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NPR's 24 most anticipated video games of 2024
Clockwise from the top-left: Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, Hades 2, Dragon’s Dogma 2, Princess Peach: Showtime!
Square Enix/Supergiant Games/Capcom/Nintendo
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Square Enix/Supergiant Games/Capcom/Nintendo
Clockwise from the top-left: Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, Hades 2, Dragon’s Dogma 2, Princess Peach: Showtime!
Square Enix/Supergiant Games/Capcom/Nintendo
It’d take more than a few surprises for the new year to match 2023’s deluge of acclaimed games. But while we don’t know the precise release date for many of its biggest titles, 2024 will soon grace us with the gargantuan Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, slated to come out on Leap Day, and it’ll likely draw to a close with a console sequel to the Nintendo Switch. But there’s a lot to look forward to apart from those bookends — here’s what we at NPR have our eyes on this year.
Persona 3 Reload, Feb. 2
I fell hard for Personas 4 and 5 but wasn’t hooked by 3. I recognize its importance: it set the current franchise template with its edgy teen aesthetic and weave of social simulation and RPG mechanics. Odd as it was in 2006, perhaps this slick new version will entice the part of me that wants to explore a ghoulish Tokyo with fashionable friends. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Skull and Bones, Feb. 16
Swashbuckling piracy was the best part of Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag and Skull and Bones is bringing that action to a standalone game, shifted from the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean and African coasts. It also promises story-rich quests that give it an MMO vibe as you adventure on your ship. I look forward to seeing how it compares with the more cartoony Sea of Thieves, which was fun to play with and against other players. — Daniel Morgan, systems engineer
Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth
Square Enix
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Square Enix
Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth
Square Enix
Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, Feb. 29
2020’s Final Fantasy 7: Remake opened the door to a radically new retelling of the 1997 original. The sequel, Rebirth, will likely depart even further, and I’m quivering to find out who’ll live, who’ll die and how I’ll take to its hybrid real-time/turn-based combat after growing fond of the fluid action of Final Fantasy 16. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Life By You Early Access, March 5
In 2015, Paradox Interactive took a wild — but ultimately successful — swing at toppling Maxis’ famed city-building franchise SimCity by launching Cities: Skylines. This spring, the Swedish publisher wants to unseat another legendary Maxis franchise: The Sims. Led by former Sims head Rod Humble, Paradox’s Life By You is also a social simulator focusing on hyper-customizability. Clothing, furniture, houses, businesses, towns, storylines, quests — seemingly nothing is locked away from players to make their own. Let’s hope Paradox’s bet on customization makes for engaging gameplay, not analysis paralysis. — Alex Curley, product manager, Distribution
Homeworld 3
Gearbox Publishing
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Gearbox Publishing
Homeworld 3
Gearbox Publishing
Homeworld 3, March 8
Despite high-profile releases, 2023 didn’t satisfy my hunger for an all-consuming real-time strategy game. Enter a new 2024 challenger: Homeworld 3, the space combat RTS from Blackbird Interactive. The first franchise title was revolutionary in 1999, and gameplay footage for this Spring’s sequel looks just as promising. Apart from battling for galactic dominance over a dozen or more hours in the main campaign, it allows you and up to two other friends to play roguelike missions in its new War Games mode. We’ll see how much Blackbird can appeal to less-experienced players while staying true to Homeworld’s roots. — Alex Curley, product manager, Distribution
Unicorn Overlord, March 8
While laden with anime tropes, the narrative ambition of Vanillaware’s 13 Sentinels blew me away. I hope their upcoming tactical RPG will do the same — and maybe scratch the Fire Emblem itch, too. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Dragon’s Dogma 2, March 22
2012’s Dragon’s Dogma is one of the most unique action RPGs I’ve played. Often compared to Dark Souls, which came out the year earlier, the game’s nearly as hardcore, with flashier class abilities and a unique pawn system that lets you recruit AI party members created by other players. The sequel will need to refine these mechanics to capture a wider audience, but Capcom’s been on such a hot streak that I’m optimistic they can pull it off. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Princess Peach: Showtime!
Nintendo
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Nintendo
Princess Peach: Showtime!
Nintendo
Princess Peach: Showtime!, March 22
The date 3/22/24 has been ingrained in my mind since Nintendo shared the trailer for Princess Peach: Showtime! last year. While I know that this isn’t the first time she’s led her own game, this feels like the first time Peach is getting the full Mario treatment with fun transformations and powerups unique to her. Kung Fu Peach? Swordfighter Peach? I can’t wait! — Rakiesha Chase-Jackson, project manager, Member Partnership
Rise of the Rōnin, March 22
Last year, Team Ninja took us to China’s Three Kingdoms era with Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty for an enjoyable adventure that struggled to stand out in a crowded field of excellent 2023 games. This year, with Rise of the Rōnin, they’re taking us back to Japan and back to the team behind the excellent Nioh and Nioh 2 games. Rise of the Rōnin has reportedly been in development for seven years and the studio says it’s their “most ambitious and challenging project” to date. If all that work marks a return to the quality of the Nioh titles, this game will be worth exploring. — Justin Lucas, Senior Director, Communications
Manor Lords, April 26
Developer Slavic Magic has been teasing a gorgeous and intriguing strategy game, Manor Lords, for over three years. Set in medieval Europe, the game is at once a city-builder, tasking you with building up manorial villages from empty fields and a strategy sim, having you defend villages from plundering bandits in real-time battles. With a publish date finally set, I’m excited to don my crown as manor lord and see if the game truly lives up to the hype. — Alex Curley, product manager, Distribution
Black Myth: Wukong
Game Science
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Game Science
Black Myth: Wukong
Game Science
Black Myth: Wukong, Aug. 20
Black Myth: Wukong looks like a AAA soulslike with slick action and terrifically bizarre character design. The game’s impressive trailers and gameplay videos generated a lot of buzz for its relatively unknown developer, Game Science. But it’s hard to know what to expect from a studio with no other major releases under its wing. If Wukong lives up to its savvy marketing, it could be a breakout success. But it’s also possible that the game and the studio will end up standing out for other less favorable reasons, as reports of a culture of sexism at Game Science could sour many who might otherwise have been interested. — Justin Lucas, Senior Director, Communications
Undated 2024
Avowed
Obsidian Entertainment has commanded respect for RPGs like Fallout: New Vegas, The Outer Worlds, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2. Their upcoming first-person fantasy game set in the Pillars of Eternity universe should be no exception. It wouldn’t be surprising if Avowed not only provided a capable substitute to hold players over for the long-awaited Elder Scrolls 6 but also raised the bar for Bethesda as they worked on their follow-up to Skyrim. — Corey Bridges, assistant producer, The Indicator
Baby Steps
Devolver Digital
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Devolver Digital
Baby Steps
Devolver Digital
Baby Steps
The ever-brilliant Bennett Foddy (of QWOP and Getting Over It fame) is back with another impish physics game. Billed as a “literal walking simulator,” Baby Steps has you independently control each of the player character’s legs, forcing you to think through locomotion you’d normally take for granted — to what I’m sure will be hilarious results. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Camper Van: Make it Home
Camper Van: Make it Home looks like the quintessential cozy game — chill music, a calming color scheme, and a simple premise that offers so much space for customization and control. I don’t know about you, but I’ve always dreamed of just unplugging and traveling the world in my own personal camper van, and soon, I will be able to do so from the comfort of my couch. — Rakiesha Chase-Jackson, project manager, Member Partnership
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree
We’ve seen little about this upcoming expansion to 2022 masterpiece Elden Ring, other than that it appears to feature Miquella, a character shrouded in mystery so deep it makes the game’s obtuse lore look transparent by comparison. But FromSoftware has a reputation for incomparable DLC, so I’m confident it’ll give me more than enough reason to return to the Lands Between. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Frostpunk 2
Developer 11 Bit Studios is upping the scale of their award-winning city-builder with Frostpunk 2. Set 30 years after the apocalyptic events of Frostpunk, the meager colony of the first game has grown into a full-blown metropolis, shifting the focus away from mere survival and ensuring its stability. It’s a change that will transform gameplay mechanics critics fell in love with to something more akin to Tropico 6 or Civilization 6 — a notable risk for a franchise with a winning formula. In any case, I’m excited to return to the outskirts of nuclear winter London to test my mettle again. — Alex Curley, product manager, Distribution
Hades 2
Supergiant Games
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Supergiant Games
Hades 2
Will 2024 be the year we actually get Early Access to Hades 2? Supposedly! It’s hard not to be impatient as I write up my most anticipated games blurb for the same game two years running, but honestly, I’ll wait however long it takes. From indie studio Supergiant, Hades 2 promises to bring the same enthralling romance and combat as its 2020 predecessor, Hades. This time, we’ll join a new hero in Melinoe, our de-facto princess of Hell, as she embarks on a mission to kill Chronos, who is technically her grandpa. But while I love some Greek mythology, what made me really fall in love with the series is Supergiant’s commitment to a gorgeous style that drips out of every conversation and combat arena. Early access release is set for Q2 2024, but whenever it drops, I’ll be here … waiting. — Megan Lim, All Things Considered Producer
Hollow Knight: Silksong
There’s more discourse than news about this sequel to indie darling Hollow Knight, which was also one of our most anticipated games of 2023. Team Cherry’s social media pages haven’t been updated in a long time, but I’m still hopeful. Game development is tough, and I’m content to wait while the studio takes its time to make Silksong as beautiful and visceral as the first game. — River Williamson, Software Engineer
Last Time I Saw You
I’m a huge fan of publisher Chorus Worldwide. The trailer for Last Time I Saw You brought back such fond memories of 2023’s A Space for the Unbound that I immediately wishlisted it on Steam. I’m looking forward to gorgeous artwork, a mesmerizing soundtrack and an emotional rollercoaster of a story. — Rakiesha Chase-Jackson, project manager, Member Partnership
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl
GSC Game World
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GSC Game World
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl
GSC Game World
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl
After many delays, the latest in this Tarkovsky-inspired shooter series may arrive by the first quarter of this year. It is made by Ukrainian developers who have kept at it despite the encroachments of a very real war. — James Mastromarino, NPR Gaming lead and Here & Now producer
Star Wars Outlaws
While the Star Wars brand is reaching the point of oversaturation, I’m admittedly excited about the prospect of a truly open-world Star Wars game where I’m not playing as someone with force sensitivity (at least as far as I know). If Ubisoft can pull off what’s looking to be a grounded single-player adventure game and provide a captivating story, it has a chance of being one of my favorite pieces of Star Wars media ever. That’s a big if, but I hope Star Wars: Outlaws lives up to the hype. — Corey Bridges, assistant producer, The Indicator
Stormgate
We already knew about Stormgate before this winter’s Game Awards. But it felt much more real when actor Simu Liu appeared onstage on Dec. 7 to tease his role in Frost Giant’s upcoming competitive real-time strategy game. It’s obvious that Stormgate’s developers, which include Starcraft veterans, are trying to position the game as the next big esports RTS in a market where decade-old titles have stagnated. With the promise of more responsive gameplay and modern netcode, I’m curious to see if they’ll actually succeed. — Alex Curley, product manager, Distribution
The Casting of Frank Stone
I’m a sucker for the kind of interactive horror movies that Supermassive Games makes in titles like The Quarry and Until Dawn. I was pleasantly surprised that they’re now teaming up with the studio behind Dead by Daylight for a new horror mystery story. I’m looking forward to putting in multiple playthroughs and seeing how the story can play out. — Corey Bridges, assistant producer, The Indicator
The Wolf Among Us 2
The Wolf Among Us 2 was on my most anticipated games list for 2023, and Telltale Games has indicated that they’re now targeting a 2024 release. Ten years is a long time to wait for a sequel, but I’m a huge fan of the Fables comics and can’t wait to return to Fabletown. — Rakiesha Chase-Jackson, project manager, Member Partnership
Bryan Stevenson stands beside jars that hold dirt collected from sites where Black people were lynched. He is the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative and the author of Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption.
Equal Justice Initiative
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Equal Justice Initiative
In his second term, President Trump has ordered the removal of monuments, plaques and exhibitions related to slavery, and the history of racial injustice in the U.S. Meanwhile, human rights lawyer Bryan Stevenson has been working to ensure evidence of America’s painful past is not erased.
Stevenson’s nonprofit, the Equal Justice Initiative, opened the Legacy Museum in Montgomery, Ala., in 2018, to chronicle slavery and racism in America. A new exhibit, which is both located in and called Montgomery Square, begins in 1955 with the boycott of Montgomery’s segregated buses and ends 10 years later with the marches from Selma to Montgomery for voting rights.
Stevenson describes Montgomery’s buses as “places of real peril” during Jim Crow. Black people were prohibited from sitting in the first 10 seats of the bus, which were reserved for white riders only. Additionally, Black people had to pay in the front of the bus, then go to the rear to board — hoping that the bus driver didn’t take off without them. In 1950, a Black World War II veteran named Hilliard Brooks was shot and killed by police after he argued with the driver as he attempted to board a bus.
“Black people couldn’t avoid [the buses] because they had to get to work; they had to go to the homes where they served as maids and cooks and domestic workers,” Stevenson says. “And it did make the bus this very unique space for how racial apartheid, how segregation and Jim Crow manifested in the lives of virtually every Black person in the community.”
Stevenson says he’s not trying to “punish America” by talking about slavery and lynching. Rather, he says, confronting oppression is a path toward liberation.
“There is an America that is more free — where there’s more equality, where there is more justice, where there less bigotry — and I think it’s waiting for us,” he says. “But I don’t think we can … create that America while we remain burdened by this history that too many refuse to talk about, too many refused to acknowledge.”
Stevenson is the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, which represents children and adults illegally convicted or unfairly sentenced. His 2014 memoir, Just Mercy, was adapted into a film starring Oscar-winning actor Michael B. Jordan.
Interview highlights
On meeting civil rights activists Rosa Parks and Johnnie Carr
After a couple of hours, Mrs. Parks turned to me, and she said, “OK, Bryan, tell me what you’re trying to do.” And I told her about our work trying to represent people on death row. I said, “We’re trying to challenge wrongful convictions. We’re trying to challenge this legal system that treats you better if you’re rich and guilty than if you were poor and innocent. We’re trying to represent children. We’re trying to do something about bigotry and poverty and people who are mentally ill. We’re trying to change the way we operate these jails and prisons.”
I gave her my whole rap. And when I finished, she looked at me and she said, “Mm, mm, mm, that’s going to make you tired, tired, tired!” And that’s when Ms. Carr leaned forward and she put her finger in my face. She said, “That’s why you’ve got to be brave, brave, brave.” And Ms. Parks grabbed my hand and said, “Will you be brave?” And I said, “Yes, ma’am.”
A monument in Montgomery Square pays tribute to the Black women who led the Montgomery bus boycott.
Equal Justice Initiative
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Equal Justice Initiative
On the march from Selma to Montgomery
We’ve been doing this project where we interview people. … Amelia Boynton Robinson was almost killed by horses and police officers. Lynda Blackmon Lowery said she got hit and she passed out. And for 40 years, she assumed that she passed out because she hit her head on the ground. And then when they uncovered documentary footage, she realized that she passed out and she was in that condition because after she fell, she was beaten by state troopers over and over again on the head. But she insisted on getting out of the hospital and being ready for the next march.
I think it’s the courage, it’s commitment, it is the tenacity, the acculturation to do things that most people would never choose to do. We recently lost Dr. Bernard Lafayette, an extraordinary leader who was tasked with organizing much of what happened in Selma. He told me, he said, “Bryan, we were prepared to die.” … And I don’t think people appreciate the extraordinary courage it took. … People were beaten and battered. And I just think to confront that kind of threat, with no protection, without an army, with no weapons, takes an extraordinary courage that I feel like we have to access again if we really want to create a more just world, and I think that’s the discovery that I’m really inspired by.
On documenting nearly 6,500 lynchings that took place in the U.S. — 2,000 more than had previously been documented
The detailed work of going into these communities and uncovering archive references and newspaper references was something that no one had undertaken. And so we spent five years combing through these records. … We now have identified 6,500 lynchings of Black people in this country between 1865 and 1950. I do think it says something again about how we have failed to investigate this really important period of American history. …
We’ve got instances where a man was lynched because he didn’t call a police officer, “sir.” Somebody didn’t step off the sidewalk when white people walked by. A Black man went to the front door of a white person’s house, not the back door. So many people were lynched, because they passed a note. They were Black men passing notes to white women. … One Black woman in Kentucky was lynched because they couldn’t find her brother. So they used her as a proxy for this Black man who had been accused of something. And when you understand that this practice, this terror violence, was about tormenting and traumatizing and reinforcing this racial hierarchy, you begin to think of this differently.
“The monuments are at eye level, and then the ground shifts and they raise up, and you are standing underneath these six-foot, corten steel monuments that identify all of these people, and it unnerves a lot of people,” Stevenson says of the Legacy Museum’s memorial to lynching.
Equal Jutice Initiative
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Equal Jutice Initiative
On what truth and reconciliation looks like
The first thing is that for truth and justice, truth and reconciliation, truth and restoration, truth and repair, I think the first we have to acknowledge is that those things are sequential. You can’t get the beautiful “R” words, like redemption and reconciliation and restoration and repair, unless you first tell the truth. As a lawyer, I can tell you that you’ve got to have the truth of what happened at the crime scene and the state understands this. They want to put all of the evidence in, because that’s what’s going to allow the jury to make an informed decision about culpability. And we’ve never really done that. And so I think this process of truth-telling has to shape what we do.
In South Africa, after the collapse of apartheid, they committed space for the victims of apartheid to give voice to their harm. They even created space for the perpetrators to give a voice to the regret. You go to Germany, the villain of the 20th century, and you can’t go 200 meters without seeing markers and monuments and memorials dedicated to the harm of the Holocaust. They’ve made truth-telling a necessity. No student in German can graduate without demonstrating a detailed knowledge and understanding of the Holocaust. They require it. And the result of that is that there are no Adolf Hitler statues in Berlin. There are no monuments or memorials to the Nazis. We’ve never done that in this country. In fact, we’ve done the opposite.
Monique Nazareth and Susan Nyakundi produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Beth Novey adapted it for the web.
Stephen Colbert in Dec. 2025.
Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
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Angela Weiss/AFP via Getty Images
Stephen Colbert is co-writing a new Lord of the Rings movie, Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema announced.
“We’ve got a very special partner that we’re working with,” said filmmaker Peter Jackson in a video shared across social media at midnight on Wednesday before introducing the comedian and Late Show host via video call.
Colbert is a Tolkien fan — he even had a cameo appearance in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug in 2013. He will co-write a new movie with his son, screenwriter Peter McGee, and LOTR veteran screenwriter Philippa Boyens. Its working title is Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past.
YouTube
Colbert said in the video with Jackson that the film will adapt six early chapters — “Three is company” through “Fog on the Barrow-downs” — from The Fellowship of the Ring, the first book of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. These chapters were not part of the first film.
“I thought, ‘Oh wait, maybe that could be its own story that could fit into the larger story,’” Colbert said. “‘Could we make something that was completely faithful to the books while also being completely faithful to the movies that you guys had already made?’”
Colbert said he and his son, McGee, worked out what they thought might be a framing device for the story.
“It took me a few years for me to scrape my courage into a pile to give you a call,” joked Colbert to Jackson.
Warner Bros. sent the film’s synopsis in a release: “Fourteen years after the passing of Frodo – Sam, Merry, and Pippin set out to retrace the first steps of their adventure. Meanwhile, Sam’s daughter, Elanor, has discovered a long-buried secret and is determined to uncover why the War of the Ring was very nearly lost before it even began.”
Shadow of the Past is one of two upcoming films in the Lord of the Rings franchise. Andy Serkis, who plays Gollum in the films, is directing The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum, which takes place in between the fictional timelines of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
Warner Bros. has not announced a release date for Shadow of the Past, but it will come after The Hunt for Gollum, which is expected in Dec. 2027.
“I did not think I’d have the time,” Colbert laughed in the video about finding the hours to work on the new movie. But, he said, “It turns out I’m gonna be free starting this summer.”
Last year, CBS announced that it was canceling The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, days after Colbert publicly criticized Paramount — CBS’s parent company — for paying $16 million to settle a lawsuit filed by President Trump over claims that CBS interfered in the 2024 election by airing edited segments of an interview with Kamala Harris. The Late Show will air its final episode on May 21, more than 30 years after David Letterman first hosted in 1993.
Paramount is also set to buy Warner Bros. Discovery in a massive nearly $111 billion merger deal.
“If you’ll excuse me, I’ve gotta finish a television show and I’ve gotta write a movie script, but I will see you all in the shire,” Colbert said in the video.
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