The votes are in! During the first month of the year the lovely XboxEra Community has the opportunity to vote on their favourite games of the previous year. And this year is no exception.

This year we’ve got the same categories as last year:

• Best Ongoing Game
• Best Indie game
• Game of the Year

Want to participate in our Community Game of the Year and other community events? Make sure to sign up on our forums. We’d argue it’s a great place to discuss video games!

Let’s get started. These are the best games of 2022 according to the XboxEra community members.

Best ongoing game

For the first time since we’ve done these community awards the award for Best ongoing game isn’t going to Sea of Thieves. This category shows that Microsoft’s ongoing titles still have an impact on the Xbox community. The top three ongoing titles are published by Xbox Game Studios. But, with quite some margin, the most voted ongoing title is Forza Horizon 5 by Playground Games. The open world racing games has kept players engaged during 2022 after a successful 2021 release. The same can be said for Halo Infinite, but problems with delivering enough content could’ve hurt the title in this vote. The winner of 2020 and 2021, Sea of Thieves, finishes the top 3.

1. Forza Horizon 5
2. Halo Infinite
3. Sea of Thieves

Best independent game

Naming this category the ‘Game Pass impact award’ could be suitable. The surprise indie hit Vampire Survivors wins this category by beating Tunic. Other titles in the top 5 most voted independent games are Tinykin, High on Life and Nobody saves the world.

1. Vampire Survivors
2. Tunic
3. Tinykin
4. High on Life
5. Nobody saves the world

The XboxEra Community Game of the Year

The meat and bones of these awards are up next. These are the twenty most voted on games in our Community Game of the Year vote. The entire list will be posted on our Community Forums. The twenty entrances on this list will be accompanied by a quote from our community on why they liked these games so much. This is a community vote afterall!

20. Immortality

We start with one of the surprise indie hits for Xbox in 2022. It’s Immortality. Our community member jasheeldz:had this to say: ”Is this a game? Who fucking knows. But I will say that it was one of the only actually mind blowing experiences I’ve had as a gamer where YOU are the character in the game, a true RPG, but delivered in such a strange way, with such a strange story.” If that doesn’t entice you to play.. what will?!

19. Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga

A LEGO game making a Game of the Year list doesn’t happen very often. But, TT Games did a good job with this one. It received votes from various community members, such as PhantomFox: ”Probably one of the best LEGO games yet. It would’ve been nice if the levels were longer and had more depth to them, but there are a lot of them and they do a great job at representing all the different eras of Star Wars. The hub worlds are fantastic, though. It’s a lot of fun just going around, solving puzzles and collecting things. There’s a ton of content in the game, definitely worth it.”

18. Gotham Knights

Another Warner Bros. title makes our top 20. The game impressed enough people in our community as it received a lot of votes. Gotham Knights was on the list of Peter42O, who put it in #9. But, if you look at the games he has played it’s already an achievement of itself that it has made his top 10.

17. Sonic Frontiers

The one and only PhantomFox had a lot to say about Sonic Frontiers: ”Huge Sonic fan, so really glad this turned out well. Of course, it isn’t perfect. The game’s got some jank and it certainly felt like some aspects weren’t totally fleshed out towards the end of the game. But man, this game was a blast. Whether it be running around in the open world, fighting enemies, speedrunning cyberspace levels, or partaking in the game’s amazing boss fights, this game was just so hard to put down. Also, the music, oh man. You can definitely tell the team cares this time around, and I’m really excited to see what’s next.”

16. Nobody saves the world

Remember Nobody saves the world? Zip was surprised by the indie game which came out in the start of 2022. ”Not really something that I was expecting but had a great time with this and need to get around to the dlc.” Not much to add there. Another independent game making the top 20.

15. Sniper Elite 5

A day one addition to Game Pass, Sniper Elite 5 impressed plenty of our community members. Astrakan wrote:”For my money the Sniper Elite series continue to be one of the most underappreciated franchises out there. I love the stealthy sandboxy gameplay, how it rewards you for being patient, and the fact that it’s one of the few series that continues to allow you to play through the campaign in co-op mode. It also doesn’t hurt that it’s beautiful to look at.” And there is more praise from our community for this game. For example, 404 user not found had this to say: ”Having a vehicle explode right next to me made me jump a bit, and while I see some stuff like rain splashing across a tree texture that’s out of place or people walking and warping through trucks, there’s nothing else like this.”

14. Grounded

Hey, this is a contribtion I recognize. Grounded was one of my favourite games of 2022. While most time spent on it was during the Early Access period, the game is one of the must play co-op games on Xbox and Xbox Game Pass. I had this to say when posting my list:”An amazing survival game with friends. Even for people who aren’t that much into survival games. A friend of mine recently bought an Xbox. And we’ll be playing more of this for sure.”

13. Persona 5 Royal

After a small discussion if this game should be allowed to be eligible for this list, we’ve decided that it deserves the recognition. Plenty of players in the Xbox community experienced the Persona franchise for the first time in 2022. One of them was PhantomFox: ”I know it’s a port but I’m gonna include it anyway. It’s too good of a game not to do so. The turn-based gameplay felt quite fluid, and I loved going through the game’s many dungeons.

The awesome presentation and music just elevated the experience even more. I honestly didn’t like the social aspects at first, but they grew on me as I went on. The story was great, but it was the Royal-exclusive third semester that really elevated it for me, that whole segment was definitely one of the best things in gaming I’ve experienced thus far.”

12. As Dusk Falls

As Dusk Falls is a narrative game with multiplayer from Xbox Game Studios. It’s not for everyone, but thanks to some fans in our community it made it to #12. One of these fans was 404 username not found, who had one important complaint: ”My biggest complaint with this game is how hard it is to get my other players together to play it. It’s a great first title from a talented studio and I’m excited to see what else they do.”

11. Overwatch 2

Our reviews editor Doncabesa is a big fan of Overwatch 2. He had this to say about it: ”Overwatch 2 is a rebirth for one of my favorite games of the past generation. Featuring great new heroes, gorgeous and well-balanced new maps, a new mode in Push that I’ve greatly enjoyed, and a progression system that feels about the same as most free-to-play titles it’s an easy recommendation for both new and returning players alike. Add in an upcoming PVE co-op mode next year and I can see myself easily putting another one or two thousand hours into this title over the coming few years.”

10. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge

Our senior editor OneBadMutha summarized TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge in a few words: ”Great arcade era gameplay” Our co-founder and podcast lead Spheshal Nick used a few extra words: ”Between the co-op, collectibles, challenges, achievements and upgrades, there’s more reasons to keep going back to Shredder’s Revenge than probably any other game in the genre has ever provided. This is all on top of fun and fantastic combat and a nostalgia overload that most should love. But even those who weren’t necessarily fans of the Ninja Turtles, still have a great scrolling beat ’em up to make their way through.”

9. Kirby and the Forgotten Land

A Nintendo game in the top 10? Oh yes! The user saintsflow20 has the perfect explanation why: ”Kirby games are always good fun, and the transition to 3D went very well! As always, I love exploring the levels and finding collectables, and solving the little puzzles you encounter. Fun and well presented boss fights too (and as usual for Kirby, the final boss fight is a real spectacle lol). I 100%ed the game fairly quickly, but it’s also good it doesn’t overstay it’s welcome.”

8. Pentiment

This list varies from large productions to side projects. One of the surprise hits on Xbox was Pentiment from Obsidian Entertainment. Our community member Mort was very delighted about it and put it in his list for best games of 2022: ”What a brilliant game! The stories, history, characters and mystery had me hooked from the beginning to end. What an incredible game, so unique and detailed and beutiful in many ways. I loved it all.”

7. God of War: Ragnarök

Did we need proof the Xbox community at XboxEra play all kinds of games? The largest PlayStation Studios title from 2022 makes it to seventh on our list. It was well loved by a large portion of our community. This action game has been an iconic showpiece for the PlayStation brand and Kratos and Atreus have become an equally iconic duo.

6. High on Life

Besides the situation with Justin Roiland, Squanch Games’ High on Life was one of the highlights of the year. Master Lee Phd acompanied the inclusion in his list with the following note: ”A Very polarising game as most comedy is hit or miss depending on your taste. I’ve only ever watched one episode of Rick & Morty but ever since they unveiled the trailer for High On Life, I knew it would be my jam. Funny, really eye popping art style and gameplay that is reminiscent of old school shooters without all the fat of an open world game.”

5. Tinykin

Tinykin is a puzzle game with platforming. And for many people it could be the surprise in this top 10. Astrakan: ”Puzzle platforming done right. The only game this year I got 1000 achievement points in, even though some of them are a bit grindy. It’s just so much fun that the grind didn’t matter.”

A surprise indeed. Our community member Fiendflag agrees: ”This was the surprise of the year for me, Tinykin is such a fun and relaxing experience that was really refreshing to see. Collectathon platformers can still be relevant today and Tinykin is the proof. Can’t wait to see what this team does next!” https://forum.xboxera.com/t/xboxera-community-game-of-the-year-2022-voting-thread/14992/39?u=suikerbrood

4. A Plague’s Tale: Requiem

While it wasn’t for everyone, A Plague’s Tale: Requiem did receive a lot of votes in our community. Our user profjjj had the best quote describing this title: ”The Rats of Us Part 2”

We assume that’s meant to be positive thing. Another user named 404 username not found also chimes in: ”I absolutely love this game, which is odd because I couldn’t get past the first few minutes of the original. Great story and made me care about the characters.”

3. Tunic

It seems there are plenty of oldskool Zelda fans around on this Xbox community. Tunic received a lot of votes. One of the votes was from Master Lee Phd: ”It finally clicked when I started playing it in small chunks on my Steam Deck. A good mix between FEZ with its obtuse puzzles and game play of a Zelda game. Collecting the pages from the game manual to figure out what was going on was very unique.’‘

2. Vampire Survivors

The number two on our list is Vampire Survivors. A surprise hit among the Xbox community. And it certainly resonated with the XboxEra community. One of the people it resonated with was jasheeldz, who wrote: ”I’m the same as everyone else; wrote this off as a strange bit-graphics nonsense, and when I tried it I didn’t get it… and then I did get it, and then I was hooked. A brilliant concept perfectly executed and delivered. Brilliant”.

And now. Onto the best game of 2022 according to the XboxEra community. It shouldn’t be a surprise.

1. Elden Ring

The undisputed king of 2022. Elden Ring was the shining star of game releases in that year, further cementing From Software as a top tier developer. The game was voted our Community Game of the Year by quite a margin. This is what two of our community members had to say about it: Fiendflag: ”Along with BotW Elden Ring is the best open world game that I have ever played mostly due to the unparalleled sense of discovery and exploration, of course the god-tier boss gauntlet and impeccable designed legacy dungeons were two more reasons to fall in love with this game.”

saintsflow2: ”What more can be said? This game had pretty much unprecedented hype levels and From Software somehow, completely blew even those expectations away. To me, the best thing about this game is that it’s the first open world game in a long time where exploring the world is actually FUN and not just a time-padder. You always find something very interesting, how many of you had a “jaw-drop” moment when you found that elevator that took you to a whole expansive underground area? I’m sure everyone knows how great this game is so I won’t say too much more.”

Thank you for checking out the 2022 Community Game of the Year Awards from XboxEra. We hope you’ll participate in creating this list next year. Feel free to check out our Community Forums!