GOTY Category 4: A.S.S. of the Year (Patreon)

Finally! It's time to talk about that A.S.S.. That's right, in a year filled with Auto-Shooting Survival games, it's bound to be hard to pick just one. But that, dear friends, is exactly what I'm calling upon you to do at this time.

Like all categories, this is open to mobile games, too, which I just want to say so that people don't forget about some of the games that saw big updates over there, like Survivor.io. Of course, Vampire Survivors saw a lot of updates in 2022, as well, and there are numerous others that are certainly worthy of your attention. Honestly, I don't like mentioning game names in these as I don't want to poison the well, but since this is a relatively new genre designation it's probably worth it for me to establish some basic guidelines.

As a reminder, dual-stick shooters where you, the player, control the actual rate of fire are _not_ A.S.S. games. Those are just dual-joystick shooters. Robotron-likes. Smash TV-esques. Geometry Wars clones. That sort of thing. Remember the old slogan that I definitely didn't just make up: If You Flick The Right Stick To Make Them Die, That Game Does Not Qualify.