Best games you played in 2024.

Really enjoyed myself gaming-wise in 2024. Personal highlights would be:

Released/Early Access in 2024:
Palworld. Yes it's janky, yes it's nothing that will win any awards for its story or visuals but my god this was practically gaming-crack. The simple base building, combined with the management of simple production lines and the breeding made me sink an unholy amount of hours into this. I doubt it'd be the same if I was playing solo or public but on a dedicated server with a dozen other people(most of us strangers at the time) it made for a really good experience.
Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes. Really scratched the itch for that old time jRPG and was a mostly true spiritual successor to the Suikoden franchise. It was a bit more "lighthearted" than Suikos usually go but still a very good game. Just... maybe a smaller focus on minigames next time :P
Metaphor: ReFantazio. The perfectly bred chimera from Atlus. Marrying systems from Shin Megami Tensei with the more "casual" aspects of the Persona spin-offs and putting this in a high fantasy setting was chef's kiss. Stunning visual design(that UI!), amazing audio, interesting characters/plot and decent turn based combat. GOTY for me.

Games from previous years I played in 2024:
Wartales. Released 2023. Absolutely loved this game. There's very little narrative wise and a lot of what is there is not that good but the gameplay/sandbox is stellar. If you like tactics based combat and building a roster of varying builds and equipment this game is amazing. Just got a new expac DLC which I plan to get sometime soon and return to the game.
Mind Over Magic. Released 2023(almost 2024). Now, this is still in very much active development. The version I played was in January/February so don't know how accurate it still is since I haven't tried the latest updates that overhauled a lot(plan to go back to it after 1.0 release in a few months). Back then it was still pretty barebones but it did provide a very addicting experience. Who knew that building up your wonky not-Hogwarts, ensuring you can keep everyone fed and alive, and training your students while tackling the monster infested underground would be so much fun?
Marvel's Midnight Suns. Released 2022. Now I've seen this one being a little debated but I personally found this to be a very enjoyable game. Story wise it's nothing mind blowing, it's kinda typical Marvel-ish stuff, but I really enjoyed the gameplay and interactions. The roster is big enough to let you experiment with builds etc(I had the DLC so that's 4 characters more) although if you want to play on higher difficulties there's a pretty narrow road you have to walk as most characters have obviously "BiS" builds that far outperform anything else they can do. Not much of a problem in normal difficulty though.
Disco Elysium. Released 2019. Finally got around to this one that has been sitting in my backlog since August 2023 where it popped in a HB Choice. Turns out I was missing out on an amazing game. I think this game has some brilliant ideas and execution as far as how "interactive" narrative should be and others can learn a lot from this. Like having your skills not only affect the kind of observations and "hints" you get but also dictate your inner dialogue and to an extend that specific skills actually interact with one another and comment on each other's comments while a logistical nightmare in planning provides such an amazing experience. Somehow though I still managed to get the absolute worst ending by missing a single 97% success roll near the end of the game. Still satisfied :P

Honorable mentions:
Let's School
IXION
Honkai: Star Rail

Playing Balatro on my phone sometimes made work suck less. I think that's the biggest compliment I can give to any game this particular year.

I haven't put many hours into it cause it's been the hardest year of my life but Buckshot Roulette is a flawless execution of a good concept. Games like these keep my interest/love in games still going,no endless filler/padding/trend chasing/and more flaws of AAA. Just creativity and personality.

Enjoyed two boomer shooters I've won here-Wraith Aeon of Ruin and Dread Templar.

And I come back to Team Fortress 2 every year cause it's my go to cozy game. 13 years later I've still yet to discover an online FPS I would like more or even remotely as much.

Balatro, LISA, and Dark Souls!

excluding games which i played again in 2024 (eu4, stellaris, civ vi) my top 3 is:

Curse of the Dead Gods
Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate - Daemonhunters
Hollow Knight

and a special mention to the recently started Old World which took me away from Hollow Knight

I finally dove into the Souls-genre this year, so my list is a bit skewed;

Nioh 2 (Honestly, I liked the stages in Nioh 1 more, but Nioh 2 was just an upgrade in every other regard)
Bloodborne
Elden Ring
Tunic
Dave the Diver (haven't finished)

I started playing late in the year, but here are some of mine:
Forza Horizon 4 (Especially for the price after sale)
Deep Rock Galactic
Slash Quest
Portal 1 & 2
Mindustry

mass effect legendary edition
vampire the masquerade bloodlines
half life alyx
star wars knights of the old republic
the invincible

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is amazing.
Last of Us Part 1 really got to me (in a good way).
Thimbleweed Park had some very good jokes.

Played the entire 2D Metroid franchise (Zero Mission, Metroid II -AM2R version, Super Metroid, Metroid Fusion, Metroid Dread). It was pretty enjoyable, the 3º and the 5º were my favorites. Tried the Metroid prime trilogy, and only finished the first one and didn't like it. Too repetitive and too much aimless wandering and backtracking.

Also enjoyed Hi Fi Rush and The Unavowed very much.

Ghost Song
Nioh 2
Alien Isolation
Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater, Metal Gear Solid (Master Collection)
Castlevania Advanced Collection
Dead Rising (Old version)
Dark Souls Remastered (I have/played PTDE before this)
Dark Souls II (Not scholar, I already have/played that version)
Dark Souls III (another playthrough)
Tails of Iron
Tomb Raider I-III Remastered

Forza Horizon 4
Brotato
Unepic

From Steam Replay, the ones that stood out:

• There is no Light
• Afterimage
• The Entropy Centre
• Dorfromantik

2024 was a pretty good year overall, no surprise a bunch of VN's in my list.

going to list from most recently played and then go older(not ranked by how much I liked it).

1. GRIS - this went straight into the favorites
2. Outer Wilds, knowledge is your progression here... so is lucking into the right directions(I had actually by chance found the 2 main things needed to beat the game very quickly), a few parts of exploration were somewhat stressful because of how the worlds progress over time so you were on strict time limits.
3. Journey, similar to GRIS in enjoyability but didn't quite make it into the favorites.
4. Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney Trilogy, still only partway through the 3rd game(I just don't want to just read in December, need action to relieve stress).
5. Okami - an older classic
6. Beacon Pines - this game is actually what sold me on that months choice, it was something I almost bought a few times when it was on sale by itself.
7. Summer Pockets - absolutely wonderful VN, I just hope reflection blue(or w/e its called) comes as a DLC for this and not a standalone purchase so I can do even more heroine routes for it, expected release date is in April.
8. Half-Life 2 + episodes... I do wish I waited a little longer for the RTX mods but it was still a very enjoyable experience(used the AI texture upscaling mod to modernize graphics ever so slightly)
9. ATRI - no surprise, another VN
10. Borderlands 1 - this was sitting in my win backlog for a very long time... because the game just did not like my 360 controller(I have an older one, supposedly microsoft had 2 different protocols or something between older and newer and that was the issue)... but once I got my elite series 2 controller that issue disappeared!
11. Detroit Become Human - I plan to do another playthrough on this, instead of pacifist... going the terminator ending.
12. The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood - Yet another VNish game... I only disliked about 1 line of dialogue in it essentially it was fuck men... could have praised women instead to stay positive overall
13. Lies of P - my first true souls like to play until the end, I did struggle with the gimmick gate guardian boss(and had to use the infinite duration perfect guard grindstone mod for this one boss)
14. Marco and Ru's Older brother... sorry The Galaxy Dragon - yet another VN, but this one has a large number of animated segments and significantly more backgrounds and such compared to other VN's, story is solid to.
15. Holocure and Death Must Die(putting both here as this isn't 1st year playing either and they are the same genre), made progress on Holocure towards 100%ing(a goal I don't think I can even achieve anymore with the latest update) and the 2nd act update for Death Must Die(can't wait for Act 3 update!))
16. Nekopara Volumes - Cute Cat Girls... do I need to say more?
17. Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga - an incredibly good Fire Emblem like game, managing squads takes a little getting used to but its really nice to customize everything to your liking? want a mage murder squad, you can do that... but better keep them safe, want a balanced team with defenders, support and offense? you can do that to.
18. Adabana Odd tales - yet another VN, this one doesn't give you a waifu to really get attached to, just a great story overall with very beautiful artwork, went straight into my favorites and is an easy recommend.

I did not care too much for Elden Ring, I did not understand it was a "Souls" game and would be difficult to the point of not being fun for me. I made a trade for it and not sure I will ever finish it.
Anyway games I really have enjoyed this year
Fallout 4
State of Decay 2
Pathfinder Kingmaker
Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous
Frostpunk
Frostpunk 2
This War of Mine
Unpacking
Eiyuden Chronicles Hundred Heroes
Sea of Stars
Yakuza Like a Dragon, I loved this one just for the story which was kind of corny but really good and there's a lot of it

Most of the other stuff is just things I won here and were either good or ok but not great
Honorable mentions
Starfield, good but not great and certainly should not have bought full price
Mass Effect Andromeda
Dragon Age Inquisition
Symphony of War Nephilim Saga

Favorite games I played in 2024:

Last Train Home
Balatro
INFRA
Chained Echoes
Helldivers 2
Lunacid
The Quiet Apocalypse
Sovereign Syndicate
Avernum: Escape The Pit
SKALD: Against the Black Priory
Tactics Ogre: Reborn
Dread Delusion

Path of Exile 2 is probably going to close out the list.