By Oliver Brandt
Contributing Pop Culture Writer
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The Xbox One got off to a rocky start when it was officially announced in 2013, but it eventually bounced back and became a fantastic place to play a host of wonderful games.
Among the thousands of games on the Xbox One, some of them are considered the cream of the crop — games that scored very well among critics and became instant classics for fans around the world. Finding excellent games from among these games can be a struggle, but that's made much easier due to platforms like Metacritic, which aggregate review scores from hundreds of media outlets and turn them into one single score.
We've put together this list of the best Xbox One games of all time, as told by their scores on Metacritic, all of which are playable on Xbox Series X|S as well, thanks to backwards compatibility.
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Red Dead Redemption 2
Score: 97/100
Rockstar Games is best known for the GTA series, but its Red Dead series is almost as good. Red Dead Redemption 2 took over a decade to release after the first game in the series, and that decade plus in the oven really shows. Red Dead 2 is a technical marvel, and it's rare to go more than a minute without seeing something incredibly impressive. The story is pretty great too, and the gameplay, while sometimes a bit clunky, is still very fun.
Grand Theft Auto 5
Score: 97/100
GTA 5 is essentially the biggest game on the planet, with tens of millions of players logging on every day to partake in the game's extensive online mode. It's more than just an online multiplayer game though, GTA 5's single-player mode is fantastic, with three playable characters that are all very enjoyable and Rockstar's sharp wit is on full display here. If you somehow haven't played GTA 5 yet, you should definitely consider checking it out.
Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain
Score: 95/100
Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid series is legendary — they're stealth action games that are unlike anything else on the market. MGS5 is the height of the series. It's an almost limitless playground of possibilities, with thousands of ways to approach every single mission in the game. It's not without its issues – it very famously fell short of the intended story, leaving it feeling a little bit unfinished – but it's brilliant nonetheless.
Celeste
Score: 94/100
Celeste is a phenomenal 2D platformer that's hard as nails — but that shouldn't put you off it. While it might seem like the Dark Souls of platformers to begin with, you'll soon learn that Celeste is about accepting who you are, overcoming personal struggles, and making it through the other side. It's packed with gorgeous pixel art, an absolutely incredible soundtrack, and a story that will almost certainly make you cry. It's fantastic and well worth playing.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Score: 94/100
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt was the game that really put CD Projekt on the map and made the studio into the worldwide success it is today, and it's not hard to see why. It's an incredibly polished action RPG with some of the best quests in the industry and gameplay to match. Sure, it doesn't have the bank heist that The Witcher 3 had originally, but it's still an incredible game, something both critics and players agree on.
Resident Evil 2
Score: 93/100
When the original Resident Evil 2 was released back in 1998, the Xbox didn't even exist yet. Now that it does, Capcom saw fit to bring its remake to the console in 2019 — and what a remake it was. Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield are iconic characters that are wonderfully resurrected in this remake, the spooks are top notch, and the whole thing looks, sounds, and plays unbelievably.
Inside
Score: 93/100
Playdead's Limbo was one of the first big success stories in indie games, helping kick off a cottage industry that today is thriving and supporting thousands of artists and developers today. The studio's follow-up, Inside, had very big shoes to fill when it was released in 2016 — and it managed to do exactly that, even surpassing Limbo by many critics' reckoning. It was praised for its fantastic atmosphere, gorgeous art direction, and much improved gameplay, and it's still a classic worth playing now, almost a decade later.
Forza Horizon 4
Score: 92/100
The Forza Horizon series lives and dies by its interesting and compelling locations to race through, and you'd think the UK would be one that dies more than it lives. Forza Horizon 4 proved the naysayers wrong, showing that there's plenty of joy to be found under Great Britain's gray skies. Some of that joy came from the introduction of changing seasons, which debuted in FH4 to great effect, essentially giving you four different maps to play in. It's a brilliant game
Divinity: Original Sin 2
Score: 92/100
Before Larian Studios took the world by storm with Baldur's Gate 3, the studio was quietly working away to pump out bangers that were pretty similar ultimately. Divinity: Original Sin 2 is one such banger, and like BG3, it's a tactical turn-based RPG that offers a massive amount of freedom and lots of roleplaying opportunities.
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It's a very ambitious game that punches well above its weight, and it does a great job of showing off basically all the systems that would eventually make it into BG3. Larian really is the best in the business when it comes to translating tabletop RPGs into video games, and Divinity: Original Sin 2 is a fantastic option for a first foray into the genre.
What Remains of Edith Finch
Score: 92/100
What Remains of Edith Finch is a short, impactful game that basically kicked off an entire genre of storytelling-focused games. Stepping into the shoes of Edith, the last member of her family, players will be thrust into a strange series of supernatural stories to piece together the family's history. There's a lot of depth to this game, with a healthy mix of absurd humor and tragedy, and there's probably something in here for everyone.
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