The best games of April 2025 were Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Blue Prince, Lost Records: Bloom and Rage (whose second half arrived that month) and South of Midnight. Each one is below with its release details, what makes it worth playing, and a “where it stands now” note covering the updates, ports and awards that followed, verified against the developers’ and publishers’ own announcements. We also cover the surprise remaster that landed the same month.
April 2025 turned out to be one of the strongest months of the year. Three of these games went on to win major awards (one of them the biggest prize in games), and all four are still easy to buy and play today.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Release date: April 24, 2025 Platforms: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC Developer: Sandfall Interactive Publisher: Kepler Interactive
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is a turn-based RPG with real-time mechanics, set in a world inspired by Belle Époque France. Its premise, from the official description: once a year the Paintress wakes and paints a number on her monolith, and everyone past that age turns to smoke. Tomorrow she will paint 33, so the members of Expedition 33 set out to destroy her before she can paint death again.
What made it stand out was the combat. Turns are chosen from menus, but enemy attacks have to be dodged or parried in real time, so a skilled player can take on fights that look impossible on paper. Our guides on how to parry and how to dodge cover the timing. Add a story that takes real risks and a soundtrack by composer Lorien Testard, and it is easy to see why it became the breakout game of the year. If you are wondering about the commitment, our guide to how long it takes to beat breaks down each act.
Where it stands now: Expedition 33 won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2025, among nine wins that night including Best RPG, Best Narrative and Best Art Direction. Sandfall reported 5 million copies sold by October 2025 and 8 million by the game’s first anniversary in April 2026. The free “Thank You” update in December 2025 added a new playable area, late-game boss fights in the Endless Tower, a photo mode and seven new languages. Everything we have written about it is on our Expedition 33 guides hub.
Blue Prince
Release date: April 10, 2025 Platforms: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC (Mac added later) Developer: Dogubomb Publisher: Raw Fury
Blue Prince is a first-person puzzle game set in Mount Holly, a manor whose layout changes every day. Each time you open a door, you draft the next room from a choice of blueprints, so every day you build a different house and try to reach the rumored Room 46 before your steps run out. It mixes roguelike runs with a long chain of puzzles and secrets that carry over from day to day, rewarding players who take notes.
It launched straight into the PS Plus Game Catalog and Game Pass, which helped it find a huge audience for an indie puzzle game. Raw Fury says that at release it was the best reviewed game of the year so far, until Expedition 33 arrived two weeks later.
Where it stands now: Blue Prince won Best Indie Game at the Golden Joystick Awards and was nominated for Best Independent Game and Best Debut Indie Game at The Game Awards, per Raw Fury’s first-anniversary recap. A Mac version followed in September 2025, and a PS5 physical edition was released through iam8bit. Patch 1.7 in April 2026 completed an accessibility update with color assist options and full button remapping. The publisher also acknowledged a PS5 save issue in May 2025 and patched it with Sony’s help.
Lost Records: Bloom and Rage
Release date: April 15, 2025 (Tape 2: Rage; Tape 1: Bloom launched February 18, 2025) Platforms: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC Developer and publisher: DON’T NOD
Lost Records: Bloom and Rage comes from the studio behind Life is Strange. It follows four friends, Swann, Autumn, Nora and Kat, across the summer of 1995 in the town of Velvet Cove and the adult reunion that forces them to face what happened. The game is single-player and split into two tapes: buying it gets you both, and Tape 2 arrived as a free update in April.
Swann’s camcorder is the heart of it: in the 1995 timeline you film your friends and the places you explore, and the game treats those recordings as memories worth keeping. Dialogue choices shape the friendships, and the April tape resolves the mystery the first one sets up.
Where it stands now: Lost Records was nominated for Games for Impact at The Game Awards 2025 and for Best Storytelling at the Golden Joystick Awards, per DON’T NOD. A physical PS5 edition went on sale in August 2025.
South of Midnight
Release date: April 8, 2025 (PS5 on March 31, 2026) Platforms: Xbox Series X|S, PC, PS5 Developer: Compulsion Games Publisher: Xbox Game Studios
South of Midnight is an action-adventure steeped in the folklore of the American Deep South. You play as Hazel, who is called to become a Weaver, a magical mender of broken bonds and spirits, after disaster strikes her hometown. Along the way she confronts creatures from Southern myths and untangles her own family’s past.
Its look is the big draw: animation styled after stop-motion, in a haunted, fairytale version of the South. At launch, reviewers praised the story and world more than the combat, which some found repetitive. It is a manageable length, too; our guides break down how many chapters there are and how long it takes to beat.
Where it stands now: South of Midnight won Games for Impact at The Game Awards 2025, Best New Intellectual Property at the BAFTA Games Awards, and the D.I.C.E. award for Outstanding Achievement in Animation, per Compulsion Games. It came to PS5 on March 31, 2026, so it is no longer exclusive to Xbox and PC.
Also Released in April 2025
The month’s biggest surprise was The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered, which Bethesda shadow-dropped on April 22, 2025 for PS5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. It rebuilds the 2006 RPG’s visuals while keeping its quests and world, and it reached Nintendo Switch 2 in August 2026, where Bethesda has since been investigating blurry visuals after an update. If you are starting it now, our guide to leveling up fast in Oblivion helps with its unusual leveling system, and the Elder Scrolls guides hub has the rest.
Why April 2025 Still Matters
Looking back, April 2025 set the tone for the whole year: an RPG from a first-time studio winning Game of the Year, a puzzle game from a tiny team ranking among the year’s best, and a folklore adventure sweeping awards for its art. If you missed any of them, all four are still easy to buy, and most have been updated or ported since launch. For what has come out since, see our list of the best RPGs of 2026.
Frequently Asked Questions
What was the best game released in April 2025? Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is our pick, and it went on to win Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2025. Blue Prince is the best choice if you prefer puzzles to combat.
How many copies has Expedition 33 sold? Sandfall Interactive announced 8 million copies sold on the game’s first anniversary in April 2026, up from 5 million in October 2025.
Can you play South of Midnight on PS5? Yes. It released on PS5 on March 31, 2026, almost a year after the Xbox and PC launch.
Is Lost Records: Bloom and Rage complete? Yes. The game was released in two tapes, and Tape 2 arrived as a free update on April 15, 2025, so buying it today gets you the whole story.
Is Blue Prince multiplayer? No. Blue Prince is a single-player puzzle game.