Everyone on the staff has already revealed their 2022 gaming resolutions. Now it's time to put our wizard hats on and try to predict the future. We're also going bold with our picks, which make these predictions much likelier to be wrong, but at least they won't be boring. Will we prove to be better or worse than the Magic 8 Ball?
Question: What is your boldest 2022 gaming prediction?
Xbox explores VR - Ozzie Mejia, Senior Prognosticator
With last week's announcement of a PSVR 2, it made me think about virtual reality in this gaming generation. We've seen the Oculus branding come and go, we've seen Steam dive in with their own Half-Life, PlayStation has offered VR to console users, and even Nintendo has dipped its toes into the space with Labo. Who's missing from this list? The answer is Xbox.
Xbox has gradually embraced the PC gaming space more and more, putting many of its first-party titles up on Steam and also spreading the Game Pass joy along to the PC users. The Xbox team has embraced new ideas like the Game Pass subscription model, cloud gaming across various devices, and a few others. However, there's no real VR presence with Xbox, even though they've teased getting in with their foray into mixed reality. I feel like that's about to change and part of it is because Microsoft has a handful of properties that would fit in perfectly within the VR realm. Imagine Forza VR or Microsoft Flight Simulator VR. This is before even getting into the dream of a true Halo VR.
Is Xbox going to get a dedicated VR headset for the Series X|S? Good chance it doesn't, but this isn't a "safe predictions" thread, is it?
Xbox gets an exclusive superhero game - Donovan Erskine, Mutant Time Traveler
With the Spider-Man series and now Wolverine on the way, PlayStation is quickly becoming the go-to place for the best comic book adaptations in gaming. While titles like Guardians of the Galaxy and Marvel’s Avengers are playable everywhere, Xbox doesn’t have any major superhero franchises exclusive to its family of platforms. I’m predicting that changes this year. Whether it be a DC or Marvel joint, Microsoft/Xbox are gonna make a major splash this year when they announce a new superhero game being developed exclusively for Xbox and Windows.
Taco Bell will form studio to make NFT Games - Blake Morse, Co-EIC
This is, for sure, the year that Taco Bell starts taking over everything, including the video game industry. By the end of 2022 we’ll all be playing non-fungible games on our Crunchwrap or Crunchwrap Supreme Big Box consoles that we paid for with Doritos Locos Tacos crypto-coins.
Taco Bell is starting a taco subscription service and @EEvisu & the boys aren't having it 😂. Sauce Talk will be back next Monday on a brand new episode of #WWES: https://t.co/AII6Mf3QrE pic.twitter.com/imnXBQoI4A
— Shacknews (@shacknews) January 13, 2022
The future is Taco Bell and there’s nothing we can do about it because Demolition Man was more than just a movie, it was a prophecy.
A new Driver - Sam Chandler, Tanner’s back
It’s been a long time since we’ve had an entry in the Driver series. It was once a hit back on the PlayStation but has since faded into obscurity and players leaned more toward either racing sims or more open-world games like GTA. There wasn’t a lot of acceptance for something like Driver, which wasn’t at all a sim and didn’t offer nearly as much open world as GTA. But I think there’s a time and place for a game like Driver and it’s definitely 2022.
Kirby reveals his true colors - Chris Jarrard, Just a husk for a dead soul
Yeah, everyone loves Kirby, I guess. I don’t trust that pink jerk. Always making happy faces and putting on a show, but it’s all fake. In 2022, Kirby gets to be up in the bright lights with his own AAA game. Great for Kirby. Those lights are gonna allow people to see the real Kirby. We are going to find out that he lied about his vaccination status for social media clout. Then he will hold firm and explain that it is his choice and his body and he’s done the research.
Half of the world will declare him a hero and he gets his own show on Fox News. As his program gains viewers, his power within the entertainment and mediasphere grows to unseen heights. Kirby gets Oprah-level pull. He uses this power to hawk MLM schemes in the Metaverse and then gets the entire cast of The Wilds super-pregnant and then never calls them back.
Kirby then starts his own vape company and starts wearing Punisher t-shirts. By year’s end, we will see him on national television on Christmas Eve where President Harris awards Kirby the medal of freedom and then Kirby signals his Metaverse militia to start the deadly coup...
Grand Theft Auto 6 revealed - Bill Lavoy, Co-EIC
This is the year we’ll get an announcement for Grand Theft Auto 6. I realize that the pandemic is throwing off normal timeframes, but given Red Dead Redemption 2 is now more than three years old, I think we’ll see Grand Theft Auto 6 teased at some point in 2022. Now, it won’t come out until at least 2024, if not 2025, but I think we’ll know that it exists this year.
2022 is the year of BlazBlue - TJ Denzer, Senior News Editor
Last year was an absolutely stellar year for Guilty Gear. With Guilty Gear Strive, Arc System Works knocked it out of the park and made one of the most important fighting games to hit the genre in years with impeccable visuals and rollback netcode. 2022 is the year it turns its attention to its other amazing fighter IP, BlazBlue. Originally developed in a time when licensing for Guilty Gear was caught up in a vortex of trouble, BlazBlue has become an admirable sister title to Guilty Gear.
With the success of Strive in 2021, I feel like this is the year we get something really cool and new for the BlazBlue franchise. Arc System Works has done things like BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle and lent BlazBlue characters to mobile games, so I know they still care about pushing that IP. I think with Guilty Gear Strive coming into the final stretch of its first DLC season, it will be prime time for Arc System Works to hit fans with a big BlazBlue announcement late in the year, perhaps around the time of EVO. Fingers crossed, I love Guilty Gear, but I’d love to see something brand-new for the IP that kept the Arc System Works fires going through some tough times.
The Hype is real - Steve Tyminski, Stevetendo show host, Cool guy!
It’s a new year and that brings new predictions for the upcoming year. That being said, it gets you thinking about what could be for the New Year. The main one I’ll be keeping my eye out for is the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild sequel actually comes out in 2022. We all know how Nintendo handles games like this where they will let you think the game is releasing and then summer is almost over and we have no information about it. Don’t get me wrong, I think the BotW sequel will come out this year but you never know with games like this. If news of a new Nintendo console comes out of left field, we might have to wait longer as they always bring the Zelda game to the new system.
I’m also hoping to see information regarding the next generation of Pokémon or at least the Pokémon Company’s plans after Pokémon Legends comes out. There have been rumors about a Let’s Go Johto series and Gold and Silver were my favorite Pokemon games.
My last one is that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge comes out in August, just in time for my birthday.
Konami will finally free Silent Hill from the depths of hell - Dennis White, Really misses P.T.
I have been one of those people that has lost faith since the PT days because we’ve spent so much time speculating just for it to lead nowhere. But with Blooper Team now involved in a new project and Konami spending more time with their IP’s in television and film, I think there is a higher chance that we will finally get a new Silent Hill project. Will it have the same creepy atmosphere and charm as the games made by the original Team Silent? I don’t know, but if a new game is on the horizon, there is also the very small chance that new versions of the previous games come to current consoles in some way. Fingers crossed.
Sony will acquire Capcom - Asif Khan, Shacknews Luminary/Lola’s Assistant
You want a hot take, Shacknews? Here you go. Sony is going to acquire Capcom in 2022 and bring all of their iconic franchises under the PlayStation Studios brand. With the acquisition of EVO last year, they are set up to make a move in the fighting game space. Street Fighter, RE, Monster Hunter, Mega Man, and countless other IPs would fit in great with the PS5 ecosystem.
Those are our boldest predictions for 2022. Are you bold enough to put on your own wizard's hat? Join the conversation and give us your predictions for the new year in the comments.
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Shacknews
replyShack Staff posted a new article, Shack Chat: What is your boldest 2022 gaming prediction?
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XCOM 3 announced
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I wish! But Jake Solomon is leading Marvel's Midnight Suns, which is already delayed into "second half of 2022", and that's assuredly being worked by the rest of the XCOM team. So seemingly unlikely we'll get any XCOM news this year.
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Steamdeck flops
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That we don't really see a significant leap in games that feel next gen. It feels like we've hit a point in the slope where it's going to be smaller increments rather than massive generational leaps. 8 to 16 bit was huge. 2d to 3d was huge. Basic 3d to maybe ps3 level graphics, but maybe even just ps2. And then it was more smaller leaps. I don't think we'll end up saying the move from PS4 to PS5 or Xbox One to Series X will be seen as a nearly a big generational progression as previous generations. Unless VR becomes mainstream, and I mean more like Oasis like, I don't think the next generation will be a big leap either. Not unless Steamdeck proves that we can move beyond the basic controller we've had since the analog stick became standard.
NFT in games will become mainstream because the publishers want it. And that makes me very sad. -
Arby's makes their first foray into the console space with a property technology that lets you smell your video games.
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In an Ender's Game kind of twist, their Arby's delivery game is actually a way for them to operate delivery bots with people thinking it's a game and they do it for points redeemable for Arby's.
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