25th December
Hello and welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we’ve been playing. This week it’s not about what we’ve been playing, but what we hope to be playing on Christmas Day (you’re reading this now, but we wrote this back in June or something as we plan ahead).
Sektori – Whatever I can get my hands on
I’ve bought my son Metroid Prime 4 and Civ 7 for his Switch 2, so I’m hoping I can get some time with the TV to give Geometry Wars-alike Sektori a proper go. Chances of this happening? Well, not high. Maybe I’ll get some time to try it on the Steam Deck, but given I’ll likely also be cooking lunch and suffering from sleep deprivation, maybe I’ll settle for a few rounds of Mario Kart World with the family and hope I don’t disgrace myself. Happy Christmas, everyone!
-Tom
Tiny Bookshop – Switch 2
Aside from playing the annual game of making sure no tiny bits of kids’ toys get scooped up with wrapping paper, tossed in the bin and lost forever (RIP the toy spoon), I’m really hoping to be playing Tiny Bookshop at some point over the Christmas period. A management game about owning a small bookstore by the sea? It sounds glorious to me, books and the beach? Ideal. I’m always drawn to management games, but ones with a cosy vibe will always pull most of my attention.
After hearing nothing but good things about it from the rest of the guides team, I am ready to get stuck in (hopefully!).
-Marie
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 – PC
While I’ll no doubt end up buying far too many games in the Steam Winter Sale and playing those to death instead over the holidays, my plan is to get through as much of this year’s gaming backlog as possible, starting with The Game Awards 2025 winner, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.
I did play Act 1 of Expedition 33 back when the game came out, but I dropped it after getting stuck on Act 1’s final boss… and now I fear going back to it. The holidays are my opportunity to restart my save and finally go see what Act 2 and 3 are about, provided I don’t let any other games get in the way first.
–Kelsey
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment, Switch 2
Gaming is essential at Christmas. No, not for playing with family – for escaping them. Just me?!That’s why I always like to have a handheld game available, so I can sneak away after too much food and drink, put some headphones on and ignore everybody. And what could be better for some escapism than thwacking and smacking a load of moblins as the Zelda series’ titular princess? It’s proving incredibly cathartic.
-Ed
Soulframe and Warframe too probably, PC
The Christmas holidays are the perfect time to jump into a game you missed, or one you’ve foolishly left by the wayside. For me, that’s Soulframe. It’s this true fantastical gem I’ve only managed to sink a few hours into since gaining access to the Preludes servers.
From the tiny amount of time I’ve spent exploring it, the game appears to be a weird one. Not in a bad way necessarily, but it’s something I’ve yet to figure out properly. Or rather, it’s not had a chance to sink its hooks into me just yet. Here’s hoping a few days free will remedy that.
Other than that, I also need to drop some time into Warframe’s latest update: The Old Peace. There’s a lot of depth to it I’ve yet to explore fully. Between these I’ll see my family and friends I suppose.
-Connor
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, PS5
Christmas games for me are one of two things. The first is a really brilliant, cerebral game I really should have played to something like completion by now (coughBluePrincecough), which I finally have the headspace and the free time and the roaring fire available to properly settle into. The second is a big, simple-minded open world triple-A map-marker-athon with an unchallenging Platinum trophy. And the second always wins.
Enter Star Wars Jedi: Survivor! I love this game, despite reviewing it and saying it was just quite good. I stand by that – it is quite good! But it’s quite good in the perfect way. I finished the story way back with the review, but like the first I have this quiet urge to go back and mop up the map, gobbling up lightsaber parts and differently-coloured ponchos and clicking my fingers to make BD-1 throw me a little healing snack. Plus, Star Wars always felt a little bit Christmassy to me, anyway, and the Star Wars Jedi games have that earnestness and silliness and authentic warm-heartedness that has always been the thing that made Star Wars great. I look forward to revisiting this quite good game more than many masterpieces.
-Taps
Lego City Undercover – Switch 2
I love Lego. My husband loves Lego. Lego loves Christmas? So, to the surprise of no one, our children also love Lego, and I have been playing through Lego City Undercover with my son again these last few evenings. I jokingly call it “Baby’s first GTA”, because really that is what it is. No car is safe, even if I am on the right side of the law. I see a car I like, Imma going to drive it. And then crash it into a wall a few too many times while driving here, there and everywhere, for it to burst into bricky ruins. Oh well, on to the next one.
-Victoria
Super Metroid – SNES (via Switch 2)
Painting a picture here, this is how my Christmas Day will go. I’ll be woken up early (though not as early as some, mercifully – maybe seven?) and will immediately go through the chaos of present swapping and unwrapping with my immediate family. Then we’ll abscond to another person’s house, which means I don’t need to cook. That’s a godsend. It’ll still be bedlam, though, with four dogs from three different households winding each other up and about six adults vying for the attention of an over-excited kid while said child’s parents (of which I am one) try to avoid them and leave them to relatives in order to extract a tiny slice of peace. Plus it’s a day of being social, and getting gradually more and more tired and drunk. After dinner I will happily fall asleep for a bit, in part out of fatigue and partially to escape the noise, until my wife gently wakes me and tells me that it’s hometime. It will be a nice day. It’ll also feel like I’ve run a marathon, just with consuming a kilogram of gravy halfway through.
My point being – I’ll be bloody lucky to get anywhere near a video game before Christmas evening, except for helping my daughter out with her new Switch 2. But given there’s no Doctor Who to religiously sit down for this year, that claws me back an hour or so in the evening. So I’ll probably settle in and play a comfort food game as the night settles in – a bit of Balatro, perhaps, or some more PBA Pro Bowling. Or, oh – I know! Flying back from The Game Awards I finished Metroid: Zero Mission on Nintendo Switch Online. I’ll probably hop to Super Metroid next. A replay of that should help to wash away some of my complex feelings about Prime 4, too… See you next year.
-Alex
Avalon, board game
Every time I go to my brother’s house, which I am on Christmas Day, we end up playing Avalon. We’re borderline obsessed as a group. To the uninitiated, Avalon is like Traitors, or Werewolf, more accurately. It’s a game about hidden baddies who are trying to upset the game for the goodies. In this case, there’s no murder, but the baddies can fail the quests you need to succeed on in order to win. And if they do, they win. There are all sorts of Arthurian permutations to this, to the rules, such special characters like Arthur and Mordred and Percival and so on, but what I’ve outlined is the essence of the game. Which is to say: it’s a game about accusing other people of lying.
This is endless, and rather precarious, fun. It never fails to amaze me how much of a base instinct it is to defend ourselves from attack. It’s an impulse rather than a conscious thought. Moreover, it never fails to amaze me how adept we are at fitting observed patterns to suit our needs. Did someone’s eye twitch? Guilty. Did someone laugh the wrong way? Guilty. Someone not saying much? Guilty. It’s astonishing what one can convince oneself of. I say “precarious”, though, because the person it’s easiest to notice a behaviour change in is a partner, who is usually someone you spend a lot of time with. But to bring this to everyone’s attention is, well, the precarious part. I suppose it depends on how much you’re prepared to risk to win…
-Bertie