🔗 Share this article

Well, how was this year in your family? Was it truly wonderful as you pretended on online? Packed with A-grades for your offspring and riotous costume celebrations for the parents? Or was it a ocean of frustration with only rare enjoyable moments? Could any part be actually real, or have we all become digitally altered synthetic personas with unrealistic smiles?

I've assembled everyone for a reflection, willing or unwilling, to discuss the paramount thing in twelve months: what titles we enjoyed the most. Without further ado:

Title Oldest Daughter Played the Most

Just Dance 2024

"Why can't you pick just one?"

"This isn't my games column."

In the mobile realm, she's invested time in Cityscapes and "searching for decent healthcare."

"In the game?"

"In the actual world."

Release Second Son Played the Most

Overwatch

"I refuse to play games on my phone." He seemed insulted that I suggested it. Point taken.

Game Youngest Daughter Played the Most

Resident Evil Biohazard

Her goal is to get into theatre school, but when she wasn’t singing, she was playing Resident Evil. She also spoke at length in great detail about her achievements on The Sims, where her avatar has a thriving utopia with far better healthcare than her older sibling has in the real world.

Game the Wife Played the Most

Crash Bandicoot: It’s About Time

She began the year at sixty percent completion and finished the year at eighty-two percent. It's a long haul not a sprint for her. On her phone: something called Woodle, where you have to remove pins.

Title I Found Amusing That My Kids for Still Playing

Minecraft

Whenever I see my 21-year-old son playing Minecraft, I set about him like a cross between a persistent critic. When he objects, I reply that I am doing this to prepare him so he can grow up and play games for mature audiences. It’s a very Scottish father/son relationship.

Most Notable Gaming Family Member of the Year

Eldest Daughter on Just Dance 2024

It wasn't even close for this one. She is unstoppable. Superior than I was at my peak gaming days in my prime.

Title I Played the Most

Marvel Snap

It was in a league of its own to the hours I spent on this remarkably well-crafted card game digital pastime, with its regularly updated range of cards and game variations.

Title I Wish I Had Played Less

Marvel Snap

The downside about games that frequently update their range is you wake up one day and see it is all just an attempt to trap you with fear-of-missing-out driven microtransactions. So love turned to hate halfway through the year and it got uninstalled.

Title I Wish I Had Played More

Doom: The Dark Ages

Glorious reinvention of a iconic franchise. Captivating atmosphere from the off. I wish I could dispatch my demons so effectively in real life.

Title I Wish I Had Played More (Thoughtful Edition)

Blue Prince

I'm unwilling to rush this gorgeous, distinctive game and I just was short on the focused attention to give it what it required earlier this year. With relatives staying over the festive period, I plan to dive into this in the wee small hours after appropriate hospitality.

Title That Kept Me Sane When I Needed It

Balatro

I'm aware Balatro was last year's sleeper hit, but I was a late adopter. And it is incredible. It just gets each element right. Crazy Poker is a wonderful concept, but the effects behind the different joker cards are so imaginative it has become a game I literally would play at any hour. Add in the charm of the card design, and this is an absolute high-water mark of gaming. I wouldn't mind being stuck in a broken-down lift for hours just so I have an opportunity but play it.

Game I Got the Most Flak For Criticising

Outer Worlds 2

I received a bit of backlash when I wrote about how a specific bug in another game soured the experience for me, but that other title is still a massive gaming achievement in terms of art, sound, acting – which I appreciated even more after slogging through Outer Worlds 2. So my appreciation goes out to the reader who took the time to write in to say that my Outer Worlds 2 review was "bitter, confused resentment". I share that as written, because I appreciate the effort, and he is obviously an astute judge of character.

Game Everybody Loved That I Just Didn’t Get

Hollow Knight: Silksong

Alright. Give me a bastard-hard exploration-focused thing and leave me without guidance on what I am supposed to be doing, except "figure it out". Great fun. I understand that it looks ace and is flawless if you are into this kind of thing, but I cannot think of a gaming experience I desire less in my mid-fifties. I was around back when all games were like this, and I’ve had enough. It was fine when I was a kid, but so was many questionable things.

Biggest Gaming Scandal of 2025

Close call between questionable alliances that caused concern, and high launch costs. Both ethically dubious and repugnant.

Games I Would Name My Children After, Were I I Was Ever Foolish Enough to Have More

Clair Obscur, Despelote and Bananza would all make interesting names called from the doorstep at tea time.

Part of My Body That Aches Most From Gaming

Right Thumb Joint. No joke. I don’t know if it’s because of button mashing or doomscrolling, but it burns like the mines of sulphur in the mornings now. I knew I should have got my thumbs protected back in the 90s.

Game I Am Looking Forward to the Most in 2026

Grand Theft Auto VI.
And it will come out in 2026, even if we have to wait patiently until the heat death of the universe.

Game I Am Looking Forward to the Most in 2036

The Witcher 4.