2022: Year of the [blank]

2022: What is it the year of?

We've had Year of the Bow, Year of Luigi, [whatever the other ones were], and so on.

And now we're here in the far-flung future of 2022, jacking in to cyberspace and replacing our arms with cyborg arms that can crush rocks.

Is 2022:

The Year of Throwback Strategy/Tactics JRPGs (Somehow)

• Triangle Strategy
• Live A Live
• The DioField Chronicle
• Tactics Ogre: Reborn
• Metal Slug Tactics (honourable mention, supposedly a 2022 game but dubious release date)

or perhaps:

The Year of Nintendo Exclusives Where You Shoot a Fucking Gun

• Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp (honourable mention, was supposed to come out in April but delayed until world peace)
• Splatoon 3
• Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope
• Bayonetta 3
• Front Mission 1st: Remake (honourable mention, supposedly a 2022 game but dubious release date)

What say you?

the delay sadly so many games i was hoping for got sent back

2022 the year of playing them fast and furious.

By which I mean action games that can be beaten under relatively short amount of time.

Gunvolt 3, 5 hours.

Neon White, 2 hours to see the credits on Steam after 15 hours practice on Steam.

Kirby in the Forgotten Land, about 10 hours.

Olli Olli World, about 8 hours.

Sifu, less than 2 hours to cut through all five levels, after more than 24 hours of practice.

More people left then good games came out this year

Year of the Acquisition imo. Take Two buys Zynga, Microsoft buys ABK, Sony buys Bungie, and Square seems to be doing everything in its power to get scooped up by Sony as well. Meanwhile, the Great Embrace continues. With game releases at a crawl, it feels fitting to name the year after an industry trend instead of a common theme in games.

However, that October schedule is packed enough to still give us a theme that will seem obvious in hindsight.

Year of the tile for me personally

Gaming as a whole I’d say year of the loot

Lawsuit

Year of the Acquisition?

The only other option I can think of is "Year of the 'what even came out this year?'", since next to nothing that's come out this year has felt like it had any impact, and I can name a single game that I've played from this year. Other than that, all the big news stories feel like they've been either acquisitions or lawsuits.

Year of the Backlog

2022: Year of the 2023

Year of the narrative games!

You know, that is fair. Both Norco and Citizen Sleeper are great examples of that. 2022 isn't a terrible year for games, just not one with a lot of big ones for my personal radar since Elden Ring and Horizon. But smaller games have been nailing it.

Yeah, that's a pretty good one. Other than uncontested Game of the Year Elden Ring, it hasn't been a jam-packed string of hits in 2022. I've certainly mostly played backlog games this year.

Also some good points. Anything else good out there in narrative games aside from Norco and Citizen Sleeper? Also, Norco is somehow 50% off on Steam currently, despite only being 4 months old. Wild.

There's an absolute embarassment of strategy and tactics games out there this year, even with a high-profile delay like Midnight Suns, or Baldur's Gate 3 being 2023. It's the sort of feast that was unimaginable just ten years ago. How times change.

But to single it down, Tactics Ogre is back so I dub thee the Year of Tactics. The Queen hath returned.

I am not sure if it would be "year of..." but with games like "Bear & Breakfast", "Cult of the Lamb" and "Two Point Campus releasing in the span of two weeks, it seems like August 2022 is "the month of the administration sim"

I think year of Acquisition fits very well. so many game companies have been buying each other or merging, I'm not quite sure what to think of it...

also, Elon Musk still hasn't bought twitter yet. 🐦

Another option for 2022:

Year of the West

• Horizon Forbidden West
• Weird West
• Hard West II
• Evil West

Game devs, why are you all so horny for the West?

@bisonhero: WEST SYDEEEEE