Best Multiplayer of 2025 - Article

by Lee Mehr , posted on 20 January 2026 / 1,771 Views

Whether looking back at Tennis for Two as the first competitive video game, Spacewar! as the first documented case of an e-Sport tournament, or the first pure cooperative experience in Fire Truck, multiplayer has been a cornerstone of gaming. Today, it's now the driving force in both multi-million-dollar competitions and social interactions – for better or worse. Publishing executives have collectively sacrificed fat stacks and reputable game studios for the faint hope of discovering a new Fortnite. From Sony to Microsoft to Ubisoft, this frenzied chase for the next diamond mine has fundamentally altered publishers' output trajectory – both in quantity and style.

Even with such unfortunate business realities, there's still a bright side: the successes that capture the spirit of competition, comradery, or both simultaneously. As evidenced below, 2025 was a commendable year for multiplayer of any stripe. Each of our finalists captured special stories that we won't soon forget, from last-second goals to valiant comebacks against all odds.

The Shortlist:

ARC Raiders

Rematch

Mario Kart World

Split Fiction

Battlefield 6

The Runner-Up:

ARC Raiders

Interesting behind-the-scenes fact: yours truly had a hand in scooting ARC Raiders above Split Fiction by a mere 0.03% of the vote. It's one of those weird scenarios where the latter arguably is a better game but not the better multiplayer experience. A peculiar delineation, but bear with me. Split Fiction's latest co-op extravaganza is both wonderful and one-note. Outside of some hijinks and side stories, determining success was quite binary: you and your buddy either progressed ahead or failed.

As evidenced by numerous streamers – biggest among them being TheBurntPeanut – ARC Raiders' avenues to success are more varied. The amount of interlocking gears that balance its PvPvE structure are impressive. For example, only teammates can revive you the standard way, but defibrillators work on any downed raider. Maybe the stranger who downed you will be charitable if you sing a song or tell a good joke; hell, maybe you'll form an unstated partnership until extraction. Or maybe you'll be minding your own business, working on quests, and get unceremoniously killed within three minutes. Such are the possibilities here.

That's what captures ARC's multiplayer: the inherent surprise – good or ill – to any trip topside. Watch yourself out there, Raider.

The Winner:

Mario Kart World

To yoink from Evan Norris' review: "Judged on its own mechanics, systems, and merits, [Mario Kart World] is a brilliant racing game, a GotY contender, and one of the finest entries in the entire Mario Kart canon, not to mention another in a long line of exceptional launch titles from Nintendo. Is there room for improvement? Yes. The open world could be more organized, the 24-player Grand Prix races could be less chaotic, and the online customization options could be more flexible, but these are relatively minor issues in such a polished, daring, substantial, and joyful game that promises to provide reliable entertainment for years to come."

With such high praise – alongside some qualms – for a kart racer, it's no surprise to see Nintendo win gold. The Mario Kart franchise has been one of those de facto party games for ages, especially so after Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was ported to Switch (1). Sure, that may afford positive bias towards any new entry, but Nintendo EPD wasn't resting on its laurels. By incorporating a new open world personality alongside all of the new technological benefits afforded by Switch 2, World will likely be seen as one of the most forward-facing entries in the franchise.

9 Comments

curl-6 (on 20 January 2026)

Either Mario Kart or Split Fiction would have been worthy winners in my book, both are excellent.

Leynos (on 20 January 2026)

AI slop games don't even deserve a nomination

SecondWar Leynos (on 21 January 2026)

Which game are you referring to?

2zosteven SecondWar (on 21 January 2026)

yes do tell

shikamaru317 SecondWar (on 21 January 2026)

I'm assuming he is referring to ARC Raiders. They apparently used a text to speech AI program that was trained on real voice actors in order to avoid paying real voice actors.

Leynos shikamaru317 (on 21 January 2026)

And GEN AI for some of the weapons

coolbeans Leynos (on 22 January 2026)

As it currently stands, that's not true. Embark's CEO talked about the ability of gen AI to make weapon models from a YouTube video, but that tech hasn't been used for any ARC weapons.

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/arc-raiders-doesnt-ai-generate-guns-from-youtube-videos-embark-clarifies-thats-a-research-project-and-not-something-that-were-using-in-the-game-now

coolbeans Leynos (on 22 January 2026)

It's kinda nuts how flippantly that's tossed around for what amounts to text-to-speech barks (which were contractually agreed to by VAs) and some canned voice lines.