By Nelson Schneider - 08/01/21 at 03:35 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! Summer’s almost over. You know what that means: I’m a year older and a year curmudgeonlier, and the cute (read: nauseating) little Snowflakes of Gen-Z and later are heading back to school, where to learn Critical Race Theory and Gender Spectrum, but not math, science, or good old traditional thinking (a.k.a., philosophy) because who needs those, right?
Let’s take a look at what garbage the Games Industry is dumping on us for the next 30 days.
Out of 27 planned August releases – still an amazing turn-out for a traditional “drought” month – we’ve got 6 that I’m classifying as ‘shovel-ready,’ which isn’t all that bad. There’s a licensed tie-in for babbys in “PAW Patrol The Movie: Adventure City Calls,” another for slightly older babbys in “Madden NFL 22,” one for grognards who still think crappy ‘80s sci-fi is cool in “Aliens: Fireteam Elite,” and one for anime weeaboos in “Shadowverse: Champion’s Battle.” Two non-licensed IPs round-out the batch of doo-doo, with a super-casual Sports-themed mini-game thing, “Instant Sports Paradise,” and Amazon – a company even more divorced from the Games Industry than Microsoft was when the OG Xbox was released – pooping out a new MMORPG in an age when the genre is on life support. Oh well, maybe all those SJWs who are mad at Blizzard will quit “World of Warcraft” and start playing “New World” instead.
Unfortunately, the out-of-control port trend isn’t letting up even a little as we move into August, with a whopping 9 rehashed releases on the schedule. However, the Switch isn’t the primary culprit/victim for once, sharing nearly equal blame with Sony’s PS4/PS5 ecosystem in portage. The Switch is getting “NIS Classics Vol. 1” (and I *snort derisively* at the very idea of a NIS game being a ‘classic) and super-cute, super-chill platformer “Hoa,” while Sony is making sure the people whose Social Credit was high enough to pre-order a PlayStation 5 can also have the privilege of re-buying “Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts 2” and “Ghost of Tsushima” instead of implementing a proper backward compatibility system. Both Nintendo and Sony are getting “Zengeon” and “Star Renegades” (both Roguelikes, and therefore should be contained instead of spread), while EVERYONE is getting a remastered version of Chris’ favorite Visual Novel, “Doki Doki Literature Club,” “Harvest Moon: One World,” and another friggin’ Roguelike, “Hades.”
With all the crap and old stuff out of the way, are we actually getting any new releases in August?! Why, yes. Yes we are! Are we getting any good releases, though? That’s doubtful! There is a fairly diverse slate of genres coming up, though, with two seeming competitors in most of those represented. For casuals, there’s a mail-sorting game starring Kiwi birds and… wait a minute, did Lord GabeN come up with this while trapped in New Zealand during the pandemic? Nope, unknown developer and Sold Out Software as the publisher for “KeyWe.” Fans of interactive fiction can look forward to “Road 96” and “Greak.” People who like to watch wheels go ‘round can look forward to “RiMS Racing” and “Classic Racers Elite.” Likewise, Survival Horror fans (like Chris) can get their poopin’ pants ready for “Tormented Souls” and “In Sound Mind,” though I definitely think the title of the former is bait to trick Souls Trolls into buying something else. Our last three titles, however, have some minor potential to be interesting, though I can’t say I’ve rushed to wishlist any of them. “Foreclosed” is a kind of “Cyberpunk 2077”-lite title by a B-tier developer. “King’s Bounty 2” is the first actual sequel in the hoary and aged ‘King’s Bounty’ PC Strategy/RPG series, which was mostly spinoffs and expansions, apparently… and it’s hitting consoles for the first time! Lastly, “Rustler” claims to be a medieval Sandbox game, yet the title gives off a distinctly Wild West vibe. And didn’t we already get a medieval Sandbox game from a B-tier developer in “Kingdom Come: Deliverance”? And didn’t it suck? Yes, and yes.
A couple of exclusives managed to get pinched-off and dropped in Nintendo’s toilet this month. “Witch Spring 3” is one of those Japanese games with a subtitle like the translator passed out and landed face-first on his keyboard, and, mysteriously, “Witch Spring” and “Witch Spring 2” don’t appear to actually exist. On the other hand, “No More Heroes” and “No More Heroes 2” definitely do exist, so the release of “No More Heroes 3” as a Nintendo exclusive isn’t terribly surprising, especially with the under-utilized HD Rumble feature of the Switch Joycons.
When it comes to months like this, I’m not sure whether to be happy or sad. On one hand, there are ZERO games coming up that I’m interested in playing. On the other hand, my backlog will stay the same size for 30 days, giving me a chance to prune a handful of games out of it before adding a handful +1 to it.
Backlog Embiggened: +0
