Gaming in 2022: Loss & The Not So New Normal
Roger Whitson, Managing Editor
Major Spoiler Warnings for all games mentioned!
I began 2022 wondering when or if we’d ever end the pandemic. 2022 was the year I first contracted COVID. 2022 was also a year punctuated by losses. While I met new friends and began finally teaching in person once again, I also lost a few loved ones. My Aunt Jan died suddenly. I’ll miss the spontaneous conversations we had on Facebook. My cat Buddha abruptly stopped eating and died in June, probably due to an aggressive case of lymphoma. Buddha spent countless hours on my lap as I explored dungeons, spaceports, haunted castles, and mythical realms — as I have recounted in two GwG articles.
For 2022’s list, I decided to focus less on games and more on top moments of gaming that impacted me. There were several games I wanted to play but couldn’t: Pentiment, Immortality, Citizen Sleeper, Neon White, and Sifu. Marvel’s Midnight Suns looked intriguing, as did Gotham Knights. But I am tired of playing games where I am an unnamed character surrounded by more popular heroes. I’d rather be Spider-Man than Spider-Man’s pal, “Insert Name Here.” And the disappointed reviews of Gotham Knights kept me from spending my money. I’ll wait to grab these games when they’re cheaper.
2023 anticipations: Hellboy: Web of Wyrd, Earthblade, Armored Core 6, Star Wars: Jedi Survivor. I thought I’d start including some anticipations for the coming year, if only to be able to look back and compare. My most anticipated game is probably Star Wars: Jedi Survivor. I loved Jedi Outcast. Not only did it have a unique approach to gameplay and the force in particular, its storyline and voice acting were compelling. I’ve never played any of the Armored Core games (please make them available for the PS5, Sony!), but I’m fascinated to explore From Software’s lesser-known property. I know nothing about Earthblade, but I love Celeste and can’t wait to see more from this development team. And I’m a longtime fan of Hellboy and its neo-noir, gothic take on occult superhero-ing. The cel-shading looks perfectly Mignola-esque.
Killing Heimdall, God of War: Ragnarok (Santa Monica Studio)
Heimdall wins the biggest asshole award in gaming for 2022. I really wanted to see him taken down. Yet, so much of Kratos’s journey in both of the Norse-themed God of War games involves rejecting his war-like past and embracing his role as a father. A few times in Ragnarok, Kratos catches himself falling back into old patterns and worries that he’s fundamentally a killer. Kratos’s various battles with Thor showcases both of their struggles to be more weapons. I still winced when, convinced that Heimdall would stop at nothing to kill his son, Kratos savagely beat the god and choked the life out of him. To be fair, Kratos gave Heimdall two opportunities to survive. But as someone who struggles against toxic masculinity, I couldn’t help but feel like my own aggressive tendencies were on display. Oof.
Becoming a Pigman, Weird West (WolfEye Studios)
I loved the anthology-style structure of Weird West. As the bounty-hunter Jane, I enjoyed what seemed to be a fairly-typical Western story about vengeance. Then as I started the second part of the anthology, I woke up as a pigman. The shift in perspective from human outlaw to pig mutant radically transformed the game. The pigman story involved chasing down enemies with a meat-cleaver, then raising my health by devouring their corpses. And there was the part where a witch feeds the souls of pigmen to the Soul Tree, turning them into mindless automatons. From werewolves to indigenous protectors based upon the real-life Anishinaabe people, Weird West kept challenging my understanding of what an RPG and a story could do.
Breastfeeding my child, Amnesia: Rebirth (Frictional Games)
Amnesia: Rebirth is not only a horror game, it’s a unique experiment in the limits of simulating gender and embodiment. The main character Tasi is a mother traumatized by the death of her child due to a rare disease whose symptoms resemble Tay-Sachs. She’s also pregnant. One mechanic allowed me to feel my pregnant belly, hear the heartbeat of my child, and reduce my fear in the process. It also featured a moment where Tasi breastfeeds her child. This was the first time I’ve seen a game depict breastfeeding, let alone allow me to experience it from a first-person POV. Of course, as a male-identifying gender nonconforming person, I can’t comment on the realism of Amnesia: Rebirths depictions of pregnancy and breastfeeding. But it was a dizzying, transformative, powerful experience nonetheless.
Suspecting that the game is a Deckbuilder? ARG? YouTube videos? An RPG?, Inscryption (Daniel Mullins Games)
What exactly is Inscryption? I’m a big fan of Slay the Spire and other deckbuilders, so I thought the game would be perfect for me. It was perfect for me, but not at all in the way I expected. The 8-bit exploration, the scrybes, the different decks, the videos, the melancholy metatextual ending – what had I stumbled onto? I have yet to play Kaycee’s Mod or hunt down the ARG clues many redditors have mentioned. And while I understand the frustration some reviewers expressed about Inscryption being so much more than just another deckbuilder, I truly enjoyed the narrative vertigo created by the game’s labyrinthine structure.
Realizing I’m a robot, Soma (Frictional Games)
Looking back on it, there were so many hints early on in the game: labor bots who were talking about things they couldn’t possibly know or understand, numerous documents describing a comet that has destroyed the surface population, and a brain-scanning machine that is supposed to cure Simon of his mystery disease. Yet I still remember the panic I felt when I finally made it to the Comms center, only to it flood with water. I desperately looked for some way to escape the waters rising around my body. There was no escape, and I didn’t need one, because I WASN’T A HUMAN, I WAS A ROBOT. Soma is full of misdirection obscuring a very posthuman story. There are no necessary selves exemplifying the human condition. There is only the fragility of the human body and our half-successful attempts to survive. By showcasing such difficult truths, Soma reminded me how effectively horror can serve as a vehicle for compassion.
Mourning B-12, Stray (BlueTwelve Studio)
As a cat-lover, I was always going to play Stray. It just happened that my own cat died Buddha right before the game dropped, becoming one of the many ways I mourned his passing. B-12’s death toward the end of the game acts as a gorgeous reminder of the interconnection of all things. B-12 is technically the final human being uploaded into a robot, making for some interesting comparisons with Soma. Yet, we only really recognize B-12’s humanity in one small part of the game. This is because humanity isn’t all that important to the game. Instead, Stray is a game about friendships that emerge in the midst of impossibility. I saw a meme the other day that said: “I have a cat! He’s my best friend! We can’t talk!” It really encapsulated my relationship with Buddha. I could never talk to him, and yet he knew me better than anyone else.
Sacrificing my follower for an extra life, Cult of the Lamb (Massive Monster)
Cult of the Lamb was full of ethical quandaries. Do I spend my time fighting demons or feeding and cleaning my followers? I don’t know why, but some combination of my followers cutsy, cartoonish, babyfaced personas and the heaviness of the game struck me as particularly horrifying. Can they really not take care of themselves? And when I was given the option to sacrifice my followers for an extra life or transmutate them into a demon to help me in battle, I was introduced to the truly addictive evil of the game. There’s a level of responsibility at the heart of Cult of the Lamb that feels similar to raising kids, and yet each one of my children are there only to increase my power. Only a lucky few would make it to a natural death, and I held their funerals. The vast majority of their lives were discarded in the march to my inevitable victory.
Being Terrified by Shellfish, Elden Ring (FromSoftware)
Soulsbourne games are full of frightening enemies. How many times was I overwhelmed by crabs slamming their claws into me, spitting water into my face, and making a mockery of any of my (many) attempts to run away? Of course, the developers of Elden Ring weren’t satisfied with one shellfish enemy. I screamed at unholy prawns with human hands (Lesser Kindred of Rot) who would evade all of my swipes and shoot heat-sinking needles at me. Lobsters were introduced who not only had more devastating claw attacks — but sniped me at range, killing me instantly. Apart from the masochism Miyazaki’s confessed in some interviews, he must have some particularly strange dreams involving shellfish.
Games I still need to play: Immortality, Pentiment, Tunic, Citizen Sleeper, Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course, Neon White, Horizon Forbidden West, Marvel’s Midnight Suns, Sifu, Scorn
