It’s that time of year! Have you finished your holiday shopping? If you’ve been procrastinating, fear not: Comics Beat has the 2025 Video Gamer Gift Guide! What are you most excited about giving (or receiving) this holiday season?
ARPAD OKAY: Sino Movements by Shudan. Yeah it’s a digital-only album, available on Bandcamp. You can buy it as a gift that they can download in whatever format works best for them, as well as stream on the site or app. Sinogrime was a mixtape, then a microgenre, the martial arts movie and video game music middle ground garage and grime share is Chinese. Here, Shudan- a London kid with parents from China- explores his cultural heritage. Yue Opera superstar Li Yunxiao sings on one track! Incredible beats and vibes for a broad variety of listeners.
EVELYNN (E.B.) HUTCHINS: Steam Gift Card. PC Gaming is in, and more affordable than buying a console. The Winter Sale starts the day after Christmas so it’s perfect.
ARPAD OKAY: Goblin Mode Beanie from Weird Works. Discovered them at PAX East. Real video game lifestyle wear (see also their “do not perceive me” enamel pin). Available from their webstore. But, also, and. This is the time of year for local winter markets, cons ending in -CAF with artsy leanings and risocore bespoke stuff in every booth. Every year, really, but in 2025 making it personal, buying from people, matters.
AVERY KAPLAN: For the Nintendork in your life who already has a Nintendo Switch 2 — that lucky duck — consider a Nintendo gift card in the $10 – $20 range. This will allow them to upgrade Switch 1 games they already have, like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and (in January) Animal Crossing: New Horizons, to their new Switch 2 versions. These updated versions include improved graphics, additional features and (in some cases) increased Nintendo Switch app connectivity. Now they’ll be playing with power!
JUSTIN GUERRERO: AYN Thor, Analogue Pocket, Miyoo Flip V2 or a DS Lite with a Flash card. Been going down a rabbit hole of retro handhelds because of the switch 2. The AYN Thor is a recently released yet highly anticipated Android based clamshell handheld that can natively run Nintendo DS, Gameboy Advance, Gameboy Color, and Gameboy games and even more. The Analogue Pocket is a modern handheld which can read Gameboy Color and Gameboy cartridges with adapters to read Atari Lynx and the Sega GameGear cartridges. It can also run ROM files if you don’t have cartridges on hand. There is also the added feature of docking it like the nintendo switch to connect to your HDTV. Next up we got the recently released Miyoo Flip V2. This is the second iteration of the Miyoo Flip model which bears design inspiration from Nintendo’s gameboy Advance SP series. But this time it comes with two analog sticks and an additional two trigger buttons. It can play Game Boy, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, Neo Geo Pocket, select PSP games. In addition it can also run NES, Master System, Super Nintendo, Mega Drive, PlayStation 1, Dreamcast, and Nintendo 64 game files on a 1GB Ram all powered by the RK3566, a quad-core Cortex-A55 processor clocked at 1.8GHz. Lastly if you want to play retro handhelds but lack the money or are on a tight budget, you can check out on ebay or mercari for Nintendo DS Lite models between $20-60 and grab an EZ Flash Parallel or an R4 card (make sure it has no timebomb or look up ways to remove it) and you can play all your favorite Nintendo DS, Gameboy Advance, Color, Gameboy, SNES, NES, Genesis and other games that can be emulated on the flashcard.
ARPAD OKAY: Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector by Jump Over the Age and Fellow Traveller. This is the nerd video game caviar. Gameplay’s a combination of lit RPG and dice-based tactics RPG. For those who love maps and schematics, anyone who dislikes the pressure of timed decisions. The story appeals to an empathetic approach to coexistence, acknowledging failure happens. Detail art by Guillaume Singelin adds to the characters what the level design fleshes out for the gameplay. Killer indie game. Available on the platform of your choice.
JAVIER PEREZ: A lot of people don’t know this, but I’m a sim racing enthusiast. I got a rig with a wheel, pedals, and even a balaclava to hide my face and shame from the outside world. However, you can forgo all of that nonsense with Wreckfest 2. This demolition derby game has all the physics and cosmetics you’d hope to find in a modern game, but under the hood is an excellent driving model with intuitive mechanics. You can play it on a wheel or a gamepad, and you are guaranteed to PIT maneuver your friends to their doom. Or jump online and take out some daily frustrations, have you ever seen a school bus launch a lawn mower into the air? I have, and I feel all the better for it.
ADAM WESCOTT: Real ones know that Final Fantasy Tactics is one of the best strategy RPGs ever made. But if you didn’t grow up training your army into monstrous monk/ninja combos, now you can live your dreams with Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles. This new edition of the game speeds up play, adds extra lines of dialogue for the characters, and includes excellent voice acting featuring the likes of Ben Starr. Best of all, it works perfectly well on both PC and Switch; no new console required! So long as (in director Yasumi Matsuno’s words) “inequality and division are still rooted in our society,” this game will remain relevant. Plus you can teach your characters math magic to murder every unit on the field at once.
ARPAD OKAY: Raccoon City Punks by Dave Scheidt and Sean Mac. A Riso-printed, self-published RE2 fan comic you’ve got to order straight from the boys. Goofy and goopy like a Mad Magazine gross-out gag, Nickelodeon-coded artwork in an old school vein. Skate kids dodging zombies, devil dogs, Mr. X, or worse yet, Leon. Puking up ice cream and searching for animal chin. A deep left field pull for the dedicated Capcom head in your life.
BILLY HENEHAN: Gamers need snacks. And my new favorite snack company is Bubblegum Kids. They had a massive book at NYCC ‘25, where I first discovered them. Bubblegum Kids has acquired many pop culture licenses for its candy: Archie Comics, Wicked, TMNT and Spongebob Squarepants just to name a few. More important than their licenses though is their flavor! Their chocolate bars are delicious, as are their freeze dried candies and sugar free gum. The Blue Raspberry Icee gum tastes like a Blue Raspberry Icee! They come packaged in such colorful and vibrant bags and wrappers, making them the perfect stocking stuffer for the snack deprived gamer in your life.
ADAM WESCOTT: While novels about video games have become more popular over the years, it’s rare to find one that approaches the medium from an informed perspective. A/S/L is the exception. Written by novelist and former games scriptwriter Jeanne Thornton, it tells the tale of three trans women haunted by the unfinished game they made together as teenagers. If you ever messed around with the hobbyist game engine ZZT, loved or despised your peers online, or became convinced that your favorite role-playing game contained the occult secrets of the universe, this is the book for you.
AVERY KAPLAN: Alarmo has been out for about a year now. The Nintendo alarm clock boasts about as many features as anyone could ever reasonably want from an alarm clock. This includes motion-sensors that allow you to hit snooze from across the bed, nine sets of seven Nintendo game-themed alarms (including Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Pikmin 4 and Super Mario Odyssey) and a light-sensitive screen that displays the time alongside a character from your chosen theme. If you want, you can set hourly chimes, also set to themed sound effects. While no one expected Nintendo to announce an alarm clock, I’ve enjoyed Alarmo’s presence in the Kaplan’s Quarters the past twelve months. While it’s a bit pricey at about $100, it’s an ideal gift for the Nintendork who wishes they had more time for gaming these days.
Have you checked out the other entries in the Comics Beat’s 2025 Gift Guide? Stay tuned for more gifting suggestions from The Beat.
