By Nelson Schneider - 02/28/15 at 04:06 PM CT
Winter is officially over, but it sure doesn’t feel like it when temperatures are still frigid and so much of the United States is still covered in a thick blanket of never-melting snow. What kind of games will Spring bring to warm us up? Probably a hot, steaming load of manure!
There is surprisingly little shovelware coming in March. There’s a new ‘LEGO Ninjago’ game hitting both handhelds (the Vita and 3DS for those not paying attention) and a new annual release for “MLB: The Show.”
There are a few more ports and remasters than there are bits of shovelware, serving only to pad out the release numbers without adding anything new. The PS3 and Xbox 360 are having two compilation bundles dropped on their moldering corpses: The “Ultimate Action Triple Pack,” which contains “Just Cause 2,” “Sleeping Dogs,” and the rebooted “Tomb Raider,” along with the “Ultimate Stealth Triple Pack,” which contains the rebooted “Thief,” “Hitman: Absolution,” and “Deus Ex: Human Revolution” (Ridiculously, all of those games already appeared on the PS3 and Xbox 360!). The PS4 and XBONE still milking remasters as much as corporately (not humanly) possible, with “Borderlands: The Handsome Collection,” “Final Fantasy Type-0 HD,” and “DmC: Definitive Edition,” proving that, once again, they are little better than expensive upscalers for 7th Gen software. Finally, Steam is getting a port of “Assassin’s Creed: Rogue.”
To be fair, the PS4 and XBONE are also getting two new, non-shovelware games that aren’t coming to every other platform under the sun: “Bladestorm: Nightmare” – a Tecmo-Koei Beat ‘em Up – and “Project CARS” – a “Gran Turismo” wannabe – which both look like the kind of no-effort, no-name crap that devs are willing to dump out at the beginning of a new hardware generation just to get discs on store shelves, even though they have little chance of receiving any critical or user-generated praise. The PS4 and XBONE are also getting a new “Resident Evil: Revelations” sequel and police brutality simulator, “Battlefield Hardline” (but then, so are all of the other platforms).
The decent number of exclusives from last month looks to be continuing into this month. Steam is giving PC gamers “Cities: Skylines” and some sort of boat-themed Indie puzzler, “Ubinota” (which, thankfully, has NOTHING to do with Ubisoft). Sony is bringing “Toukiden: Kiwami” (yet another Tecmo-Koei Beat ‘em Up) to the PS4 and Vita and “Tokyo Twilight Ghost Hunters” (some sort of anime-inspired RPG) to the PS3 and Vita. The PS4 is also getting “Bloodborne,” a spiritual successor to the intentionally-aggravating “Demon’s Souls” from From Software (much to the delight of insufferable ‘Souls’ fanboys everywhere), while the PS3 is getting yet two more loli-moe RPGs in the form of “The Awakened Fate Ultimatum” and “Atelier Shallie.” Microsoft is finally putting out a new exclusive for the XBONE and Xbox 360… but it’s family-friendly roller-coaster simulator “ScreamRide” instead of something that might appeal to their Dudebro userbase. Nintendo is also putting out a single exclusive for the WiiU… but it’s another ‘Mario Party’ game, so it can be safely ignored. The 3DS is getting three exclusives, on the other hand, two of which are published by Nintendo: New IP “Code Name: S.T.E.A.M.” (which looks mildly interesting), a new ‘Fossil Fighters’ game for dino-loving grade-schoolers, and “Harvest Moon” knock-off “Story of Seasons.”
If Square Enix brought “Final Fantasy Type-0 HD” to Steam, I would buy it. Other than that, there is nothing on the March release schedule that even makes a single hair of my eyebrows twitch with interest. More ports, more remasters, more sequels, and a few new things that look incredibly similar to old things that weren’t good. Bleh!
Backlog Embiggened: +0
Comments
Jonzor - wrote on 03/15/15 at 11:33 PM CT
I just thought since it's a cross-buy game and you're so big on 3DS-to-Wii U you'd be interested in showing Nintendo some encouragement with your wallet. Plus, they're fun games.
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/15/15 at 02:09 PM CT
No, Jonzor, digital games don't put any pressure on us. If Tipping Stars was on a disc, it would be another story, but with all of the console makers mismanaging their digital shops, it's difficult to get excited about them the way we do Steam.
Jonzor - wrote on 03/09/15 at 12:17 PM CT
Do you feel pressure to buy Mario Vs. Donkey Kong Tipping Stars (which was left out of the list) in order to promote 3DS porting to the Wii U?
Chris Kavan - wrote on 03/01/15 at 11:37 AM CT
Because they can never stick to a basic schedule - Project CARS has been pushed to the first week in April, but fear not - both PS4 and Xbox One are getting Cabela's African Adventures to make up for it (yes, those are both ports previously on the PS3 and Xbox 360).
