My Ten Most Anticipated Games of 2022

I feel like it’d be an over exaggeration, if not outright inaccurate, to say 2021 was a bad year for video games. Quite frankly, there were plenty of awesome new games or updates to existing ones. On a personal level, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart properly demonstrated the potential of the PlayStation 5, both Great Ace Attorney games finally made it to the West, and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate truly made the impossible possible by completing its roster with Sora from Kingdom Hearts.

But I will admit the industry itself has made it hard to be optimistic about 2022. Over the last twelve months, we’ve seen outright abysmal releases like the Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy remasters, the likes of Ubisoft and Square Enix committing to incorporating NFTs (the newest environmentally damaging grift) into their games, and then there’s just everything about Activision, which has once again highlighted how horrible the industry can be behind closed doors.

While it is important to acknowledge all the bad parts of this industry, even if it’s painful to do so, that doesn’t mean there’ll be no joy to be found in it either. As always, there are already a number of select games I’m looking forward to this year and I’m sure there are a number of amazing titles that haven’t been announced yet. Plus, this is a yearly tradition at this point so let’s get on with things and get to my ten most anticipated games of 2022.

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Favourite Moments in Fiction #18 – Peach Joins the Party (Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle)

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

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It’s very easy to make fun of Princess Peach considering her track record for being kidnapped, so I greatly appreciate any game that allows her to be more than the damsel-in-distress and actually take part in any sort of ass-kickery. Take Ubisoft’s strategy RPG crossover – I was already on board with seeing Mario packing heat but even arming sweet, innocent Peach? The image of her holding a giant shotgun is amazing on it’s own but Ubisoft went one step further. Continue reading

My VG Music Picks #76 – The Phantom of the Bwahpera, Act 1 / Act 3 (Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle)

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle

As I wrote in my review of the game last week, one of the joys of Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle is seeing all the crazy shit Ubisoft was able to incorporate into the world of Mario. You’d think Nintendo would’ve reigned them in but it feels as if they were quite lenient in regards to the silly shenanigans Ubisoft came up with. And I think, for quite a lot of us, the absolute pinnacle of delightful absurdity that they concocted was the Phantom of the Bwahpera. Continue reading

Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle – The Best Crossover No One Wanted

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I remember when this game was first leaked. So many people refused to believe it was even remotely true. A strategy-RPG crossover game starring Nintendo’s beloved Super Mario and Ubisoft’s iconic Raving Rabbids? Admittedly, it did sound so ludicrous that it just had to be fake but cut to E3 2017 and Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle was officially announced. It was all real. But what was even more surprising was that it looked really good.

The Rabbids’ name had certainly got a bit of a bad rap over the years due to many finding them obnoxious and annoying (before the Minions came along and managed to somehow be worse), but even some of the loudest dissenters couldn’t help but admit to being intrigued by this bizarre union between Nintendo and Ubisoft.

The game went on to become the best selling title on the Switch that wasn’t published by Nintendo and, as of September 2018, has sold over 2 million copies. This surprise smash hit won a lot of peoples’ hearts and I’ve been meaning to write up a review of it since the DLC came out last year. So let’s not waste any more time and dive right into the wonderfully, weird world of Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle. Continue reading