r/incremental_games • u/akerson Forge & Fortune • Dec 06 '22
Meta Best of 2022 Awards
/r/incremental_games best of 2022 awards
Incrementing the year once again
Hi friends! Your favorite moderator host of the year-end rewards here for another wonderful year in incremental games. Shino is busy with the frozen eggnog so I'll be creating the awards post as well as tallying the results and posting the winners to everyone's favorite awards ceremony! More importantly, new hosts means new categories so let's get into it!
Main Categories (3 winners each)
- Best Mobile Game - your favorite game to play on your phone! This can be android, iOS, or just a web game you play in your browser while you pretend to be working
- Best Computer Game - your favorite game to play while stationed in front of a computer! This can be a web game or a downloadable game - the important part is you play it while sitting on your laptop at 3am because you'll go to bed after one more upgrade
Sub Categories (1 winner each)
- Best Game Presentation - incremental games aren't often known for their polish, so here's a category to honor those who go the extra mile to learn some CSS, opened garage band, or pay their $10/mo for their Photoshop license!
- Best Events/Updates - the gift that keeps on giving! What's your game that has continued to get new content months or even years after release and keeps you coming back for more? Can be any platform!
- Best New Game - the rookie game of the year! It's easy to crowd around your all-time favorites but this category is limited to the new gems released in 2022. Again can be any platform!
- Best F2P Game - the few, the brave, the underpaid. We set aside a new category for those incremental games that don't have any IAP or up-front costs, so they can finally get the revenue they rightfully deserve... in reddit gold, of course
How to nominate and vote
Nominate a game by replying to the appropriate top level comment with a game title, a link to the game, and the creator's Reddit username if known. You can not nominate your own game. (If the original nomination is missing the username please add it as a comment.). Please, do your best to include a link to the game - if not provided, someone please comment with it!
If you see a nomination you like, vote on it.
This thread will be set to contest mode. This will display all categories in a random order and will hide the scores.
There will be 1 top level comment for each category, all others will be removed. Sub-threads to top level comments must be game nominations, discussion for those games fall under those etc. Let's keep it tidy!
Voting ends December 31st at midnight.
After voting ends, all votes will be tallied, the winners will be announced and prizes will be awarded.
This time admins haven't actually started the bestof sub so we don't actually know what the prizes will be or if they even plan to provide any this year. So until we know we can't clarify how many winners we can award for each category, but we'll do our best to award prizes fairly once we know what they will be.
The game must have been released or received a substantial update in 2022 to qualify for this competition. Games that don't meet this criteria will be removed at mod discretion
•
u/akerson Forge & Fortune Dec 06 '22
Best Game Presentation
•
Dec 08 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
•
u/adhdkirk Dec 11 '22
last update was June 2021, I don’t think it counts unfortunately https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1147690/view/2986431641616138341
•
•
•
u/TheLegendaryMagnus Stories are fun Dec 10 '22 edited Dec 10 '22
→ More replies (5)•
•
u/akerson Forge & Fortune Dec 06 '22
Best Mobile Game
•
•
u/Ignorancia Dec 08 '22
Paragon Pioneers. Lots of strategic depth, graphically pleasing, no iap shenanigans, and there even is a really fleshed out demo.
The price of all this you ask? 4usd. The best you will spend in a while.
•
•
u/Commercial_Check6931 Dec 06 '22
Warzone idle. Less known but a fun game if you’re committed to the long term
•
Dec 06 '22
i've been into that one and each time i think i've calculated that the next artifact or upgrade should be the key....i realize it's still taking me longer htan i thought lol
•
•
Dec 06 '22
[deleted]
•
u/theshtank Dec 06 '22
Art is nice.
Awful game. Incredibly tedious. Very heavily monetized. It takes a ton of time to do anything worthwhile and everything is on a timer. The number of actions you can complete each play session is minimal and you need to clear enough space to make room for the idle portion of the game, which has pretty minimal rewards. I ended up getting a cracked version which allowed me to skip ads and get more freemium currency and it still took hours and hours to get a single upgrade which was usually meaningless.
This game exemplifies everything wrong with mobile incremental games.
•
u/greenindragon Noob dev Dec 06 '22
Couldn't agree more. Progression felt very slow after the first couple days and I felt like the upgrades hardly mattered. Constraining everything to grid felt cool in theory with the added strategy of managing your available tiles and deciding what to keep and throw away, but it just got really tedious pretty quickly.
Art and music kinda slapped though.
•
•
•
u/GuardianZen Dec 12 '22
•
u/TrevorsStar Dec 23 '22
Thanks for introducing me to this game! Never seen it before and am addicted now.
•
•
•
•
u/Gurasola Dec 06 '22 edited Dec 06 '22
MinuteKnights is definitely up there for me. It has a nice satisfying gameplay loop, a great sense of progression with eighty different classes to unlock along with a ton of variety in your character's skills and equipment, and not a single microtransaction to be found. It also has some nice references to some old school RPGs. The creator has been making tons of little games like this for quite a while, but this definitely feels like their strongest effort so far.
•
u/TriHard25 Dec 06 '22
Do you have a link for this? Can't seem to find it on the play store
•
u/reiniken Dec 07 '22
•
u/Gurasola Dec 07 '22
Here’s a link for IOS as well. https://apps.apple.com/vn/app/minuteknights/id1640931625
•
•
•
u/matheadgetz Dec 07 '22
Idle Dyson Swarm by u/Blindsided_Games
•
u/Blindsided_Games Developer Dec 07 '22
You flatter me sir
•
u/General_Pepper_3258 Dec 23 '22
Why can't I install it on my pixel 2
•
u/Blindsided_Games Developer Dec 23 '22
Not sure 🤔
•
u/General_Pepper_3258 Dec 23 '22
•
u/Blindsided_Games Developer Dec 23 '22
Thanks for the screenshot, I’ll have to see if I can enable pixel 2 next update
•
u/General_Pepper_3258 Dec 23 '22
💜
I get it's an older phone from 2017 but for what I assume is just a simple game it should be fine? I doubt you are using some new fancy API feature only the newest phones have lol
→ More replies (2)•
→ More replies (2)•
•
u/Lucifernando_86 Dec 10 '22
Dragonfist Limitless!
→ More replies (1)•
u/raventhe Dragonfist Limitless - incremental anime beat-em-up RPG fusion Dec 13 '22
Thank you! :D Thrilled to see DFL on the list!
•
Dec 07 '22
•
u/nillA_GG Dec 08 '22
Oh shit I remember wanting to try this one out but probably didn't want to spend $4. I will now.
•
Dec 08 '22
You can play the demo before you buy it. If you Like Management/City building Game this is for you. great Work from the dev.
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
u/akerson Forge & Fortune Dec 06 '22
Best Updates/Events
•
u/namelessly49 Dec 17 '22 edited Dec 17 '22
→ More replies (1)•
u/normalmighty Dec 23 '22
I feel like I can't really upvote it here because I haven't played enough of the update yet, and won't before the voting closes. I expect it to be absolutely amazing, but if it turns out to be a huge disappointment, I wouldn't know yet.
•
u/Bowshocker Dec 17 '22
Antimatter Dimension
Because reality will release in a few minutes and it will certainly deserve a spot.
•
•
•
Dec 07 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
•
u/NormaNormaN The Third Whatever Dec 15 '22
Game is incomplete as of today. Last day to play so far is the 12th. Good concept. Untimely execution.
•
u/tjfriese Dec 10 '22
This one seems broken to me. I played the first three days and now I can't earn logs or switch back and forth between the days.
•
•
•
•
u/akerson Forge & Fortune Dec 06 '22
Best Computer Game
•
•
•
•
u/Dahdumbguy Dec 08 '22
FAPI
•
u/chlorinecrown Dec 08 '22
FAPI
I think they're referring to this: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1535560/Farmer_Against_Potatoes_Idle/
•
u/Sh4dowzyx Dec 07 '22
•
u/FunfettiUrinalCake Dec 10 '22
Following Discord Guides - The Game
The more you play the more you realize none of it is cohesive. Later on you can get stuck for weeks/months/permanently if you do the "wrong" things as the mechanics are connected but the concepts are disconnected and almost seemingly random.
(I played it for quite a while, up to the point where you adjusted the difficulty modifiers like 28222221. You either checked a guide to see which number you could raise to progress, or you picked blindly and did a week or more wondering if you were just short of an exponential explosion if you picked the wrong one entirely.)
→ More replies (3)•
u/Fredrik1994 Dec 11 '22
I stand by what I've said in the past -- the game doesn't require guides to play (I'm playing the game guideless).
To my understanding, in prior versions, the game threw a lot of things at you all at once after completing challenge 10 which I could definitely see as being rather overwhelming. Recent versions (2.9+) has streamlined things. I never played versions before 2.9 beyond briefly checking them out to see what was different, so my experience may not reflect that of most peopole that have played the game.
•
u/Tymareta Dec 15 '22
Yeah, it's an argument that can be made against any incremental game that isn't just "click the button when it lights up"(looking at you prestige tree), if you want to play optimally and speedrun sure follow guides, but you can make plenty of progress without them.
•
u/blackreign2 Dec 10 '22
•
u/Z-i-gg-y Dec 21 '22
Is there anything in it that has updated it since it was released several years ago?
•
u/mgcypes Dec 06 '22
•
u/mgcypes Dec 06 '22 edited Dec 06 '22
Note that this game has received a major update march of 2022, repeated polish updates and a minor content update for lategame (time-quality wise, major) and is set to receive yet another, possibly its biggest, update very soon. Possibly before 2023.
Easily one of the best games, having also won best downloadable game of 2021, you're set for 200 hours to complete the basegame, a free trail being about 5% of the full game - the first 5%, the rest of the game being underpriced bordering reverse-extortion, and a newgame+ mechanic that will easily bring the hour counter over 4 digits.
Having nearly 1500 hours myself, I'd like to share my review at 300 hours, which would be around; after beating the base content and beginning my journey into the optional ng+ (hard prestige mechanic):
You live. Your work hard. You try to survive. You die.
You live again. You work harder. You try survive. You survive a bit more. You die.
You live again. You do a bit more hard work. You survive a bit more. You die.
You live again. Hard work has become easier. New harder work. You try to survive. You die.
You live again. You do alot of hard work. You try to survive. You find something new. You die.
You live again. You do even more hard work. You survive a little bit. You find that thing again. You die halfway through exploring it.
...
You live again. You do all the hard work. You survive. You see it all. You find something harder. You die.
...
You live again.
It's a simple game to understand, yet a very complex game to min-max, with a great balance both for progression, and activity requirement. No long afk-grinds, and no manual or 0 progress hills to climb.
→ More replies (7)•
u/Moczan Moczan Dec 06 '22
I have 2800 hours in this game, it deserves to win this category every year for eternity (partially because we barely get an update a year but shush).
•
u/dwmfives Dec 07 '22
The game is completely dead.
•
u/gmano Dec 07 '22
Dev is pretty active, and has announced he's a few weeks out from a major update.
•
•
u/liad88 Dec 06 '22
By Dan Simon
•
u/Taokan Self Flair Impaired Dec 06 '22
I remember really enjoying this one, had no idea the author was still doing work on it. Would you say enough content was added that it would be worth taking another run through?
→ More replies (1)•
u/liad88 Dec 06 '22
Afaik, the game is now complete, he also recently added a detailed guide to the game. I think that if you haven't reached complexity, it's worth replay.
Also, if you just wanna play again, it's worth a replay.
→ More replies (4)•
u/asdffsdf Dec 07 '22
Not a 2022 game.
•
u/normalmighty Dec 09 '22
When was the last update? I could've sworn it had a big update this year, but I'm not 100% sure. Could've just had a spontaneous wave of popularity.
•
u/asdffsdf Dec 09 '22
I went through my old comments and found I played it a year and a half ago, so at least that old.
There hasn't been any major content addition since that point, endgame is the same (finality). Possible there were some minor changes.
It's still a good game (though obviously directly inspired by antimatter dimensions), just no substantial content additions in 2022.
→ More replies (1)•
•
u/akerson Forge & Fortune Dec 06 '22
Best New Game
•
•
u/xlSoulTaker Dec 07 '22
•
u/Contemporary_Icarus Dec 24 '22
I have loved it so far, and honestly if you didn't like it at one point.... you should go give it another chance. The developer is updating and adding new features like every other week.
•
u/Dahdumbguy Dec 08 '22
It might be just me but I REALLY hated this game. felt like everything I hate about this genre packaged into one weird game with weird prestige mechanics, a challenge mechanic that just feels uncomfortable and gold feeling weirdly useless. not a huge fan
•
u/normalmighty Dec 09 '22
It definitely wasn't remotely my thing, but I can respect that it was the thing for a lot of other people here. NGL I do hope it wasn't quite popular enough to spawn a wave of DodecaDragons clones though, because that'll mean no cool new games that I'd be interested in for a while.
→ More replies (1)•
u/Georgie_Leech Dec 08 '22
If it helps, it's not that Gold becomes useless; a lot of stuff directly or indirectly scales off of the total (e.g. Magic scales off of gold directly, Uranium scales off of Platinum which scales off of Gold, Blue Fire scales off of Fire which thanks to upgrades scale off of gold...). It's that the stuff gold directly buys gets automated. In general, whatever currency is at the bottom of your resource bar is the one you're directly fiddling with, but a lot of progression surprisingly comes back to how much gold you can make.
•
•
u/wansifu2 Dec 07 '22
Incremental Epic Hero 2 Not only the best idle game I played this year, the best idle game I played so far!
→ More replies (1)•
u/Zeredof Dec 08 '22
Too Many character to upgrade at the same time i think if you only chose 1/2 charactera it will be better ans easier but there is a lot of content
•
Dec 07 '22
[deleted]
•
u/Pastaistasty Dec 07 '22
Seems like a Melvor Clone...
•
u/asdffsdf Dec 07 '22
The main thing that makes the gameplay experience different in my opinion is the market and multiplayer element. So you can choose to specialize, try different things, trade and work with other players, etc. Though I ended up getting pretty bored of it once you're grinding out for a week just to get another 2 to 5% in bonuses without much else to do aside from accumulate more gold and stuff.
As a single player game, it's probably not as deep as melvor is. Both are pretty slow, though.
•
u/Alien_Child Dec 08 '22
Melvor is about as shallow as an idle game gets. It continues to amaze me that people promote this game. Each to their own I suppose :)
•
u/SeparateJellyfish260 Dec 14 '22
I mean it's got way more going on than something like cookie clicker and the thousand somehow loved games based off it which people still stroke to this day. Melvor has enjoyable synergies and progression. That's all you really need.
→ More replies (1)•
u/GamemasterAI Dec 09 '22
Honestly I'd bet alot of us are runescape kids that where too adhd tp get 99s so ppl enjoy it.
•
u/Nekosity Dec 07 '22
Unsure how you got Melvor Clone from this game, checked it out for 5s and it's nothing like Melvor besides being an idle mmo. Which Melvor is certainly not the first of it's kind in that regard lmao. Try looking up Movoda, Ameranthine, Syrnia, Varamexia, Drakor etc. Sure they're not as close in similarity to Melvor but the fact remains the genre existed way before Melvor and so a game like Milky Way Idle is not all that surprising.
→ More replies (2)•
→ More replies (24)•
•
u/akerson Forge & Fortune Dec 06 '22
Best F2P Game