GamesBeat’s Rachel Kaser wraps up the year by recounting all of the games she played in order from best to worst.
It’s not the first time I’ve said it, but it bears repeating: 2022 was a strange year. Perhaps the games themselves weren’t as wild as the industry itself, but we still had some great ones. We also had some not-so-great ones. So to close out 2022, let’s do a slightly different Focus. I’m going to rank all of the games that I played this year — all of them.
This is going to be a long list, so strap in. Since I’ve already published my top 5 games, we’ll start at the top and work our way down. Keep in mind these are rated based on my own personal level of enjoyment with these games. If you disagree with me? Good! I welcome discussion! (Except where the bottom five are concerned. I will not be taking questions on those).
Before I start ranking the games I played, let me begin by telling you which games you’re not going to see on this list – for the simple expedient that I didn’t play them. Unfortunately, I’m not blessed with infinite time, so I could only get to so many of them. These games include (but are not limited to):
I wish I could have played all of the above – it’s strictly a matter of time limits that I didn’t. The Mortuary Assistant is a particularly deep cut, as I do love my horror games. I’m also sad that I didn’t get time for the second AI: The Somnium Files game. I like the first one quite a lot, but I’m not actually done with it yet, hence my reluctance to start the sequel.
Also, I want to forewarn you of some games I did play that won’t be on this list. Here are a few honorable mentions:
Slime Rancher 2 & Coral Island
Both of these games put a big smile on my face. Anyone who knows me knows I love Slime Rancher, and Coral Island scratched my Stardew-like itch. However, both games are early access. I don’t want to officially judge them because they’re explicitly incomplete. It wouldn’t feel fair. But I’ll revisit these later, I promise.
Powerwash Simulator
I wanted so much to like this game — the concept alone is so good. But I couldn’t play it for more than a few minutes without getting seasick. I can’t judge the game for that — my biological peccadilloes aren’t the developer’s problem. But the fact remains I couldn’t physically play this game very much.
Lost Ark & Splatoon 3
Anything multiplayer on the below list, I felt I saw enough of to make a good judgement. Lost Ark and Splatoon 3, not so much. But I want to acknowledge them, as I felt they were generally well-made games. I simply didn’t get enough of them to put them on this list. Also, adding more would disrupt the nice “70” on the list. You know, priorities.
I won’t give my Top 5 here, as I already wrote about them in another article, which you can read here. So we’ll start at number 6.
6. Stray
Like most indie games this year, Stray wasn’t a very long game. But it made full use of every moment, as players followed the adventure of a sweet orange cat. The Cat explores a number of environments, including a cyberpunk city that’s possibly my favorite game environment of 2022. Stray was everything it needed to be: More than just “the Cat game,” but a very good Cat game all the same. It also had one of my favorite game endings of the year, though I won’t spoil it.
7. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge
I’m a sucker for a good throwback and Shredder’s Revenge was a delightful throwback indeed. With some games, if they have good enough gameplay, I’ll just discount the story. That’s exactly what I did here. Who cares if the “story” is comparable to an episode of a cartoon? Just let me absolutely demolish the Foot Clan — that’s all I need. The fact that I could actually unlock a character, as opposed to having to buy them as DLC put the biggest, stupidest smile on my face.
8. Elden Ring
Hear me out! Elden Ring was technically a better game that several of the games that beat it in this ranking. But I confess it took me a while to get into it. Still, it eventually won me over, if only because it’s one of the most beautiful games I’ve played in the last five years. The exploration also freed me from the fetters of previous Souls games, meaning even I was able to enjoy myself, even if everything in the whole world was able to ring my bell on the regular.
9. Kirby and the Forgotten Land
I’ll never forget the first moment I, as Kirby, inhaled a car in Forgotten Land. Here’s me, waiting for my (real life) car to get serviced and all of a sudden Kirby pulls that on me. I was so pleased to see it because I knew everything that came after was going to be fun. And it was! I wasn’t expecting to like this game over some other “family-friendly” titles this year, but it won me over with its good humor, charm and some genuinely difficult endgame bosses.
10. Tunic
Tunic is one of those games that makes me feel smart. The central mechanic of finding the guidebook pages was one of my favorite things in a game this year. I also enjoyed the puzzles, which reminded me a bit of Lara Croft Go of all things. I can’t praise a game for cuteness, like Kirby and Stray above, and not express my delight over the diminutive fox who wears the titular Tunic. I enjoyed Tunic, plain and simple, and I’m glad I played it before Elden Ring swallowed me whole (metaphorically).
11. Neon White
Mike Minotti is going to be very cross with me for ranking Neon White this low. But I did genuinely enjoy the action platforming elements and its replayability. The art style, the movement, the mechanics — it’s a very clean game, in all senses of the word. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if I found the dialogue pretty skippable. But out of all the games this year with such dialogue (and there were lots), I liked this one the most.
12. Pokémon Legends: Arceus
It’s been a while since I’ve liked a Pokémon game as much as I’ve liked Arceus, specifically because it was different. Playing more like a beginner’s version of Monster Hunter, Legends caught my attention right at the start. You’re no baby-faced student this time. Instead, you begin the game by getting a text message from god itself. If this is the direction that Pokémon is headed, I approve.
13. Hardspace Shipbreaker
This scrapping sim is the perfect accompaniment to a podcast or a show; just throw on something with sound and I could play Hardspace Shipbreaker all day and all night. And yes, I blew myself up a time or three, which gave me the biggest laughs I had playing a game this year.
14. Xenoblade Chronicles 3
This game is probably one of the main reasons that I didn’t play more games this year. Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is a big, meaty RPG with some of the most over-the-top voice acting I’ve ever heard. Everything about this game is so earnest and dramatic I can’t bring myself to dislike things in it that would ordinarily annoy me. It’s a beautiful world and story, though said story did lose me on occasion.
15. Marvel Snap
It takes a lot to get me into a mobile game. Given how many of my other devices are dedicated to gaming, my phone is for destressing and watching funny videos. But darn it, Marvel Snap got me hooked. I don’t even really like card games, but I do when the cards I’m playing have Scarlet Witch and Hulk on them. Like many, I got sucked into Marvel Snap and I can’t deny its charms.
16. Live A Live
I’d heard of this game years ago, so finally getting to play it was a treat. Live A Live feels like several different games that come together to make something greater than its whole. The old-school mechanics and story blend well with the modernized graphics. It’s one of the better RPGs to come out this year — which is saying something, because we got a few of them.
17. A Plague Tale Requiem
This is one of the saddest games to come out this year and the fact that I identified strongly with the main character didn’t help. Requiem expands on the previous game’s scary plague rat mechanic, giving protagonists Amicia and Hugo new stealth and attack tools. While the game is a bit on the long side, it’s a heartbreaking conclusion to the siblings’ story, and I applaud the developers for being one of only a few games this year to wring actual tears out of me.
18. Sonic Frontiers
I was never a Sonic person as a kid, so I didn’t discover the blue hedgehog until my adolescence. So while Sonic Frontiers didn’t tickle the nostalgia button in my brain, I can’t deny it’s a fun, challenging platformer. The open world also serves Sonic well, and it’s a pleasure to run all around it.
19. Marvel’s Midnight Suns
There are many games whose stories I like so much that I ignore the gameplay issues. Midnight Suns is the opposite: I like the gameplay so much that I pretty much ignored the rather silly story. Never thought I’d say this, but I’d much rather be on the battlefield than flirting with Blade and Wolverine. I liked it so much I’m willing to overlook the fact that my Steam copy is almost completely broken (but it does lose the game some points).
20. Vampire Survivors
You know me: Roguelikes/lites are not my thing. Ordinarily it’s hard for me to enjoy them. But Vampire Survivors makes it up to me with its bullet hell shoot-’em-up mechanics. I can’t not be happy while slaying this many demons or bats or whatever else might be coming to get me. While I enjoy spectacle, I enjoy just as much when a game can restrain itself to just the basics and still be great.
21. Chinatown Detective Agency
A cybernoir mystery puzzle game is everything I could ever want in a game, and this indie title delivered. Chinatown Detective Agency suffers a bit from audio problems and some odd visual quirks, but it’s got a cool central hook prompting users to do their own clue-hunting. The main mystery story is good, as is protagonist Amira Darma — a refreshingly professional spin on the noir detective trope. I just wish there were a little more to it.
