Contractually Obligated 2022 Game of the Year List

Today ends 2022.

2022 was a very bad year for me personally. I wasn't able to work for most of it due to constant health issues. But this did give me more time to play video games... kinda. Sitting at a computer became impossible unless several issues aligned perfectly, laying down in bed with a switch became harder to do when I needed to sleep more, and reclining in front of the TV had a time limit before a different type of rest was needed. I'm kind of a wreck right now.

But with some actual diagnoses that were months in the making and change in diet that should help things, I am confident 2023 will be a swing year for me after the height of COVID and my health issues kept me from so many things I love in life.

So lets not dwell on the hardships and instead celebrate those little moments of goodness that made this year worth being around for.

(List is reverse order (10 to 1) and only factors games that had either had their 1.0 release this year or a significant expansion)

List items

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  1. Kirby and the Forgotten Land

  10. Kirby and the Forgotten Land

  I basically only played the demo. I got the game from the library while my partner at the time was in the hospital. Suffice to say it was not high on my priorities at the time.

  But boy can Karby do some donuts in that parking lot.

• 

  2. Ooblets

  9. Ooblets

  Ooblets has its fair share of problems. But its a charming game with goofy, tumblr-bait dialogue and a Batt- err Dance system that, while fairly simple , can actually have some fucked up combos you can pull off (you ever chain stun an entire team of dancers so you can build your hype to enough levels that you drop one dance move on them and you win the match?).

  While I appreciated the game for not really having a time pressure on the farming front (in-game days and weeks can go by and no time pressures emerge), it does participate in some fomo with the actual calendar, having some holiday events that succeeded more in making me feel bad for not participating than happy they existed.

  Overall though, Ooblets is a fun, if imperfect, time.

• 

  3. The King of Fighters XV

  8. King of Fighters XV

  I adore what I've played of this game so far.

  But I also have no one to play with and no motivation to pick it up more than the few hours I had.

  It has the potential to be much higher on my list as time goes on, but for now, I just didn't play it enough.

• 

  4. Windjammers 2

  7. Windjammers 2

  I put just a little bit more time into this than KOF, but not enough to get those heart pumping, intense matches that I've had with the original. Blame COVID and blame me only having this on a console no one else I know has.

• 

  5. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge

  6. TMNT: Shredder's Revenge

  Exactly what you would want from a Turtles in Time follow-up, though with some pretty significant online woes. Still, I enjoyed enough of my one time playing it to put it this high on my list, even with the constant disconnects and desyncs.

• 

  6. Splatoon 3

  5. Splatoon 3

  They made Salmon Run not time limited.

  That's really the biggest improvement they made over Splatoon 2 and the improvement that secures it this spot.

• 

  7. Tunic

  4. Tunic

  Tunic tries to be three different games and the success rate is not in its favour.

  Its a middle-to-bottom-rung Zelda game, with moment to moment gameplay that just does not live up to the series it so admires.

  Its an awful Dark Souls game, the biggest inspiration for its combat. Defense and hitboxes are wildly inconsistent, the best solution for most fights is grinding money for consumables, and Tunic might have the worst parry in video games (yes, even when you power it up).

  But god DAMN does it blow Fez and similar games out of the water... if you are willing to engage in the puzzles on your own terms. Sometimes it will be best to say "oh fuck that" and just look up the answer (especially if you are planning to do the puzzles not necessary for the good ending), but, shockingly often, you will actually WANT to pick up a piece of paper and figure it out on your own.

  The trick was creating a puzzle system that is coherent and easily recognizable, yet deeply creatively interwoven with the game world and immensely satisfying to figure out. I will hold solving the secret on the mountain as one of the best moments in video game puzzles until I die.... even if I had to look up the answer 98% of the way there because of a few ambiguous hints and the finicky nature of its solution.

  In the end, Tunic will push a lot of players away much like similar games before it. Either the genres it tries to emulate on the surface won't gel with everyone or the puzzles and their solutions won't click for you.

  And that's okay.

  I was able to hit the sweet spot for 90% of it and didn't let the other 10% keep me down and, therefore, its on my list. I sincerely expect those ratios to flip for some people and this to end up on their worst games of the year.

  That's just the type of game Tunic is.

• 

  8. Vampire Survivors

  3. Vampire Survivors

  People have talked this one to death. Its just fucking fun to take a system and break it over your knee. And this game lets you do it in less than 30 minutes and reap that dopamine from it.

  Easily the game I will buy on other platforms and beat from scratch the most in the coming years.

• 

  9. Rumbleverse

  2. Rumbleverse

  As much as Apex Legends has been my go-to Battle Royale of choice, I do love a good BR that really throws the guns out and approaches things in a completely unexpected angle.

  Tetris 99 making puzzle games ultra competitive. Mario 30 taking inspiration from speedrunning. Black Survival being a point-and-click survival crafting BR that somehow worked super well? Super Bomberman R taking Bomberman to levels you've never seen.

  But a fighting game battle royale? You know, Fighting Games? Those games that require you to be able to react to an opponent one on one? Those games that needed perfect online to be even comparable to the offline experience? Those games that had high execution barriers and mind games where even a frame of animation can determine a win or a loss?

  Making one of those would be an impossible task... for any other team but Iron Galaxy. Combining their chops at impeccable online fighting game play with Killer Instinct and knowing how to create incredible depths of competition with simple systems with Divekick, Rumbleverse almost seems like the natural next step for the studio with Battle Royales being the king of the live services. And boy did they deliver.

  While the launch wasn't without problems or needed rebalancing and the systems do need better feedback in places, those are problems easy to ignore when you are having this much fun irish whipping a man dressed as an 80s aerobics instructor off a skyscraper, then chokeslamming his cyclops friend off said skyscraper right onto his head.

  Its silly, its funny, its remarkably deep for its systems (especially with the Season 2 changes to combos making them so much more versatile and optimizable). Its just a helluva good time.

• 

  10. Marvel Snap

  1. Marvel Snap

  Fuck you Disney.

  How dare you make a TCG this good.

  I know you had Ben Brode, one of the cocreators of Hearthstone, headlining the project, but, god damnit, I was so ready to hate this game. But my Marvel fatigue, the Disney Greed from its monetization, all my valid criticisms for the game evaporate once I started playing this nonstop and had a blast doing so.

  Is it too slow in its dishing out of new cards? Yes. Does it have a significant problem creating an approachable experience for new players now that most of the people they'll be playing have half of the cards unlocked? Absolutely. Is its monetization of new cards through its battle pass system disgusting? Fuck yeah it is.

  Am I still going to be playing this constantly? You fucking bet I am. And Disney can pry the money out of my cold dead hands before I succumb to the monetization in this game.... again (I swear that one time I bought the battlepass I had a good reason and it was a moment of weakness and fuck you Disney)