Media literacy plays a pivotal role in equipping young people to react responsibly during crises, cultivating a critical viewpoint and attitude towards global incidents. In this light, game-based innovative learning strategies hold extensive potential to facilitate immersive educational experiences for youngsters, fostering cognitive skill development and literacy enhancement, thereby shaping the future of media literacy education. This study, fitting within the YO-MEDIA project, seeks to understand how game-based learning strategies can foster media literacy skills among youngsters. The project team examined games associated with health crises, politics, and wars in the Steam and MetaCritic databases to grasp the current situation in this area. Despite identifying thirteen thousand games revolving around these themes, the majority lack relevance to promoting critical thinking and media literacy. Upon thorough analysis, the team picked seven games aligning with the research goals. The benchmarking process was meticulously comprehensive, encompassing the analysis of various elements of these games, including themes, game reach, social media presence, game structure and design, and player experiences. The study’s results offer robust insight into the key elements for developing games that promote critical thinking and media literacy among young people. This research indicates that game-based learning strategies have the potential to significantly improve media literacy skills among young people. However, further research and development are required to create more games that align with educational goals and foster critical thinking and media literacy.