2022 hasn't been the best year for games, but it certainly hasn't been the worst, either. With a few notable big releases scattered throughout the year, there have been hundreds of hours of content to keep people invested. Coupled with the particular 2022 releases that I played, however, were some games that I'd missed along the way. Finding the time in between writing and playing other games, I chose to spend it with some titles that piqued my interest but that I'd never seen fit to invest the time in before. Up until November, I also found myself unemployed, so I had a lot of extra free time to sink into playing games and venturing into a couple of titles that normally might not interest me. 2022 hasn't been the best year for games in general, but it's been pretty damn good for me. Let's see the greatest hits.
Elden Ring
Ah, Elden Ring. I'm already getting nostalgiac for you as I look forward to the inevitable future replay. I've been a big fan of FromSoftware and their unique video game experiences since I played Demon's Souls all the way back in the late 2000s. Having enjoyed their own signature style of storytelling and risk/reward gameplay that boasted large, semi-open environments to explore, the prospect of a game akin to their previous titles going full-on open world was mouth watering. Some fans were concerned that the two styles wouldn't mix, as a totally open world environment did raise some questions about whether or not FromSoftware's established formula would mix with it. Ten months since launch, it's safe to say they needn't have worried. They blew it out of the water with Elden Ring and it will be nothing short of a crime if they don't go full open world again in the future. It took me two weeks to finish it, and during that time it blew passed all of FromSoftware's previous games for me, dethroning Bloodborne as my favourite of the lot. Furthermore, it went even further and cemented itself amongst my top ten favourite games off all time. I think the open world map and emphasis on exploration were just what their previous games were missing for me, and Elden Ring managed to be my perfect FromSoftware game before I even knew what that was, or that I wanted it. It's safe to say 2022 started off with a bang.
Cooking Companions
Earliser this year, I found myself keenly interested in playing more visual novels, spurred on by both my love and nostalgia for Doki Doki Literature Club!, and general boredom, which saw me spending hours on Steam searching for new games to sink my teeth into. Cooking Companions was advertised as a sort of DDLC! clone, a psychological horror combined with a dating simulator. For the most part, I thought it would scratch the itch left by Team Salvato's masterpiece and nothing more. What I found ended up being so much more in its own right. Cooking Companions sees the player locked in a cabin in the woods with their travelling companions in the midst of a bad storm(the classic horror setup). After some time has passed, however, the player character seemingly begins harvesting the corpses of those who venture outside to look for help. As if that wasn't bad enough, they then start feeding the meat from these corpses to the remaining companions due to the fact that their usual supply of food has run out. There are a lot of interesting details to the story, like one of the companions, Karin, almost immediately turning on you and showing her true colours as a bit of a maniac, and some notes spread around the house suggesting the homeowner has more than skeletons in his closet. But, in true fashion, there is a lot of hidden lore to uncover if you are persistent enough, and a lot of what can be found hints at a very dark, sinister backstory for the group of friends, who are possibly fleeing famnine in Europe. I thoroughly enjoyed Cooking Companions and its free DLC, and I look forward to the sequel with bated breath.
Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak
I've been a Monster Hunter fan for as long as I can remember, and I had been waiting for the Sunbreak expansion ever since it was announced in late 2021. In June of this year, it finally arrived, and it totally blew me away. The Iceborne expansion for Monster Hunter: World was massive, and it added countless great additions to that game, but there is just something about Sunbreak that made it more memorable for me. The monsters were cooler, the story was more interesting, and a lot of the gameplay changes were better. Overall, I think I just enjoyed it more than the previous Monster Hunter games I'd played, and I definitely enjoyed it more than the base game. Not to say that Monster Hunter Rise was bad(because I do love it), but it was definitely missing something. On top of everything else, Sunbreak gave us a feature I hoped for in the series long ago but never actually thought we'd get; the ability to take NPCs with you on hunts. That's something I hope becomes a mainstay. It's been way more fun than it has any business being fighting alongside the other characters you've gotten to know over the course of the game. To say I'm excited for the future of the series would be an understatement.
The Milk Games
Technically two different games, these visual novels are entitled, Milk Inside A Bag Of Milk Inside A Bag Of Milk and Milk Outside A Bag Of Milk Outside A Bag Of Milk. Don't let the ridiculously absurd names fool you, though. They are deeply moving and at times upsetting experiences. The second of the two is specifically the one that I want to focus on for this entry on the list, but they kind of come as a package deal, and it wouldn't feel right to exclude the first game. The Milk games follow a young girl who, after an unspecified accident of some kind, cannot see properly and vehemently dreads the outside world. Throughout the first game, the player accompanies her to the shop to buy milk, and we see the world through her eyes, which have distorted the people and areas around her into horrific versions of themselves. The second game takes place largely in the girl's home, where it is revealed her mother is abusive and she herself is taking medication for her issues. The player is also revealed to simply be a figment of her imagination rather than a true presence, the voice of either her subconscious or possibly her depression, as many dialogue options are emotionally charged and confrontational, suggesting you and the girl are constantly at odds with one another. These visual novels are largely about trauma and coping with it, as well as the stigma around mental health, being medicated for it, and the various shapes that mental issues can take. I played the first game during the summer simply because a friend of mine mentioned that it looked interesting and I decided to check it out myself. Now, I couldn't be happier that I did. Both games are incredibly moving.
Cyberpunk 2077
Where do I even begin with Cyberpunk? Back in 2020, I was as excited as anyone for the then upcoming release of one of the biggest games of all time, one that also promised to be a contender for one of the best video games ever made. Imagine my disappointment when it launched and it was absolutely lambasted by critics for technical issues, unacceptable performance on last-gen platforms, and a supposedly lacklustre open world. I quickly put the idea of playing Cyberpunk behind me and moved onto other games I was interested in, but the urge was always there to take the plunge. I've always been a huge science fiction fan, after all. Alien is my favourite movie of all time, and I've always loved Star Wars, as well as recently having gotten into Blade Runner. A conversation in August with a friend of mine led to him telling me he had recently played Cyberpunk and he maintained it was incredible. After expressing my interest in the game but lamenting that I couldn't afford to buy it right now, he valiantly got it for me as a gift. Suffice it to say, I absolutely adore Cyberpunk 2077. I maintain it is a phenomenal game with an equally phenomenal story and cast of characters. It's still mired in issues two years after launch, but the writing is top notch, and the world is one of the greatest we've ever seen in the video game industry. It also depicts a beautifully authentic view of music and the importance of it to both musicians and mere consumers, one I've not seen any other game emphasise. I could go on all day about how much I love Johnny Silverhand and his relationship with my V, or how the various nightclubs and gang hideouts seamlessly blended the aesthetic of crime and science fiction, but all I need to say is this; I went into Cyberpunk with very low expectations, and it raised the bar to new heights within days of starting it. It has a very special place in my heart.
Dear Esther
After several large-scale, open world games this year, I found myself a bit burned out and looking for something much smaller and quicker. I found two "walking simulators" that I really took to, the first of which was Dear Esther. At the beginning of Dear Esther, the player hears a man reading the contents of a letter explaining how he and his companions ran aground while out at sea. Addressed to the eponymous Esther, the letters become more intriguing and concerning as the game-and the narration-continue. It is unclear who the player controls throughout, whether it is Esther who has come to search for her missing husband, or the man himself reliving some version of the events that transpired after the shipwreck. We are given several glimpses into the backstory of what happened, and how things are not quite as simple as they seem at the game's beginning. I strongly urge you to play the game for yourself. At a time when I didn't have the energy or motivation to dedicate my time to enormous blockbusters or open world triple-A titles, Dear Esther surprised me with how well suited it was to what I was looking for. I never thought I could take to a simple exploration game, but I had a great time with this one, and I won't soon forget the experience.
Gone Home
The second of the two games I alluded to before, Gone Home is a game I actually turned my nose up at several years ago when I first played it. Expecting it to be a full-on horror game, I was annoyed when I discovered that it wasn't and simply turned it off after less than ten minutes. This year, however, I went in wanting to see what it was really about and wound up having an incredible time with it. After returning home from living abroad, Katie(the character you play as) returns to her family house only to find it abandoned with signs of having been vacated in quite a hurry. A note from her sister Samantha, too, tells her not to snoop around hoping to find out what happened. Of course, Katie doesn't listen. There's a great game in there for anyone hoping to spend an hour or two exploring the environment and piecing together the backstory, but to illustrate why I loved Gone Home so much, I'm going to have to just tell you what happens. Before the events of the game, Samantha began hanging around with her friend from school, Yolanda. As it turns out, they ended up becoming more than friends, and her parents did not understand her homosexuality, nor did they approve of it. Samantha had a blowout with her parents and fled the home, leaving Katie to come back to the aftermath. As always, there's a very interesting and creepy side story which concerns the house's previous owner, as well as Katie's and Samantha's father, who did not have the happiest childhood or home life. It's an emotional one, for sure. Having only realised that I was bisexual in the last few years, I really appreciated the story Gone Home was telling, and it left me wanting more games like this long after it was over. I wasn't expecting to love it so much. I'm really glad I gave it another chance.
God Of War Ragnarök
God of War 2018 was my first game in the series, despite having been interested in Kratos and his story for many years. For whatever reason, the series before that point just passed me by. I used to do deep dives on the wiki reading about the Greek saga, so I was somewhat caught up with the events of the story before jumping headlong into Santa Monica Studios' 2018 sensation. I loved every aspect of it, from the more emotionally poignant approach to the story to the combat and beyond. I was very excited for Ragnarök, like many people, and I was not disappointed. It took me around two weeks to finish, maybe slightly longer. The previous game was the first game that I ever actively decided to get the platinum trophy for, and I've never been what anyone would call a trophy hunter. Ragnarök was an improvement over its predecessor in almost every way, but where it really shines is in its depiction of Kratos as a father and his relationship with Atreus. This godly father and son tag team go where they've never gone before-literally-and it was emotional, satisfying, and exhilirating to watch their relationship develop and culminate in one of the most touching finales of any game I've ever played. If the series continues to explore other mythologies, I think we're in for a hell of a ride, but the Norse saga has been incredible, and I'd be just as happy if they ended the series there. I couldn't have ended 2022 any other way.
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