
One of the benefits of doing my monthly “Gaming Goals” article is that I can keep track of what I played when I look back at the end of the year. And as I did last year, I created a simple chart to show what MMOs I ventured into during which month of the year.
So there you go: About 16 MMORPGs, depending on your definition, that I touched in 2022. Some of these were much briefer stays than others. For example, Embers Adrift, Tower of Fantasy, Lost Ark, Diablo Immortal, and Crowfall were first-time expeditions that didn’t really take with me. A couple others — SWTOR, Fallen Earth, Guild Wars 2 — were return visits that also failed to be “sticky” in the way I was hoping.
That leaves us with the streaks — the MMORPGs that I invested a good amount of time into. Lord of the Rings Online is the most obvious, with an uninterrupted 12-month play. I’m a little surprised I didn’t take a break in that time, but hey, I like this game!
I didn’t recall spending five (!) months in Elder Scrolls Online, but I guess I must have. I keep thinking that this is a title to revisit sometime soon.
Wrath Classic got a couple of runs there, mostly bolstered by the incoming Wrath Classic (and then defeated by general apathy toward that expansion when it did come out). I jumped back into retail WoW in the last quarter of the year and had a pretty OK time there.
RIFT and DDO were titles that I spent a nice chunk of time in this year. The former was a big splashy return to an old favorite MMO, while the latter was picking up my character and going through another expansion. And then there’s New World, which only recently got its hooks into me after its revamp and fresh start servers.
I should point out old MMOs that I didn’t touch at all this year, which include FFXIV, Star Trek Online, and Neverwinter.
All in all, it was a good year full of variety. I don’t plan or map these games out in advance, so it’s more like seeing where the wind — and my whims — take me. Maybe 16 titles signal that I was too full of wanderlust and wouldn’t settle down, but I think LOTRO provided my “home base MMO,” so to speak, that allowed me to venture out into other territories.
There are some upcoming titles I’m keenly interested in, but as for other MMOs that I might return to in 2023, I have only the loosest of notions. DDO is always a good bet (I think it makes for fun blogging, but that could just be me), and RIFT/EQ2 could take over for that WoW fix if and when I leave retail WoW. I feel like LOTRO and New World are going to be a good bet for a while now, and ESO probably will suck me back in around expansion time.