An introduction to me, Kevin Zuhn
Hey there! I’m Kevin Zuhn, the creative director and head writer at Young Horses Games. My notable work includes Bugsnax and Octodad: Dadliest Catch, which you’ve probably watched a steamer play at some point.
When it comes to games, I have a voracious appetite. By my count, in the year of 2023 I played over 170 games in total. How do I do it? I pretend it’s research!
But having played what my friends and coworkers call an ‘upsetting amount of games’ I find it harder than ever to narrow things down to a Top 10. After all, if I’d only played 10 games this year, the list would write itself! So this is me digging deep into what I love and what I find value in, and I hope that you find value in these games, too.
Triple-A Tentpoles!
Look, do you really need me to tell you that the biggest, most successful, and most beloved games of this year were good?
…You do??
Well alright, then.
Frankly, my top 10 list is going to feature a lot of indies, mostly because I think it’s more fun to recommend games that might have flown under your radar! But heck, I still played all the big releases and they were pretty spectacular this year. If there are some notable titles missing from the list, those are games that I’ve started but haven’t finished yet. Tears of the Kingdom and Baldur’s Gate are really freaking long, I’m sorry!
Anyway, to whet our palates, here are my top 5 AAA games of 2023!
Street Fighter 6
I’ve always wanted to like Street Fighter! Unfortunately, I’m terrible at fighting games and terrified of online play. But along came Street Fighter 6 with its ridiculous single player adventure mode; Where I’m free to brawl anybody I can see and hoover up special moves as I live out the Shonen tournament arc of my dreams! It’s an interesting fusion of fighting game and RPG systems, and I hope more fighting franchises give this approach a shot so I can finally like them, too.
Resident Evil 4 Remake
I played the original Resident Evil 4 on Gamecube in 2005, and it left a huge impression on me. For decades I considered it one of the best games of all time, and I applauded its influence on the wider game industry. I never actually finished it. Hell, I didn’t even get to the castle! That’s, like, one fourth of the way in! So the Remake was my shot at absolution, a way to redeem my childhood crime. And dang, it was an absolute blast! My kid self was a fool, but at least they can rest in peace.
Super Mario Bros. Wonder
Mario as a series always seems to oscillate between wild experimentation and playing it completely safe; and it’s usually fallen to the 2D games to be the safe choice. So it’s cool to see a traditional Mario whose central mechanical gimmick is just “something unexpected will happen”. Every level’s an experiment of some kind, and there are tons of lil’ experiences in Wonder that I’d be happy to see fleshed out into full games!
Hi-Fi Rush
After playing it, I wrote in my notes that I should absolutely not forget Hi-Fi Rush no matter what else came out this year. Games have been trying to crack the formula for rhythm brawling for ages, and at last we’ve got the secret; animate everything! Seriously, Hi-Fi Rush has some of the best character and environment animation I’ve seen in games, it’s entrancing. I also have a specific weakness for any game about tackling a series of colorful themed bosses. This is the Triple-A game that I’m least confident you played, and if that’s true, please correct that mistake!