It was decent.

Voted good, definitely better than 2020, and at least on par with 2019. This year had some really good releases that I already mentioned in some of the GOTY threads - Nier Replicant, Scarlet Nexus, Tales of Arise, Blaster Master Zero 3, Metroid Dread, Shin Megami Tensei V, NEO: TWEWY. Some other games that I still didn't have time to play and they are sitting in backlog. Some games that were good but not as good to mention them here. Actually, I'll probably even go as far as to say that 2022 will have a hard time beating this year, something I didn't really expect considering the pandemic and the conclusion that 2021 will suffer from it.

Mediocre, too many issues with online gaming. Off-line was great though, Ratchet and Clank was a true highlight.

Yet PSN is getting more and more unstable and FS2020 has had tons of trouble with all its online services. I've never been disconnected from GT Sport as much as in the past week. FS2020 is on hold for now as live weather and azure text to voice kept having issues.

I just found out that loading times in FH4 are short and snappy, when I'm off-line.... Connect to the internet and my loading times become much longer, sometimes up to two minutes. FH5 has no traffic when connected online, go off-line and traffic appears. (FH4 has traffic will connected, yet a lot more traffic when not connected???)

Actually by far the best I played this year was Tlou2, that felt truly next-gen, but is from 2020... Astro's playroom was great as well, also 2020.

I just started Psychonauts 2, maybe that can elevate the year a bit more :)

It was amazing. Metroid Dread, Monster Hunter Rise, Hitman 3, Skyward Sword HD, Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury, Ys IX and I can't wait to play Shin Megami Tensei V. That's plenty of awesomeness.

Subpar

When it comes to Nintendo, it was alright. The beginning of the year looked like it could be amazing, but it seems we forgot we're still amidst a pandemic. My highlights are Metroid Dread, Shin Megami Tensei V and Ys IX, especially the first two.

Not too bad...good in fact.  I got something out of all three console makers this year if we are being honest. When it comes to exclusives on the new consoles, I had quite a few to catch up on with the PS5 that I just got. I got a total of six in fact that interested me (4 exclusive to gen 9) that released over the past year for it. All in all, despite not having a big holiday release, Sony has definitely delivered in the 1st party games department. I see nothing spectacular so far, but it is a solid start.

Series X has been good to me since launch. Gamepass is a godsend and where Sony lacked a huge blockbuster game for the holiday, MS delivered twice with Halo and Forza H 5...both of which are nothing short of fantastic. They had a slower start than Sony, but these two games, and knowing Starfield is right around the corner, has left me excited to see whats next. And again...gamepass has been amazing.

Switch, of course, continues to deliver for me as well. Monster Hunter Rise and Shin Megami Tensei V are both my front runners for GotY, and next year looks to be absolutely amazing as well. And there really isn't much else to say on that.

As a Nintendo player it was mediocre.
As a Playstation player it was mediocre.
So... Mediocre I guess. Thats not to say there werent games I liked, but overall the year was not as good as many before it.

Solid year. I had plenty of fun with SMTV, Metroid Dread, and Monster Hunter, in particular.

I enjoyed 2021 (...in gaming anyway...) a lot actually! But I think that's owed to my good fortune in having been able to acquire both a Series X and a PlayStation 5 (the platforms where, let's face it, most of the real excitement's been this year) and also maybe the fact that I happen to like a lot of offbeat sorts of games. Still, in the comparison of 2020 to 2021, I definitely enjoyed the former's selection of new games more overall, so maybe I'll stop short of actually calling this am "amazing" year and just say that it was good, as in above average by my standards.

"Amazing" recent years in gaming to me were like 2013, 2017, and 2020 and this year came up just short of those metrics for me. Not by much though. Last year and this year are easy direct comparisons. I can name 15 games released last year that I think are all pretty incredible. I can name...7 or 8 from this year of which I'd say the same, and another couple more that come close to that threshold for me...

2020 faves

1) The Last of Us Part II
2) Spiritfarer
3) Hades
4) Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin
5) ScourgeBringer
6) Streets of Rage 4
7) There Is No Game: Wrong Dimension
8) Mission: It's Complicated
9) The Pathless
10) They Bleed Pixels
11) Demon's Souls
12) Ghost of Tsushima
13) Astro's Playroom
14) Ori and the Will of the Wisps
15) Animal Crossing: New Horizons

2021 faves

1) It Takes Two
2) Returnal
3) Solar Ash
4) The Artful Escape
5) Psychonauts 2
6) Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart
7) Deathloop
8) Metroid Dread
9) Kena: Bridge of Spirits
10) The Medium

...but also if I had to combine these two into one list of favorite games covering both years, nothing from 2021 would make the top three and at least two would fall below Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the thing. So good year...great launches for PS5 and Series X really in my book (mostly thanks to the second half of the year)...but, at the same time, nothing that even came close to rivaling TLOU2 for my taste.

If we're counting 2021 DLC for previously released games here, then let me also mention though the new Spiritfarer content has been just wonderful! Also The Medium is starting to grow on me more actually (I just replayed it and liked it better than I remembered), so I may rank it in better in years to come.