PC, PS5, Switch 2; Sam Eng/Devolver Digital
An exquisitely fluid game of tricks, grinds and manuals is framed by a story that uncovers the poignancy of the infamously painful pastime

Skateboarding video games live and die by their vibe. The original Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater titles were anarchic, arcade fun while the recent return of EA’s beloved Skate franchise offered competent yet jarringly corporate realism. Skate Story, which is mostly the work of solo developer Sam Eng, offers a more impressionistic interpretation while capturing something of the sport’s essential spirit. It transposes the boarding action to a demonic underworld where the aesthetic is less fire and brimstone than glittering, 2010s-era vaporwave. It is also the most emotionally real a skateboarding game has ever felt.

The premise is ingenious: you are a demon made out of “pain and glass”. Skate to the moon and swallow it, says the devil, and you shall be freed. So that is exactly what you do. You learn to ollie first, a “delicate, precise trick” according to the artfully written in-game text. Then come the pop shuvit, kickflip, heelflip and more.

PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox; Eyes Out/Blumhouse Games
Psychedelic visuals and a promising premise are let down by tired game design in this first-person horror with an appearance from the synthpop pioneer

Video games have delivered a feast of singular and wondrous sights in 2025: ecological fantasias teeming with magical beasts; stunning, historically obsessive recreations of feudal Japan. But here is an end-of-year curio: psychological horror game Sleep Awake serves us synth-rock pioneer Gary Numan stepping into what is perhaps the schlockiest role of his life – a gigantic floating head named Hypnos.

This late-stage cameo is not quite indicative of the game as a whole; the handful of hours prior to Numan’s arrival are more mournful than madcap. Mostly, you explore the dilapidated, tumbledown streets of what is thought to be the last city on Earth. This setting is a magnificent work of imagination. You see it through the eyes of a young woman named Katja, who moves along rooftops, gazing out upon a barren, lifeless hinterland, into labyrinthine streets whose darkness and arcane logic recall the stirring subterranean etchings of Italian artist Piranesi.