With The Game Awards approaching, GameSpot invited several editors to recommend their favorite games of 2026 in one sentence, providing clues for players preparing to vote. These titles are the editors' personal candidates for Game of the Year and do not represent official nominations or a unified ranking.
Mark Delaney first recommended the PC title Retro Rewind: Video Store Simulator, calling it his favorite career simulation game. Players run a video store from the 1990s, and a recent major update even added video games to the inventory you can manage.
The recommendation list also includes Hiking Together, Control: Resonance, and Bungie's extraction shooter Lost Starship: Marathon. Hiking Together supports 1 to 11 friends hiking on puzzle islands; Control: Resonance is described as blending Remedy's quirky atmosphere with supernatural action experiences.
Other editors chose the farm life simulation game Mistria Ranch, the vampire-themed RPG Blood of the Dawnwalker, the life simulation game The Sims Life, and the action game 007 First Light. The list also covers titles across various genres such as Onimusha: Way of the Sword, Nioh 3, Thallos, and Castlevania: Curse of Belmont, including some lesser-known, small-scale games that players might easily overlook.