Hey hey! I’m Chloe Appleby, and let’s be real: 2024 has seen some fantastic new releases by incredible creative minds globally. So many titles have not only blown audiences away, but reshaped how many people perceive games. I had too many games I liked this year, and I struggled picking a small list, so a few honourable mentions from me are Strange Scaffold’s Clickholding, The Water Museum’s Arctic Eggs, Nerial’s The Crush House, and A Spoonful of Wonder’s Copycat.
Yet for me, 2024 was the year of my favourite genre: the detective and mystery game! Nothing fuels me more than booting up a mystery game, putting on my Detective Pickachu hat, sipping a fresh cup of coffee and feeding into the delusion that I can solve actual crimes as long as I can find the ball of yarn, spanner, and parrot at the scene. I promise not all my top games are detective games, but most are.
Chloe Appleby’s favourite games of last year
1. Neva by Nomada Studio
This is my GOTY for 2024, it is a visually striking game that transports the player into the world of Alba, the protagonist, and her connection to a lone wolf cub. Together you fight back against mysterious dark forces plaguing and corrupting the world while you grow to immensely care for both characters.
In this subtle nod to the state of the world, I still find myself thinking about Neva since playing it on a flight to Japan and the emotional impact it has left on me. (Don’t play Neva on a plane, you will get weird looks when you sob uncontrollably at the end).
Read: TGA nominee Neva is an underrated gem you need to play
2. Infinity Nikki by Infold Games
I have never played a Nikki series game before, and I released how much I have been missing in my life. I love dressing up in my fun outfits, being a diva, flying around in a bubble dress, and showing the stylists of Miraland that I am better than them. It is a whirlwind of cute aesthetics, girl-coded mysteries and areas reminiscing of Breath of the Wild. Best of all? You solve town mysteries in style.
3. Thank Goodness You’re Here! by Coal Supper
As a half-English spawn, I grew up watching British comedy shows like Keeping Up Appearances, Blackadder, Only Fools and Horses and The IT Crowd with my family, and this game transported me right back to childhood. Walking into each scenario as the salesman kept me on my toes and every solution and interaction in stitches throughout. Fish and chips, traumatic meat lumps, and Matt Berry – need I say more? Yes, go play it.
4. No Case Should Remain Unsolved by Somi
No Case Should Remain Unsolved was recommended to me by Shuhei Yoshida and it changed how I perceive puzzle games and their storylines (also, we are now besties). This mystery game puts you in the position of a detective looking into a cold case of a missing girl.
You piece together memory fragments of conversations, matching them to the correct speaker while slowly unfolding what really happened in the past. The twist in this story left me shocked for hours and Somi (the developer) is an incredible force to watch.
5. Detective Riddelle by Puzzlab
Sydney-based studio Puzzlab have created a game that is an interactive novel meets mystery game in this lovingly created homage to escape rooms. In this game you follow the titular Detective Riddelle and Lucy, journalist and her future girlfriend, solving a murder on a train through various puzzles.
I had to grab a notebook and pencil for this one, which made me even more immersed in the story. When you play this game you can tell it has been created by escape room buffs and I will be playing the sequel when it comes out!
Read: GamesHub’s Most Anticipated Games Of 2025
6. The Rise of the Golden Idol by Color Gray Games
As a big fan of The Case of the Golden Idol, I became ravenous when I saw the sequel was coming out. This game met all my expectations and then some! It is clever, original and gritty. The gameplay was true to the original, while adding in new features like the additional mystery mini games for each scenario. For the sake of humanity, I hope the Golden Idol is never discovered again, but for my sake I hope it is found and mis-used constantly.
