March 27 – April 2

Section: 

The last sports game I bought was Madden 10, which I bought about a year ago for sixty-nine cents. I traded it in recently, because my time with it only served to remind me that I haven’t followed football in nearly twenty years and that I have no concept of strategy. That lack of strategic knowledge made grokking the controls virtually insurmountable.

I’ve always been more of an NFL Blitz/NBA Jam sort of guy, anyway: fast action, quick controls, and virtually no rules but to put points on the board. Fortunately V7 Entertainment has my back. Old Time Hockey takes the Arch Rivals approach to penalty keeping, which is to say there are no penalties, and applies it to hockey. You might say it’s thinking outside the (penalty) box.

Yes, I know There’s Poop in my Soup 2 is out this week. That one’s a foregone conclusion, not a pick of the week. For a real pick, I have to go with the Hanson brothers, and I don’t mean "MMMBop." So let’s put on the foil, dust off those slot cars and make that bus look mean with the cement heads of Old Time Hockey.

Chris "C" Cesarano

And just like that, Greg might have already sold me on this Old Time Hockey game. I haven't been able to jump into a hockey game since NHL Stanley Cup on the Super Nintendo. Man, just listening to that complete four-minute soundtrack brings back memories. The new EA Sports series is surprisingly deep and well-polished, but it's hardly as accessible to someone as sports-game-illiterate as I.

That's not my pick of the week, however.

I don't often get excited for fighting games these days, but something about Pocket Rumble just leaped forward and socked me a good one, right in the jaw. Having just watched kids, teenagers, and adults alike take joy in Blaster Master Zero and the Snipperclips demo while running an Extra Life booth at a convention, I'm excited to own Pocket Rumble so that I can watch others play it together at conventions. This is leaving alone that it's a portable fighter I can play with others.

Pocket Rumble is my game of the week.

Felix “Go forward bravely” Threepaper

There’s a sense of déjà vu as I scan the PS4 list … because most of the games on it came out on Steam last year. Of these, I like Wonder Boy Returns: an HD remake of an arcade stalwart. May he (or the new playable female character) take a whole new generation of players far away from the mucky muck.

The Ringed City is the final expansion for Dark Souls III, coming out about a year after the initial game. This could be the last new Souls content ever. On the flip side, the Mafia III expansion, Faster, Baby! is based on that thing I just (air quotes, eyeroll, annoying head bobble) loooove to do in GTA clones: car chases.

As for the list of next year’s PS4 games this week’s Steam releases, I’m slightly intrigued that they’ve resurrected the dead-since-2009 MMORPG Legend of Ares as a free-to-play game – not because I used to play it, just because I didn’t think MMORPGs could come back like that. Apparently you can’t use your old character, though.

I’m getting serious Jeanne D’Arc vibes from the combat system of God Wars: Future Past. That’s enough to make it my pick of the week.

Erik "wordsmythe" Hanson

The important thing is that I disagree with Greg as a thin premise to type, "I'm gonna make Gretzky's head bleed for Super Fan 99 over here."

I also feel the need to let you know that On The Road appears to have zero to do with Kerouac.

For me this week, I'm going to try and get into last week's Mass Effect: Andromeda and maybe check out the free Titanfall 2 DLC, "Colony Reborn."

This week:

PC

  • Beat Cop
  • Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King
  • Bomb Squad Academy
  • Castle Explorer
  • Chronicles of a Dark Lord: Tides of Fate Remastered
  • Dark Souls III: The Ringed City
  • Dungeon Creepster
  • Flamel's miracle
  • Gemstone Keeper
  • God and Nemesis: of Ghosts from Dragons
  • GUNNVR
  • Has-Been Heroes
  • Lament
  • Lamp Head pushed out two weeks
  • Legend of Ares
  • Light It
  • Mafia III: Faster Baby!
  • Majotori
  • Manipulated
  • Microgons
  • Miniature Garden
  • Mono
  • Mr. Donovan
  • Old Time Hockey
  • On The Road
  • Operation Abyss: New Tokyo Legacy
  • Pastry Lovers
  • Project:surviving
  • Rain World
  • Ripple
  • Scribble Ships
  • Sketch! Run!
  • Sumoman
  • Swarm Universe
  • The Eagle's Heir
  • The Sims 4: Bowling Night Stuff
  • The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series - A New Frontier Episode 3: Above the Law
  • There's Poop In My Soup: Number 2
  • Therian Saga
  • Thimbleweed Park
  • Titanfall 2 – Colony Reborn
  • WAVESHAPER

PS4

  • Anoxemia
  • APB Reloaded
  • Dark Souls III: The Ringed City
  • Dick Wilde
  • Fatal Fury: Battle Archives Volume 2 (PS2 classic)
  • Fated: The Silent Oath
  • God Wars: Future Past
  • Harvest Moon: A Wonderful Life Edition (PS2 classic)
  • Has-Been Heroes
  • Heroes of Monkey Tavern
  • Horse Racing 2016
  • Kingdom Hearts HD I.5 + II.5 Remix
  • Korix
  • Mafia III: Faster Baby!
  • MLB The Show 17
  • Nightmares from the Deep 2: The Siren's Call
  • Old Time Hockey
  • Punch Club
  • R.B.I. Baseball 17
  • Rain World
  • Skyforge
  • Skykeepers
  • Snake Pass
  • The Inner World
  • The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series - A New Frontier Episode 3: Above the Law
  • Vikings: Wolves of Midgard
  • Warhammer 40,000: Eternal Crusade
  • We Are The Dwarves
  • Wonder Boy Returns

Xbox One

  • Anoxemia
  • Dark Souls III: The Ringed City
  • Has-Been Heroes
  • Mafia III: Faster Baby!
  • Narcosis
  • Old Time Hockey
  • R.B.I. Baseball 17
  • Snake Pass
  • The Inner World
  • The Walking Dead: The Telltale Series - A New Frontier Episode 3: Above the Law
  • Thimbleweed Park
  • Vikings: Wolves of Midgard

Switch

  • Snake Pass
  • Pocket Rumble
  • Has-Been Heroes

3DS

  • Pocket Rumble
  • Has-Been Heroes

RIFT

  • Awaken
  • Constellation Distantia
  • Deep End
  • Dick Wilde
  • Don't Knock Twice
  • Enigma Sphere: Enhanced Edition
  • Guardian Arena
  • Narcosis
  • Pluto
  • Stage Presence
  • Twisted Arrow

Vive

  • A-Escape VR
  • Darwin's bots: Episode 1
  • Deep End
  • Enigma Sphere: Enhanced Edition
  • Narcosis
  • Trigger Happy Shooting
  • Twisted Arrow
  • Uplands Motel: VR Thriller

Comments

Blossom Tales: The Sleeping King

It's about time that popular 90's family sitcom 'Blossom' finally got a proper follow up.

The important thing is that I disagree with Greg as a thin premise to type, "'I'm gonna make Gretzky's head bleed for Super Fan 99 over here."

iunderstoodthatreference.gif

"Little Wayne's legs are shaking all over the place"

Wonder Boy Returns is the one I don't want to get. Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap is the one I'm looking forward to, if only because the art is way better.

Returns:

Dragon's Trap:

Art doesn't make or break a game for me, generally, but Returns is ugly.

This week marks maybe the only time a Kingdom Hearts game is coming out and I'm not getting it. I've already bought every game in that collection multiple times and I'm not doing it again!

That being said, if you're not a crazy person like me who has already bought into all of Kingdom Hearts you should get the KH collection.

And the award for Best Post-Colon Suffix in Game Naming goes to....

La La Land There's Poop In My Soup: Number 2!

My big get this week is Hacknet - Labyrinths. Absolutely love Hacknet, so this new story chapter is a no-brainer for me.

On the curiosity side, I'm anxious to see how Rain World and Thimbleweed Park are received.

I have not put a lot of time into a sports game since probably NFL 2K for the Dreamcast. I have dabbled once or twice with MLB The Show in years past.

Ken Griffey Jr. wants me to get MLB The Show 17. I'm weighing his offer.

The animation in Rain World looks amazing.

I hope the SFV server beta delivers.

Can't believe Dark Souls is coming to an end

I might check out Old Time Hockey if it you can turn off the play by play, because what I heard of it is atrocious.

"The Sims 4: Bowling Night Stuff" sounds like it was named by the most apathetic and tired marketing department of all time.

jrralls wrote:

"The Sims 4: Bowling Night Stuff" sounds like it was named by the most apathetic and tired marketing department of all time.

(Checks official webpage)

Yep. Still made by EA.

Aww, completely ignored the Vita and its Salt and Sanctuary release this week.

kazriko wrote:

Aww, completely ignored the Vita and its Salt and Sanctuary release this week.

Ok, at this point Sony is just messing with me. I checked The Drop before vetting the list, and they changed it between checking and they change it after I post.

doubtingthomas396 wrote:
jrralls wrote:

"The Sims 4: Bowling Night Stuff" sounds like it was named by the most apathetic and tired marketing department of all time.

(Checks official webpage)

Yep. Still made by EA.

Marketing Guy: What are we going to name this?
Marketing Girl: I don't care.
Marketing Guy: Come on, it's our job.
Marketing Girl: We've done, like a billion of these things.
Marketing Guy: We are being paid to come up with a name for this game. Like, that's literally our job.
Marketing Girl: *sigh* What's it about?
Marketing Guy: Bowling night stuff.
Marketing Girl: Fine, "The Sims 4: Bowling Night Stuff." Done!
Marketing Guy: Come on, no way will they let us name it that.
Marketing Girl: Like anyone is even paying attention at this point.

Pocket Rumble is my game of the week.

I'm with you! I kickstarted this one and it's great to finally see it coming out. Any attempts to bring out the best things that fighting games have to offer while trying to remove the complexity and execution barriers that usually go with them make me very happy. I haven't played much of the pre-release builds yet but it's looking promising.

gravity wrote:
Pocket Rumble is my game of the week.

I'm with you! I kickstarted this one and it's great to finally see it coming out. Any attempts to bring out the best things that fighting games have to offer while trying to remove the complexity and execution barriers that usually go with them make me very happy. I haven't played much of the pre-release builds yet but it's looking promising.

Well son, I got bad news for both of us.

Aaron D. wrote:

On the curiosity side, I'm anxious to see how Rain World and Thimbleweed Park are received.

Played Thimbleweed Park last year at PAX East and it was looking really solid then. It'll be fine, although it's not going to set any sales records.

jrralls wrote:

"The Sims 4: Bowling Night Stuff" sounds like it was named by the most apathetic and tired marketing department of all time.

To quote Lazy Game Reviews: "The Sims 4 - Two years of meh"

(Watching this franchise fall of a cliff has been incredibly depressing. RIP Maxis)

I'm surprised someone hasn't made a Sims competitor. Maybe Colossal Order is working on one to become the new Maxis.

BNice wrote:

I'm surprised someone hasn't made a Sims competitor. Maybe Colossal Order is working on one to become the new Maxis.

It's a really hard type of game to make and get right. In particular the amount of assets required for a Sims game would, I think, be difficult for an indie team to do.

Demyx wrote:
BNice wrote:

I'm surprised someone hasn't made a Sims competitor. Maybe Colossal Order is working on one to become the new Maxis.

It's a really hard type of game to make and get right. In particular the amount of assets required for a Sims game would, I think, be difficult for an indie team to do.

This.

There's also the WoW problem by which I mean you're talking about competing with an absolute sales juggernaut. So if you want to be successful and directly compete you're going to need to peel off a large number of their user base. Alternatively you wait for a moment of weakness, like Cities Skylines wasn't greenlit by Paradox until after Simcity 2013 stumbled out of the gate despite the team already having much of the necessary pieces complete due to their work on the Cities in Motion games.

That said, someone at Paradox hinted they were looking into doing a Life Sim game, but that was a couple years ago. So we'll see what happens.

ccesarano wrote:
gravity wrote:
Pocket Rumble is my game of the week.

I'm with you! I kickstarted this one and it's great to finally see it coming out. Any attempts to bring out the best things that fighting games have to offer while trying to remove the complexity and execution barriers that usually go with them make me very happy. I haven't played much of the pre-release builds yet but it's looking promising.

Well son, I got bad news for both of us.

Bummer. Well, I've waited this long and I can definitely wait a little longer.

Cool, I thought Old Time Hockey was releasing later this year on Xbone.

doubtingthomas396 wrote:
kazriko wrote:

Aww, completely ignored the Vita and its Salt and Sanctuary release this week.

Ok, at this point Sony is just messing with me. I checked The Drop before vetting the list, and they changed it between checking and they change it after I post.

Ok, I can see that happening. Lets snapshot it and see how it changes for next week.

A Rose in the Twilight PS Vita — Digital
Aaero PS4 — Digital
Cosmic Star Heroine PS4 — Digital
Crawl PS4 — Digital
Euro Fishing PS4 — Digital
Fairune PS Vita — Digital
Kero Blaster PS4 — Digital
Lichtspeer PS Vita — Digital
Rolling Bob PS4 — Digital (Out 4/13)
Sexy Brutale PS4 — Digital
Snow Moto Racing Freedom PS4 — Digital
StarBlood Arena PS VR — Digital, Retail
Stardew Valley: Collector’s Edition PS4 — Retail
Yooka-Laylee PS4 — Digital, Retail
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2017/...
Captured 4/7.

Dat PS4 list is rivaling Steam. That's crazy.