Games I played in 2022

Have you ever had that feeling that you forgot to do something… like update your blog in the last 10 years? Maybe I will go back and see if I can chart a history of what I played over that time. My last post on this blog was 2012. Day Z was hot shit, and I had just purchased a reasonably powerful gaming PC. That machine is still under my desk, now relegated to photoshop and video editing. I really love that PC case though, looks a bit like an abstract storm trooper according to Dina. Anyway, here (in chronological order) is what I played this year.

 

Frontier Pilot Simulator

The way this game feels in it’s interface takes me back to flight sims on the Amiga and PC in the 90’s. It’s a mix of being a bit basic, combined with not being well explained. Sometimes a game being slightly obscure can make it more interesting. Frontier Pilot Simulator (FPS) is a flight game based on flying cargo hauling VTOL (Vertical Take Off and Landing) aircraft on a newly colonised planet.

Starting off with the small, nippy Scarab, you can progress through the mid-sized Ox to the jumboesque Behemoth. The flight controls really remind me of Zarch, the 80’s game where you controlled the thrust of a small ship with mouse presses to burst or feather the throttle. A 360 pad makes the process much easier, and the inertia, weight and wind make the flying interesting. When you are carrying a full load your craft is sluggish, sometimes being too heavy to successfully hover. Whilst the flight model is detailed, this is not a full on hardcore sim, more sitting halfway between arcade and simmy. Reminds me a bit of Dropship United peace force, that PS2 ode to the dropship from Aliens.

Frontier Pilot Simulator has you flying round a large map, completing jobs for various interests on the planet, from mining people through to scientists and tourists. You can take jobs that allow you to build out certain locations to have more facilities. This is a pretty chill experience, one to slap on that 70’s play list (maybe the soundtrack to Air America?) and enjoy your space trucking.

 

Pine

I got ill at the start of 2022, and was off work for a couple of months. Not feeling too great, I wanted something easy and chill to play, and Pine fit that bill really well. I have not had a console since the PS3, so I feel I miss out on some games. I was really interested in Breath of the Wild when it came out. I love the adventure of an open world. I mean, I really do want to go over there and climb that mountain, that sounds like a good time. Pine feels like it has been influenced by Zelda games, but as I have never played a Zelda game, I feel like I might be missing out on some of the cues and nods they are providing.

I really enjoyed the running around in this game. The way you interact with the different factions in the game, endearing yourself to them or aggravating them according to what you are trying to do is really interesting. The combat system has a bit too it, but I did not really engage with it too deeply. The world design and music are really well done, and what they have created is a world that is really pleasant to visit.

Given that more and more games are layering in RPG elements these days, I can see this being a good game for younger people to start to get to grips with light RPG mechanics. I had a really pleasant time with Pine, and it did not overstay its welcome. After 30 hours I had seen the main story through and done a chunk of side stuff. A really great game to play if you are recuperating and want something light.

 

PUBG (Player Unknown’s BattleGrounds)

Whilst I was recuperating, I also was wondering if I could still play “real” video games. My reactions felt thick and slow (although let’s be fair, I was never what you call a twitch gamer). When it came time to get back on the horse, I chose PUBG as the vehicle for seeing if I could still do it. PUBG in 2022 is in a weird space. Brendan Greene near single handedly created the Battle Royale genre, springing from the fervour that surrounded DayZ and ArmA2. I think in the 10 years since I last posted, I have easily played over 2,000 hours of ArmA2 and 3. I remember playing Battle Royale in ArmA3 (I was always more partial to Sa-Matra’s wasteland), and it did not hook me although it did have the hallmark of later PUBG – it was terrifying! Jeff Gerstmann (from the Jeff Gerstmann show) described PUBG as a horror game and I think he is spot on.

Anyway, 2022 PUBG is now split between ranked and casual, with casual being full of AI controlled BOTs in lieu of real players. Unsurprisingly, this makes it a hell of a lot easier for clunkers like me who cannot keep up with these damn kids. In a typical casual match, I think the split is about 75% bots and 25% people. This suited me fine, and I was even able to get the occasional chicken dinner. Dropping into a match with 100% real people is obviously much tougher, I can maybe get a kill or two but I can’t really put the whole package together to be super competitive.

Regardless, I enjoyed my time with PUBG. Running round Erangle is like visiting your old home town. New additions like mortars and drones are fun to mess with. Hurtling across the landscape on a motorbike trying to pull backflips will always be fun to me. I can’t say that I love the smaller maps, but I know they need to keep the player base ticking. It's not the kind of thing I could do daily, but it’s nice to see PUBG still trucking.

 

Xcom2 LWOTC

XCOM! Long War! That's XCOM baby! Etc etc. 2013’s XCOM:EU/EW was transformational for me. Not since playing Nobunaga's Ambition on my little sisters game boy has turn based combat completely grabbed me like this. Oooh, and Space Crusade back on the Amiga. I often lean away from grand strategy (I find it overwhelming) and more into small scale, tactical stuff. Long War is the incredible mod for the 2013 game that turns the main campaign into a longer, deeper and richer experience. There's a brilliant quote from XCOM Lead Designer, Jake Solomon, in which he says: "We're basically a 20-hour tutorial for Long War, and that's okay." (Thanks Eurogamer!)

When XCOM 2 dropped in 2016, it was great, and the mods for it were fantastic and varied. But it took a long time for Long War to come to XCOM2. The expansion Wrath of the Chosen made the process more complicated, and when you add in the complexity of everyone running a bunch of other mods as well… it’s a lot. Eventually Long War of the Chosen came out, and this was my third attempt at trying to play it on normal difficulty, the previous two attempts having failed (that’s XCOM baby, as they say on Reddit).

LWOTC adds a much deeper strategy layer to XCOM2. You are thinking about:

·         What territories am I operating in

·         What missions am I discovering

·         What are my infiltration times

·         What are my upgrades

·         How much am I raising Advent’s awareness/hostility

·         What are my resources and tech vs what are their resources and tech

·         Do I have scientists and engineers?

·         Oh and the bloody avatar project (Yeah Bradford, you told us)

There is a lot to learn and a lot to manage. In my first two playthroughs, I was managing OK on the tactical level but was so behind on the strategy layer that Advent were starting to field units that I could not effectively kill. In this playthrough I paid much more attention to making sure I was always current on my weapons and armour tech. My usual approach to XCOM is to use a lot of custom characters based on some folks I know (hey Where’s My Demo and Warhawks lads). I then populate the rest with movie folks (Aliens, Predator, 80’s action movie staples). I love the bit where after you complete a mission you get to make a propaganda poster, but in previous playthroughs I spent too much time doing that, so for this run I just left them mostly on default.

Overall, finally finishing a LWOTC campaign was really satisfying. However, the definitive Long War experience is still 2013’s XCOM EU/EW. During the pandemic, I played LWR (Long War Rebalanced) mod, and that was the best I think Long War has ever been for me.

 

Warhammer 40,000: Sanctus Reach

I have been interested in this game from 2017 for a while. I think the team set out to try and translate the WH40k tabletop game to a video game. Army Points Totals, weapon ranges and weapon loadouts were very familiar from my forays into the strange world of WH40k in the 1990’s. I played through the main campaign with most of the DLC and was pretty much done after 50 hours or so. Sanctus Reach is good but not great. If you are interested in WH40k, there are loads of other games that do more with the lore and the richness of the universe (more on this in a mo).

The turn based approach with large armies and pretty basic graphics does mean the game is not demanding (both mentally and computationally). The kind of thing you can leave running in the background, make some moves and then step away again. Whilst I think I played about 50 hours, the GOG client tells me I had it running for 150, so it was obviously on in the background a lot. I think there are plenty of other offerings for big battle Warhammer scenarios, so this is one only for the deeply interested.  

 

Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor Martyr

So this year saw me reading a lot of WH40k books. I had previously enjoyed Dan Abnett’s Inquisitor books, and when I saw there were new installations in the series (the Bequin trilogy being well underway) I decided to reread them all. I often find that I want to play games that align to whatever I am reading, and this coincided with the Warhammer Skulls sale over the summer. I snapped up Inquisitor Martyr, Battlesector (which I have not touched yet, as I had just finished Sanctus Reach and was not ready for more of the same straight away) and Space Marine Anniversary Edition. I had very little idea of what to expect from Inquisitor Martyr. ARPGs had largely passed me by, I never played any of the Diablo games when they were popular, and so my only experience with ARPGs was Torchlight (and some of Torchlight 2). 

Inquisitor Martyr provided me with 100 hours plus of fun. It helped that by the time I came to the game it was 4 years old, meaning there was plenty of additional content to explore. Playing the crusader class, I messed with a bunch of different builds and weapons. The story itself is not bad, but the setting is fantastically grimdark, and that combined with the enemy variety and satisfying gameplay loop kept me coming back. The support for controller on PC was well appreciated, as I spent more time playing it on the couch than on the desktop. The endgame void crusades were rewarding to mess around with, and whilst I did not use them, the co-op features seem like a nice touch. The amount of action they were able to cram onto a screen was seriously impressive (it can get hectic), and there is depth aplenty in the classes. And sure, an Inquisitor murdering hundreds of millenia old chaos marines is a bit cheesy, but it's a video game - the suspension of disbelief was not hard to come by. This has really got me thinking about taking a look at Diablo 4 next year (especially if it comes to Steam).

Warhammer 40,000: Space marine anniversary edition

So I saw the trailer for the new space marine game coming in 2023, this went on sale and since I was already neck deep in WH40k games I said why not. This game was unusual for me in that I played 10 hours and was done, but I had a good time for those 10 hours. I am pretty sure I turned the difficulty down as I was having trouble getting the combat system down, and honestly it never occurred to me to turn it back up. This is an OK game (An OrK game? -Ed). WH40k Orks are always a bit of a laugh. Some of the sequences in this are great, like wielding a thunder hammer with a jump pack and smashing large groups of enemies. The shooting is pretty basic. I will probably check out Space Marine 2 when it goes on sale.

Warhammer 40,000:Mechanicus

This is probably the best WH40k game to date, the game I enjoyed most in 2022, and is perhaps my favourite game music of all time. Released in 2018, I had grabbed it in a steam sale at some point but not started it until this year. This game immediately hooked me and dragged me in. At its core it is an XCOM clone, turn based combat with a neat feature whereby action points (called cogitation points) are not a given, fixed resource but must be harvested - from computers in the world, from enemies, and eventually from techno spiritual abilities. It is a neat dynamic that took me a while to learn. When you add in to this the difficulty curve of Mechanicus (starts harder, shifts to easier as you get more powerful) I can understand why some people may bounce off this.

But if you persevere, there is a real gem of a game here. You can upgrade your party of Tech Priests and their support teams. You can acquire loot and build loadouts and spec out priests to fulfil different roles - as it’s WH40k, walking close to the enemy and smashing with a large axe is always an option. You are presented with choices throughout each mission. Do you explore more but increase the enemies you will fight? Do you stop to help beleaguered troops from your ship? Every action can have a consequence here. There are senior tech magi on your ship whose goals do not always align. The story is good, the atmosphere is great, and all of this is further enhanced by Guillaume David’s phenomenal soundtrack. Blending deep heavy synth bass sounds with choral chanting and industrial percussion, he really pulled out all the stops (pun intended) for this one.

Being able to play with a controller on a TV was a key part to why I enjoyed my time with this game so much. It was also one of the few games that I replayed fully twice, completing the whole thing to see two different endings. If you like WH40k, or if you like XCOM style turn based combat, this is a must play.

SnowRunner

Some games can be super intense, demanding concentration, planning, situation awareness and so on. SnowRunner is not one of those games. It is a game I liked to play to chill out. Throw on the 60’s/70’s playlist on Spotify and just drive this truck along these muddy tracks, picking up or dropping off logs. SnowRunner adds a lot to the previous iterations of the game (SpinTires and MudRunner). Some of the interfaces are more streamlines, there are more tucks to buys, more jobs to do, and bigger, linked maps (they feel bigger anyway). Truck modifications and upgrades are now a thing, and mod support remains a great way to enhance the game beyond the base content. SnowRunner is at its best as a multiplayer experience though. It is undemanding, and having a mate come and winch you out of a ditch makes the game much easier. Grab a beer, get on Discord, and get trucking!

Project Zomboid

In the last two weeks, project Zomboid broke into my top ten most played games of all time on steam (at 230 hours total). It was my most played game of 2022, accounting for 19% of the time I spent on Steam. It is funny that I started this blog talking about DayZ, because whilst the way you play this game (isometric camera view, very zoomed out) is completely different, this game gives me really strong DayZ vibes. 

Set in Kentucky in the summer of 1993, the game sees you thrust into a full on Zombie outbreak. The game starts by informing you “This is how you died”. A neat touch, as death in zomboid is as inevitable as taxes. At the start you  are in your home which is randomized each time, could be a trailer in a trailer park, could be a nice detached two story house, could be an apartment in a busy city. The early phase of the game is gearing up, going around looking for weapons, stocking up on food, and watching TV shows to gain skills. Sometime over the next 30 days, power and water go out, which makes cooking food and storing food much harder. Fail to prepare and you end up crouched in the woods, sharpening sticks and eating raw squirrels.

The zombies in Zomboid are legion. Individually, they do not pose a big threat, however when they are in groups they are far more dangerous. They are drawn in by sound, so whilst there are guns in the game, their use is highly situational. The difficulty of the game varies a lot, with the default apocalypse difficulty making avoiding combat the best bet. I ended up playing on survivor difficulty most of the time, which makes combat more manageable.

The zombies can bite, lacerate or scratch you. Bites are 100% fatal - you will die at some point over the next few days, whilst the other two carry percentage chances to infect you - and infection with the knox virus is 100% lethal (can be altered by mods, I chose not to). There are a million ways to die in Kentucky. Some memorable bits include:

• Nearly getting Wilfred killed when he stood on a burning fireplace and could not run. Camped out in the woods drinking rainwater for a week.

• Losing Wilfred after 4 months and 2400 kills to a single zombie when he failed to push them away whilst looting a police station and dying to a scratch on the hand

• Losing a 1 month character who fell off a roof due to a misclick

• Losing Edmond after two months, just after he had secured the gas station in Muldraugh (got sloppy in combat)

• Losing a survivor because a companion (superb survivors mod) pushed them into a zombie mob    

Once you pick a place to stay and secure it, the late game becomes about farming, trapping, fishing, water: standard survival game stuff. I think the game keeps me coming back for a few reasons. I really love the setting. The jump scares still get me, even after 200 hours there is a genuine feeling of terror when you open a door to find that the bathroom has 20 zombies in it. Any time I do die in the game, it is my own fault. You can chose to spawn a new character into an existing world and reclaim your old base, but I prefer to wipe the slate clean and start again.

I recently started playing with mods, and it has added a lot to the game for me. The main thing has been fixing some annoying bugs. When you design a character, you can take positive and negative traits. Negative traits award you points to spend on positive traits. I often take smoker, but in the base game you can only light a cigarette with matches or a lighter. Not a campfire or a barbeque though. So a mod fixes that, allowing me to light tabs from an oven, or a car (all cars in the 90’s had cigarette lighters, come on). I tried the splendid survivors mod for a while that adds both friendly and hostile NPCs to the world, but have turned it off for my latest run. It is nice having people chop wood for you, but ultimately I started seeing more survivors than zombies, so I turned it off. NPCs are on the developers roadmap. Speaking of which, Zomboid has had over 10 years of development - it really shows the labour of love that this game is to the team who make it. Project Zomboid would be my game of the year for 2022. 

Battletech

I have been playing HBS Battletech since 2019. While I have never played the tabletop game, the mechwarrior games were an early part of my PC gaming experience. Rather than putting you in the cockpit, Battletech pulls you out to a turn based strategy layer as you control your mercenary lance on a variety of missions. The running of your own mercenary company is a big part of the hook for me here. Hiring and firing pilots, salvaging mech’s, upgrading your ship - there is a lot to do here. You can fly from system to system (there are hundreds to visit if not thousands), pick and choose your contracts, build faction rep, and participate in special scripted flashpoint missions for greater rewards.

Whilst the base game is fantastic, the mod support is nothing short of incredible. The battletech universe is supported by reams of fiction (much of it churned out in the 80’s when military science fiction was riding a wave - think of the Aliens movies for example). There are many total overhaul mods. Having previously played the BEX (Battletech extended) mod that focused on lore and adding more Mech’s. I decided to try the BTA (Battletech advanced) mod that overhauls the gameplay and adds new vehicles as well as new mechs. One of the thing I really liked about BTA is how it handled evasion (how hard a mech is to hit based on how fast it is going). This increases the viability of the light mechs you acquire in the early game, making them more viable into the later game.

Something about Battletech makes it scratch the same itch that XCOM does, which is probably why I passed 1,000 hours in the game in 2022. That makes it my second most played game on Steam, after ArmA 3.