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    Zero Punctuation End of Year Big Beautiful Women Pageant Predictions and Results 
Top 5/Bottom 5 of 2012 predictions
Others can add their predictions as well. Feel free to delete it when the actual list comes out.

Top 5:

  • 5: [PROTOTYPE 2] (He enjoyed getting around, it was more balanced than the original, and despite being relatively silly, he still said it was fun.)
  • 4: Either Dishonored (He did say it came close to Thief's level of excellent stealth gameplay, but was bogged down by the Moral Choice System of Doom), or Doom³ BFG Edition (Actual context, no objective markers, and much better than the spunkgargleweewee that was Medal of Honor Warfighter -pahahahaha-)
  • 3: *Insert token independent game title here* (More than likely, he'll place it here to counter the arguements that his #4 worst game is a sign of him "selling out")
  • 2: X-Com Enemy Unknown (He welcomed the changes that X-COM purists dismissed, and considered it a large step above Valkyria Chronicles, which was in relatively the same genre)
  • 1: Spec Ops: The Line (It affected him enough to seem genuinely depressed afterwards, and the emotional high is one of the big reasons why he recommended it in the first place. Said emotional high is not at the same "fucking a burning dolphin" level of Silent Hill 2, but it came pretty close)

Bottom 5:

  • 5: Assassin's Creed III (Too much faffing about, not enough stabbing. The only game in the series that he considered boring)
  • 4: AMY (One of the worst horror games he's reviewed, and the fact that it's an indy game didn't stop him from thrashing it. His #3 best game will be set in place to counter any "Yahtzee hates an indy game? HE SOLD OUT HURR DURR OVERPRETENTIOUS DURR" arguments.)
  • 3: Medal of Honor Warfighter (pahahaha) (Bad enough to earn it's own genre name of Spunk-Gargle-Wee-Wee)
  • 2: Resident Evil 6 (Managed to be even weaker than Resident Evil 5, and he didn't hold that game in high regard either. He may put Halo 4 here instead, just to troll the fanboys or because Microsoft broke Bungie's promise of stopping the series -which Yahtzee approved of-, but if not, Resident Evil 6 will be #2)
  • 1: Inversion (Managed to fuck up gravity powers by forcing players to use cover beforehand, thus stripping the game of the only Cadbury Creme Eggs it had.)
    • I doubt he'll put Halo 4 on that list. He said that he enjoyed the story and thought it was a definite step up from Halo 2 and 3 (the only other entries of the main series he's played), but it was way too short.

Actual List:

  • Best Of:
    • 5: Dishonored. Brought up his complaints about the moral choice system and dialogue again, but praised the stealth.
    • 4: The Walking Dead: Praised the story and pacing, but didn't put it higher because his keyboard hasn't forgiven him yet.
    • 3: Far Cry 3: Mentioned it was a late edition (Actually the second last game he reviewed before the Best/Worst of), but mentioned again how it was vastly superior to Far Cry 2.
    • 2: X-COM Enemy Unknown: Said it how an old franchise should be rebooted (throwing a Take That! at EA for the Syndicate reboot in the process), and lead it into Warfighter (Ha ha ha).
    • 1: Spec Ops The Line: While he criticized how he now reviews modern shooters hoping for another groundbreaking story like this, he praised the story again, and mentioned that the developers deserve much more love for making it.

  • Worst Of:
    • 5: Resident Evil 6: Said the game hit its prime with RE 4, and that he just wants the thing to die already.
    • 4: Neverdead: Said he found the game cute, but still had massive design flaws.
    • 3: Steel Batalion Heavy Armour: Hated the Kinect support and decided the developers just didn't care.
    • 2: Medal Of Honour Warfighter: (Pahaha) Brought up how warfighter is an actual military word and the spunk-gargle-wee-wee incident, and mentioned he only reviewed it because of his favourite game.
    • 1: Amy: Loathed this game, and noted it was the first Indie game he put in the Bottom Five and said it was downright offensive.

Before the year ends, he's going to do a follow up The Walking Dead review.
After all, he WAS completely wrong about how it would end...
  • Sort of- he gave it No 4 in his Best Of and praised it again.

Predictions for Yahtzee's Top 5 of 2015
Since nobody made another prediction for Yahtzee's Top 5 for two years, I think it's time for another one. Also, I'm not arranging this in a order since I want to open a bit of discussion.

Top 5:

  • Invisible, Inc.: It's rare to see Yahtzee liking a mechanic so much, he dedicated an Extra Punctuation to discuss (and gush about) it. Last time this happened to Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, and look where it ended up on his Top 5 of 2014 (granted it wasn't a very good year)
  • Bloodborne: I'm just going with what he said on his Let's Drown Out on Titan Souls.
  • The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: Since Yahtzee likes a good narrative, and The Witcher 3 provides exactly that, It's very likely he'll put it on the list.
  • Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain: He liked the organic sandbox, and that counts for a lot if Shadow Of Mordor is any guide.
  • Until Dawn: He praised it in an Extra Punctuation column as a David Cage-style game done right, and he's a horror fan in general.
  • Splatoon: It's rare for Yahtzee to find a shooter he likes, much less a multiplayer-focused one, and it even let him keep to himself in the multiplayer matches.

Bottom 5:

  • Alone in the Dark: Illumination: So bad Yahtzee gave up playing, and judged the rest of the game based on the mission names.
  • The Order: 1886: Coined the term "Funk-marble-tee-hee" (which is basically alternate setting spunk-gargle-wee-wee)
  • Godzilla: Manages to fuck up the one thing video games does best, blowing shit up.
  • Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water: He couldn't stand it, and his decision to review it over Xenoblade Chronicles X as his last game of 2015 makes me think he was trying to fill out his Bottom 5 roster.
  • Star Wars Battlefront (2015) or Evolve: He's against multiplayer-only games on principle, and found that the one mode he did enjoy in each was swamped by the stuff he didn't. They could also fill in for Battlefield and Call of Duty as examples of bad trends or ideas in triple-A game design.

Honorable Mentions:

  • Undertale: His Extra Punctuation article on the game might be a sign that he's not gonna review the game, unless he doesn't apply his usual rule of only including games he reviewed, reviewed the game later, or make a special exception.
  • Just Cause 3: Didn't dwell on the technical issues, and praised it for the same reasons as Just Cause 2, but "more of the same" generally doesn't make his Top 5.
  • Rocket League: He liked the gameplay, but felt it was over too quickly.

Actual Top 5:

  • 5: Bloodborne: Liked the horror, and From learned from their previous Souls games in making it.
  • 4: Soma: Atmospheric horror on par with Bioshock
  • 3: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt: A rare triple-A game that didn't skimp on character or story.
  • 2: Elite Dangerous: Huge sandbox, and the combat's infrequency makes it more engaging and the rest of the game more relaxing.
  • 1: Undertale: Deep narrative and unique gameplay.

Actual Bottom 5:

  • 5: Star Wars Battlefront (2015): For being multiplayer-only and leaning too heavily on the Star Wars brand to sell itself.
  • 4: Hatred: For giving games & gamers a bad name, and reinforcing stereotypes we're trying to disprove.
  • 3: Godzilla: Just awful.
  • 2: Alone in the Dark: Illumination: An Obvious Beta that ignores its series' legacy.
  • 1: The Order: 1886: Ignored its own potentially good ideas in favor of generic cover-based shooting.

Bland 5:

Top 5 of 2017 Predictions (Again)
Since this year has been a great year for games with releases such as Breath of the Wild, Persona 5, Prey, and other great games, this is probably going to be a fun year to predict what Yahtzee's gonna consider as his Top 5, Bottom 5, and his Bland 5. Same as the WMG for 2015, this won't be in any particular order.

Top 5:

  • Prey: Calling it now since Yahtzee really likes the games that inspired it.
    • Jossed. He basically gave it an honorable mention for being "not quite bland enough for the bland list".
  • Persona 5: Even with the typical JRPG and anime bullshit, Yahtzee does like his life simulators.
    • Confirmed, even if Yahtzee himself was surprised by its inclusion.
  • Night in the Woods: An engaging story-based game that tackles unique themes? It would be more surprising if it wasn't here.
    • Jossed. Not mentioned at all.
  • Horizon: Zero Dawn: It won't be number 1, but he likes it well enough despite being burnt out on wilderness sandbox games; citing that none of the games' flaws are dealbreakers.
    • Jossed. It basically got an honorable mention for being "not quite bland enough for the bland list".

Bottom 5:

  • The Surge: Yahtzee just straight up hates the game with passion, a little ambiguous whether he actually hates the game or just wants to hate a game after so long.
    • Confirmed, though it was actually only his fifth-most hated game of the year.

Bland 5:

  • Outlast 2: Because of how horror has changed over the years, but not bad enough that it'll go to the Bottom 5.
    • Jossed; Yahtzee was so nauseated by it that it made the Worst 5 list instead.
  • Sniper Ghost Warrior 3: Another Ubisoft-like open-world game, what's there that isn't bland about it? Well maybe except for...
    • Jossed, as it turns out that Yahtzee hated it so much that he awarded it Worst Game of 2017.
  • Ghost Recon Wildlands: An actual Ubisoft open-world game, of course there's another one this year.
    • Confirmed.
  • Mass Effect Andromeda: Certainly not bad, but this certainly isn't Bioware's best either.
    • Confirmed.

Actual Results:

  • Top 5:
    • Persona 5: Despite it being a JRPG, he enjoyed the style, music, characters, and "high school girls in vinyl catsuits sticking their bums in the air".
    • Breath of the Wild: Just a really well-made game.
    • Cuphead: Unique, well-realized, and entertainingly difficult.
    • A Hat in Time: He almost gave this spot to Mario Odyssey, but A Hat in Time's charm and freshness won over Mario's polish.
    • Resident Evil 7: "A successful change of tune that also manages the balance between disturbing and knowingly camp that marks Resident Evil at its best."
  • Bland 5:
    • Agents of Mayhem: Volition may have had energy and ideas going into development, but the end result was comparable to them "[rotating] their wrists for a while going 'Buhpidee-buhpidee-buhpidee-buh.'"
    • Mass Effect Andromeda: Bland setting, bland characters, bland dialogue, and bland sex.
    • Destiny 2: A grind so mediocre that it only came in third in a mediocrity contest.
    • Ghost Recon Wildlands: Another bland Ubisoft sandbox consisting of "going to the icon and shooting the thing".
    • Star Wars Battlefront II: An entirely obvious campaign that was clearly focus-grouped by the corporate machine to exploit audience nostalgia so they don't have to develop any new ideas.
  • Worst 5:
    • The Surge: "Annoying and stupid and plays like you're trying to unjam a kitchen drawer."
    • Outlast 2: Bad gameplay, nonsensical plot, and attempts to compensate for its lack of actual scariness by "trying to put [Yahtzee] off [his] fucking dinner."
    • Dead Rising 4: A "stripped-down, tarted-up holiday special" with none of the qualities that made the first two Dead Rising games good.
    • Sonic Forces: Started with a few good ideas, but it quickly goes back to Sonic Team's comfort zone of "shitty characters, horrible physics, and masturbation."
    • Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3: "Ugly, boring, badly optimized, and with a story straight from a twelve-year-old boy locked in the bathroom with a Tom Clancy-themed pinup calendar and severe familial issues"; a game So Bad, It's Hilarious.

Top 5 of 2022 Predictions
This hasn't been done in a while, and similar to the above examples, this won't be done in any particular order. This year will be particularly interesting to predict because of the noticeable dearth in AAA games this year (to the point where Yahtzee actually re-reviewed No Man's Sky).

Honorable Mentions:

  • Ravenous Devils: Yahtzee overall really enjoyed this game (praising the Black Comedy presentation and finding it very refreshing to play a game focused around a Happily Married couple), but it's ultimately way too insubstantial to actually end up on his end-of-year list.
  • Rogue Legacy 2: Yahtzee gave this game a very positive review all things considered, but he also put it into the same category as Hand of Fate 2 and Left 4 Dead 2 in terms of it being a sequel that's "basically the first game but better" instead of being a worthy sequel that uses the concepts introduced in the prior game as a jumping-off point for a new story that demands be told (i.e., Silent Hill 2, Thief II: The Metal Age, Dark Souls 2, BioShock Infinite and, to an extent, Portal 2). As such, he'll likely note that it's good but not worthy of being placed on the Top 5 list.
  • Not for Broadcast: On the one hand, Yahtzee did sincerely praise the strong characterization of the news team along with feeling its Black Comedy landed more often than not, but on the other hand he also unfavorably compared the game to both Papers, Please and This War of Mine in terms of it not managing to make the moral choices legitimately difficult, and he also complained about it falling into the Golden Mean Fallacy regarding politics near the end.
    • It's worth noting that it might end actually up in the Blandest 5 list since Yahtzee could try and argue that it's a corporate attempt at taking a clever indie concept (a "bureaucracy-em-up" a la Papers, Please, This War of Mine, Return Of The Obra Dinn, and Not Tonight) and needlessly simplifying it for the sake of the Lowest Common Denominator. Granted, he didn't do this for Returnal regarding Roguelikes when it came out, but the possibility is still there.
  • Hardspace: Shipbreaker: Yahtzee was very fond of the gameplay loop that Hardspace provided with being a unique simulator game with an existent chance to mess up if he isn't paying enough attention, since it brings a sense of satisfaction and challenge to the game. He also remarked that he found the storyline and its characters to be quite engaging and interesting. However, he still had complaints about the game, one of which led into a massive tirade about how it's a constant issue for games to force gameplay to come to a standstill purely to allow the plot to take focus, so it's debatable if it would be placed onto the Top 5 for that reason.
  • Evil West: While Yahtzee did note the game generally came across as an artifact from the Seventh Console Generation (with him specifically criticizing both the story being a blatant Cliché Storm and the plethora of Damage Sponge Bosses in the game's back half), he noted that the game itself was perfectly fine and even quite fun in parts, praising its creative color palette and noting how refreshing it was to play a game that actually had multiplayer as an optional side option rather than having it awkwardly crowbarred into its main singleplayer campaign as part of a live-service revenue stream.
  • Scorn: Despite the fact that Yahtzee gave this game a pretty negative review, he surprisingly enough tried to defend its generally unpleasant atmosphere and gameplay in a later Extra Punctuation video over whether or video games need to be "fun" or not. As such, he might give it some marks for its unsettling atmosphere at the end of the year.

Top 5:

  • Elden Ring: Yahtzee really enjoyed this game, to the point where he had an entire Extra Punctuation video where he talked about how well the game executes the usage of an open world (especially when in contrast to its overuse in Ubisoft sandboxes). Considering his opposition to sequels (while Elden Ring isn't a sequel to Dark Souls, it is a Spiritual Successor, and in the past this has usually made little difference) and self-admitted "Souls-like fatigue", though, it most likely won't be his Best Game of the Year.
  • Tunic: As someone noted in the YouTube comments section here, Yahtzee makes less jokes when he's genuinely praising something, and this review has a good 30-50 second sequence where he's gushing about how well it executes its sense of uncovering a greater mystery while directly tying it into the game mechanics and encouraging/rewarding exploration. He also further praised the game in his Extra Punctuation video on "immersion vs. linear storytelling" in gaming, so there's a decent chance for it showing up on this list.
  • Neon White: Yahtzee praised this game a lot for its excellent primary gameplay loop related to deckbuilding (which he even noted was doubly surprising since he's not actually a fan of deckbuilding), clever original concept based around "speed-running", and having a Visual Novel element he didn't hate (with him even positively comparing it to the Persona franchise in terms of how the visual novel element provides a "necessary breather" from the combat). With all that being said, it'll be a major surprise if it doesn't show up on his end-of-the-year list in a positive fashion.
  • Endling - Extinction is Forever: Yahtzee spent a lot of his review praising it for its use of an open world to the benefit of its story and an organically-delivered, strong exploration focus that worked in conjunction with its usage of Story Breadcrumbs. Additionally, while he did complain about the ending being a real downer, he still praised its Green Aesop and argued that its Anvilicious nature was (to an extent) valid & necessary.
  • Fashion Police Squad: While Yahtzee did note that the by-the-moment gameplay wasn't exactly stellar, he gave it incredibly high remarks for its hilariously over-the-top campy style and creativity, with him noting that its eccentric delivery and Surreal Humor was more than enough to carry him through the game's weaker moments.
  • Metal: Hellsinger: Yahtzee favorably compared the game to both BPM: Bullets Per Minute in terms of it being a well-executed mix of a Rhythm Game and "Boomer Shooter" (with him noting that its core gameplay loop was actually very fun to play), and he also gave it high marks for its use of Troy Baker as The Narrator providing enough personality and depth to its narrative to prevent the game from falling into Too Bleak, Stopped Caring territory a la Agony.

Bottom 5:

  • Horizon Forbidden West: Considering how Yahtzee not only said he hated this game (to the point where he retroactively bashed its predecessor) but he dedicated an entire Extra Punctuation video to dumping on what he felt was bad characterization in its main lead, it will most likely be his Worst Game of the Year.
  • Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach: Yahtzee loathed this game to the point where he outright said "I want to hurt it" during his review. It's almost unquestionably going on the Bottom 5 of this year.
  • Hell Pie: While Yahtzee did praise the gameplay, he ultimately lambasted it for its lack of clever writing (he specifically described it as "Conker's Bad Fur Day without the wit") and being utterly revolting. Admittedly, he didn't seem to dislike this game to an extent that would've placed it even within the same ballpark that he despised Outlast II in terms of "being gross", but he did still seem to find it to be tasteless and un-funny, so there's a non-zero chance of it ending up here.
  • Return to Monkey Island: Yahtzee found the ending personally insulting.
  • Babylons Fall: Yahtzee all but confirmed it would be going on his Bottom 5 list in the game's post-ZP review stream.
  • Postal: Brain Damage: Not only did Yahtzee find the gameplay to be rather dull and not very fun, he also criticized its story being a painfully dated period piece for the media & political landscapes of The New '10s and The New '20s. As such, Yahtzee could possibly place it here for it being a poorly dated and unfunny satire that didn't even bother to make its gameplay as a Boomer Shooter actually fun to play around in.
  • The Callisto Protocol: Yahtzee really despised this game, to the point where he retroactively praised its Spiritual Predecessor Dead Space (a franchise he has already made clear he doesn't enjoy) and spent most of an entire Extra Punctuation video complaining about the game falling into an irritating misuse of audio logs along with many other video games (i.e., Control and Hardspace: Shipbreaker). Combining all that with him outright remarking in his review that he found The Callisto Protocol to be "an almost refreshingly bad game" and him unfavorably likening it to Outlast II (another survival horror game he deeply hated for mistaking frustration for terror), and it's almost certainly ending up on his Bottom 5 list for the year.

Blandest 5:

  • Dying Light 2 Stay Human: Ubisoft sandboxes appear in all of his Blandest 5 end-of-year lists, and considering how he didn't outright hate this game to the same extent that he did Horizon: Forbidden West, it'll likely show up here.
  • The Quarry: With the exception of Until Dawn, virtually every Supermassive Games-penned game has appeared in his Blandest 5 at the end of each respective year, so it's likely going to show up here. That being said, Yahtzee also noted in an Extra Punctuation video that the "only" reason he covered this game was to make fun of David Arquette's bad facial animations, so it might not show up either.
  • Ghostwire: Tokyo: While Yahtzee did overall seem to enjoy the game, most of his complaints were about the game having an unnecessarily large open world and the gameplay being generic. All of these elements sound like great material for the Blandest 5 list, particularly since he started out the review sharing a semi-joking Broken Pedestal attitude towards Shinji Mikami and also more seriously admitted his genuine disappointment regarding a game he was sincerely excited for (which is similar reasoning to him assigning Agents of Mayhem to the Blandest 5 list for its respective year).
  • Salt and Sacrifice: Yahtzee specifically complained about how uninteresting the ending was and how needlessly similar it was to most other Soulslike RPGs (along with it replicating the bad application of healing potions that was previously seen in Bloodborne), so he'll probably put it here to serve as a reflection of his comments about how he's now suffering from Souls-like fatigue.
  • Stray: While he didn't seem to necessarily hate this game, Yahtzee wasn't particularly enthused by it either, with him unfavorably likening it to a "walking simulator" due to its constant usage of contextual button prompts for gameplay along with a general lack of depth to its mechanics. As such, it might end up here for similar reasons to how Everybody's Gone to the Rapture ended up on the Blandest 5 list for 2015 (though granted, he didn't seem to dislike the story in Stray nearly as much as he did in Everybody's Gone).
    • As noted above, if Endling shows up on his Top 5 list for the year, there's a greater chance of him placing Stray on the Blandest 5 list as part of him making a "compare-contrast" example of how one game (Endling) used the same overall premise significantly better than the other (Stray) did.
  • Saints Row (2022): While Yahtzee surprisingly gave this game a significantly nicer review than most other critics at the time of its release, he still lambasted it for its lack of creativity and being a poor sequel to a franchise he personally loves, to the point where he specifically dedicated an entire Extra Punctuation video to describing why he thinks the game's central premise of being a Continuity Reboot was foolish and inherently setting itself up for failure.
  • Gotham Knights (2022) and Midnight Suns: Yahtzee gave fairly negative reviews to both of these games, but as his criticisms were more based around how dull, repetitive and generic he found them to be, they sound more like ripe fodder for the Blandest 5 list rather than the Bottom 5 list.

Actual Results:

  • Best 5:
    • #5: Not for Broadcast — Started out this portion of the overall video apologizing to Sam Barlow for not better appreciating the potential of Full Motion Video games when Her Story and Immortality had first come out since he felt they didn't have enough gameplay to go along with them to keep them interesting; Yahtzee then noted that he's placing Not for Broadcast on this list since despite him feeling it was a bit "hit and miss" at times, it truly won him over by its ending, sheer effort, and its admittedly generic "knob-twiddling" gameplay being able to keep him properly engaged moment-to-moment
    • #4: Hardspace: Shipbreaker — Cheerfully called it "that meditative game about spaceship dismantling" while also joking about how much fun he had intentionally getting its name wrong when he reviewed it
    • #3: Tunic — invoked Praised it for being an interesting mix of Dark Souls and The Legend of Zelda, calling it "wonderfully deliberate in its nostalgic theming and solid core gameplay integrated with a sense of unfolding mystery"
    • #2: Elden Ring — After noting at the start of his entire video how much this game overshadowed the entire rest of the year, Yahtzee praised Elden Ring for having a fantastically-realized open world and serving as such a great natural progression of the Souls-like RPG that he actually kept trying to play it in what little remained of his spare time throughout the year; however, Yahtzee then noted that he's not calling it his Game of the Year due to his self-admitted "Souls-like fatigue" along with getting irritated by the Difficulty Spike in the game's second half making him have to stop roughly three-to-four bosses before the ending (with him then begging for a FromSoftware game to come out "with a decent fucking ending!")
    • #1: Neon White — While he did lament the "Wanime" elements to its story, Yahtzee noted that Neon White was ultimately the game that stuck out easily the most when he went over his favorite games of the year due to its very strong core gameplay loop and the game generally having "a wonderfully breezy, innovative spirit" that came from its indie roots
  • Blandest 5:
    • #5: Stray — Basically described it as a glorified walking simulator, and complained that it could be recreated at the player's home as long as one owned both a cat and "a laser pointer shaped like a contextual button prompt"
    • #4: Dying Light 2 Stay Human — Felt its open world and setting were both incredibly bland and obvious, its zombies weren't interesting to combat in the slightest, and even its implementation of both Le Parkour and a hang glider weren't able to make the experience legitimately interesting
    • #3: Trek to Yomi — Yahtzee started out this part of his video musing that he sees "Third Blandest" as an unofficial "One True Blandest" award for the year, and then noted that he was putting Trek to Yomi here since he didn't like how "stop and start" its story was, epically described its simplistic gameplay as "waving a sword and moving right", and found the whole experience to be almost absurdly forgettable
    • #2: Gotham Knights (2022) — After starting out noting how an ideal superhero game a la Marvels Spider Man should be able to make the player feel like the superhero in question, Yahtzee then complained that his experience in Gotham Knights where he constantly struggled against enemies with "spongy health bars" in same-y punch-ups after doodling around on a slow, boring movement mechanic in the form of a motorbike made him feel more like "an overworked pork butcher with an unusually long commute"
    • #1: Saints Row (2022) — While Yahtzee noted that this game wasn't necessarily bland in comparison to all of the other games that came out this year, he ultimately condemned it for providing such a dull and disappointingly generic Continuity Reboot (that he also noted wasn't at all necessary in the first place) to a franchise he sincerely loved
  • Worst 5:
    • #5: Hell Pie — Praised the nuanced, platforming mechanics and interesting, varied environments, but noted that all of this effort was for naught due to it being "gross as shit"
    • #4: Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin — While he admitted that he was initially hesitant on condemning a game where he's had several actual friends praising their experiences with it, Yahtzee then noted that he ultimately decided to judge the game based on his experience in the game: namely, that he found it to be "a load of old piss on a freshly laundered pillow"
    • #3: The Callisto Protocol — Gave a Call-Back to his Top 5 of 2014 list in how he put Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric (the last game he had reviewed for that year) on his Second Worst spot, and then freely admitted he was following similar logic for The Callisto Protocol being on this year's list, with him also lamenting that he's starting to feel that mid-to-late December following the Game Awards has become a "Dump Month" for video game releases
    • #2: Babylons Fall — After noting how much of an Epic Fail the game was that its servers were shut down only six months after release, Yahtzee ultimately condemned the game by describing it as "an ugly, boring, confusing tripe lollipop that already failed so hard, there's little point in berating it further"
    • #1: Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach — Yahtzee freely admitted that, as evidenced by him putting a "post-dad game" in the form of Hardspace: Shipbreaker on his Best 5 list for the year, he doesn't have a clue what's necessarily popular with children "these days", but then continued by noting that even though the popularity of Five Nights at Freddy's generally mystifies him, the numerous terrible design choices, examples of misplaced effort, and just generally being horribly thought-out are all justifiable enough reasons for Five Nights at Freddy's: Security Breach being his Worst Game of the Year.
  • Honorable Mentions:
Top 5/Bottom 5 of 2023 predictions

Top 5:

  • Hi-Fi RUSH — Yahtzee seemed to adore this game, giving it nearly unqualified praise and stating it as a sign that AAA developers know what gamers really want, but are only giving it to them begrudgingly.
    • Confirmed for Best of 2023.
  • Shadows of Doubt — It's in Early Access, sure, but he even mentioned in his Top of 2011 that he was considering giving the 4th best to Minecraft when at the time he played it, it was still in beta.
    • Confirmed for 3rd best, despite the rule of excluding early access games!
  • The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom — Pretty sure he might ignore it being a sequel to his 4th best of 2017, but who knows.
    • Was a mentioned as a runner up, but didn't win.
  • American Arcadia — The ending really stuck with him, enough for him to talk about it on Semi-Ramblomatic.
    • Was a mentioned as a runner up, but didn't win.

Bottom 5:

  • Forspoken — Yahtzee called this game 'everything that's wrong with writing and game design'.
    • Confirmed for 2nd Worst.
  • Redfall — Called it, alongside Forspoken, a "shit apocalypse" in his Gollum review.
    • Confirmed for 5th Worst.
  • Atomic Heart — See above.
    • Jossed.
  • The Lord of the Rings: Gollum — Sure, he pitied Daedalic Entertainment for it, but still called it an "extraordinarily shit game."
    • Confirmed for Worst of 2023.
  • ?note  — The second end card at the end of the video said: "Well if you remain curious as to what the second game was rest assured my bottom 5 video will probably be after the embargo" essentially teasing ? being a part of the Bottom 5. Yahtzee later revealed a week after the review went live in a livestream the the game was Hellboy Web of Wyrd.
    • Confirmed for 3rd Worst.

Blandest 5

  • Resident Evil 4 (Remake) — Yahtzee flat out called it bland and said it failed to capture the spirit of the original, along with introducing new features he really didn't care for.
    • Guessing this as Most Blandest, just for Yahtzee's attachment to RE4.
    • Jossed.
  • Starfield — Found it ultimately boring, especially considering the hype around it. Could also be another contender for Most Blandest.
    • Confirmed for Most Blandest.
  • Mortal Kombat 1 — While he's usually not for fighting games, he's acknowledged it's one of those franchises that's still more of the same exact thing, never thinking to evolve or be unique, compared to the fun he said he had with Street Fighter 6's World Tour mode. Could also be a contender for the Worst list.
    • Jossed for Bland 5, Confirmed for 4th Worst.

Actual Results:

    Other Theories 
Yahtzee is a gun nut...
...or at least has an interest in firearms. A lot of gun images in his reviews are uncommon guns, the IMI Galil and Norinoco QBZ-95 being an example. He also mentions Glock by name in 50 Cent: BotS. Come to think of it, a LOT of varying gun images are used throughout his reviews.

Yahtzee is Eminem from an alternate timeline where he discovered video games instead of rap.
They're both foul-mouthed white men who are famous for their unique style of art, and they both share a love-hate relationship with their fans.

Yahtzee is the gaming equivalent of GG Allin
They're both foul-mouthed, deviant white men who have a penchant for using politically incorrect humor and subject matter in their works.

Yahtzee doesn't really care about Half-Life 2: Episode 3 as a game
Think about it: he's previously expressed his opinion that a series needs to die once the developers can't think of anything new to do with it, and in his Orange Box review, he chided Episode 2 for repeating some of the setpeices from vanilla Half-life 2 and Episode 1. He's also repeatedly shown that he gets a massive thrill from pissing off die-hard fans of any given property, as well as his disdain and confusion at the very concept of a fandom. With those two facts taken together, it would make sense to think that the only reason he's pushing for Episode 3's release before Valve is ready is because he's planning on bombing it and igniting the mother of all firestorms in the heart of one of the biggest fanbases on the internet.
  • Not likely. First, he's a big fan of Valve. Portal is one of the only games he's called "perfect", and YTOTW showed that he was already a fan of Half-Life. Yes, he's criticized the other episodes, but Valve themselves have stated that their experiment with episodic releases isn't working, and that after Episode 3, they'll go back to normal cycles. Since he probably knows that, he's probably urging them to release Ep 3 early as a "Get it over with" scenario.
  • TC (I can't think of any other term), you should probably lay off the conspiracy theory sites for a while.
  • From his Half-Life Extra Punctuation: "You know, I almost don't even care about Half-Life 3 anymore, because it can only remove some of the ambiguity that makes the series interesting. But that's a very, very big "almost". With fireworks bursting out of every letter except the S, which is actually a big snake." Guess we can call this Jossed.

Warhammer 40k is actually a metaphor for Internet Culture and Yahtzee is the Tau Empire
Think about it: Not very great in terms of resources, but influential, will work against the trend even if others dislike it and believes he is a smart person in a swathe of trash and arse. This of course means that 4chan is the Eye of Terror.
  • Even the Eye of Terror has some standards.
  • Plus all the yellow.
  • And they both employ smaller, odd species to help them (Tau with Kroots, Yahtzee with his Imps)

Yahtzee likes Kingdom Hearts.
Think about it. His review of Epic Mickey made it obvious that he must have played Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II at some point, yet he never reviewed the game and took it apart, like he did with Final Fantasy XIII and, to some extent, The World Ends with You. Now, why would he miss such a great opportunity to bash an insanely popular franchise to hell, heavens and back? The reason is obvious: Yahtzee played KH, enjoyed it and thus can't make a review about it that bashes it. Further evidence for this is that, while he mentioned the games twice during the Epic Mickey review, he didn't badmouth it in the slightest, only mention the fact that one can easily read uncomfortable subtext into Sora's interaction with the Disney Characters. Being so nice to a JRPG is really unusual for Yahtzee.
  • I'd be careful with that assumption, that's the same mistake the guys who asked for the Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Pokémon White and Borderlands reviews made.
    • I'm not saying he should review it or that he thinks it's a very good game (KH has many flaws, which's existence even hardcore fans like me have to admit) just that he probably enjoyed playing it. Indeed, if he were to review it, he'd probably not give it a very good "score", since its gameplay and the gameplay:story ratio is just way below the standard Yahtzee keeps preaching.
  • Wishful thinking on your behalf. It's probably what the troper right below me said.
    • Or maybe he's played it, didn't like it and was unable to come up with what he deemed a good enough show about it. He has mentioned this happening before, so who knows?
  • The fact that this propped up in the visuals to the Pokemon White review suggests he's read this and jossed it.
    • Technically, he never explicitly said that.
      • Emphasis on suggests, there's the possibility to consider as the middle man.
  • According to the Portal 2 Review, he actually can like games.
    • Sadly Jossed. The only one he's played is Kingdom Hearts III, and he really didn't enjoy it.

Alternatively, Yahtzee is saving Kingdom Hearts...
For an hour long rant or otherwise extra special episode(s). I adore Kingdom Hearts, but I realize it does have its flaws and no doubt Yahtzee has found a couple of them.
  • A stinger at the end of his Majora's Mask 3D review lends further credence to the idea that this might be Jossed.

Yahtzee likes most of the games he plays.
He started his act as a parody of video game fans constantly complaining about everything and has been seeing who "gets it," as a form of My Species Doth Protest Too Much. He keeps his loyal groups of fans around just for his own amusement at how much they miss the point. This would explain why he has such hatred of anyone being a "fan" of something, as he's seen more than his share of vile, hateful words coming from the mouths of people who call themselves "fans." Based on what he says, the one thing he seems to genuinely dislike is the Wii, as it's gone completely against his expectations and sold like hotcakes. And maybe the United States, though that might just be another part of his parody, as it's been quite popular to hate the USA for many years now. Especially since he married, and had a kid there.
  • Maybe. I get the sense he likes most games but he just feels that to often people (and reviews) overlook the negative when giving 'fair' reviews. Many of the things he mentions in the reviews aren't likely to be brought up but are nevertheless valid points. It seems as if he feels that a good review (critic, fan, whomever) doesn't just review the positive but the negative in equal measure and takes the entirety into consideration.
    • So he rags on a game... because too many professional reviewers aren't thorough enough with their criticism? That's actually an interesting idea, if only we could get his word on this.
    • Uh, he's frequently mentioned this in reviews. He's never made a secret on how he mostly brings up the negative because a lot of other people focus on the positive.
    • Yahtzee does not do Game Reviews. He is a Game Critic. Citing the Heavy Rain transcript, "I feel like I've come to the wrong door. I'm a game critic, you see, and Heavy Rain is a game in the same way that Ian Thorpe is a salmon."

Yahtzee chooses certain titles as the subject of his episodes specifically to see how many nerves he can prod at.
Every now and again, a review of his seems to go past "I don't like this game", even by the standards of the show, specifically ones with fanbases that are known to have skin thinner than the membrane of a bacterium. In short, while he's getting paid to critisize games in an entertaining and yet valid manner, he's also been making his unofficial title of professional troll quite literal when he gets a chance.

Yahtzee is a troper.
He has used trope names several times in his reviews or columns. More specifically, in the Driver: San Francisco review, he expresses his disdain for "Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies". One "Extra Punctuation" column talked about taking darkness in a story too far, specifically using the words "Dark and Edgy" (and eventually "dedgyark") to describe it. Combined with his expressed love for good storytelling, it's not a stretch to think that he found TV Tropes one day and has been trapped here ever since, even if he doesn't have an actual profile.
  • Yahtzee has been using trope words quite a while before Driver: San Francisco, maybe even from the start. And there is no way to know if Yahtzee is Known or not or even if he knows about TV Tropes because trope words are used in gaming circles too.
  • If he is hes a troper that named a trope.
  • Pretty much confirmed that he knows TV Tropes after that Shout-Out in the Yooka-Laylee episode.

Yahtzee is Karkat Vantas.

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