2023 has been an uncommonly busy year for gaming, every month crammed with long-awaited blockbusters, massive sequels, and even high calibre remakes of beloved classics dominating players’ time and leaving us all with a mounting pile of shame. Yet alongside glossy showcases such as Starfield or Zelda, there have been a host of quirky indie games and unexpected contenders, often showing up practically unannounced – looking at you, Hi-Fi Rush – that have managed to stand shoulder to shoulder with AAA titles and sweep awards categories around the world.
Read on to see what makes Empire’s ranking of the best 2023 had to offer!
20) Aliens: Dark Descent
Platforms: PC, Xbox, PS5 / PS4
It might have taken the better part of four decades, but this year we were finally presented with an Aliens adaptation worthy of the title. A real-time, squad-based tactical survival horror rather than the blazing shooter you might expect, this unbearably tense strategy game takes pages from the Xcom playbook, but gives them a unique and effective twist as you and your squad climb aboard an express elevator to hell. The interface is clunky and the launch version had more than a few (non-Xenomorph) bugs to stamp out but there’s no denying how lovingly developer Tindalos’ title captures the oppressive atmosphere and particular aesthetic of the 1986 sequel. From the whine of the motion tracker, to the crackle of the pulse rifles and even the James Horner-adjacent score, every thread of Dark Descent feels pulled from the movie, making the game an exhilarating ride and even allowing you to customise your marines to reflect their on-screen counterparts (almost mandatory). It’s almost impossibly hard at times, but even that plays to the game’s strengths — the sense of overwhelming horror when you realise that you’re boxed in with no way out and no chance of survival is as panic-inducing as James Cameron intended.
19) Amnesia: The Bunker
Platforms: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
The Amnesia series has long established itself as one of the best horror franchises around, but The Bunker proves itself the scariest yet. Set in the middle of World War I, players inhabit French solder Henri Clement, trapped in the eponymous underground facility by cowardly superior officers, and hunted by a creature known only as ‘The Beast’. With the monster vulnerable only to light, The Bunker is a masterclass in tension as Henri struggles to keep a lonely generator chugging along just for a measly dim glow. Staying put isn’t an option though, and every step into the depths searching for a way out or even just fuel for your greatest ally – the generator – is a claustrophobic nightmare. It’s how the game evolves on its predecessors that impresses though, with the catacombs a semi-open world to explore as you dare, and more opportunities for emergent gameplay thanks to the freedom to experiment with tools. With each attempt to escape offering its own dark delights, horror fans may never want to leave The Bunker.
18) Lies Of P
Platform: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
While Elden Ring may have set a new standard for Soulsborne games with its vast open world packed with secrets, in Lies of P, Korean developer Neowiz proved there’s still plenty of life left in the genre’s earlier staples. Loosely adapting the original Pinocchio novel, this sees Geppetto’s “son” wandering the stunning belle epoch city of Krat, where automatons have run rampant and slaughtered their human former masters – at least, the humans who aren’t afflicted by a horrific plague. Brisk combat, incredibly unsettling enemy designs, and meticulously planned labyrinthine environments make this an easy highlight of the year – but maybe not one for anyone who finds puppets creepy.
17) Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty
Platform: PC, PS5, Xbox
The core Cyberpunk 2077 suffered a pretty disastrous launch back in 2020, but years of updates and improvements culminated here, with a full 2.0 release of the core game joined by a meaty expansion. And what an expansion – Phantom Liberty delivered a massive 20+ hour campaign in the new Dogtown district of the neon hellscape that is Night City, with hacker V drawn into a mission to rescue the President of the New United States. As an action/spy romp seamlessly embedded into flow the main game, it already impresses with a host of new abilities, weapons, and vehicles to master, but it’s the cinema-quality turns by Hollywood A-listers Idris Elba as government agent Solomon Reed and Keanu Reeves (reprising his base game role as digital ghost Johnny Silverhand) that cements this as the true epic Cyberpunk 2077 always aimed at being. The comeback kid of 2023.
16) Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandora
Platform: PC, PS5, Xbox
Announcing a game in 2017, then almost sneaking its release out six years later is usually a bad sign – and for movie tie-ins, often an even worse one. Yet Frontiers of Pandora defies expectation, proving itself a surprisingly engaging return to the Avatar universe. Running adjacent to James Cameron’s films, your role as a Na’vi child raised in human captivity and forced to reconnect with their roots after Sully’s big screen rebellion fits neatly with the anti-colonialism themes of the movies, while its open-world gameplay is the perfect genre to exhibit the vibrant, living planet. The game’s mix of exploration, crafting, and first-person combat won’t win awards for originality, but it applies those mechanics more masterfully than most to bring Pandora to life.
15) Hi-Fi Rush
Platforms: PC, Xbox
Dropping out of nowhere like a hot new mix tape back in January, Hi-Fi Rush is the latest work from Tango Gameworks. It’s a real oddity though – rather than a chilling survival horror like the studio’s The Evil Within series, or a supernaturally tinged action-adventure like Ghostline: Tokyo, it’s a colourful, cartoonish rhythm-action game. While a massive departure from what players may expect of the developer, Hi-Fi Rush is an absolute blast, with its madcap plot – you play wannabe rock star Chai, whose futuristic iPod gets embedded in his chest in a cybernetic upgrade gone wrong, giving him the ability to fight in time with the beat of the world around him – gorgeous comic book-inspired visuals, and, of course, killer soundtrack making for one of the best surprises of the year. With such meticulously crafted music-focused gameplay, it’s no surprise it won Best Audio Design at The Game Awards this year.
14) Fire Emblem Engage
Platform: Switch
The latest entry in Nintendo’s turn-based strategy series was simultaneously a mix of fan service and forward thinking. With returning characters from past Fire Emblems serving as spirit partners to Emblem’s new cast of heroes – led by Alear, the Divine Dragon, prophesised to save the world of Elyos from the forces of the Fell Dragon – its story was something of a tour of the franchise’s past. It was in the combat itself that Emblem felt like an evolution though, keeping the specificity of the turn-based model but allowing a spectacular degree of customisation for each warrior. From weapon specialisations to skills inherited from training with those returning figures between battles, there’s near-infinite potential for how you develop your army. While not quite as ambitious as 2019’s Three Houses, Emblem serves up all the tactical and strategic planning fans of the series crave, while proving a great entry point for newcomers.
13) Armored Core VI: Fires Of Rubicon
Platform: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
Before becoming synonymous with grimdark fantasy epics and gruelling combat with the Dark Souls series, FromSoftware was probably best known for its Armored Core games, where mountainous mechs clash in frenzied battle on a ruined future Earth. It’s been over a decade since the last entry, but 2023 showed there’s plenty of fuel in the tank with this resurgent instalment. The plot is loose – humanity is now battling over resources on a distant planet, with your mercenary main character caught between factions – but ultimately plays second fiddle to delivering the searing metal and clashing arms of the real stars: the giant honkin’ robots. Seemingly endless upgrades and customisation options are available to tailor your mech against the legions of war machines you’ll be clashing with, while generous checkpointing lets you experiment on the fly, and an unexpectedly speedy movement system makes it all feel like you’re living your mecha anime dreams.
12) Starfield
Platform: PC, Xbox
One of the most ambitious games of the year, if not the decade, Starfield promised players the universe – and almost delivered. Although its scale and complexity work against it at times, this vast space opera delivers a galaxy’s worth of planets to explore, all while unravelling a mystery that might pre-date existence itself. Its overlapping systems – combat, exploration, diplomacy, base building, space shootouts, and more – mean there’s something here for everyone, and like developer Bethesda’s Fallout and Elder Scrolls series, there’s no ‘right’ way to do anything, so your journey is quite literally what you make of it. Unfettered freedom in an awe-inspiring cosmos – what more could you ask for?
11) Pikmin 4
Platform: Switch
Nintendo’s shrunk-down strategy series has always offered players a microcosm of whimsy, balancing diminutive interplanetary visitors humorously cataloguing “alien” objects that will be strangely familiar to human-sized players, with exploration and combat that test mastery of the eponymous plant-animal hybrids and their unusual abilities. Pikmin 4 updates the formula though, bringing in a host of new Pikmin – including eerie Glow Pikmin, stars of new nocturnal tower defence levels – and an emphasis on “dandori”: the art of mastering efficiency, challenging you to allocate your swarms of Pikmin in perfect order to overcome tight, time-based challenges. As charming as ever but now with tighter mechanics and possessed of greater focus in every aspect of the game, Pikmin 4 stands as the best in the series yet.
10) Final Fantasy XVI
Platform: PS5
The Phoenix plays an important role in Final Fantasy XVI – fitting, then, that this proved to be a rebirth for the decades-old series. While it all but abandons any lingering pretences of being an RPG, FFXVI still delivers all the weirdness and idiosyncrasies that mark it out as part of the series. Brooding swordsman? Check, in leading man Clive Rosfield. Inscrutable but high stakes politics with the fates of millions in the balance? Check, with the feudal nations of Valisthea, warring over territory using the series’ familiar elemental summons as terrifying weapons of mass destruction. Unexpected emotional gut punches when you least expect them in the story? Check, for many spoileriffic reasons. It’s all bolstered by one of the smoothest battle systems in years, fast and furious enough for action gamers but with just enough customisation and tactics to satiate the series’ longer term fans. Square Enix risked everything with this wholesale reinvention of what a core, numbered, mainline Final Fantasy can be – and thankfully, that risk paid off.
9) Star Wars Jedi: Survivor
Platforms: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
Surely it’s only a matter of time before Cal Kestis makes the leap from games to the big screen, right? After all, the young Jedi – one of scant few to escape Order 66 – now has two blockbuster action-adventures to his name, and both are on par with the best of the cinematic Star Wars. Building on 2019’s Fallen Order, Survivor continues Cal’s story in the years between the Prequel and Original Trilogies, now working from the shadows against the Empire. Rather than repeat all the tricks of the first game though, developer Respawn has refined everything to perfection – there’s less planet hopping, but the environments you explore are better realised – bigger, more populated, and filled with meaningful side quests. Cal’s Jedi skills have evolved too, with five lightsaber stances to tailor responses to every threat the galaxy throws at you, and a few new Force tricks such as animal taming. It’s all wrapped up in what’s a contender for 2023’s best looking game, a dazzlingly realised world that could put Lucasfilm to shame. Huh, maybe Cal doesn’t need a movie, after all…
8) Street Fighter 6
Platforms: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
The best thing about Street Fighter 6 is just how gloriously weird it is. Sure, it’s immediately a best-in-class brawler, with a beefy roster of 18 new and returning World Warriors to get to grips with. And yes, its combat is both reassuringly familiar to long-time fans but also deliciously tactical thanks to the new Drive gauge system, allowing you to counter or reverse opponents’ attacks, or unleash ferocious Drive Impact assaults on your unfortunate victims. And sure, with classic controls, streamlined modern inputs, and even an AI-assisted ‘Dynamic’ mode, it’s the most accessible Street Fighter ever. But what really sets it apart though is World Tour – a Yakuza-lite, RPG-esque mode where your deliriously customisable fighter travels the globe, learning “the true meaning of strength” from key characters, all while getting into scraps with everyone from passing office workers to cardboard box-wearing delinquents. It’s bonkers, we love it, and you will too.
7) Diablo 4
Platforms: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
You’re knee deep in mud and bones, surrounded by a ravenous legion from the pits of hell itself… and having the time of your life. Such is the bloody spectacle of Diablo IV, an 11-years-in-the-making return to form for Blizzard’s action RPG series after the murky experiment of the mobile-focused Diablo Immortal. Chasing down Lilith, Daughter of Hatred, is the ostensible aim of the game, but this a world so crammed with side quests, compelling supporting characters, and emergent storytelling that it’s all too easy to find yourself straying for hours at a time. With bountiful potential for character builds and a giddying amount of loot dropping from every fell beast and greedy bandit you slay to customise them with, there’s no end to Diablo IV’s dark delights.
6) Resident Evil 4
Platforms: PC, PS4 / PS5, Xbox
2023 was in some ways the year of the remake – see also, System Shock, Dead Space, Metroid Prime: Remastered – but when they’re as good as this reimagined Resi 4, we can’t complain. Leon S Kennedy’s Spanish vacation, taking in the sights and sounds of dilapidated towns and meeting (not-so-)friendly parasite-infected villagers as he tries to rescue the US president’s daughter, was an immediate high point for the series back in 2005, and nearly two decades later, Capcom has made it even better. It all looks stunning, of course, but it’s small mechanical refinements that have outsized impacts, elevating the whole experience. The new ability to crouch, for instance, further heightens the fear factor as you try to sneak around undetected, while being able to parry attacks with your knife reduces the original’s reliance on quick-time events. Along with some judicious tweaking of the plot, better explaining the origins of Las Plagas parasites and further establishing supporting characters, this is the definitive version of arguably the best Resi game.
5) Alan Wake II
Platform: PC, PS5, Xbox
After 2019’s Control revealed the events of the original Alan Wake were merely one case investigated by the mysterious Federal Bureau of Control, the thought of returning for another dose of weirdness focused on the titular tormented horror writer felt… small. Those fears proved unfounded though, as Alan Wake II takes some of the biggest and best ideas from its shared universe sibling and weaves them into a multilayered tale that will have you questioning reality itself. Alternating between Wake, trapped in a twisted reality seemingly drawn from his own novels, and new character Saga Anderson, an FBI agent investigating a string of murders in the setting of the first game, this leans more into survival horror than either of its predecessors, but doesn’t lose any of the deranged charm writer/director Sam Lake infuses into his works. By the time the final page is turned, we’re left with just one question – can we have Control II next, please?
4) Marvel’s Spider-Man 2
Platform: PS5
Building on the success of 2018’s debut Spider-Man game and it’s shorter-but-tighter 2020 sequel, Spider-Man: Miles Morales, was always going to be tough; both set the bar for superhero adventures so high that you’d need webshooters and spider-like agility to clear it. Amazingly, this surpasses it by focusing on both Spectacular Spider-Men at once, offering a classic Marvel Team-Up as players swap between Miles and Peter, allowing them to protect the sensationally realised New York – now expanded to include Brooklyn and Queens – with either of the webbed wonders’ unique power sets. Stakes are ratcheted even higher with the introduction of fan-favourite Venom, but unlike Sam Raimi (forced to include the villain in 2007’s Spider-Man 3), developer Insomniac actually wants the monstrous antihero in its game, and the symbiote’s presence – and the impact it has on Peter – adds a powerful twist to how the saga spins out. Like all the best comics though, the real strength of Spider-Man 2 is in its characters, balancing blow-out action sequences with heart-rending moments of personal drama. The real king of the (web)swingers.
3) Super Mario Bros. Wonder
Platform: Switch
For Mario’s first all-new, traditional 2D platformer in years, Nintendo could have simply played the classics and still walked away with an award winner. Instead, Wonder is absolutely crammed with new stuff – bonkers enemies requiring fresh tactics, imaginative power-ups, collectible badges that can be equipped to further modify abilities, characters hidden away in the overworld maps waiting to be found, and much more besides. It’s the utterly delightful approach to design that cements this as an instant classic – pick up a Wonder Flower and the world around you warps and shifts, almost as if Mario has eaten a very different kind of mushroom, providing wild and unpredictable gameplay moments each time. Factor in the largest playable cast ever seen in a Mario game and a fantastic multiplayer mode, and Nintendo has a new contender for best 2D Mario ever.
2) The Legend Of Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom
Platform: Switch
Nintendo’s long-awaited follow-up to Breath of the Wild builds on the success of that landmark entry in the series, with another adventure exploring the fallen kingdom of Hyrule. However, this time Link both takes to the skies and plumbs the depths of the world, uncovering ancient secrets amidst a time-twisting story that ranks as one of the best in the series. It’s Link’s suite of new powers that marks this out as an all-time great though, particularly Ultrahand – the ability to attach, combine, and build with almost any object in the world. Used in conjunction with technological gadgets from the ancient Zonai, Ultrahand has given creative builders the freedom to craft almost anything they can imagine, from enemy-hunting tanks to giant robots and aerial death machines. Long after peace has been restored to Hyrule, players will be experimenting and tinkering with Tears of the Kingdom, cobbling together weird and wonderful creations for years to come.
1) Baldur’s Gate III
Platform: PC, PS5, Xbox
Number one? As if there was any doubt. While it’s built on a years-long Early Access window, the full and final release of Baldur’s Gate III has been nothing short of a revelatory gaming experience, condensing everything great about the underlying Dungeons & Dragons system into a fantasy epic where players can do… honestly, almost anything they like. The game kicks off with you escaping Mindflayers – unfortunately with one of their parasitic spawn nuzzling inside your cranium – but what you do after that, and how you go about it, is entirely up to you. Charm, rob, sneak, or battle your way across the world, romance your party members or treat them like chattel, make allies of enemies or kill them from afar with a well-aimed fire bolt – whatever you do, Baldur’s Gate III morphs and adapts to ensure every playthrough is an entirely new experience. With an incredible voice cast bringing the game’s assortment of memorable characters to life (it wouldn’t be Baldur’s Gate without the return of D&D legends Misc and Boo) and nigh-infinite replayability, this is unquestionably the finest game of 2023.
