What did you play in 2022?

[Syt]

I've spent more time with a few games (as opposed to little time with many games) this year. It's mostly been a fun gaming year for me, with some new and old games coming back into rotation. How about you?


A random list, in no particular order.

Path of Exile
By far my most played game on Steam with 2371.8 hours. I got the bug bad again in one of the years this league, and spent far too much time clicking the mouse to make things go *splat*. The most recent league has not grabbed me at all, though, and I had a quick look at the league starting next week, and I don't feel like going back to it, though there's some interesting changes coming (including redoing Archemesis monsters AGAIN, buffing a number of items/melee things/curses, updating jewels to be more relevant, ...). I like playing it while listening to podcasts, but I can also burn out on it quite bad, and then take a break for months.

Elden Ring
I was initially quite excited about it, and I think it's the logical evolution of the Dark Souls formula to the next stage. I enjoyed my 50+ hours with it, but it does not gel with my playstyle much. In the previous games, I'd meticulously progress slowly, explore the environments, dispatch enemies methodically (almost like in a stealth game). It's why DS1 took me 120 hours to finish, and why DS2 and 3 with 130+ hours each are still unfinished for me. With how much larger Elden Ring is, I doubt I would finish under 4-500 hours (70-100 seems common for a first "normal" playthrough). The game has issues, but the combat remains fun, though I feel it may lean too hard into spectacle later in game. And I said after DS3 that I hoped that FromSoftware would do something other than bleak dark fantasy with decrepit castles, cemeteries, catacombs, libraries, swamps etc. ER has some absolutely spectacular environments, but I feel it can be best summarized as "Dark Souls, but much larger, with more freedom, and more tools to smoothen the difficulty curve for new players."

Final Fantasy I
It was ... ok. The story and gameplay is very basic (find thing/defeat enemy to unlock next chapter, no characterization etc.). The pixel remaster has a nerfed difficulty compared to old NES release, and I had no huge issue to complete the game, but I don't think it's aged well. I've dabbled a bit with FF2 which starts adding more actual story, but I haven't made much progress on it.

Skyrim
I've spent some hours on this, but mostly to try out Wabbajack. It's a tool that downloads and installs whole modlists for you, often with some options for customization of those lists. I gave Living Skyrim a try (which has a few hundred mods) and was surprised by how smooth the process was, though you should reserve large chunks of your hard drives. I also paid for a lifetime sub on Nexus a few years ago when I was still streaming and first started following modlists and wanted faster downloads - which speeds up the Wabbajack mod installs a lot, obviously. It's a very impressive tool. There's modlists for other games that can be installed with Wabbajack, but the huge majority of lists on its website are for Skyrim.

Old World
A pleasant surprise, though one that didn't have much staying power for me. I really enjoyed my time with it (a good 40 hours) and its mix of ancient/medieval civ game with character interactions. However, I'm not sure I like its "grab city sites" early game mechanic. It's however one of the few 4X games where I actually enjoyed playing scripted missions/campaigns.

Fire & Maneuver
A tactical game about 19th century battles. You have to buy unit packs, and it's primarily geared towards online MP. Didn't click for me - it felt a bit clunky, and the gfx were a bit too cartoony even for me. And you generally will only have a small number of units in the field. A successor to Age of Rifles this is not.

Into the Breach
Mix of tactics and puzzle game, you command mechs against monsters on an 8x8 grid. You know their next moves in advance, and you need to command your units to best prevent them from doing damage to infrastructure or buildings while navigating maps' special rules and conditions. It's a very sleek game from the makers of FTL, and I enjoyed it, but I also started feeling it became a bit tedious later on. It won game of the year from a number of sites I trust a few years back, so my opinion on that might be just me.

Slipways
A mix of 4X and puzzle/board game. You colonize a sector and build supply chains, following fairly basic (but in practice complex) rules. A fun time waster to play while listening to podcasts or watching a show.

Crusader Kings 3
Bought it at release, played a bit then, but only really got into it in the last few weeks, adding 200 or so hours to my play time there. I fired up again CK2 for comparison, but even though I miss some features from CK2 (and some that were not well implemented not at all ) it's hard to go back to the old one now.

Victoria 3
It's a bit of an unbalanced mess, but I think it can be shaped into a great game about the 19th century. I still hope it doesn't follow Imperator's footsteps, because I see a lot of potential in it, and I enjoy it despite its flaws (thanks to mods for now ... ). I have over 230 hours on it now (though probably 50+ are from running observer games while working from home or just trying out mods ). Probably my game of the year. It's of course not a blockbuster like Elden Ring or as polished as that game, but it's much more in my wheelhouse.

Hearts of Iron 4
While waiting for V3 I went back and gave HoI4 another try. It has a lot of good parts, but I still can't get into it quite as much as into some of Paradox's other games. I guess I'll keep trying, though.

winSPWW2 and winSPMBT
These old Steel Panthers games still get their annual patches. I gave them a try earlier this year, and they're still fun, and in 4k they look a lot better than I feared (just wish there was UI scaling ...).

[Josephus]

Hmmm....

Civilization VI
Football Manager 2021
Football Manager 2023
Victoria III
Hearts of Iron IV
Crusader Kings III
Europa Universalis IV (just playing that now for the first time in a couple years)

EDIT: Oh...forgot Humankind

[frunk]

New to me this year:

Celeste
Children of Morta
Downfall (Slay the Spire fan expansion)
Journey
For the Warp
Into the Breach
Mars Horizon
Orb of Creation
Ozymandias
Super Auto Pets
Trackmania
Vampire Survivors
Wildermyth

Ones that I keep coming back to:

Baba is You
FTL
Gridiron Solitaire
Hades
Kerbal Space Program
Noita
Path of Exile
Slay the Spire
Through the Ages

I've mostly fallen off of Paradox games.  I'll occasionally pick up HOI IV or Stellaris, but I don't put in enough time to really say I played it rather than noodling around with mods or the setup.

[Iormlund]

I did play some PoE, but while Sentinel was a great league mechanic, I'm not feeling it for Archnemesis.

As usual I played older games for a while.
Spent some time trying "hardcore" (ghost mode) on ghost Recon Wildlands with no HUD or AI teammates.
Played a couple games of Endless Space 2.
Went back to D3 and leveled a few characters (two in Hardcore).

I bought Chaos Gate, because I like both X-Com AND 40k, so why not.
And I'm now playing Darktide, much because of the same. I immensely enjoyed Left4Dead and Vermintide, and love 40k. So yeah... So far the game seems in most aspects a step backwards from VT2, sadly. But I'm still having fun cutting down cultists and deamons.

[FunkMonk]

Played a lot of ARPGs... Path, Diablo, Grim Dawn, Last Epoch. All variations on a theme. Will always have a couple of these on my hard drive.

FM21 and 22 got some play. My usual Arsenal playthrough 

Paradox games of course: EU, CK, Stellaris, and now Victoria 3. Games I'll come back to for a while every year.

Old World. Great spin on 4X. Really enjoyed it.

Forza Horizon 5. Fun AAA arcade racing game. Great for a short traipse through the desert in a muscle car.

Doom Eternal. Great traditional FPS.

Hell Let Loose. My favorite "milsim" FPS because it's fairly easy to play while still having enough complexity to feel authentic.

Breath of the Wild. Another game I come back to every year.

[Grey Fox]

Completed Monster Sanctuary, The Gunk, The Pedestrian & Tinykin.

Played
Monster Hunter Rise
Pokémon Scarlet
Forza Horizon 5
Floppy knights
Dicey Dungeons
Bugsnax
Garden Story
Archevale and It takes two with my son
Naheulbeuk Dungeons
No man's sky
and a couple more I forget.

[mongers]

Oh dear, probably 40-50 hours spread over the year, some Cvi6 and random old stuff like those Kingdom games.

[Sophie Scholl]

World of Warcraft: I ditched earlier in the year after absolutely loathing a lot of the Shadowlands changes to lore and the expansion as a whole, but Dragonflight brought me back and I am loving it so far. I actually feel like I'm playing WoW again instead of some other game messily grafted onto WoW's story.

Europa Univeralis IV: Mindless fun that I indulged in on occasion when bored. I was loving MEIOU & Taxes, but the recent update has just made it too dense for me to enjoy anymore so I went back to the base game.

Wildermyth: Fun and engrossing fantasy adventures that I plan on diving into again some day.

Star Wars: The Old Republic: I went back for the first time since launch and... eh. The stories are good, but I play it like a solo player game as the rp community is just... non-existent from what I've seen. I might play again some day to finish off the various stories.

Diablo III: I got through a bit more of the story, but I still get bored quickly of the grind.

[Oexmelin]

I no longer have much time (nor computer power) to play PC games, so it's most console now, and old games at that. I never buy games on release nowadays, only when they are on sale.

So, 2022 was mostly Dark Souls 3, Red Dead Redemption 2, Mass Effect Andromeda, the Batman Arkham games. I keep coming back to the Hitman series. I think that covers the year.

I keep wanting to play Witcher 3, but the sprawling narrative means I forget a bunch of things / leads in between play sessions, and I suck at the combat system.

[Valmy]

No freaking time to play anymore after my father passed away. Now all the stuff he was doing is stuff I have to do in addition to all the stuff I was already doing.

Though I did play some CK2 to let off steam sometimes.

[Josquius]

Disco Elysium  Excellent
Portal 2 Started playing many years ago but just sort of dropped it. Came back to it and played it through. Aye. Its good.
Long Journey Home Seems a fun little Star Control like game but a critical game breaking bug ruined it for me.
Hades EXCELLENT. One of the best things ever.
Bastion Meh.
Surviving the Aftermath Meh. Too slow and plodding.
Per Aspera Fun little story basedcity buildery RTS thing.
Cities Skylines I really wanted to be able to build a real city. I couldn't.
Witcher 3 Finally finished.
Crusader Kings 3  Just one game. But takes forever. Its addictive but doesn't really do much CK2 didn't.

[garbon]

Disco Elysium  Excellent
Portal 2 Started playing many years ago but just sort of dropped it. Came back to it and played it through. Aye. Its good.
Long Journey Home Seems a fun little Star Control like game but a critical game breaking bug ruined it for me.
Hades EXCELLENT. One of the best things ever.
Bastion Meh.
Surviving the Aftermath Meh. Too slow and plodding.
Per Aspera Fun little story basedcity buildery RTS thing.
Cities Skylines I really wanted to be able to build a real city. I couldn't.
Witcher 3 Finally finished.
Crusader Kings 3  Just one game. But takes forever. Its addictive but doesn't really do much CK2 didn't.

Did you see the new pedestrian focus dlc for city skylines?

[Josquius]

Disco Elysium  Excellent
Portal 2 Started playing many years ago but just sort of dropped it. Came back to it and played it through. Aye. Its good.
Long Journey Home Seems a fun little Star Control like game but a critical game breaking bug ruined it for me.
Hades EXCELLENT. One of the best things ever.
Bastion Meh.
Surviving the Aftermath Meh. Too slow and plodding.
Per Aspera Fun little story basedcity buildery RTS thing.
Cities Skylines I really wanted to be able to build a real city. I couldn't.
Witcher 3 Finally finished.
Crusader Kings 3  Just one game. But takes forever. Its addictive but doesn't really do much CK2 didn't.

Did you see the new pedestrian focus dlc for city skylines?

I've looked into it. Heard its not good. Very much a hack job to try and fit a square peg into a round hole. Gives you some pedestrian areas but you still have people going around with cars in their pocket and a certain style of play set as the true way to play.
We need Skylines 2 which takes a more modern approach to urban design.
This sums up my views on skylines.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fy672b7xZ6c&t=4s

It is still a fun game but not quite the true city builder I desire.

[Syt]

Forza Horizon 5. Fun AAA arcade racing game. Great for a short traipse through the desert in a muscle car.

I was looking forward to that one a lot last year, but then barely played it. I played a lot of FH4, so not sure if it was a case of being tired/more of the same, or if I just liked the North English countryside better than Mexico.

[Syt]

Hades EXCELLENT. One of the best things ever.
Bastion Meh.

Do you think you would have liked Bastion better if you had played it first when it came out? I agree Hades is a much better game, but the basics (outside story) feel like a very refined version of Bastion to me. Though the narrator in Bastion was fun.