gaming moments ever. I really enjoyed my time going through the game and have since played Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1-3, and I'm now 20 hours into Elden Ring. And yet, this game still remains my favorite one.

This game's focus on agressive play over the more defensive styles of most of the other games, in addition to it's higher speed, really jived with me in a way that most of the others didn't. The levels and bosses were mostly great, compared to imo weaker selections in most of the other games. I still don't like the blood vial grinding or the obtuse and cryptic stuff the game loves to do (Seriously, how am I supposed to know that killing the Blood Starved Beast in Old Yharnam randomly opens a door in the Chapel?) but despite that, I really enjoyed my time with this game and look forward to replaying it in the future now that I have the DLC.

I was one of the few people who actually had a Wii U and thus one of the few to play the original Splatoon. While it lacked content at launch, I had a lot of fun playing it online and so when a sequel was announced for the then upcoming Nintendo Switch, I of course got it. Like most online games, I played it for a bit when it was new and then dropped it.

For whatever reason I decided to pick it up again this year and got way more into it than I had in the past. That alone kinda makes it an odd inclusion for this list, but this year was when I finally made my way through the campaign in the first game and in this one, and I had a good amount of fun with the campaign. Some decently creative levels and bosses, though imo the levels can go on a bit too long.

The last year has been very good for Mario RPG fans and this game was the start of that. I owned the SNES version on Wii Virtual Console but hadn't ever gotten far into it and this was the perfect opprotunity to finally fully play Mario's first RPG. It was a lot of fun and the battle system was a real highlight. Exploration was solid and dialogue was enjoyable, though I feel like the story is a bit basic compared to what some later games would do.

This is a game I've played through in previous years where I hadn't made a list but I did do a replay this year since they added trophies to it on PS5. Toy Story 2 remains a surprinsgly good 3D collectathon from the N64/PS1 era that holds up better than many of it's contemporaries. Add in a great soundtrack and brezzy runtime of just a few hours and it's always a nice one to go back too.

So far this is my second favorite Soulsborne and you can probably guess why if you read through my explanation for Bloodborne. It's the closest to matching it's faster, more agrressive playstyle and it has a great set of bosses that get really hard as the game progresses. It probably should be my favorite entry tbh, and I can't quite point to why it isn't. Maybe it's the lack of cohesion compared to other games, or the overload of the grey, dull color choices that I'm not a fan of.

I'm only a couple hours into this game but I wanted to include it since it's been very fun thus far and I doubt it'll be seen on many other lists since it's release went under the radar. It's a spiritual successor to the Goemon games and it's pretty solid linear 3D Platformer with a bit of a combat focus. I recommend giving it a look.

Figures I'd pay $60 for a cart not too long before a $6 digitial re-release, what luck. Either way this is a pretty solid mascot platformer that improves in many ways over the original game. It's much easier and has a password system, control feels better, and the levels are largely better designed. There's still some annoying bosses, the game loses a bit of the first game's circus theming, and the soundtrack imo is a signifcant downgrade, but I still had a good amount of fun playing through it.

Super fun co-op indie game about trying to get scrap while avoiding monsters, highly recommended.