PC Gamer's Game of the Year Awards 2022

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We reveal PC gaming's brightest stars of the last 12 months.

Game of the Year 2022
(Image credit: Future)

Welcome to PC Gamer's annual Game of the Year awards. Each day, for the rest of the month, we'll be revealing another of 2022's best PC games, culminating in our ultimate Game of the Year on December 30.

To create this list, each writer nominates up to six games released within the last 12 months. Those nominations become our shortlist. We then gather together to talk through the list and—after much wailing and shouting—decide on both our overall Game of the Year and the 13 other games we feel deserving of an award. Once the games are chosen, we assign them categories that exemplify what they each did best. The award categories are designed to fit the games we've picked, which is why we run different ones each year.

Alongside the main awards, each PC Gamer writer has also picked a personal favourite of the year. We'll be updating this page with new awards and personal picks throughout the rest of the month.

The Awards

Best Ongoing Game: Guild Wars 2
Best Strategy: Total War: Warhammer 3
Best Early Access: Disney Dreamlight Valley
Best Roguelike: Vampire Survivors
Best Puzzle Game: Strange Horticulture
Best Sandbox: Teardown
Best RPG: Persona 5 Royal
Best Design: Card Shark
Best Co-op: Monster Hunter Rise
Best Platformer: Neon White
Best Story: The Case of the Golden Idol
Best Comedy: Trombone Champ
GOTY Runner-Up: Marvel's Midnight Suns
Game of the Year: Elden Ring

Personal Picks

Katie Wickens: Two-Point Campus
Jody Macgregor: Hard West 2
Lauren Aitken: The Witcher 3 – Next-Gen Update
Tyler Colp: Signalis
Evan Lahti: Into the Breach: Advanced Edition
Phil Savage: Destiny 2: The Witch Queen
Lauren Morton: Roadwarden
Jorge Jimenez: Tactics Ogre: Reborn
Fraser Brown: Grounded
Tyler Wilde: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Joshua Wolens: Pentiment
Shaun Prescott: Steelrising
Sean Martin: Warzone 2 DMZ
Andy Chalk: Hell is Others
Christopher Livingston: Farthest Frontier
Jacob Ridley: F1 Manager 2022
Wes Fenlon: Dorfromantik
Robin Valentine: Warhammer 40,000: Darktide
Sarah James: PowerWash Simulator
Morgan Park: MultiVersus
Mollie Taylor: Hatsune Miku: Project Diva MegaMix+
Andy Chalk: Elden Ring

Past Awards

Game of the Year Awards 2021
Game of the Year Awards 2020
Game of the Year Awards 2019
Game of the Year Awards 2018
Game of the Year Awards 2017
Game of the Year Awards 2016
Game of the Year Awards 2015
Game of the Year Awards 2014
Game of the Year Awards 2013

Phil Savage
Phil Savage
Editor-in-Chief

Phil has been writing for PC Gamer for nearly a decade, starting out as a freelance writer covering everything from free games to MMOs. He eventually joined full-time as a news writer, before moving to the magazine to review immersive sims, RPGs and Hitman games. Now he leads PC Gamer's UK team, but still sometimes finds the time to write about his ongoing obsessions with Destiny 2, GTA Online and Apex Legends. When he's not levelling up battle passes, he's checking out the latest tactics game or dipping back into Guild Wars 2. He's largely responsible for the whole Tub Geralt thing, but still isn't sorry.