Archive for the ‘Lists’ Category

1 Jan

Best of 2025 Closer

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Lists. Tagged: , , , , , , .

I don’t know about you, but 2025 was a long year for me – in a good way – and I have no intention of letting 2026 blow past uneventfully either. But there was a great deal of closure in entertainment media last year: Hollow Knight: Silksong, Hades II‘s full release, the Switch 2 console, the Fantastic Four in the MCU, the debut of the all-new “DCU”, and the (likely) end of the Mission Impossible saga all became realities at last after years of hype, Xbox completed its transformation into a third-party publisher after years of… the opposite of hype, and this site finally hit at least a-post-per-month inside one calendar year, which has been a goal of mine for a decade. After all that, it kinda feels like massive targets for anticipation are running low, and the prospect of 2026 carries a fair amount of uncertainty.

That is, until you take a glance at the release schedule.

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey dwarfs everything else on the film calendar, but Iñárritu, Fennell, Spielberg and Eggers are set to join him on the film-bro-favourite dias with Digger, Wuthering Heights, Disclosure Day, and Werwulf respectively (though that last one sadly may not make 2026 here in Aus). The morbid curiosity of millions of nerds will converge when Avengers: Doomsday and Dune Part Three both allegedly land on December 18 – less than a week before I post my first movie-related countdown of the year. The anxiety will be real, but before then we will have seen a new Spidey, James Gunn-universe takes on both Supergirl and Clayface, a new Michael Jackson biopic, the debut of The Mandalorian on the big screen, The Super Mario Galaxy Movie, and new cinematic incarnations of both Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter.

And speaking of which, we’ve got another promising year of fighting games brewing! Riot Games’ 2XKO will be properly out within weeks of this post, with Invincible VS and Marvel Tōkon: Fighting Souls set to join the arena by year’s end. Elsewhere Capcom will be looking to extend ‘The Streak’ with Resident Evil Requiem and Pragmata, Bond will be back in gaming where he belongs with IOI’s 007 First Light, Nintendo’s first full year with the Switch 2 looks stacked with quality support (Fever, Fortune’s Weave and Duskbloods, baby), and Valve’s promising Steam Machine will test just how big of a gap Microsoft has left in the hardware space.

Of course, one question looms above all others: will the “before GTA 6” memes FINALLY end? But for me, it’s all about the keys The Pokemon Company and Square Enix still hold to my heart. Pokemon’s 30th anniversary promises an imminent Gen 10 announcement, but I just cannot wait for the release of Pokemon Champions and all of the battling community implications to follow. As for Square, well, they really could make 2026 something special by dropping trailers for Dragon Quest XII or the finale of the Final Fantasy VII remake trilogy – let alone releasing either game.

But before all that potential chaos goes down, here are the links to all ten countdowns (and all 100 countdown items) that look back on the best of 2025:

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Top 5 Disappointments

Top 10 Game Re-Releases & Expansions

Top 10 Movie Characters

Top 15 K-Pop Singles

Top 5 Game Consoles

Top 10 Movie Scenes

Top 10 Gaming Moments

Top 10 K-Pop Albums

Top 15 Games

Top 10 Movies

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31 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 10 Movies

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Lists, Movies. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

As we close out another year, it’s worth taking one final beat to appreciate how good we had it in the cinema in 2025. Despite how much time (and money) I spend watching movies in a given year, this final countdown is often something I just smash out in one session in the post-feverish haze right after I’ve put my whole life force into the Games list, and before the New Year’s celebrations begin. This year I couldn’t quite do that; it was just so difficult to cut the list down to a mere ten, let alone decide which film to put above the rest in a slot that really felt quite arbitrary in 2025. We definitely did have it good.

IMAX’s first full year back in Sydney since the advent of Letterboxd culture was a properly stacked one; I visited six times in 2025 and loved every session, and that’s because the year delivered high-end action on a scale rarely seen. There was plenty of sub-genre variety within that action, too, so even though that’s probably the biggest theme throughout the list, I never felt things were getting too samey. It’s also pleasing to realise as I type this that just one movie on the list was a streaming exclusive.

Anyway, from the 31 new-release films I saw in 2025 (not including anything released after December 15th, sadly), these are my ten favourites. Thanks for reading this year.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

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10. K-Pop Demon Hunters

Coming in for its fourth and final main-list mention this month – a tied Vagrant Rant record – the unlikely flint that re-ignited the K-Pop scene for yet another new generation kicks off our final top ten. It rises above an extremely competitive field thanks to the inimitable, whimsical Sony Animation style that, as the Spider-Verse movies have made abundantly clear, tends to bowl critics over en masse. Just as heartwarming, however, is the career boosts for the large squad of talented would-be (and in some cases former) K-Pop stars with great vocals and/or production talent that didn’t quite fit into the industry. Much like the last big Sony movie from this team, KPDH does feel like it ends way too quickly, but the journey there is a blast.

9. Weapons

Marketed as a horror movie, formally a mystery caper, secretly a dark comedy; Zach Cregger’s Barbarian follow-up is a slippery film to categorise, but it absolutely hums along for the majority of its run time. You might accuse the pulp-novel-esque structure, which shifts perspectives like book chapters, of cutting the story’s tension a bit, but it also enriches the small-town community vibe, lines up some killer callbacks, and shares the spotlight among a committed cast who each take out a Jenga piece until everything comes crashing down. Immensely engaging to unravel as you watch, just as meaty to unpack thematically afterwards, Weapons officially makes Cregger a directorial voice worth keeping an ear on.

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30 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 15 Games

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Games, Lists. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

That one really snuck up on us, huh?

Before September, I was ready to sing the praises of 2025’s evenly-paced major videogame release schedule like it had finally cracked some previously unseen cadence code. Sure, I was 90% sure the convenient rhythm was an accidental side effect of increasingly longer development schedules just about everywhere, but there was pretty much always an interesting game release (or three) just around the corner, and a lot of them were really good. Of course, I enjoyed that immensely.

Then everything changed. While 2023 made headlines in all relevant places for its perceived overall quality as a videogame release year, that one was largely filled with known quantities we had time to anticipate; the final quarter of 2025 was all about heat from surprise sources and/or surprise release dates. By the time we reached an unusually barren November (probably GTA VI‘s fault), there were more 2025 games with 80+ Opencritic scores and passionate fan followings than any regular person could conceivably play. And they were all so varied! Co-op experiences returned in a big way, the needlessly controversial “interactive story” umbrella had a vintage year, and I don’t think there’s ever been a better time for roguelike reception. What a year to be into this hobby.

Add on a brand-new Nintendo console with something to prove, even more big moves into the handheld PC market, and comfortably the best year for Xbox Game Pass ever (for videogame releases, definitely not pricing or PR); now there’s a recipe for a good time.

My criteria for game eligibility is at least five hours of play time, unless time is an irrelevant factor to understanding the experience (i.e. multiplayer games, or really short ones). That disqualifies the following games I had at least some interest in: ARC Raiders, Fast Fusion, Kingdom Come Deliverance II, The Drifter, Urban Myth Dissolution Center, Consume Me, LEGO Party, The Alters, Fantasy Life i, Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo, Sonic Racing CrossWorlds, Rift of the Necrodancer, Ninja Gaiden 4, No Sleep For Kaname Date, Digimon Story: Time Stranger, Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii, Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment, Citizen Sleeper 2, and most unfortunately, Ghost of Yotei and Blue Prince.

If a game isn’t in the above paragraph or the list below, I either just didn’t like it enough, or you can find it my re-releases / expansions countdown. Even so, my draft Honourable Mentions roll is so large this year that I’ve decided to weave some of them into the main list wherever a nearly-there game seemed similar enough to one in the top 15 – anything to shorten the page even a little.

Parentheses indicate the version/versions of each game I played in 2025. Let’s go.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

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15. Rematch (XSX/PC/PS5)

It doesn’t matter if it’s relatively bare-bones, seems derivative, or has its fair share of jank; Rematch feels incredible to play. It’s also the only game this year I bought on a second platform (without the luxury of cross-progression) and started from scratch again just so I could play with friends, and that in itself says all I need to say about how much of a hold this 3-5-a-side cartoon football simulator had on my thoughts, feelings and desires in the middle of 2025.

It even cost the surprisingly whimsical, delightfully tactile and often satisfying Drag X Drive a shout-out position on this list – and I really wanted to give that game its flowers here – because the competitive essences of the two games are so similar at the end of the day. DxD feels better to play in a tactile sense, and encourages a surprisingly wholesome online community, but a win in Rematch after a perfectly-executed team move with mates after saving a certain goal is like digital crack. So Slocap’s admirable “Rocket League with people” gets to, um, kick off this year’s incredibly strong list.

14. Pokemon Legends: Z-A (NS/NS2)

Just the second game in the unstoppable Pokemon juggernaut’s relatively new “Legends” series, design-wise Z-A moves about as far away from the trendsetting Pokemon Legends: Arceus as possible: that game was all untamed open wilds, minimal human interaction, de-emphasised battling and hyper-tuned catching mechanics; this one is both a celebration and indictment of urban sprawl within a single city, with colourful verbose characters around every turn and an almost hilariously insatiable attitude to Pokemon duels that puts any game in the traditional main series to shame.

The game is evidently super-proud of its experimental real-time battle system, but that isn’t what lifts it onto my list; rather, it’s the fulfilment of a decade’s worth of unresolved Pokemon X/Y foreshadowing by way of a genuinely endearing main cast that succeeds at feeling like an RPG party where X/Y failed, as well as a frequently hilarious localisation that turns random NPCs into memetic heroes. Oh, and the game actually runs properly, so evidently that wasn’t too much to ask.

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29 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 10 K-Pop Albums

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Console, Games, Lists. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , .

Following a largely male-dominated 2024 double countdown, 2025 sees a return to our regularly scheduled programming: a predominantly female K-Pop mini-album top five, and a roughly even gender split on the full album side. The EPs are typically big on beats but otherwise nearly impossible to throw a thematic lasso around; as for the LPs, you could say this year’s commonality is successors: there are zero debuts involved, and I found at least something worth saying for each entry about how the artist’s previous work reflects on the newer effort.

Language restrictions are a bit looser for me when it comes to Korean albums than singles, but entire LPs with vanishingly small amount of Korean lyricism – or none at all – still introduce too many questions about western pop lines, so I don’t tend to include them. But I will shout out Kandis’ Playground and Yerin Baek’s Flash and Core, which are both great fun.

1-3 tracks = not eligible

4-7 tracks = mini album

8+ tracks = full album

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

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MINI-ALBUMS
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5. Rich Man – aespa

Another year of K-Pop, another SM Entertainment album way better than its missed-opportunity title track would seem to foreshadow. Like many of those examples, said title track is made a little better by its connection to the wide variety of B-sides that follow, although they are definitely still the real stars. In particular Count On Me, the song that kicks off the mini’s less spicy second half, is a smooth winner that’d fit into any vocals-forward playlist, and follow-up Angel #48 adds a garage beat to keep the silk moving. I am also a big fan of warbly first-change rap/chant vehicle Drift, however, because a whistle chorus is somehow still my biggest pop weakness after all these years. Makes that questionable treatment of the famous Cher quote go down just a tad easier.

4. Beat It Up – NCT Dream

Another busy year for the Dream lads saw multiple album releases hit the shelves and streamers, but while there’s nothing on Beat It Up that quite hits the skyward heights of the DREAM TEAM B-side from their Back To The Future album, I find the former to be a more consistent listen overall. The EP features a soft centre with crunchy bookends: the title up top and Tempo / Tricky at the end are all about brash beats, and Tempo in particular is a real rollicking head-bopper. Meanwhile Rush combines both sides of NCT Dream’s dual identity, sliding an airy dove-spawning title drop between bassy rap verses; Cold Coffee leans more on the euphoric production but gets there with an understated EDM buzz, and Butterflies serves up a reliable SM ballad – albeit in the middle of an EP rather than as a closer.

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28 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 10 Gaming Moments

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Games, Lists.

Naturally some version of this warning happens every year, but in 2025 it’s more relevant than ever: an unusually high number of 2025’s very best games were defined by their ability to hide twists, cameos, stunning escalations of scale, and other important details from their players until just the right moment – usually deep into their respective stories. So I implore you to be very careful scrolling this list if you’re still waiting to play something released this year.

That said, time for another dose of highly-concentrated gaming goodness, as worthy of discussing as any other part of the interactive tapestry. The original plan for this year’s list was a bit different, but – agh, never mind, I’ll get to it.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

SPOILERS FOLLOW; PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.

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10. Le Super Tournoi de Jacinthe – Pokemon Legends Z-A

In 2025 I still don’t do a countdown list of the year’s best videogame characters, nor the best soundtracks or songs from a videogame. But if I did, this year’s editions would feature both Lady Jacinthe and the incredible electroswing battle track that accompanies her boss battle. The former is a delightfully vain thorn in the side of our hero from the moment she takes an interest in the time-honoured Pokemon protagonist power bump, and the lavish tournament she forces onto most of the story’s named cast is a blast – even when interrupted multiple times by more important story beats, to the great irritation of the ostentatious host. Eventually, the final match approaches – against Jacinthe, naturally – and then that tune hits. Suffice to say it’s worth sitting on that opening freeze frame for a good minute or two before you start launching your attacks.

9. Bar Fight – Dispatch

There are more pivotal and/or emotional moments throughout episodic pseudo-Telltale Games renaissance Dispatch, but catharsis and triumph simply do not hit harder than at the climax of Episode 5, when new studio AdHoc showcases just how impressively you can construct an action sequence when you don’t have to deal with that old abomination of a game engine. Time after time an apt directional button prompt will initiate a show-stopping match-cut linking a team-bonding taco session with a flashback to the brutal bar brawl hours earlier. But this satisfaction does not pay off just because of the stunning direction; it’s also a writing flex, giving the team of superpowered misfits at the heart of the game’s story a moment to get along – at long last – before the stakes really escalate in the final few episodes.

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27 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 10 Movie Scenes

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Lists, Movies. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , .

Ah, the fun one that no-one reads – presumably for fear of spoilers, which is absolutely fair. Speaking of which, I had the opposite problem to that of my characters countdown this year: too many scenes to choose from, so I had to cut some good ones. I’d shout out the cut ones up here as honourable-honourable mentions, but then I’d be putting spoilers before the spoiler warning, and we can’t have that.

Quality action films provide the bulk of the movie moments that will stick with me from 2025, despite – perhaps because of – the fact that the memorable scenes from those action films aren’t necessarily all about the action. In fact they’re quite often about family (found or unavoidable), clashing ages or ideologies, and they are almost always enhanced by music choices. Or, you know, really well-filmed stunts.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

MASSIVE SPOILERS FOLLOW.

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10. Line Dance – The Accountant 2

The overwhelming strength of this unlikely and uneven pulp action sequel is the comedic chemistry between leads Ben Affleck and Jon Bernthal, and I firmly believe the plot is worse off for the restraint shown towards their brotherly relationship. And sure, there’s a pretty good sequence of the two trying to talk about deep stuff on a couple of deck chairs, but the one where the two essentially forget the plot and just drink, banter, attempt to dance, and eventually fight a smarmy barfly is heartwarming Hollywood gold. I can’t prove it, but I have a sneaking suspicion the scene was written and added late in production, once the crew realised how good Affleck and Bernthal played off each other on screen.

9. The Guardian and the Widow – Thunderbolts*

Say what you will about the MCU, but the ability of its marketing department to hide big elements of its movies/shows has been famous for a while now. Thunderbolts* concealed the superpowered individual most important to its plot, the permanent death of a returning character, and its “real” title (though the latter move is probably less successful) from every piece of pre-release hype, and yet had no issue going ham on footage of the film’s most emotionally affecting sequence – yet it still works. As New York (once again) threatens to crumble around them, Yelena Belova and her fake spy dad Alexei Shostakov have an impassioned heart-to-heart so well-acted by Florence Pugh and David Harbour that it overshadows the literal shadow entity wreaking havoc around them. It brought me to tears, and almost makes the mishandled Black Widow movie better in retrospect.

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26 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 5 Game Consoles

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Console, Games, Lists. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , .

It hurts to admit, but it feels like this particular list’s days might be numbered.

It’s not that there isn’t plenty to discuss. There was always going to be a lot to say about the console market in 2025, as each of the three traditional big players threw its marketing focus behind at least one new piece of machinery. And yet it seems increasingly likely that one of those three will move out of the console market altogether before long, and with last-gen development support appearing more nebulous by the month, it’s perfectly possible that within two years I’ll only have two relevant console platforms to talk about.

Nonetheless, we’re still doing this, and any discussion about the videogame console market in 2025 simply has to address the gigantic elephant in the room: cost. Here in Australia, every major console you can buy is now more expensive than it was this time last year (except, if you want to be technical, for the PS5 Pro and all models of the original Switch). Two of the major brand subscriptions are also more expensive than this time last year, and while these costs are still dwarfed by the eye-watering sums in the PC market right now, the fact remains that current-gen console gaming costs more in real-money terms than it has in a long, long time. So these ecosystems need to make themselves worthwhile, and regardless of their popularity, the following is my take on which ones did that the best in 2025.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

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5. Xbox One

LAST YEAR: 5th

So last year I said I’d probably never put the Xbox One on the main list again, but that was based on the PS4 showing much more relevance to casual players. In 2025 the PS4 got almost nothing new, while at the very, very least the Xbox One picked up some of the sprinkles from Microsoft’s attempt to justify its big Xbox Game Pass price increase. So it just hangs on as a result of my desperate attempt to keep this countdown at full top five status.

4. Nintendo Switch

LAST YEAR: 2nd

The original Nintendo Switch falls to its lowest position ever as far as this tiny list is concerned. This is mostly because Nintendo had something a little more pressing to focus on through 2025, but the Switch did get some pretty fabulous exclusives* (read: not on Playstation or Xbox consoles) this year, so the relatively strong performance of the other two major console platforms also plays a role.

The excellent Xenoblade Chronicles X Definitive Edition led the way as the best Nintendo-exclusive game without a bespoke Switch 2 version, but it was followed mighty closely – in both quality and release timing – by never-ending tactics/visual novel fever dream The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy. The earlier Donkey Kong Country Returns HD faced some critical heat for its nip-and-tuck choices, but the older brother Switch had its biggest moment in the final third of the year, when perfectly fine versions of Hades II, Pokemon Legends Z-A, and Metroid Prime 4: Beyond graced the library of the elder statesman. A few notable indie productions picked the Switch as their sole console platform, too, such as the charming While Waiting and the excellent Simogo Legacy Collection, and that all added up to a pretty decent year – just not quite with the same standalone shine as in recent times.

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25 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 15 K-Pop Singles

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, K-Pop, Lists, Music. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , .

So is K-Pop cool again?

Ever since the midpoint of the year, when a certain Sony animated fantasy movie appeared on the world’s Netflix accounts, I have heard all kinds of publicly-blaring K-Pop music while out and about – and not just songs in English, or the standard BTS/Blackpink-adjacent breakout hits either. I’m not saying the success of K-Pop Demon Hunters directly convinced an entire industry to collectively get its act together and put on a show, but only six of my top fifteen songs this year came out before the movie…

This list is today and always based primarily – if not exclusively – on audio, and I don’t tend to watch music videos at all until I actually write it, so visuals have virtually no bearing on the ranking; the only requirement for consideration as far as I’m concerned (beyond language) is that at one point or another throughout 2025, each song was promoted by itself as a lead track on an audio release of some kind.

Despite their seemingly ever-increasing presence, songs without Korean lyrics in them are not eligible for this list. So that means the fabulous UP by Alyssa Reid and oceanfromtheblue isn’t eligible, and it also means no Twice’s Me+You, no Katseye’s Gnarly, no Miso’s happy, no Monsta X’s baby blue, no Olivia Marsh’s Strategy, and no Boynextdoor’s Say Cheese! But all of those songs are worth seeking out, regardless.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

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15. How It’s Done – Huntr/x

I can think of no more fitting way to kick off the 2025 list than with a song from the movie that swept the world off its feet and reinvigorated global interest in K-Pop like it was 2012; the only question is which Huntr/x song to pick. Golden is the, uh, golden child, of course, but it feels a bit too Broadway for this top 15. What It Sounds Like just reminds me of how weirdly quickly the movie’s finale is wrapped up, and Takedown sounds kind of unfinished by thematic design. That leaves just the opener, and the song that turned K-Pop Demon Hunters from a well-animated curiosity with a fun conceit into a genuine musical threat backed by proper industry talent. It’s probably no accident that How It’s Done sounds more like a recent K-Pop song than any of the other Huntr/x tracks, but importantly, it also sounds like a good one.

14. Express Mode – Super Junior

There has to be some level of nostalgic comfort food vibe at work deep within my subconscious whenever a supposedly post-peak Super Junior song finds a way onto this annual page, but I will stop putting the lads on the list when they stop putting out “100% certified slappers”. This long-settled group has made plenty of songs that experiment with unexpected influences, but there’s definitely something about this one that goes just a little harder on the throwback play than SuJu has in recent years: the backing track is all about club motifs, the chanted chorus is heavy on bass and light on melody, while the post-chorus and bridge provide all the tune and vocal highlights – that’s right, it’s the old Sorry Sorry / Bonamana / Mr Simple template, and now that I’ve seen the full video, I’m certain of it. Hey, they’ve still got it.

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24 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 10 Movie Characters

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Lists, Movies. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , .

2025 was a pretty rich year for quality films, although this time around my draft document for potentially memorable movie characters looked a tad smaller than normal. These ten plus the honourable mentions represent almost the entire shortlist, which means I jotted down a potential candidate at a rate just under once every two 2025 films I saw. I suppose this year featured a bunch of direct sequels with largely unchanged ensembles (MI: The Final Reckoning, Wicked: For Good, The Accountant 2), films where a memorable cast wasn’t really the point (The Naked Gun, Wolf Man, F1), and films where no one character stood out because everyone was so well-realised (Sinners, Fantastic 4: First Steps, the How to Train Your Dragon remake).

Also, unusually for a character list, roughly half the entries are either hiding some major secret, are absent from their films’ trailers, or both, which necessitates some mild spoiler talk to even discuss why they’re so memorable. The plot gloves aren’t completely off, but veteran moviegoers may pick up on a twist or two by implication, so be warned.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome. MILD SPOILERS MAY FOLLOW.

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10. Akasa – Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle

As shounen anime arc villains go, Demon Slayer’s Akasa is one of the more memorable ones I’ve seen: even before getting into the significant amount of screen time his chequered backstory receives inside the confines of Demon Slayer‘s long-in-development Infinity Castle movie, his design is just really cool. Within a sea of seemingly insurmountable foes rocking gimmicky weapons and hidden power sets, this dude just beats people with his bare hands; that’s usually the realm of heroic characters. Then there’s the fact that virtually every viewer wanted to see Akasa’s demise after his final-act rudeness at the end of the Mugen Train movie – which, let’s not forget, was at one point the highest-grossing animated film of all time. Did the visually stunning sympathy play work? That’s up to the viewer, but either way the kid makes an impression.

9. Mickey 18 – Mickey 17

This guy does feature in a Mickey 17 trailer, although not the one I saw initially; regardless, the appearance of the 18th edition of corporate clone-fodder Mickey is one of that chaotic plot’s many inciting incidents, and turns the amber light in front of Robert Pattinson’s most outlandish performance tendencies fully green. As the movie gets more complex and unravels a bit as a result, Pattinson remains an unhinged joy to watch, playing a nervous wreck and a daredevil against and alongside himself to riotous results. An unpredictable plot isn’t always the best move when your world-building is thin on the ground, but an unpredictable character in the hands of either Pattinson or writer-director Bong Joon Ho has yet to be anything other than a magnificent spectacle.

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23 Dec

Best of 2025: Top 10 Game Re-Releases & Expansions

Posted by vagrantesque in Best of 2025, Lists. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , .

Ever since the debut of this list a few years ago, I wonder when the day will come that there won’t be enough content to fill it. But so far, each time a year has started slow for re-releases and/or expansions, it has well and truly recovered. 2025 was no different; in fact in the end I didn’t even have room for the likes of Ninja Gaiden II Black, System Shock 2 25th Anniversary Remaster, Suikoden I & II HD Remaster, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, Yooka-Replaylee, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Avatar FoP: From the Ashes, or Lies of P: Overture. In fact, I barely needed to play them.

The rather different nature of this year’s Game of the Year list means this page is where most of the best JRPG-adjacent content of 2025 lives; it’s also where a good chunk of Switch 2 stuff is eligible, as the industry’s slower and slower development cycles begin to clash with Nintendo’s modern commitment to consistent releases. I also thought about easing off on the policing of that Remake-vs-Reimagining line this year, but I don’t think there were any real examples that challenged it anyway.

Parentheses indicate the version of each slice of gaming goodness that I played.

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VR BEST OF 2025 DISCLAIMER

This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. Nobody ever agrees with me 100%. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.

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RE-RELEASES
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5. Dragon Quest I + II: HD-2D Remake (NS2)

This nice little value package from Square Enix lovingly recreates two pixelated classics in the mould of last year’s Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake – and for virtually the same price as that single game – but I wouldn’t know much about the trailblazing lone-protagonist first entry because, on the recommendation of a few reviews, I’ve exclusively been playing II. And as a complete Dragon Quest scrub for most of my life, I think it might be my favourite of the original trilogy. It’s the only one to feature a full RPG party of pre-formed characters with their own backstories, which have apparently been heavily expanded in the remake, and they all have that warm old-school fantasy charm.

Otherwise, everything that was true about III last year continues to shine: the most colourful iteration of the HD-2D aesthetic to date, plenty of neat quality-of-life tweaks, and a wonderfully orchestrated soundtrack. Only now the Switch 2 (finally) exists, so you can enjoy all those things with the same simplicity yet a crisper resolution on a train ride.

4. Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater (PS5)

One of the strangest visual remakes in recent memory, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater applies an absolutely gorgeous coat of graphical paint to an all time classic, replacing every character model and bringing in entirely new lighting systems to frankly stunning results. It also removes the “3” from the original title to better reflect the chronology of the Metal Gear story, but effectively does not touch the original game’s animation framework or voice track (with some tiny exceptions), preserving the exact feel of an all-time videogame classic for better and worse. Modern Konami brass were clearly petrified of overriding Hideo Kojima’s vision in any way save for that iconic title sequence, which results in a very unique product: one that holds up magnificently for the most part. And yet, for some reason (oh hello Unreal Engine 5), the remake’s performance regularly brings even the PS5 Pro to its knees, with judder and frame inconsistency around almost every turn. And that ain’t great.

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