April 4 - 10

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IMAGE(https://www.gamerswithjobs.com/files/pictures/pictures/picture-13445.jpg)   Felix “Jet Set” Threepaper

Welcome folks, and happy “64th Anniversary of the demolition of Ripple Rock” week!

Ripple Rock was a huge underwater mountain off the coast of British Columbia. Its peaks created eddies that caused havoc for shipping in the area. Naturally, the only solution was to blow it up. The Canadian government had been plotting its destruction since 1830, although did not find a way to make it work until 1958. The demolition was one of the first nationally-televised events on Canadian TV and the blast was the biggest non-nuclear controlled explosion ever at the time. You may all celebrate by playing a game with destructible environments.

It’s a funny old week. There’s not nothing coming out, but it’s a mix of ports, re-releases, and DLC.

Take LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. It’s a game based on all 9 of the main Star Wars movies. While some of these movies have been made into LEGO games before, that was a long time ago (2005). These have been comprehensively rebuilt, such that the gameplay and visual quality is far, far away from the simplicity of the original games. Combat has been fleshed out to include different attacks and combo meters, and now there are skill trees to spend your bricks on. Rather than each movie game having one central mission hub from which to do the missions in order, it’s now presented as a galaxy of planets for you to visit in any order.

The big hitter this week is MLB: The Show 22. It’s the first time the series comes out on the Switch. It’s also on GamePass. I’m not sure what the new features are—maybe it doesn’t feel the need to have any, given the demise of its main competitor, R.B.I. Baseball.

Orcs Must Die! 3: Tipping the Scales introduces a new desert biome with a reptilian theme. There’s new enemies, gear, and 5 new scenarios, including some favourite maps from earlier games.

Godfall: Ultimate Edition marks the first time this ARPG comes out on Xboxes. It will be on Steam, not GamePass, but will include all the updates, expansions, and skins since its original release in 2020. It will also allow players to start at level 50 and skip straight to endgame.

Outbreak: Contagious Memories says it’s a parody of horror games like Resident Evil and Silent Hill, but I can’t see where the parody is. It looks like a straight-up attempt to make one of these types of games, but marketed with a wink, acknowledging that the dialogue is cheesy in parts. Otherwise, it’s standard third-person shooting, resource scarcity and inventory management.

Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition is an HD glow up of the classic RPG from 1999. It’s a graphical upgrade, with some UI tweaks and an option to auto-battle.

Chinatown Detective Agency is a cyber-noir point’n’click adventure game. It’s got a bit of a Carmen Sandiego vibe, as your character works for Interpol, and you are trotting around the globe trying to solve cases before the time runs out. You also solve mysteries using research from the real world.

While I’m impressed with how much work has gone into improving the gameplay of LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, I’m not sure my kids will be into it, which means I won’t be either. Therefore my GOTW goes to Chinatown Detective Agency. It’s got enough descriptors that are loaded into my personal SEO when looking for smaller indie games to try.

Here's the list, now in release-date AND alphabetical order!

PC

  • 04-04

  • A Butterfly's Dream
  • Absolute Tennis Manager
  • Animal Rivals: Up In The Air
  • Caverns of Evil
  • Defensive War -SEALED GOLEM-
  • Die Die Die And Try
  • Easter Bunny
  • Escape Down
  • Fengtian Baishipu
  • Frontier Fortress
  • GAMEDOG
  • Hare Apparent
  • Knightblade
  • Kuroi Tsubasa
  • Lucky Tlhalerwa - Zombie Rampage
  • Merge Hero
  • MindSweeper
  • My Yandere is a Futanari
  • Nature's Habit
  • Nonogram Kindom
  • One Of The Victims
  • Past Synergy
  • Penelope's Odyssey
  • Picture story -kaiwa-
  • Sakura Succubus 5
  • ShapeGrid
  • Sisters_Possession1
  • Space Beastz
  • Terror Shooter Apocalypse
  • Transcendence Legacy - Voidswept
  • 04-05

  • A Ghostly Rose
  • Aoihana
  • Fanite
  • Healing Simulator
  • Hexagonal Tower
  • I HUMAN MACHINE
  • Indecent Details - Find the Difference
  • Island of the Ancients
  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
  • Letter Bender
  • No Anglerfish
  • Shadow Fate
  • Sigh of the Abyss: Shadow Bonds
  • System Purge
  • The Days After
  • The Elevator Game
  • The Night You'd Wish to Forget
  • VR AirHockey
  • Wild West Gringos
  • 04-06

  • A Siren's Call VR: Death Comes At Night
  • Aberration Analyst
  • Awesome Board
  • Beasts of Burden
  • CannonBall
  • Cygnus Racing League
  • Epic Vampire
  • Goddess Of War Essa
  • Jumphobia: Homeward Bound
  • Lenin Simulator
  • Limited Unleashed
  • Magnet Crusher
  • Mokoko X
  • Mutant Alley: Dinohazard
  • Outbreak: Contagious Memories
  • Split
  • Super Seal Slide
  • Win The Diamond
  • 04-07

  • Apocalypse: Floodgates
  • Bad Bad
  • Bird and Beast Fantasy
  • Child of Lothian
  • Chinatown Detective Agency
  • Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition
  • Circle Empires Tactics
  • Demeo: PC Edition
  • DID YOU SCARED
  • Doggo
  • Drifter's Tales
  • Godfall: Ultimate Edition
  • JANITOR BLEEDS
  • Kombinera
  • Orcs Must Die! 3: Tipping the Scales
  • Radon Break
  • Relics 2: The Crusader's Tomb
  • Screeps Arena
  • Storming Master
  • Summer With You
  • Terry Poorflyer
  • The Game of Unknown
  • The Sinking Structure, Clione, and Lost Child -Log5
  • United Assault - Battle of the Bulge
  • Waves Running Simulator
  • 04-08

  • Apocalypse, Wow!
  • Bone's Cafe
  • Cyber Pool
  • Deliverance
  • Digitizer
  • DREAMVIBE
  • Fantasia Sangua
  • Get Tanked!
  • GO, GO, Knight!
  • Hidden Farm Top-Down 3D
  • HoopsFPS
  • Hot Spring Hero
  • Irritability & Mood Swings
  • Keep It Live
  • Living Island Project
  • Local Paper Small Town
  • Lollipop Knight
  • lure
  • Max Traffic
  • Mirror Spirits
  • Monster Girls and the Mysterious Adventure 2
  • Monster Master
  • Nightfall
  • Planet Conqueror
  • Retrieving The Past Steam EDITION
  • Rolling in the Maze
  • Spearmint Goose
  • Sunshower
  • Super Turbo Racing
  • The Ducksuckers
  • The Quantum Cat
  • Where Are My Mittens
  • Woods of Death 2
  • 04-09

  • Merge Cats - Idle Game
  • 04-10

  • Comrade Quack
  • Crimson Dawn

Xbox Series X

  • 04-05

  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
  • 04-06

  • Outbreak: Contagious Memories
  • 04-07

  • Godfall: Ultimate Edition
  • Kombinera
  • Whiskey & Zombies

Xbox One

  • 04-05

  • Legal Dungeon
  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
  • Replica
  • 04-06

  • Outbreak: Contagious Memories
  • 04-07

  • Chinatown Detective Agency
  • Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition
  • Godfall: Ultimate Edition
  • Kombinera
  • Orcs Must Die! 3: Tipping the Scales
  • Slipstream
  • Whiskey & Zombies

PlayStation 5

  • 04-05

  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
  • 04-07

  • Godfall: Ultimate Edition
  • Kombinera
  • Slipstream

PlayStation 4

  • 04-05

  • Legal Dungeon
  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
  • Replica
  • 04-07

  • Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition
  • Eschatos
  • Godfall: Ultimate Edition
  • Kombinera
  • Orcs Must Die! 3: Tipping the Scales
  • Slipstream

Switch

  • 04-04

  • Dashing Dodgems
  • 04-05

  • LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga
  • MLB The Show 22
  • 04-06

  • Outbreak: Contagious Memories
  • Worm Run
  • Z-Warp
  • 04-07

  • Bibi & Tina: New adventures with horses
  • Chinatown Detective Agency
  • Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition
  • Floating Farmer
  • Happy's Humble Burger Farm
  • Kombinera
  • Mokoko X
  • Radioactive Dwarfs: Evil From the Sewers
  • Red White Yellow Zinger
  • Sherlock Holmes: The Devil's Daughter
  • Slipstream
  • Spingram
  • THE HOUSE OF THE DEAD: Remake
  • The Last Friend
  • 04-08

  • Astrodogs
  • Boreal Tenebrae
  • 04-09

  • Axolotl

Comments

Imagine how much faster sessions of Carmen Sandiego would have gone if you could have Alt-Tabbed to Wikipedia.

Looking forward to seeing Chinatown Detective Agency. It's supposed to be on GamePass at launch.

I'm paying straight cash for it on Steam. They have had me at "Pixel art cyberpunk Carmen Sandiego."

Hour and a half in and it's totally worth it.