You probably think you know how 2024 went for gaming. Big budgets, flashy trailers, and the usual suspects from Ubisoft or EA dominating the charts, right? Well, honestly, that's not exactly the whole story. If you actually look at the data and the sheer chaos of the last twelve months, 2024 was less about the "predictable" and more about the weird, the indie, and the surprisingly polished remakes that nobody expected to be that good.
It’s easy to get lost in the noise.
There were so many new games releasing 2024 that even the most hardcore completionists ended up with backlogs that look like a digital hoarders' paradise. We started the year with a "Pokemon with guns" controversy and ended it with a tiny little robot saving the reputation of a billion-dollar console.
The Indie Takeover Was Not an Accident
For years, people have been saying "Indie is the future," but in 2024, the future basically kicked the door down. We aren't just talking about niche hits. We are talking about games like Balatro.
Think about it. A poker-themed roguelike created by a solo developer known as LocalThunk managed to sell over 3.5 million copies. It wasn't because of a massive marketing budget. It was because the game is addictive in a way that feels almost illegal. It’s "just one more round" personified.
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Then you have Palworld.
Remember January? It feels like a decade ago.
Pocketpair dropped this open-world survival game that everyone called "Pokemon with guns," and it exploded. 25 million players in a matter of weeks. It proved that gamers are hungry for weird genre mashups that big studios are too scared to touch.
- Animal Well: A surreal Metroidvania that looks like a neon fever dream.
- Manor Lords: A medieval city builder that had millions of wishlists before it even hit early access.
- UFO 50: 50 games in one from the creator of Spelunky.
The trend here isn't just "indies are good." It's that indies are now providing the stability and innovation that AAA studios are struggling to maintain. According to some reports from VG Insights, indie games actually accounted for nearly half of the total revenue on Steam this year. That is a massive shift from 2023.
Why 2024 Was Actually the Year of the RPG
If you like spending 100 hours staring at stat screens and talking to NPCs, you've had a busy year.
The volume of high-quality RPGs among the new games releasing 2024 was genuinely staggering. We started strong with Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth in January, which took the series to Hawaii and proved that Ichiban Kasuga is arguably the most lovable protagonist in gaming right now.
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But then Final Fantasy VII Rebirth arrived in February.
It’s huge. Like, "too much content" huge.
Square Enix took the linear path of the original and turned it into a massive open world filled with mini-games (some would say too many mini-games, looking at you, Queen’s Blood).
The Atlus Triple Threat
Atlus basically owned the calendar this year. They didn't just release one hit; they dropped a trio of bangers:
- Persona 3 Reload: A ground-up remake that finally made the 2006 classic feel modern.
- Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance: An "expanded" version that actually fixed the narrative issues of the original Switch release.
- Metaphor: ReFantazio: This was the big one. A brand-new IP from the Persona team that traded high schools for a high-fantasy election race. It’s stylish, it’s political, and it might be the best thing they've ever made.
The AAA Identity Crisis
While indies and RPGs were thriving, the traditional "Blockbuster" space felt a bit shaky. We saw some incredible highs, like Astro Bot—which is basically a giant hug for anyone who grew up with a PlayStation—and Black Myth: Wukong, which showed that China is now a serious contender in the high-end action space.
But we also saw Concord.
It’s hard not to talk about it. Sony spent eight years and hundreds of millions on a hero shooter that lasted about two weeks before being pulled from shelves. It was a sobering reminder that "polished" isn't enough anymore if the "soul" of the game feels like a corporate checklist.
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Then there’s Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
People were worried. BioWare hadn't had a "clean" win in a decade. While The Veilguard shifted the series toward a more action-oriented style that polarized some old-school fans, it was a technical marvel with some of the best character-writing the studio has done since Mass Effect 2. It proved BioWare still has the sauce, even if the recipe has changed.
The DLC That Acted Like a Full Game
We have to talk about Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree.
Is it a "new game"? Technically, no.
But considering it’s larger and more complex than most full-priced releases, it dominated the 2024 conversation. Hidetaka Miyazaki and the team at FromSoftware didn't just add a new map; they added a vertical labyrinth that humbled even the most veteran players. If you didn't get your teeth kicked in by Messmer the Impaler at least twenty times, did you even play games in 2024?
Actionable Insights for Your 2024 Backlog
If you're looking at this mountain of releases and feeling overwhelmed, here’s how to prioritize based on what actually stuck the landing:
- For the "Short on Time" Crowd: Grab Astro Bot or Thank Goodness You're Here!. They are punchy, imaginative, and won't require a second mortgage on your free time.
- For the Competitive Fix: Helldivers 2 is still the king of "emergent chaos." Even months after its peak, dropping a 500kg bomb on your friends (accidentally, of course) remains peak gaming.
- For the "Vibe" Seekers: Animal Well. Don't use a guide. Just get lost.
- For the Traditionalists: Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2. It feels like a high-budget Xbox 360 game in the best way possible. No open-world bloat, just chainswords and aliens.
2024 wasn't just another year of sequels. It was a year where the definition of a "hit" changed. We stopped looking purely at graphics and started looking for games that actually respected our time and curiosity. Whether it was a card game about poker or a monkey fighting gods, the best new games releasing 2024 were the ones that took a risk.
To stay ahead of the curve, keep an eye on the "Early Access" labels on Steam. Many of the biggest hits of 2024 started there, and the 2025 pipeline is already filling up with indie titles that are currently being polished by player feedback. If you want to find the next Balatro, you have to be willing to look where the big publishers aren't.