How these 10 gaming companies are keeping players engaged in inventive ways

The video game industry has had a rough few years, and it’s nothing to play about. In fact, 2024 saw the peak (hopefully) of a massive wave of layoffs: According to the Game Developers Conference annual industry report, one in 10 developers were let go as marquee studios downsized and scores of indie studios were shuttered. Following a pandemic boost in purchases and playtime, spending eventually fell and the industry growth has been essentially flat, while uptake in promising—and expensive—mediums like VR headsets has been limited at best. We think it’s safe to say that gamers, developers and investors alike have been holding out for a hero.

The most innovative gaming companies this year showed up armed with weapons for a resurgence. Flagship titles proved they could still draw out occasional gamers and their wallets: EA Sports’ College Football 25 was the first entry in the franchise in more than a decade, buoyed by a groundbreaking name, image, and likeness (NIL) program that put real money in real college players’ pockets. By December, it became the all-time best-selling sports game in the U.S. Tekken 8 drop-kicked other beat-’em-up entries with its novel tutorial mode, convincing casual fighting game players that they could learn the basics—and win—without hurling their controllers against the wall.

But other games offered a glimpse of the industry’s potential growth areas. With 45 million global users, Pocket Worlds’ Highrise platform—an online universe in which users can dream up their own virtual speakeasies with others around the world – became a new archetype in the realm of user-generated content. Balatro, the highly addictive roguelike card game, proved that mobile was still king; Inworld AI’s generative storytelling tools offered developers a strategy to margins and divert more resources toward creating dazzling experiences. And lastly, Game Science’s hit RPG Black Myth: Wukong—China’s first AAA title—unmasked a new market contender capable of multi-billion dollar exports.

1. EA Sports

For putting college athletes in the game

EA Sports, a division of the video game company Electronic Arts, develops and publishes sports-focused titles. In 2024 it launched two of the year’s best selling console games—EA Sports College Football 25 and EA Sports FC 25—and packed them both with immersive features that blur the line between digital and IRL like never before. For College Football 25, its first entry in the franchise in more than a decade, it also launched the world’s largest single-sport NIL (name, image, and likeness) program, giving more than 11,000 college athletes the ability to make money by licensing their appearance to the game. For FC 25, EA Sports developed a new, AI-based gameplay system that incorporates athletes’ real-world stats and strengths for each position they play on the field. With FC 25, EA Sports also debuted its Cranium technology, letting gamers create and customize new players for their teams—including themselves—down to the width of their smile and texture of their skin. Within a mere four days of its release, College Football 25 sold 2.2 million copies of its deluxe edition, earning more than $200 million and later becoming the top-selling video game of 2024.

Read more about EA Sports, honored as No. 29 on Fast Company’s list of the World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies of 2025.

2. Bandai Namco

For teaching casual gamers how to fight like pros

Bandai Namco Entertainment is a Japanese developer and publisher of video games. In 2024, the company released Tekken 8, the latest installment of the long-running arcade-cum-console fighting franchise, to critical acclaim, with players eager to immerse themselves yet again in the longstanding series’ deep lore. This entry focused on protagonist Jin Kazama’s war with his literal inner demon. However, another unexpected feature emerged: A completely revamped tutorial mode featuring “ghost AI” that takes the art of learning a fighting game back to basics. The new training mode—the first for a fighting game—learns from gamers’ play style, creating an adaptive opponent that can target a player’s weaknesses to help them improve, while also letting them replay exact scenarios from previous matches. (Mortal Kombat 1 copied this feature several months after Tekken 8‘s release.) Tekken 8 sold 2 million copies in one month, pushing global sales of the Tekken series to 57 million. It won Best Fighting Game at The Game Awards 2024. Bandai Namco notched other successes in 2024 with the launch of Shadow of the Erdtree, a downloadable expansion of its smash 2023 hit Elden Ring. The expansion, which sold 5 million copies within three days of release, was lauded for its hauntingly rich graphics and sheer hours of gameplay it brought players.

3. LocalThunk

For single-handedly dealing a royal flush of a game.

Canadian video game developer and artist LocalThunk (who publishes under a pseudonym) is the mysterious mind behind one 2024’s sleeper hit: the poker-inspired video game Balatro. The game, named after the ancient Roman term for a court jester, can be described as video poker played through a funhouse mirror. Players start each “run” with a standard 52-card deck, which they use to make poker hands to beat progressively high score goals (appropriately called “blinds”). The game’s “rogue-like” approach—meaning each run is completely different from the last—is fueled by more than 150 jokers that modify how hands are scored, plus a host of ways to modify the cards in the deck (“glass” cards, for example, offer a score multiplier but can shatter when played in a scoring hand.) Another component of Balatro‘s viral success is the ability to share runs with other players, offering the opportunity to learn new strategies and discover wild cards. Balatro has become so addictive that some countries temporarily removed it from console platforms due to its perceived ability to influence gambling, leading one official from Balatro publisher, Playstack, to post on X, “While we’re at it, can y’all stop calling this game ‘crack cocaine’ before the FDA comes after us too?” Balatro sold more than 2 million units in six months, becoming the publisher’s fastest-selling game and later winning multiple categories at the 2024 Game Awards, including Best Independent Game, Best Debut Indie Game, and Best Mobile Game. Initially launched for PCs and consoles, the game was released on mobile in September, raking in nearly $1 million in just a week in the Apple App and Google Play stores. Total mobile game sales had reached $4.4 million by the end of October.

4. Sony Interactive

For assembling AstroBot, gamers’ new favorite mascot

In September 2024, PlayStation maker Sony Interactive Entertainment released the PS5-exclusive AstroBot, a 3D “platforming” role-playing game that features the PlayStation’s usually sidelined automaton mascot. Developed by Team Asobi, the company’s Tokyo-based in-house developer, AstroBot wowed hardcore gamers with innovative mechanics while sporting a design simplicity that lures even the most casual players. For almost every level of game—in which a crash-landed Astro must fly across the galaxy in his spaceship “controller” (which looks suspiciously like a PS5 controller)—the player must master a new unique ability, from shrinking to the size of a mouse to slip in and out of cages to stopping time as a means of evading enemies. AstroBot’s standout feature is its use of the PS5’s DualSense motion controller, which not only enables players to feel every punch and explosion on the screen, but also surprises them with creative features: One level, for example, requires players to blow air onto the controller’s touchpad to successfully inflate a bubble. AstroBot is a shrewd and sneaky ad for itself: From the controller delights to its in-game cameos (one of AstroBot’s abilities is to wield the axe of Kratos from the God of War franchise) the company brandishes its prowess as a gaming powerhouse from start to finish. AstroBot won “game of the year” at the Game Awards 2024, and sold more than 1.5 million copies in just two months, a feat for a PlayStation-exclusive title. Mario who?

5. Game Science

For putting China’s gaming scene on the map

Game Science is a Chinese video game developer best known for the role-playing game Black Myth: Wukong. During the pandemic, Beijing officials initiated a crackdown on what they called “obsessive” gaming, wiping billions of value from tech giants like Tencent and NetEase and sending the Chinese stock market into a tailspin. Some argue that Black Myth: Wukong, developed by ex-Tencent employees, has single-handedly put China on the global stage as a video game publisher since then, keeping government officials at bay and clearing the way for future high-budget, high-profile video games. In the game, based on the widely read Chinese novel Journey to the West, players assume the role of The Destined One, the game’s anthropomorphic monkey protagonist, and must defeat mythological bosses to obtain six relics (or senses) on the way to allegorical enlightenment. Many Asian gamers delighted in seeing Chinese cultural touchpoints represented in the game—the country reportedly saw a spike in tourism among those wanting to scope out in-game inspirations, such as the Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou—and Black Myth coasted to the Player’s Voice win at The Game Awards in December, along with Best Action game. Black Myth: Wukong sold 20 million units in its first month; it is the most-played single-player game ever on Valve, and the top-selling game on Steam.

6. Our Odyssey

For unlocking accessible gameplay for all

Our Odyssey is a not-for-profit organization that connects young adults impacted by rare or chronic conditions via social events. In 2024, Our Odyssey released Overjoyed, a software application that allows users to convert their mouse, trackpad, eye-tracking hardware, or voice software into keyboard inputs, providing a more accessible gaming experience for gamers who may have difficulty manipulating a standard controller. Overjoyed, which was co-created by Anthony DeVergillo, a game developer who has Duchenne muscular dystrophy, costs $7 for users to download and offers presets for gaming on Xbox and PlayStation consoles. Our Odyssey later partnered with controller company 8BitDo to adapt Overjoyed to be used with the Nintendo Switch. The Overjoyed controller has seen downloads from more than 100 people, who are providing crucial feedback for further development of the software.

7. Inworld AI

For breathing AI-powered life into NPCs

Startup Inworld AI has created an AI engine for game development, enabling engineers to push elements of their games, such as non-playable characters (NPCs), beyond pre-loaded scripts. NPCs typically interact with players in rigid, pre-defined ways, which makes for repetitive gameplay. With Inworld AI, developers can easily program scenarios—say, enemies patrolling a certain area for threats—with a variety of fluid and unpredictable interactions, rather than a response that players can easily anticipate, adding a dynamic element to games. In 2024, Inworld expanded beyond its initial focus on NPCs to offer a comprehensive suite of AI solutions for gaming. These tools include in-game purchase recommendations, which use AI to analyze player behavior to deliver timely, personalized suggestions for possible add-ons to buy. The tools also encompass dynamic in-game companions that can offer players assistance, background information, and even comic relief to enhance the gameplay experience. This tool was on display in Wol, a game for Meta Quest Pro that Inworld AI co-developed with Niantic in 2023. The game’s talking owl guide helped the game win the 2024 Webby Award for “Best Use of Augmented Reality, AI, Metaverse, or Virtual.” At 2024’s Game Developer’s Conference (GDC), Inworld also unveiled Narrative Graph, a tool codeveloped with Xbox than generates a graph of branching narratives from developers’ uploaded scripts or outlines, speeding up the writing and planning process and allowing more time to refine gameplay. Death by AI, a survival party game for PC and iOS launched in May 2024 and developed by Playroom using Inworld’s engine, reached 10 million players in its first month, and 20 million within three months.

8. Pocket Worlds

For letting mobile gamers create and live in their own universe

Pocket Worlds is the developer of Highrise, a mobile-first gaming platform focused on user-generated content. Users can create unique rooms, play games, and host events with others around the globe. In March 2024, Pocket Worlds proved itself a major competitor in the burgeoning user-generated content movement by launching Highrise Studio, a suite of creator tools that allows users to easily build, deploy, and earn from the digital experiences they dream up, from speakeasy lounges to book clubs and karaoke rooms. Pocket Worlds also launched a new Payments API that allows creators to host events where users can buy in and cash out, as well as an earnings program that enables creators to make money based on the time users spend in their worlds (instead of relying on individual micro-transactions). Through Highrise Studio, Pocket World has built a path to wealth for some users—one user has earned $300,000 from his poker-based speakeasy—and life partnership for others. Highrise boasts 45 million users globally, and in 2024 Pocket Worlds surpassed $250 million in revenue.

9. Razer

For giving serious gamers a mouse with competitive edge

As a company that primarily makes computer hardware for gaming, Razer knows that for competitive players, speed and accuracy is everything—a button pressed a millisecond too late can turn a win into a loss. In 2024, Razer offered serious gamers a competitive edge with the Viper V3 Pro, a super-accurate ultra-light gaming mouse targeted toward the esports world that comes packed with 95 hours of uninterrupted gameplay. The Viper V3 Pro boasts a maximum polling rate—the number of times the mouse sends its position to the screen per second—of 8000Hz, far beyond that of any wireless mouse on the market. Taking its fidelity to speed and accuracy even further, Razer also launched Snap Tap, a groundbreaking technology for its gaming keyboards that lets players change directions instantly without lifting their finger from the previous key. The Snap Tap feature is so effective that it has proved almost too effective, as some esports leagues have claimed it “removes human error” and have even banned players from using it when competing in fast-paced shooter games such as Counter Strike. IGN rated the Viper V3 Pro with a 9 out of 10, saying, “When it comes to pure performance in competitive gaming, it’s hard to imagine how a mouse can get much better.”

10. PlayVS

For taking esports to middle schools

PlayVS provides an esports platform for students to form their own leagues and compete in games such as Rocket League, Super Smash Bros, and League of Legends. In early 2024, PlayVS expanded its offerings to middle schools across the U.S. and Canada, boosting its registered educational institutions from 2,500 to 3,000—and resulting in a 28.62% year-over-year increase in its individual users. In September, PlayVS also launched Stadium, a free, digital-first esports competition platform designed to reach a broader audience of young enthusiasts who may not have access to an esports league. In addition to expanding its user base, the company also expanded its partnerships in 2024. It renewed its deal with Nintendo to provide hardware and software (free of charge) to under-resourced schools, and partnered with NBC Sports and the Premier League to launch the ePremier League College Invitational, an EA Sports FC 24 tournament that took place across six different universities in the U.S.

Explore the full 2025 list of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies, 609 organizations that are reshaping industries and culture. We’ve selected the companies making the biggest impact across 58 categories, including advertising,