2025's first big PS Plus hit is a 14-year-old Need for Speed game

This week's top 40 PS5 and PS4 games chart sees 2025's first PS Plus hit Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered nearly reach the top 10!

2025's first big PS Plus hit is a 14-year-old Need for Speed game
Lee Brady

Lee Brady

Published

On this week's popular PS5 and PS4 games chart, we can see all three of the monthly PS Plus January 2025 games scoring quite highly with subscribers. In particular, PS Plus has scored a big hit with Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered, the now-four-year-old PS4 remake of a 14-year-old PS3 game! With good reason too — it was easily one of the best PS3 games ever released!

Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered is the biggest PS Plus game for January 2025

  • Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered was the most popular game in January 2025's PS Plus Essential lineup
  • The racing game beat out PS Plus game Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League with 4.7% more active player
  • It was also 33.9% more popular than the third PS Plus game for January, The Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe
Using a gameplay data sample from over 3.4 million active PSN accounts (courtesy of our partnership with Game Lens, which draws most of its PSN data from sources beyond TrueTrophies), we track the debut player count of every PS5 and PS4 game to produce our weekly PlayStation Chart (which you can find at the bottom of this article).

That includes the big PS Plus games released in January 2025: Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered, Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League, and The Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe. All three games released on PS Plus Essential on Tuesday, January 7, 2025, and from the bunch it's clear that the PS4 Need for Speed game was the most popular with subscribers.
Despite this remastered version of the 14-year-old PS3 racing game being four years old itself, it still managed to draw in 4.7% more PS5 and PS4 players than the barely one-year-old Suicide Squad. It just goes to show how enduringly popular Criterion's first swing at the Need for Speed franchise really is to demand such attention so many years after its initial 2010 launch.

Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered is effectively the same game as that original PS3 title — just with a fresh lick of paint to bring its graphics up to par with other PS4 racers and also some newly added cross-platform online play. That said, fans still swear by this particular entry in the franchise, often rating it higher than the developer's later entries Need for Speed Most Wanted and Need for Speed Unbound.

Either way, it looks like PS Plus is off to a very strong start in 2025. While Need for Speed did outrank Suicide Squad, the fact that both games are sitting shoulder-to-shoulder in the #12 and #13 spots respectively. The Stanley Parable isn't too far behind either, trailing Need for Speed Hot Pursuit with 33.9% fewer players but still ranking rather high at #18.
Elsewhere on this week's popular PS5 and PS4 games chart:
  • Marvel Rivals' PS5 player count is still looking strong in January 2025, with the game refusing to budge from that #3 spot
  • Wuthering Waves, the latest free online PS5 game gatcha sensation, is holding strong at #29
  • Overwatch 2 slipping to #19 and Fall Guys to #40 suggests we some older online PS5 games finally showing their full shelf life as the competition refuses to let up
For the rest, check out this week's top 40 PS5 and PS4 games in the chart below!

Most popular PS5 and PS4 games (week ending Sunday, January 12, 2025)

PositionGamePublisherLast week
1 iconFortniteEpic Games1
2 iconCall of Duty HQ (including Black Ops 6)Activision2
3 iconMarvel RivalsNetEase Games3
4 iconGrand Theft Auto VRockstar Games4
5 iconRobloxRoblox5
6 iconEA SPORTS FC 25Electronic Arts6
7 iconNBA 2K252K Games7
8 iconRocket LeaguePsyonix8
9 iconMinecraft (2)Mojang Studios9
10 iconTom Clancy's Rainbow Six SiegeUbisoft10
11 iconEA SPORTS College Football 25Electronic Arts11
12 iconNeed for Speed: Hot Pursuit RemasteredElectronic Arts-
13 iconSuicide Squad: Kill the Justice LeagueWarner Bros. GamesRE
14 iconEA SPORTS Madden NFL 25Electronic Arts13
15 iconApex LegendsElectronic Arts15
16 iconHELLDIVERS 2Sony Interactive Entertainment12
17 iconEA SPORTS FC 24Electronic Arts14
18 iconThe Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxeiam8bit-
19 iconOverwatch 2Blizzard Entertainment16
20 iconRed Dead Redemption 2Rockstar Games19
21 iconGran Turismo 7Sony Interactive Entertainment17
22 iconDestiny 2Bungie24
23 iconGenshin ImpactCognosphere18
24 iconElden RingFromSoftware22
25 iconDragon Ball: Sparking! ZEROBandai Namco Entertainment21
26 iconPhasmophobiaKinetic Games26
27 iconCyberpunk 2077CD Projekt25
28 iconDead by Daylight 1/2Behaviour Interactive27
29 iconWuthering WavesKuro Games-
30 iconIt Takes TwoElectronic Arts20
31 iconASTRO BOTSony Interactive Entertainment23
32 iconThe Crew MotorfestUbisoft28
33 iconVALORANTRiot GamesRE
34 iconHogwarts LegacyWarner Bros. Games30
35 iconMarvel's Spider-Man 2Sony Interactive Entertainment29
36 iconWarframeDigital Extremes36
37 iconWWE 2K242K Games38
38 iconGhost of TsushimaSony Interactive Entertainment37
39 iconBrawlhallaBlue Mammoth Games33
40 iconFall GuysEpic Games31
Chart compiled using gameplay data from over 3.4 million active PlayStation accounts (not just TrueTrophies accounts). Chart information is copyright Game Lens (formerly GameInsights). Regarding this data:
  • When an account opens a game, this is registered as a game being played. Accounts can only register a game once per week.
  • Our data is good for suggesting general trends — we represent this using percentages, not numbers.
Written by Lee Brady
News Editor Lee covers the latest upcoming PS5 games like Ghost of Yotei while making sure PlayStation Plus’ classic PS1 and PS2 games are given enough respect. Lee leads the charge on our original data analysis courtesy of Game Lens. His 25 years of PlayStation experience compliments his love of Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, and Sonic the Hedgehog.
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