WEEKLY RECON

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2022 To The Moon

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2022 To The Moon

E55: All of the games releasing in 2022.

Weekly Recon
Jan 3, 2022
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2022 To The Moon

www.weeklyrecon.com

Good morning gamers. It’s here, welcome to 2022!

We hope everyone was able to get some rest and spend time with their families during the holidays season. For the first edition of 2022, let’s take a look at everything that happened over the last two weeks. 

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2022 - Game Releases

Modern video games have developed into an experience that no other media form can replicate. There’s a level of encapsulation that allows players to enter a fantasy world and be part of it like its real life. 2022 is another major year for the video game industry and with it comes a plethora of exciting and revolutionary games. Here’s everything we have to look forward to (release dates are subject to change). 

Q1 2022 (January, February, March)

  • Rainbow Six Extraction - January 20 

  • Pokémon Legends Arceus - January 28

  • Dying Light 2: Stay Human - February 4

  • Total War: WARHAMMER 3 - February 17

  • Horizon Forbidden West - February 18

  • Elden Ring - February 25

  • Gran Turismo 7 - March 4

  • Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin - March 18

  • Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands - March 25

Q2 2022 (April, May, June)

  • S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl - April 28

  • Forspoken - Spring

  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga - Spring

  • Kirby and the Forgotten Land - Spring

  • Ghostwire: Tokyo - Spring

Q3 2022 (July, August, September)

  • Saints Row - August 23

  • Redfall - Summer

Q4 2022 (October, November, December)

  • Starfield - November 11

  • The Lord of the Rings: Gollum - Fall

TBD 2022

  • God of War Ragnarok

  • Gotham Knights

  • Hogwarts Legacy

  • Suicide Squad: Kill the Justic League

  • Bayonetta 3

  • The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2

  • Marvel’s Midnight Suns

  • Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora


Steam - Best of 2021 

During the final week of 2021, Steam published several lists of their top sellers, best new releases, most played games and more. The data they analyzed was from January 1st, 2021 to December 15th, 2021 - let’s take a look at what they uncovered.

Top Sellers (Measured by Gross Revenue)

  • New World

  • Grand Theft Auto V

  • Destiny 2

  • Valheim

  • Battlefield 2042

  • Dead By Daylight

Top New Releases (Measured by Gross Revenue)

  • Forza Horizon 5

  • Farming Simulator 22

  • Narake: Bladepoint

  • Back 4 Blood

  • New World

  • Resident Evil: Village

Most Played Games (Highest Peak Concurrent Players)

  • Apex Legends

  • Dota 2

  • Valheim

  • Rust

  • Cyberpunk 2077

  • Grand Theft Auto V

Best of Virtual Reality (Measured by Gross Revenue)

  • Boneworks

  • Into the Radius

  • Arizona Sunshine

  • Beat Saber

Controller Friendly (Daily Active Controller Players)

  • FIFA 21

  • FIFA 22

  • Cyberpunk 2077

  • The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth

  • Apex Legends

  • Halo Infinite


Esports Corner 

Despite the ongoing pandemic, the esports scene showed drive and resilience throughout 2021. It was a very successful year across the industry so we’ve decided to honor it by recapping some of the year's biggest moments. 

Most Watched Esports Tournaments

Many major esport events were able to return to a LAN setting, and others were not. Despite the lack of fans in some spaces, tournament organizers were always able to establish a pleasurable viewing experience through various online live streaming services. Esports Charts released the final 2021 statistics so here are some of the highest viewed events of the year,

  • League of Legends World Championships: 174.82m viewers (134 hours total airtime) 

  • DOTA 2 The International 10: 107.23m viewers (125 hours total airtime)

  • Mobile Legends MPL ID Season 8: 76.94m viewers (172 hours total airtime)

  • CS:GO PGL Major Stockholm: 71.26m viewers (120 hours total airtime)

  • Valorant Champions: 46.04m viewers (98 hours total airtime)

  • *Free Fire World Series Singapore had the highest peak viewership at 5.41m

Most Valuable Esport Deals

Esports is becoming much more mainstream and with it is a slew of industry partners just salivating to get their foot in the door. Here’s a recap from some of 2021s most memorable esports sponsorship deals. 

  • TSM’s $210m partnership with crypto exchange FTX which includes a 10-year naming rights deal.

  • The renewal of Intel and ESL Gamings ongoing 20-year partnership where a combined $100 million was committed towards esports until 2025.

  • FaZe Clan partnering with DC comics in an effort to attract different audiences to each brand. The partnership saw limited edition merchandise and various FaZe members enter the DC Universe comics. 

  • Rocket League partnered with multiple automobile companies such as Lamborghini, BMW, Ford, McLaren and then even ventured off into events with Formula 1 and NASCAR. 

Most Shocking Esports Roster Changes

Rostermania is some of the most exciting weeks for esport fans but every year there's a few changes that excite, sadden or even shock the industry. Here are some of 2021s roster moves that we’ll never forget. 

  • Dev1ce leaving his long-time stint at TSM and joining Ninjas in Pyjamas (CS:GO).

  • Jerax coming out of retirement to compete with evil Geniuses (DOTA 2). 

  • Rekkles leaving G2 Esports to join LFL team K-Corp (League of Legends).

  • Cloud9 loaning TenZ to Sentinels when Sinatraa got suspended (VALORANT). 


Gaming Roundup

  • The NFL announced that John Madden, the legendary sports broadcaster and name behind the NFL video game franchise passed away at 85. The first John Madden Football game was released on June 1, 1988. 

  • Riot Games settled a 2018 California gender discrimination suit for $100 million. According to the Washington Post, $80 million will go to women employees and contractors who worked at Riot Games from 2014 onwards. 

  • Remedy Entertainment announced that they signed a global development, license and distribution agreement with Tencent for a co-op multiplayer game codenamed Vanguard. They are currently working on four different projects: Smilegate (CrossfireX), Epic Games (Alan Wake 2), 505 Games (Control 2) and Tencent (Vanguard).

  • According to Tom Henderson, Star Wars: Eclipse is reportedly having development issues and can be delayed until 2026-2027. Eclipse is set to be a multi-planet open world game with multiplayer components.

  • PlayStation’s database has God of War Ragnarok’s release date listed as September 30th, 2022. Despite the lack of confirmation from PlayStation, the release date makes sense as Horizon Forbidden West launches in February. 

  • Square Enix announced that the development of Final Fantasy XVI has been delayed by “a half year”. FF16 producer Naoki Yoshida took to Twitter to apologize to fans stating that the ongoing pandemic and working from home are the root causes of the delay.

  • According to the Verge, CD Projekt will pay $1,850,000 USD to settle a class action lawsuit against them for the failed launch of Cyberpunk 2077. Since the launch of the game, their stock price has fallen 54%.


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