A slow year in gaming overall as publishers and developers are still adjusting to the post-pandemic world. With lockdowns and working from home over for me, I got a lot less gaming in personally. Along with that, there just weren’t that many titles out that pulled me in. This year I really tried hard to play more games with actual endings other than open world loops. A couple of those titles snuck through the cracks though (looking at you Cyberpunk 2077 and Vampire Survivors). Still some real bangers this year, but I’ll add at the bottom.
January 2022
Deathloop (PS5) – 1/6/22
Sackboy Big Adventure (PS5) – 1/15/22
February
Doom Eternal (PC) – 2/16/22
March
Far Cry 6 (PS5) – 3/6/22 – Main Campaign
Shadow Warrior 3 (PS4) – 3/15/22
Song of Iron (PC) – 3/23/22
April
Road 96 (PC) – 4/4/22
Spongebob Squarepants: Battle For Bikini Bottom – Rehydrated (PS4) – 4/14/22
May
Spider-Man (PS5) – 5/6/22
Super Mario Bros U Deluxe (Switch) – 5/25/22
June
Hardspace: Shipbreaker (PC) – 6/19/22
July
Stray (PS5) – 7/24/22
October
Paper Mario: The Origami King (Switch) – 10/28/22
December
God of War: Ragnarok (PS5) – 12/7/22
WarioWare: Get It Together (Switch) – 12/16/22
2022 Gaming Superlatives
Not all of these games may have come out this year, but they are the ones that consumed most of my time.
Best Game – PS5: God of War Ragnarök – One of the few games I bought on launch day and even preordered in 2022. Well worth the wait and a huge improvement and refinement over God of War (2018). Another great overall story and a lot of variety on the enemies this time instead of just palette swaps. The ending was kind of blah, but after The Last of Us series, most game endings are.
Runner Up: Cyberpunk 2077 – I’ve had the game roughly since launch and never touched it. I got the PS4 version as a gift, and after the initial reviews started coming out, I figured I would never play it. With the PS5 version released as a free upgrade this year, I decided to jump in. Let me say this is one of the best looking current generation console titles out there right now and a great story too. Don’t get me mistaken though, a lot of the missions and stories just seem to fizz or go nowhere which probably comes from the rushed development. My main beef is a control one though: no matter how much time I spent tweaking the controls, the right stick look and aim just never felt right. Still I am playing this at the end of 2022 and should hopefully have the main story done early in 2023.
Best Game – Mac / PC: Hardspace:Shipbreaker – I first played the game at PAX East 2020, about a month before the lockdown. A few months later it was released to early access. I got a good 15 hours in under early access before I put it away to wait for the shipping 1.0 release. That came this past May and I jumped into the story and all the additional ships added. Plenty of variety for this spaceship scrapyard simulator. It’s the job I never knew I wanted if I wound up in space and in debt.
Runner Up: Vampire Survivors – I got this game in Early Access just because of the hype alone and I couldn’t figure it out. I would last 10-15 in game minutes tops before I got wiped out. Then I actually read up on it and learned about the weapon evolution system and in no time I became a screen clearing killing machine.
Best Game – Switch: Paper Mario: The Origami King – The Mario games that aren’t side scrolling or 3d platformers are sometimes the best. The Origami King is funnier than it should be for a Mario game. A lot of real world and Mario/Nintendo universe visual and written jokes. The attack system is simple enough for my mind except for the puzzles that made me think way too many steps ahead.
Runner Up: WarioWare: Get It Together – I love a good WarioWare game. You can just put every old game on a cartridge and I would still buy it. Thankfully this has some new gameplay ideas and microgames to play. Finished the main story and now here I am going for all the unlocks.
Best Game – Mobile: Easy Come, Easy Golf – Clap Hanz made my favorite arcade style arcade game as of recent, Everybody’s Golf, for PS4. Easy Come, Easy Golf is their mobile entry and it was initially an Apple Arcade exclusive (now on Switch too). It’s a great evolution of the elements of Everybody’s Golf and the Hot Shots Golf series before it. I am still a bigger fan of the console versions, but this even plays on Apple TV well.
Runner Up: Solitaire+ – I am addicted to single card draw Klondike. It is the biggest time killer for me. The Apple Arcade version is the best version of iOS solitaire. No ads, nags, micro-transactions. I can just mindlessly stack cards.
Here’s to playing a couple more good games (and a lot more Solitaire) in 2023!