Today, we reveal how your votes shaped the PlayStation Blog Game of the Year awards for 2025. This year’s voting saw nearly 1.5 million votes cast across the awards’ 19 categories, with your choices, and your choices only, deciding which games would earn the coveted top spots and accompanying trophies. 

As with every year, the awards are a chance for you to help highlight the experiences that made your gaming year, and by extension, the creatives who have crafted those games. And as with every year, there was an abundance of titles to select from, leading to some tough choices. 

Before we dive into the category winners, a thank you to all the creators whose collaborative work has brought PlayStation players so much enjoyment the world over these past 12 months. 

And without further ado, the games which received the most player votes in each category are… 

Best New Character

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It’s once again time to come a’Reckonin’ o’er the hill and vale, Helldivers–the Festival of Reckoning’s upon us*! This is a time to reinvigorate our hearts with a commitment to spreading peace and Managed Democracy throughout the galaxy, and we’ve got a special celebration lined up to help.

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Fast versus slow. This varying approach to depicting zombies in film, television, and video games has been going on for decades. The Zekes in World War Z are known for their speed and relentless aggression, stacking on top of each other in a frenzied bloodlust to seek out their next meal. But as we pondered this concept, we found ourselves asking, “Why not both?” The idea of transforming gameplay with Walkers became the crux of our partnership with AMC to bring a crossover episode of The Walking Dead into World War Z.

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Inhyuk Park here from Project Cloud Games and it gives me great pleasure to share more details on our team’s unique approach to The Relic: First Guardian.

But first of all, I have some very exciting news. Alongside publisher Perp Games, we are excited to announce that The Relic First Guardian will launch on the PS5 on May 26, 2026. 

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“I wouldn’t go in there,” warns traveling storyteller Ugetsu, as Atsu approaches two large and looming wooden doors. “Because you may not return.”

It’s a caution many Ghost of Yōtei players loved to ignore. As the trigger point for revered side-quest The Spider Lily General, that ominous gate is the start of a haunting mythological adventure that lingers long in memory after its completion. Only fitting for a game that launched so close to Halloween.

I spoke to Creative Directors, Nate Fox and Jason Connell, to find out the inspiration and secrets behind The Spider Lily General, and how they felt about the optional quest’s popularity. But, similar to Ugetsu, I must warn you – there are spoilers ahead. You might want to play this mission before venturing any further…

The quest’s origins

“The Spider Lily General was actually one of the earliest missions in the game and one of the first Mythic Tales we created,” reveals Jason. “It came from one of our designers and writers, and we dissected what makes a great Mythic mission, how they’d look and feel.”

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As we continue sharing more from the world of Saros, today we’re stepping behind the scenes to highlight one of the pillars of this new universe: its characters. This latest trailer marks the first time we’ve shown a deeper look at our ensemble cast: the faces, voices, and performances anchoring the story of Saros.

What you’ll see in the trailer is more than motion capture and dialogue. It’s months of collaboration, interpretation, and trust between our directors, our actors, and the entire studio. Below, our team shares what it meant to bring these characters from script to screen.

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Let me tell you how a PlayStation in a Welsh recording studio sparked a three-decade journey into the rhythm-action genre. This is the birth of our game, Aaero2: Black Razor Edition, which is available now on PS5..

As the 90s came to an end, my band had just signed our first record deal and we were living at a recording studio in Wales, recording our first EP. One evening, with my guitar parts, the bass and drums already in the bag, the drummer and I noticed a PlayStation under the TV in the lounge. There were two games; Colin McRae Rally and PaRappa the Rapper. We played a lot of Colin McRae before deciding to give the other odd-looking game a go. That’s where it all started for me and rhythm games. I’ve been obsessed with video games since I was little. The revelation that playing music and playing video games had a crossover point was huge.

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Behind the scenes the team here at Bungie has been incredibly hard at work on Marathon, our brand-new PvPvE extraction shooter* – where the dark sci-fi world of Tau Ceti collides with tense survival FPS gameplay.

In Marathon, players scavenge the lost colony of Tau Ceti IV as a bio-cybernetic Runner while surviving against hostile UESC security forces, rival Runners, and unpredictable environments to seek their fortune.

Today’s ViDoc shares a new look at Marathon’s gameplay and immersive sci-fi setting. The team also explores updates since Alpha, like improved visual fidelity, proximity chat, solo play, and a new Runner shell: Rook.

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Another year has come and gone, but we can’t help looking back at the incredible gaming memories made in 2025. The PlayStation Blog team wants to thank you for your support all year long, and wish you a happy holiday season.

And we’re not alone! We gathered season greetings from our talented friends and studios from across the industry. So grab a cup of cocoa and enjoy this year’s collection of holiday greetings. Cheers to 2026!

2K Games (WWE 2K25) ❅ 505 Games ❅ Acquire Corp ❅ Activision ❅ Annapurna Interactive ❅ Arc System Works ❅ Arrowhead Game Studios ❅ Asobo Studio ❅ Astragon ❅ Bandai Namco Entertainment ❅ Behaviour Interactive ❅ Bend Studio ❅ Blizzard Entertainment (Diablo IV) ❅ Blizzard Entertainment (Overwatch 2) ❅ Bloober Team ❅ Bloober Team (Chronos: The New Dawn) ❅ Bluepoint Games ❅ Bokeh Game Studio ❅ Bungie ❅ Capcom ❅ Chrono Studio ❅ Clouded Leopard Entertainment ❅ Crystal Dynamics ❅ Dark Star ❅ Digital Extremes ❅ Dragami Games ❅ Enhance ❅ Enigmatrix ❅ Firaxis Games ❅ Firesprite ❅ Funcom ❅ Gearbox Software ❅ Gemdrops Inc. ❅ Gryphline ❅ Guerrilla ❅ GungHo Online Entertainment ❅ Hangar 13 ❅ HB Studios / 2K Games ❅ Housemarque ❅ Insomniac Games ❅ Inti Creates Co. ❅ Kalypso Media ❅ Klei Entertainment ❅ Koei Tecmo ❅ Konami ❅ Level 5 ❅ Media Molecule ❅ Midgar Studio ❅ Mintrocket ❅ Moon Hood ❅ Naughty Dog ❅ nDreams ❅ NetEase (Ananta) ❅ NetEase (MARVEL Rivals) ❅ NetEase (Naraka: Bladepoint) ❅ NetEase (Once Human) ❅ NetEase (Sea of Remnants) ❅ NetEase (Where Winds Meet) ❅ Nexon (The First Berserker Khazan) ❅ Nexon (The First Descendant) ❅ Nihon Falcom ❅ Nippon Ichi Software ❅ Nuverse ❅ Outerloop Games ❅ Outright Games ❅ Outright Games (Bluey: The Video Game) ❅ Pearl Abyss ❅ Pocketpair Publishing (Never Grave) ❅ Pocketpair Publishing (Palworld) ❅ Polyphony Digital ❅ Raw Fury ❅ RecRoom ❅ Red Candle Games ❅ Resolution Games ❅ Saber Interactive ❅ San Diego Studio ❅ Santa Monica Studio ❅ Sega ❅ Serenity Forge ❅ Shueisha Games ❅ SNK ❅ Spike Chunsoft ❅ Steel Wool Games ❅ Sucker

On December 16 we will release a content update for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl with a brand new storyline which will bring:

• 8 quests that can take hours to complete
• 7 locations to explore
• 6 characters with their own backgrounds and stories
• A unique weapon
• A hub to create

All of this — completely free for all owners of the game. Christmas arrived earlier in the Zone. Let’s get into it.

What’s S.T.A.L.K.E.R. all about?

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl gives you a chance to jump into the Chornobyl Anomalous Zone. A place frozen in time since 1986, but re-emerged after the second explosion caused by secret scientific experiments.

It is an abandoned area, surrounded by a massive perimeter wall to protect the outside world from what was left inside after horrific experiments. Now, this place is full of mysteries, buried secrets, horrific mutants, anomalies, artifacts, and… people.

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