The 12 best video games of 2023 (so far)

If there’s a theme to our favorite video games of 2023 to date, it comes down to two conflicting ideas. On the one hand, refinement: As the steady tide of video game remakes continues, apparently unabated, we can at least take some solace in the fact that developers seem to be getting better at the form. Two of the best games of the last few months have been remakes of old classics that manage to preserve what was good, while making room for what was new, both managing to justify their existences both new and old.

Meanwhile, a streak of wild creativity continues to bubble up from both the margins and, unexpectedly, smack dab in the center of the industry. This is, after all, the year when Nintendo released one of the most creatively ambitious titles in its entire history, while other developers bent the power (and trap goblin mentalities) of their own players to the dark aims of pushing the medium to its creative limits.

Here, then, in a spirit of, let’s call it, refined creativity, are the 12 best games of the first half of 2023, listed in alphabetical order, as chosen by A.V. Club staffers.

Wild Hearts

We liked because it didn’t stop at imitation. Capcom’s Monster Hunter is hard to beat when it comes to the “kill a bunch of big beasties, one boss fight at a time” sub-genre of action games. But we appreciated that developer Omega Force—best known for its Dynasty Warriors games—refused to stop at a simple imitation with , which instead encourages players to get ambitious and creative with their efforts to bring down massive monsters. The star of the show is the “karakuri” system that lets hunters summon structures and devices on the fly, transforming the battle and tipping the odds against the game’s beautifully crafted creatures. (Then you chop them up and turn them into pants—this is a Monster Hunter imitator, after all.) [William Hughes]