By Nelson Schneider - 04/02/17 at 04:43 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! April has a lot of releases slated, especially compared to recent months of unwarranted drought. But don’t be FOOLED, as the upcoming titles for the idiots’ month aren’t looking to be particularly stellar. Maybe there will at least be something to care about…
Only one piece of shovelware this month… and it’s also a port! So let’s just move on to that bloated section of the article.
There are going to be a ton of ports and remasters release in April, mostly of stuff that didn’t really deserve a second chance in the first place: “LEGO City: Undercover” is the most shovel-ready port, but there are plenty more. “Air Conflicts: Secret Wars” and “The Silver Case” are both coming to PS4. “Valhalla Hills,” “Bulletstorm,” “Lock’s Quest,” and Indie darling “Stardew Valley” are coming to the 8th Gen PC-likes. The ‘Outlast’ series of Survival Horror zombie schlock is getting a compilation on the 8th Gen PC-likes. The 3DS is getting “Runbow,” hopefully as a last gasp before the Switch drinks its milkshake… but the Switch isn’t going to impress anyone with a remaster of “Mario Kart 8.”
April’s whopping 7 multi-platform releases are a fairly diverse lot, so there should be something for just about everyone. Fans of bland military shooters can look forward to “Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3.” Rednecks and other ATV racing fans can look forward to “ATV Renegades.” Horror fans and Adventure fans can look forward to “Little Nightmares” and “Syberia 3,” which is finally seeing the light of day after many years and many folks presuming the series to be dead. ‘Dragon Quest’ fanatics who can tolerate the foul taste of Musou can look forward to “Dragon Quest Heroes 2,” while old-school puzzle fans can get “Puyo Puyo Tetris” on either the PS4 or Switch (which is an odd mix for a multi-plat), and pathetic Rareware-loving man-children can relive the ‘glory’ days of the N64 with ‘Banjo-Kazooie’ spiritual successor, “Yooka-Laylee.”
Exclusives aren’t looking too spicy for April. Starting dismally, PC is getting “Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War 3” (there are getting to be a few too many of these, methinks), and the surely-spectacular “Tequila Zombies 3” (There have been two other ones?!). Sony’s biggest hype producer (for unknown reasons) is the cross-generational “Persona 5,” which promises to bring more of everything that was terrible about the previous ‘Persona’ games. Aside from that, the PS4 is getting some sort of card game in “ArmaGallant,” which will probably be as bad as “Eye of Judgment,” and the Vita is getting a Visual Novel entitled “Period: Cube – Shackles of Amadeus.” I really don’t want to play a VN with ‘period’ in the title. Nintendo is still in the Switch launch window, but all they have to show for it in April are a couple of meh digital games on the revamped Nintendo Network: “Mr. Shifty,” a SHMUP, and “Shakedown Hawaii,” a low-budget knock off of Ubisoft’s style of Sandbox game.
VR has one title to show for the month. Specifically, PLAYSTATION VR has one title: “Starblood Arena,” which seems to be some sort of spaceship Vehicular Combat simulator with a heavy implied PvP element.
Bleeeeeeeeehhhhhh…..~ I’m not feeling it again this month. The only thing in that jumble I’d even consider wishlisting is “Dragon Quest Heroes 2,” but I haven’t bought or played “Dragon Quest Heroes 1” yet, and I’m really not a fan of the taste of Musou, so I’m not really excited about it.
Backlog Embiggened: +1
