SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
It is officially award season for films and TV and also for video games.
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UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As Astro Bot, singing) I am Astro Bot. I am Astro Bot.
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DETROW: PlayStation's "Astro Bot," inspired by the iconic "Mario Bros.," won game of the year at The Game Awards on Thursday. It's about a cute robot rescuing other robots in a colorful galaxy. But if you're not into running or jumping, or you want something much more casual to enjoy with your family, there are a lot more games to explore. NPR has put together an interactive list of our favorite 80 games from 2024 to help you find your next favorite. NPR gaming lead James Mastromarino edited the list and joins me now. Hey, James.
JAMES MASTROMARINO, BYLINE: Hey, Scott.
DETROW: So we're coming up on the holidays. A lot of people are gonna have some downtime with family. Perfect time for gaming - where should you start?
MASTROMARINO: Well, "Astro Bot" is a pretty great place to start. The trick is that you have to have a PlayStation 5. And this game is not only for that expensive piece of hardware. It's also a celebration of the hardware itself. Like, your spaceship is basically a giant PlayStation 5 that you run around this galaxy with. But it is just such a delight. You know, games can be many things. It can be trying, emotional, meditative, scary. This is just pure fun.
The other thing about it, though, that's a little bit of a letdown is only one player can play at a time. So if you're looking for something that multiple people can get into, there's "Super Mario Party Jamboree," which is, like, this chaotic digital board game that Nintendo puts out year after year. This latest iteration, "Jamboree," is pretty decent. And then there's also "LEGO Horizon Adventures," which is actually really good with two players. My little 8-year-old nephew and I just played the heck out of it over Thanksgiving.
DETROW: We're talking about big companies, big franchises here, but it's been a big year for independent games - right? - games that put nowhere near the budget into some of their competitors and get really overperformed and were being rewarded.
MASTROMARINO: Yeah, so the big darling of the year is called "Balatro." It was basically made by one person. But it blew up. It was nominated for five game awards and won three of them, even in this incredibly crowded field. And a lot of the appeal comes from the fact that it's basically, like, a single-player poker game. You assemble poker hands and combine them with special effects to get these outrageous cash payouts. And Short Wave host Regina Barber wrote about it on our list, and I talked to her about its appeal.
REGINA BARBER, BYLINE: Having these small missions, you know, and you have these cards that have cute faces on them 'cause you need these joker wild cards to, like, make your poker hand better and better - it is very, for me - I mean, I'm a big "Legend Of Zelda" fan. I like cute games. I like gambling just a little. So it just, like, hits all of those things. And you are going to think it's not that interesting, but just stick with it for 5 minutes, and you'll be hooked.
DETROW: Speaking of "Zelda," what about really epic adventures, those types of games where you dive into? What are some good places to look?
MASTROMARINO: Well, there is a "Zelda" game that fits that bill called "Echoes Of Wisdom," where...
DETROW: Yeah.
MASTROMARINO: ...You actually play as Zelda for the first time in a mainline Nintendo game, so that was exciting. It's been a bonkers year for these, like, long role-playing games, you know, essentially, like, the "War And Peace" of video games, things that you can sink into and...
DETROW: Yeah.
MASTROMARINO: ...Play for, like, 80 hours at a time. My favorite is "Metaphor: ReFantazio," which is this game about a scrappy group of rebels that are trying to unmask the man who assassinated the king and also basically win, like, an election. So it's a kind of wild premise with an even wilder design. But it's...
DETROW: What a bunch of sentences you just said.
MASTROMARINO: Well, for the medieval art fans in the audience, a lot of the monster design is based on Hieronymus Bosch...
DETROW: Oh, cool.
MASTROMARINO: ...The painter of - yeah - The Garden of Earthly Delights. So just, like, this insane stuff. But it's a game that's about democracy and dragons and fairies. And while it is extremely long - we're talking, like, 80 hours - it is just a blast.
DETROW: Any other role-playing games to mention?
MASTROMARINO: Well, "Final Fantasy VII Rebirth" came out this year. It's sort of a sequel and sort of a remake to the beloved 1997 game. And then there's also "Elden Ring: Shadow Of The Erdtree," a follow-up to that 2022 hit. And finally, I really love "Another Crab's Treasure," which is as difficult as, like, an Elden ring sort of game, but it's got this really cutesy "Spongebob" sort of aesthetic. You're literally a hermit crab who's sort of zooming on the ocean floor, taking on, like, lobsters many times your size.
DETROW: When we do lists like this, I love how many directions that they go. Can you tell me about some of the real boundary-pushing games in our collection?
MASTROMARINO: Yeah, I wanted to end on this one called "Caves Of Qud," but that's Q-U-D. And it is this absolutely insane, like, deep simulation. So it's, like, set in, like, this bizarre kind of science-fiction premise where there are, like, sentient trees and fungi and mutants just walking around. But it does have a story that you'll kind of pilot your little adventurer through. And I spoke to Becky Brown, an audio engineer who works at NPR about what drew her to the game.
BECKY BROWN, BYLINE: The fact that this game looks like a spreadsheet, the fact that you can be this flying, slime-spitting, multiple arms, like, creature that also has a force bubble that you can initiate - the fact that if you are a mutant, you can then get more mutations later. You know, at certain levels, you can decide, like, OK, time to get a new one. What am I going to get? I guess I have a scorpion tail now. OK, let's figure out how to use this in combat. Like, it's a game that's all about essentially accumulating survival strategies and hoping that they're all going to keep working for you.
DETROW: I see the appeal.
MASTROMARINO: Yeah, and it's one of many experimental games that are on this list, but it's been in the works for a really long time and has just a really fascinating approach to game design.
DETROW: That's NPR gaming lead James Mastromarino. I do want to say to you that all of these games sound interesting, but my family has a holiday tradition of playing a decadesold version of "Wii Bowling" that we are going to stick to.
MASTROMARINO: (Laughter).
DETROW: So there's room for that, too.
MASTROMARINO: Absolutely.
DETROW: Hundred pin - thanks so much for talking.
MASTROMARINO: Thanks, Scott.
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