World Video Game Hall of Fame Unveils 2025 Finalist Lineup

The lineup of twelve candidates was announced for the 2025 finals of the World Video Game Hall of Fame, including Angry Birds, Quake, and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. 

Established and overseen by The Strong’s International Center for the History of Electronic Games, the World Video Game Hall of Fame is located at The Strong National Museum of Play, Rochester, New York.

Since its inception in 2015, the World Video Game Hall of Fame has celebrated titles that meet four key criteria: Icon Status, Influence, Longevity, and Geographical Reach. The final selections for the current year will be announced on May 8, 2025.

While the official selection committee will make the final decision, gamers can play a role in the process as well. Through daily votes till March 13, 2025, the public can contribute to the Player’s Choice option, with the top three picks collectively counting as one vote in the final selection.

The full list of finalists for 2025 includes:

• 1977th Mattel Electronics Football, created by Mattel Electronics, is one of the first handheld electronic games that featured a simple LED-based display where players controlled a small blip representing a football player, dodging defenders to score touchdowns,
• 1981st Defender, a horizontally scrolling shooter video game developed by Williams Electronics for arcades with the main goal for the player defeating waves of invading aliens while protecting astronauts,
• 1981st Frogger, an arcade action game developed by Konami and published by Sega with the main goal to direct five frogs to their homes by dodging traffic on a busy road, then crossing a river by jumping on floating logs and alligators,
• 1989th Golden Tee Golf, created by Incredible Technologies golf arcade game with a signature feature of using a trackball to determine the power, direction and curve of the player’s golf shot,
• 1996th Harvest Moon, known in Japan as Farm Story, is a farm simulation role-playing video game developed by Amccus,
• 1996th Quake, a first-person shooter game developed by id Software and published by GT Interactive,
• 1966 Tamagotchi, created by Akihiro Yokoi of WiZ and Aki Maita of Banda, is a small egg-shaped handheld video game with an interface consisting of three buttons that allows players to take care of digital pets,
• 1997th Age of Empires, a real-time strategy video game based on history, developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft.
• 1997th GoldenEye 007, a first-person shooter video game developed by Rare and published by Nintendo with the player controlling the secret agent James Bond to prevent a criminal syndicate from using a satellite weapon,
• 2007th Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, a 2007 first-person shooter video game developed by Infinity Ward and published by Activision set in modern times, unlike previous entries of the series,
• 1999th NBA 2K sports video basketball game developed by Visual Concepts and published by Sega,
• 2009th Angry Birds, retrospectively known as Angry Birds Classic, is a physics-based casual puzzle video game developed by Rovio Entertainment.

It is worth noting that the inclusion of Angry Birds and GoldenEye 007 marks their third time appearing as finalists. The mobile slingshot game was nominated in the Hall of Fame’s inaugural year in 2015 and again in 2023, while GoldenEye 007 has been a contender in 2020 and 2023.