Top 10 best video games of 2026 – from 007 First Light to Resident Evil Requiem

It’s been a torrid year in many ways, but 2026 has still managed to serve up some classic video game titles, from Pokémon Pokopia to Forza Horizon 6 – but which is the best of the best?

It all seems to have happened very quickly, but 2026 is now officially halfway done. As has been obvious for a while now, it’s an excellent year for quality video games and even if you somehow ignore GTA 6 there is a bewildering array of other promising new titles to come.

For now though we’re offering up a half year report for 2026, in the style of our annual Top 20 of the year. Who knows what our list of the best titles will look like by December but for now these are, in our opinion, the best games of the last six months. Although according to our usual rules we don’t include remasters, remakes, yearly sequels, or expansions.

We also don’t include early access titles, so despite being very good Slay The Spire 2 isn’t eligible yet. And just missing out on the top 10 we’d also highly recommend Vampire Crawlers, Mewgenics, and Demon Tides.

10. Yoshi And The Mysterious Book

Nintendo Switch 2

The biggest fault we can find with Yoshi And The Mysterious Book is that the marketing for it was absolutely awful. It completely misrepresented the game as being only for very young children, when in fact it’s a clever deconstruction of 2D platformers, that puts the emphasis on a dazzling array of what are essentially power-ups, rather than the main character of Yoshi himself. This is dressed up in a bizarre story about a talking animal encyclopaedia, but after an underwhelming first few levels Yoshi And The Mysterious Book becomes a mad sandbox of classic Nintendo invention, that actively encourages you to stretch its mechanics far beyond their expected limits.

9. Mina The Hollower

Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC

Creating a game that purposefully looks like an old Game Boy Color title is certainly a choice in 2026, but this new action adventure from the creators of Shovel Knight is far more complex and varied than should seem possible, considering the prehistoric technology it’s emulating. There’s even beauty in its carefully sculpted ugliness, and while Zelda: Link’s Awakening is an obvious comparison to make visually Mina The Hollower is entirely its own game, especially in terms of the ‘hollowing’ technique (basically, tunnelling underground for a short distance), the densely designed game world, and the puzzle-filled dungeons within it.

8. Forza Horizon 6

Xbox Series X/S and PC

As far as anyone knows, a PlayStation 5 version of what is now the Xbox’s most important first party franchise is still on the way this year but given Microsoft’s increasingly incomprehensible multiformat policy that may no longer be a certainty. PlayStation owners should certainly hope it’s still coming, though, because while Forza Horizon 6 doesn’t really do anything new (and still doesn’t have proper crashes) this is the best entry yet, with a stunning version of Tokyo to race around and a huge array of, not just cars, but modes to compete in, resulting in what is easily the best arcade racer of the modern era.

7. Pragmata

PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC

Even if it hadn’t turned out to be a good game, we would’ve praised Capcom for taking the chance on a big budget, new IP like this. But as it happens, Pragmata is one of the best surprises of the year. It’s an excellent third person shooter whose central conceit – that you have to complete simple block puzzles, to expose weak spots in the armour of attacking robots, while simultaneously controlling the game as a as a regular action game – never feels gimmicky. It’s a highly engrossing experience, from beginning to end, and we’re still shocked at how close it came to outshining Saros, which happened to come out at around the same time.

6. Nioh 3

PlayStation 5 and PC

If Sony wasn’t helping to fund these games we don’t think there ever would’ve been a Nioh 2, let alone 3. They always seem to get overlooked, and Nioh 3 was no different, even though it’s one of the greatest Soulslikes ever seen – at least in terms of those not made by FromSoftware. In terms of combat alone it’s inarguably the best and if it wasn’t for the terrible storytelling and deeply flawed loot system (both long-standing problems for the franchise, that this new sequel refuses to address) it would be right up there with Dark Souls et al. Especially as what his sequel does add, that is very welcome, is a lot more variety in terms of enemies and settings.

5. Saros

PlayStation 5

Returnal has long been our favourite PlayStation 5 exclusive, but we were hoping that this spiritual successor would take its place in our affections. Alas, that hasn’t really happened, despite Saros featuring possibly the best gunplay in any third person shooter ever, especially in terms of games with more fantastical weaponry. It’s an absolutely perfect blend of modern 3D combat and developer Housemarque’s mastery of 2D arcade action, and while it’s only a small step up from Returnal it’s still transcendently wonderful. Unfortunately, we don’t like any of the ancillary elements of the game, with its miserable atmosphere, unimaginative backdrops, and boring characters – all of which was handled much better in Returnal.

4. Resident Evil Requiem

PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC

The best proof that 2026 has been a great year for games is that Resident Evil Requiem is only at number four in our list. It would’ve been even higher if it was just a little more consistent but, like most Resident Evil games, the first half is noticeably better than the second, especially given the rather weak ending. When it’s firing on all cylinders though Requiem is the best new entry in the franchise in two decades, with an excellent blend of over-the-top combat with Leon S. Kennedy and some genuinely terrifying segments with new character Grace, who has justifiably become an instant favourite with fans.

3. Öoo

Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC

Easily the lowest profile game in our top 10, we wouldn’t even know Öoo exists if a reader hadn’t mentioned it to us. We always criticise indie developers for picking unhelpful names, but this one is not only impossible to google but it’s equally hard to know how it’s supposed to be pronounced. The name is actually a pictograph of the main character, a curious worm whose body segments can be deposited as bombs and used to propel itself across the game’s devilishly designed platform levels. That’s all there is to the mechanics and yet the game manages to exploit them in endlessly inventive ways, constantly convincing you that a puzzle is impossible, right up until the moment you solve it.

2. Pokémon Pokopia

Nintendo Switch 2

This list is full of welcome surprises and no less than when it comes to our top two, neither of which we think anyone was expecting very much from originally. The entire Pokémon franchise has been in the doldrums for years, and a spin-off that’s a cross between Minecraft and Animal Crossing seemed an unlikely way for it to rejuvenate itself.

That’s exactly what’s happened though, with Pokémon Pokopia catapulting Ditto up the list of the world’s favourite pokémon, as you use them to recreate a post-apocalyptic wasteland in the most laidback and charming way possible. It has structure and goals for those that crave it but equally you can just mess around building and designing as you please, where creating habits for pokémon is just as compelling as capturing and battling them.

1. 007 First Light

PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2 (Q3), and PC

Hitman developer IO Interactive is a talented studio but nothing about the trailers to 007 First Light suggested this was going to be anything particularly special. But it absolutely is. It’s right up there with Alien: Isolation, in terms of recreating the look and feel of the movie series it’s based on, to the point where it’s actively more enjoyable than many of the actual films. The younger version of Bond may look like a smarmy git in the promotional images but in context he’s disarmingly likeable and even vulnerable at times.

All the performances in the game are top notch and one of its great triumphs is allowing all the characters time to breathe, with far more incidental dialogue than you might imagine. Occasionally it goes a bit too far, with some surprisingly slow pacing, but one of its many surprises is that when it does get going the gunplay and melee combat is top notch. It also has the best training montage in video game history and one of our favourite needle drops ever. We even liked the theme tune and title sequence.

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