I will never, ever, EVER care about Elden Ring. Those games are 100% not for me, and no amount of online gaslighting will change that! Sorry, I had to get that off my chest. 2022 was another year of positive changes in my life, but we’re here for video game talk. The year wasn’t exactly devoid of big releases, but most of them passed me by. Nintendo’s decent offerings were overshadowed by delaying my most anticipated titles out of the calendar, continued fleecing with every new sports game, and players doomsaying the antiquated specs of the Switch. Have these people not seen a Nintendo console in the last 15 years? PlayStation Studios put out some well-reviewed sequels that were nonetheless too similar to pull me back. Xbox had next to no first-party excitement, but Game Pass is my main draw at this point. Many of the titles on this list were played on that service, which makes me feel good about the whole thing.

I was able to find enough new games to fill out 10 spots well enough. None of them, however, quite hit the same highs as in the past. This isn’t a bad thing, as I used 2022 to set yet another personal record for number of games beat. All told, over 80 sets of credits rolled. I have a lot of big franchises clogging up my backlog, and I finally got sick of it. I cleared many older Sonic and LEGO titles from my plate. I chipped away at retro collections for Mega Man, Castlevania, and Contra. And in my most ambitious project to date, I finally earned every achievement in Rare Replay. My most rewarding moments were with games I missed in 2021. To name a few, Death’s Door, The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, and Guardians of the Galaxy were all excellent times. After all that work, though, the needle on my backlog hasn’t moved that much. I’m going into next year with an ironclad plan of attack to remedy that. But enough about years that aren’t 2022! It’s time for my 10 favorite games that released in the last 12 months. There’s no Elden Ring.

10. Pokémon Legends: Arceus

Oh wait, I forgot to pick a theme for this year… Well, I suppose it’s “reinvention.” A lot the games on this list took a good hard look at themselves and made changes to better suit modern tastes. The open-world structure of Pokémon Legends: Arceus was promising enough to bring me back after disavowing the series years ago. Is Arceus the best it could be? Not at all, but it let me off the leash just enough to really get something out of it. Most importantly, the Sinnoh region is still populated with Pokémon old enough for me to recognize. What I want from this franchise is to be convinced that Pokémon exist as creatures in the world. That ideal gets continually more difficult as they invent new monsters, but Arceus at least makes an attempt. Initially, I was eager to poke around the big environments, filling out the Pokédex and doing side quests. Pretty quickly, though, I had the team I wanted and didn’t feel motivated to do anything else. That’s when I had an idea. How fast could I mainline Arceus? I was already looking away from the screen and mashing through any story-related text boxes. Blasting through the game in 15 hours was the perfect way to get a fast hit of the Pokémon experience.

On a good day, I can remember maybe half of the type matchups that make up the battling basics of Pokémon. Natures, abilities, EVs… I have heard people talk about these before, but they have never once entered my mental calculations while playing. Yes, children literally know more about battling than I do, but in my defense, the games never ask for more than a child’s understanding. But my ill-formed strategy mixed with some suspect game tuning to ultimately return a lost sense of danger. I think somebody screwed up, because in nearly every battle, either I or my opponent’s monster would die in a single hit. I was chronically underleveled, but I was able to squeak by every time. Every fight turned into an exciting samurai duel where the quickest creature won. I would come out the other side with one or two of my guys alive, but that unexpected pushback kept me playing until the end. It was a playthrough that lasted exactly as long as it should have. I know these games always hide a lot of content after the credits, but… I don’t care. I don’t need to know that the obviously evil guy is evil, or whether your character ever gets back to the present (I bet they hadn’t even thought to address it). Truthfully, I would still rather see Game Freak make more titles like Pocket Card Jockey than continue this self-destructive Pokémon cycle. If that can’t happen, at least I was able to find a way to enjoy this one.

9. Sephonie

When I saw that the two-person team of Analgesic Productions would be releasing another game this year, I made it a priority to check it out. Their previous title, Anodyne 2, was quietly amazing and my 2019 favorite. Sephonie is also a 3D platformer with evocative low-poly graphics and dreamy music. The jumping challenges in this one are a lot more technical and unique, though. The trio of scientists you control have a short dash move that doubles as a wall jump. There’s also a wall run move that I had a hard time getting the hang of. It sometimes feels closer to controlling cars than people, but once you wrap your mind around it, executing Sephonie Island’s obstacle courses feels rewarding. Cheat options are also included if you get truly stuck. These platforming bits are interspersed with block matching puzzle sections, and I don’t know how to feel about them. They are relatively brief and evolve enough to not feel repetitive, but I can’t help feeling that they’re incongruous with the rest of the game. These could be replaced with Minesweeper or Wheel of Fortune and not have much of an effect. The Zelda-like dungeons in Anodyne 2 were a lot better at reinforcing the story themes and offering varied gameplay in my opinion.

The narrative didn’t hit me the same way this time, but you can feel the personal experiences poured into the words on screen. I respect it for that. The main issue is the six-hour runtime. Don’t get me wrong, I adore short games. And in those hours, Sephonie’s platforming and puzzle gameplay develop in a satisfying way. However, I don’t think there’s enough time for the scientists’ characters to shine. After defeating a boss, you see a lengthy sequence detailing some of their backstory in an artful way. I thought these were brilliant, mostly because of the intense specificity in the prose. Sephonie Island is a weird place filled with alien-like creatures, but it’s on Earth, and these characters are from real places. The evocative detail in the writing at these points convinced me that some of it must be autobiographical. Backstory is just that, though, and I was hoping for more interaction between them in the present. What’s there hits the sketches of an interesting arc, but more space to talk would have been appreciated. The ending of Sephonie could be seen as a hard turn, but I think it justifies itself and comes away with a strong contemporary message. So while I didn’t connect with Sephonie as much as Anodyne 2, I know that someone surely will. That still counts as a success in my book.

8. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge

My excitement for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is limited to the first movie and a few of the comics. But it’s pretty admirable that the franchise has reimagined itself so many times for different generations while keeping the fogeys from the ‘80s happy. Shredder’s Revenge is perhaps best enjoyed in that multigenerational way, in co-op play, but I still had a great time as a single player. Every moment oozes with love, talent, and personality. It’s the idealized look for this version of the Turtles, and you get to see all their greatest hits (plus some lesser characters I didn’t recognize). The fighting in this beat-em-up is solid, with weighty hits and a good flow. But once you realize you can just do a dance and earn charges for your special move forever, some of the nuance goes away. Tweaking this to require more risk would help, I think. The campaign has extra objectives to occupy your time if you so choose. Using them to boost the stats of your turtle is a nice bonus. I would say the game is a bit long to comfortably fit in a single evening of relaxing fun, but each level is some intriguing new environment to keep you playing. I was sufficiently hyped by the end, with bombastic boss fights and sick rhymes bringing it all together. Tee Lopes is a fantastic composer, and the surprising guest artists on the soundtrack make it even better. I don’t think you can leave Shredder’s Revenge without a big smile on your face. For die-hard shellheads and casual ninja appreciators alike, it’s an easy recommendation.

7. Poinpy

At some point, Netflix added mobile games to its subscription. It’s a bit of a headscratcher to me, but if you have the service, Poinpy is very much worth a try. By the creator of Downwell, Ojiro Fumoto, this very much strikes me as his wanting to make an “Upwell” and changing things piecemeal until it all clicked into place. You’re being chased by this irate cat, and you must appease it by collecting fruit for its desired smoothies. It’s abstract at first. But eventually, you’ll be dialing in your jumps and planning around level gimmicks to execute blistering athletic feats for high combos. It’s all got a bouncy attitude reinforced by the pleasant graphics and Calum Bowen’s quirky soundtrack. Some form of progression is included in this roguelike with unlockable modifiers that enable you to effectively break the game if you use them right. Just as fun is the puzzle mode, where you must think about your bounces carefully to collect fruit, building knowledge that helps in the main game. Poinpy is an addicting timewaster, and as part of a subscription, there are no ads at all. It also has perhaps the craziest ending on this list, which is really saying something. I was surprised there was an ending at all, and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It’s probably unlikely that I’ve motivated you to download Poinpy and play all the way through, but at least do yourself a favor and look up the cutscene. I enjoyed Poinpy so much that I went back to Downwell, which I used to think was insurmountably difficult, and finished that one as well.

6. Kirby and the Forgotten Land

Kirby’s 30^th year was an eventful one, including a concert, an announced remaster, and a spin-off racing game. But nothing was so momentous as the puff’s first real 3D platformer, Kirby and the Forgotten Land. I’m impressed at how HAL Labs appeared to change so much yet really changed so little. Everything you’ve come to expect from the series is here, including secret-dense stages and extra modes. It’s the added dimension that gives those traditional elements an exciting sheen. The breadth of copy abilities is scaled back, but what’s here has been rethought and tailored to the new style of play. It’s quality over quantity – any given power has an identifiable special use, which wasn’t always the case. This is highlighted in the optional challenge rifts that complement the main stages. Upgrading these abilities is also a fun twist, and I was always looking forward to seeing what utility the new forms would provide. The real star, though, is arguably Mouthful Mode. New Kirby games usually have some kind of gimmick, and this one is very smartly executed. Aside from the novelty, taking over the found objects creates some engaging puzzle moments. For instance, finding the right shape to match an oncoming wall, or ferrying water across a treacherous path. There is a good variety, but the Mouthful objects reoccur enough to build familiarity and escalate challenge. A lot of times, the game will give you the option to retry a set piece moment if you missed goodies along the way. This is remarkably friendly, as I remember the time when Kirby games made you blindly pick between two doors and dangle the treasure you “failed” to get in front of you. Unfortunately, there’s no way to exit a stage mid-run and save your accomplishments. That ultimately made returning for 100% too repetitive to attempt.

For some Kirby fans, the presentation is the primary draw, and Forgotten Land generally does not disappoint. When the Switch’s hardware is increasingly used as an excuse for ugly games, you need only to point to Kirby here to show them how it’s done. There are compromises, sure, but the environmental art direction is very attractive. The new Beast Pack bosses, though… that’s a miss for me. They have some weird proportions and use a design language that unsettles me. I’m sure someone like it, but it doesn’t blend well with the traditional Kirby art. The music boasts some great melodies, as usual, and contextualizing the sound test as a Waddle Dee band is the cutest thing ever. Actually, the whole Waddle Dee town is delightful. I’m not sure why Kirby wants to make friends with the Dees when he's usually happy to eviscerate them. But that’s how Kirby rolls; he can be your pal, or he can destroy you, and one doesn’t preclude the other. After a few years in a sort of slump, I can say that I’m excited to be a Kirby fan again. Forgotten Land was the key to reinvigorating this underrated icon for the decades to come.

5. Vampire Survivors

“Why does everyone on podcasts love Vampire Survivors so much?”

I was a little confused when I finally tried the game for myself. You just… walk around and watch your weapons automatically kill these mindless hordes of monsters? My first few hours, I was sort of flailing around and dying a lot. But I’m glad I stuck with it. Once I started investing in persistent upgrades and learning what makes a good build, I was on the road of the game’s addicting progression. The sheer content-per-dollar value of Vampire Survivors is astonishing. Just as soon as you think you’ve got a handle on things, an entirely new layer reveals itself. The more characters and items you unlock, the bigger your pool of options becomes, to a transformative degree. Oh, you thought that was it? Look at all these secret weapon evolutions to really power up your run. Oh, you fool! Try out these tarot cards and change everything. Oh, I pity you!! These cheat codes unlock an unfathomable number of novelties so that you shall never reach the end of the rabbit hole. It’s an infectious loop, complete with sparkles and fireworks, that’s been primarily used in modern gaming to con you out of money with microtransactions. In Vampire Survivors, though, everything is in service of engagement for fun’s sake. Once the game hit 1.0, I spent a good amount of time getting every achievement. It’s like popping popcorn! But as soon as I was done, more stuff was added, and a substantial expansion followed. Honestly, I’ve kind of had my fill at this point. Still, Vampire Survivors is undeniably punching far above its weight. It’s proof that high-fidelity graphics aren’t necessary, and a rare “podcast game” that proves to be more entertaining than whatever the podcast is.

4. Tinykin

Before Pikmin 4 was officially announced, I was jonesin’ for that Pikmin goodness. Tinykin… isn’t that! But it’s amazing all the same. Instead of real-time strategy, you use your miniature army of creatures for 3D platforming. The many rooms of the comparatively giant house are some of the most delightful spaces I’ve explored in a game. That’s all due to how they crisscross to make every possible path an inviting one. Shining pollen calls out from the distance, just begging to be collected. Get enough and you can float through the air longer, letting you reach even more places. Enjoy the beautifully realized furniture that is both naturalistic and placed with a designer’s eye. Even if I didn’t connect with the insect NPCs everywhere, they add so much in retrospect to making the environments feel lived in. They’ve transformed places we see every day into delightful cities and attractions. These nonlinear levels are masterfully designed. And while I hate to say it… I feel like the Tinykin themselves are overshadowed because of it. Yeah, they’re cute, and I liked all their functions. Connecting electrical currents… cool! Making ladders... great! But once you explore most of the room, you’ve just got a bunch of creatures following you around with nothing to do. Part of me feels like they were meant to get people in the door and to make the game stand out. That definitely worked if it’s true. Tinykin is another short game, but there is yet more to do for those with a compulsion for scrubbing every inch for stuff. There’s a decent chance I’ll come back to it, if only to enjoy the feeling of hopping around with my miniature crew. I’ve written some more about it already!

3. A Plague Tale: Requiem

Whoa, plot twist… in a year where I generally stayed away from the “prestige” model of third-person, cinematic, violent releases, the second Plague Tale somehow made it into my top three games. The reason I played it? I thought the rats looked cool. I blasted through the first entry before Requiem came out and enjoyed it quite a lot. Even now, I’m not sure which of the two I like better, but the series is worth trying all the same. In the first few hours, Requiem feels like your standard safe sequel. Like in Innocence, you sneak around deadly zealots, craft alchemical powers from scavenged materials, and manipulate seas of rats with various forms of light. The most fundamental changes stand out only because I played the series back to back, but most of them are positive. For one, stealth-focused areas are a lot more open than before. There are branching paths all over the place, and you’re free to find your own route to the end point. In a genre that so often feels tied to a mandatory script, improvising my own way reinforced the role of scrappy children out of their element. Depending on how you tackle these sections, one of three experience bars matching your playstyle will increase. The abilities earned this way made me feel seen by the game, and they were flexible enough for me to fill two of the three bars by the end. Crafting and scavenging have been streamlined by splitting ammunition and upgrade resources. This alleviated inventory quibbles I had with Innocence. One change I disagree with, on the other hand, is the swap from French accents to British ones by the voice actors. It’s a small thing, and one I got used to, but setting-appropriate accents immersed me strongly in Innocence. Maybe I’ll try the French language option in a future replay.

Once things get moving and Requiem started to differentiate itself, I was effectively glued in place until the credits. The new characters that join Amicia and Hugo were welcome, the various mechanics all gelled beautifully, and the environments were so stunning I popped up photo mode often. The back part of the game is on a single island, and the artists did an unbelievable job selling it as an outward paradise with dark secrets underneath. The performances of the two leads brilliantly sell every twist and turn of the plot. Yet it follows a similar trope as other “prestige” games… namely, that the player is clearly ruining everything by continuing on, and things would really be better if they had just given up. The brutality and suffering are palatable only because it’s about rats flowing like water, which is still kind of funny. I was a little disappointed with player-controlled rat swarms, which was hyped before release. You only have a few occasions to use it, to pretty unspectacular effect, and I actually found that the limited implementation in the first game was more fun. Nevertheless, the non-controlled rats put on a real spectacle in the last moments. A Plague Tale: Requiem is affecting and engaging, and it should find a spot on your catch-up list if you missed out on it.

2. LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga

For the previous eight entries on this list, I could heartily recommend the game to any player. With LEGO Star Wars, though, you have to be a lot like me to get the most out of it. That is, a nostalgic completionist who likes spending tons of time in cartoonish versions of their favorite movies. As I found out online, there are a lot more of us than I realized. After 384 LEGO games from Traveler’s Tales, they finally decided to make some significant changes. They’ve pulled the camera in and more efficiently categorized the hundreds of characters unlockable for play. Most important is the change of balance for story levels versus the open world. Once they started making these vast overworlds with hundreds of special bricks to collect, I lost interest in previous titles. Here, the story missions are slight, and even more emphasis is foisted onto the exploration. There are over 1600 collectibles in the galaxy, and I was compelled to find them all. To my shock, this is the best open world TT has ever done. What changed? The camera helps a lot with putting you in the Star Wars world. And goodies are scattered everywhere, turning the game into a plastic Super Mario Odyssey. The dozen or so explorable planets will intersect on certain side quests, all rewarding a recognizable or deep cut character to join the team. There are complex puzzles (while still being appropriate for a children’s game). You can also use Boba Fett to sequence break a lot of stuff, which always feels great.

If you want the honest truth, the Star Wars setting does a lot of heavy lifting. I had a ball seeing yet another game’s interpretations of these planets. I lit up with glee every time I recognized an obscure character or in-joke from the depths of Wookiepedia. The new voice actors are surprisingly well-cast, and the returning ones from the cartoons are excellent as always. This game was the first time I was exposed to the complete story of The Rise of Skywalker, and it seems like the only palatable version to me. Skywalker Saga is the most fun I’ve had with a LEGO game in at least 10 years. And I played at least 10 of them in 2022 alone! Yeah, they’re something of a weakness for me, but Skywalker’s stunning scope is one I would only have patience for set in a franchise with deep personal roots. I struggle to think of one that would suit this style of game better. The Skywalker Saga doesn’t include the best action of this year, nor the best exploration, not even the best comedy. But it gives the opportunity to explore the Star Wars galaxy for dozens of hours, which is what I’ve wanted to do since I was a youth.

1. Return to Monkey Island

Some of the first games I ever played for myself were the Humongous Entertainment Junior Adventures. They instilled in me a lifelong appreciation for the point and click genre, even if the number of games I can recommend today without reservations is pretty low. I didn’t know it then, but Humongous was co-founded by designer Ron Gilbert, who was in large part responsible for the genre’s boon. Years later, I would try Gilbert’s two Monkey Island games, which still contain humor and inventiveness rarely matched today. I was equal parts surprised and ecstatic that he and other original team members would Return to Monkey Island™ in 2022. Adventure games never seriously died out, they just lost appeal for people outside a small community of devotees. With Return catching the eyes of a more mainstream audience, it’s both a showcase for player-friendly modernizations and a big pile of nostalgia. That duality is reflected in the story, which focuses on uncovering The Secret of Monkey Island™ once and for all.

First, the puzzles and interface. On the console version, bubbles helpfully highlight all interactable objects onscreen. Their prompts are written to have more context than just “look cannon” or what have you, adding functionality and personality. Days of pixel hunting and brute-forcing verbs are behind us. Adventure gamers often love wandering around with no clues, and Return facilitates this well. If you don’t like getting stuck, though, there’s a smart hint system and a lower difficulty option. On the hard mode, I thought these puzzles were wonderfully balanced. The number of things you have to juggle at any given time is always controlled to be manageable. The early game is a fairly linear retread of areas from Monkey Island 1, which eases you in. The latter half is a tangled spaghetti structure of new locales like in Monkey Island 2. These are my favorite moments in adventure titles, where you can pull in any number of directions and find how it all unravels. Aside from a couple of red herrings that had me solidly on the wrong track (you’re telling me “the bite of a thousand quills” isn’t the toothbrush Stan wanted?), I rarely found myself at a loss for ideas. This is puzzle design that has been honed over decades.

The second half of adventure games’ success is story and presentation. One look at the art style and I immediately said, “people are going to hate this.” I kept an open mind, and in the thick of it, the match is perfect. It’s the most vivid form the series has taken. Importantly, the art is readable without being barren. The dulcet music throughout the journey was always enjoyable, though I confess I most enjoyed the moments when they played the old hits. That brings us to the story, the new most controversial part of Return. The trio of Guybrush, Elaine, and LeChuck is nailed again. One look at their motivations here is a microcosm of the story at large. She’s trying to move on to something useful yet boring, all while the boys circle the same meaningless pursuit. Tons of new and returning characters populate the sea, and some are given more depth than previously imagined. Guybrush being an adventure game protagonist, he typically ruins their lives, and the story makes a half-serious attempt to address that. The theming is clear, but the ending kind of fumbles the ball. In its defense, it lets the player map onto it what Monkey Island means to them. But major plot threads are just left dangling and ignored, which I struggle to see as good storytelling. Endings are hard to write. At least this one can be a thinker. No matter your take, Return to Monkey Island is the best form of a genre I still revere. Its reinventions should be applied more broadly to realize ideas that are not easily explored elsewhere in gaming. And Ron, if you happen to be reading this, I’ll reiterate what I said years ago: The world desperately needs another Putt-Putt.

For everyone else, thank you for checking out this list! It’s been a whirlwind year in many respects, but I’m proud of what I’ve been able to accomplish. If you want some further reading over the holiday break, I humbly suggest you bookmark my nine-part series covering every achievement in Rare Replay. It was a project as frightening as it was rewarding, and I would love to get some more eyes on it. Regardless, have yourself a great 2023 and I’ll see you soon.