The end of 2024 has arrived, so it’s the perfect time to look back at the cool games launched last year. RPGs, action games, horrors, and more, fans of many genres ate quite well this year. So, one might ask, what would be the best games of the year to play if you wanted to have a high-quality, year-ending gaming marathon? And wouldn’t it cost a lot?
The answer to the former is: keep reading; recommendations are forthcoming. The answer to the latter is: not necessarily, especially if you visit G2A.COM and scout out great game-keys offers.
Enough chatter! Let’s talk about the hard-to-refute recommendations!
Myths and fantasies
It would be inappropriate to begin the list of recommendations with anything other than Black Myth Wukong. While obviously, unashamedly based on the Journey to the West, BMW is technically a sequel to it, and follows a different monkey, The Destined One, on an epic quest to find relics of the Monkey King, scattered after his demise at the hands of the divine army.
Black Myth is an engaging action game with elements inspired by Souls-likes. Most of your fighting will be done with a staff or a spear, although different combat styles, handy spells, and transformations bring a pleasant diversity to battles. It’s a great mix and it can make any boss fight (of which there are plenty) feel like an epic duel of powerful, mystically-gifted warriors.
If you’re keen on TPP action games and/or are a fan of the novel, it’s an absolute must-play.
Another fantasy game absolutely worth taking a look at is Metaphor: ReFantazio, created by people who also worked on the Persona and Shin Megami Tensei series. It takes place in the United Kingdom of Euchronia, currently in the middle of a succession crisis spurred by the untimely death of King Hythlodaeus V. The heir being cursed and comatose since before the events of the game certainly doesn’t make things any easier.
If you’re familiar with Persona, you will probably feel at home in Euchronia, and if you aren’t, you’re in for a wild, stylish ride. Metaphor: ReFantasio is as much an RPG, as it is a social simulation with a strong element of time management. Oh, there are also thrilling, turn-based battles, powered by the Archetypes, heroes of old lending you their power in a manner conveniently similar to classes from other games.
Real world with a twist
The next two games couldn’t be more different from one another, in every way, but most essentially: their tone.
Let’s start with Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, the latest full-scale game in the series formerly known as Yakuza. A direct sequel to Y7: Like a Dragon, it once again focuses on Ichiban Kasuga, a former Yakuza with an overactive imagination and a lifelong fan of the Dragon Quest series. IW takes the franchise overseas for the first time, as Ichiban travels to Hawaii on family business, while Kiryu, as secondary protagonist, deals with his own problems in Japan.
Infinite Wealth mixes serious plot, over-the-top side stories, disarmingly sincere writing, bouts of intense (turn-based) combat, and a ton of side-activities, including one about running a holiday resort. Slice-of-life, crime drama, fleshed-out settings. Like a Dragon in a nutshell.
On the completely different end there is Silent Hill 2, a cult-classic horror game from 2001 made by Team Silent at Konami, now recreated by Bloober Team. The story of a man called to a unsettling town by a letter from his dead wife has been an inspiration to horror games for over two decades. Now it enjoys modern graphics and gameplay improvements which make it the best way to experience this classic today.
Four against a horde
Finally, one absolutely must at least consider Helldivers 2, this year’s runaway multiplayer hit. It’s a PvE game for up to four players in co-op, sending you and your friends against hordes of robots and giant bugs who threaten the managed democracy of Super Earth.
Much like Arrowhead Game Studios’ previous games (such as Magicka), Helldivers 2 doesn’t take itself very seriously, the satire is dripping off every word, but the gameplay is crunchy, satisfying, and very good at balancing silly fun with nail-biting focus.
Lots to play before 2025
These games are just five out of all titles which made (or should have made!) a splash this year, but one shouldn’t forget about other 2024 hits. The delightfully X360-style Space Marine 2, the fascinating experiment of Capcom’s Kunitsu-Gami, a bombastic adaptation of a manga and anime classic in DRAGON BALL: Sparking! ZERO, and many others all deserve a chance to enrich your library before 2025 starts dropping its own hits.
Both now and in the foreseeable future, you could save a lot of money, if you seek these titles out on the G2A.COM Marketplace, where deals are good enough to let you fit more games into your budget than you’d be able to elsewhere.
Don’t let yourself miss out on incredible games!
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