Sure, 2023 wasn’t as good a year for video games as 2022 (few years are, especially lately). But there were a bunch of really fun games, as you can see from my “Best Video Games Of 2023” list.
But it was just as bad, as you can see from the following list of my least favorite games of the year (which I present in the order I played them).
Though not as good as the year before (few years are), 2023 was still a really good year for video games. Or at least for the kind of games I like to play.
Here, in the order I played them, are my favorite games of 2023.
Four years after being released for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, Mac, and Stadia, and three since it came to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S, the sci-fi first-person shooter / action role-playing game Borderlands 3 is finally coming to the Switch as the Borderlands 3: Ultimate Edition.
And while it doesn’t add anything that would warrant owners of the previous versions to consider buying this edition as well, people who missed it the first time around — and, of course, enjoy deep sci-fi shooters with snarky sensibilities — would be well advised to pick this up.
Of all the questions I had after reading J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord Of The Rings, not once did I ever wonder what Gollum was up to in the years between them. Mostly because I just assumed he’d spent them in his cave, eating sushi, listening to Led Zeppelin, and lamenting the loss of his precious. But having played the deeply flawed third-person stealth action game The Lord Of The Rings: Gollum (PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Switch, PC), which covers this time period, but is a complete fabrication and not based on anything Tolkien wrote, I find myself even less interested in Gollum’s sad little life.
For years, I’ve started my “Best Video Games Of [insert year here]” lists by lamenting how it was a terrible year for games, but that there were some bright spots. Not this year. 2022 was easily the best year for games — well, the kind of games I like, anyway — in maybe 10 years.
Here, in the order I played them, are my favorite games of 2022.
As someone who spent the late-’70s and early-’80s watching Godzilla movies on TV, the classic mid-’80s arcade game Rampage — in which you get to be a gigantic monkey, wolf, and yeah, lizard who trashes a city — was an early favorite. It’s why I was so curious about Terror Of Hemasaurus (PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X / S, Xbox One, PC, Switch), an old school-style arcade game in which you, yeah, get to be a giant lizard who trashes a city…but in a way that adds new menace to his rampage.
If there’s one word that best describes the original Bayonetta it’s “ridiculous.” The action was ridiculous; the story was ridiculous; and the character was so ridiculously sexualized that, over the course of the game, she went from being offensively sexist to a parody of sexist characterizations to being practically misandrist (i.e., man hating) in how her overt sexuality seemed to mock those who found her behavior sexy. It was utterly, gloriously, unrepentantly ridiculous — and also ridiculously fun. Which is also where we find Bayonetta 3 (Switch), which has the same ridiculous kind of combat, story, and capering as the first game.
“The Deadsuit. Quiet for many years… On this day, something stirs within. Something new…” And with these ominous words, the adventure that is Ghost Song begins. A sci-fi, third-person, side-scrolling shooter for Xbox Series X / S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, PC, and Switch, Ghost Song is a modern version of a classic kind of game that manages to be as unique as it is familiar, and as flawed as it is fun.
As an old fool, I often like it when people kick it old school. Especially when those people are game designers making a first-person sci-fi shooter. But I also love modern conveniences. Which is why I was excited to try out Prodeus (Xbox Series X / S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Switch, PC), which the good people at Bounding Box Software have described as being an old school shooter with modern touches.