So uhh, video games are good! And there are some coming out in 2025, which will hopefully be good. You saw the title didn’t you? Do I need to explain what this is about? Everyone makes lists like this, but they usually feature the same sets of games, but not me though. Yes, I’m fighting through depression induced writers block again. I’m depressed because the world sucks, but at least there’s good video games to look forward to.

I initially was not going to do an Anticipated Games list because the last time I did one, two of those games sucked, and four didn’t even get released that year (two of which still are not out). But then I realized, that’s just how life is. Sometimes, your expectations are proven to be all for naught, and you learn more about how to spot red flags. Also, the games here look quite a bit better than the ones on the last list, so let’s get right in, starting with…

10: The Backworld

We are starting off this list with a quirky EarthBound inspired RPG about The Backrooms. Hell yes, are putting together two of the most overdone horror tropes, but they’re overdone horror tropes that I like so I don’t care! In all honesty, there’s always going to be at least one EarthBound inspired RPG on my anticipated games of the year list, regardless of whether or not they involve depression. That being said, the number 10 spot was a tossup between this and Dreamed Away, since I didn’t want want the list to be flooded with EarthBound clones.

I went with The Backworld because combining these two premises for games puts a surprisingly unique twist on both of them. If you look up Backrooms games on Steam, you’ll see that most of them look like generic, realistic walking simulator/survival horror schlock. This goes in contrast to The Backrooms conception as a place outside of reality where the rules of nature don’t apply. The entire premise is based around “noclipping” out of reality. Not sure if you’re aware, but there’s no such thing as “noclipping” in real life. The entire project is just a bunch of gamer brained nerds seeing an image and constructing a video game like lore around it, yet the most these steam games can do is “run and hide from scary monsters.”

Adapting The Backrooms into an EarthBound clone makes a surprising amount of sense given that the latter relies on surreal, and often creepy imagery that balances on the border between charming and nightmarish. Both are also about exploring and immersing yourself into strange new worlds that get weirder as you go along. And from what I can see, it has the visuals and the audio down perfectly, and one can tell that this game will have some interesting shit to see and experience.

9: Doom: The Dark Ages

See, I’m capable of enjoying games that are remotely mainstream, though I almost didn’t include it on the list. Not because I’m NOT looking forward to it, but because I don’t know what to say about it. That is partially because Doom 2016 and Doom Eternal were almost universally well received, but also, I haven’t played those two yet. About a year ago I played through the classic Doom series, and intended to go through the series as a whole, but Doom 3 sucked hard and destroyed my motivation to continue with the series, so I decided to come back to them later.

I feel like this is may be the game on the list that I’m least likely to play in 2025 (aside from The Backworld if it is delayed until 2026), simply because I insist in playing games in order of release. That being said, they are games that I am looking forward to playing because I do in fact like blowing up demons with big fucking guns. Doom: The Dark Ages in particular, seems to tell about the Doom Slayer’s backstory as a medieval super weapon, which is only slightly more absurd than him wanting to rescue his pet rabbit.

Based on footage shown, Doom: The Dark Ages seems to have taken criticism of the previous game’s lighter tone into account, and is returning to the darker and grittier aesthetic of Doom 2016. This decision is a good one, because I love shit that is dark and creepy and involves lots of blood and gore. In fact, I don’t even like FPS games, I only played Doom to indulge my guro fetish, and I look forward to using Doom: The Dark Ages for that purpose, as well as our next entry.

8: Corpse Party II: Darkness Distortion

So, I am a pretty big Corpse Party fan, but this game is lower on the list for a few reasons. Namely, the visuals look incredibly cheap and also rough. Yeah, people have torn into the game for this, and it’s fair criticism, but also it’s the part of the game I care the least about, especially in horror games where this type of uncanny valley shit makes everything creepier. Also the same applied to Blood Drive, which I quite enjoyed… also they delayed it, so there should be some time to iron out some of the issues. That being said there is some skepticism on my part.

That all being said, I am looking forward to seeing what Team GrisGris’s take on this next game will be. I am assuming that this is an attempted reboot of the cancelled Dead Patient, since that one also took place in a hospital. I’m also quite curious about Ayame Kirishima, a name that is undoubtedly meant to draw parallels to Ayame from the previous trilogy, who played a major role in Blood Drive’s ending.

Corpse Party’s appeal has always been in its setting and writing, and despite the shitty looking visuals in the Pax West 2024 gameplay video, I still found myself drawn in just from the writing going on, and I do like what they are doing with the set of characters, as I do like the idea of the main protagonist being a streamer. While there has yet to be a Corpse Party game that lived up to the original, there’s also yet to be one that I actively disliked, so chances are there will at least be something I like about Darkness Distortion.

7: Dead End Aegis: Another Record

Okay, this is the one entry on the list that isn’t confirmed for a 2025 release, but you have to have at least one prediction. Thus far, the only Jast USA title confirmed for a 2025 release is Mojika: Truth Rears its Ugly Head (more on that one later), and it’s set for this month. Release date issues aside, there is one other oddity regarding this game. I’m looking forward to reading this visual novel, but I’m also dreading the fuck out of it. If you’ve read my review of DeadΩAegis, you know why.

I’ve covered some of the most depraved and fucked up games, yet there are only two that have genuinely traumatized me. The first of these was Starless: Nymphomaniac’s Paradise, which was also a terrible game, so I have no reason to look at any of its sequels. DeadΩAegis (pronounced Dead End Aegis) was the other one. Unlike Starless, DeadΩAegis is good, very good in fact. For something to have such a profound effect on me that I dread returning to its universe, in spite of how engaging its story and characters were, that’s both high praise, yet also a serious detriment. And for comparison, I can easily return to shit like Maggot Baits and Euphoria.

That sense of dread is why it’s only number 7 on this list, because it’s hard to get excited for more psychological trauma.

6: Oddventure

Here’s the other EarthBound inspired RPG on this list. God imagine being one month from release, but being only the second most well known Mother-like with the prefix “odd”, when the most famous one is vaporware. Anyway, some of you may remember the Kickstarter campaign for this from back in May on 2021, or from the 2021 Mother Direct. Yeah, there are so many EarthBound inspired RPGs that they had to stop making Mother Directs because there were too many… yes, I know that’s not why they stopped them, shut the hell up.

Anyway, Oddventure is now coming out, winter of 2014 is finally he…. oh fuck, that’s Oddity again. But seriously, I am looking forward to playing Oddventure, the jokes are just too easy to make. Right away, the most notable factor is easily the visuals. The animation is so much more vibrant and detailed than something like Undertale or LISA, or even Omori for that matter. It also looks like it’s going to have many elements from those games, such as meaningful choices or turn based battles with emotions as gameplay elements. I also love how the Steam page has “The friendly RPG where nobody has to die… but can. In a horrible way” listed as a feature.

There really isn’t much for me to say here, because my reason for wanting to play it is basically “it’s more of shit that I already liked,” and whatever unique factors that are present, such as the story, are shit I don’t find out until I play it. Yeah, that’s kind of the difficult thing about anticipated games lists, but we make do with what he have.

5: Demon Tides

So, I’ve been playing this game’s predecessor Demon Turf lately, and I’m quite enjoying it. I have lately been in a 3D collectathon platformer mood, which is why this and the next entry are so high up, aside from both of them looking real good. I will be reviewing Demon Turf in the future, but the short version is, “I like it, but it feels like it’s missing that special something that pushes it into one of my favs. My main issue is that it lacks the sense of atmosphere and immersion that most of my favorite 3D platformers have, between the linearity, the frequently re-used NPC lines and the fact that there’s so much fog everywhere. Again, I like Demon Turf, but I feel it would be a lot better with those things.

It’s a good thing that all of these look to be improved in the sequel Demon Tides. Right away, this trailer demonstrates the greatly improved visuals, and boasts a “massive open world.” Everything looks gorgeous and breathtaking, and there’s a lot of new shit added. For fucks sake, they even expanded on the fucking dress up system. God I fucking love Beebz, she’s so… you get the idea.

The main appeal to this series has always been the amount of style and drip that it has, and it looks like Demon Tides has that in spades. Hell it seems to have a lot more of that than the original game did, which is saying something. And assuming it maintains everything the first game did well, this is looking to be absolutely amazing.

4: Ruffy and the Riverside

Guys, I’m sure you’re very shocked to hear this, but I think I might like 3D platformers. I suppose that’s kinda shocking considering the two that made my 2023 anticipated list (those being Clive ‘N’ Wrench and SpongeBob: The Cosmic Shake) both sucked, though that year gave is Cavern of Dreams and Corn Kidz 64 to make up for it. I’ve been far more cautious with regards to 3D platformers given the horrifying realization that having a colorful mascot character and shit to collect doesn’t make your game good, and I think it’s much more likely for Demon Tides and Ruffy and the Riverside to succeed.

With regards to Ruffy, well, did you see that trailer? These visuals are beautiful! I also do like the recent trend of 3D platformers using sprites and 2D animation for their characters (was kinda surprised Demon Tides did away with that tbh), and I do like the Mario Odyssey influence with those 2D segments. The primary gimmick seems to be that you can swap the places of certain things and altar the environment, and that’s nice I guess, but it all depends on how it’s executed.

What really has me excited, is exploring the beautifully designed and varied world that this game looks to offer. There’s been no shortage of novelty N64 throwback platformers that don’t understand what made Mario 64 and Banjo-Kazooie so memorable to so many people, so this amazing visual style already gives me high hopes. If Yooka-Replaylee releases this year as well then I’ll certainly be in no shortage of shit to collect.

3: Henpri: Hentai Prison

I know that I’m most known for my reviews of visual novels and eroge, but I have found myself less interested in the genre as of late. Not enough to make me swear off VNs or anything, but I just find myself intimidated by the sheer scope of some VNs. You know that meme of the girl from Sabrina the Teenage Witch… Sabrina I think her name is, where she just has several plates of pancakes being brought to her, and she has this distressed look of being fed too much? That’s me with dark visual novels. The last major visual novel I reviewed was Kara no Shoujo, and it took me forever to finish that one cause it’s so long. It’s also part of a trilogy, and the other two are even longer. During the same year, two different Clockup Dark Eroge came out, and the Nekopara Devs made one that looks really fucked up/hot/awesome.

So, you may be wondering, what force on earth could get me to put a 60+ hour VN this high on my list? First of all, that length is why it’s not number 1, but more important… just look at it’s VNDB user rating. I don’t think I’ve seen another VN with that many perfect 10s relative to its total vote, while still having a large sample size. Hentai Prison is ranked 37 based on its average. For comparison, Kara no Shoujo is ranked 242, and Saya no Uta is 288.

On top of all of this, its premise is one that strikes a very personal chord to me as someone who is strongly passionate about artistic freedom, as well as something that instantly brings out my curiosity. I just know this one will be something special.

2: Mojika: Truth Rears its Ugly Head

This one, on the other hand, looks like it’s going to be fucked up, and I’m all the way here for it. We know it’s going to be fucked up entirely because Nitro plus is behind it, but its premise also has my interest piqued in just how morbid it is. Your main character is Tanezaki Suteru, who is apparently so ugly that “comparing him to an ugly duckling would insult ducks everywhere.” The bullying and harassment he sustains is made all the worse considering he can see the thoughts of others, and can see the twisted thoughts of his abusers. He decides to use this to get his revenge.

This premise resonates with me on a personal level, given that I’ve been a victim of harassment and bullying, and who has a tendency to see through the facade of most abusers. Now, I understand that this may just sound like some sort of incel woman hating edgelord shit to some, and I would have some apprehension if this was in the hands of a lesser creator. However, every experience I had with Nitro Plus has been stellar, and their work is commonly revered among the visual novel fandom. I’m sure it’s not for the type of people who thought Angel Dust was “offensive to CSA survivors,” but some of us quite enjoy it when art reflects the darker and uglier side of life.

On top of this, the artwork is done by Euphoria’s artist, which is also a bonus for any type of fucked up visual novel. I look forward to being traumatized by this one.

1: Off

And we’re back to EarthBound inspired RPGs, except not since Mortis Ghost didn’t even know about EarthBound when he made Off, so the similarity is coincidence. Nonetheless, I’m sure that the big surprise to you is that I never played the original. It’s been one that I’ve been meaning to get to for a while, so imagine my surprise when an enhanced remake is announced with added content, and that Toby Fox is doing the music for it.

For those that have not heard of this game, the basic premise of Off is that you play as a being known as the batter, and you are sent to purify each zone, and by purify, I mean kill everyone in. Off looks to be a very abstract and surreal looking game, with a very dark aesthetic to it, and you all know how much I love that weird shit. I must admit, I’ve kept my knowledge of this game vague because I wanted to go into it blind, but I can just tell that it’s something right up my alley.

This game has just about everything going for it, from the fact that the original is highly acclaimed, to it being commonly mentioned alongside some of my favorite games of all time such as EarthBound, Undertale, and Omori, it having that dark surrealist aesthetic that appeals to me, and even that fucking fangamer special edition that I can’t wait to sink my teeth into. Everything about this game just feels so… obvious that it’s going to be one of my favs. With everything else on this list, there’s at least some doubt that it could turn out disappointing, but I just know that won’t be the case with this one.

Honerable Mentions

Dreamed Away
Dragon Quest I & II HD-2D Remake
Lunar Remastered Collection
Suikoden I & II HD Remaster: Gate Rune and Dunan Unification Wars
Cairn: Mathair’s Curse
Demonschool
Devil’s Liminal
Blocks for Babies
Angeline Era
Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound
Orbo’s Exodus
Toree Saturn
Urban Myth Dissolution Center
Sea Fantasy
Beyond Citadel
Ender Magnolia: Bloom in the Mist
Bylina
Croc: Legend of the Gobbos Remastered
Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter

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