Game of the Year Watch 2026 Begins | IGN GOTY Watch

(upbeat music) - What's up everybody? Welcome to a special edition of Game of the Year Watch. This is our show where we start lining up potential Game of the Year candidates to see what we'll likely be voting on come awards season. I'm Damon Hatfield, today I'm joined by Aliak and Nick Lemone, and I hope you guys are ready to talk about some real good video games. - Absolutely. - Oh yeah. - Always. - Lots of good stuff. So no matter where you play, there have been a lot of great games released this year already from Resident Evil to Pokemon to forts at a Crimson Desert to 007 to mean at the Hollywood just an embarrassment of riches for us gamers. I've pulled scoop nation to see if there are any front runners for the fans will reveal the results in a bit, but first just saw our producers know behind the scenes, all the copy has been updated and run down, the copy here is a little bit outdated, but we can jump into our first game here. I think a good place to start would be the best selling game of the year and my personal pick. - Ooh. - For game of the year so far. That's a Resident Evil Requiem. - So this is the Damie pick. - So far? - That's my personal pick. - Gotcha. - But I also think it's a likely front runner, just in general. - 100. - And is the best selling game of the year so far. So a good jumping off point. Nick, we've talked about this game a lot on Game Scoop. - Yeah, and for good reason, I think the game is outstanding. I think still to this day, the momentum of this game, this game came out what March, Resident Evil? - Early March. - Early March. So early part of the year and yet it still has the momentum that I think is gonna carry it all the way through to December. It will have to deal with a giant grand theft auto size monster in the room. But if there's one person who I think can actually handle it, it's maybe Leon S Kennedy himself. I think Resident Evil Requiem is just a delightful love letter to all things Resident Evil, whether you're a longtime fan or a relatively new one. And honestly, it's just so fun to play. I played the game like six to seven times in a row. I've 100% of it. So, I love it, the Rogue Like mode is really fun. Leon must die. However, I do have my qualms with it, you know. If I am getting nitpicky in this game of the year style discussion, the only thing I can think that is really going against Resident Evil Requiem is strong first half of the game all the way up through Grace's basement section where you get to the midpoint of the game and then we switch and we make a pretty drastic change in location, tone, and the pacing gets flip flopped a little bit and I think that's where the game gets significantly weaker. That said, the first half of the game is the strongest Resident Evil has ever been. I'm gonna go out right and say it. The Grace, the trauma center, the medical ward. That is, I would argue one of the finest Resident Evil environments ever. I look forward to years from now where we do an art of the level on just Grace's section in that medical ward. And then how it's kind of just sandwiched by delightful bite-sized Leon sections. It's so good, it's a little bit of action. It's a little bit of horror. It just comes together to make a great package. - But come on, Leon's whole section in bombed out Raccoon City. When he's climbing that fallen over skyscraper and shooting out the glass to making the zombies fall, all of that is brilliant as well. - The set pieces are fantastic. And I think the Capcom did such a great job of giving you things to do in the open city section but none of it felt particularly meaningful or meaty in a way that like juxtaposed with Grace's section, Grace's sections earlier on. They just felt more substantial to me. And like I was doing more Resident Evil things. This almost felt like a Devil May Cry game when I was in Raccoon City as Leon. - I can agree with that section where that section where you reach Raccoon City. I expected more from that section. I'm not sure what I think the pacing kind of slowed down for me and I kind of got used to the monsters in that moment, but I absolutely loved Resident Evil 9. I think that was the moment where I was like, "Hmm, what's going on here?" But the rest of the game was to me, amazing. You beat me, you said you beat it seven to nine. I think it's like five or six times, but whatever I needed to do to 100% it. - Wow, okay, I got four, four. - Four to three. - I mean that's pretty good, did you get a speed run? - I got the speed run. - I got the speed run, okay. I loved Resident Evil 9. I think Capcom did something that they hadn't done before and I was connecting the old Resident Evil and the new Resident Evil and they made it work. It seamlessly, we got the horror. And honestly, the Grace scene that we got at the very beginning is one of the most terrifying moments. Resident Evil has ever been and honestly any other horror game, I can't remember a horror game that's gotten me like that. I just love that they combined the old and the new and it feels like instead of choosing one of the two, this is the new direction. They're embracing both sides, first person and third person in this working. - Okay, so Resident Evil Rockweam, hugely successful, best of the game of the year so far. The fourth best-selling game of the year so far is Pokemon, Pocopia. This is a game that I quite enjoyed, in spite of the fact that I'm not a Pokemon guy. The Tonal Whiplash is amazing and I love you. This is the thing that Game of the Year does that brings together disparate types of games and forces them to do bad, gladiatorial combat. I love it. - Is this cozy town building social simulator game with Pokemon a game of your contender? - I mean, I think it's 100% of valid contender, especially for people who might be turned off by Resident Evil's either violent score or maybe it's just not your cup of tea, then the same way that those people may not be particularly interested in Pocopia, you know? I mean, one thing that I did not expect myself to be as kind of grabbed by Pocopia as much as it did, and it's mostly because the game feel. Like the game feels good to move around in in a way that a lot of the kind of Minecraft style games don't particularly feel great. Like this is, you know, co-developed by the Dragon Quest Builders folks, and I think a lot of their DNA shows there, you know? I'm not a big fan of the tree punching survival or, or not horror, but I dream of survival games where you're building up towns just because there's usually never any sort of direction, and the thing that's beautiful about the Dragon Quest Builders games, and then that has in turn affected Pocopia is objective-based gameplay where it's like, do this. Now do this. Now go ahead and do this and do it however you want, and I really appreciate that sort of feedback loop, and it forces you to do things and consider things you had it before. Plus, it's great in a style debate because you're going back to canto region, original Pokemon, and you're seeing like a post-apocalyptic version of Pokemon Red and Blue, which is really delightful. I mean, the Pokemon franchise is 30 years old now. Pocopia is the best-reviewed game in the entire series history. Yeah, as a Pokemon fan, I feel like I've been one of those people that have been waiting for a Pokemon game that just felt good, that looked good, that I was excited to play, and this was it. I took, you know, it took Minecraft inspired level building, and it also kind of took a little bit of animal crossing too. So two highly successful games that mesh together into Pokemon. I guess my question is, do you guys call that innovation or inspiration? I mean, it's innovative in that Nintendo and Game Freaker. Like, what if we gave it to someone else? Yeah, and I think that's an innovation that speaks for itself, in my opinion. But I just don't know if this game in particular has the legs it needs from a more hardcore audience. You know, the people who are playing the Crimson Deserts, your Resident Evil's and things like that. But I mean, there are outliers like yourself. So I think it has a shot. Now, there are two games worth mentioning that got a 10 from IGN so far this year. That's Forza Horizon 6 and Mean of the Hollow War. Correct. Again, two very different games. Think of the diversity of games we've already just mentioned so far. Forza Horizon 6. Forza Horizon 5 was our game of the year in 2021. Is 6 a contender? Look, I love, here we go. I love Japan. I love Japan, too. Don't get me wrong. I love the formula forza Horizon has kind of introduced and implemented. But I can't help but feel like I've already played this game. And that's the biggest dilemma I've had. It's really fun. Don't get me wrong. It's just I've done all of this before. And the way that a lot of the things that we've been talking about feel fresh and exciting and new, whereas, you know, not to be like, you know, break it down to it's like absolute simplest formula, but it is just kind of driving a car around in a way that's very arcadian fun. And I think I'm at a point in my life now where I want more sim-based style challenging. You know, I want to learn that I'm oversteering and figure out how to fix that. This is just kind of something that I play to pass the time, as opposed to a thing that I actively want to, like, make progress in. Yeah. I mean, the presentation is flawless. I can't knock it for that. It does have kind of been there, done that feel. Exactly. And about friction, you enjoy a certain amount of friction in your games, but Forza Horizon 6 kind of goes out of its way to present a frictionless experience for the player. I don't know, it gets a little bit. I get a little bit tired of it. It's like overwhelming, like, positivity. And like, it's always trying to boost me up. And like, you're awesome. Here's a free car. You basically created cars. You're so good at this. It's like, okay, thank you. But also, like, give me a challenge. Give me a challenge, even like the, you know, the giant mech race, right? I thought that would be a lot more challenging than it actually was. In that, you know, you're on paper, it's a great idea. You are racing against a giant mech. And then it's like, oh, it's all kind of like scripted and chill, and it's designed to lose. And I feel good about it because I win. But I didn't really feel like I earned it, you know? Oh, yeah, what'd you think? Yeah, I'm always impressed by the visuals of this game. And I feel like it's one of those games. It's just really, really fun to play it. But again, I expect a little bit more from a game of the year. Like, I won, like, personally. This is very personal. I want a really good story that takes me to different worlds. And I think this is really a really fun game. It's impressive what they've done with Forza. But we have seen it before. And we have other contenders that I feel like have impressed me more. All right, we need to take a quick break. But when you return, we will discuss "Meena the Hollower" and "Your Picks" for "Game of the Year" 2026 so far. Play, IGN's Summer of Gaming is presented by our official retail partner, Best Buy. Welcome back to Game of the Year Watch 2026. We've been discussing some of the highest rated games on IGN this year, but what are your games of the year so far? I put the call out and scoop nation answered. Now, there is a clear front runner, which we'll get to in a bit, but perhaps more interesting is the tie for fifth place in my very scientific polling. Please break it down. I am dying to know. For fifth place. So, this would be 4th, 4th, 6th and Crimson Desert. Wow. That's a, I'm not surprised, but I guess maybe a little bit. That's pretty interesting. Yeah. So, we talked a bit about 4th, 4th, 6th. That got a 10th from IGN. Crimson Desert got a 6th from IGN, but it's a polarizing game, but people have passionate about it. The people that love it, they really, really, really love it. And I should say, there are lots of people on staff here at IGN that really, really love it. Oh, yeah. I know Justin Davis was obsessed with it for a bit. You know, I love it. Karato loves it. Like, what was your experience with it? I think this is, I do not love this game. However, I do think it's interesting, and it's a game that I frequently uninstall and reinstall on Steam every time there's an update, because I always think maybe now is the time that I'll love it. One thing is, we talked a little bit about me loving friction in my games, and I think that this game has plenty of it, but it's not handled particularly elegantly. Like, one of the things that this is constantly getting served to me, it's like designed for social media, and that there's so many bespoke little secrets that you would never know they're there unless some influencer or content creator told you about it. And it's just, because the game doesn't communicate how any of these things are a possibility to you. For me, that's its biggest problem. It's like, show me that there are these sorts of secrets innately and organically in the game. I don't need to rely on, I shouldn't have to rely on content creators to show me that there's a really one of a kind unique pair of boots that let you run on water, let you jet ski through the water. It's like, that's really cool. I just wish the game told me that these types of things exist so that I can go and be on the lookout for them in a way that feels like I would actually be able to investigate and figure out these things are there as opposed to the game just kind of arbitraried. I'd be like, well, you didn't interact with every single clock in the town. So how would you not know that the thing is there is little things like that? I just don't think it's, it doesn't kind of choreograph itself very well and tell you what are the possibilities, which I can appreciate, but not, not game of the year material. Game of the year material should teach you as you play. Alex, what do you think? I think this is the game that your friends get mad at you for not playing, they're just insisting to like, please just play Crimson Desert, has haven't already before. There's just something about the game that I think, like you said, is missing for me to be able to like consider it for that. I'm not surprised that it's here because of how many people absolutely love this game, but maybe it is filling a space that was needed to be filled before and that's why people love it so much. I just, to me, in terms of like uniqueness and branding, it just looks like another, you know, open world. I'm a model where you can just, you know, run around and do cool things, but I don't know, it's missing something, a soul. I mean, it's the only game that we've been discussing, it, it didn't receive universal, at least. Yeah, correct. But the people that love it really love it and I think that makes them like want to defend it. Yeah. So they're very loud champions of it. I strongly suspect that the type of people, like the, it's people who enjoy, you know, lush, beautiful world, which I will not argue that. Games and Dead are just one of the most stunning games I've ever seen. I, I just, it, it looks expensive in a way like I don't know, necessarily think it's beautiful in that it's art direction is beautiful. I think it just looks like the money is on the screen that the dev clearly put a lot of time and effort in it. And I think it's a very impressive, almost tech demo, but it's like, I don't know, I just have zero interest in actually engaging with any of its systems in a way that like I want to follow and love with it. But it's just, there's nothing in the game so far that has managed to like grab me and grip me in the way that, you know, a lot of the other games. I would actually liken this a lot more to Forza Horizon 6 in that this just feels like something I'm playing to pass the time between big releases without really engaging with it meaningfully. Well, then it's fitting that this is tied with Forza Horizon 6 for fifth place with, with the fans. Coming at number four is Pokemon Pocopia. Wow. Lots of fans there. And then number three, finally Nick is mean of the hollower. My personal number two pick for Game of the Year. I think mean of the hollower is just, I'm going to go out right and say it. I think it's the best 2D Zelda game that has ever existed. So better than Link to the Pass, better than Link to the Awakening. And then better than the Capcom produced 2D Zelda games, which are also better than Oracle Vaget Seasons and Minish Cap. And Minish Cap. Which are, and the DS games, Phantom Ariglass. Okay, maybe, maybe not between two worlds. Link between worlds is pretty damn good. And you know, mean of the hollower is just this delightful blend of, it feels a lot more like the Oracle of Ages and Seasons games to me, combined with Bloodborne, in the way the game incentivizes you being aggressive. I really like that about it. I love that there's tons of secrets to find. I like that the game doesn't hold your hand. I like that it's challenging. And just everything about the game is just very clearly made by people who at the top of their craft. And I would expect nothing less from the people who gave us Shovel Knight. And like Shovel Knight, I look forward to constantly replaying this game probably once a year for the rest of my life, the way I do Shovel Knight and Spectre Knight. It's so good. I do have one major problem with the game. The towers are not fun. The towers that you do in the game after every dungeon, after every boss dungeon, you have to do this thing where you ascend a tower to activate it and then move on to the next one. Those are not fun, no matter what you do. For despite those not being fun, I still think the game is a 10 out of 10. 10 out of 10. Number three with the fans number two is 007 first light. This is the game I finished recently. I also loved this game. They took a bold risk by telling a prequel story, introducing a new bond and I think it's a great bond. Aliak, did you play 007? I did. I finished it. And I actually, I feel like I want to love it. I want to. I feel like you and Nick are more in agreement and I love that. Yeah, that's good to hear. I wanted to love this game so much, I always wanted to play Hitman games and I never got a chance to jump into them. So I thought this would be my first entry into the Hitman style genre of games and I love James Bond. So I wanted to love this game, but there was something that wasn't just clicking for me. There were moments that were really fun, but it also didn't seem as polished as I wanted it to be. And part of the story was strong. Some parts weren't as strong for me. It just wasn't hitting. I think I wanted a little bit more from this game. I wanted to see some more fun things from the Hitman games that I feel like a lot of people wanted to see. And I will say though, positive, when I finished the game and you got a chance to actually see all the cool gear that you could now unlock with a bond and see your cars and all of that, the extra content. I thought it was really cool. I was like, maybe I should spend some more time in the game and just forget about the story and the gameplay. I just played like this. Let's just unlock things. I was exciting, but I don't think it is enough for a game of the year. Agreed, Nick? I'm torn. I think that this game is a prime game of the year material. Again, but you guys are going to say Nick is a broken record to keep saying the same thing. But I think the front half of this game is so much stronger than the back half. Going into the game, I was super hot when I first started playing it. I think it's tutorial section all the way up through the first time you actually do James Bond stuff, right? The chess match set piece in like, I think it's like Croatia or something like that. I forget where it is exactly, but that is what I imagine when I heard that IO Interactive was doing a Bond game. This was the perfect distillation of that. The first chunk of it was like, this is so sick. The way that the chess match ends where you're falling out of the plane and skydiving and taking out dudes. It's so cinematic. It's so exactly what I wanted from like the Hitman formula combined with the cinematic storytelling of Bond. However, as the game unfolds, it starts to get, it funnels you into a more linear and linear path and you start to do less of the things that made me fall in love with the game. You still do James Bond stuff, but you don't have the kind of improvisational nature that it feels like James Bond is so good at other than, oh, I failed myself. Now I have to go loud and now I have license to kill, so I'm just going to shoot everyone in the head. It is a little bit breath of the wild because the animal is very scarce and you're constantly having to pick up different guns and improvise, right? And whoever at IO Interactive came up with the throw your gun at somebody to close a distance, you deserve a raise, get that person a raise because that is one of the finest mechanics I can't wait for other games to steal it. It's so good and it's a great way of closing the gap in a way that I don't think I've ever really seen in the game before. All right. We have to take another quick break. When we come back, we'll reveal the very clear front runner, probably very obvious front runner for a game of the year so far. But before we move on, I want to thank our sponsor for Summer of Gaming, Evil Dead Burn, only in theaters July 10th. If you're new to the franchise or need a quick refresher before the movie hits theaters, then you're in luck because IGN's very own Alan Knight is here to give a spoiler free guide on what to expect. Cheers to your perfect family. Evil Dead Burn hits theaters July 10th and if you don't know what you're walking into, consider this, you're warning. This video is sponsored by Warner Brothers. William, my sweet boy, I work if anything, we're asked to be together again. After Alice unexpectedly loses her husband, she goes to stay with his family, her in-laws at their home. Some are quiet, some are she thinks is safe, some are that would normally be a place to recover after a great loss. But this is an evil dead film, so as one may imagine, what was supposed to be a family coming together becomes a family tour to part, in this case, literally. So how do you survive that? Before we're here to find out. First things first, let's talk about what we're actually dealing with, because a lot of people get this wrong. The evil dead are not zombies, they're not ghosts, they're not some virus you can quarantine or a monster you can see coming from a distance, they're far more sinister. What they do is they find the people closest to you and they take them. And then whatever is left walks around in that person's body knowing everything that person knew about you, your history, your fears, the specific thing that would break you, and it uses all of it. The physical stuff is bad and gruesome, don't get me wrong, but that's almost secondary to the psychological warfare. So where does all this actually come from? The evil dead, deadites, all that traces back to one thing, the necronomicon, the book of the dead, an ancient text that has been responsible for every single bad night in this franchise, it's history. Someone finds it, someone reads from it, and then everyone around them has a very serious problem. An evil dead burn specifically, it's a little different. For the first time in the franchise, someone reads from the book on purpose, which, and I cannot stress this enough, is not a great idea. So to illustrate the point, I will read a passage straight from the book of the dead. You see, there we go, "Kundar", "Estratta", "Montose", "Kundar". "Pouch you all on your soul!" Anyway, deadites go through your grief, your guilt, your love, like a filing cabinet, and they find the exact thing that would break you, and they go straight for it, with joy. It's a humor to it, a real pleasure in what they do, and that's what makes them so hard to face. And they can do all that because they're wearing the faces of your loved ones. Let's take poor little Alice, for example. She's already grieving, she's already raw, she goes to her in-laws home because that's where the people who loved her husband are, and that's where she thinks she can heal. And then they turn, one by one, and she's in their house, surrounded by people she once loved with nowhere to go. Family is supposed to be safe. An evil that burned that very thing is weaponized. Dites don't pick strangers. They pick the people you cannot walk away from because family is the root of all the evil they will ever need. So how do you fight back? That's the question. Everything we just covered, the grief, the obligation, the faces of the people you loved, all of it, is working against you. But what do you actually do when something worrying your mother's face is coming at you? When it's your sister, when it's your father-in-law, your grandmother, someone you made a vow to. What do you do? The answer is simple, and it is brutal. You have to be willing to hurt the ones you love. You have to be willing to sacrifice because when it's killed or be killed, the only way to survive is to look at the face of someone you love and destroy it. The question isn't really, how do you fight back? The question is, is that something you can do? There are ways to come back to evil dead. This member of it has historically been effective fire, the passages themselves, if red correctly can close the door they opened, but none of that matters. If you can't get past facing your demons, evil dead bird, only in theaters July 10th, get your tickets now. IGN Summer of Gaming is presented by our official product partner, Lenovo Legion. And we're back. It's Game of the Year Watch. We've been discussing a lot of great candidates, we've been sharing the top five picks so far from Scoop Nation. I said number one is a clear front runner and also probably obvious and yes it is Resident Evil Requiem. Level 7 First Light was in second place but Resident Evil received almost twice as many votes, so millions and millions of more votes than Level 7 First Light. That's my personal pick, a Game of the Year so far, Resident Evil, and Alec I think it's also yours if you're going to vote today. Yeah, absolutely it is. Again, I play the game so much, I loved it and you know what? I think it's time to get a horror game, to get a game of the year. Which is Resident Evil. Resident Evil has never won Game of the Year from IGN before. Really? Whoa. Well, hold up. Maybe four back in 2005 when it was, maybe that was it. Two remakes did not either, huh? No. Interesting. Well, yeah, I think Resident Evil is an outstanding one. What made you love it so much? Oh, man. I think it was the immersive storytelling from Grace, also the performance of the actor that for Grace was just so, so good. I loved being able to jump between a fully immersive horror game where I almost feel like I can't finish the level and then having to take a break and jump into a beloved original character like Leon. I mean, we've been waiting to play as Leon for a long time and getting to see him as an older character now. I don't know. It's just such a good mix of old and new and it feels so good. And Resident Evil has been nominated already. I think three times in the last five years for Game of the Year and it hasn't won. I think Alan Wake was the closest one to win, but then we had Baldur's Gate 3. So I hope this year would be the win. If I'm voting now, I'm voting Resident Evil Requiem. I love it. It has everything survival horror, action horror, the cinematic story telling, the villain. I love this game. Leon. Let's not forget Leon. Leon's the best. Just the coolest dude. I mean, like the modern area of Resident Evil games, the new numbered entries, seven and eight, you know, they first person games and then they're bouncing back and forth between those and the remakes, which are third person. And what are like a bold decision that seemingly unnecessary for nine to be like, we're going to make half the game first person and half the game third person, but they huge success. Very well. Very well. Completely. But Nick, if you were voting today, I think you I think you'd vote for a game we haven't even mentioned yet. Yeah. You know, I got to be true to who I am and it's the one thing that I'm constantly thinking about it. I'm constantly going back to it. Resident Evil is my number three pick for Game of the Year currently again. No GTA. We're still halfway through the year. Okay. And two is Mina. Two is Mina. Okay. But my number one pick for Game of the Year currently, as it stands in June, 2026, is Bungie's marathon. It's not a thing that I thought I would ever be in love with, but man, I cannot stop thinking about this game. And when I think this game is exactly what I want from a video game, especially something that says, you know, tired at this point as an extraction shooter. It's a first person shooter. It's an extraction shooter. I like my shooters. Don't get me wrong. But an extraction shooter isn't really my type of thing. But everything about the game's art direction, it's music, it's style overall. It's just, it's showing me things I've never seen in video games in a way that's like exciting to me. You know, I opened up the backpack for the first time, the inventory is so alien and like foreign. And it just seems actively like, we don't want you to learn this. And I really like the game that puts the challenge up like that. I like the high skill, skill ceiling for the game. I like how sweaty matches are. And I love that you are putting something on the line every time you load into a match. My favorite thing that, you know, without trying to get all into what makes it so unique, the end game of Marathon's current end game is called Cryo Archive. And it's this level that you actually can't even play. They only activate servers on the weekend for it. And also you have to have a minimum value load out, a value that at minimal of 5,000, which is a lot of higher tier gear. So you know that you are going through this labyrinthine type, you are actually boarding the marathon itself. And you are in this labyrinth with other teams with high value gear. And you're all trying to basically go through and solve various PvE style vault puzzles and deal with PvE enemies while also contending with other squads with high value gear. There's just a thrill that I have an experience in a game in ages with something like marathon. And it's a high that I can't do. chase, that I haven't been able to chase until this game, and I worry that the player base isn't going to be there. And so that's why I'm doing my best to go to bat for, because I think that this is a game that should be experienced. I love how Bungie's vision for this game has been uncompromising until I would say yesterday is when they unveiled their PvE mode, that dedicated Vault Breaker mode, that's going to be coming in later in July, as part of the middle of the season to update. So they have started to compromise a little bit in their vision just to hopefully bring some players in. And at this point, I'm like, do whatever you need to. Please keep this game alive. I've never been so invested in a game as a service before, as I am with Marathon. But yeah, everything about this game, I love it. I like, you have played Marathon, right? I have. Yeah, I'm supposed to be one of the players that's supposed to be playing. I'm the exact person they want in this game. I, what I love about it is its unique identity. Like you said, this is a world that I absolutely want to learn more about. Extraction shooters are not a type of shooter that I am a super experienced in, but I jumped into it as my first extraction shooter. And I got to play for a whole week just trying to really, trying to really love it. I got really excited once I was able to pick up the Halo VR in the game. Yes, the volley right. That was so exciting for me. Then once I lost it, I was like, oh my God, I got to get through this. I gave it a couple of more, more runs. But I think I got distracted by other shooters. I've been playing a lot of battlefield. And I think I just, I want Marathon and Bungie to succeed so much. So I'm there. I'm right there with you. I want, I want to love this game. But I think I need more. And I'm not sure what that, how to identify what that is for me. I love the world. I'm supposed to be playing this game. And maybe I should jump in. Nick, maybe I should go play with you and get another player in. Join my squad. I do think just my, my quick pitch to AliEx. Yeah. This is Bungie. They still know their gameplay loop that they've mastered with Halo. The encounter, grenade, shoot and melee. And then they encounters over rinse and repeat over and over. It's just this perfect formula of ultimate game feel. And there's nothing quite like it. Well, it does seem like we're, we're getting a short list of games that, if we were voting now, games that would be nominated, Resident Evil, 007 First Light, Meant of the Hollow or Pocopia, maybe Fort six. I think it's kind of like the short list that's, that's emerging. Ryan McCaffrey pitched in his host of agents, podcasts unlocked. He would vote for 007 First Light right now. But there's one more game that just barely didn't make the top five, which you can talk about for just a brief moment here. I think it was one vote away from tying with Fort and Crimson Desert. And that's Pragmata. Pragmata is good. It's a love for Pragmata there. In my opinion, it's a great game, the exact type of game that we used to get every other month back in the 360 days, but not quite good enough to be game of the year material. What do you think? Yeah, I'm right there with you. I think that this game, it's been, it's greatest benefit is two outstanding performances from our two leads. And also the game does not overstay its welcome. It's just as long as it needs to be. And it has additional challenge content for people who want to take on the challenges because some of the end game stuff in Pragmata is probably some of the most fun I've had in games outside of marathon. I'm just like, oh, this is like PS2 level challenge of like the game that you would rent on a random weekend. And you're just like, I just need one more challenge to beat the game. And it's like the game does a good job of distilling all that down. And it's just, it's again, it's an experience you haven't quite had before of, you know, using the controller in a way that feels novel and exciting with your face buttons, navigating the hacking minigame while you're still moving around and aiming with the left analog stick and the trigger buttons. Like it's such a inventive use of, you know, rethinking the controller. And I guess that's what I'm looking for with something like Game of the Year's. I want something I've never quite experienced before. And I do think that Pragmata has that in spades. Granted, I do think it kind of shows its hand pretty early. And it doesn't change all that much throughout the course of the game other than wanting to see what happens to our fine heroes here. But again, Capcom. Capcom's crushing it. Two games already this year. They saw that on a motion coming out. They already announced the next Resident Evil plus DLC for Requiem. We're spoiled, Damon. We're spoiled. And Mega Man, we don't, we don't deserve Capcom. That is our show. But this is not the end. Game of the Year Watch has begun. We'll keep checking in for the rest of the year. And I don't know if you were aware. There are a lot of games still coming the rest of the year, including this indie game called GTA 6. And a little, there's the whole Zelda of it all as well. Oh, yeah. Please be excited for that. But first, it's time for a brand new month of gaming. Jump into the humble June choice bundle and score an amazing lineup of titles. Right now, you can grab Octopath Traveler 2, the Rift Raker, Life of Strange, Double Exposure, Indica, Citizensleeper 2, Starward Vector, Construction Simulator, Hell Clock, and Overlooting. This month's charity is It Gets Better, a non-profit organization with a mission to uplift, empower and connect LGBTQ youth around the globe. And do humblebundle.com through July 6th to start playing today. Thank you to Alieck. Thank you, Nick. My name is Damon. This is IGN's Game of the Year Watch. And we'll see you on the next one. Imagine setting your makeup, then forgetting it's even theirs. Meet new grippy setting mist from Mabelie, New York. Zelda mist technology locks in your look for up to 24 hours, with flexible all day comfy grip. No tightness, no stickiness, no residue. Just plump, dewy hydrated skin that still feels like your skin. Try new grippy setting mist from Mabelie, New York.