10 Controversial Video Games You Must Play In 2022

For better or worse, building hype is the keystone of marketing strategy for any video game.

Long development cycles mean long drips of PR, teasing gamers through a game's development, releasing new teasers, trailers, demos and screenshots all in an effort to build enough anticipation for potential players to explode come launch day.

This is why it's also very easy for a game to be controversial. If it's anything less - or even just different - than players expected, then you can bet social media and message boards will be lighting up with hot takes, arguments, calls for class actions suits, and because we can't have nice things, sometimes even threats of violence. Empty threats, but still threats.

More often than out, however, with a little time for the game to improve or gamer tempers to settle, such games often turn out to be perfectly fine. Sometimes, even great. A little change isn't always a bad thing, my friends.

With that in mind, here are ten controversial video games you must play in 2022, because we all deserve a second chance.

The original Syndicate, released in 1993, was an isometric tactics and strategy game. Set in a dystopian, cyberpunk future where corporations have replaced governments, the player controlled a team of cybernetically enhanced agents performing missions ranging from warfare, assassination, extortion, corporate espionage, and more. You used the funds and corporate secrets you stole to expand your territory across the globe.

It was unique and complex.

The Syndicate we're talking about, released in 2012, was none of those things.

Syndicate (2012) is a first-person shooter telling a linear story through a typical level-by-level structure. In a drastic departure from the complex mechanics of the original, this version consists almost entirely of shooting and running forward.

However, it was developed by Starbreeze Studios, one of the best when it comes to innovating the FPS genre. The combat was fast, responsive, and satisfying. By combining acrobatic maneuvers and unique, high-tech weaponry, it felt closer to a Matrix game than any official Matrix game has so far. And, surprisingly, the game even featured an excellent four-player cooperative multiplayer mode inspired by the original game.

If you can put aside your nostalgia and treat it as something new, Syndicate (2012) is an excellent shooter, well worth your time.