Golden Lance Best Remaster/Remake
As part of the Golden Lance Awards, we want to highlight the best remake/remaster of 2025. Remastering or remaking something beloved and adding a fresh coat of paint, or even rebuilding it from the ground up, can be an undertaking.
But one game shone the brightest, so here is our award!
Xenoblade Chronicles X – Best Remaster/Remake of 2025
Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition emerges as a standout remaster, transforming what was once a stranded Wii U exclusive into one of the biggest science fiction epics on the Switch.
Improvements are substantial and meaningful. These include enhanced character models, the ability to change time of day at will, and party member swapping from anywhere. In addition, universal experience gain for all characters, and a quick recast feature streamlines combat.
Beyond these quality-of-life upgrades, the game adds a brand new epilogue story, four new party members, and a new Skell mech, while bringing improved model quality and higher internal resolution to the already ambitious open world.
The game’s masterful pacing builds through three epic stages—on-foot exploration, ground-based mech combat, and finally aerial flight—creating a gameplay experience that elevates it to arguably the best in the Xenoblade series, with jaw-dropping graphical fidelity and draw distances that feel impossible on aging Switch hardware.
For breathing new life into an underrated triumph, Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition is our choice for the Golden Lance Award for Best Remaster/Remake of 2025.
