2024 may not have been the best of the decade so far, but now at this halfway point, we’re ready to look to the future! We kicked off last year with a look at our most anticipated pieces of media (or events!) in 2024, and this time we’re narrowing the playing field by choosing five each! Join Allan, Emmett, Graydon, and Josh as they ring in the new year with their Top 20 of 2025! Will all of their wishes come true? God, I hope so. We deserve it, dude.

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Allan Muir

1. Avowed

I love just about every game I have played that was developed by Obsidian Entertainment. From Knights of the Old Republic II to The Outer Worlds I have been immersed in the worlds of their games. The former partly was due to the game being set in the Star Wars universe, with the latter being from the minds of Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky.

For those who have been living within a cone of blissful ignorance for the past decade; Avowed is an action-adventure game set within the world of Pillars of Eternity aka some of the best CRPGs of the past decade. It would be difficult for me to summarize Pillars 1 and 2 within a paragraph so when I say both Pillars of Eternity games are MUST plays, I mean it.

While there are “negative” headlines around the internet regarding the art director being spread on Twitter and YouTube, I frankly don’t see what the big deal is. Let the game speak for itself and not what grifters want you to believe.

2. Lost Records: Bloom & Rage

Don’t Nod has held a special place inside my heart for the past five years… It wasn’t until I played Life is Strange back in February of 2019 that I was set on a journey of self-discovery in which I learned a lot about myself and without subsequent narrative games from Don’t Nod such as Life is Strange 2 and Tell Me Why that I still have things to discover within my state of being.

I am incredibly interested in the release situation for Lost Records with the first part being released in February With the way that I have been feeling as I play Life is Strange: Double Exposure, I need something that evokes the feel of those earlier games. From the limited number of videos I have let myself watch I am interested in seeing how things will materialize based off said trailer footage.

3. Civilization VII

What can I say about Civilization that has not been said already by every single person who plays the games? What I can say is that I have not been this excited about a Civ game since Civ 5 about fifteen years ago. Despite owning the most recent releases in the series (Civ V, VI, Beyond Earth), I was not able to stay engaged with VI and Beyond Earth as the vast backlog of comics, manga, books, movies, anime, and video games have been… draining on my ability to do much of anything consistently lately.

Even when factoring in Civ VI I was always interested in the concept of things such as rising sea levels, disasters, diseases, etc. When I was playing Civ VI recently I did not do so well when playing as Rome in a scenario dealing with the dark ages. Despite not doing well in that playthrough it did the job as I wanted to keep putting in more time. Aside from Avowed, this is my most anticipated game of the year.

4. The Outer Worlds 2

As mentioned above, The Outer Worlds is one of my favorite games of the past five years. It was the first true installment in a Tim Cain/Leonard Boyarsky game I played, as I was not that aware of the games put out by Troika, be it Vampire The Masquerade: Bloodlines, Arcanum, or Temple of Elemental Evil. The Outer Worlds was not only an extremely enjoyable game but a smaller-scale RPG which I really could use more of these days.

As with Lost Records, I have not looked at much, if any, of the trailers, screenshots, or anything that could give any expectations that could affect my perception of the game. Ironically, the Fallout TV series has had me thinking about The Outer Worlds more and more with the themes and views of that first season.

5. Whatever Comes Next For Fallout 76

Ever since I decided to put more time into Fallout 76, I have realized that it is finally a fun experience. It wasn’t until signing up for Fallout 1^st that made me really enjoy/appreciate the game and more importantly, the player community. I have been playing the game in one capacity or another since the beta back in 2018. While I can see where criticism can be made toward the implementation of NPCs into the game, altering the tone of what the game had up until the Wastelanders update allowed it to gain a new identity.

Despite the various theories about Fallout 76’s place in the canon of the series, a lot of the stories I’ve discovered within the game have been far more interesting than what I found in Fallout 4. That said, considering how long Fallout 76 has been running I am very interested in how things will be handled once the decision is made to end the stories and world of Appalachia.