Most Innovative Game of 2024 - Article

by Mark Nielsen , posted on 16 January 2025 / 2,007 Views

Even if it is still technically one of the younger art forms out there, video gaming is no longer in its infancy. It has well over 50 years of history and most of its biggest franchises are old enough to be married with kids. At this point there's inevitably some predictability to the games that are made, some "been there, done that" that can occasionally make an otherwise well put together game feel dull. But this category is for celebrating the games that go against that and still insist on pushing the envelope, rather than adhering to a well-established blueprint.

The Shortlist:

Pacific Drive

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

Helldivers II

UFO 50

Balatro

The Runner-Up:

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

Innovation has become a staple of the Zelda franchise over its last several entries and Echoes of Wisdom doubled down on that by delivering something completely different from Link's usual sword-swinging and shield-wielding gameplay. Zelda is more a thinker, a builder, and in this case a conjurer of objects out of thin-air, from monsters to furniture. It's impressive how many times as of late this series has subverted our expectations and brought entirely new mechanics into play, and even more impressive how well the results have turned out. Even with a long list of tried and true formulas in their hands, Nintendo isn't usually a company that settles for playing it safe.

The Winner:

Balatro

Balatro was not only one of last year's biggest indie breakout hits, it was also a game that struck conceptual gold with a simple yet fresh idea: poker as a rougelike, complete with modifiers, multipliers, shops, and a whole lot of depth. It may not be a reinvention of the wheel but creative combinations of things we already know about can often be just as appealing and, in this case, enough so to make it one of the year's most lauded titles - one that's already inspired imitators. "If poker works as a rougelike then why not yahtzee? Why not tic-tac-toe?" Surely it's only a matter of time before we're all putting hundreds of hours into getting the ultimate run at drawing straws, and if there's one thing that signifies a clever idea, it's copycats.

4 Comments

G2ThaUNiT (on 16 January 2025)

I definitely agree with the winner but why is Helldivers 2 on the list? There's several other games that immediately come to mind that are a lot like Helldivers 2 like Earth Defense Force 5 as one example. What exactly was innovative about the game? I loved it, but just thought it was a fun arcadey PvE game.

Machina G2ThaUNiT (on 16 January 2025)

The game master elements of the in-game war get a lot of praise for being innovative. I'm honestly not sure if it's been done quite like that in other games before, though if it has it's never been as successful at getting people invested in it.