Pokemon Legends: Arceus, Turbo Golf Racing, Horizon: Forbidden West and Bayonetta 3 were among reviewers’ favourites
(Picture: ES Composite)Gamers enjoyed an eclectic array of treats in 2022. A phalanx of big-budget titles (finally) began to justify the potential of next-generation gaming, which was long promised by the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles and yet rarely delivered – until now.
However, these digital titans rubbed shoulders with far simpler titles, which satisfied the urge for nostalgia while also providing large dollops of curiously addictive joy.
You’ll know the heavy-hitters already. Sony had a massive year with both Horizon: Forbidden West and God of War: Ragnorak, each of which showcased the power of what the PS5 can bring to the party.
Meanwhile, Elden Ring bewitched all who played it and made even hardened gaming veterans go a little misty-eyed with its panoply of unexpected delights. As expected, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Overwatch both proved, once again, that there’s still plenty of life in competitive shooters, even if the latter racked up almost as much enmity as it did popularity, due to a controversial Battle Pass mode.
Where things went a little off-piste is that so many of the best games of 2022 were born on the opposite side of the creative mountain from a “conventional” blockbuster. For instance, Vampire Survivors, Return to Monkey Island and Pentiment all tore up the gaming rulebook in their own way. Good job.
The Standard has chosen 10 award winners, based on careful appraisal of critical and commercial success, which was then, ahem … enhanced by our writers’ preferences. For added fun – and to prevent tantrums – each of the team has also picked a hidden gem and shared why it made their pulse quicken.
So keep going beyond the main list of winners to discover the ones that (nearly) got away.
Best games of 2022
Game of the year: Elden Ring
Rating: 17+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, PC
Our game of the year came out all the way back in February – and set the bar so high that it must have made most of the other contenders on this list seriously consider calling it a day, right at that moment.
Elden Ring takes the brutal, atmospheric combat of the popular Souls games (by the same developer) and replants the action into an open world so exquisite that it almost begs to be explored.
While this title is more forgiving for new players, it is still a Souls-like game at heart, which means you’ll be seeing the death screen a lot. Yet in the same way that pain is the best tutor, each of these deaths will teach you something, and the gradual progress you make with each life lesson provides a truly gripping gameplay loop. Elden Ring delivers some of the most satisfying moments ever enjoyed on a gamepad.
Buy now £41.85, Shopto
Honourable mention: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Best Xbox exclusive: Pentiment
Rating: 16+
Platforms: Xbox Series, Xbox One, PC
Yep, it was another quiet year for Xbox exclusives. On the upside, this fallow era is allowing a host of less mainstream titles to grab the limelight – and Pentimentis most certainly that. Part adventure-game, part light role-playing game (RPG) and part 16th-century murder-mystery, you play Andreas — an artist turned detective in this oh-so-intriguing tale of conspiracy, regret and redemption.
It helps that this game is utterly gorgeous: an interactive, animated tapestry, which makes each scene a delight to look at. Even without these visual delights, Pentiment would still be thoroughly engrossing throughout the 13 hours it takes to complete. Make no mistake, this is time well-spent.
Buy now £14.99, Xbox.com (download only)
Honourable mention: Grounded
Best PlayStation exclusive: God of War: Ragnarok
Rating: 18+
Platforms: PS5, PS
This was always going to be a tight battle between Horizon Forbidden West and God of War: Ragnorok. For our money, the latter edges this one, mostly for the engrossing character work and the grittily effective fighting.
Every single character in this game feels flawed – and all the more human as a result. The voice acting is genuinely superb – and wielding Kratos’s famous Leviathan Axe and Blades of Chaos is even more satisfying this time around. Better still, you can now play as Atreus in certain scenes, which forces you to switch up your combat skills and master both brute force and a range of styles. Beating your enemies into a bloody pulp has never looked or felt this good. A triumph.
Buy now £59.95, Base
Honourable mention: Horizon Forbidden West
Best Switch exclusive: Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope
Rating: 7+
Platform: Switch
On paper, the Mario + Rabbids formula simply shouldn’t work. Who wants to see Mario, Luigi and Princess Peach tooled up with guns? And for that matter, who wants to see these guys hanging out with Ubisoft’s slightly irritating rabbids?
Yet that kind of thinking seriously underestimates one simple truth: that Nintendo provides the ultimate platform upon which to craft something new, that is able to explore the universal science of fun.
The game is essentially Mushroom Kingdom X-Com, which charmed everyone who played the original when Switch launched. This sequel takes the same idea and runs with it. That said, it feels a little more open-world, strips away the retro isometric design and also offers many more interesting levels along the way. Hats off, Ubisoft. This is an absolute blast.
Buy now £46.99, Amazon
Honourable mention: Xenoblade Chronicles 3
Best indie title: Stray
Rating: 12+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series, PC
Any title that involves you playing as a cat was always likely to get a lot of people purring in a world where social media is festooned with the antics of our feline friends. Even so, few expected Strayto be quite such a refreshing experience for the casual gamer.
OK, so this isn’t the most challenging title here but it is utterly charming and manages to fill its own dystopian game-world with enough detail to tell a surprisingly engaging story. That is no mean feat when all your character can say is “meow”, via a dedicated button no less. If the angst of everyday life makes you want to hiss, it’s time to snuggle up on the sofa with Stray.
Buy now £29.99, Amazon
Honourable mention: Tunic
Best sequel: Return to Monkey Island
Rating: 12+
Platforms: PS5, Xbox Series, Switch, PC
There hasn’t been a “proper” 2D Monkey Island game in 25 years. So it was a surprise when Return to Monkey Island was announced – and then quickly released – earlier this year, brought back from the dead by Ron Gilbert, the veteran creator of the first two.
Point-and-click adventure games have gone out of fashion over the previous quarter of a century, but Return to Monkey Island feels like a breath of fresh air – both a throwback and also a modern take on adventure gaming at the same time. There’s plenty of fan service in here, with familiar characters and locales. Even so, it’s also a great way of showing people who missed the 1990s what the fuss was about.
Buy now £19.99, Xbox.com (download only)
Honourable mention: A Plague Tale: Requiem
Best online shooter: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Rating: 18+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, PC
Ardent fans typically snap up a new Call of Duty title to whizz through the short single-player campaign before getting to grips with its brilliantly moreish online combat. What’s unusual is that Modern Warfare 2 is a consummate experience on both fronts.
It’s a cliche to compare any game to a movie, but we’ll risk it to compliment those light-dappled canals in Amsterdam, which bely the brooding menace of the action about to unfold. And yet, serious praise must go to the multiplayer mode here. Yes, the addition of perks help to keep the whole formula fresh but this bad boy takes these sumptuous new canvasses and concocts online arenas full of such visceral thrills that it’ll suck the life out of whole weekends. You have been warned.
Buy now £56.99, Amazon
Honourable mention: Overwatch 2
Best sport game: FIFA 23
Rating: 3+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Switch, PC
There have been many seasons when this franchise merely went through the motions to milk its fans but this isn’t one of them. There are no gimmicky street-soccer career modes here to distract from what’s delivered on the pitch.
Instead, we get HyperMotion 2, a revamped animation system, based on the motion capture of real players and enhanced with AI. Put simply, this is the most lifelike movement ever seen in a football game and the tackles land with a force you can almost feel. Even without the World Cup to get everyone in the mood, it is oodles of fun.
FIFA 2023 is the end of EA Sports’ deal with football’s governing body and so this year’s game is the last in its current form. If so, it’s going out with a bang.
Buy now £49.95, Amazon
Honourable mention: Nintendo Switch Sports
Best mobile game: Marvel Snap
Rating: 12+
Platforms: iOS, Android, PC
Eight years after Hearthstone reinvigorated the premise of digital card games, Marvel Snap has arrived to get everyone addicted all over again. Build a collection of superheroes and fight the AI or the other human players using the special powers of your deck to your advantage. It’s free to play and, while it has microtransactions, they’re perfectly easy to ignore.
This is the classic “easy to pick up, difficult to master” framework, and it makes for the perfect mobile game – one that’s ideal for short bursts, yet can easily take away far too much time if you let things roll on for too long, making it extremely easy to miss your Tube stop.
Download now Free, App Store
Honourable mention: Diablo Immortal
Best DLC: Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course
Rating: 7+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Switch, PC
Cuphead’s dessert has taken a long time to bake but it’s been worth the wait. Unveiled in 2018, with plans for release the following year, the game eventually arrived in 2022. It offers a surprisingly generous second helping for players looking for a tasty slice of unforgiving and yet gorgeously styled run-and-gun action.
You get 12 brand-new bosses, three weapons and the (slightly overpowered) Ms Chalice as a playable character. Frankly, it’s amazing how quickly you slip back into the vicious rhythm of Cuphead – even after five long years away from the kitchen. This is one to saviour.
Buy now £16.74, Argos
Honourable mention: Mario Kart 8 DLC
Best games of 2022 – Standard staff picks
The Standard’s tech writers each highlight one game you might have missed which deserves attention.
Cult of the Lamb – Vicky Jessop
Rating: 12+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Switch, PC
In a nutshell:
Animal Sims for the satanically inclined.
Why play it?
This viral sleeper-hit is a rare combination: cute, addictive – and dark as all heck. You play a lamb on a mission to kill the heretic gods that are keeping your own deities prisoner. The basic conceit is to build a cult that is strong enough to take them on.
The result is akin to The Sims in that your followers must be fed, watered, adequately sheltered and preached to each day. In return, you harvest their devotion to level up and go on quests to defeat those enemy gods. Sadly, as any evangelical will know, your new flock’s faith can become all too fragile.
The game mercifully makes the choice to remove morals entirely. As the lamb, you are free to brutally sacrifice and brainwash your followers. Alternatively, you may treat them with love and respect before sending them off to spread your gospel. The design is cartoonish, the gameplay easy to follow – and the result is infinitely binge-able.
Personal highlight:
The joy of converting followers into your cult to watch it grow.
Buy now £20.99, Xbox.com
Dying Light 2 — Saqib Shah
Rating: 18+
Platforms: PS5, PS4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Switch, PC
In a nutshell:
A gleefully mindless open-world survival horror game.
Why play it?
Dying Light 2 feels like it was made by a teenager who has binged too many zombie flicks and played too much Mirror’s Edge. The game drops you into a post-apocalyptic nightmare patrolled by the undead, with just your parkour and combat skills standing between you and a grisly death. Oh, and you’re also infected with a disease that leaves you prone to mutation when the sun sets. Hence, the title.
While hardly original, this sequel to the beloved 2015 game is at its best when you’re sprinting across rooftops, vaulting across buildings and generally pushing yourself to make crazier jumps. It’s even better played with mates, thanks to the four-player online co-op mode.
Personal highlight:
Grabbing a high-level weapon from other players to eviscerate zombies with.
Buy now £34.39, Amazon
As Dusk Falls – Alan Martin
Rating: 16+
Platforms: Xbox Series, Xbox One, PC
In a nutshell:
An overlooked choose-your-own-adventure story for adults.
Why play it?
I’m a sucker for games that force you to make consequential decisions along the way. The Walking Dead, Heavy Rain and Life is Strange would all have made it onto my list in past years – and As Dusk Falls follows the same tradition. It’s essentially based around a dizzying array of choices that help to decide each character’s fate via the magic of free will and chaos theory.
The weird frame-by-frame graphic novel style takes getting used to. However, the story – which intertwines the lives of two families brought together by a heist gone wrong – is fascinating. Better still, the characters are both interestingly written and varied. It didn’t get much attention at the time, but it’s well worth the seven hours it takes to finish the story – especially as you can vote on decisions as a group for a shared multiplayer experience.
Personal highlight:
Seeing the flow chart of missed choices at the end of each chapter.
Buy now £17.85, Shopto
Turbo Golf Racing – Barry Collins
Rating: 3+
Platforms: Xbox Series, Xbox One, Switch, PC
In a nutshell:
Golf with cars – think Rocket League played on fairways instead of football pitches.
Why play it?
With Epic Games largely leaving the popular Rocket League series to fester, it’s great to see another developer pick up the baton of multiplayer sports games played with cars. Here, up to eight players must smash massive golf balls around twisty, obstacle-strewn courses, each trying to be the first to sink the putt. Without doubt, there’s a proper adrenaline kick to Turbo Golf Racing.
You get Mario Kart-style power-ups along the way – and the ability to fire a rocket up the exhaust pipe of opponents, just as they’re lining up the killer putt, is sadistically satisfying. Alas, the online lobbies can be quite empty and there’s not much single-player fun here. Who knows? Maybe Epic will buy it and bring the Rocket League hordes flocking to the fairways.
Personal highlight:
Sinking a putt from such a long distance that all your opponents are forced to watch the replay.
Buy now £14.99, Xbox.com
Immortality – Stuart Andrews
Rating: 16+
Platforms: Xbox Series, Xbox One, PC, iOS, Android
In a nutshell:
Sift through clips from three forgotten movies to find out what really happened.
Why play it?
You’re going to find Immortalityon a lot of game of the year lists. That’s partly because, hey, everyone’s a movie critic these days, so what could be better than playing detective while scrambling through a mass of shots and out-takes, to find the common elements that link one clip to another?
Yet it’s also because Immortality is a game with layers of real depth. For a while, you’re piecing together clues that surround accidental deaths and illicit relationships, but then something shifts and you find hints of a darker truth. What looks simple at first turns out to be strange, spooky and wittingly misleading. Immortality’s recreations of dodgy sixties, seventies and nineties genre movies are note perfect, yet they camouflage a story based around art, perspective, power, sex and death. Once you’re into this game, you can’t get it out of your head.
Personal highlight:
Those first uncanny moments where the glitches start turning weird.
Buy now £16.74, Xbox.com
Vampire Survivors – Andrew Williams
Rating: 12+
Platforms: Xbox Series, Xbox One, PC
In a nutshell: Chaotic on the outside, easygoing dopamine-fest on the inside. It’s ideal for mindless play.
Why play it?
Why pay £70 for a premium game when this one costs under £4 and soaks up just as many happy hours? At first, Vampire Survivors feels like a top-down shooter throwback from the Nintendo SNES and Mega Drive era: drenched in 16-bit retro chic.
Here, though, you simply move around and your character will fire automatically. After a while, you realise that it often barely matters how you move because, with the right upgrades, your hoards of enemies will be vaporised before they can even touch you.
The real skill in Vampire Survivors is in choosing and upgrading weapons, finding killer combinations that line up like the winning combos on a fruit machine. After a while, you’ll wonder if it is as shallow as a fruit machine, too. But with no micro-transactions to weigh the thing down, you’ll bask in the fun of how vibrantly chaotic the screen becomes at the end of each run of sheer vampiric joy.
Personal highlight: The first time you “evolve” a weapon doesn’t half make you feel powerful.
Buy now £3.99, Xbox.com
