I was looking back fondly on this year now that we’re into 2022 and there have been a lot of great releases, and it got me wondering what your favorite game of the year was. To make things more fun, I think it’d be neat if we picked one Choice of Games and one Hosted Game. Here’s a list of them to help you remember:
Choice of Games
-Fate of the Storm Gods by Bendi Barrett
-VERSUS: The Deathscapes by Zachary Sergi
-Belle-de-Nuit by Rebecca Zahabi
-Pugmire: Treasure of the Sea Dogs by Eddy Webb
-Vampire: The Masquerade — Out for Blood by Jim Dattilo
-Battlemage: Magic by Mail by Nic Barkdull
-The Play’s the Thing by Jo Graham and Amy Griswold
-Wraiths of SENTINEL by Paul Gresty
-Parliament of Knives by Jeffrey Dean
-Cliffhanger: Challenger of Tomorrow by William Brown
-Faerie’s Bargain: The Price of Business by Trip Galey
-Witchcraft U by Jei D. Marcade
-Pon Para and the Unconquerable Scorpion by Kyle Marquis
Hosted Games
-Relics of the Lost Age by James Shaw
-Clans of Éire: The Brothers War by Fionn Graham
-Keeper of the Day and Night by Brynn Chernosky
-The Mage’s Adventures by Sam Young
-The War of 2022 by YHGS
-Lux, City of Secrets by Thom Baylay
-Donor by Elena Hearty
-Fifty by Rustem Khafizov
-A Kiss From Death by William Loman
-Dinosaur Island Escape by Chris Viola
-Pirates of Donkey Island by Gilbert Gallo
-Blood for Poppies by ME Smith
-The Vampire Regent by Morton Newberry & Lucas Zaper
-Rain King by Marvin K
-Interstellar Airgap by John Lance
-The Horror Behind the Walls by Alex Ryan
-Raiders of the Icepeak Mountains by Adrao
-Temple of Endless Night by Dariel Ivalyen
-Faerie’s Bargain on the Choice of Games side. A very replayable and complex (in a good way) game with multi-layered choices and a concept that really clicked with me.
-Relics of the Lost Age on the Hosted Games side. Again, very replayable, even if it is a “simple” concept, lots of fun interactivy and roleplaying potential. Didn’t think it’d be that much for me as I’m not that big into the Indiana Jones movies, but it’s just so well done that I was in for the ride anyways.
The Play’s the Thing would have to be my favorite CoG title from 2021: great setting and characters, fascinating plot and meaningful choices, well-written, and full of Shakespeare references and reflections on the writing life. Witchcraft U would have been a contender, but I accidentally wiped out all my progress halfway through and haven’t finished it yet. And Faerie’s Bargain deserves special note as one of the most beautifully written CS games ever.
My favorite Hosted Game of 2021 is a tie between A Kiss from Death and The Vampire Regent. Both are dark but deeply fascinating tales set in richly imagined worlds, brought to life by elegantly crafted, evocative prose.
Underrated games that deserved more love or attention than they got: Battlemage, Donor, Pugmire
(Also, welcome to the community, Tyler! Happy New Year!)
So many great titles came.put this year, what a list!
I think for CoG I’d have to go Vampire Masquerade Out for Blood (with Fate of the Storm Gods as a runner up) and for HG it’d be DONOR (with LUX as a close 2nd) though there are SO.MANY titles.on those lists that I loved
On the Choice of Games side, unconquerable scorpion was the best, with only Parland of knives coming anywhere close; on the Hosted Games side, I would say it’s a tossup between relics of the lost age and keeper of day and night
Also, just curious, but what did you like so much about out for blood? I played it and, well, it failed to meet my expectations completely, and all of the other people I talked to said the same thing. Is there something we missed?
Well, I enjoyed the whole feel of the town (it really did feel lived in to me, like it was a place from the MC’s past) and the cast of characters were very unique and intriguing. I enjoyed the whole “try to run a store” aspect and enjoy just about anything with romance and vampires, so it was a win win win win for me, personally. I love the series, but liked the fact that there wasn’t so much exposition about the different factions/politics. It just felt like a fun adventure to me, and I was here for it. (Also I tested continuity, so I read through 25+ of the beta testers playthroughs, and noticed that there were new scenes to read in every single seed, so the choices really did matter - there were MANY different versions of every path, which I really appreciated). I am sure everyone has reasons to like or dislike any game…hoping this thread stays uplifting. These were all great games, even if some didn’t care for a few.of them.
Agreed very much with the uplifting message. I think that makes the thread much more enjoyable. Build up your favorites instead of trying to tear the other ones down!
There weren’t many stories in the past year that interested me enough to check them out or purchase the full version, if I’m being honest (not saying they’re bad), and generally speaking I’m way more interested in HG than COG, so I’d have to say Lux, City of Secrets, which was horribly overpriced for the reading time it offered in my opinion (the total word count doesn’t matter if I’m not the type of reader who checks out many different paths), but it was well-written and gave me a chance to continue being Winter’s devoted doormat, so there’s that.
For COGs it’s a tie between Cliffhanger and the second Pon Para COG. For HGs it’s Lux, city of secrets. I do think it would have been better if the writer had just released one Lux instead of dividing it into two, but it’s still fun to watch my character grow and plenty of interesting encounters for me to experience and I both enjoy getting to know RO’s even better and both meeting old side characters again and meeting new ones.
Cog it’s hard to choose because it was a very strong year lol toss up between cliffhanger and fate of the storm gods. HG I will say evertree book 3 but they’re always a strong contender series and book wise.
