PlayStation 5 is well beyond the halfway point of its generation, yet its library continues to grow. With Grand Theft Auto 6 still due later this year, there is plenty of time to explore the console’s strongest releases.
This is a living selection of standout PS5 games, covering major adventures, inventive indies, role-playing games, horror, strategy and multiplayer. The latest update adds Hades 2, Marathon, 007 First Light and Star Wars Zero Company.
How we chose these PS5 games
Every game here comes personally recommended by an experienced player. Quality matters, but so do variety, length and mood, so the list includes different ways to enjoy the console. If you are comparing a console setup with dedicated gaming hardware, our arcade machine buying guide offers a useful starting point.
1. Star Wars Zero Company
Bit Reactor’s squad strategy game brings the Clone Wars era to life through precise turn-based tactics, characterful soldiers and cleverly designed encounters. Several members of the team previously worked on Firaxis’ XCOM reboot, and that heritage is clear in the careful positioning, unpredictable battles and meaningful decisions.
The game also delivers a compelling ground-level view of the Republic’s collapse. Your squad becomes a group worth caring about, particularly when the default permadeath setting makes a failed mission permanent.
2. 007 First Light
It has been almost 30 years since a truly great James Bond game, but IO Interactive’s 007 First Light makes a strong return. It is a polished action adventure with the developer’s Hitman-inspired social stealth woven between its larger set pieces.
The result is a smart, entertaining blockbuster with a distinctive take on a young Bond. It may not replace GoldenEye 007 in gaming history, but it offers a thoroughly satisfying spy adventure.
3. Marathon
Bungie’s extraction shooter will not suit every player, but its asymmetric PvPvE structure can produce extraordinary multiplayer tension. The rules take time to understand and the experience can be unforgiving, yet the drama is difficult to match.
Solo and group roles give the game welcome flexibility, while deep science-fiction world-building, sharp shooting and striking art direction create a compelling future setting. Bungie’s long experience with responsive gunplay remains one of Marathon’s greatest strengths.
4. Hades 2
Supergiant Games’ follow-up to Hades expands a near-perfect roguelike formula without losing its pace. Combat remains crisp, randomly selected boons are carefully balanced, and each run finds the right tension between progress and failure.
The game’s Greek mythology is brought to life through stylish art, memorable characters and witty, flirtatious dialogue. It is a superb example of what independent development can achieve.
5. Pragmata
Capcom’s science-fiction action game combines modern presentation with old-school design instincts. It follows Hugh, a space-suited survivor fighting robots on a lunar base while managing resources and pushing between save points.
Hugh’s android companion Diana adds an unusual emotional and mechanical dimension. Her grid-based hacking puzzles interrupt the shooting in inventive ways, creating quick bursts of problem-solving that remain enjoyable even after the game offers ways to bypass them. Pragmata feels polished, fresh and ambitious.
6. Alan Wake 2
Remedy Entertainment turns its long-awaited return to Alan Wake into both a survival-horror masterpiece and a mystery about creativity. The game embraces haunted woods, literary unease and reality-bending horror while applying the studio’s experience from Control.
Writer Alan Wake shares the adventure with FBI agent Saga Anderson, whose investigation is connected to his disappearance years earlier. Players can move between their stories, shifting from detective work to cosmic horror. It is a defining modern horror experience.
7. Astro Bot
Team Asobi transformed the ideas of the free Astro’s Playroom into a full-scale platformer, and the result is arguably Sony’s finest game in the genre. Astro Bot is a technical showcase, using DualSense haptics, speaker effects and detailed surfaces to make movement feel unusually tactile.
Its levels constantly introduce new tools, comic encounters, bosses and demanding challenges. Hundreds of collectible bots dressed as PlayStation characters also turn the adventure into an affectionate celebration of the platform’s history, including the work of Japan Studio and games such as Ico, LocoRoco and PaRappa the Rapper.
8. Baldur’s Gate 3
Larian Studios’ Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game feels remarkably natural on PS5. Its enormous campaign combines strong storytelling, memorable companions, flexible problem-solving and genuine player agency with the unpredictable chaos of tabletop play.
The console version also supports split-screen co-op. Whether played alone or with a partner, Baldur’s Gate 3 is one of the generation’s essential role-playing games.
9. Blue Prince
Blue Prince mixes mansion exploration with puzzles, roguelike structure, deck-building ideas and a mysterious family history. Whenever you open a door, you choose the next room from three randomly dealt blueprints, making each attempt different.
Its systems take time to understand. Rather than treating the mansion as one straightforward logic puzzle, players need to gather rooms and uncover how their individual mysteries connect. Note-taking, experimentation and persistence reveal an original game that continues beyond its initial completion.
10. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Sandfall Interactive draws on the era of lavish visuals, grand stories and turn-based battles associated with classic console role-playing games, then gives the formula a distinctly French identity.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is visually impressive for a small-to-medium-sized team. Its appeal rests on responsive combat, inventive art, likeable characters and a story that can be both sincere and playful. It is a focused, rewarding RPG that avoids wasting the player’s time.
Choosing your next gaming setup
These games cover very different tastes, from tactical squads and role-playing parties to platforming, horror and competitive shooting. For readers who enjoy physical controls and shared-room play, RETROCADE also offers arcade machines, compact bartop arcades and virtual pinball machines.
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