If you call yourself a disk, get into a console: the most anticipated games of 2025
Nowhere is seriality so valued as in video games: most of the top sellers here are usually not just the tenth, but the twentieth or even thirtieth installments of well-known franchises. And so it is this time: all the most discussed and long-awaited releases of our top ten are not original games, but add-ons of the worlds long-loved by gamers. Their trailers have been watched by tens of millions of users, and it is for their sake that many people will buy next-generation consoles, if they haven't already done so. "Izvestia" tells about the main upcoming blockbusters of the gaming world.
The Witcher IV
"The Witcher" over the past few years has turned from a relatively local brand for geeks into a must-know element of pop culture. The third "Witcher" was played even by those who do not usually play games, the series with Henry Cavill watched the whole world. As a result, the fourth "The Witcher" - one of the most anticipated releases of the coming year, although from the first trailer, which is gaining tens of millions of views on YouTube, it is not clear whether we will play only for Ciri (it was necessary sometimes to do in the past "The Witcher") or for someone else. If only for her, it may not appeal to all gamers.
Grand Theft Auto VI
The famous GTAVI trailer with Tom Petty's music has gained over 230 million views in a year, and the game is still not here, and no one knows if we will see it, as promised, in Q4 2025. And, most importantly, how it will be different from the last part, still evergreen, not for nothing it is in the top five according to the results of sales 2024 in Europe, although it is already more than 10 years old. It is clear that the basic concept will remain unchanged and you will need to race in other people's cars, shoot in all directions and try to survive when you are hunted by both feds and bandits. We are waiting for more details about the rest.
Doom: The Dark Ages
The eighth game in the Doom series storywise promises to be a prequel to 2016's Doom. The last game to this point, Doom Eternal, came out in 2020 and sold over half a billion dollars in this first year alone. Apparently, the creators are counting on even more impressive results this time around, though the memory of Doom's failure for mobile devices in 2023 is still vivid.
Mafia: The Old Country
The fourth part of Mafia is actually a prequel to the series. Participate in the showdown of organized crime will have to Sicily at the beginning of the last century. Among the features - voiceover in Sicilian language, which seems quite exotic, given that the number of people who speak it - from 5 million to 10 million people. The release is expected in summer, so during this time you can go to Sicily and listen to how they speak there, so that everything in the game will seem quite familiar. They say the best time to go there is at the end of spring.
Kingdom Hearts: Missing Link
The fifteenth game in the series, Missing Link will be released only on mobile platforms and should help pass the time until the release of Kingdom Hearts IV, which will appear unclear where and when. How you can play from Russia, it will be clear closer to the case, but most likely, it will have to create an account for another country - at least to pay for the purchase of a foreign card. However, perhaps the game will be conditionally free - as part of a big promotional campaign before the big release.
Sid Meier's Civilization 7
"Civilization" will be released on all platforms, including even the old Switch - after all, if he pulled the sixth part, to cope with the seventh. Another thing is that the sixth came out in 2016, and the new version should be much more technological and spectacular. But we don't know much yet. For example, that the voice of the game became Gwendoline Christie, the star of "Game of Thrones". And also - that an important part of the game will be the recreation of the Shawnee Indian language, which today in the whole of America remember a hundred people. Firaxis, the developer of "Civilization", has spent a lot of money on studying and preserving the Native American culture. The game is expected very soon, in February.
Death Stranding 2: On The Beach
One of the most odious and controversial projects in the history of video games got a sequel, it will be released this year, if its creator Hideo Kojima doesn't get the idea to remake something again. At least, he's said himself that he had a script for the sequel, but rewrote it into Pandemic because he felt his plot was too literalized. But what if he finds dangerous parallels again? The game is planned exclusively for PlayStation 5.
Assassin's Creed Shadows
Honestly, we haven't had time to miss it yet. Assassin's Creed Mirage was only a year and a half ago. But creators promise something completely new, because it will be the first game in the series made on the new Anvil Pipeline engine. The action will be set in 16th century Japan, and this time, after numerous scandals, the authors promise that everything will be historically accurate, and the open world will be as close to the real topography as possible.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II
A lot of water has leaked since 2018, when the developers of the game about Bohemia of the XV century had to justify themselves to Western activists for the fact that there were few black people in the frame, which automatically means racism. Moreover, the game was held under the category of far-right statements, which, however, did not prevent it from becoming a global hit on top platforms. In the new game, Czechs will fight Hungarians, the space for this will be twice as big as in the original, and authentic firearms will be added to cold weapons.
Monster Hunter Wilds.
The sequel to another 2018 hit, Monster Hunter Wilds will be the first of all releases in the series to not only feature Russian subtitles, but also Russian voice acting. Gamers were given a demo at Gamescom 2024, and as a result, the game won prizes in the voting, including as "Most Epic Game," "Most Spectacular Game," and "Best PlayStation Game." Among the most useful innovations are the riding animals, which take the player to the goal themselves, so as not to waste time and energy on another marathon race.
