Later this week, we’re going to be offering up our traditional predictions for the MMO genre in 2025, but before we do that, we have to look at our predictions from a year ago to see where we hit the target… and where missed the mark so badly our shot went off past the next field over a couple of barns and into a haystack we didn’t even know was there.
Let’s have a look at how we did last year, shall we? Did anything we predicted at the end of 2023 actually happen in 2024? (My commentary will be in the italicized notes at the end of each entry!)
Blizzard, World of Warcraft, Overwatch, Diablo IV, HOTS
Andrew: I predict Blizzard will continue to lose player trust and its position in esports. I think the Season of Discovery will bring people in, and we may see a bit of an uptake in WoW’s popularity because of that and the new expansion, but at least in my circles and among readers, I’m not seeing anything that’ll make it the king it once was. I think it’s definitely having a comeback moment, but not necessarily with core MMO fans who have long since left it behind.
Andrew: If it’s not already happening, I predict some work will be done in the background on a new Overwatch game, either as a sequel or spin-off. We may not hear about it in 2024, but the IP is so strong, I can’t imagine Blizzard looking at the damage it did to the series this year and simply giving up. Nothing yet, but it still seems reasonable.
Andy: WoW does better than most people expect when let out from under the thumb of Activision, as Microsoft focuses on getting the WoW team happy again. The War Within launches in the summer with all of the pains that come with shorter development times, the community piles on about Blizzard because Blizzard, but it has everything sorted within a few weeks after launch, and it continues the trend towards midcore and non-raider/Mythic playstyles. Accurate except for the part where Microsoft cares about making the WoW team happy; instead, it just went hard on layoffs and killed BlizzCon.
Bree: Console launch for WoW, though I also don’t see how Blizzard could fit it in next year. Still nope. Crazy they’ve not done it, though, right?
Bree: WoW’s The War Within will be pretty good but not spectacular. Maybe even good enough to pull the game out of its long slump, but I think it’ll feel small, with a lot of people in there at launch to looksee but no chops beyond that. I’d like to be wrong. WoW Classic Cataclysm won’t be setting any records, though. Definitely felt like just a big spike and a fall-off to me, but without numbers from Blizzard, who knows? And does anyone remember Cataclysm Classic launched?
Bree: Blizzard will announce it’s launching Overwatch Classic. Score! Blizz is even calling it that.
Carlo: Heroes of the Storm will make a comeback with a new hero from one of the Microsoft properties. Nope, but it did get four updates this year.
Chris: After Microsoft and Blizzard get their corporate ducks lined up, Blizzard will once more try to make inroads into the Chinese market. Definitely – Blizzard and NetEase patched things up as soon as they could after you-know-who left.
Colin: Now both under the Microsoft banner, World of Warcraft and The Elder Scrolls Online release a series of cross promotions. Weirdly, we haven’t gotten this yet.
Eliot: World of Warcraft launches The War Within in late 2024 (my bet is September at the earliest) and it is… actually good! Like, it’s just well-received. People are happy with it and it does well. The team still manages a few self-owns along the way including still trying super hard to sell the “third era” talk about the game, but people are more willing to overlook it because the expansion isn’t reheated nonsense. By the end of the year, there’s even rumbles about a long-requested feature coming to the game that irritates some of the diehards, but there’s a growing sense that maybe WoW is, in fact, good again. Bang on, and we could even count the housing announcement this way, as there are definitely some raiders who think housing is a waste of time. I haven’t heard much third era talk in a while, though!
Eliot: WoW Classic’s Season of Discovery turns out to be… well… what it is. All of the prognostication about it turning into a launchpad for something new turns out to be just self-created furor that doesn’t go anywhere, and the luster fades. Another seasonal experiment is announced in 2024. Meanwhile, Cataclysm launches and… well… you can imagine how that goes. Insert your own Hindenburg meme. All accurate. SOD seems like little more than a fad, and Pandaria Remix was definitely a fresh experiment this year.
Justin: I think 2023 will continue to be an uphill year for World of Warcraft as it continues to tinker around with Classic and kicks off the Worldsoul Saga (which will be “fine” but not as game-changing as Blizzard hoped). Justin was being the harsh one on Blizz last year!
MJ: Someone gives me a cool Leap Day event in game! Would you believe the game that did it was… WoW Classic Hardcore?
Sam: Blizzard is going to have one more big mess on its hands, but then the console launch will reinvigorate it for a bit longer. Microsoft will consider it a win. Still no console!
Tyler: WoW’s The War Within will launch to generally favourable reviews. It will still be an uphill battle to win back player goodwill after all that’s happened in the last few years, but there’s a sense the game’s course is beginning to correct among those still playing. Seems fair.
Tyler: Diablo IV will continue to struggle as it has, but I don’t see any major catastrophes on that front. I think it’s possible it could transition to free-to-play, but I wouldn’t bet on it. This seems fair too. It doesn’t seem to be blowing up the charts, but it also hasn’t collapsed in a heap. The free-play events are another clue about retention.
Tyler: I think there’s at least a 60% chance that Overwatch 2 never delivers any more story content. I’d be more optimistic if story missions hadn’t been completely ignored at BlizzCon, even in their 2023 retrospective. Regardless of how much PvE is or isn’t added, people will continue acting like they never did anything on that front. Videos are story content, right? Right guys? Guys?
Tyler: Heroes of the Storm will get that speculated Steam release, though perhaps not until late in the year. It will not get the full revival fans are hoping for, but I’m cautiously optimistic we may see more support in the form of small balance patches and the like. Not yet, but maybe next year?
Tyler: Late in the year — at BlizzCon if there is one — Blizzard unveils a new game. Possibly the survival game they’ve been working on, maybe something unexpected. I wouldn’t be shocked to see another smaller mobile title. Does canceling a survival game count? We do know of a few more titles in the works, but nothing concrete or major for MMORPG fans.
Final Fantasy XIV and XI
Andrew: I think FFXIV will continue to do right by people. I’m seeing more and more people still getting on the bandwagon after all these years. Yep.
Andy: FFXIV launches its newest expansion to critical acclaim, but with some lightly rumbling about the sameness and formulaic expansions have become. We’ll hear some calls for innovation from SE. I’ve definitely heard that rumbling, but it’s relatively minimal, especially compared to the toxic bad-faithers who tried to target the game this year.
Bree: Final Fantasy XIV’s Dawntrail will carry the year rather easily, eliciting shock and tears even from mainstream outlets that usually pretend MMORPGs don’t exist and/or are dead until ad revenue is on the line. Oh, snarky Bree. Was I right, though? I think I expected Dawntrail to make a much bigger splash. It had a lot of competition this year – maybe too much for it to be a clear winner?
Carlo: FFXIV’s expansion will come out. It’ll do well, but I don’t think it’ll be as impactful as Shadowbringers or Endwalker. It’ll be fine though because more FFXIV! This seems fair.
Colin: FFXIV Dawntrail is great and wins all of the awards. We shall see!
Eliot: Final Fantasy XIV launches Dawntrail in June or July, and general consensus is once again annoyingly good, with a sense from some places that you want this to not be as good because they just did a big story cap-off expansion and this has to be a lesser prospect, but… it isn’t. The new jobs are considered delightful, the graphical upgrades are well-received, the gameplay remains solid, and at least one quality-of-life change is widely praised. The playerbase also seems generally happier with the state of the game moving into the end of the year. Seems pretty accurate to me, especially in regard to the storyline being more low-key and less world-ending.
Eliot: Final Fantasy XI finally confesses it knows what maintenance mode is by actually going that route. Rest in peace. Neverrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
Justin: FFXIV’s summer expansion is going to suck all of the oxygen from the room and draw a lot of lapsed and dissatisfied players into a tropical isle adventure. It surely carried midsummer!
ArenaNet, Guild Wars 2, Guild Wars 3
Andy: Guild Wars 2 continues its trend of more frequent but smaller releases. The game will continue to demonstrate its staying power, while remaining more or less understated in the greater MMOsphere. Fair.
Bree: I think Guild Wars 2 will have a pretty quiet year in the months between the class weapon launch and the next expansion, potentially convincing ArenaNet to retool its planned cadence. This was probably wishful thinking at the time; ANet doesn’t seem to have altered course.
Carlo: Guild Wars 2 will have completed the story beats for this latest expansion. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s going to be some kind of frustration with class balance again sometime in 2024. And water is still wet.
Colin: Guild Wars 2 finishes out Secrets of the Obscure as planned. The rest of the updates will be just as disappointing as the last one if you aren’t interested in playing around with additional weapons or chasing legendary armor. Many of the issues from the weapon beta won’t be fully fixed, and balance will be a mess for a few months, but it smooths out by the time the next expansion comes out. GW2’s next expansion follows a pattern similar to SOTO. This is harsh but fair – the back half of SOTO wasn’t all that compelling, and Janthir is sticking to the same cadence.
Eliot: Guild Wars 2 announces its follow-up to SOTO and fans absolutely lose their minds with excitement; it looks really cool. While it’s still on the same level of scope, the changes are just better-received all around and people are hype for where the game is going. I don’t think anyone saw housing coming, but it definitely caused some losing-of-minds when it was announced!
Justin: Guild Wars 2 is going to deliver another lame expansion and make players antsy that ArenaNet isn’t working on a proper Guild Wars 3 already. How is this the only mention of Guild Wars 3? Nobody saw that one coming. Anyhow, yeah, everyone wants GW3, but not because Janthir or housing was lame!
MJ: ArenaNet regrets moving Guild Wars 2 to the small releases style and considers going back to bigger expansions, even if only slightly bigger. Doesn’t seem that way!
ZOS, Bethsoft, Elder Scrolls Online
Andrew: Elder Scrolls Online will do well for those who already love it, but I’m not expecting anything huge this year. Just the usual cadence – maybe even smaller, since we didn’t get a Q4 DLC. Of course, next year is another story.
Andy: ESO continues to do ESO-y things – being successful without being splashy about it. Yep.
Carlo: Elder Scrolls Online will bring back the “Arrow to the Knee” joke from 12 years ago. Please tell me that wasn’t actually 12 years ago.
Eliot: The Elder Scrolls Online just keeps on scrolling. There are content updates. It still does not seem to be doing much to address its enthusiasm problem, but it’s still a rock-solid game. Sensing a trend here, though we’re nervous about the 2025 outlook.
Justin: ESO is going to announce that it’s done doing yearly chapters. Justin nailed it. This literally happened this morning.
Tyler: Elder Scrolls Online will release another chapter that appears functionally indistinguishable from prior chapters to those of us not heavily invested in the game. There is a 98% chance it involves Daedra. Maybe hyperbole – Gold Coast was quite distinct and a nice throwback to Oblivion – but yeah, none of our writers here really expects ESO to rock any boats.
Daybreak, Palia, LOTRO, EverQuest franchise
Andrew: Palia will continue to have a rocky beta at the least, and there’s going to be a lot of talk about bringing in more multiplayer features, if not massively multiplayer. Rocky seems fair, but stabilizing now. Does being bought out by a core MMORPG studio count?
Andy: Palia continues to build out on the solid but still somewhat shallow foundation while continually futzing with its monetization as it struggles to find the sweet spot of what people will buy and for how much while not pissing off the folks who view any monetization as evil. Has definitely had some monetization bungles this year, along with its beta foibles.
Andy: LOTRO continues to chug along merrily with its moderate but very consistent success. We are sitting on the field of victory enjoying a few well-earned comforts.
Andy: EverQuest 3/Next/N+1 shares some more information but suffers from lack of vision and direction, and likely builds with gamer sensibilities from two decades ago because “EQ and EQII are still profitable so people must like it.” We didn’t get deets about EverQuest 3, apart from that they are still fussing with it in the earliest possible stages.
Bree: Daybreak will finally reveal EverQuest X, a massive metaverse sandbox MMO, as part of its 25th anniversary festivities, but it’s at least seven years away. It’ll re-release Landmark to bolster some goodwill in the meantime. (OK, now that’s wishful thinking.) Nope and nope. But I’m going to keep my EQX prediction for next year. It’s just the right level of ridiculous for our times.
Carlo: LOTRO will have another strong year from regular content releases and patches. Sure, just not as strong as 2023.
Chris: Darkpaw will introduce EverQuest 3, capping off its “Year of Itself” thing that it has going on for the original two games. It will be nothing like EverQuest Next, however, and will likely take years to come to anything close to fruition… or an early access launch. Nopes.
Eliot: Daybreak Games manages to self-own more and fail to really win back the crowd and suffers one major, notable loss – maybe a title shuttering, maybe a major staff member leaving, or maybe someone else buying SSG. Maybe we could count the DC Universe Online layoffs and bungle of its current-gen console launches? Other than that, Daybreak managed not to screw up much this year and actually ended the year on a high note. Huh.
Justin: LOTRO is going to continue to expand on the Umbar region for its next series of updates, bring out 4K support, and start up a new legendary world with some crazy ruleset. Yepperdoo! Although the latest batch of legendary servers seems pretty tame, which is probably why they are so popular.
MJ: As it is EverQuest’s 25th anniversary and EverQuest II’s 20th, Daybreak Games has a few big things planned (maybe another local fan meet up again?). The expansions will be a big bigger and flashier this year and perhaps the focus on only veterans at endgame will ease up and new or returning players will get some attention. MJ pretty much called Fippyfest! Nice work, MJ.
MJ: EverQuest the Tease will offer some artist conceptions, but whether it will be as a “this is what we would have done if we didn’t scrap it” or “this is what we plan to do, though nothing’s been done yet,” we will have to see. However, this Year of EverQuest the Second would be the best time to really punch it out and offer something substantial to players. Still nope.
Sam: EverQuest Next*2 will have an early access next October. I won’t be invited, though, which is mildly disappointing since I predicted it. Can you tell how much we want EQ3? Come on, Daybreak.
Amazon, New World, Lost Ark, Blue Protocol, LOTR MMO
Andy: Amazon’s LOTR MMO says something else tone deaf, while development status gets vague, indicating a lack of enthusiasm internally at AGS for a LOTR-game-in-name-only. We’re really still waiting on any info here. They don’t seem to know what they’re doing. Andy nailed this.
Bree: Console launch for New World and Lost Ark, though I really don’t think Amazon’s up to task. Called the New World console, at least! Didn’t call the rest of the trainwreck, though. Lost Ark needs to be next.
Bree: I think Throne & Liberty and Blue Protocol are in for a rough road in the west. Throne & Liberty definitely saw more delays, but it apparently sold well enough here. Blue Protocol, on the other hand, saw such a rough road that it gave up entirely.
Carlo: Lost Ark will find a way to get more players to return to the game. Possibly make high-end raiding more accessible without making the journey there feel like a full time job. Amazon has definitely tried some tricks, but as I type this mid-November, the game is showing the fewest average and peak concurrent players it’s ever had.
Chris: Throne & Liberty will be delayed. It was!
Colin: Blue Protocol launches in the West to much fanfare, but it fizzles within a few months and quickly fades into obscurity. This would’ve been preferable to what we did get, which was a big fat nothing.
Eliot: Blue Protocol launches initially into a weird place; the first couple of weeks are fairly quiet, as it seems like not as many people were hype about this as expected. But then positive word-of-mouth starts spreading, and while the game is still beset by critiques that it has predatory monetization it definitely seems to have legs. It doesn’t follow Amazon’s prior trajectory of big launch numbers followed by a steady die-off, but instead respectable numbers that climb. It’s like the old days all over. RIP, BP.
Eliot: New World manages to capitalize on the second wind of its expansion launch and settles into a comfortable groove. A somewhat precarious groove, to be sure, as the game always feels like it’s on the knife’s edge… but a groove all the same. Unfortunately, New World kinda bombed out this year instead. Ug.
Justin: New World will continue to improve in its offerings and reputation. It did the opposite of this! Opposite day!
Justin: Blue Protocol is going to give us hope for a vivacious future. Quietly sobbing at my desk now.
Sam: New World is going to add a character level booster and I’ll finally have a chance to try it the game’s actual PvP mode. New World doesn’t want you. It doesn’t want any of us. Pfffffflllllllbbbbbt.
Tyler: Blue Protocol will get its Western launch. Reactions will be a bit lukewarm but lean favourable. It plugs along OK, but doesn’t make the big splash Lost Ark did. Sigh.
Pearl Abyss, Black Desert, EVE Online, Crimson Desert
Carlo: Black Desert Online will release more PvE-friendly features that make it easier for players to grind without having to get interrupted by other players. The ultimate outfit releases and everyone buys it, making BDO a legendary game, even more legendary than FFXIV and WoW. Black Desert had a disturbingly quiet year, honestly, though it’s definitely making inroads with the more casual PvE playerbase.
Eliot: EVE Vanguard collapses and goes nowhere. CCP Games is still plugging away at this one.
Sam: Crimson Desert will be promoted back to an MMO. This would be nice, but as it stands, we’re not even sure it will launch with any multiplayer at all.
Tencent, Tarisland, Dune Awakening, Nightingale, Conan Exiles, Path of Exile 2
Bree: I expect Tarisland to come out strong. It won’t bleed WoW much, but it’ll bleed other MMOs. If it came on strong in the west, we’ll never know. It certainly didn’t stay that way or appear to put any dent in any games at all, and its late launch on Steam totally bombed, so I’m calling this one a fail.
Bree: Nightingale will be the sleeper hit of 2024. I’ll spend way too much time in there. I really thought this was gonna be a better game than it turned out to be. I’m still bummed.
Bree: Funcom will remember it’s still working on a DUNE MMO for Tencent and actually bring it to beta. It’s in testing, but almost no one is it it, and we’ve gotten zero news in recent weeks heading into the new year, so I don’t think this one should count. We’re still waiting for serious beta.
Chris: Nightingale will be delayed. It was, several times, and frankly, it could’ve used several more delays.
Chris: I predict that Tarisland will become a sleeper hit – not the WoW killer Tencent envisions it to be, but a far more solid MMORPG in spite of that; in fact, I’d even go so far as to guess it’ll near a top ten status. No freakin’ way, sadly.
Justin: Tarisland and Nightingale are going to give us hope for a vivacious future. Still sobbing quietly at my desk.
MJ: Conan Exiles will continue to expand on the living world features it is starting with Age of War Act III making PvE better and making the game feel more like a mini MMO. This is fair! Funcom made a botch of it, but it definitely boosted living world features in it latest update.
MJ: Warframe 1999 introduces a new way for players to join in the game, like Duviri did. This allows folks to start at this content easily and not have to go through the whole storyline of the game. Yep!
MJ: Path of Exile 2 interest will be huge when the closed beta starts in June, taxing the infrastructure, but Grinding Gear Games is prepared for it and things go relatively smoothly. Didn’t quite make June; ironically, the infrastructure problems are what brought on the multiple delays.
Tyler: Tarisland will launch and get a decent amount of hype for a month or two before it’s all but completely forgotten, at least in the West. This absolutely looks true.
Broadsword, SWTOR, Ultima Online
Bree: Broadsword will finally get a version of Ultima Online New Legacy to the public, but the formal launch will be delayed into 2025. I misjudged here! It actually did launch in October 2024, but only after multiple delays – years of delays, really. And it didn’t make much of a splash that I’ve seen.
Colin: Star Wars The Old Republic has a minor comeback under Broadsword. It won’t be anything like the old days, but it will get more love than it did under BioWare the last few years. I will tentatively say I think he’s right!
Justin: SWTOR is going to get a second renaissance of a sort under Broadsword. Again, I think we’re at the start of it, and I’m pleased to see it.
MJ: SWTOR gets some love and attention under Broadsword and interest in it is rekindled and some players come back. Three in a row!
Riot Games and the Riot MMO
Andrew: Riot is probably due for something major this year, especially with it having been a few years since Arcane came out. It’s not that League of Legends isn’t popular, but it isn’t gaining the company much. Having lost Greg Street, the company could put a name on the MMO to try to drive up hype, or maybe Street leaving was a sign that this MMO won’t make it across the finish line. That isn’t to say that I think it may be outright canceled, but I’m wondering if it’ll be smaller scale. Still in development, at least. Riot does seem to have scaled back some of its game dev priorities this year, though, with all the layoffs.
Andy: The Riot MMO continues to be a thing. They promise. Apparently!
Carlo: The untitled League of Legends MMO will finally release at least one screenshot! We might even get a neat trailer to go along with it! Not a chance – years away at best.
Kickstarter MMOs
Andrew: I’m not expecting anything from any Kickstarted MMO project except doom: walking back promises, delays, and poor releases, maybe another outright cancellation or two. That’s every year!
Chris: Squadron 42 will begin its delay announcements. And knowing my luck, I will finally have a PC capable of running SQ42 and Star Citizen, but it won’t matter because neither of these games will come out, and by the time they do, my rig will be outdated once again. Accurate. (Chris did play SC this year, though!)
Sam: I think I’ll find my way into Ashes of Creation for at least one or two evenings. I don’t think we’ll see any sort of release but I think they’ll tease like it for a couple of months. Yep, still deep in alpha.
Other MMOs and multiplayer titles
Andrew: Niantic will continue to be the biggest player in the MMOARG space for at least the first few foreseeable months, but Pokemon Go will continue to decline. If any Niantic IP is shut down this year, it’ll be Pikmin Bloom. On the other side of things, Orna will continue to be the little game that could, though sadly I think mainstream recognition will elude it. Pikmin may as well be dead for all Niantic promotes it. POGO definitely seems to be in decline. Orna is cute!
Andy: Something new and totally unexpected launches onto the scene that gets all of us excited with a close release date. It promises to innovate the genre, and we think that just maybe it might have a chance. A chance. But we are still skeptical. Always skeptical. I would be tempted to award Andy points for Stars Reach, but it’s too far away. How about Brighter Shores?
Bree: ArcheAge 2 will delay into 2025. Delayed into 2025, then into 2026, and also rebranded with less MMO content than before.
Bree: Albion Online will change its mind about its new cadence and do something huge – like a full-blown expansion or PvE server – by the end of the year, pushing its concurrency numbers to a new record. Nope. It did see huge concurrency with the new EU server, and in my book it’s easily a top 10 MMO, but its dainty cadence is ensuring nobody in the broader genre is watching it. Nobody even mentioned it this year but me!
Bree: Roblox will announce Roblox 2. Still no, but I know it’s coming.
Carlo: PSO2:NG will get some new content updates, and if Blue Protocol comes out this year, PSO2 will see a dip in its playerbase but will once again return to normal levels after a few weeks. PSO2 has fallen off so hard, even without BP giving it a run for its money.
Carlo: Closers will remain open. Yes, actually.
Colin: Wayfinder limps along for most of the year without the backing of a publisher, but eventually finds one and launches, to modest success. Limps seems harsh but fair – it did struggle with layoffs. It’s still self-published, though.
Eliot: At least one title that hit early access this year just can’t make it through to the end and shutters partway through. Wagadu Chronicles comes immediately to mind. Sigh.
Eliot: Crypto schemes persist, but they become more tangibly desperate. Instead of seeming legitimate before quickly becoming otherwise, they seem like desperate grabs right out the gate. No new projects actually manifest from that scheme. Apart from the EVE Awakening thing, yeah. The types of people who made money off crypto schemes have pivoted to AI schemes and now even those are failing.
Eliot: We see the revivals of lost games become a thing this year. Rogue servers power on, old titles that were let go come back, and so forth. It’s not the biggest story, but it’s a year of wins for game preservation. City of Heroes Homecoming, baby!
Justin: We’ll hear that a few long-time MMOs are closing for good this year – RIFT and Champions Online. Both fortunately still kicking!
MJ: ARK goes back to its ways of delays. And also disturbingly low-key comms.
MJ: Adventure Quest 3D housing launches and it is addictive; players start grinding for furniture. Sure is a theme this year, yeah?
MJ: Star Trek Online starts a new storyline with a popular Star Trek character and surprises fans when the actor voices it. Which? I am not telling! I’ll tell! It was Denise Crosby.
Sam: Evercore Heroes, which is technically dead and is being retooled as Project R I think, will come out with a sad blog around June saying that they couldn’t find enough full time funding so they are going to shutter the project permanently. I’m even more shocked than Sam to say that development continues.
Sam: Personally I’ll still be playing Harry Potter Magic Awakened, but I don’t think it’ll be a daily gaming session for me. I haven’t missed a day since launch, which is pretty surprising considering nothing has kept my attention this long on a while. NetEase heard Sam and sunsetted the game in 2024 just to spite him. That’ll teach him to fall in love with an MMO.
Tyler: Wayfinder will die a slow, painful death without having left early access. There’s a small chance it gets rescued by a generous publisher, but I don’t think that’s likely. It actually did leave early access! It’s small, though, but still hanging in there.
Tyler: I said this last year and was proven wrong, but I think this is the year RIFT will kick the bucket. Gamigo has kept it going, thankfully!
Carlo: Bobby K will be one of the dancers for Dancing with the Stars! You mustn’t manifest these things, Carlo.
Stay tuned for later this week week when we deliver our predictions for 2025!
