After rounding up the worst releases of the year, Metacritic has now published its lists of the highest-rated games of 2025. For now, the rankings cover Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo consoles. The PC list is expected to follow later.

To qualify, a game had to:

Launch between January 1 and December 31, 2025
Receive at least seven reviews from professional critics

Titles are ranked by their Metascore, the weighted average of critic reviews.

If a game launched on two generations of the same console family (for example, Xbox One and Xbox Series), Metacritic included the version with the higher number of critic reviews.

🎮 Best Games of 2025 on PlayStation

The top spot on PlayStation in 2025 went to Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (92/100). What started the year as a dark horse from Sandfall Interactive ended up becoming a serious Game of the Year contender by December.

Interestingly, Microsoft’s Forza Horizon 5 also made the top three, showing how cross-platform titles performed strongly on Sony’s ecosystem.

The highest-ranked current Sony exclusive was Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, which landed in seventh place with an 89 Metascore.

Top 20 – PlayStation (Metascore)

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 — 92
Hollow Knight: Silksong — 92
Forza Horizon 5 — 92
Split Fiction — 91
Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector — 90
Dispatch — 89
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach — 89
Monster Hunter Wilds — 88
Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter — 88
BALL x PIT — 88
Sektori — 88
Sword of the Sea — 88
Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles — 88
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle — 88
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II — 88
Shinobi: Art of Vengeance — 87
Absolum — 87
Lumines Arise — 87
Ghost of Yōtei — 86
Silent Hill f — 86

🟢 Best Games of 2025 on Xbox

The Xbox top 20 also includes several former PlayStation console exclusives, such as Final Fantasy XVI, the Silent Hill 2 remake, and Helldivers 2.

The top three positions, however, were dominated by multiplatform titles, with Split Fiction leading the chart at 93/100.

Top 20 – Xbox (Metascore)

Split Fiction — 93
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 — 91
Hollow Knight: Silksong — 90
Blue Prince — 90
Monster Hunter Wilds — 90
ARC Raiders — 88
Final Fantasy XVI — 88
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II — 88
Shinobi: Art of Vengeance — 87
Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii — 87
Two Point Museum — 86
Silent Hill 2 — 86
Mullet MadJack — 86
Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 + 4 — 86
Helldivers 2 — 85
Assassin’s Creed Shadows — 85
DOOM: The Dark Ages — 85
Gears of War: Reloaded — 85
Elden Ring Nightreign — 84
Battlefield 6 — 84

🔴 Best Games of 2025 on Nintendo Switch

Nintendo’s ecosystem once again followed its own path. Roughly half of the titles in the Switch top 20 do not appear in the PlayStation or Xbox rankings.

Some games are absent simply because they never received Switch ports. Others appear thanks to the launch of Switch 2, which brought updated or native editions of previously released titles.

For example, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom — Nintendo Switch 2 Edition took first place with a 95 Metascore.

Top 20 – Nintendo Switch (Metascore)

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom — Nintendo Switch 2 Edition — 95
Hades II — Nintendo Switch 2 Edition — 95
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild — Nintendo Switch 2 Edition — 94
Hollow Knight: Silksong — 91
Donkey Kong Bananza — 91
Trails in the Sky 1st Chapter — 90
Absolum — 90
BALL x PIT — 89
Split Fiction — 89
Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo — 88
Street Fighter 6 — 87
Super Mario Galaxy + Super Mario Galaxy 2 — 87
Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound — 87
Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles — 87
Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition — 87
Mario Kart World — 86
Heretic + Hexen — 86
Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time — 86
Shotgun Cop Man — 86
Deltarune — 86