Dominik Diamond's 2025 Alternative Game Awards: Family Picks
- Balatro emerges as Dominik Diamond’s personal lifesaver and top emotional pick.
- Marvel Snap was his most-played title but fell out of favor over microtransaction-driven changes.
- Family favourites: Just Dance 2024, Overwatch, Resident Evil Biohazard, Crash Bandicoot and Minecraft dominated household playtime.
- Blue Prince and Doom: The Dark Ages are singled out as games he wishes he'd had more time for.
Household winners and what they reveal
Dominik Diamond ran through the year’s most-played games in his household, naming casual hits and deeper experiences his family returned to again and again. His round-up balances light-hearted family picks with more serious critical favourites.
Family favourites — who played what
Eldest daughter: Just Dance 2024 topped the list for sheer persistence and skill. Dominik calls her “a machine” at the game, a tribute to hours on the dance pad.
Middle son: Overwatch remained the competitive staple. He rejected mobile gaming — “I don’t play games on my phone,” a line Dominik relays — and stuck to shooter sessions.
Youngest daughter: Resident Evil Biohazard and The Sims were her go-tos; the latter’s simulated world amusingly offered better imaginary healthcare than the real one, Dominik notes.
Wife: Crash Bandicoot: It’s About Time provided a steady, long-term campaign to chip away at; she moved from 60% to 82% completion over the year.
Father: Dominik’s own most-played game was Marvel Snap, a deck-building, fast-match card game that consumed the most hours of his year.
Standouts, regrets and late discoveries
Marvel Snap earned praise for its design but also critique: Dominik says the evolving card pools and variants eventually felt like “an attempt to suck you into FOMO-fuelled microtransactions,” turning affection to frustration.
Conversely, Balatro — a card-based, poker-adjacent indie from LocalThunk/Playstack — is singled out as a restorative experience. Dominik calls it the title that “saved my soul,” praising inventive joker powers, witty design and nonstop replayability.
He also highlights Doom: The Dark Ages as a game he wishes he’d played more for its reinvention of a classic franchise, and Blue Prince as a “beautiful and unique” cerebral game he intends to return to when time allows.
Not every hit lands for everyone
Some widely adored games didn’t land with Dominik. Hollow Knight: Silksong is acknowledged for its excellence, but he describes it as “not a gaming experience I want in my mid-fifties,” underscoring how age and taste shape reception.
Overall, Dominik’s alternative awards offer a mix of family-focused fun, indie reverence and candid takes on monetization and replayability that shaped his 2025 gaming year.
