Gaming Influence: Thoughts - The Game Awards 2022

Hello everyone, 

Welcome to Gaming Influence, a reboot of the same name I created back in WrestleCorp. However, not only will I be giving my thoughts on certain video games and video game series, but also video game movies, video game anime, video game digital presentations, etc.

For this edition of Gaming Influence, I'll be giving my thoughts on The Game Awards that happened on December 8, 2022. 

Before I start, not every game that was shown in this award show will be talked about as I will mainly talk about games that I care about and am interested in. If the games you care about and are interested in don't show up here, don't take it personally, I have nothing against the games, but they're not just for me or I don't have much to say about them except cool. However, if you are happy with the games that you care about and are interested in that I'm not or nothing to say about it, good for you and I'm happy for you.

Anyway, let's get started!

Now, for those who are wondering, what is The Game Awards? The Game Awards is an award ceremony hosted by Geoff Keighley and his team to bring the world of gaming together to celebrate video games and hand out awards for the companies and creators of these beloved video games we love. However, I will mainly focus on the games when talking about the show. They generally showcased games, showcased movie trailers tieing into video games, handed out awards, and did live musical performances relating to video games. How did The Game Awards do this year? Let's get to it!

Dead Cells: Return to Castlevania is the DLC for the roguelike-Metroidvania game developed and published by Motion Twin as it will be released for Switch, PS4, Xbox One, and PC in Q1 2023.

Wow, this is a collaboration that didn't expect coming and this is pretty awesome. Dead Cells is pretty much is like a Castlevania game so the fact that they are collaborating with Konami to bring Castlevania to this game is quite awesome. Still waiting for a new Castlevania game Konami! Anyway, looking forward to this DLC as it comes out next year.

Mike Mignola's Hellboy Web of Wyrd is a roguelike action-adventure game based on the original comic from Dark Horse Comics and Mike Mignola as it will be coming to PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Switch with an unannounced release date.

It's so cool to see a comic being made into a video game as the art style of the game is exactly the same as the comics which is freaking awesome. In terms of how the game will turn out, only time will tell, but it looks great, and I hope to see more of it in the future.

Among Us Hide N Seek is a new mode for the popular online multiplayer social deduction game developed and published by Innersloth, Among Us, as it will be coming on December 9, 2022, on PC, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, PS4, and PS5.

Okay, this is awesome and this game continues to get new modes ever since its release which is great to see. Adding a monster impostor to the game is going to add a lot and should be a lot of fun as well and by the time you are reading this, it should already be out now so if you're a fan of Among Us, I say check it out. If not, you're sus...

After Us is a platformer developed by Piccolo and published by Private Division as the game is coming out on PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC in Spring 2023.

I have to say that I really love the art style as it looks gorgeous and stunning. Judging by what's happening in the trailer, it's going to be tragic and joyful at the same time in some way, but I'm definitely intrigued and want to see more of it as it comes out next year.

Replaced is a 2.5D sci-fi retro-futuristic action platformer developed by Sad Cat Studios and published by Coatsink as it will be released on PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X next year.

I remember seeing this game before last year at the Game Awards, but I could be mistaken for another game. Regardless, I really love the art style of this game and the gameplay looks to be a lot of fun with the action as I'm very curious about what the story of this game will be about. Either way, hope to see more of it when it comes out next year.

Street Fighter 6 is the next installment of the popular fighting game franchise developed by Capcom, Street Fighter, as it will be coming to PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One, and PC, on June 2, 2023.

Every time I see more of this game, the more I'm excited about it as you can even create and customize your own fighter in Street Fighter 6 which is awesome. Also, we got the return of Dee Jay and three new characters including Manon, Marisa, and JP. I have to say that all of these characters are looking pretty good and fun to play as well as the roster is stacking up and it's great to see. Hope the game turns out well when it's released next year on June 2, 2023.

Hades II is the sequel to the Best Action and Best Indie Game of the Year in 2020 for the Game Awards, Hades, which is developed and published by Supergiant Games as it will be coming to PC with an unannounced release date.

Holy crap! Granted, I had a feeling that Supergiant Games is currently working on their next game, but I didn't expect it to be Hades II of all things as Supergiant Games normally don't make sequels so this was a surprise. In addition, I love Hades so the fact that a sequel is being made for this is awesome as it has the same gameplay as Hades, but looks to be improved with new characters and a new setting. I'm very intrigued by how this game will turn out and hope to see more of it in the future.

Judas is a first-person shooter game developed and published by Ghost Story Studios, the same studios and creators of Bioshock, as it will be coming to PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC with an unannounced release date.

Oh, snap! The creators of Bioshock are creating a new game and it looks awesome! Normally, I'm not a fan of first-person shooters except a few franchises, and Bioshock is one of them. This game absolutely looks like Bioshock in terms of gameplay and the story seems interesting too with a very interesting art style as well. Can't wait to see how this game turns out and hope to see more of it in the future.

Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demons is the origin story of the popular action-adventure game series developed by PlatinumGames, Bayonetta, as it will be coming to Switch on March 17, 2023.

Oh my god, I didn't see this game coming at all! Wow, nice to see that the Bayonetta series will have its first-ever spinoff game and that's awesome. With the success of the Bayonetta series as of late, it makes sense to continue to capitalize on it, and having an origin story of Bayonetta makes sense if you played the games so that's great. It's amazing how the Bayonetta series was about to not exist back then until Nintendo came in and helped PlatinumGames to continue the series as they made it what it is today which is incredible. This looks to be an interesting spin-off with the art style, but looks to be the same gameplay from the mainline Bayonetta games so I'm interested to see how this game will turn out when it comes out on March 17, 2023.

STAR WARS: Jedi Survivor is an action-adventure game developed by Respawn Entertainment and published by EA where the game will be released on PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC on March 17, 2023.

I have to say, this game actually looks pretty good and the game actually looks pretty fun to play as well. However, since this game is being made by EA, I have to be a bit skeptical about their recent actions for the past couple of years with their microtransactions and so forth. Regardless of that, the game does look great, and hope it does well when it comes out on March 17, 2023.

Earthblade is a 2D explore-action game developed and published by Extremely OK Games, they're known for one game-winning Games For Impact and Best Independent Game of the Year in 2018 for the Game Awards, Celeste, as this game will be released in 2024 with unannounced systems that it will be on.

This game has been in development for a while, but it's great to see the progress of this game and it looks incredible. It seems to be a Metroidvania game to me which I'm down for as I love Celeste back in 2018 so I expect this game to be great as well. Hope to see more of it soon when it releases in 2024.

Forspoken is an action role-playing game developed by Luminous Productions and published by Square Enix, it will be released on PS5 on January 24, 2023. In addition, a demo is available now for the game.

This game has been delayed multiple times, but it looks like they finally have a definitive release date for this game, and the fact that they have a demo for the game tells me that this game won't get delayed any further and it will only release on that release date which is great. In terms of what I've played with the demo so far, this game to me feels like Western Final Fantasy and if the demo is an example of what we're going to get with the full game, I'm totally onboard and looking forward to playing the full release of this game on January 24, 2023.

DS2 is the sequel to the Best Game Direction and Best Score/Music for Game Awards in 2019, Death Stranding, developed by Kojima Productions and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment as it will be coming to PS5 with an unannounced release date. 

Holy crap! I knew that Hideo Kojima was working on multiple projects, but didn't expect DS2 to be one of them which is insane. Granted, after what happened in Death Stranding, it would make sense to continue it, but just didn't expect it since Hideo Kojima is also working on a game for Xbox. However, it looks like the Death Stranding story continues with DS2 and I'm freaking excited about it. Looking forward to seeing more of this game in the future.

Tekken 8 is the next mainline game in the popular fighting game series developed and published by Bandai Namco, Tekken, as it will be coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X with an unannounced release date.

Tekken 8 continues to look awesome as we got to see more returning characters from the franchise and it looks like the story of Kazuya and Jin will continue as expected. Very interested to see where the series will go from here and wonder if Heihachi will even be in this game due to his Japanese voice actor passing away a few years ago. Regardless, this game is looking awesome, and hope to see more of it in the future.

Baldur's Gate III is a role-playing game developed and published by Larian Studios. It will be set to be released on PC in August 2023.

Nice to see that the third game for Baldur's Gate has been made as they're generally a pretty good series and this one continues where it left off as it's looking great. Hope to see more of this game in the future when it's released in August 2023.

Fire Emblem Engage Expansion Pass is DLC for the upcoming fantasy tactical role-playing game developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo, Fire Emblem Engage. Wave 1 of the Expansion Pass will be released on the same day as the release of Fire Emblem Engage, January 20, 2023.

Ever since Fire Emblem Awakening, there has been expansion passes for the Fire Emblem games and this one is no different with Fire Emblem Engage. For Wave 1, we're getting Edelgard, Dimitri, Claude, and Tiki as Emblem characters as well as getting in-game support items, in-game accessories, and a silver card. This is looking to be a great Fire Emblem game and I can't wait to see how it plays when it comes out on January 20, 2023.

Diablo IV is the next game in the popular action role-playing game series developed by Blizzard Entertainment, Diablo. The game is set to be released on Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and PC on June 6, 2023.

This game is coming a lot sooner than I thought and from what we've seen from it so far, it looks incredible. Really hope that the game delivers and looking forward to seeing more of it when it comes out on June 6, 2023.

Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores is an expansion of Horizon Forbidden West as it'll be coming to PS5 on April 29, 2023.

Holy crap! Didn't expect that Horizon Forbidden West will be getting actual DLC and that's freaking awesome. You get to explore Hollywood which is freaking awesome. This will probably keep us busy until the next Horizon game which I'm looking forward to when it happens and I can't wait to play this expansion on April 19, 2023.

Blue Protocol is a free-to-play online action role-playing game developed by Bandai Namco and published by Amazon Game Studios as it will be coming to PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC in 2023.

This game has been in development for a while so it's great to see this game finally coming out and it looks great so far. At first, I was questioning if Bandai Namco working with Amazon Game Studios is going to do anything, but once we've seen from the trailer, this has the potential to be really good. We'll see how this game turns out when it comes out next year.

Crash Team Rumble is a 4v4 team-based action game developed by Toys for Bob and published by Activision as it will be released on PS5, PS4, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X in 2023.

Oh wow, didn't expect a new Crash game since Toys for Bob were a part of the Call of Duty team, but I guess they were also making a spinoff Crash game which is nice to see. Granted, it's not a mainline Crash game, but this looks to be a fun co-op game involving the Crash cast and hope to see more Crash games in the future. Looking forward to seeing how this game will turn out when it's released next year.

The Lords of the Fallen is a reboot of the action role-playing game developed by CI Games that was released on PS4, Xbox One, and PC back in 2014. The reboot of the game will be coming to PC, Xbox Series X, and PS5 with an unannounced release date.

This was announced back at Gamescom this year and back then, they only showed a CG trailer. This time however, they managed to show gameplay for the game and it actually looks pretty good. They really made this game look like a Dark Souls game which I can't complain about as it does look great. Hope to see more of this game soon in the future.

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty is an expansion of the action role-playing game developed and published by CD Projekt Red as it'll be coming to Xbox Series X, PS5, and PC in 2023.

Despite the game having a rough launch, the game definitely has improved a lot since then and is now a better game. The DLC for this game looks pretty cool and the fact that they got Idris Elba in this game is freaking awesome as well. We'll see how this expansion does when it's released next year.

Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon is the next mainline game of the mecha-based video game series developed by FromSoftware and published by Bandai Namco, Armored Core, where its last game was Armored Core V on the PS3 and Xbox 360 back in 2012. The game is set to be released on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One, and PC in 2023.

Holy crap, Armored Core is coming back! The last time we saw anything with Armored Core was Armored Core V back in 2012 so eleven years later, we're going to get a new game in the series which is freaking hyped. With FromSoftware killing it the past few years, I have a feeling that they're going to show the world that they're more than just the Souls series so this is their chance to do so and it's looking amazing. Hope this game delivers and I can't wait to see more of it when it's released next year.

Final Fantasy XVI is the next installment of the popular Japanese role-playing game series developed and published by Square Enix, Final Fantasy, as it will be released on June 22, 2023, on PS5.

Every time I see this game, I continue to be amazed by how amazing this looks and it looks incredible. The gameplay continues to look fun, the story seems very interesting, and the world that you're going to explore in this game seems to be big and expansive which I'm really excited about. This game has a chance to be really good and I really hope the game will deliver when it releases on June 22, 2023.

Overall, this was a good awards show from Geoff Keighley and his team. To me, this is one of the better Game Awards shows as the pacing was mostly good, the game announcements and trailers had a lot of variety with some nice surprises on there which was great, and the awards part of the show was done well in my personal opinion. The speech that Christopher Judge did was a bit long, but he definitely put emotional and passion to his speech which made him winning the award that much special so good on him. In addition, I feel like Genshin Impact shouldn't have won Player's Voice and God of War Ragnarök shouldn't have won Best Score/Music as Genshin Impact wasn't a 2022 game at all and I personally think that Xenoblade Chronicles 3 should've won Best Score/Music, but that's just me. Also, the Game Awards orchestra was great especially Pedro Eustache (Flute guy) as he nailed his role with the Xenoblade Chronicles 3 melody part which I love. Other than that, one of the better Game Awards shows and I hope we get to see more shows like this from Geoff Keighley and his team so good job here.

You can catch the full Game Awards show yourself with the link below:

What are your thoughts on the Game Awards?

What were your highlights and what games do you really want?

Let me know in the comments below and thank you for reading.