Best games of 2022: Bayonetta 3

Bayonetta 3 takes everything that made previous Bayonetta games wonderful and turns them up to eleven in the series’ most ridiculous outing yet

GLHF

2 min read

December 28, 2022 - 1:28AM

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2023 is just around the corner, but we’re looking back at 2022 to talk about all the games that made the year what it was.

Almost everybody at GLHF has written about their own personal game of the year, and while none of us can say that any of the games picked are the best game of the year, we all stand behind our own picks as the very best game we played in 2022. Our second piece of the week comes from GLHF contributor Georgina Young, about her favourite game of 2022: Bayonetta 3.

Before 2022, it’s hard to believe that the last Bayonetta game was released in 2014. It was a Wii U exclusive, and therefore a very small portion of the general populace was able to play it. Four years later, a Switch version was launched, and the Umbra Witch was launched into the mainstream, being applauded both critically and commercially.

I had a Wii U. So, I am one of the few people that have been patiently waiting eight years for Bayonetta 3, ever since I saw the credits roll on Bayo 2. For me it was worth the wait. It wasn’t like I was short of things to play in the meantime.

Bayonetta 3 takes the tried and tested Bayonetta formula and turns it up to 11. There are even more secrets that are even harder to find, more devilish weapons and helpful demons, more playable characters, and even more difficult boss fights than ever faced before.

Bayonetta 3 turned the series’ signature action combat up to 11. Picture: Nintendo

Adding in Demon Slaves created a complexity to the combat that we didn’t see in the series’ previous games. They deal more damage, but leave you vulnerable. Balancing the best accessories for either Bayonetta or her demons is also a tough choice. There’s certainly more skill involved than in previous games, where learning certain combos feels vital to success on harder difficulty.

The main story is only around 15 hours, but by the time I reached the finale of Chapter 11, I knew I’d play it again. Aside from cleaning up all the missed secrets, I finished it on increasingly harder difficulty settings, played through all the challenge chapters, and by the time I put the console down, I was 80 hours deep.

Bayonetta’s bonkers storytelling was elevated and perfected in Bayonetta 3. Picture: Nintendo.

One of the most devilish parts of Bayonetta is always the Rodin boss fight. Many people never defeat him. He takes you down in two hits, his attacks are lighting fast, blink and he’ll catch you, and in Bayonetta 3 he’s the hardest he’s ever been. I think I adjusted my loadout more than 10 times trying to find the perfect combination, but when I finally bested him, the feeling was unrivalled.